What experiences will you carry forward for this New Year?

As Will Rodgers said,“Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.” Get Focused, Get a Plan, Get Going … it can be YOUR amazing year.
 1  HOT News …  the Broncos playoff game is on Sunday, the 20th … not the day of the Winter BookCamp as some were worried about. Sign up NOW—you can’t afford to miss this full day to set the stage, to tweak what you are currently doing, to add amazing new ideas and strategies—it’s the 6 Must Haves for You and Your Book for 2013.     
Attend Author U’s January Winter BookCamp on January 19th. We are excited to kick off the year with a DEEP dive BookCamp that will look at the 6 MUST HAVES to building your authoring and book success … the result is that your business will soar. The date is January 19th and the Early Bird pricing ENDS on next Saturday, the 12th. Here’s the link for that: http://authoru.org/ai1ec_event/january-bookcamp?instance_id=114   

What experiences will you carry forward for this New Year?

1           HOT News … the Broncos playoff game is on Sunday, the 20^th … not the day of the Winter BookCamp as some were worried about. Sign up NOW—you can’t afford to miss this full day to set the stage, to tweak what you are currently doing, to add amazing new ideas and strategies—it’s the 6 Must Haves for You and Your Book for 2013.  

Saturday, January 19^th (there is no Dinner and a Program this month). Info on the website at http://www.authoru.org

Cost: Members $119 early bird through 1/7, Non-Members $159 early bird
AuthorU Members Early Bird – $119
AuthorU Non-Members Early Bird – $159

Today is National Go Caroling Day … perfect for this time of the year.
 1    Book awards are in the book mix again. USA Book News offers paid up Author U members a $10 discount when entering book awards contest. Here’s the link to get yours: http://usabooknews.com/authoru.html 

2    Hurry and reserve your seat! Early Bird ends December 27^th. Learn the 6 Must-Focus-On Areas to Build Readership, Increase Book Sales and Gain Exposure as an Author for 2013! Here’s what we are covering in a jam-packed day: 

1. Social Media: What social networks to be on, what to say, how to get more likes and shares, website integration and more!
2. Branding and Message: What to brand, how most mess it up, what to consider, plus an exercise to gain brand and message clarity

Have you ever been around someone; read something; or seen something … and you want to get in a shower or a hot bath and soak the slime off?

That’s exactly how I feel when I read about the gobbling up that involves the granddaddy of all Vanity Presses—Author Solutions as the mother ship to Booktango, Inkubook, iUniverse, Trafford, Xlibris, Wordclay, AuthorHive, Pallbrio and Hollywood Pitch. Did you know that Author Solutions and its various companies derive over two-thirds of its income from selling services and books to authors … not to the readers of authors’ books?

The kingpin of vanity presses (as Smashwords’ founder Mark Coker states in his blog that Author Solutions makes more money from selling services to authors than selling authors’ books, “Author Solutions is one of the companies that put the ‘V’ in vanity. Author Solutions earns two-thirds or more of their income selling services and books to authors, not selling authors’ books to readers …”

Book Award Announcement Season is here  What do you do when you win a book award? The savvy author tells others about it. Don’t count on your publisher to do it if you are published by someone other than your own company.

It’s time for you to start bragging … and formally announce you and your books kudos to the world.

Get your computer open and:

1. Create the publicity to now support your book and drive up book sales. Write a media release that includes who awarded you, in what topic area. Make sure you include your book title (I’ve actually seen this forgotten), you as the author, publisher and where the book is available. For example, I live in Colorado—the top book store in Denver is the Tattered Cover—include that the book is available (and make sure it is). If you have a judge’s comment and appropriate, include it.

Who would have thought … two giants in publishing are doing the merger waltz? —this times it’s Penguin and Random House. The negotiations are on for what the surviving and new publishing company will look like including who will be exiting the building. The new company, to be called Penguin Random House, will boast $4 billion in revenue and control about 25 percent of the worldwide consumer book market.

There will be obvious changes: to save money … to make money. When two companies, any company that has a similarity such as Penguin and Random House, Noah’s Ark doesn’t work. Picture this: Between the two, there are over 9,000 employees across the globe. Some, maybe plenty, are going to go—it’s the Noah’s Ark factor. Expect to see imprints disappear; with them, editors will get the pink slip. The multiple duplicate accounts—the warehousing, distribution, accounting, technology and operations in general … all will most likely come under a single operation when it’s over.

Hold the salt, are you dangerous or daring in the kitchen — it’s National Cook Something Bold Day … what can you stir up?

Here’s your Top Ten Tweets for the past week —

Tweets are faster than a speeding bird … below are Author U’s Top Ten Tweets from the past week that you may have missed …
 

Success & Resources

7 Distraction-Free Writing Environments for Authors http://t.co/whCuVclJ

Ten ways to save the publishing industry-like the sixth one! http://t.co/ikN5mCv9

Writing Smarts

The No. 1 Tip of Successful Writers – http://t.co/VLnKv7Sa

Social Media and Marketing Strategies

11 Things Not To Do Before Your Book Launch http://t.co/8bYyrQwz

Johnny Depp to launch book imprint at HarperCollins. Do you appreciate his literary taste? http://t.co/denHjcHP

10 ways to syndicate online writing. Have you tried any of them? http://t.co/RsFT9hMh

It’s National Adoption Awareness month … and today is All Saints Day … are they connected? Sounds like a lot of love and caring …

Here’s your Top Ten Tweets for the past week—

Tweets are faster than a speeding bird … below are Author U’s Top Ten Tweets from the past week that you may have missed …

Success & Resources

One of the top 5 mistakes fiction authors make: rushing to publish. http://ow.ly/ehW2j

Calling all authors—there is an agent for you and your book if you look and seek assistance to get published. http://ow.ly/ehVMp

Writing Smarts

Today is Nat’l Writing Month—start your masterpiece! http://ow.ly/ehYsv

10 Rules for Writers in writing ficiton by bestselling authors. http://ow.ly/ehYB3

Social Media and Marketing Strategies

Authors-are you using photos in your blog? Here’s top mistakes commonly made from @publicityhound: http://ow.ly/ehVw0

When someone asks you—anyone—what’s the Vision for your Book, and for you the Author, what do you say? Do you stammer and stutter? Do you feel like you project the “deer in the highlight” gaze? Or are you direct and succinct?

For the visionary founder of Virgin, Richard Branson, he’s been an entrepreneur from the get-go. Virgin was seeded when he was 20 years old—since then; he’s created an empire that includes eight separate billion-dollar companies in eight different industries. He’s birthed a new book, Like a Virgin: Secrets They Won’t Teach You at Business School and it is both a good read and incredibly insightful. And yes, he did it all without earning a degree in business. As he writes,

                        “Had I pursued my education long enough to learn all the conventional dos and don’ts of starting a business,
I often wonder how different my life and career might have been.”

Fall kicks off the Book Award submission season. Will the author be honored for his or her words and book? Or will the Book Boot be felt? The question every author needs to ask is, “Did I do the best job in writing, in presenting, in connecting with my crowd—the people who need, want my words?” In other words, “Did I rush to publish?”

Working with authors every day, there are routine hiccups that are all too common. When they are pointed out, they are often surprised that they didn’t notice them—both pre-layout and during layout. To anyone who is experienced with books, those hiccups are glaring and would have been noticed quickly.

What’s that mean? Simply this: don’t go it alone. Before you enter your book, make sure it’s of “star” quality.

The Boot Starts Here … on the Outside
The title doesn’t work. The reader is clueless as to what the book is about. Does it solve a problem? Does it entertain? Who is it for?