Speaking for FUN and PROFIT

Whether you are just starting or almost finished with your print or eBook, you wonder, “What step to take next?” Who can help me find the right publisher? Who can partner with me to make my book a solid seller? Check out your choices to be sure you get what you need.

Many writers think that all they need is a good editor and their book will be ready for publishing and promoting.

Maybe you think you don’t have enough time to write it yourself? A ghostwriter can take over and finish the research and get it out.

Think about another choice: Bookcoaching. Before you write too many scattered chapters consult with a coach who knows your book category, who your market is, and where to find them.

Your book coach also knows what makes up a saleable title and can help guide you to write a great seller by knowing your

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Not writing articles yet? You really should try it, if you want a lot of free traffic to your web site. A simple “Top Ten…” Or “Six Mistakes” type of article can be written by anyone. When you’re ready to start writing, avoid the following common mistakes people make when writing and submitting articles.

1. Too short. If it won’t fill a page, webmasters won’t want it. Write articles of at least 200 words.

2. Too long. Articles that are too long won’t be picked up by newsletters or most web sites. Keep it under 700 words.

3. Poor Title. “Air Safety Information,” could be the best article on air-safety ever written, and “I Survived A Plane Crash” the worst, but the latter would still get more readers. Get their attention with the title, or they’ll never know how good your article is.

4. No keywords in the title. If you call your story

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Every writer eventually develops her own unique style of writing. As you struggle to create your own voice, while focusing on the required standards, you may want to consider the following tips for improving your style and establishing a professional formula for success.

1. Edit your work continuously to eliminate all those extra words. One of the most common mistakes a writer makes is to use too many adverbs and adjectives. You should try to eliminate unnecessary content to keep your crisp and concise. Less is more.

   Example: Does the meaning change if you cut -

   • “past history” to “history”

   • “really unusual” to “unusual”

   • “very impressive” to “impressive”

   • “accurate facts” to “facts”

   • “true reality” to “reality”

   Choose your descriptive words carefully and utilize them in sentences where they will be most effective.

2. Select uncomplicated language to say what you mean as simply as possible. Writers frequently have a more extensive vocabulary than the average reader does. You will not impress

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Do you want to publish something? An article, a non-fiction piece, a short story, a children’s book, the great American novel? What are you waiting for? You may be answering that it’s just too competitive. Competition in the writing industry is fierce, no doubt, but many good writers have piles of work collecting dust in a box, sitting in the corner, or in file upon file, tucked away in a desktop PC. You may be one of them, and their problem and yours is not the competition. It’s the approach.

Ten years ago, publishing anything from a 500-word article to a suspense/thriller was a cumbersome task. The problem was the overwhelming procedure of querying an editor, waiting for a response to the query, tossing aside numerous rejections, then sending off your work after the query. Then, someone actually asked to see the work, only to decide they didn’t like it, after

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Still marketing your book through press releases, networking groups, and talks to groups? If these methods have taken a great deal of effort and time and brought you only a few clients or product sales, you may now be ready for your virtual marketing machine, the Internet!

To get ready to market your book Online use these ten tips:

1. Buy an up-to-date computer with a 56k modem or more and Internet capability.

2. Open an email account. Bypass the freebies, because you need an email account from which you can send an attachment. You want to look professional. For you email address, don’t use confusing letters and numbers. Use your name plus business keyword such as Judy@bookcoaching.com.

Since dial up connections are so slow, consider getting DSL or cable high-speed Internet. Before you buy, ask about limitations on sending group email (no-spam, of course).

3. Educate yourself about email, the Internet, and

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Making a speech seems simple. You speak, others listen. However this isn’t always the case, in fact one of the biggest challenges for speakers is getting their audience listen.
If you have to make a speech - you want it to be memorable and successful. If you understand why people don’t listen, you will be more successful at getting them to listen!

Here are nine reasons why people don’t listen to a speech.

1. Message overload.

If you are at a seminar and spend most of the day listening, you simply have too much information in your brain to retain all of it. Most presenters make the mistake - myself included - of putting too much content into their speeches.

2. Preoccupation.

Many in the audience are thinking about other issues - when is my pay due, what will I do on the weekend, I must finish that pressing business proposal etc.

3. Rapid thinking.

How often have

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Frequently when I am communicating with other webmasters and I
bring up the subject of writing articles, I often get a response
like “I’d rather have a root canal, I just can’t write”, or “my
spelling is horrible and my grammar is not much better”. In my
view, the first excuse is just a matter of attitude. The latter
excuse falls on deaf ears because the major word processing
programs have good spelling and grammar checking capabilities.

We’re not talking about something that would qualify for the
Pulitzer prize in literature, just articles dealing with a topic
that may be of interest to a group of people that also may
happen to have an interest in your particular business
proposition or activity.

While not as dramatic as the college professor’s dilemma of
“publish or perish”, many Internet marketers have found that the
publicity and traffic that articles can bring to their websites
is second only in importance to

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1 - Regardless of where you land your first writing job, chances are you will work an exorbitant number of hours for a less than desirable salary.

Below are the results of a poll on freelance income published in Freelance WorkExchange News: Market Bulletin FREELANCE SURVEY.

Thanks to the hundreds of you who took part in last week’s poll on freelance income. We asked you how much you earned from freelancing in a year. The results were as follows:

$0-10,000 48%

$10-20,000 8%

$20-50,000 14%

$50-100,000 18%

More than $100,000 12%

It seems that many of you are still freelancing part-time, or working at building up your business. However, a healthy 30% of you make over $50,000 a year, with a good percentage reaching six figures.

So the potential in the market is clearly excellent. We’ll be working hard to move many more of you into the $100,000 bracket in the months ahead.

See the following sites for more information

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Q: How do I expand on an idea without getting too wordy?

A. Before you begin counting words, focus on holding the reader’s interest.

(1) Writing as fast as possible, write up your idea, in expanded form, as if you were writing an email to a good friend. Don’t edit or censor yet.

(2) Stop! Take a break — at least fifteen minutes. Have a cup of coffee, take the dog around the block, spend quality time with the cat.

(3) Return to your article and go on the attack. Replace abstract thoughts with word pictures or anecdotes.

For example, this morning I wanted to encourage readers undergoing midlife crisis to be wary of costly career tests and assessments.

First, I wrote, “Some assessments are not especially scientific or valid. Astrology can be just as useful — and a lot cheaper.” Okay, but ho-hum.

I changed this sentence to, “At midlife, the tests invariably demonstrate that you’re

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I once read somewhere that at least 90% of language is non-verbal. How do we communicate then if only 10% of a language is actually spoken? The simple answer is body language. In general day-to-day life we are constantly reading other people’s body language. From just walking along a street and looking at passers by, we ascertain whether someone is friendly, hostile, approachable, standoffish or just indifferent. All this information is gathered and assessed subconsciously and without uttering a word.

Have you ever been in a room a shop or a park for example and spotted someone you took an instant dislike to? You don’t know the person, you’ve never seen them before, yet as soon as you looked at them they irritated and annoyed you. You didn’t like what you saw but you are totally unaware of the reason for this feeling.
The object of your irritation could be extremely

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