Writing Tip: Prioritizing a Task #MFRWauthor #amwriting @kayelleallen

How to Prioritize a Task 

Writers deal with shifting priorities all the time. If we have children, we put their needs before just about anything else. A spouse often comes before our needs. We face deadlines with books, with blog posts, with friends' expectations... you name it. There are always things tugging at us. Asking us to decide which is more important.

How do we decide? By putting them into a chart like the one shown here. There are four quadrants: Important, Not Important, Urgent, Not Urgent.

Important implies something that must be done, but perhaps not this moment. Urgent means it's something that must be done now. Not important means it can wait until a better time. Perhaps nothing bad will happen if we don't do it at all, or at least the consequence is something we can live with. Not urgent means it should be done, but can be put off.

What's the difference? An urgent task has a looming deadline or one that has passed. It can have a significant impact on your life. Important tasks don't have a deadline, but they have an impact anyway. Urgency is associated with time and impact. Importance is associated more with impact.

So how do you decide what to do first? Consider whether the task at hand has a deadline. Must it be done right now? Paying the light bill by a certain date to keep the lights on is an urgent task. Changing a burned out light bulb might be important if it means you can't see to pay the light bill.

Think of the Urgent and Important tasks as putting out fires. They are extremely important. Things could get worse if they are not handled now.

Important but Not Urgent tasks are things we do to be proactive. We can do them at a pace that allows us to spend "quality time" on them, without rushing. But they must be done.

Urgent but Not Important tasks are things we have to do right now (answering the phone) but that you might be able to shuffle a bit.

Not Urgent and Not Important tasks are things we do that don't add to our goals, such as shopping, playing a game, even some driving. These are more "time wasters" than productive items.

Tarthian Empire
Companion

Plug a few tasks into this chart and see how they fall. If they are not urgent and not important, they can wait. The urgent and important can not. Determine where your tasks fall in this chart and you will be well on your way to prioritizing your next task.

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Kayelle Allen is the founder of Marketing for Romance Writers. She is a multi-published, award-winning author, and the owner of The Author's Secret, an author support company. Her unstoppable heroes and heroines include contemporary characters, futuristic immortals, covert agents, and warriors who purr.

Homeworld http://kayelleallen.com

Unstoppable Heroes Blog http://kayelleallen.com/blog

Twitter http://twitter.com/kayelleallen

Facebook http://facebook.com/kayelleallen.author

The Author's Secret https://theauthorssecret.com

The Business of Writing for #MFRWauthors #amwriting

I’ve said several times that when it comes to marketing I feel like a toddler trying to teach a baby how to walk. That was why I joined MFRW, I wanted to learn how to market myself better. Oh I know the basics. I have a facebook page, a twitter account, a pinterest account, a blog my and website. I try to promote myself when I have a new release by visiting blogs and doing chats. I try to get reviews on my books. But I don’t know it all.

My forte is writing. I’ve been at it for years. I was a president for two of RWA’s chapters, the newsletter editor for the same two chapters plus I was the editor for the WRW’s magazine (it was a short lived magazine but it was beautiful). I’ve done programs and workshops on writing. I worked with critique groups. Now, I’m a senior editor for a small press. I still don’t know everything but as an editor I have seen things that let me know some writers could use a little help.

So that is what I’m going to post for the MFRW. Writing tips, editing tips, and formatting tips. Here’s one of my favorites...

** TODAY'S TIP **

I was attending a panel on editing and a new writer asked, “How many times should I edit my book?”
One of the authors on the panel paused for just a moment and then said, “Until you’re so sick of it you want to throw it against the wall.”

There is no set in stone amount of times. It depends on your manuscript. Do you feel it shines like a diamond? As you read through are there still parts that snag at you? Make you wonder if there is more you need to add? Only you can be the judge of that.

Let's Talk About It.

How would you have answered that new writer's question? How many times should you edit a book?

Barb :)

Barb will be posting a monthly blog feature "The Business of Writing".

Hey #MFRWauthors! BLOG TITLES That Drive Traffic!

Explore more infographics like this one on the web’s largest information design community – Visually.

MFRW Monthly Quote - July 2014 #MFRWauthor

"An artist must have downtime, time to do nothing. Defending our right to such time takes courage, conviction, and resiliency. Such time, space, and quiet will strike our family as a withdrawal from them. It is…. An artist requires the upkeep of creative solitude. An artist requires the time of healing alone. Without this period of recharging, our artist becomes depleted."
-Juila Cameron



Emerald
Emerald is an erotic fiction author whose short stories have been featured in anthologies published by Cleis Press, Mischief, and Logical-Lust. She serves as an assistant newsletter editor and Facebook group moderator for Marketing for Romance Writers (MFRW), and she selects and posts the monthly inspirational quote on the MFRW Marketing Blog. Find out more about her at her website, The Green Light District.

Hey #MFRWauthors! Just LINK IT!

Let's talk about LINKING. My rule of thumb is when in doubt, just LINK IT! What am I talking about? Really, everything. All of your social networking accounts, blog, website, tumblr - literally everything - should be linked.  Because then you are doing the work once while your impact is huge. It's that easy.

Are there accounts you shouldn't link? Nope but there may be some more geared towards different types of posts. It's still okay to link them because there is always overlap and as long as you aren't spamming out oodles and oodles of promo, your goal should be to extend your reach (and sell more books).

Now time to get to work!

First and foremost, have your blog connected into your social media sites, particularly facebook and twitter. This means each time a post goes up on your blog, it automatically goes to these programs for you. Here's promo without anymore work than setting up your single post. You can set up these links in the SETTINGS account of your blog. Blogger allows you to link with Google+ also and I recommend you do it even if you do nothing else with Google+ (yet).

Link your blog to Networked Blogs on facebook. You can search for the app on facebook and select SYNDICATE to connect your blog. Here is another way for potential readers to find your blog and follow you. It is becoming more and more popular so jump on it! Doing this also means your blog posts are automatically sent out via facebook. If you have an author's page, you can even choose to have them sent there instead of your profile.

Other TOP TWO places to link your blog (that have a bit more to it than just linking):

Triberr - Build your reach exponentially. See my previous post with specifics on this site. This is a bit more involved than just linking though completely worth it.

Goodreads - Thousands of readers use this site. If you don't create an author's page and utilize it by linking, you are missing a big opportunity for networking regardless of the horror stories we see with reviews on goodreads. Check in about twice a week to see if you have any messages, reviews, etc. Most importantly, link your blog to post to your author page! See mine here.

Another place to link your blog is in search engines that give potential readers more places to find you. Most have widgets for you to add to your blog but some just simply place you into a database to be more searchable. My favorites are: BlogNation - BlogTrain - Blog Lovin' - Writing Blogs - Linky - AuthorsDb. Be sure to set up all your links in each of these - most require your blog rss feed so have that handy - so each time you post in one place, your information spreads out across the web.

Finally, make a list of all social networking sites you belong to or any on-line accounts.

Here are some of the most common: facebook - twitter - google+ - Pinterest - LinkedIn - tumblr - stumbleupon - YouTube - Picasa. Go into the SETTINGS options in each of these and be sure you have linked as many of them together (and with your blog!) as possible. There are other sites you might choose to use and regardless of which ones you choose, just be sure to link them.

Remember every time you link it, you reduce your work in half while doubling your reach.

I don't suggest you spend hours a day on these sites.

In fact, linking your accounts means your time spent on marketing decreases even though you are visible in more places. Once these accounts are established (& LINKED!!), you will need to do little more than your regular blog posts. A few of these places I mentioned take extra maintenance but it's minimal and worth it.

How does this help your business?

You will advertise to a wider audience as you increase your reach. You will write more because your time spent marketing will decrease. It's a simple case of Win-Win.

So, what are you waiting for? Just Link It!

And Keep Writing!

Paloma

Paloma Beck is a Romance Author living a life of contradiction... she's a happily married carpooling mom writing erotic romance. It's almost naughty! Paloma writes full-time and has three series in the works with others on the fringes. Her books span both the contemporary and paranormal romance genres.

Paloma serves as MFRW's Blog Director.

Newbie World: Multiple Pen Names for #MFRWauthors

The Question is... 
Multiple Pen Names: Good idea, or not?

As writers, we know how important names are. We meticulously research our characters’ names, bandying

about ideas for each with the care given to newborns. And for those of us just starting out in the romance industry, this includes one of our biggest decisions: choosing our own name. We want it to sound romantic, but not porn-star, despite what my husband might think. And we also want it to represent our genre. Someone who writes historicals will probably lean towards something different than someone who writes BDSM stories.

There are many reasons to choose a pen name: our job requires us to protect our real identities, we don’t want our neighbors to know what we write, or even just to keep a distance between the interwebs and our “real” selves. But I’m assuming if you’re reading this, you might have already gotten past the first pen name issue, and now are tackling an even bigger one: do I need a separate pen name when writing in a different genre?

Like any good question, the answer is a little gray.

First, here are some reasons we might choose (or have the decision chosen for us by an agent or publisher):

· Our first books didn’t sell very well, and we (or the publisher) want to distance ourselves from that. A re-branding, if you will.

· Or, we are writing more books than our current publisher can publish/market (oh, what a nice problem to have), so some authors choose to go with a different pen name and avoid the contract issues by going to another publisher with a different series or book.

· We’re writing something that is very different from our “normal” genre – something that our fans might not be expecting. Even in staying within romance, if you’ve previously written sweet historicals and are now branching into grittier, racier, contemporaries, your fans might not be expecting it. This seems to be especially true if switching to a totally different genre.

· From Kim Harrison: big book retailers have a habit of purchasing only the same number of books that an author sold on their last release. If it was a bad release, then the store will only by that many books of the next release, but if it's an unknown author, the stores will buy more in the hope that it will be a blockbuster. So you write under a different name, and get a better shot at selling through your books.

Great. We know why, but now, how?

Like with our first pen names, here are the rules:

· Keep it easy. No hyphens, no strange pronunciations – you want it to be something that your readers can easily look up. Should be easy to spell.

· Keep it memorable. Jane Brown is probably not going to stick for someone. But I love the way, for instance, Kresley Cole rolls off the tongue. (Though I would say “Kresely” probably breaks rule #1. As in writing, know the rules and then break ‘em.)

· Keep it unique. It’s pretty easy now to do a Google search on names and see the number of hits generated. Don’t expect that a reader will use “author” when searching for you; you want to be one of the very few that comes up when someone searches for your pen name.

Here’s the thing that needs to be emphasized, though...

Each of these names needs to be managed. Think website, Facebook, Twitter, etc. And while not every one of these needs to be an entirely separate account, you will have to have virtual real estate built up around each name; at the very least, a website.

You’ll want to think long and hard about your time management and how much effort it will take to keep up various other online personalities, Sybil. My other caution here is that readers read not just for genre, but also for voice. What I’ve seen on many reader forums while researching this topic is frustration from readers for a perceived lack of intelligence. They are fully aware that an author can write across multiple genres, and get frustrated when they can’t find a backlist because of a pen name. So I would just say here that if you do choose an additional pen name, make sure it is abundantly clear in your books’ bio so that readers are able to easily track you down.

Talk To Us.
As with everything, it’s a very personal decision. Let us know what you think – have you chosen a second (or third) pen name? What are the pluses and minuses?

ADDITIONAL REFERENCE LINKS:
http://www.writing-world.com/business/pen.shtml
http://jamigold.com/2011/06/branding-101-to-pen-name-or-not-to-pen-name/
http://www.justaboutwrite.com/A_Archive_What'sInAName.html

Posted by Erin

Erin writes paranormal romances as Erin Moore and contributes to the MFRW Marketing Blog with her monthly column, A Newbie's World. Her latest book is a sexy minotaur shifter story set in Crete.

She manages two monsters and one unruly husband in Atlanta in between writing and main-lining chocolate and tea. Look her up on www.AuthorErinMoore.com or, of course, on Twitter: @AuthorErinMoore.

Authors Making a Difference on Twitter #MFRWauthor @MFRW_ORG @AuthorNicMorgan

MFRW on Twitter 

On the first of July this year, author Nicole Morgan became the Twitter Coordinator for Marketing for Romance Writers. Please join us in thanking Nicole for her service to MFRW and to its members.

What does a Twitter Coordinator do? Here's the job description from the group files.

Twitter Coordinator

Like all staff positions in MFRW, the Twitter Coordinator and assistant are an unpaid positions. Either looks great, however, on a writing resume. The Coordinator needs a solid understanding of how Twitter works, and should be an experienced user. This position is a highly visible aspect of Marketing for Romance Writers.

Main duties (same for both positions):

Sign in as the owner of the MFRW Twitter account.
Share tweets requested on the MFRW street team.
Follow MFRW members.
Send tweets for the MFRW blogs.
Assist Pinterest Coordinator with sending tweets if needed.
Use lists on Twitter to make it easier for members to find and follow each other.
Launch and run a program to get MFRW members to follow the MFRW Twitter account.
Communicate with staff via email in the separate MFRW Staff Yahoo group.

Other duties:

Attend staff meetings with other members of the MFRW staff (approx every four weeks) using Google Hangouts or other software as decided by the staff.
Time involved: one hour per week, slightly more for attending staff meetings. Total time invested is up to the individual.

Ownership:

The MFRW Twitter account is registered under the MFRW Admin Email.

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As you can see, there's plenty to do, and Nicole needs help. We're looking for an assistant who can do pretty much the same thing. Having help means Nicole gets to take time off, attend conferences, meeting writing and editing deadlines, and so on. If you're interested, please apply by emailing mfrwstaff-ownerATyahoogroupsDOTcom.

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We've seen an increase in followers, and we are busy sending out messages for our members. The MFRW Pinterest account also shares tweets. When our members' books are posted on our Pinterest boards, we tweet about it. You can learn more about MFRW and its benefits here.

We urge you to follow our Twitter account, and also the account of our coordinator. You can find us here:

MFRW_ORG http://twitter.com/MFRW_ORG

Nicole Morgan https://twitter.com/AuthorNicMorgan

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Other MFRW Social Media

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/groups/mfrwauthors/

Pinterest http://www.pinterest.com/mfrworg/

Goodreads http://is.gd/mfrwgoodreads

LinkedIn https://linkedin.com/company/marketing-for-romance-writers-organization/

Marketing for Romance Writers http://marketingforromancewriters.org/

Marketing for Romance Writers Yahoo http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MarketingForRomanceWriters/

WHO THAT? #MFRWAuthor

Semi Rant Warning.

It seems I've posted endlessly about the misuse of Who, Which, That. I've certainly raged enough internally when I hear the words misused, which is all too frequently. Most of the time people look at me as though I've lost my sense of humor. No big deal, they might say. It's not as if the words aren't interchangeable.

Sigh.

Use which for things and who for people. Use that for things and, informally, for people.
Make it simple: Who is for people. That and Which are for things. The 'informally' seems to have crept into use fairly recently since the last time I checked the rule was very clear. The same as using 'laconic' to describe facial expressions, and now I doubt many people know the definition of laconic. I didn't when I first read it, and had to look it up. Looked it up again when a well known author used it to describe a lifted eyebrow.

Sigh.

Yeah, I sigh a lot. But then I read a gem, such as this by Doranna Durgin from her Sentinel Shifter book  Tiger Bound

Emphasis mine "She looked down at him, this man WHO had come for her, and at the monstrously huge creature THAT accompanied him—"

How perfect is that? The man is WHO the creature is THAT. And for those writers of Urban Fantasy with shifters, what better way to convey how they feel about their animals selves? If the POV character thinks of other shifters as WHO when they are in their alternate form, the writer is SHOWING the character is comfortable with their 'other' self. But if they use THAT, we would know they're really not happy about the 'monster' living under their skin.

Simple?

And as far as using THAT as an extra word in a sentence, you might want to rethink. In the preceding paragraph I originally wrote: "...the writer is SHOWING that the character is comfortable with their 'other' self." Upon rereading, I removed 'that' as an extraneous word, slowing down the narrative. Sometimes 'that' is the perfect word but far too much of the time it's makes our writing cumbersome.

Think about it, especially if you write characters who are 'more than.'

What are your grammar gremlins? Let's grab a cup of coffee and rant on.

Mona Karel is the writing alter ego of Monica Stoner who lives at 6500 feet and has been known to growl when hearing the English language abused.

Moderating the #MFRWorg Facebook Group—Keeping Track of Group Posts #MFRWauthor

As of this writing, the MFRW Facebook group is at 3,918 members. While I thought I might perhaps be announcing the 4,000 milestone marker with this post, it appears that will have to wait until next month. :) I won't be surprised if we hit it by sometime around the middle of next week. The group’s growth is still going strong!

For this post, I thought I’d mention a feature I discovered relatively recently that some group members and especially moderators may find useful. If you aim to keep up with the posts to a group, Facebook has a feature that makes it a bit easier. Each new time you visit the group page, Facebook indicates the point at which the posts on the page are ones you’ve already seen. It does this with a label that says “OLDER POSTS” in the left margin. The label is a bit subtle, written in shaded gray and in a somewhat small font size. Once you know to look for it, however, it can help you keep track of which posts you’ve seen and which you haven’t.

For me, for example, it’s a very helpful feature in moderating the content posted to the group. Before I learned of this feature, I used to haphazardly visit the group multiple times throughout the day and vaguely memorize when I had last been there so I could tell when I had scrolled down far enough that the posts were ones I’d already seen. Now, I click on the group listing from my home page feed and scroll down until I see the “OLDER POSTS” heading (often I’ll just do a Control/Command + F search with the word “older” to locate it quickly). Then I simply check the new posts by scrolling up the page until I get to the top.

For moderators, this makes keeping track of checking the group page content much easier. And if you’re a group member, this feature lends a hand if you want to be sure you don’t miss any posts. :) Do note that whenever someone comments on a post, that post automatically moves to the top of the group page, so if you see posts you’ve already seen amidst the new ones before you get to the “OLDER POSTS” label, that just means a new comment(s) has been left on it.

To learn what the “OLDER POSTS” heading looks like, you can go to any group of which you are a member (the MFRW one, for example :) ). At the top of the page beneath a pinned post if there is one, you should see a shaded gray heading that says, “RECENT POSTS.” This means that the posts that follow that are ones that are new since your last visit to the group, and the font and appearance of the “RECENT POSTS” heading are exactly like the “OLDER POSTS” one. If you scroll down far enough, you’ll eventually see the “OLDER POSTS” heading, indicating that all the posts below that are ones that were already posted the last time you visited the group.

Incidentally, if you haven’t been by in a while, you may want to go check out the MFRW Facebook group—holiday weekend sales and giveaways abound! For those who are celebrating U.S. Independence Day, I wish you a safe and beautiful holiday weekend. And for those who aren’t, I wish you a beautiful weekend as well, and you may want to come by and take advantage of the sales and giveaways of those who are! ;)

Thanks for reading, and until next month!


Emerald
Emerald is an erotic fiction author whose short stories have been featured in anthologies published by Cleis Press, Mischief, and Logical-Lust. She serves as an assistant newsletter editor and Facebook group moderator for Marketing for Romance Writers (MFRW), and she selects and posts the monthly inspirational quote on the MFRW Marketing Blog. Find out more about her at her website, The Green Light District.

Author-to-Author Tip: SAID IS DEAD @MSKosciuszko

"Said" is Dead

I recently saw a Facebook post that claimed “said is dead.” It went on to list all the other “better” options to use, along with the emotion that correlates to each word.

I do agree that sometimes yelled, demanded, or murmured are the best words for the job, showing how the dialogue is being said, especially if it’s difficult to show the emotion through the particular dialogue. However, most of the time, “said” is exactly what I want.

Said is dead, huh? Of course it is. That’s the whole point!

Readers barely even notice it. It serves its purpose of clarifying the speaker and then shuts up and stands in the corner like it’s supposed to. Dialogue tags remind the reader of the author’s presence, so when you have to use a tag, why not use the one that’s almost invisible?

Originally posted on Katya Armock's blog.

Author-to-Author Tip from Author M.S. Kaye

M.S. Kaye has several published books under her black belt. A transplant from Ohio, she resides with her husband, Corey, in Jacksonville, Florida, where she tries not to melt in the sun. Find suspense and the unusual at www.BooksByMSK.com.

Website  |  Facebook  |  Twitter  |  Goodreads  |  Pinterest  |  Google+

M.S. Kaye most recently released Kindling the Past, a romantic suspense, with Liquid Silver Books.

         

Kindle is fighting to survive on her own, to break free from her possessive and violent ex-

boyfriend, not to let her best friend Anna know she’s in love with her husband. Most of all, she fights the visions she sees of the past—she doesn’t believe in that kind of stuff.

Then Anna is shot and killed.

In their grief, Kindle and Ty, Anna’s husband and Kindle’s Taekwondo instructor, grow closer. Although Kindle is careful never to let him too close, he helps her learn to accept her visions are real. Eventually, the truth about Anna’s death breaks through into Kindle’s visions, and she must find a way not to let it destroy her.

BUY LINKS

Liquid Silver  |  Amazon  |  iTunes

What do all those MFRW hashtags mean? #MFRWauthor #MFRWorg #MFRWave

MFRW is Marketing for Romance Writers 

MFRW stands for Marketing for Romance Writers. The group motto is "seek, teach, share, learn, succeed." MFRW is a peer-oriented mentoring group open to the entire literary community. Ask your marketing-related questions, or request help, advice, or opinions. You can learn how to create a professional image and use it effectively, as well as ask for opportunities to join other authors in promotional efforts. You can learn the business aspects of writing.

News about pitch sessions and calls for submission are posted on the Yahoo group. As a member, you can attend exclusive, member-only pitch events with publishers. Members can attend free, online workshops and seminars.

MFRW promotes for its members on most social media. You can get your book cover pinned on one of the MFRW Pinterest boards, and show off your cover models, even if you don't have a Pinterest account yourself. You can get interviewed on BlogTalkRadio. Link your blog to a community hop via a unique software "ribbon" with exciting themes, and draw readers to your site. There are many other opportunities as well. All writers and genres are welcome. We break all promotional opportunities into four main categories, to better reach the right audiences for our members' books. The categories* are: Mainstream, Erotic, Young Adult, and GLBT.

MFRW Costs

Services and membership are free. There are limited costs for a few unique items (blog hops, advertising opportunities) that range from 50 cents to about $3. If you have questions about marketing your books, join us.

Peer Mentoring and Calls for Submission

You are welcome to post your questions on the Yahoo group. Another member will answer. Because we are peer-mentored, you will benefit from many viewpoints. Many publishers are members of the Yahoo group, and we allow calls for submission. Although we do monitor these calls, and attempt to ensure all are legitimate, we do not endorse any publishers. We sponsor an annual pitch event exclusively for members. We average about twenty publishers who take part. Visit our website for more information. http://marketingforromancewriters.org

Twitter and Hashtags

The hashtags #MFRWorg #MFRWauthor #MFRWave help you promote. Here's what each stands for:
#MFRWorg - anything to do with the organization. A catchall for anything and everything, and used when you need to save space with a longer tweet.

#MFRWauthor - Having to do with one of our authors. We often use it to identify ourselves to one another online.

#MFRWave - this refers to our ribbon - or "wave" type hops. The software is unique. Click the following link and you will see it in action. A hop is ending as of 6/22/14, but the ribbon will be visible for a few more days. http://is.gd/mfrwave
FYI -- the hashtag #MFRW by itself stands for Maryland Federal Republican Women. It is not associated with Marketing for Romance Writers.

MFRW History

MFRW was founded in 2006 by author Kayelle Allen for a few friends. Members now number in the thousands. Kayelle heads the group to this day, guiding its direction and overseeing the numerous volunteer staff members that help it run.

Newsletter Editor-in-Chief Rochelle Weber

Assistant Editor Emerald

Assistant Editor Barbara Donlon Bradley

Blog Director Paloma Beck

Bloghop Coordinator Mona Karel

Where to find MFRW online

Yahoo group (core site) http://is.gd/mfrwgroup
Twitter: http://twitter.com/MFRW_ORG

Facebook Author group http://is.gd/mfrwfb
MFRW Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/mfrworg

Pinterest http://is.gd/mfrw_pin

MFRW on G+ http://is.gd/mfrw_gplus

MFRW Newsletters

Newsletter http://issuu.com/mfrw

Ezine http://paper.li/kayelleallen/1340913374

MFRW Blogs

Author Blog: http://mfrw-authors.blogspot.com/

Marketing Blog: http://mfrw.blogspot.com/

MFRW Blog Hops

MFRW Bloghoppers Author Workspace https://www.facebook.com/groups/mfrwbloghoppers/

*Authors alone determine where their books fit, with the caveat that for Young Adult blog hops only, we check to ensure the site is at or below a PG13 rating. Otherwise, the author determines heat level (erotic vs mainstream).

Membership is open to anyone in the literary community, and is free. Why not join us? Begin with the core group, found here. Yahoo group (core site) https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/MarketingForRomanceWriters/info
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edited 02/15/15 to update links

#MFRWorg Monthly Quote - June 2014

"From the age of six to fourteen I took violin lessons but had no luck with my teachers, for whom music did not transcend mechanical practicing. I really began to learn only after I had fallen in love with Mozart’s sonatas. The attempt to reproduce their singular grace compelled me to improve my technique. I believe, on the whole, that love is a better teacher than sense of duty."
-Albert Einstein



Emerald
Emerald is an erotic fiction author whose short stories have been featured in anthologies published by Cleis Press, Mischief, and Logical-Lust. She serves as an assistant newsletter editor and Facebook group moderator for Marketing for Romance Writers (MFRW), and she selects and posts the monthly inspirational quote on the MFRW Marketing Blog. Find out more about her at her website, The Green Light District.

Creating Solid Blog Content. #MFRWorg Talks Memes.

Blog Content can be a challenge for authors. It's important to post with some regularity but coming up with new ideas for your posts can pose a challenge. Why not participate in a blog meme? It gives you a weekly blog feature with the benefit of a group of people interested in the mutual success of your blogs.

Blog Memes
Memes are weekly blog features posted across multiple blogs centered on a common theme. A blogger can choose weekly to participate so if you need a break, you take a week off. One of the most recognized memes was Six Sentence Sunday. The organizers discontinued it - it grew huge - but several off-shoots have now taken root in the blogging community. There is power behind a group and memes are driven by the group.


Sexy Snippets
In Sexy Snippets, participants select seven sentences from a WIP or published manuscript. This gives you the chance to feature a piece of your work, along with a short book promo weekly. See a sample of my Sexy Snippets. This meme operates out of a facebook group. You can sign up weekly at the Nuthouse Scribbler's website. The heat level in this meme runs across the board from sweet to spicy. As a participant, you are encouraged to read and comment on as many others as possible.












Tantalizing Tuesdays
Participants select a photo of their choice and write an original 200-word story to post every Tuesday. It's an awesome way to keep your writing sharp because telling a story in 200-words is not always as easy as it sounds. See a sample of my Tantalizing Tuesday post. This meme operates out of a facebook group where you can sign up weekly and also has a website. Erotic Authors will be most comfortable with this group. A special note about this group is that as a participant, you're expected to read and comment on the other stories - they extend you the same courtesy. Hey, it's guaranteed blog traffic!

Thursday 13

This meme is not exclusive to authors. But it's easy and can be fun if you get creative. Participants simply post a list of any 13 things. You include your link on the group's website and others will pop around from blog to blog reading the lists. Here's a sample of one of my more creative Thursday 13 posts. I've hosted other authors as guests for this feature. I've also posted 13 sentences from one of my books, listed 13 character names, quotes, super heroes, chick flicks, romantic places, etc, etc... the list is endless and can always be used in a way to promo your writing. MFRW uses this feature on our Author's blog!

Sneak Peek Sunday

This meme is fun and promoted on the MFRW Yahoo group. It also allows authors to post the longest excerpt. Participants post 6 paragraphs (no more, no less) from either a WIP or a published work. It's every Sunday, open to both unpublished and published authors. Just sign up at their website and include the link code in your post so readers can hop around from blog to blog.

Book Hooks

This is MFRW's own weekly meme. MFRW authors are invited to participate by signing up on our blog each week. It's a chance to hook readers on your current WIP or any previously published book. Then you include the link code in your post and readers will have the chance to jump from one author to another. FIND MORE DETAILS HERE.

So... Do You Meme? Share other memes you like.

Paloma

Paloma Beck is a Romance Author living a life of contradiction... she's a happily married carpooling mom writing erotic romance. It's almost naughty! Paloma writes full-time and has three series in the works with others on the fringes. Her books span both the contemporary and paranormal romance genres.

Paloma serves as MFRW's Blog Director.

#MFRWorg Newbie's World: Why Authors Need Facebook @AuthorErinMoore

Facebook: Why we need it, even if it drives us crazy.

Facebook. It’s awesome for our personal lives, letting us share pictures with others, keep up with our schools and communities, find people with common interests, stalk our ex-boyfriends…oh, wait.

But as an author, it can sometimes be a little daunting and confusing. For starters, what type of page should we choose? And then, once we have it, how do we go about liking other pages – some pages wants us to switch back to our “personal” page before we can like them, and I am not entirely sure I want everyone to know when I’ve liked something like “Sex With Romance.”  And once we’ve figured that out, how do we get those cool little tabbies for our blogs and other stuff on there?

And yet, it’s worth it to figure it out. Most of our readers are on Facebook, and Facebook also brings in new readers; a lot of inbound traffic to Amazon and other ebook sites comes directly from Facebook. So we need to be on there, and we need to be on there in a professional manner.

As some of you already know, I’m a big fan of “do as I say, not as I do” on this blog. So some of the advice below will be recommendations from knowledgeable sources that I may or may not have already implemented myself (just in case anyone is checking my Facebook page –which, if you do, make sure to like it).

Ahem. Now, first things first: What type of page should you have?  Well, really, as an author, there is really only one for your author self.  I will put gold stars there in case you are in doubt.  And you will need to start from your personal profile in order to do this – don’t create a whole new page (with a separate email address) from the initial FB log-in page.  Main reason: you can’t usually like another page as your author page, otherwise. 

Types of pages:

Local Business or Place

Company, Organization, or Institution

Brand or Product

Artist, Band, or Public Figure

Entertainment

Cause or Community

Adding a page for individual books:

If you are already sort of big time, you may want to consider adding pages for each of your books. The downside to this is that you may split your audience – people may miss updates if you post to the book, or miss them if you post only to your author page. However, if the book does blow up (in a good way), someone may make that page for you, and you don’t necessarily want to cede that control.  Food for thought.

Now, onto the fun (read: complicated) stuff.

Yes, you can like other authors’ pages. You may have to go to their page and then click on the down-arrow near the like button. Then there should be a line that says “like as my page.” That’s it! But it seems that most authors have gotten with the program – if it’s set up as an author page, then you should be able to like it with the “like” button. 

Help with Facebook Tabbies (aka apps, aka sort of a pain);

So, most of us would like our blogs to be linked to Facebook. The best way is to use an app – you know, those cute little buttons. There are a few different apps to use for blogs: RSS Graffiti, Networked Blogs (though this will now direct you to their spin-off, Symphony), and Social RSS. 

They all work essentially the same way. They are going to ask you for a lot of permissions from Facebook (you can’t escape The Man), and then import your blog (or blogs) to the pages you direct. I used Symphony and found it pretty self-explanatory. And then I got this awesome new tab called “blog” on my page.  It will also post updates to my FB newsfeed any time I post on my blog.  

What else do you need as an app? You can also load in Goodreads, Pinterest, or Youtube videos – entirely up to you.  Goodreads is an easy one – you can do it from Goodreads, and then it magically loads the app onto FB.

For Pinterest, it’s a a little bit trickier. If you use the link here, then only follow steps through #7 – looks like Facebook has had a few changes since 2012 (ya’ think?) and it loads up a little “Pinterest” link fairly nicely with only the first seven.

YouTube: There is either Woobox (which I used for my Pinterest tab, very helpful) or YoutubeApp. Again, make sure to accept all permissions and then edit later.

All in all, Facebook for businesses is not necessarily a walk in the park, but with a little bit of help, it can (and should) be done. Happy Facebooking! Let me know what you think – what do you see on others’ pages and wish you had on yours? What has worked well for you?

-Erin

Just in case you want more to read:

http://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/blog/so-facebook

http://socialmediatoday.com/tara-urso/2281751/your-facebook-pages-organic-reach-about-plummet

https://blog.kissmetrics.com/new-facebook-pages/

http://weblogs.about.com/od/socialnetworking/ht/AddBlogFacebook.htm

New Format for MFRW Newsletter

Big changes are coming to the Newsletter in July. They're laid out clearly in the June issue, but here is a brief summary along with the new submissions form and a mock-up of the new format so you can see how the new featured author pages, book pages and advertising pages will look. Here is the link to the files:

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/MarketingForRomanceWriters/files/MFRW-Newsletter-Forms/

Sorry I couldn't do this as a Bitly link, but for some reason it wouldn't open in a third tab.

Also, with all the new work we'll be doing, we need to expand our staff. My current assistant editors will format the book pages and I will handle the Featured Author, advertising, and final layout, but now I need at least three more proofers, possibly more since the newsletter will likely be more than 100 pages. If you'd like to become a member of the newsletter staff, please contact me at:

mfrwstaff-owner@yahoogroups.com

I think that's about it. Be sure to read the June Newsletter and check out the mock-up and ad-rate breakdown in the files. Grab the new submissions form if you had a book come out in May, June or if you have one coming out in July and your publisher has a "Coming Soon" page with pre-order links to your books. If you have no buy-links, you may want to wait until August to submit your July releases. Each book runs for three months.