How to Write Blog Posts When You Are Blogging to Market a Novel

Posted in Blogging on July 23rd, 2010 by admin

by: Phyllis Zimbler Miller

source: http://www.millermosaicllc.com/blog-posts/

Publishing a non-fiction book will usually make it easy for you to write a blog dedicated to your book. The non-fiction subject of your book and related topics can provide ample blogging material.

For example, if you wrote a book on cooking low-fat diets, you could post one low-fat recipe a day along with insider tips to ensure the recipe turns out well.

Or if you wrote a book on new social media platforms, you could write each post about one new social media platform and probably never run out of new posts.

The problem of writing ongoing book blog posts really presents itself to fiction writers. If you’ve written a romance novel or a mystery novel, what are you going to write about in your blog posts?

With a little imagination (and you are a fiction writer, aren’t you?) you can come up with interesting posts for your book’s blog. Let’s look at some examples:

You write a novel that takes place in 1970 during the Vietnam War. Because the Vietnam War plays an important role in the novel, you could write posts about historical events that took place during that era or historical events that led to that era.

And you could write about the military today fighting in Iraq or Afghanistan and about military families back home. There’s no need to mention your book in every post; the overall context of the blog is about your book.

Now let’s stretch our imagination farther. You write a mystery novel about a series of medical-related murders. You could write posts about deaths that were not murders but were actual medical mysteries.

You could also write posts about new hospital procedures that are being implemented to reduce medical-related deaths. And you could write posts telling the family of hospital patients what to look for in suspected medical malpractice.

What if you’ve written a children’s picture book about family members learning to get along? Children are not going to read your blog and their parents aren’t going to read your blog aloud to their children.

You could write posts about parent-child issues; if you’re not an expert, you can quote other experts. You could review other children’s picture books on similar topics. You could write posts about children’s literacy issues.

The truth is that you can cast your imagination net far and wide for subjects on which to blog. Just remember that every few posts you should mention your book in connection with that post.

For example, if you were writing a post about children’s literacy issues, you could mention that a specific second-grader in your book could read long words but not short words and that her teacher suspected dyslexia.

Or you could quote an entire (short) scene from your novel to illustrate a point you’re making. And, yes, it’s okay that people reading your blog may not know who the characters and situation are. If you choose an appropriate scene, most readers will be able to understand the context of the excerpt.

Fiction authors should be as active as non-fiction authors in the use of blogs to market books. Give your blog readers interesting and well-written posts, and they will read your blog and hopefully buy your book. – P.Z.M.

Phyllis Zimbler Miller is a National Internet Business Examiner at http://www.InternetBizBlogger.com as well as a book author, and her power marketing company http://www.MillerMosaicLLC.com combines traditional marketing principles and Internet marketing strategies to put power in your hands.

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Book Writing – 5 Reasons You Should Plan While Writing a Non Fiction Book by Glen Ford

Posted in Book Writing on May 28th, 2010 by admin

source: http://bookpublishingnews.blogspot.com/2010/05/book-writing-5-reaso…

Good project management says that planning before you start a writing project is a good thing. And many writing systems say you need to plan your writing before you do it. But people seldom come out and tell you straight up why.

So here are five reasons you should plan while writing a non fiction book:

1. Provide focus for your book. If you start off just writing a non fiction book you could end up with just about anything. Your book could go off into a side discussion. You could end up repeating information three or four times from different viewpoints. You could end up with a whole different book than what you started from. While a fiction writer can live with this (but shouldn’t) since the story lives only in the writer’s head, a non fiction writer can’t. After all, a non fiction writer’s subject is well known by many people. And they will know where the book should go. Even if the writer didn’t.

2. Narrow down the options. There are a lot of options when writing a non fiction book. Even just in the physical form of the book. You need to limit those options or the tasks of designing and writing a book will become overwhelming. Besides, if you don’t plan you may find out that your book is outside the parameters your chosen distribution method can accept. Finding out your wonderful tome is too long for a publisher is not a good thing!

3. Ensure there is a market for your book. A book without a reader is a lonely, pitiful object without purpose or value. By determining your market before you begin, and then writing to meet that market’s needs, you will ensure that more than just your mother will read your book.

4. Keep your readers coming back for more. Getting an agent, editor and publisher interested is a good thing. But keeping a reader reading until the end is even better. That’s what will ensure your agent, editor and publisher talk to you again. The only way to keep a reader interested to the end with a non fiction book is to write what interests the reader from the start. You have to solve their problems or help them avoid a pain point. That’s the only way to guarantee your reader’s interest.

5. Identify alternatives to this book. Look, you’ve done all the research. You’ve spent a lot of time, effort and maybe money up to this point. You’ve identified your perfect reader. Maybe you’ve even written your book. And sold it. Wouldn’t it make sense to get as much out of this expense as you can? By planning up front, you’ll be able to identify where you can write a second book. One that doesn’t rehash the same information. Or you can identify where you can present a course. One that will help sell copies of your book. By identifying alternatives to this book, both up front and as you go, you’ll be prepared when opportunities knocks.

Do you want to learn how to write a book in 24 hours? Take my brand new free course here: http://www.learningcreators.com/

Do you want to read more free information like this? Go to my blog: http://www.learningcreators.com/blog/

Glen Ford is an accomplished consultant, trainer and writer. He has far too many years experience as a trainer and facilitator to willingly admit.

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