Writing Prompt: Identify Positives and Motivating Factors.

Writing Prompt 113

Identify positives and motivating factors.

On Monday, we talked about why it’s important to address weaknesses in a professional setting. Today, it’s time to address the opposite – – anything that is positive or motivates us to greatness. Today’s prompt is not exactly resume material and is not informal blog writing either. It is more like a midway call to action to get you to think about all the positive things about you.

You have already identified your skillsets that are appropriate in a work setting. You have also determined your strengths. You haven’t, however, had a chance to fill in the gaps by learning to identify the many positive things about you. Positive things can certainly lean towards things such as gardening, shopping, using power tools, taking care of pets, or any of 1,000 similar things. However, I encourage you to go a bit more abstract in your thinking.

What really sets you apart from others? What motivates you to be great in your life with yourself and with others? How can you describe the positive things about you in ways that others can relate to?

Education – Quick Tips

In this new education section, I’d like to provide a quick tip to motivate nonfiction writers.

Showcase positive book reviews about your book.

We are still doling out some fabulous advice for nonfiction writers who have written books. Even if you have not yet written a book, hopefully, you will find today’s advice motivating enough to encourage you to take the plunge and write a book!

If you have published a book, you will most likely get a mixed bag of negative reviews and positive reviews. Book reviews themselves are not always written properly, but on occasion, you’ll find enthusiastic book lovers whose main passion in life is to read books and write about them. Those heartfelt book reviews is what all book authors seek. And those are the ones that should be showcased.

Presenting positive book reviews in a book jacket or obtaining them before a book is published is ideal. However, if book reviews come out after a book is published, it’s a great idea to showcase those on a blog. Spread the message that your book is good based on positive words from others.

Marketing success in writing

Today’s feature is on book author Jennifer Richardson.

Jennifer Richardson has one of the best success stories of using positive book reviews to get her to greater success. She wrote a book, Americashire, after having lived in the countryside of England for three years. An American by birth, Jennifer moved to England with her husband and spent three years learning the ins and outs of a quaint new home surrounded by an eclectic mix of farmer-types and city folk.

 

She wrote this nonfiction book overlapping in two distinct categories, memoir and travel writing. She

wrote intimately about her childbearing issues while deflecting the seriousness of things with witty observations about the interesting personality types of the people she met, obviously, with heavy comparisons between North American and British people.

I’m not sure if the subject matter of her book, her writing style, or her social media marketing helped get Jennifer Richardson her many positive book reviews, but something did, and she has capitalized on that! Her website now lists her many positive book reviews and contains links to follow-up interviews as a result.

Marketing success, non-writing

Here is our eleventh feature on Artistic Toy Manufacturing Co. and the wild success of its custom plush and toys.

Artistic Toy began working with a flooring company to produce a stuffed bear that was prepped for tradeshows. All was good except for the fact that the flooring company was trying to promote the softness of its products but was not able to. Apparently, they had gone to other toy manufacturers to try to mass produce an “ouch” in a bear to convey the idea that a patch of fur was removed by the bear in order to give its carpets extra softness. That was a tough assignment to duplicate in a plush toy environment.

Artistic Toy invented a unique patch with the word “ouch” handstitched to a fabric that was applied to the plush bear. With this invention, they were able to address the concerns of the flooring company by incorporating an element (the word “ouch”) in a way that spread the message of softness as requested by the flooring company. Seems that it worked!