Key Business Partners, LLC

Before I begin the Tweets-acular, here is a tidbit I would like to share–

I just don’t know how to get started?

Writers—have you ever said this to yourself or someone else? Well, here are a few tips to help you get started writing.

~Keep a folder of articles, quotes or stories of subjects you feel passionate about
~Develop a “mock” up book with “chapters” and then place your thoughts and ideas you write down within the related “chapter
~Create a vision board about what you see for your book

Remember, taking the first step maybe known as the hardest but it also feels the proudest.

Now…here is the Tweets-acular for Writers & Authors: Books, Publishing and Marketing:

1) @sherikayehoff retweeted @warrenwhitlock post titled Numbers an Author should Know. —>all I have to say is….GREAT information to know for writers and authors…may change your mind on where you may wish to be networking.

2) @jonathanfields tweeted about a post by @the99percent titled What Daily Meditation Can do for your Creativity.–>Nice article filled with solid tips! When I take the time to be present and focus on my breathing for a few minutes, I come back to my work and writing, with more clarity allowing me to get more things done.

3) @thecreativepenn tweeted about a post by @rachellegardner titled How to Title Your Book. –>here is what she states,”Think of it this way: the better your title is, the better your chance that the publisher will decide to use it, rather than changing it.” She does offer a great process to help with narrowing down the possibilities for your book.

4) @life_enthusiast tweeted about a post via @wendyybailey titled 9 elements to help your copy connect with your ideal learners. –>here are a few tips: a) have a very thought out headline to capture your readers b)add a P.S. to make the copy cohesive c) and here is one I hadn’t though of…add captions under the pictures to reiterate points related to your ideal reader

5) @jolindsell tweeted about her article her Heluim titled Good Sources for Book Reviews.–>On her list, she adds Book Wire (which offers author statistics and video clips of book releases) and Building Rainbows (which offers book reviews by the reading public).

I hope you have enjoyed this edition of Tweets-Acular for Writers and Authors. I hope you will visit these blogs and share your thoughts with me and the other bloggers.

And as always…keep writing!

Here we go with the Tweets-Acular list:

@writersrelief tweeted about post entitled Query Letter 101. Some great and simple advice– 1)don’t use any “fancy” tricks to grab the agent’s attention like bright purple highlighters or crazy fonts. 2) the query letter is your one shot to prove your books’ worth 3) keep current on industry standards for writing query letters 4) be sure to read the guidelines and follow them specifically

@tips4writers tweeted about a post by Mark Pennington entitled Top 40 Grammar Gaffes. A few tips Mark shares within the post are 1) Keep modifiers close to the words they are describing to avoid dangling modifiers. 2) An infinitive has a to + the base form of a verb. Placing a word between the to and the base form of the verb can create confusion. If tempted to split the infinitive, brainstorm for better verbs. 3) (and one of my peeves as well) Don’t use no double negatives….oops..hehehe. I mean…It is always bad to use double negatives.

@thecreativepenn tweeted about a post written via @selfpublishingreview entitled Do Writers Use Twitter?Now, this blog post was interesting because there was a conversation about how twitter has helped writers. Some say they don’t feel Twitter has helped them in their writing but it has helped build relationships. I would just like to add here — isn’t that what is the basis of writing, building solid relationships? How does a writer receive readers? By allowing the readers to get to know them as the author of their work. Just my .02 cents.

**An added treat to the above blog post was a link to a post by @helengallagher
>>See, this is the magic and wonderment of Twitter. I found Helen’s blog because I am connected to @thecreativepenn on Twitter. I may not have found Helen’s site otherwise and I would not be able to share this…>>

A social networking site for writers called Author Advance

@michaelhyatt tweeted about @chipmacgregor blog post titled What is a Brand? He summaries it as “what a reader has in his or her mind when they walk into a bookstore and see your book”. This is a great post with tons of information for writers. I recommend it! There was one thing Chip mentions at the end of the post. He said, ” But even a wonderfully inventive brand won’t support a lousy product, which is why I always say the success of a writer always comes back, eventually, to the quality of the craft.” —>yes it does.

@rachellegardner tweeted about author @jodyhedlund and her blog. It was interesting to go on there today because she wrote a post How important is an author’s brand?. And here take on it is very appealing as well. She met with some marketing experts on the subject and the summarized it this way…in their many years of working with authors, what they’ve experienced is that the author’s name becomes their brand and that usually doesn’t happen until after at least 2 to 3 books are published.–>
And that is because people need to get to know you and once they know you for the quality of the work and your subject that your audience wants to read, you will have a following, those creating a brand with your name.

I do hope you enjoyed this week’s Fab Five Friday (with a few extras) as there is some really good content out there for writers, authors, entrepreneurs and business owners.

Have a great weekend!

Here is a list of 10 sites and blog posts I favored over the past couple of months on Twitter. I wanted to share them with my fellow writers and authors:

1) Blog post by Lisa Brunel (original article posted Ezine articles) at Publishing Guru.com to discuss how to write conflict in Children books.

2) @straynotes twittered about My Writing Nook, a new Google app for iPhone for writers. You can now write anywhere with having the other things writers crave such as a dictionary and thesaurus.

3) @DebraMars posted a tweet about a Q &A about what a MFA is…Master of Fine Arts and how it can help a writer. This post was via @writersdigest written by Brian A. Klems. One thing he mentions is the access to resources you gain by having a MFA, some you may not be able to receive without.

4)@alexisgrant retweeted @mariaschneider 5 Questions to Ask before you Write for Free To me, the big point Maria makes here is that “making a name for yourself online is a whole different game than the print world I came from”. She goes onto mention that one single post on a high profile blog can bring in thousands of new readers to your writing.

5) @Stephenbright posted a tweet about his friend Cindy’s new site called, Write Live. It is a new interactive way for writers to share your writing and passions.

6) @inkyelbows (always shares great tweets!) shared a tweet about how video can help promote your upcoming book event. You need to see this cute short video!

7)@onlinewriters tweeted about their organization for Online Writers. A social networking site for, you guessed it, online writers. Even though it is fairly new, it is a place for online writers to come together and support each other.

8)@aswinn – Author Allison Scotch Winn wrote a blog post about Should you accept a low advance? . The one point I liked that she made was, Be proud of yourself because you got an offer. Some writers go for years and years without ANY offer. Also, know what your expectations are as a writer/author. This will help when the offers do come in.

9)@elizabethscraig chimes in about an editor who weighs in on what “well-written” means at Mysterious Matters. The editor writes about these elements:
a) properly spelled, grammatically correct, punctuation in the right place.
b) Good variety in sentence and paragraph structure
c) Simple and effective descriptions
d) sentences that stop you cold (this is a blog for mystery writers/authors)
e) good dialogue in the right places
f) a sense of control
g) an awareness of novel as story
h) a sense that the author is someone I would like to meet

10) @cherylrainfield retweeted @publishingspy tweet about how to avoid illegitimate literary agents. Be sure to ask for credentials when working with people.

Here are my picks for Fab Five Friday this week:

First, let me start out with a link from a link. Joan Stewart, the Publicity Hound, posted a link to The Daily ‘Dog article about how to submit material to the editors at The Family Circle magazine. Great insight and information. The one I really enjoyed was sticking to one form of communication. For instance, if you choose to email a query, don’t then call the editor asking if they have received your email. If you want to follow up, you follow up by email.

Next, I found a new organization online for writers and editors called the National Association of Independent Writers and Editors. You can join and receive some benefits such as:
You can receive your own NAIWE based website to showcase your work.
Get listed in the “find a writer/find an editor” database.
Receive legal information and responses on a individual basis for industry specific questions.
Discount on technical support services for one of your most valuable assets, your computer.
Opportunity to network with fellow NAIWE members.

And there are more benefits for only $149 per year to join.

Another interesting post came from Twitter from ASBPE (American Socity of Business Publication Editors) where Matt Bolch wrote an article titled, “Levering your Freelance Stuff”. I enjoyed this article because it started off by discussing the importance of establishing relationships between editors and freelancers. He gives some advice on how to get more out of a freelancer (not about money, but more concise work) and how to encourage a freelancer.

Then I would like to introduce you to a fellow twitterer I am now following, @10 Minute Writer (aka Katharine Grubb) who wrote a post called Canoeing Down the Illinois River: A Tribute. Katharine talks about how canoeing allowed her to enjoy a childhood memory and write about it (her passion). This then inspired me to write about how her story reminded me of a childhood memory and thus I wrote about it too.

I would like to end by sharing with you some work from one of my online friends, Sheila Finkelstein. Sheila is a wonderful person who is a gifted writer, photographer and artist.

Thank you for visiting my blog and sharing with me these websites and blogs. I hope you have a great weekend!

This week the list is focusing alot on not being afraid to write and how just taking the time to write will help you grow as a writer.

I will start off with Julie Roads of Writing Roads with her tweet about Copyblogger’s post on How to Get Copywriters to Mentor you for Free. I will say at first when I started reading his first paragragh about if you want mentoring to learn do write with great prose but you don’t have the money….”get into their heads”. However, knowing Copyblogger is one of the most predominant sites on copywriting and blogging, I figured there was more to this bit of a sentence and I kept reading.
And I received some great pointers:
1) Read and learn. Be the shadow of those who write well and take notes of the words they use. Of course not word for word, but study how they choose the words and how they structure words.
2) Take the time to physically write these lessons down. By taking the deliberate action of writing these lessons down, you can retain the value much better. 3) Growth will occur by writing down and studying how others write because it challenges your memory muscle.

And Dave offers a challenge in this post to writers—-check it out!

Then I noticed this tweet by Cathy Bryant on writing character emotion on April 10th. Now, when I clicked on the link to this post, I was taken to the most current post of today, which was an interview with Cheryl Wyatt. I was thinking this was the post for the writing character emotion so I started reading it…great interview and Cathy asks some great questions about writing. Then I went to the post about writing character emotions on April 10th and it is another great post where she creates a discussion around the emotion of anger and shares her answers with you.

Through my google reader, I found this post by Rebecca Benston of Benston Blogs about The Best Advice I ever GotRebecca discusses how in the book, The Right to Write, is explains sometimes just by putting your emotions or experiences in written form helps with your writing. At least you are doing the physical task of writing something and not stopping yourself by listening to your inner voice say, “why are you writing that down, no one cares about how you got angry at the guy who cut in front of you at the grocery store.” For me, I wrote down when I took my daughter to the doctor and what she was doing while we were waiting. It helped me think about describing things using my senses at the time–what I saw, heard, smelled felt.

Next, just found this one on Twitter—from @travellinda. A forum for women writers called SheWrites. A newly created ning group for women writers to gather and support each other.

Take a few moments (well it will probably take you about 45min to an hour) to read these posts below that I found this week via Twitter, Facebook and or Google Alerts.

This first post was done by the Publication Coach Daphne Gray-Grant and it is about 5 copywriting tips from Shakesphere. Great article and then I also noticed she had a new book, 8 1/2 steps to writing Faster, Better …well, it was a great surprise to see you can purchase your newest book, 8 1/2 steps to writing Faster, Better along with some wonderful extra bonus gifts and you get it ALL for only $49!

Next, is at Pro Writing Tips a book review done by John Roach at Pro Writing Tips of Karen Reddick’s Grammer Done Right.

Now, here is an “oldie” (from April 2008) but a goodie for writers—what NOT to do when pitching a story to Mashable. For those who may not know, Mashable is one of the highest blogged, rss feed, twittered social media sites on the internet. So if you are a writer and wish to write for them–be sure to read this!

Last and fabulously last….one of the best lists I have seen for the publishing, writing, reading industry on the web. tweeted by Book Gal Penny S.

Oooo-one more. Just found this one. Great post as a reminder regarding networking for writers and authors at conferences and conventions. JA Konrath, author of several books and short stories wrote a post called Con Etiquette.

Here is a guest post from a very good friend of mine, Heidi Richards-Mooney and she has a wonderful offering to spark up your marketing efforts – Quirky Marketing Calander.
Well, I wanted to add one “non-traditional holiday” you may not be aware of…
Did you know that February is Library Lover’s Month? When is the last time as an author or writer you have checked out to see the programs happening at your local library. Today, I went to the library to return some books and found out about a local charity I can contact regarding an event that is coming up to raise money for their organization. Also, every month, the local writer’s group, Florida Writer’s Association holds free meetings.
Also, as an author if you would like to do a book reading to help promote your book, most library’s will be delighted to have you on the schedule.

Did you know that today (February 6th) is Bubble Gum Day?
Bubble gum was invented in 1906 by Frank Fleer. But it didn’t get to market for 20 years because the recipe was so sticky it was a real challenge to remove it from skin (had to use turpentine). After 20 years and several recipes later, it was introduced as Dubble Bubble Gum. Pink just happened to be the color of the gum because it was the only food coloring on Fleer’s shelf that day. Since then every other manufacture has used pink as the standard. What standards in business are you following and what can you do to improve upon them. Did you know you cannot buy bubble gum at any Disney property? They don’t sell it because they don’t want their streets lined with discarded gum.

Or that January 17th is Kid Inventor’s Day – January 17th was chosen as Kid Inventors Day because it is the birth anniversary of Benjamin Franklin, who invented the first swim flippers almost 300 years ago at age 12! Chester Greenwood A grammar school dropout, invented earmuffs at the age of 15 and accumulated over 100 patents in his lifetime. Need a new product or service to offer your clients? Why not ask a kid (or several) to come up with a solution. You could host a contest or a Day for kid inventors. Get the local community to donate prizes to the finalists and winners. Be sure to check out Kid Inventors Day online for a list of activities, etc. for kids.

And August is National Inventor’s Month? If you are an inventor, think about some of the creative ways you can market your new product. How could you get noticed by the media, by your community and most importantly by your target market? How about Tryvertising your new product? According to TrendWatching.com, Tryvertising is, ” a new breed of product placement in the real world, integrating your goods and services into daily life in a relevant way, so that consumers can make up their minds based on their experience, not your messages.” Hotels, bars and restaurants make good use of Tryvertising their products to build a customer base and instill loyalty in their marketplace.
So what does this mean to inventors? It means there are several “quirky and non-traditional holidays” you can tap into to promote your own invention.
In fact, because you are an inventor, quirky might just be right up your alley.

If it is then I want to tell you about my brand new book that just came out TODAY! It is called Quirky Marketing ~ 365 Ways to Promote Your Business Using Zany and Non-Traditional Holidays. (www.quirkyoffer.com)

The above “holidays are just 3 of the 365 ways you can promote your business!

And that’s not all!

In addition to 365 Ideas to promote your business, inside the 2009 Edition of Quirky Marketing Calendar, we show you how to use the calendar, how to work with the media, give you monthly action plan templates, a blank monthly calendar and more. At the end of each chapter is a comprehensive listing of additional holidays you can explore and use to promote your business. And an expanded resource section.

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If you don’t find at least 3 other events or holidays you can use to promote your inventions, I will give you your money back – and you can keep the book! But you have to hurry before the bonuses are all gone.

Go to www.QuirkyOffer.com and read about all the fabulous bonuses and grab your copy today!

To your success … and then some,

Heidi

Heidi Richards Mooney, Author, Entrepreneur, Business Coach