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Good Morning, my writerly friends, I've come across two blog posts I'd like to share. I thought you might find them interesting. How To Build An Author Platform by David Gaughran What is an author platform? Which elements should it contain? And is any of this stuff more important than just writing another book? Perhaps not. But certain aspects of an author platform are important tools for reaching readers and, especially, for holding on to them. The topic can be confusing as everyone seems to be mean something different by the term. And then this problem is compounded by a lot of terrible advice proliferating, quite frankly. Number-chasing nonsense which doesn’t serve anyone. Even the term “platform” seems to be quite nebulous and elastic — fertile ground for snake-oil salesmen. Let’s nail that down first: Author Platform – A Definition Everyone will agree a website is part of an author platform, as well as any blog and your various presences on all the different social media channels, if applicable. But what about your email list? Personally, I think it’s most useful to be open here. An author platform is a writer’s collective presence on the internet. Some dude. That seems pretty straight forward and uncontroversial. Where opinions diverge is with regard to what an author platform is truly for, and what it should contain. And people often skip over the first part of that and jump right to the second. But it’s hard to know if you’re building the right tool if you don’t know what it will be used for. There are many ways to slice this onion. Primarily, though, author platforms: entice new readers; and engage existing ones. You might assume author platforms are largely for finding new readers, whereas I’d strongly argue that their real value is in engaging existing readers, and deepening connections with people we have already sold books to, or otherwise interacted with. More on that in a moment. The internet is a big place and you can’t be everywhere, not if you want to keep producing books regularly — which should always be your main goal. So, what should you focus on? Which social networks can be dispensed with? How can you build a platform worthy of the name with what little time you have? To put a finer point on it, is any of this worth the bloody effort? Social media networks in particular are giant time-sinks, as we all know only too well. *closes eleventeen tabs* Non-Negotiable Elements of an Author Platform The only truly necessary elements in an author platform are a website and a mailing list. Everything else is optional. I’d also strongly argue that a basic presence on Facebook, at minimum, is very useful indeed, but we’ll get to that in a moment. But, really, the only absolutely essential thing to have is a website where readers can find basic information about you and your books, and also sign up to your mailing list. And it’s actually the latter that’s the truly crucial part. Everything else is secondary. My guide to author websites is here: Level Up Your Author HQ And this is by far the best resource on email: Book of the Year: Newsletter Ninja But which other elements might an effective author platform contain? Before you can answer that, you must think about what a platform is truly for and what you, in particular, want to achieve. * I love David's blog. Read the rest here. In the Chorus That Surrounds Every Writer, Listen to the Voice That’s Your Own
The writer was young, she had ideas; she wrote her required essay in a burst of enthusiasm, convinced it not only exemplified her voice but revealed the crux of her soul. She’d spent hours, days, weeks on it; dug deep, pushed hard, got feedback from trusted friends, parents, a favorite aunt who’d published several books. She polished and shined and edited and tweaked, and when she finally handed it in, excited to get her beloved teacher’s feedback and a hoped for “A,” she felt as if she’d just delivered the finest piece of writing she’d managed so far in her young life. It came back with his scrawled note: “Where are you in this? Good ideas but the execution isn’t there. You sound like you’re trying to sound like someone else, and I know you can do better. You’re a good writer, but this is lazy. See what else you can come up with, and run it by me again.” She couldn’t even remember the grade—it might have been a C+. All that stuck was the gut punch of having so badly miscalculated her abilities. Or had she? She came to me with the essay, and when I saw the teacher’s note, along with his scribbled red marks throughout, I grumbled to myself: “This is why I hate writing classes.” Now, to be fair to writing classes and writing teachers, I’m know there are many good ones. Classes in which teachers are not literary demagogues indoctrinating students in the “my way/highway” school of thought. Teachers who nurture a writer’s voice, no matter what age, rather than inject their own. Teachers who don’t tell a student how they (the teacher) would write it, but help the student write it as they (the student) sees fit. Teachers who know how to critique without killing a person’s soul. I’m sure there are many of those. Just not enough. What bothered me about this girl’s experience was that there seemed so little about her voice that her teacher acknowledged: her originality, her tone, her unique twist of phrase and spin of sentence. Yes, it needed editing; I might have made different choices with some of the verbiage, surely the included dialogue had some clunky bits. But it also screamed of originality and literary irreverence, taking chances on ideas and expressions that made it refreshingly … fresh. Read the rest here. |
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