10 Easy Steps to Becoming a Published Writer

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10 Easy Steps to Becoming a Published Writer

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The Randomer Returns

I overtook Neil Gaiman but then New York Times best selling author Sherrilyn Kenyon snuck up and overtook both of us so I need your help. Please put the word around.

If you need short URLs, the following go to the literature category http://tiny.cc/TheRandomer  http://tiny.cc/ShortyAwards    

One thing I have going for me is that Shorty Awards have chosen one of my answers to their interview as a featured quote - there are about 15 and mine is one of them.

Did the newsletter come out okay by the way?  Would love some feedback.

Thanks everyone.

Rebecca.

The Randomer Returns

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I Have Been Nominated for a Twitter Oscar!

Real-Time Academy for Short Form Arts and Science Award ('Shorty')

This is a real, proper, no nonsense award and I've been nominated for it by a bunch of people, including the top magazine for writers in the UK! The people behind the award are here:http://rtacademy.org/ 

At the moment, I am in 3rd place behind multi-award winning best selling author, Neil Gaiman .

Please vote for/nominate me.  To do this, click here - http://tiny.cc/VoteRebecca and tweet a message about why I should win.  Look at what others have said if you need an idea what to write. It needn't be anything amazing but to qualify as a proper nomination/vote it has to be something.  In only 7 votes time I will be in 2nd place but this will get very competitive. It's a big award with a ceremony in New York and everything so what I really need you to do, if you feel you can, is to blog about it.

I am very close to getting published and this could tip me over the edge.  You are the best friends and supporters I could hope for in the online world and I know you'll help.  Thanks in advance. 

Rebecca

 

I Have Been Nominated for a Twitter Oscar!

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How Google Wave and Twitter Lists Fit Into Your Digital Village

I've had lots of fun being on the BETA testing team for Lists and, now, surfing Google Wave as a previewer. New tech is appearing all the time and it can be hard to figure out how it fits into your human world. This is my (admittedly Brit-centric) view of the new tools and how we can use them.

The web is not a scary, digital world. It's just a bunch of people, chatting. To me, that sounds like a village. Obviously, there are many kinds of village and you may have different buildings in yours but this is what my digital village looks like.

Home is where you start off. For me that's a web site but for others it will be a blog. Home is the place where all the bits of your online self make sense. It is the place where people go when they want to find out a bit more about you. Your digital home is the place where your bio, news and links hang out.

The Pub This is the place with all the people. You never know quite who will be there but you know there is a good chance that you will find a group of friends or colleagues. This is where you go to pick up the general news and meet new people.

For me, Twitter is the pub. It's a bustling social environment with everyone thrown in together. In Twitter, now, there is a function called Lists. It's still in BETA testing but it will be rolled out to everyone soon. Lists is a great place to categorise your contacts and form clubs.

The Club House Once you have your lists together, you might want to set up meetings for your clubs. There are lots of ways to do this but the most common on Twitter has been to use hashtag groups which can be turned into club rooms in www.tweetchat.com . Another way, is to go to www.twibes.com and set up a twibe for your club. With this function, you can post to twitter and the twibe at once - as you do with tweetchat - but you can also post just to the Twibe. There's a huge benefit to this. It takes away noise in the tweet stream and is an opt-in way to receive the relevant tweets. Facebook is also a great way to update your 'club' if you can handle the constant advertising and shape-shifting privacy policy. Of course, now, you can also use Google Wave. Once all the bugs are ironed out of GWave it will an amazing asset to your club - but more on that later.

Coffee Shop This is your own personal hangout. Kind of like the pub but more intimate and less frenetic. This is where you kick back with your chums and muse over your current obsessions (or maybe currant obsessions since it's a coffee shop.) Think of the coffee shop in FRIENDS or a friendly cafe or diner. This is your blog. I could throw in an analogy about whose turn it is to buy the muffins but I'm sure you all know about popping over to other blogs and leaving comments or linking to friends' blogs from Twitter etc.

Business Club The place that springs to mind is Linked In. On Chris Brogan's advice, I finally gave in to the call of Linked In and I'm glad that I did. Within a very short period of time, I had reconnected with old friends and was being approached by head hunters. My own take on Linked In is less formal than most. Attitude-wise, generally, a suit is required. You don't need a tie, but don't show up in your flip-flops. A general guide is: Linked In= suit; Facebook= jeans; Twitter= PJs.


Venue This is where Google Wave comes in. Oh GWave, I love it so. To me, GWave is a venue. Let me explain...


1. You go to the pub and see who's around - oh look it's a bunch of word nerds. Wouldn't it be great to meet up and talk about thriller books?


2. You watch the tweet stream to see who's being extra interesting then you click on them and put them into your 'thriller' list.


3. You tell them all that you want to meet up and talk about books you love, then you post a message on Facebook about an 'event' on Google Wave.


4. You set up a 'thriller' wave and add all your friends.


5. You notice that the author whose thriller you reviewed has left a comment on your blog. You get him on side as a surprise guest.


6. At the appointed time you all meet on the wave. The author speaks; you post a podcast he made about his book and a link for people to buy it; everyone speaks to the author. One of the participants is a book shop owner. She posts a link to her website. The author puts up a map as he explains where he's signing books next... and so on. Maybe you even go crazy, include Ribbit and everyone speaks to the author in a conference call. It's your choice.


Well, there's your village. Hope you like it. Let me know what buildings you would add.


Rebecca
rebeccawoodhead.com

How Google Wave and Twitter Lists Fit Into Your Digital Village

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LISTS on Twitter - Thoughts for Writers and Others

Readers of my new diary - rebeccawoodhead.com/diary - will already know that I'm part of the Beta testing group for Twitter's newest addition - 'lists'.  They will also know of the slightly secret squirrel nature of this mission.  Well, so many of the testers have blabbed now that it's safe for me to do the same so here's my review so far of Lists.

What are Lists?

The general idea of lists is: they're lists.  Tech explanation over.  Rather than give you a step-by-step account of what you see as you press each command (there are many of these posts already in circulation) I'll give you my feelings about what the technology means. 

• Follow Friday every day: Follow Friday is over.  There's no reason for it at all any more.  Instead of filling Twitter with noise every Friday you can simply make a permanent 'Follow Friday' list.  We've been talking about this in the testing group and the feeling seems to be that Follow Friday has a kind of cultural significance at the moment - people 'get' it - so there may be a few Follow Friday lists.  After a while, they'll probably go as you can do so many more specific things with Lists.
• Rooms Been in a hashtag discussion?  Taken it to Tweetchat so you have a 'room'? Well now you don't need Tweetchat.  The functionality is pretty basic but each list can now be a little chat room.
• Your Own TV network This is a metaphor but you can use lists in the same way as you use your TV.  Group your entertainment: comedy, music, news etc.  Group your experience in the way that makes most sense to you.
• Your Twitter PA Set up private lists that tell you how you view your own followers.  Not nice to think in terms of 'A List' 'D List' etc but there are many other ways to define them: cheeky, funny, clever, agent, publisher etc.  Some people will end up in many lists, others may appear in only one or two. 

Well, that's probably all I can tell you for now except that there is a Word Nerd Army list and I want all the original Word Nerd Army supporters on it because - and this is the one bit I failed to mention above - people can follow everyone in a list with just one click and the Word Nerd Army deserves to be followed ;)

Hugs,

Rebecca
a.k.a. The Slightly Secret Squirrel
http://twitter.com/rebeccawoodhead
http://rebeccawoodhead.com/

LISTS on Twitter - Thoughts for Writers and Others

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Now Officially Ms Twitter UK!

Finally the Tweeterwall of Fame is up and I no longer have to say 'no - I am Ms Twitter - honest.'

There has been much interest in the blog I set up to fulfil my Ms Twitter promises. I have sent in two of the articles I was asked to write. One - a guest blog - goes up on a very exciting site at the start of next week. The Word Nerd Army blog will have its first influx of new observers. I wonder what they will make of the issues and comments.

Look forward to reading all your comments. :)

Rebecca

Now Officially Ms Twitter UK!

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What Kind Of Twitterer are You? – a Quiz for Writers

People seem to fall into four groups about Twitter. Here’s a little quiz to see which group you fall into and how this could affect your career as a writer:

What Kind of Twitterer Are You?

1/ You are writing a book. You...

a/...send out tweets (messages) about your book constantly, set up a newsfeed from your blog and sign up to a number of automated programs that guarantee to drive traffic to your page, figuring it makes sense to get as many eyes on your book as possible.

b/... don’t tweet. Twitter is a fad. Twitter is full of airheaded wasters and you wouldn’t want them to buy your book anyway.

c/ ...get very confused. You want to make sure people know about your book but there’s just endless text on this Twitter-thing and you don’t know who anyone is or how to join the conversation – if it even is a conversation. Why can you only see part of what’s going on all the time anyhow?

d/...unfollow all the automated marketers immediately then scroll through your follower list picking out only the ones you like the look of before hacking away all the dead wood. You then follow the people you’re interested in and start finding out about them.

2/ A publisher starts to follow you. You...

a/ ...DM (direct message) them immediately with a summary of your book and links to your blogs; ask for their email address, offer your phone number and give them the best times to call. Write down a 21 day plan of action to get them to take you on – and possibly a campaign against them if this fails.

b/ ...know it’s a mistake as you don’t have a Twitter account, then wonder why anyone would want a publisher to follow them. If anyone asked your advice, you’d say:
‘publishers just want to see how inane you are before they reject you. Stay off Twitter and get on with your book.’

c/ ...think ‘OMG! What now? Do I DM, do I not DM? What’s the protocol? Aarrrgh!!’

d/ ...openly thank them for the follow. Follow them back. Look into the kinds of work they’re interested in and the people they currently represent. Join in with discussions about the publishing industry and let them know about developments you discover. Promote their authors in a non-spamming way (e.g. RT – retweet – news about award winners from their stable) and let other authors and readers know about them through #followfriday.

3/ You only have half an hour a day in which to tweet. You...

a/ ...see how many tweets you can put out with trending hashtags and your book in the same tweet. The more newsworthy the hashtag the better. It doesn’t matter if it’s relevant or not. Gotta push that book. Go through your followers and see the names of the followers of spammers and sex-workers. If people will follow them, they’ll follow anyone – why not you? Never take your eyes off that sale. It’s a numbers game. Visibility is power.

b/ ...think ‘If I were on Twitter, I wouldn’t waste thirty minutes a day on it. Do people not have lives?’

c/ ...wonder what you can do in only 30 minutes. You are paralysed with indecision and end up feeling like a failure before your day has even begun.

d/ ...scroll through your new followers - taking time to thank the new publishers, media people and celebrities following you. See if there are any conversations that are too important to leave for a day, and make a pithy contribution. If there aren’t any then put out a general update, witty quote or comment on a trending topic before getting on with the rest of your day.

Results

Mostly a – you’re a Web 1.0 Spammer

Back in the early days of the dot-com boom, a group of people rose up from the primordial ooze and began to spam. In the early days, spam was considered to be repeated mass-emailing of unwanted drivel about business opportunities, pharmaceutical products and ‘personal services.’ Today, people are so fed up with spam that spam-sensitivity is heightened. There are people on Twitter who will unfollow you for any amount of promotion. Promotion is not always spam - sometimes it’s Parma Ham or something equally delicious - but many people won’t stay around to find out, so promote elsewhere.

Twitter is a discussion place. It is a party. If you unendingly promote yourself on Twitter, you are like the annoying person at the party with all the business cards but no interest in anybody else. It is really good that you believe in yourself or your product so much but let your web site or blog do your promoting. Put a link in your Twitter bio to that site and people will go there if they want to know more.

If you write an interesting article, put up a link but be aware that publishing a feed of all your blog or site content is a bit of a no-no. Would you just put your 140 character tweets up on your blog? Of course not. It would make your blog followers feel ignored. Think carefully before you commit the same faux pas with your Twitter friends. They want to talk to you. Throw off your business hat, loosen your tie and have a chat. You might like it.

Mostly b – you’re a Twitterphobe

You hate Twitter. You haven’t been on it but the very thought of it takes your blood close to boiling point. Why ‘dumb-down’ society any further? Isn’t it stupid enough already? Why won’t people switch off their computers and start reading again?

I hear your fury. Find your neutral space – it will pass. Read ‘Twitter is as Twitter does’ by clicking the link at the bottom. It is fine to be selective about your Twitter friends. Sign up and look up people you’d really like to chat with. Which authors do you like? Why not talk to them? They may even talk back. You can stay up to date with the trends in the literary world and get as involved as you like.

It is fine to protect your updates and only communicate with your best friends if you like. You can use Twitter as a bookmarking device for the things and people you find most interesting. Alternatively, you can take part in literary conversations like #litchat, where readers share ideas in real time using the Twitter ‘hashtag’ search facility. If you need this further explained, come to http://twitter.com/rebeccawoodhead when you sign up and I’ll take you through it.

Mostly c – you’re a Bitter-Twitter

You want to get on board with the Twitter-thing but you just don’t get it. Maybe you were a little over-enthusiastic and followed hundreds of people and now you don’t know which conversations to follow or what to do. Take a step back. Look through your timeline and see which of your new chums are starting to annoy you. Unfollow them. This is important because some people are put off if they see you follow too many more people than follow you. Look at what’s left. If you were at a party, is this the kind of party you’d stay at? If not, look for people you’d like to talk to and invite them to your party until it is.

Terminology can be confusing. For instance ‘Bitter-Twitter’ would have made perfect sense a few months ago but now ‘Bitter-Twitterer’ or 'Bitter-Tweeter' makes more sense. People tend to ‘tweet’ rather than ‘twit’ now. They talk to ‘tweeps' rather than ‘tweeple’ and ask people to ‘tweet’ or ‘follow’ rather than ‘twitter’ them. The vocab changes all the time. Just throw yourself into it and eventually you’ll find a way to make yourself understood. Don’t panic!

Mostly d – congratulations, you’re a member of the Twitterati!

You’ve sussed out Twitter and are moving into the realms of the Twitterati, if you’re not already there. Celebrities, journalists and publishers contact you daily and your experience of Twitter is interesting and fun. You have followers at the top of their game in publishing and media; frequently find prize-winning authors on your follow list and are never short of an expert to DM about a writing issue. You take your work seriously but are not afraid to be silly when the party calls for it. Good work. Follow me any time!

Now you know the kind of twitterer that you are, you need to know what to do to enhance your Twitter experience. The guest blog is on The New Author. I've organised transport for you. Next stop: 'The New Rules for Literary-Twittery'. Jump on the Blog Tour Bus....

What Kind Of Twitterer are You? – a Quiz for Writers

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Nearly 500 Followers in Only 6 Months!

Haven't said anything recently because I didn't want to jinx it but I've noticed my online following has been growing a bit of late. I just counted all my online followers (and yes, I took out duplicates) and I've got 468!

I know it's cheeky but any chance you lot could indulge me and mention this on your own blogs/twitter or just pop up a banner on your site and see if I can get up to 500? Thanks hugely. I'll keep you posted. :)

Nearly 500 Followers in Only 6 Months!

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Started the Next Novel!

The time has come to start another book, so I have. For the first few chapters, I usually need to lock myself away and become a total hermit so don't be cross if I don't post for a while. I may be able to throw a few words at Twitter and maybe Facebook if you're on those but I doubt I will be able to put together anything blog-worthy for a little bit. Feel free to chat amongst yourselves.

twitter: http://twitter.com/rebeccawoodhead
facebook: http://facebook.com/rebecca.woodhead

Started the Next Novel!

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First Ebury Publishing and Now Bloomsbury - The Publishers Sending me Pressies in the Post this Week

I assumed that the first time a full manuscript-sized envelope dropped through my door from a publisher it would be the manuscript of my debut novel with an 'unfortunately' letter enclosed. Not so. First, Dim Wit fell through my door from Ebury Publishing and now I await the arrival from Bloomsbury of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.

Seriously folks, get on Twitter if you want some free goodies.

Get Involved with Publishing

Obviously, I'd love you all to be telling people about my writing and blogs but I'm not the only writer on the face of the planet and we're in a recession so it's only good publishing karma to help out the authors already in print isn't it? If they do well, the publishers will do well and if the publishers do well they'll be more likely to take a punt on new writers.

The Plan

Let's harness the power of our own little networks to see how much we can move things along. It's good practice for when we all get published ourselves after all. It's all well and good for us to be navel-gazing and pondering endlessly on our would-be-author status but the fact of the matter is that some of us will be published soon *shock!* and when that happens, we'll need to know what to do next. Part of that is the business side of publishing - marketing and what-not - so let's have a go at it!

If you look at my previous post, you'll see I've started to promote Dim Wit using the hashtag #dimwit on Twitter. The people at Ebury Publishing have already put a link to that post here on the blog.

Help Yourself

This is the point where I appeal to your inner 'but-it's-a-recession-why-should-I-help-anyone-else?' brat. If you're not feeling charitable, have a moment of self-interest. They are publishers. They will be keeping an eye on how various marketing strategies are working. If, when they search for #dimwit your name comes up as a retweeter of a book they publish then maybe they'll check you out. Worth a tweet on the off chance eh?

When I've read the book from Bloomsbury, I'll put up a review and we can all do our best to spread the word. In the meantime, if you're on twitter, look up #dimwit and get retweeting. I'll put up some shorter quotes so retweeting's easier. If you're not on twitter, cut and paste the quotes from the left column and put them on your blogs and social networking sites.

All we need to do is start a bit of online chat - not tough is it? Also, don't forget Jamie (Ford.) Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet is a stupendous book and I'm loving every page of it. Jamie's already on the New York Times Best-Sellers List and published in new countries every week but still there's no publishing deal in England. We've got to turn this around. It's great that Toad sent me a copy of the book from America but I want to see it in my local bookshop and think 'that's my chum's book. Isn't it pretty?' Let's see how much of an international ripple we can create for all these authors then - when it's the turn of one of us - we'll know what we're up to.

Happy chatting!

Rebecca

Rebecca Woodhead

First Ebury Publishing and Now Bloomsbury - The Publishers Sending me Pressies in the Post this Week

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