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Career Planning for Writers

Branding and goal planning. Sample topics: deciding on your goals and priorities, branding issues, entrepreneurship, platform building and ownership, series vs. stand-alone stories, etc.

Blogging: Tips, Tricks, and Knowing Your Goals

Arrows pointing up with text: Blogging Tips and Tricks

As authors, we’re often told to blog, but we don’t hear as much about the nitty-gritty of how to do so. If we take the time to blog, we want to make sure our time is well spent. So let’s review some tips, tricks, and “best practices” for how to reach our goals with blogging.

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April 24, 2014

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Should We Learn to Write Series?

Connected chain links with text: Should We Write Series?

Many books recently on the bestseller lists have been part of series. From the Divergent series to the new cliffhanger and serial books, series are a popular trend. But what if we don’t naturally write series? Will we be left behind? The “lessons learned” section in my post about Beverly […]

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April 22, 2014

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Are You Living Your Dream?

Sunrays emerging from cloud with text: Are You Living Your Dream?

If we’re living our passions, life is pretty darn good, especially compared to the alternative. And if we’re not living our passions, that might be because we don’t even know what they are.

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March 6, 2014

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Is Hybrid Publishing Always the Best of Both Worlds?

Half moon with text: Hybrid Publishing: The Best of Both Worlds?

I’m going to admit right from the start that this might be a controversial post. My goal is to explore issues while not “bashing” specific groups, but we’ll have to wait and see if I succeed. We’ve often heard that having the cachet of a publisher name behind us will […]

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February 18, 2014

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All About The Money: Authors, Readers, and Ebook Prices

Checkbox form with text: Author Income & Ebook Prices

The publishing world has been abuzz with the results of the 2014 Digital Book World (DBW) and Writer’s Digest Author Survey. Headlines scream “Most authors make less than $1000 a year.”  Numbers taken out of context claim that 80% of the 9000+ respondents earn $1000 or less. Eh. Yes and […]

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January 21, 2014

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Ebooks: What We Buy vs. What We Read

Pile of books with text: What We Buy vs. What We Read

Between the rise of self-publishing and the agency pricing settlement, the industry is struggling with how to price ebooks. Before the settlement, many self-published authors enjoyed the attention they received at the low end of the pricing scale. On the other hand, many traditionally published authors bemoaned the high prices […]

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January 7, 2014

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Branding 101: Do You Have a Tagline?

Burlap canvas with an overlay of text, "imagination unlimited..."

Taglines are like the phrases on a movie poster: short, intriguing, punchy, attention-getting. In addition to taglines for our writing, we might also want one about us and our author brand.

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December 31, 2013

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The Pros and Cons of Writing Contests

Check box form for excellent to poor ranking with text: Are Writing Contests Worth It?

The other week, my friend Janice Hardy emailed me for insight into a question one of her blog readers had about writing contests. She wanted to turn the question into a blog post on the pros and cons of writing contests and thought I might have something to say about the […]

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November 14, 2013

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Handling Readers: Expectations and Disappointments

Angry bear with text: When Readers Get Angry

Most of us suffer from self-doubt in some way. Those of us doing NaNoWriMo might have reached a point in our story where events aren’t playing out as cool as they seemed in our head. Or maybe NaNo’s going great, but we’re not sure we can keep up the quality. […]

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November 12, 2013

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