Well, I went ahead and created a little website just for Spunk, a Fable, called, (what else?) Spunky. (Look at…

If you haven’t impregnated a Kardashian, toppled Wall Street, or starred in your own syndicated un-reality show, you may not have an instant platform for promoting your newly minted book. Let’s face it, for most first-time authors—and even for many of the multiply published among us—the first…

It's official: I'm self-publishing. The Vesuvius Isotope will be published by my brand new sole proprietorship, Murder Lab Press, and the publishers who have shown interest in the manuscript have been notified. Since I have just gone through the trials of tribulations…

(Me at my favorite place, an over-water house Bora-Bora, 1999. From the MyDestination.com article.)

Promotion is part of the writer's equation. And I'm just not good at it... never have been. Yes, I was a shy kid, but that can't be an excuse to get out of letting the world know…

Niche Over Numbers

by Karen Dodd

If you are a newly or soon-to-be published fiction author, chances are you are feeling overwhelmed by the what, why and how of building your author’s platform.

Let’s start with the…

I hope I have convinced you in part 1 of this series that a logo is an invaluable addition to your marketing repertoire.  In this post, I explain how to use that logo to create a button…

Your logo is your brand.  It is literally the picture of you.  When readers see a link to your website, they may or may not recognize - between the "http://www" and the "dot whatever" - that it is YOUR website.  But when they see your logo, there will be no doubt in their minds.  A picture is…

Last night I attended a cocktail party (an event designed to raise the profile of the charity I chair, Girls Write Now, with women in publishing), and fell into conversation with one of my favorite leaders, innovators and prognosticators in the publishing…

A few weeks ago, a post entitled, "Where do your marketing dollars go?" spontaneously combusted into a brainstorming session for how we can all promote and market our own work.  Because I SO love bullet…

I've spent the last few days working on a marketing plan for my latest book, Walking Woman: Step-by-Step to a Healthier Heart. It's been hard, picky work. Each author has his or her idea of marketing and these ideas have to fit the market and the genre. Since my book is a health guide, the first step of my marketing plan was to identify health organizations that…

Book Blog Tours are a relatively new phenomenon and, while you can organize your own, it can be difficult without the proper connections and, with the cost of some of these tours, really not worth it. These companies promote their tours through a range of online media and, frankly, do all the work for you so you can focus on other things, like preparing your guest blog posts.  Though a service, a tour can be put together frequently with less notice than on your own and with far less…

For those of you who were intimidated by the thought of marketing yourself on YouTube, here’s a video tool for you.Vine, Twitter’s new social media video app, allows you to make short videos on your computer or mobile device and easily upload them to your Vine, Twitter, and Facebook accounts. The catch? The videos are limited to…

As an author, you'll probably hear a lot about email marketing. Like social media, it's seen as one of the essential marketing tools for promoting your current books, your future works, and building your personal brand and author platform.

In fact, email marketing is arguably more…

Today I'd like to welcome guest blogger Dane Golden of Hey.com, who is here to talk about how writers can use YouTube to build their author platforms.…

I recently wrote the following piece for Shelf Pleasure, a new destination spot for women who love reading. Shelf Pleasure was founded by two former New York editors and marketers. I hope you'll take a look and support this new site. They do take submissions!

• How Books Find Me, by Kristen Havens…

by Sherrie Wilkolaski

A marketing tool all authors need to utilize to market and promote their books is the author interview.  It’s quite simple to create and the investment of 30 minutes or less will go a long way to produce a tool that can be used time and again, both on and offline.  If you’re interested in treating yourself to one of the most valuable…

I blog regularly in support of my book which I published almost a year ago.  The thing is, I'm not sure how effective the blog is in encouraging readers to invest in my book.  I enjoy blogging for the most part and it certainly keeps my writing skills sharp.  But some days, I feel like I'm talking to myself.  For all of you bloggers, what has been your experience in blogging vs. book sales off of your website? I would love to hear from you.  I could use a little encouragement about now...…