WRITERS - DON'T GET SPOOKED!

 Hello from Crippled Beagle Publishing and Happy Rainy (East Tennessee) Friday,

The word spooky just came to mind. Obviously, Sunday is Halloween, so the concept is timely. On top of that, I had a conversation with a fellow creative today that rang true. As I coached her, I wished I could go back in time, find a writing and publishing mentor, and ask her to coach ME. I published my first book in 2013. Since then, I've made every marketing mistake possible. The first was NOT building an email list. There were plenty of mistakes after that, which, in many ways, makes me an expert these days! Pay attention to what I share with you, because I can save you a load of time, heartache, and money.

Writers panic. We get spooked. That is N.O.R.M.A.L. My client is a superb storyteller with a beautiful message to share. While her target audience is young and specific, the lessons have broad appeal and her book has enormous potential. She's a gifted, hard-working artist, and a GOOD writer. She simply needs to keep moving forward. And she will. She's done much harder things.

Often, writers (you know the type) have enormous goals, unclear pathways, and personal concerns. The trick is to WRITE, EDIT, PUBLISH, AND MARKET! Drop the doubts and persevere. (And ask for help when you need it.)

Often, clients and prospects ask the following questions (in bold). My answers are below each question:)

Will anyone want to read my book?

YES.

Will people thing I'm an egomaniac?

YES. WHO CARES? MAYBE NOT. WHO CARES?

Am I a decent writer?

YES! I don't work with bad writers.

How many copies can I actually sell?

As many as you like. Marketing is imperative, but you can do it on your schedule and budget.

Here's the good news. Those are big questions, but they can all be answered in time. I can help you. You can do research. Most importantly, you can ACT, WRITE, PUBLISH, BEGIN marketing, and learn on the job. DON'T GET SPOOKED and stop. KEEP WRITING and learning.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN, TOO!

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Paper or Plastic (Computer)?

 Hello creatives,

I hope the week is going well and you are finding joyful pursuits every day. Am I old, stubborn, or just low-tech? I wonder, because it feels like I'm CONSTANTLY being sent to an "app." I remember when a teaching colleague whipped out a USB thumb drive, and I thought he was about to light a cigarette on school property. I thought he had a lighter, and I was light years behind.

I'm heading to New York City tomorrow to visit my cousin Annie. She's quite the world traveler and tech-whiz, so she TEXTED me an APP to use to CHECK IN ONLINE and BUY a ticket for rail passage from Newark, New Jersey, to Penn Station in Manhattan. Geez, that plus the whole Allegiant app check-in process on my phone's tiny screen took an hour. I do believe all these convenient tools take longer than a plain old paper ticket. Right? I think I'm one of those old-fashioned ladies who needs a younger traveling companion.

Speaking of paper, I often joke that I'm a tree killer. Meh. I plant trees and water plants. I'm good. I do use a whole heck of a lot of paper, though. Sometimes, being outside or in a different room, holding a pen and not tapping a keyboard, and physically writing can be freeing! Try it. When I brainstorm and work on projects, each one has it's own stack of paper. REAL paper. When school supplies rear their neon heads at department stores in early August, I snatch up 100 or more 15 cent spiral bound notebooks. They serve me well.

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If you are weary of the screen and need a new outlook on your project, try paper and pen. Try using paper and pen OUTSIDE. Take your writing on the road. You can always type whatever you create on paper into Word. I'm all packed for New York with walking shoes, cash, a mugger whistle (my mother insisted), and, you guessed it, a notebook and pen.

Happy writing!

Jody

FOUR QUESTIONS to Help You Sell More Books

 Good morning,

As I may have told you (I talk about this a lot right now), I am designing an online course to help authors with marketing. Most cannot/will not pay for a publicist (overpriced and overpromising, anyway), and I want something that YOU can absolutely use, enjoy, and profit from! My top goal is for you to produce books that impact the world and make YOU proud of your work. My second goal is for you to make a profit. Thus, the course. It's an affordable and reasonable solution for authors who know they need to market their books but don't really know how or are overwhelmed by all the different parts and pieces.

My plan is to create a 12-week course with weekly modules that teach authors WHAT is important, WHY it's important, and a realistic amount of HOW. I am also launching a monthly membership that follows the course. Through that monthly membership, I will expand each of those modules into entire months of lessons via emails, videos, printable documents, etc. That way, in a year's time, authors have REAL FOUNDATIONS for marketing their books online and in-person. They can take their time working through the modules on weekdays and even revisit them any time they like because I'll archive everything.

The 12-week course --- Each topic will be self-contained, meaning you don't have to do everything (though I will make it easy to do everything over time!).

1. author brand kit
2. planning book releases (launches)
3. the business (financial parts and pieces) of being an author
4. list building to grow your audience
5. platform development (content delivery to build audience)
6. event planning
7. SOCIAL MEDIA (you name it)
8. website stuff
9. marketing to organizations (schools, retailers, etc.)
10. scheduling everything ever (all the parts and pieces in a calendar)
11. reviews (who, what, when, where, how, why)
12. value-added pieces to enhance book sales (stuff you can do inside your book)

The open-ended membership will include expanded teaching and the following:

• Expanded lessons for everything listed above and MORE.

• I will guide you (slowly and steadily) through weekly lessons for each module so you aren't overwhelmed and can easily fit the work into your schedule.

• 1 basic, realistic assignment every week. In other words, you'll have results!

• Pdf resources, of course, that you can print out and follow.

• 1 group Q&A Zoom meeting per month that I will record and archive/email to you. In other words, you don't have to be there to benefit.• ALL lessons will be archived so you have plenty of time to learn and implement what I teach.

• Up to 4 questions per month via email to me. I will answer via a spreadsheet to which everyone has access.

• A database (the spreadsheet) of the questions and answers. You'll be able to search for all kinds of answers. NOTHING fancy. I keep everything as simple as possible.

• Any new support materials I create (cheat sheets, social media frames, tech tips, good articles, tech tips, etc.) MORE will be added. This is the list thus far.

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QUESTIONS FOR YOU:

1. WHAT do you think is a reasonable price for the 12-week course? What would carefully and methodically going through these lessons, one by one, with my total and consistent support, be worth to you?

2. What do you think I should charge for the ongoing membership? The membership lasts indefinitely, as I will teach new content every month.

3. What do you want to learn?

4. What is the biggest struggle for you when it comes to marketing your books? Thanks for your input. I am doing this for YOU, so I want to know what YOU think and what would work for you:)

EMAIL ME AT dyer.cbpublishing@gmail.com. You can reply here but you can always email me directly. 

THANKS AGAIN and happy weekend!

xoxoxo Jody

HELLO from Crippled Beagle Publishing!

As I advise clients throughout the week, I keep a little sticky-note list so that I can share those same tips with you. I have the same conversations many times over, which tells me the information is important. Today, I offer one easy to implement/try action item for each phase of the publishing process. If you'd like cheat sheets or one-on-one tutorials for any of the tips below, email me at dyer.cbpublishing@gmail.com or call me.

PHASE 1: Writing

If you need math or science formulas/notations in your document, you can find every character you need (even pre-written formulas) in Word. Go to the Insert tab, then click Equation. Play around there to see the many helpful options.

PHASE 2: Editing

Many times a year, I find that clients are trying to "hand type" or manually enter the table of contents. Forget that! Word has an awesome tool via the References tab. First, you must create/select/modify Heading styles in the tool bar (found on the Home tab). Then, as you type in, for example, a chapter title, you can simply click one of the heading styles in the tool bar, which will automatically format the heading AND prepare it for the table of contents. Once you finish the book (yay), you can then use the References tab to create a custom table of contents. There are a few steps, but this process is EASY to learn.

PHASE 3: Publishing

NEVER think that a hybrid-published or self-published book can't hang with the big boys. There are only a handful of big, "traditional" publishing houses left in the USA. They choose authors who have enormous (profitable for them) social media followings and lists so that when they publish, the house recoups any advances. The majority of books are self/hybrid-published AND earn most of the royalties. Thank goodness we don't need a board room of strangers to approve, right? As an author, though, you should adhere to industry standards. If you publish with me, you are in good shape!

PHASE 4: Marketing

Quick tips:

Use your email signature to advertise your book(s) and brand! Under your name, include a tag line, book cover image (small), and actual link to your buying page on Amazon/other. Different email accounts have different options, of course, but typically you can go to the settings menu to craft a specific signature that will automatically land at the bottom of every email you send.

As you read books, write reviews and share them online. When you post the reviews, name yourself as an author! Toot your horn! Sign the review in some manner like this:

"[Review of book, which does NOT need to be long.]}" —Jody Dyer, author of [Book Title]

See? Easy!

Feel free to forward my emails and cheat sheets with other authors. I love meeting new writers and learning from them. As always, thank you for sharing your precious time and ideas with me. Have a wonderful week!

xoxoxo

Jody

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TO JOIN THE CRIPPLED BEAGLE PUBLISHING CLINIC, click HERE!

CRIPPLED BEAGLE PUBLISHING CLINIC is open for author business!

 KEEPING IT SIMPLE, but announcing something BIG!

I have launched the Crippled Beagle Clinic, through which I will do one-on-one author coaching in a number of areas, including writing, editing, publishing, and marketing.

Rebranding is in process, too. Take a look at my new logos:

Part of my revamp efforts include a monthly newsletter. Here's the first edition. Enjoy!

BE SURE TO JOIN IN ON THE FUN AND LEARNING!

Subscribe HERE to receive weekly emails with tips on writing, editing, publishing, and book marketing. 

If you want a .pdf copy of the newsletter or have questions about anything related to writing and publishing, email me at dyer.cbpublishing@gmail.com. Thank you for trusting me with your time and ideas.

xoxoxo

Jody Dyer, owner of Crippled Beagle Publishing and Crippled Beagle Publishing Clinic