January 17, 2009
Website as Writing Sample: Does Yours Pass?
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1) What's New at the Shared Self Publishing Experience
Keep up with traffic figures. See what kind of audience a big, do-it-yourself site can draw.
2) FEATURE ARTICLE:
When an Author's Website Becomes a "Platform"
When someone from the publishing world visits, your site becomes a writing sample and evidence of whether or not you have an audience. You wouldn't send a book proposal scrawled in crayon. Is your website the electronic equivalent?
Find out what a great website meant to one literary agent and why it may result in a book deal for one author...my wife!
3) SiteBuildIt: Online Study Where Your "Thesis" is a Brand New Website!
Don't think you could build your own site? Well, if you can write, you can build a more popular site than some web designer can! Learn from the pros.
4) Books and Niches
Meet some experts in niche marketing who have posted to the site.
5) New Pages on the Site
When you signed up for the newsletter, you were promised an update on new pages to the site. Here they are!
==============
Functionality Alerts!
==============
If any links in this newsletter don't work, it's probably because your email software cuts off the link text at a line break, then prints the rest of the link as plain text. To use one of these links, try copying the WHOLE link then pasting it into your browser.
This email was designed to be read in an email reader that reads html. If you don't have one or yours is turned off, this letter might not look great but I'm guessing you're still smart enough to make sense of what I'm saying!
==============
1) What's New at the Shared Self Publishing Experience
For publishing-related reasons that will soon become apparent, I spend a good deal of time this newsletter discussing my wife's new site, Your Personal Lap-Band Guide. ("Lap-Band" is a form of weight loss surgery.) So let's take a look at Your Personal Lap-Band Guide's traffic figures...
Only two months old, the site is already averaging 24 unique visitors per day.
- 7-8 from msn/live
- 3 from google
- 0 from yahoo (they haven't gotten the news yet!)
- 3 clicking from her other site, Your Personal Nutrition Guide
The other ten or so visits, for the most part, are from her weight loss surgery clients.
Sure, the traffic is very modest...so far. But continue on to this month's feature article to learn about the big payoff.
2) FEATURE ARTICLE
When an Author's Website Becomes a "Platform"
Brain Teaser...
You're the owner of a bar with a stage. It's Tuesday, and your regular Thursday night band just canceled. There are two bands you can book on such short notice, but neither of them has played your joint before. Both of them play the same genre of music.
- Q: How are you going to decide which one to book?
- A: You're going to go to Myspace, and you're going to book the band with more "friends." Why? Because it's THEIR audience you're hoping will fill YOUR barstools.
Welcome to 2009.
1989: Your publisher wants to find an audience for your new book
2009: Your publisher wants you to write a new book for your audience
"Um," he hesitates, when he sees the blank look on your face, "you do have an audience, don't you?"
We're currently experiencing a bit of a role reversal at our house
No, I'm not wearing a dress. But it's my wife, the dietitian, who's receiving pitches from a book agent.
I mention it because it has to do with this New (Publishing) World Order.
My wife, Suzette, has been becoming an expert in weight loss surgery (WLS). And rather than just hoarding all that knowledge in her brain, she's been posting it to the 'net.
(She began the site 2 months ago. It already has about 75 pages.)
Then, by happenstance, she heard about a NY literary agent (specializing in the nutrition and weight loss market) looking for a dietitian to author a WLS cookbook.
Suzette's a go-getter. She got right on it and called the agent.
Unfortunately, she was too late. The agent had just committed to working with another author on the project.
But the agent wasn't stupid. She knows WLS is a growing market. (No pun intended.) She wanted to know if Suzette had any other book ideas.
Well, Suzette has a TON of book ideas! They made an appointment for Suzette to pitch ideas.
So Suzette pitched, and the agent listened. The agent liked Suzette's ideas (like specialized weight and exercise journals for WLS patients), but thought they were too easily copied and ripped off for the agent to get involved.
So the agent said, "Let me talk to my partner." And that was the end of the call.
To be followed by, "We're not interested," right? Wrong. Soon Suzette received an email...
The agent wanted to pitch Suzette some ideas. The agent told Suzette she could help her get distribution for her journals. She wrote, "We think we could do something with you"! But here's the sentence that caught my eye:
[My partner] agreed...You have a great platform.
Translation: Website. A 2 month old website packed with info on a particular kind of weight loss surgery is resulting in agents pitching book projects to my dietitian wife.
Translation: We assume you have an audience.
Translation: Thank you for the 75 page writing sample. We loved it.
As I said before, "Welcome to 2009!"
Suzette is working with an agent. Developing a book proposal for publishers. All because she's taking an approach to marketing that recognizes current realities in publishing.
We've all decried the "celebrity" trend in publishing because we think it leaves us out. Well, guess what?...
It doesn't. We live in an age where you can create your own brand of segmented celebrity on the internet.
When it comes to the hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of folks who have had Lap Band weight loss surgery, Suzette is suddenly "big." (And getting bigger! Though don't ever tell a dietitian she's getting bigger.)
What the *%$#@! are you waiting for?
We've all heard the demeaning term "vanity publishing." Some of us have even heard it aimed at ourselves.
While your book doesn't deserve the label, your site probably does. It's focused on you and your work, and for that reason attracts attention almost solely from people who already know you.
Talk about vanity!
Want real attention for your book(s)? (The kind that comes from people you don't know.) Want to authenticate yourself with agents and publishers? Build a real website. And if you're asking, "Who's to say what's 'real'?..."
Suzette's site is real. See if you don't agree. (You may note that even at 75 pages it's still very much a "work in progress.")
It's meant to be used by people, hence it draws an audience. Is your site meant to be used, or is it meant solely to sell you and your books?
A useful site is more than a lure to agents. It establishes you as an expert in the field you're publishing in - and that's what gives people a reason to buy your books. Also, the traffic a useful site attracts is good for selling MORE than your books...
Suzette's site sells books by others, sells products used by WLS patients (think food scales, portion control dishes and more), puts prospective patients in touch with doctors, and results in new clients for Suzette.
(Google Tucson Dietitians. See if Suzette's name doesn't come up on each of the first three pages!)
ALL of these things put money in Suzette's pocket.
Do you think book agents and publishers would rather work with an author who has a feel for how business is conducted? I certainly believe that. Suzette's site conveys professional knowledge and business expertise.
There IS a company that shows you exactly how to build such a site aimed precisely at YOUR field using your own writing skills and knowledge. Suzette and I have used them for four sites so far.
This is how you get started. (Write me if you have any questions.) How much more time are you going to waste?
3) SiteBuildIt: Online Study Where Your "Thesis" is a Brand New Website!
I'm always trying to figure out how best to describe SiteBuildIt. What do you call something that
- hosts your site
- gives you the tools to research your niche
- shows you how to plan and structure your site for maximum traffic
- provides tools that let you write to the web without computer code
- puts you in touch with a community of others doing the exact same thing, and
- holds your hand every step of the way?
I struggle, but it's hard to sum up. (It's something you have to experience.)
But how about this?...
SBI is an online, hands-on, e-business course of study that ends with you having a fully functioning, well-trafficked website.
In fact, the SiteBuildIt method is now taught at over 25 colleges and universities (including my local U. - the University of Arizona).
You, however, can take the course at home.
It works for Suzette and me. It could work for you.
4) Books and Niches
Author Experts in Niche Marketing
There weren't a ton of posts to the site this month, but I was impressed by the range of marketing approaches I saw. Allow me to draw attention to some must-reads:
Jess Moleman writes eloquently about authoring and self publishing, which led to a heck of a fruitful discussion in his comments section. That dialogue led me to ask him to write an article about Web 2.0 marketing approaches he uses.
Very worthwhile reading, especially for those of us who weren't raised on the internet!
William P. Robertson is a teacher, but he makes grand use of his time off.
A niche marketer extraordinaire, he self publishes quite successfully in
- audiobook poetry
- Pennsylvania horror (I'm not kidding!)
- regionalized historical fiction
For lessons in thinking about your book's specific audience, you can do no better than reading what William has to say.
Enid Wilson is quite the niche marketer herself. Do you know what JAFF stands for? (Neither did I.) Jane Austen Fan Fiction. Enter a new world and read how Enid is making a splash in it.
John P. Schulz will crack you up! The author of Requiem for a Redneck (read his post) - and a longtime reader of this newsletter :-) - pays attention to what people find funny.
His fictional small-town newspaper, The Berwin Times, makes people laugh, and that's why he's thinking about how to find it a wider audience. In this month's featured website review, we had a heck of a discussion about it.
John recently bought SiteBuildIt with the goal of finding traffic for his "newspaper," and thus his book.
5) NEW PAGES ON THE SITE
When you signed up for this newsletter you were promised updates on new stories posted to The Shared Self Publishing Experience. Below you'll find the new pages added to the site since the last newsletter.
Remember to read the comments! (Because when writers write back in response to my questions, sometimes that's where the best information is.) And please post your own comments as well!
Off "Beat" Book Marketing Plan
Author/Illustrator Likes BookLocker
Novel Ideas About Self Publishing
Kim Sponaugle's Picture Kitchen Studio
Help Book Benefit From TV Buzz
How Many Pages of Content Constitute an SBI Site?
WRAPPING UP
Please remember that this newsletter is perfectly suitable for forwarding to your self published friends and acquaintances! You can also recommend to them that they sign up for the newsletter on The Shared Self Publishing Experience home page. Also remember to tell those folks they can post to the site in return for a link to their site!
This newsletter comes from
Add it to your address book so it doesn't end up in the Spam pile!
THANK YOU
Thank you for subscribing to and reading this edition of Advanced Self Publishing. If you have any comments or suggestions, I hope you'll contact me.