You’ve already written your book, but you want to test the market or build an author platform before release by blogging it. How do you take your completed manuscript and break it down into 300- to 500-word pieces—blog posts—when you wrote it to flow as one continuous chapter after another? Good question. I continue to […]
The Pros and Cons of Blogging a Completed Manuscript
It’s not uncommon for writers with completed manuscripts to want to blog their projects. In their quest for ways to promote their work, they discover the “blog-a-book” concept and think it might work well even though they will skip a major step in the process. They won’t write, publish and promote their work but rather […]
Should You Blog Your Finished Manuscript?
Many writers who discover the benefits of blogging a book after they finish writing their manuscript are tempted to put this process to use at that late date. They wonder if it will have the same positive affect and if if it’s a good idea. After doing this myself, I don’t highly recommend it. Plus, […]
8 Ways to Test Market Your Book Idea
In both How to Blog a Book and my new book, The Author Training Manual: Develop Marketable Ideas, Craft Books That Sell, Become the Author Publishers Want, and Self-Publish Effectively, I suggest you evaluate your book idea before you begin blogging or writing it. Even if you spend time doing so, you may still lack certainty […]
What it Takes to Succeed as an Author
It takes more than just a good idea and good writing to produce a successful book. It also takes more than the ability to develop a large and engaged fan base—an author platform. And it takes more than an Author Attitude. To become a successful author you need to produce a marketable book. That means […]
Do You Have What It Takes To Become a Successful Author?
How to Blog a Better Book: Lesson #9 As National Book Blogging Month (NaBoBloMo) 2013 comes to a close, it’s time to ask yourself an important question: Do You have what it takes to become a successful author? If you blogged your book in 30 days, you know you can complete a manuscript. If you […]
Will Someone Really Steal Your Idea If You Blog Your Book?
If I had a dollar for each time an aspiring author voiced a concern about his or her blogged book idea getting stolen or actual blog content getting pirated, I’d be rich by now. This fear is similar to the one harbored by a person I know who won’t allow agents to look at his […]
Keeping the Energy Going
Last night, or rather this morning, at about 2 a.m., I was answering interview questions for a piece that would appear on someone’s blog. It was a very long interview–23 questions–that I should have completed about two weeks ago. I’d answered many of the questions many times before for other people. Then I came across […]
Should You Use a Pen Name When You Blog a Book (or Blog)?
Many aspiring authors and bloggers put off starting their projects while contemplating one big issue: using their real name on their work. The debate whether or not to use a pseudonym or a pen name. To me, this issue comes down to fear. Sometimes the fear has sound basis. Sometimes not. These are things to […]
C.C. Chapman on Blogging vs. Blogging a Book
Writers like to write. They don’t like to promote or build platform. That’s why I encourage them to blog and to blog their books. As they blog, they actually promote themselves and their work—and build platform. Why? Because they are producing content. Search engines love content. And readers want content—especially content that solves their problems, […]
