Ready to be bolder? Personally, I don’t think it is possible to be in business nowadays without being bold. There is too much information out there and people are only able to notice those messages that really jump out at them.
If you haven’t yet read 24 Carat Bold, maybe now is the time to get your hands on a copy and learn how to be bolder…
Get your copy from Amazon then send your receipt to me at mindy@bookmidwife.com – for your chance to win a thought leadership and publishing consultancy session worth $500!
Books purchased between 9pm Monday 8th through midnight Wed 10th (UK time) qualify for the competition.
Good luck with your boldness and your business! And your entry!
Now I’m feeling upset and feeling like cheating. Now I’m feeling what my author clients feel when they have to produce lots of writing every week.
Except this is not lots of writing. This is simply getting a daily offer out to the market every day in April. Offers that I have already planned and that are really exciting. But for one reason or another, including a great session with a new private client yesterday, I didn’t get my offer out. And now we have plans this weekend so I won’t be able to post a new offer every day.
So, today’s offer is valid for the next three days. And it is a repeat of the amazing Online Course offer, with the same, great, never-to-be-seen-again discount! Get my complete online ‘Write and Publish Your Book – Step by Step’ course for just $33 instead of $199, this weekend only!
Go get your copy NOW and write your book with confidence: https://www.udemy.com/write-and-publish-your-book-complete-course/?couponCode=003
Have a great weekend!
Today’s offer is a fabulous free resource for authors! Thanks to the amazing Wendy Kier for alerting me to this.
http://lorirtaylor.com/102-hashtags-smart-writers-are-using-to-build-big-brands-on-twitter/
Writers – if you are not using these #Writing hashtags, then you are surely missing a trick or two. Enjoy!
P.S. If you want to be sure you are notified about the daily offers we are making during Audacious April, simply subscribe below! I love being creative and generous and I have something special planned for every single day this month. I hope you enjoy them, and best of luck with your writing!
Today’s offer is an easy one. You simply join my free webinar with Amanda Clarke tomorrow and you could win a Silver ticket worth £995 for my next program starting on April 27th. I will be giving one place away to a lucky listener. And I will be giving lots of tips away during the webinar, to make your writing faster and easier! Easy!
Amanda says…
“Thinking of writing a book? You Learn How to Write Your Best Book in Just 90 Days”
Award-winning international speaker and entrepreneur Amanda E Clarke interviews The Book Midwife founder Mindy Gibbins-Klein to find out how!
So many business people want and need to write books, but they never seem to get started. My good friend Mindy Gibbins-Klein is founder of The Book Midwife coaching company. She has helped over 500 entrepreneurs just like you to write and publish great books – fast! Mindy knows how to help aspiring authors make it happen and create their book in just 90 days. Some of her clients have earned £500,000 to £1M because of their books!
I’m delighted to be interviewing Mindy on Wednesday April 3rd at 9am. If you have been thinking about writing a book, you don’t want to miss this. Mindy is going to pull back the curtain and reveal lots of ways to make book writing easier, more efficient, more effective and more fun! I can’t wait.
Please join in the fun….:)
To join us, all you need to do is go to the following link at 9am BST (UK time) on Wednesday April 3rd : http://InstantTeleseminar.com/?eventID=39821700
Audacious April – Day 1. In keeping with the philosophy of 24 Carat Bold, I am going to do a special offer every single day this month. The last day (April 30th) is my birthday, so let’s celebrate for the entire month.
Each offer will only be available for one day, so you will need to be quick if you see something you like.
So, here we go. Today’s offer is my complete online ‘Write and Publish Your Book – Step by Step’ course, normally $199 and today only $33!
Yes, this is the offer I said I would not repeat but it is April Fool’s Day, after all  Get your access to this popular course for just $33 today, April 1st only at https://www.udemy.com/write-and-publish-your-book-complete-course/?couponCode=002
 Once upon a time, the Romans used to celebrate the new year during the month of March, with many festivities happening around the 15th or the IDES of March. What a great concept. A time of spring and renewal (at least here in the Northern hemisphere) seems like a much more sensible period to make a new start on things in your life and business.
In particular, I would like you to consider what new IDEAS could help you make that new start. Where could a new idea inject some new energy or a new perspective to something that has been bothering you in your personal life, or in your business?
You don’t need to come up with all the answers immediately. Simply asking this powerful question will start the process flowing, and then your subconscious can begin to look for answers in your daily interactions, your thoughts and even in your dreams.
If you have been looking for inspiration, simply take today as an IDEAL day to start. Why not? It’s as good a day as any other, and it helped the Romans celebrate many new years during the days of the Empire. In fact, when in Rome, let’s do as the Romans did and start with the celebration.
To bring the new energy and ideas into your life, begin by acknowledging and celebrating the good things already present in your life. I suggest to my clients that they actually write their blessings down, which makes them even more tangible and easy to remember. For many clients, this step alone has been wildly transformational, in terms of shifting blocks and opening up space to be creative.
Want more IDEAS today? Start by celebrating and treating today like the first day of a new year or even a new life. Want more inspiration? It’s there for you. Today would be the perfect day to tap into it. Let me know how things start to flow for you. Welcome to the IDEAS of MARCH!
P.S. In case one of your ideas involves writing a book, there is currently an 88% discount on my ‘Write and Publish Your Book – Step by Step’ Online Course, you can still get it for just $33 instead of $199 if you are quick…
Writing a book can be a hard enough process, but getting it out to your audience can become a nightmare. However, if you start working on promoting your book as soon as you start writing it, and even right before that, it can be a much easier and much more rewarding process. Your writing and your confidence can even benefit from it. The social media author of today has to go beyond the traditional promotional tools that we’ve been used to for so many years. I wanted to show you some easy ways that you can use the Internet to promote your book yourself, without any costs, so that you make sure your audience will know about your book when it’s ready.
Start early. The sooner you start promoting your book, the better. It doesn’t matter that you’ve only just got an idea and nothing else – none of the research or none of the planning. Having an idea and being sure that you are going to write the book is all the reason you need to start promoting it. You can start even a year, if not even more, before your book’s release date. The more time you have to build up an audience and a list of e-mails, the better.
Social Media. Social media is one of the easiest DIY ways that you can find your audience and start communicating with them. I personally would recommend Twitter and Facebook, at least to start with. They are very easy to use and can be very effective if used right. Getting lots of followers/friends shouldn’t necessarily be your priority, contrary to popular belief. It’s better to have fewer followers, but who are genuinely interested in you and your book, then to have 15,000 followers that couldn’t care less. On Facebook you can join different groups that are related to the subject you are writing about and join in the conversation. You will find some of your target audience this way. On Twitter, make the most of hashtags so you can start engaging with like-minded people and what your subject book is about. It is very important that you try to have meaningful conversations and build honest relationships. Over time, you will have built a certain “fan base” and you will have an audience, however small, that is eagerly awaiting your book and that will help you promote it by sharing your posts. That is why it is important that you start the promotional process as soon as possible. To get help and lots of ideas for your social media strategy, get in touch with @networkerplus, founded by my friend and client John Coupland. For help executing on that strategy, contact Socialable, run my by good friend and brilliant entrepreneur Lilach Bullock.
Every once in a while, let your readers know how your book is progressing and ask for their advice whenever you feel like you are in a rut. This will make them feel like they are a part of your book, they will show you support and you could even get some great advice from them.
To make life easier on yourself, try using a social media tool such as HootSuite, which will allow you to post on different social networks at the same time and to schedule tweets and posts, thus saving time.
Keep up a blog. Start writing a blog, and make a point of it to do it regularly and as often as possible. It will help you promote your book, build a bigger audience and it might even help you in your writing process. You could write about several things. For example, start by writing articles related to the subject of your book. You could also start a bi-weekly/weekly journal on your blog where you keep your readers up-to-date on your progress. This, again, will make them feel like being a part of your book, as they are feeling bad for you when you are down and happy when things are going your way.
Give up free stuff and collect emails. People love getting free content, so you could also try giving it to them every once in a while. For example, you can write a short story, an essay or a how-to guide, related to your subject. The best part of this is that you will be able to collect emails that you can later use to let them know that your book is out.
Create a website for your book. Once the launch date for your book approaches, you should create a website where your book is the star. Make sure you include your blog, links to where people can buy your book, a few samples from the book (one or two chapters), as many reviews as you can muster, a list of all the future events you will be attending and of course your contact info.
Comment on other blogs and guest blog. Look for other relevant blogs (the keyword here is ‘relevant’) and start commenting, which will help you reach more people. You can also talk to other bloggers and convince them to let you guest post on their blog. This way you will reach a whole new audience – just make sure to include a short description of yourself and a link to your own blog/website.
Post videos. Try to post a few short videos every now and then (doesn’t have to be as often as you post on your blog) on Youtube and on your website. In these videos you can talk about the subject you are writing about in your book. If you have the necessary confidence you can also try to keep a video journal of your progress, where you talk about how your writing is going.
Host a competition. Competitions are great ways to get your audience animated and a great way to promote your book. You could offer your book as a prize and even offer to put the winners’ names in your book.
I hope you will find these tips useful and easy to follow and that you will start promoting your book right away!
 It used to take nine months to a year to get a book into print – and that is still the case with some traditional publishing options. Many authors put up with the wait, reasoning that it is worth working with one of the big publishers and hopefully taking advantage of the extra marketing, promotion and exposue that should bring.
However, another trend has crept up on us over the past year or so, and that is the nearly instantaneous process of self-publishing, especially online. Not only do aspiring authors want to see their books out quickly, they want to see them out NOW. And online publishing platforms actually make that possible.
If you are familiar with my material, you will know that I have strong concerns about people slapping books together and putting them into the market before they are ready. There are advantages to getting a book out quickly and there are disadvantages too. Let’s look at the launch date implications.
Traditionally, there has been a massive focus on the launch date, or publication date, and an assumption that the author needs to get most of their sales in the first few weeks following launch. This is the legacy of the big publishers who put most of their emphasis and efforts into those first few weeks, and then not always very much after that. Most books do not achieve bestseller status in their first week. Who cares?
There is no good reason to follow this policy anymore. Modern publishing requires us to take a longer term view. Popularity and sales for a book can and usually do build over time. A slow burn. The book can become a bestseller at any time, not just during launch week. So the pressure is off, in terms of having to make the book a bestseller on Day One.
At my publishing company, Anoma Press, we have helped many of our authors’ books generate more and more sales over time, not fewer and fewer. We are always looking for more sales and distribution opportunities for our authors, such as the 12 country deals we signed at a recent book fair, and promoting our books in special apps, TV ads and other campaigns this quarter.
If you have a committed publisher who understands this, they see the author as a partner and value the long term relationship with the author and potential of the book.
On the other hand, you don’t want to rush a book out because then you are on the back foot in terms of marketing. I see so many books launched with incorrect data on Amazon, missing information and photos, no reviews, and this can make the author look unprofessional. Many media publications are only interested in new books so you will miss out if you do not have things lined up and ready for launch day. You can do a lot of platform-building leading up to publication, and set things up properly if you have a few months to plan things.
So, what is the answer? It depends on the book, the topic and the urgency, the window of opportunity (tying in with current events and news etc) but mostly it depends on how you view your book marketing campaign – long-term or short-term. I would never advise an author to delay a book that is ready and timely, just for marketing purposes, but at the same time. that book will benefit from doing the essential preparation for the launch.
Good luck!
I don’t know if you were planning to work on your book during the holidays – after all, it’s still called “work” so perhaps it would defeat the purpose of holidays! I don’t really agree with that, however – I think the holidays could be a great time to write your book, or at least start it! And I’m going to try to convince you that writing during this period doesn’t have to be stressful and could also prove to be very productive – and with a bit of skill, it might even get you out of some dish washing this festive season!
For many of us, winter holidays are probably the best and the most fun time of the year: a time to relax, get relieved of all the stress accumulated in the past year and recharge yourself mentally for the coming year. For some people, however, winter holidays, and Christmas especially, are very stressful: the entire family is visiting, the house has to be cleaned, all the food must be cooked and ready in time and the weather starts getting colder and colder as days pass. But, whatever you think of winter holidays, and however they make you feel, I believe this is a great time to start writing your book. And I’ll explain why.
Whether the holidays relieve you of stress or make you even more stressed, as I mentioned earlier, it’s a perfect time to work on your book. You never know when inspiration and the desire to write come – so why assume from the get-go that you won’t be writing for a few weeks? If this period makes you stress-free, then your relaxation has a good chance of turning into more inspiration, more creativity and more great ideas. If, on the contrary, this period stresses you, than writing could have the opposite effect and relax you and also get you focused on this productive thing.
However, there is always a chance that this period of time could prove to be a bit dangerous for your writing. You might have some radical ideas that you wouldn’t normally write about and that you might not agree with after a month or so passes. What is important is that you stick to your brand and you remain consistent in everything you do.
Although it is the holidays, a time when, traditionally, many of us aren’t used to working (or, better put, don’t really want to work), there is no reason to stop writing, even if you only write for a few hours a day, or however much you can. Writing doesn’t have to be work – it can be a creative exercise that can be fun and extremely rewarding, both short-term and long-term. Here are some tips that should help you with your writing this jolly season:
- First, set some reasonable goals for yourself. It always helps to have some clear goals in place, so you know what you are heading towards. Whether you decide to write a certain number of words, pages or chapters, your goals should always be reasonable. It is Christmas and New Year, after all, so there may be some cooking, some family time and some fun involved that must be accounted for when setting your goals. Setting up some unreasonable goals that you won’t be able to achieve in time will only make you feel bad because you didn’t manage to finish what you wanted to.
- Make a plan/schedule. After you have set your goals, it is time to make a schedule. This will make your work even easier and will help you achieve all of your goals in the time you’ve set up in the beginning. Again, just like when you set your goals, you have to be reasonable when making your schedule. Write in your calendar and put some post-it notes on your desk to remind you when and when not to write.
- Delegate some of the usual holiday tasks to others. Free yourself from all the stress that cleaning and cooking for many people can bring. This way, your mind will be clear and ready to write. And this time, you have all the right reasons to ask some of your relatives to wash, clean and cook for you! Who knows when you will have this opportunity again – after all, they can’t say no to you when you are writing your own book!
I hope this will help you decide to write a book this winter holiday! Why not make this book your gift to you, after all?
Writing a book might seem like an overwhelming idea and the most complicated thing in the world, but it doesn’t have to be – with an idea to start with and a good system in place, anyone can write a book.
Writing and publishing your own book is an enormous accomplishment, a great ego boost and one of the greatest validations that you can hope for, there’s no doubt about it. And if you want to be regarded as an expert in your field, there’s no better way to do it than by having your own book.
Don’t be scared by time and don’t think that you can’t write a book. I personally believe that anyone can write a good book – and fast. And I’ll show you some tips that will help you do just that.
1. Set a time limit. Decide on a date by when you want your book to be finished and don’t accept anything less from yourself. Of course, make sure it is a realistic time period, and you definitely have enough time to finish your book by then. And tell all of your friends on Facebook and Twitter followers about your plan – knowing that everybody knows about your plans and that they might ask about your progress could really help motivate you.
2. Write down your strategy. After you’ve decided what the topic of your book will be, you should start strategizing. Write down all of the messages for your chapters and make notes under each chapter about what exactly you are going to write. You could also set up some daily or weekly deadlines. If you know exactly what you have to do each day, it will be much easier to finish the book by the date you’ve set in the beginning.
3. Research. Do all of your research before you start writing, or leave it all till the end. Try to write down all of your findings in one place, so you won’t need to go back and research constantly while you are writing. This will only distract and take more of your time. You could also set another time limit for your research, just to make sure you don’t get lost in the realm of interesting information that is available on the Internet and in libraries. Also, if you put all of your research in one place and categorize it, then you won’t lose time while you are writing looking for that paragraph in that book or that webpage from that obscure website.
4. Put all of your passion into your book. When you write a book, your readers will notice the heart, the passion and the love you’ve put into it. It probably is a safe assumption to make that when you decide to write a book, you are passionate about it and love the subject – and this will show in your writing. Your readers will feel this passion in every word and it will make your book that much better. People don’t want to read a heartless contract, after all. They are looking for that human touch, for that passion that characterizes us, as humans. When writing your own book you will also convey who you are and your personality in the pages of the book, so when your readers meet you in a social situation or a speaking event they will know that they are meeting the same person they met when reading your book.
5. Stay away from distractions. This can be especially hard, I know. It seems almost impossible not to check the Internet for the latest news, look at the phone to see if anyone tried to contact you in the last two minutes, or just check the time and weather every five minutes. Try to find a quiet place, where there is no Internet and “forget” your phone and your tablet at home.
6. Write anywhere, anytime. Every time you have a free moment, write something down. If you get an idea, wherever you may be, make sure you put it in writing, so you don’t forget it. You should also have a pen and paper ready to use by your bed, so whenever you get an idea while trying to sleep, you can easily jot it down. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gotten ideas at 2 in the morning, but was to lazy to get out of the bed to find something to write them down. And, of course, I always forget them the next day!
I really hope these tips will help you decide to write a book and help you write your best book fast. Let me know in your comments how your writing is going, and whatever problems you are facing! I am here to help!
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