Tag Archives: BABS

Launch…Like No One Is Watching

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JANUARY!
January hops onto the map like a young kangaroo, with not one but two BABS meetings. We’re in Belvedere Monday and in San Francisco on Wednesday, with two different groups hearing about tools for book launches and author platforms.

I’m excited to get my concept of independent book launches out onto the round table of our group. House launches, (I call traditional publishing “house” publishing), the source of great excitement in decades gone by, have very little in common with Indie launches. That’s what I’ll be talking about at this week’s meetings. Wednesday night in San Francisco, Anne Hill will shine more light on the author platform. Sign up here: BABS

The past three months, I’ve enjoyed the initiation of a formal ePub Club. Well, formal might be a bit of an exaggeration. Five of us meet on the phone and make use of Google docs and spreadsheets to move forward with a variety of tasks to help our ebook discovery. This month we will all get up to speed on Google Hangouts so we can build a presence on YouTube. See the Club Checklist tab for more information on how to create an ePub Club.

JANUARY AUTHOR PLATFORM CLASSES
Also in January, I am offering two one-night classes for authors. On January 24th, authors will learn the basics of an author platform. At the end of the class, every participant will know what to do next. On January 30th, authors will start creating their outreach system to build a readership. This class is good for people who attended the first class, or authors who already have some web presence established and want to expand. Go to this page of Bel-Tib Rec and scroll to the bottom:
Author Platform Classes at Bel-Tib Recreation Department

BECOME A SUPPORTING MEMBER
Bay Area Bloggers Society has grown to over 600 members. This month we are offering a new option which will help us serve this large group with better venues and content. You can now become a Supporting Member at $30 per year. After January, BABS meetings will be $5.00 for the public, and free for Supporting Members, who will also be notified about meetings before they are announced publicly. We’ve had waiting lists for most of our meetings, so this is one way to help those most interested secure a seat. The membership dues will help pay for the Meetup site, allow us to reserve bigger venues, attract better speakers, and of course, more chocolate! If you’re on the Meetup site, you’ll receive an email describing all this in detail.

MANAGE THOSE REVIEWS
My second e-course, “Managing Reviews,” is available on Amazon. The continuum of a launch has a whole lot to do with effective and appropriate reviews. If you only have time to learn one thing about your author platform this month, I recommend this e-course. Reviews are not what they appear to be. Amazon is stripping reviews from author pages left and right. You need to know what works and what will result in a lot of disappointment. For an investment of a couple of hours and $3.99, you’ll be way ahead of the curve in this department.

Anne Hill and I are calling 2013 the year of Cutting-Edge Publishing. One thing I can tell you about that: It takes a village. Join us. We are having fun making our books and digital products discoverable.

Suzanna Stinnett

Suzanna on Twitter: @Brainmaker
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Come Welcome Chinese Bloggers on Their First Visit to the U.S.A.

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How far is your reach?

 

One of the intriguing things about blogging as well as other forms of instant publishing is that you never really know where your influence might reach. This is something to hold close to your heart as you live with the daily demands of new media communication and connection.

I’ve led a user group in the SF area for about five years called Bay Area Bloggers Society. It’s a quiet thing, really, we just get together locally and share what we know, support each other, flatten the learning curves. It seems to work for people, because the membership is now approaching 600 and just keeps growing.

I haven’t blogged a lot about BABS, but here is where you’ll see me talk about it. Last year I was very fortunate to connect with Anne Hill of Creative Content Coaching who came on board as co-organizer and has given the group a big boost with her intelligent use of new media. That’s another place you’d see BABS mentioned, but mostly we talk on Twitter using the hashtags #blogsoc and #BABSPub.

So it came as a bit of surprise that a project of the State Department contacted me last week with a request to speak (via translators) with a group of Chinese bloggers, new media leaders and executives coming to the U.S. for the first time. Through the International Visitor Leadership Program, these brave people are coming to learn more about American freedom of speech, leading via blogging and microblogging, using new media to be more informed about the government, and the future of other media such as newspapers. Unlike most of us across the U.S. and elsewhere, these people use new media at risk. Some of them cannot live at home with their families, but must hide and keep moving in order to do what they feel is so important with new media.

I take this assignment very seriously. It’s such an opportunity for diplomatic connection and to grow new relationships globally. I posed some questions on #blogchat on Twitter Sunday evening to give people an opportunity to join the conversation. That invitation continues, open to any who have ideas about how Americans and Chinese citizens can deepen this new global collaboration.

Be well, keep blogging, and recognize this great freedom. It is not a given.

Suzanna Stinnett
Founder, Bay Area Bloggers Society
@Brainmaker
@SuzannasList
See the Author Platform E-Courses on Amazon:
How to Produce A Series for Digital Readers
Managing Reviews

Publishing While Driving

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Earlier today on #writechat I made this statement: If authors are willing to wield the enormous responsibility of being in the driver’s seat, it is now available.

Let me “keyword” that out for you:

#WILLING

#RESPONSIBILITY

#AVAILABLE

I said it in response to the question I hear every day from clients and people who attend my user group meetings and fellow Twitterians. “Should I publish into digital or wait and find an agent or a publisher?”

Driving is a big job. The thing to remember is that when you’re driving, you get to be on the road. As long as you want someone else to do the driving, you’re going to have to wait in line. It’s a very long line. And when you get “picked up,” you know what happens next? You’re going to get dropped off at the Market Your Own Book Corral, where you’ll run around the track with everyone else.

Pull on those sleek driving gloves, sister. It’s time to get behind the wheel and drive.

Suzanna Stinnett

Find me on Twitter:BRAINMAKER

 

 

Get the Reader in Your Radar

Your reader is as unique as you, make sure you connect

As I view the coming year of BABS meetings under the umbrella of “Authors Go Public,” I keep hearing this little message in my head. “It’s a reader platform.” Readers are as unique and eccentric as you, dear author, so making the transition to see your outreach efforts (your blog, your Goodreads presence, your Shelfari friends and your book extras, all of that) as a Reader Platform is the most succinct advice I can offer.

READER PLATFORM?

What does it mean? It means you’re circling around your reader, knowing where they hang out and what they say to their friends. It means you spend more time understanding them than you do talking about yourself. So you built an author platform, didja? Who cares? We’ve all got one of those.

A reader platform should be a big love-fest. Somehow, you’ve got to find your own way of connecting with your readership and growing that into a fertile, active playground.

Publishing these days is certainly author-centric, to use a phrase I hear from Anne Hill. And that’s a good thing. An astoundingly good thing. But your outreach — your platform — better be reader-centric. Because that’s all you’ve got going forward.

Read more in Anne’s new ebook: Three Steps to Selling Your eBook.

Learn what happened in 2011 and what authors are doing with it in my ebook: Indie Authors in the Publishing Sea-Change

Get your Kindle series rolling with Beyond Bestseller Part One

Cover for Beyond Bestseller Part One

 

 

 

Suzanna Stinnett

Follow me on Twitter: Brainmaker

Visit my Shelfari page: Suzanna Stinnett