Get Known Before the Book Deal

The Intention Behind "Get Known Before the Book Deal"

If you are ordering or buying my book, Get Known Before the Book Deal, there's a good chance that you might wonder what other books to get with it.

To set the record straight, I never intended to cram every possible thing on platform into one book. Instead, I intended for GKBTBD to be a helpful primer. The book you'd likely read before or with Michael Larsen's How to Write a Book Proposal (learn more) or Elizabeth Lyon's Nonfiction Book Proposals Anybody Can Write (learn more).

There's a time and a place when writers tend to think about platform and that's when they are on their way to a writer's conference to meet agents and editors for the first time.

In Get Known, I'm suggesting that you think about platform as far before then as possible.

I am not sure that it would have been wise for me to cram in chapters on social networking, book promotion, and self-publishing into this book. In fact, I take that back: I am SURE cramming it all in would have been a bad idea. Get Known is a primer, not an encyclopedia.

To illustrate my point, a grateful reader recently e-mailed me and said:

"I particularly like the short chapter style [in Get Known]. I think that format makes the book "user and reader friendly" particularly for creating a writer's platform, something most writers find confusing.

You weave a seamless guide that ends with the reader saying, "I can do this!"

That was my intention. To help writers get platform and get that they can build theirs over time.

Also, let's get real. Social media books will likely fare much better as e-publications and Get Known was written for traditional print publication. What I had in mind was that like Larsen's and Lyon's books, the book would become a reliable book in its field. A great starting point with many books in many forms to come before and after.

Get Known covers the basics of platform development. If you read it and start to brainstorm ideas, as many readers say they do, then your platform will be off to a great start. Then, when you approach an agent with a book idea and that agent says, "So tell me about your platform," you won't be standing there with your mouth hanging open wondering what she means.

As I wrote in my last post on the definition of platform, the primary objective of Get Known is to help writers understand platform, so they can get theirs in gear.

So will there be more to do after the steps in Get Known?

Yes, there is always more to do. There's writing the book. There's marketing the book. There are all the breakthroughs in technology that are going to happen during the lifetime of your book (you hope). In these times that includes social media and reviewing other people's books in a variety of formats.

But the stage covered in my book is clearly described on page two. It's the preparation stage before writing a book proposal and pitching a book. Or, perhaps, you can develop your platform and your book concept simultaneously. I've seen people do it.

But whatever you do, don't try to throw the whole deal up overnight because it just doesn't work. And if you project an unholy urgency, that's just going to turn people, agents and editors included, off.

If I know one thing about writers after working closely with them for the past eight years, it's this: we get easily overwhelmed. We don't always need or want an encyclopedic approach. Sometimes a primer is all we need to get the idea and get going in our own way. And I hope you will actually be in the process of your platform and not just trying to use my book to wrangle a buck.

Because if you are a writer just starting to think about platform development for the very first time, you really don't have to think about social networking, book promotion, and self-publishing all at the same time...unless you are ready for all that.

I suspect, if I had tried to throw everything that's hot now into the mix of Get Known a lot of writers would have walked away completely overwhelmed.

What do you think? Should I have taken an encyclopedic approach and tried to cover everybody's everything and kept the whole thing up to date for traditional publication? (Would that even have been possible or would the book have already been outdated by now? I think so.)

Or do you find what's in Get Known to be enough? I'd like to hear what you think.

Happy platform building, writers!

Playing Catch-up: Link Roundup

Sorry to be MIA. I was working with my designer on the banner for this blog and the upcoming website. What do you think? A pretty big contrast from the look over at The Writer Mama Riffs, but that's okay! Speaking of my other blog, have you heard about the Writer Mama Back to School Giveaway? It's a daily writing book/stuff giveaway that starts tomorrow, September 1st. Here's the complete round-up of giveaway items and the "Da Rules."

Here's a few posts on platform that are worth your time:

Joe Wikert's Publishing 2020 blog has an interesting post about author's e-book rights.

Amazon is reportedly acquiring Shelfari. Interesting.

Chuck Sambuchino recently interviewed Jeffery McGraw of The August Agency, LLC and he has a few valuable things to say about author platform. Why not read the whole interview since it's a way down?

If you are a fitness pro, you'll be interested in this post on platform development from Amanda Vogel over at Active Voice Fitness Writing and Marketing. (Clever blog name, too.)

Joe Wikert also mentioned, "Penguin Group USA offers a free 64-page document called Internet Advice for Authors: Getting Started, Getting Online, and Getting Noticed. [Ed. Note: This link will download the PDF to your computer.]  This is an excellent resource for any author who doesn't know the first thing about websites, blogs as well as building a solid author platform and online presence.  It's great to see a major publisher sharing this sort of information with the world, not just their own authors."

Thanks, Joe and thanks Penguin!

And finally, my advice for aspiring authors who are considering cracking open their checkbooks and laying down a big chunk of dough for platform growing advice this fall. Save your money! Wait until October when my book, Get Known Before the Book Deal, Use Your Personal Strengths to Grow an Author Platform, will be rolling off the presses.

Can't wait to hear what you think about it. In the meantime, the praise has started rolling in. I'll post a taste next time...

Keeping Platform Development Real: The Blog-to-Book Deal

I see articles, like this one from Typepad all over the Web and traditional media. It's another article that will undoubtedly raise the hopes of bloggers everywhere that they too can land a six-figure book deal simply by choosing a topic and blogging about it.

I don't want to be a party-pooper. I really don't. But I feel the need to point out that while these three bloggers were landing book deals using the blog-to-book method, hundreds, if not thousands, of other writers were getting deals in the traditional manner by pitching themselves to agents and editors.

I was so happy to see popular blogger Penelope Trunk keeping the blog-to-book fantasy grounded for her fellow bloggers. You can see from her suggestions in this article, that while the goal of blog-to-book may sound oh-so much easier than going the traditional route, Trunk has no delusions about it. Platform building and marketing, which is how agents and editors typically view blogging, is actually not a substitute for all of the usual skill sets (like writing well and book proposal writing, which is the selling your writing part) that writers have to learn to clinch a book deal.

One of trickiest parts of what I do as a writing-for-publication instructor is help my students assess the value of their platform accomplishments through the eyes of agents and editors. Because yes, platform development through the Internet is very important for writers of every stripe, who wish achieve traditional publication. But their is a straighter, shorter path and that is to be the one who delivers your pitch to the agents and editors themselves, instead of waiting to be discovered.