Now that I have introduced the concept of blogging, I’ve opened up Pandora’s overwhelm box for many writers. Why? Because most writers don’t feel they can get their “real” writing done if they also blog. Not only that, they lump blogging in with all that other social media “stuff,” like social networking, they need to do to promote themselves and their books and create an author’s platform.
Here’s the good news: You can do it all and not feel overwhelmed. You can write your book, blog and promote yourself and your book via social networking, and have time left over. How? By blogging your book.
Here’s how it works:
- Map out the content for your book.
- Chunk your content down into post-sized bits.
- Sit down and write every day, or several times a week, in short increments of time. (You can also write in longer increments less often, if you prefer.)
- Copy and paste those short bits of writing from your manuscript as blog posts on your blog each time you finish a writing period. (Or break the work you do during your longer writing periods into shorter pieces and post those several times during the week.)
- Share your blog posts by including links to them with your status updates on your social networks, like Facebook and Twitter.
Pretty simple. You will have your manuscript written in no time flat. As you continuously publish blog posts, you will find yourself gaining fans and followers and your blog moving up in the search engine rankings. That means you will have developed an author’s platform. Not only that, you will have done some simple social networking along the way.
See. I told you it could be done. Write your book, blog, social network—all in one fell swoop with little to no overwhelm at all. How do I know this? I blogged my book, How to Blog a Book: Write, Publish, and Promote Your Work One Post at a Time
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h4 align=”center”>How to Blog a Book: Write, Publish, and Promote Your Work One Post at a Time
You still have a chance to get in on some of the preorder and release-day deals. Here they are:
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h4 style=”text-align: center;”>Registering for my free How to Blog a Book teleseminar on April 23 at 5 p.m. PT! Register here: http://bit.ly/BookLaunchTeleseminar One FREE 30-MINUTE blogging or blog-a-book COACHING SESSION will be given away during the teleseminar! Also, 2 FREE SIGNED COPIES of How to Blog a Book will be given away during the telesminar.
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h4 style=”text-align: center;”>I am offering a 15 minute FREE blog-to-book coaching session for all those who preorder before April 23. Just email a copy of your Amazon or B & N receipt to namir(at)ninaamir.com to schedule.
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h4 style=”text-align: center;”>For those who purchase a copy ON May 23 and send me a receipt (at namir(at)ninaamir.com), I am giving away 2 FREE blog-to-book coaching sessions!
Excellent suggestion!
Some think that this would hinder sales, but I think blogging your book is a great way to gain a fanbase. Unless your blog is read by everyone, you’ll still be able to get sales once you publish. Reading an excerpt may even encourage a follower to buy the book.
Would you post the entire book? Leave off the ending? Take part or all of it down once you publish?
Hi Mark! Thanks for your comment. All your answers can be found at http://www.howtoblogabook.com. However, let me try to give you the short answer here. Blogging a book does not hinder sales. It builds your platform, which you need for both traditional and self-publshing. I suggest you leave a few things out that you then include in the published version to entice blog readers and publishers to purchase your book. Plus, when you edit the book, you will likely add more content. My book, How to Blog a Book, is now more than double the word count you find on the blog.
I blogged all but two chapters. I encourage people to blog most of their books. For fiction, I suppose you could leave off the ending…seems a cheap way to get people to buy a book, though.
YOu don’t take it down when done. You keep blogging on the topic, if you write nonfiction. For fiction, you can blog another book or blog on the topic. Or you can leave it up and go on to something else, but you’ll lose SEPR in the process, so you really need to keep blogging.
Nina