When Indie Publishing Is a Viable Option 

I completed my first “real” manuscript in 2005 and entered it in the 2006 Golden Heart contest for romantic suspense. In a freaky run of good luck that book, “The Watcher”, won the award that year. 

To say I was elated is understatement. I’d entered on a lark, had no expectations or illusions about doing well, and even less understanding of what the award meant. 

On the excitement scale winning was a perfect ten, but in the real world of publishing it doesn’t guarantee anything. Realistically, winning RWA’s Golden Heart Award represents the fact that five of your writing peers deemed the first 50 pages of your manuscript strong enough in all elements of the scoring guide to win in a category of perhaps 150-200 entrants, depending on which category you entered. 

While that’s a big coup in the romance writing world, it guarantees nothing but the slim possibility of being published. 

News of my win brought lots of requests and an agent, but ultimately every publishing house passed on “The Watcher.” My agent was certain the book would go to auction, but it didn’t. 

That’s when I learned that “spin” is very important in selling a book, and that editors aren’t the be-all and end-all of the industry. There’s a hierarchy that has to be scaled before a book is acquired by a publishing house; the larger the house, the taller the ladder. And there are literally dozens of factors that must align like the stars for your book to get published. 

However, ever the optimist, I didn’t sit on my tush and complain. I finished a second book, “The Avenger,” which won the 2007 overall Daphne Award under another name, mutually parted with my agent, and continued to shop my books around. The contest wins garnered requests for partial and/or full manuscripts, but never amounted to a sale. 

I continued writing and learning about the craft and the business because, really, that’s the only part of the business the author can control. I wrote a third book in that loosely connected trilogy and two historical thrillers. I wrote a young adult paranormal.

Nothing sold. 

And, yes, in spite of my head telling me I was a solid writer, my heart felt like something you’d scrape off your shoes. Even though I never considered giving up, I got very weary of the highs and lows of submission and rejection, submission and rejection. 

I felt like I was on a merry-go-round that wouldn’t let me off, and I didn’t have the courage to leap toward the dizzying ground below!

Finally, I began to think about publishing “The Watcher” myself. My family and friends wanted to read it, and I thought they deserved at least a complimentary print copy. Perhaps my books would never be read outside my family, but that would bring me satisfaction. 

I had long clung to the traditional publishing model even though my common sense told me the landscape was changing, the internet was exploding, and writers were taking their careers into their own hands. Most of my writer friends gave me advice contrary to my own instincts, or I would’ve indie published a year before I actually did. I was ready to take the leap in early 2010. 

Still, I hesitated. ”Self-pubbed” had such an ugly ring to it. Did I really want to give up the “dream” of a book published by one of the NY Six? Would I sacrifice sensible and alternate publication to get my books in a brick and mortar establishment? Or did I simply want readers to enjoy my stories?

What finally moved me toward indie publishing was not Amanda Hocking’s or John Locke’s incredible success. It wasn’t my instinct that electronic books were the waves of the future. It wasn’t even my son-in-law saying, “It isn’t what percentage of the book market is now electronically published, Jo. It’s how fast it has happened.” 

Exponentially! 

Finally, it was my own mortality that kicked my ass. I thought of Andrew Marvell’s poem “To His Coy Mistress.” The thrust of the poem is “I could take more time to woo you, but ‘time’s winged chariot’ is at my back and I don’t have ‘world enough and time enough’ to waste.” 

I felt I could no longer woo New York. 

As a mature writer, I bring many skills and assets to the table, but youth isn’t one of them. As Marvell concludes in his poem, I cannot “make the sun stand still,” but I can give it “a good run.” I can “tear [my] pleasures with rough strife/through the iron gates of life.”

So I struck out on my own, grabbed the golden lasso and trudged through the incredibly exciting and wonderfully straight-forward journey of indie publishing. 

The first electronic copy of “The Watcher” went live on August 18; “The Avenger” went live on September 3; and “The Traitor,” on December 31, all in 2011. 

I haven’t looked back, haven’t harbored regrets, and haven’t stopped to count my sales or money earned (not much anyway, <g>) because really the only thing in the writer’s control is producing the next book. Our careers should always be about that. 

I do know I’ve achieved more in sales and income  in the last five months than I could’ve possibly done in traditional publishing in a full year. Clearly some of it is luck, much of it is hard work, and I like to think a smidgen of it is talent. 

The vagaries of the book industry are wide, wild, and unpredictable. Who knows what readers will like? Often they don’t know themselves until they see the cover or read the blurb. No one can predict what will flop and what will fly. Not NY, not indie publishers, not the woman on the street.

As an independent writer, you must do it all (or hire someone to do it for  you). If that scares you to death or you lack confidence in your own vision, then possibly indie pubbing is not for you. 

But if you’re confident in your writing, if you have strong resources in family and friends, and if you enjoy managing your own career and relying on the sweat of your own brow, then you might consider dipping your toe into the indie publishing pool. 

What do you have to lose? 

You can find the entire Andrew Marvell poem here: http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/marvell/coy.htm 

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I’m giving away one free download of “The Watcher,” “The Avenger,” OR “The Traitor” to one random lucky commenter.

Here’s a quick blurb on Jo’s latest, THE TRAITOR 

Assistant district attorney Isabella Torres and DEA Agent Rafe Hashemi want to prosecute the same man, notorious and vicious Diego Vargas. But Isabella believes Vargas knows something about the disappearance of  her older sister twenty years ago and wants to charge him for his current human trafficking operation. Rafe wants to nab the corrupt councilman for drug trafficking.  

When Isabella and Rafe meet anonymously at an upscale bar and end up spending a passionate night together, only to learn the next day who the other is, sparks fly and the game is on for control of the case. Forced to cooperate with each other, they must balance the danger of the case against the danger of their hearts. 

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Have you ever begun a sojourn that ended up being a much longer journey than you’d anticipated? Have you ever started one thing only to see it turn into something else?

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Join us tomorrow for a Q &A with fire arms expert Adam Firestone.

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Bio: Like many writers, Jo Robertson penned her first story at a young age. However, a family and a teaching career put her writing dreams on hold until her Advanced Placement seniors conned her into writing her first complete manuscript. That story, which subsequently won RWA’s Golden Heart Award in 2006, was THE WATCHER. Contact Jo at:  http://www.jo.lewisrobertson@yahoo.com. Also follow her on www.twitter.com/jorobertson29 or www.facebook.com/jorobertson44.

I’m thrilled to be a part of Romance University during the first week of the new year and I hope all of you guys enjoyed a wonderful holiday season. Now that we’re all rested and have eaten waaaay to much, I hope you’re as excited to get back to work as I am!
On January 19th, Market or Die will launch its third book in the series titled, “Market or Die: Integrated Marketing Plans for Writers.” In this book, I’ll go into detail on how a writer should market using an integrated strategy. For those who can’t wait for the release, here’s a sneak peek.
There are 7 key components to constructing a successful book marketing strategy. Hopefully, all of you have thought about one or all of them, somewhere along the way to marketing greatness. With marketing now resting in the author’s hands, it’s important to have a strategy before you release your book.

#1 – List your goals. So, you have a book to market, what’s your goal? To sell $1000 worth of books? To make it an Amazon.com bestseller? To have your e-books out sell your print copies 3 to 1?

Whatever your goal is, write it down. Writing down your goal(s) will keep your marketing strategy focused. When you see your goals on paper, you work harder to find a way to achieve them.

#2 – Research Social Media Sites. Make a determination of which social media sites are right for you. You’ll probably start with Facebook, Twitter and a Blog. Make a note to monitor these sites with what is being said about you and your work using an application like Google Alerts. Knowing what is being said about you online, helps you stay in the know without spending countless hours online.

#3- Build a list of connections and content. Play the who do you know game. Write down all the connections you have in the industry and how they can help you achieve your goal. Do you need marketing help? A book review? An endorsement? If so, who do you know that can help you achieve those things…write it down and reach out to the people on your list and ask for their help. You have a book to sell and a goal to achieve. Now isn’t the time to be shy.

#4- Join in. Whether you belong to an in person writers group, or online. Get involved and start making new connections. Meet new people and start networking. Post thoughtful comments on industry-related blogs or topics relevant to your books. Confident, secure people in the industry LOVE helping others.

#5- Strengthen and build on existing relationships – Now, isn’t the time to get lazy with the friends you’ve already made in the industry either. Work to get to know them more closely. Meet them in person if you can. You’ll not only learn more about your industry, you’ll build stronger advocacy connections within your existing group.

#6 – Measure your results. You will need to be able to make sure that you can measure your goal. List out how you plan to do that? Maybe it is via sales numbers? Numbers of Facebook Fans? Amazon.com rankings? Knowing how you will succeed is just as important as succeeding.

# 7 – Analyze, test and change. No matter if you achieve your goal or not, it’s important that you look at what happened during the marketing phase of your book. Do you have the right connections? Was your goal realistic? What, if anything, did you fail to consider? Change up your plan for the next release in order to position yourself for greater success.

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Jennifer would like to hear from you. What is your greatest marketing challenge?

Tomorrow, the fabulous and prolific M/M romance author, Andrew Grey, helps us with our writing goals.

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Bio:

Jennifer Fusco is the Creative and Brand Manager for the General Electric Company, North America and the author of the Amazon.com bestselling series, MARKET OR DIE, marketing books for writers.

A two time winner of the Advertising Excellence Award for 2010, Jennifer has launched successful national print and digital ad campaigns. Currently, she is a member of the (ANA) Association of National Advertisers and believes brand building is a key to professional success.

Due to the overwhelming response Market or Die received from writers, Ms. Fusco launched a website and blog designed to educate writers of all genres.

In her writing life, Ms. Fusco is a member of RWA’s PRO network and serves as the President of the Connecticut Romance Writers. She is represented by Eric Ruben of The Ruben Agency. Jennifer has also completed two paranormal romance manuscripts and will be a monthly contributor to the Romance Writers of America’s RWR Report, beginning in 2012.

Born in North Carolina, Jennifer currently lives in Connecticut with her husband and young son.

Making an Appearance

The skills necessary to appear in front of a group of readers that you don’t know are vastly different from the skills you need to sit down and write a book. But the task doesn’t have to be as alien or as terrifying as it may sound. For all that I don’t mind talking to people, I hate to be put on the spot about the book I’m writing. Most authors are.

And that’s okay.

The first thing to remind yourself when you are preparing for an author event is that it is okay to not answer some questions. J.R. Ward isn’t going to reveal who all her upcoming couples are and Kresley Cole may not want to rip the band-aid off who a popular character’s potential mate is and Nora Roberts is hardly going to confirm the precise book and time that Eve and Roarke will have a baby.

Why?

Because the readers don’t need to know that and you, the author, don’t have to tell them. So let yourself off the hook for the hard questions. Prepare yourself with an answer for those. When Richelle Mead, the author of the popular young adult series The Vampire Academy, made a stop in the area to sign the sixth and final book, she opened her comments up with three caveats:

• She wouldn’t talk spoilers about the current book and asked her readers to do the same
• She asked that questions avoid potential cliffhanger spoilers at the ends of the book
• And while she knew that the final book would lead to a lot of questions for the readers about certain characters’ fates, she wouldn’t comment on all of them because some, if not all, would be appearing in the new book series

Short. Sweet. To the point. Did it make some of the readers unhappy? Sure. They want to know everything that’s going to happen. They are invested in the work. But that’s a double-edged sword and the new author is going to want to reveal every juicy detail, particularly with an enthusiastic crowd, but remember — you want the readers to still buy the books so if you feed them the whole meal, they might not and particularly if you are still in the middle of writing it — your ending may not be the one you told the readers and that can lead to even more grief.

It’s simpler for you and easier for your readers if you just decide right up front what questions you won’t answer and a polite, easy way of saying no comment to the question. For me, it’s usually a teasing grin and a “you’ll see.” It’s even more fun to grin enigmatically and say, “you’ll see” even when you don’t know the answer.

Preparing For the Event

Okay, you’ve established which questions you’re not going to answer. Now what questions do you answer? What do you say? How do you brace yourself for standing in front of strangers and letting them into the private worlds you write about.

The first thing to remember is that author events, reader events, book clubs, book signings and more are all social events. In most cases, you, the author, are as much a guest as you are a host. You’ll have been invited to be there, a host will act as a liaison for you.

That liaison is a good person to check with in order to take the temperature of the group you will be visiting. Don’t be shy about asking. For example, if you’re visiting a book club at a store and you’ve been invited, doublecheck what this club reads. If they are mystery/thriller fans, they may not be the audience for your paranormal romance and vice-versa.

If the event or host has a website, check it out. Check out what they’ve been reading. Are you familiar with any of the authors? If it’s a multi-author event and you’re being invited, who else is going? Are they in a similar genre? Imagine, if you will, you are a YA author and you’ve been invited to an event where all the other authors in attendance write category romance — you might not share the same audience.

That being said, some of the best events feature an eclectic mix of authors. I’ve found new authors to love and read at events where the guests varied as wide as YA to historical to paranormal to chick lit and straight contemporary suspense. Do your homework and be prepared — it’s fun if you get the chance to go to the same event as an author you happen to like personally.

As an aside, a few months ago, I attended a science fiction convention. I was chatting with Bruce Boxleitner while he was autographing for fans when actress Kate Vernon skipped across from the table where she was signing for her fans to shake his hand, chat with him and share a gleeful greeting with an actor she admired. It was adorable, fun to witness. Events are opportunities for you and for your readers.

Quick Tip:

If it’s your first time, ever, talking to a group of readers as a genuine, professional author, I recommend taking a friend. They can be another author or a personal friend, but it’s the support structure that can help. Multi-author signings offer you the benefit of sitting in good company in an encouraging atmosphere. Friends at a reader event means one friendly face in the crowd and if you’re nervous about talking, you can ask them to stand towards the back and even shift around unobtrusively, allowing you one person you know you can connect to.

Be Optimistic

It’s easy to say don’t be nervous. But the simple truth is, everyone gets nervous. I’d remind you to just go, be positive and be professional. You’re representing your books and it’s okay to laugh with the people who like them, nod to the people who don’t (and yes, people who don’t like what you write are just as likely to make a point of telling you). Don’t take any of it personally, just focus on being positive and upbeat.

The best signings, the best events and the best book clubs are with authors who walk in the door open-minded and outgoing. I’ve watched friends who were intensely private, shy people, turn on the bubble and the smile.

• One author told me that she just makes herself smile, no matter what and as long as she remembers to flex her face muscles, the rest of it is easy.
• Another author practices sixty second answers to all the interview questions she gets when she does blog tours as a way of preparing for a signing, reading or event
• A third walks in the door cold, sits down and says, okay, what do you want to know?

Go to other author and reader events, attend as a reader. Sit in the back and watch. Every author handles it a little bit differently, adding the flavor of his or her personality to the mix. But I’ve learned from every single one of them.

Focus on your readers, listen to their questions and then share your love of the written word with them. The one thing that you may have trouble wrapping your mind around at first is that all those people whether it’s 2 or 200 came to see you. They took time out of their day to come and listen to you because they love words – your words.

So don’t be afraid to talk to them, you might just surprise yourself with how much fun you can have.

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So, RU Crew what is it about author appearances that worries you? Excites you?

Urban Fantasy author Jaye Wells brings insight and experience to the table as she explores twining existing myths and folktales into your world building.

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Bio:  As a child, Heather Long skipped picture books and enjoyed the Harlequin romance novels by Penny Jordan and Nora Roberts her grandmother read to her. A grown up romantic, she’s a kid at heart who believes laughter is as important to life as breathing and the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus are very real. Heather  writes contemporary romance with a dash of humor and paranormal suspense with a splash of fantasy. She’s a member of Romance Writers of America, North Texas Romance Writers, Dallas Area Romance Authors and Romance Writers of America’s Fantasy, Futuristic and Paranormal Chapter.  And lately, she’s been to a lot of book signings, book clubs, author teas and reader/author weekends.

In May 2009, one of the biggest editors in romance at my dream publishing house offered me a three-book contract. I had worked for years to achieve this.

But that’s backstory. The story I’m going to tell today is what happened next. I call this story “What I Learned on After-the-Sale Vacation.”

First (since I am also a professional historian, and historians love to tell the punch line before the joke), here’s The Big Lesson I Learned: Nothing changes. Well, yes, your book ends up on bookstore shelves and lots n’ lots of people read it and tell you they adored it. This is fantastic. Actually, it’s way beyond fantastic. But nothing inside you changes. All that eagerness, all that love and passion and emotion I put into my writing, all that heartbreak and anxiety and uncertainty and frustration and fear and sheer boiling mania I felt before I made that sale is still with me. It is part of me. Succeeding in this manner has not changed me as a person. Ten years at a Zen monastery and some really good therapy might. But that’s also another story.

What did I learn, in practical terms?

1. First-week sales are HUGELY IMPORTANT. Great first-week sales land you on bestseller lists, which then go into promotion for your next book, which then sell more of that next book. They also help determine whether the big buyers will buy your second book in quantity. Do whatever you can to encourage readers to buy your book in those first few days. This includes promoting your book through social media (Facebook, twitter, blogs, etc.) and mailings to booksellers and book clubs before the book releases.

A Lady's Wish by Katharine Ashe

2. Professional contacts are crucial for creating a buzz for your first book. But you must start networking early. I don’t mean four months before your release date. I mean four years. At least one or two. Volunteer for positions in writers groups that will help you meet industry people. Every positive contact you make during these years will serve you well. I was co-chair of Programming for my local RWA chapter for two years before I got published. In planning monthly programs I met industry luminaries whose effect on my career has been significant. This takes time and effort, but it is incredibly fun, and it ensures that your name is familiar to influential people when your book hits the stands.

3. Take your time. When I learned of the eight-month space between the release dates of my first two books, I groaned. How would this build an audience? But I spent those months learning about promotion and, more importantly, writing the best books I could. That time also gave me the creative space I needed to propose an additional project to my editor. That project became my e-book, A LADY’S WISH (March 15), a $1.99 delicious little novella tied into my print trilogy, to be released two weeks before book 2 of the series, CAPTURED BY A ROGUE LORD (March 29). We invented this e-novella as a promotion for the print series, but it turned out to be super fun to write! It never would have happened, though, if I’d been rushing. In the crazy-speedy world of publishing, time can be a writer’s friend.

4. Don’t be surprised when people you thought would embrace your triumphs do not. Be gracious. No matter what. No. Matter. What. (Graciousness always feels better to me anyway.)

5. All bloggers are not created equal. Many are magically wonderful and I cherish them—like the women of Romance University! Other bloggers are not interested in furthering your career. Some are unprofessional. Take very great care in planning your blog appearances.

6. Fan mail is worth it all.

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If you are a published author, did you learn any crucial lessons after your first sale? If you are yet-to-be-published, tell us what you are doing now to prepare for those months between your first sale and book release, because we’d love to give you a high five and “Way to go!”

Don’t forget to join us on Monday, March 14 as Sally Bayless pops in to tell us about her writing journey.

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Bio: The American Library Association’s Booklist named Katharine Ashe one of the “New Stars of Historical Romance” and her debut historical romance, Swept Away By a Kiss, was nominated for Best First Historical Romance in the Reviewers’ Choice Best Book Awards. Katharine lives in the wonderfully warm Southeast with her husband, son, two dogs, and a garden she likes to call romantic rather than unkempt. A professor of European history, she has made her home in California, Italy, France, and the northern US. Please visit her at www.katharineashe.com.

Welcome, Jeannie!

Thanks for having me back, RU Crew!

If you missed last month’s post, I gave the details on how to build a plan for Twitter.  This post will help you to build a plan around using Facebook for marketing purposes and how to make it work for you instead of suck the hours from your day. (Hint #1: Stay away from the games.)

Finding the Time

One thing about social media — there is always something to tweet about, or someone else’s posts to read. It can consume a tremendous amount of time if you let it.  Sometimes, I think people look at the possibilities for life domination by social media and shy away to avoid it. But it doesn’t have to control your life.  Social media is like an employee – it’s supposed to work for YOU.

Going into social media without setting your own boundaries would be like giving a new employee a signed blank check.  It would be a matter of seconds before they spend crazy amounts.  So don’t give social media a blank check of your time. To quote one of my favorite movies, “We say who. We say when. We say how much.”

To make any sort of social media community work for you on a business level, you have to make a plan.  You have to allot the amount of time you can spend, the resources you have to devote to it and work from there.

And one very important aspect: separate out the time you interact with friends and family on Facebook versus the time you spend actually connecting/building with your readership or networking. Time is as important an investment as money, and when you’re a writer, sometimes more so. Consider your minutes like gold coins and hand them out with care.

So let’s make your Facebook community work for you:

Friends versus Fans — which do you want?

There are two ways to join the Facebook community:

1.    Create a personal profile for yourself and become friends with others.

2.    Create a business page that others can “like”.

Let’s look at the differences in how each works:

Managing Your Facebook profile

A profile works best when you wish to communicate equally with someone else. By creating your profile and “adding a friend”, you are both agreeing to see each other’s updates. This is great when you are dealing with your friends, family and old acquaintances.  It can also work for you when you wish to network with others in the publishing industry – other writers, agents, editors, etc.

If you’re concerned that the agent you aspire to have won’t want to read about your cat’s trip to the vet, you’re probably right. Though it is pretty simple to skim the news feed that comes from your friends’ list, you can use List and Locks to help manage your profile.

Lists

Whenever you add a friend, you have the option to add them to a list.  This is a tremendous tool, one you should get in the habit of using.  It’s invaluable to help stay on track with your time and goals for using Facebook.

1. You can Choose Who See Your Status Updates.

If you separate your friends into lists, such as “family, Friends, Writers Network”, etc, when you make your status updates, you can choose which lists see the updates.  So if you’re writing about the dog, the cat, or just something more private, you can keep those updates to those closest to you.

2. You can view statuses by list only.

This is terrific when you’re looking to focus the time you spend on Facebook. (A must when using Facebook for business purposes.)

If you have allocated ten minutes toward building your professional connections, you need to make sure those ten minutes are doing only that. One excellent way is to categorize your friends into lists.

Lists can include:

• Family
• Friends
• Writers Network
• Agents & Editors
• New Friends

Facebook is terrific in that it brings together all the factions of your life, but you won’t always communicate with those groups in the same way.  Let’s say I want to spend five minutes on networking.  I can click on my “Writers Network” list and see all the writers and authors I am friends with. I can leave comments, read updates and check in …and just as easily check out.  It makes those five minutes clear, concise and well spent.

Locks

Along with using the lists above, you can set locks (permissions) on your status updates, your photo galleries and other things you add to your profile.

When you post a status update, if you wish to control who sees it, click on the little lock icon.  If you select “Customize”, this will allow you to choose among your lists.  Only the lists you select will see that update. The same is true of your photo albums.

Essentially, wherever you see that little lock icon it offers you options on who sees what in your profile.  Using the lists can help you focus your activities and your time spent, it also allows you to choose whether the agent you admire sees everything you post about your family.

Managing a “Fan” or Business Page

When it comes to readers or fans of your work, less can be more.  Since a profile requires equal sharing of personal information, readers may not feel comfortable befriending you.  However, “liking” your business/Writer page is simple and easy and helps them stay connected.  It’s also been set up within Facebook that you can connect this directly through your website.

There are basics I often see overlooked in Facebook Fan Pages, though.  Readers like your page and visit your page for two things:

• Interaction
• Information

If you aren’t providing both of these, your fan page needs an overhaul.

Interaction

Once you have a fan page, you actually have to post on it. J (I know, darnit.) I’m guilty of forgetting this myself and sometimes it can be impossible to think of what to say.

If you do actively use your Profile and your Fan Page, treat them differently.  Truly focus on the audience and post for them.  Maybe one way to separate the two is share aspects of your work on your fan page and leave the more personal aspects to your profile page.  Remember the goal is to interact. Ask questions, answer ones commonly asked (such as every writer’s favorite, where do you get your ideas?). Yes, it’s “all about you”, but the conversation with your followers shouldn’t be.

Hold Facebook-only contests.  Give away autographed copies of your book (or someone else’s) or ARCs or maybe even a gift basket of things that tie into your book.

Information

Does your Fan Page have information abut your upcoming releases? Or your current release?  An easy way to find your website or an easy click-to-buy link for your books?  One reason a Fan Page works as great marketing is the ability to share all the details about you as the author and your work, but you’d be surprised how few authors give that information on their fan pages.  Post your reviews. Book trailers. Videos.  Post tidbits of your current story. Give additional insight into you that they won’t find on your website or elsewhere (such as your all-consuming love of Smores Ice Cream. Oh wait, that’s me…)

Sometimes it seems like double the effort, but the goal is to remain engaged with your readers before, during and after you have a book on the shelves.

Ultimately, the best elements of a successful fan page will include the following:

1.    A branded experience targeted to your audience
For a writer this means post with the voice your books offer.  Are you quirky? Come up with quirky, off-the-wall things to comment on.   If you’re a suspense writer, share your top scariest movies moments.

2.    Having a conversation with you.
Posting your updates and making them relevant is only part of the equation.  When folks take the time to comment back, stay engaged.  Reply.  You may not have the time to reply to all of them and that’s okay. But one or two blanket statements so that folks know you’ve read them, you’ve seen them, can make a world of difference.

Some Common Mistakes

When authors and writers set up their fan pages and profile, I see a lot of common mistakes that can minimize the effectiveness of your efforts.

• Don’t post the same status update on both your profile and fan pages.   If someone is connected to both your profile and your fan page, seeing you post exactly the same thing to both can feel like being spammed. Eventually, when people see double on a regular basis, they’ll stop reading and you’ve lost the connection.  Facebook works because it feels personal.  Tailor your posts to the audience at hand.  A profile is meant to be more personal.

• Use a different picture for your profile on each page you have.   When your status updates come up, they see your profile picture thumbnail and your words.  It helps to show a separation.

• Reply to comments.  If you’ve posted and people have responded, be sure to engage them back.  They like to be heard, and being acknowledged by you can make a world of difference.  Being ignored by you repeatedly can, as well.

Don’t forget: Linking to/from your website

Because Facebook is the proverbial lunch room, you want to drive traffic in a strong flow between your website and your Facebook page.  There are simple ways to do that by adding plugins to your site (whether it’s made in HTML or WordPress or something else entirely.)  WordPress offers a large amount of plugins to make the steps easy, so do a search for “Facebook” and you’ll find plenty to choose from.  The other option is to go to the Facebook Plugins page at http://developers.facebook.com/plugins .  From here, you can choose the type of link to Facebook you want your site to have: from a simple “LIKE” button to more complex options like using a Facebook login to interact on your website.

Over Saturation through Inter-connectivity

There are also apps that will allow you to connect your Twitter accounts to your Facebook, as well as pulling in your blog posts.  This is certainly open for debate and you have to choose what is the best option for you, but my advice is to error on the side of caution. This creates a seamless connection between twitter and your blog and your  Facebook pages.  If you have your twitter feed automatically posting to your Facebook, and your blog automatically posting to your twitter feed, someone who reads ALL of those will get the information in triple.  It’s a quick way to get them to tune out and stop reading what you have to say.

If you’re depending on your twitter and blog feeds to populate your Facebook pages, then you aren’t using it for what it’s intended.  Facebook is a community, meant for conversation and interaction.  To automate your process too much means you’re missing out on the best benefits it offers.

Finally, Measuring Results

Fan pages offer the opportunity to measure your results through Facebook Insights. On the left sidebar of your fan page, you’ll see a box titled “Insights”.  Only the admin can see this box, and if you click on “see all”, it will give you details about the traffic on your site.  You need a certain number of fans to see geographical information, but you can measure the growth rate and interaction rate of your fans.  But much of this is intuitive — you know if people are responding to you.  If they aren’t, mix up what you post, add something new and don’t be afraid to try.

Ultimately, social media can work for you as well as you want it to.  Always keep the goals in mind when interacting on a business level.

***

RU Crew, tell us about your experience with Facebook. Do you have a fan page? If so, how do you make it effective for you?

Jeannie, thanks for continuing this fantastic special series! Drop by tomorrow when Theresa Stevens, Publisher, STAR Guides Publishing, talks about first meets between the hero and heroine.

Jeannie’s Bio: It was a Saturday afternoon when Jeannie Ruesch gave up her illustrious, hours-long ambition of becoming a Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader (after seeing the made for TV movie).  That day, she sat to write her very first story and when she was finished, she knew that pen ..or rather, pencil and collegiate-lined paper was the path for her.  She was six.  She finished her first two books in 7th grade—handwritten on 150 legal size pages and complete with hearts dotting the I’s, of course.

As an adult, however, she discovered the need to…well, pay for things.  In her words, she “paid a lot of money to go to school, get a degree and go beg for work.”  She began her career in marketing and design and continues to this day, with her graphic design and marketing business, Will Design for Chocolate.  She considers herself fortunate that her passion of writing and her other love go hand in hand so nicely.

In 2008, she sold her first completed novel (as an adult and written on a computer this time) to The Wild Rose Press– a historical romance that has been a labor of love from the start.  “It’s been through four or five revisions, including one complete scrap-it-and-start-over, and has been a wonderful tool for learning how to be a better writer.”

She is also the creator of the WIP Notebook, a writer’s tool to help stay organized while you write.

Now with a few more tools in her author’s tool belt, her first published book, and a drawer full of emergency chocolate, she has a lot more stories to tell.  She lives in Northern California with her husband (who is likely tired of having his brain picked on the ‘male perspective’), their son and her brother, who she thanks every day (since he cooks and she hates to.)

***

The Home Stretch

Part 6 – The Grand Finale

Hup, Two, Three, Four! Get your rears in gear, we’re off for our final lesson on how to conquer WordPress. Hip Hip Hooray!!

And finally we move to the last (hey, quit applauding!) button on the dashboard. After this, you’ll be a pro. Heck, you’ll probably be teaching ME!

• Settings/General:
• Site Title – You can change it here!
• Tagline - Think of something brilliant – but remember, you can always update it later.
• Email Address – If you’re changing email accounts, you’ll need to change this as well, and wait for a confirmation.
• Time Zone - Choose a city that’s closest to your time zone.
• Date Format - Whichever tickles your fancy!
• Time Format – Your choice!
• Week Starts on – This will affect your calendar widget.
• Language -  =)

• Writing:
• Size of the post box – If you write short pithy posts, you can comfortably set this to 20-30 lines. If you write literary masterpieces, experiment with this. If you set it to be 100 lines, 100 lines will show on the front page, and then it will automatically create a link to another page. If your posts are long, use this wisely grasshopper, and people won’t have to scroll for miles to see your next post down!
• Formatting – If you click the emoticons box then your =) will be converted into a smiley graphic. If you click the correct invalidly nested box, WP will fix various XHTML mistakes for you.
• Press This and Post by Email were both covered above.

• Reading:
• Front page displays:
• Latest posts – Most blogs are set up this way, latest post on top, older posts below
• Static page – Here you can choose one of your pages to be on the front page of your blog all the time. More like a website.
• Blog pages – choose how many posts you’d like
• Syndication Feeds – The number of posts people will see when they download one of your feeds
• For each article in a feed show – Choose full text or a summary
• For each article in an enhanced feed show – Take your pick!
• Encoding – best to leave it at UTF-8
• Email Settings – when someone subscribes to your site, this is the email they’ll receive.

Remember to click Save Changes!

• Discussion:
• Default Article Settings –
• Attempt to notify any blogs linked to from the article. This will ‘ping’ (*see below for an explantion of pinging) any link you have in your post. If you post a lot of links, it will slow down your posting considerably, as each link must be pinged before you can post.
• Allow link notifications from other blogs – When someone posts a link to YOUR blog, you’ll get a ‘ping.’ This is good!
• Allow people to post comments on the article – Lets people comment on your post. If you want to post with no responses, uncheck this box!
• Other comment settings – Take a moment to read through these. They are truly self-explanatory, but necessary if you’re accepting comments.
• Email Me Whenever – if you want a quick email when someone posts a comment, or a comment is being held, check these.
• Before a Comment Appears – I recommend you check both of these. You’ll receive a very brief email with a link to address any comments.
• Comment Moderation – With a spam filter, moderation isn’t the nightmare it used to be. But in the large text box, you can enter various words you don’t wish to see posted in comments. Any comment that uses those words will be held until you manually approve or disapprove.
• Comment Blacklist – same as above, except comments containing these words will be marked as spam. No moderation needed.
• Comment Reply via email – =) just like it sounds
• Subscribe to Comments – if you have a hot commentary on your blog, this will send the comments to your email box
• Subscribe to Blog – This is your goal – to get people to subscribe to your blog, to see what brilliant words fall from your keyboard.
• Avatar Display – Avatars are the little pictures displayed next to a comment. Mine is generally an adorable smartass, although other people use their photos or book covers. Choose if you’d like avatars displayed or not – Gravatar is currently the most common.
• Media Settings:
• Image Sizes – My thumbnail size is generally 150×150, but you can choose what size fits you best. And you can resize it in the post as we described in Lesson 4!
• Auto Embed – makes it super easy to embed videos – just add the URL to your post as plain text on it’s own line and voila.
• Video Player – If you post a video on your site, clicking this will play your video in the VideoPress format.
• Privacy:
• Site Visibility: If you’re going to be Queen of the Blog World, check number one. If you just want humans – not search engines looking for your blog, check number two. If you’re blogging out the secret resources on planet Cadmaxiumnium and require your posters to log in, click three.
• Open ID:
• This allows you to use your blog URL as a sign in to any Open ID sign in form. Less remembering of passwords – yeah!
• Domains:
• Lets you redirect your blog to a URL you already own, or purchase a URL, such as www.iwriterealgood.com. Or just keep the freebie you have.
• Webhooks – This is out of beginner range. Sorry guys, look for it in the next group of lessons for when you become – TaDa!!! Super Blogger!!
• *Pinging - WordPress automatically notifies Ping-O-Matic each time you create or update a post. Then Ping-O-Matic notifies about 20 other services that you’ve updated your blog. This lets people who browse sites like Technorati or Sphere find your most recent posts! However, if you put a lot of links in your post, Ping-O-Matic has to test each one to make sure it works, and this slows everything down. Waaay down.

This concludes our walk through the WordPress.com blog park. Now take your gallons of knowledge, your pretty pictures and your brilliant writings and let’s get posting. Please feel free to post your URL here – we’d love to see what you’re up to! I’ll go first! http://ccspencer.wordpress.com/. And if you want to see the benefits of a WP.org blog, visit http://www.smartassromance.com or take a look around RU! Gotta love WordPress!

***

Carrie is a faculty member on Romance University. In her spare time she manages a restaurant, designs jewelry and websites, and is writing three manuscripts concurrently. She lives on a farm in Iowa with seven cats, a husband from England and, as was discovered in the mudroom last week, a family of raccoons. You can visit her blog anytime at Smart Ass Romance.

***

The Home Stretch

Hup, Two, Three, Four! Keep it moving, keep it moving! No WP slackers allowed!

Today we’re tackling the middle of the dashboard. Most of it is self-explanatory, but that doesn’t mean I’m not going to tell you what it does anyway. As anyone who has ever read one of my manuscripts can tell you, I love redundancy a lot. Repeatedly.

This is the middle of the dashboard, where most of the good stuff is. Some of it we’ll gloss over, and some we’ll dig in a little deeper. Shovels handy?
* Under each main category, ie posts, media, etc., is a drop down box. Clicking on the main title will bring you to the sub menu. Generally the first button in the drop down menu is the same as the main category tab. For example, under Posts, the first button is Posts. The same thing. You’ll see it listed below as Posts/Posts.

• Posts/Posts: Your main column will list all of your current posts, categories, stats, tags, author and date posted. The posts button underneath shows the exact same screen.
• Add New – Add in a new post
• Categories – Add new categories; review the ones you have already listed. From here you can add and delete categories, as well as create a hierarchy of categories. For example Romance is one of your categories. If you’d like to make a sub-category underneath it, you would add in Comedy in the top box title then under the Parent drop down box you would choose Romance as the main category, and then add in a description.
• Post Tags – Displays tags you already have in use and allows you to add more more more!
• Media/Library: Displays the photos and other media you currently have uploaded to your library, what post they’re in, and allows you to delete them from here. You have limited space, so be careful what you upload! No videos of your time share in Aruba!
• Add New – Upload new images or other media files here.
• Links/Links: If you choose to have links as one of your sidebar widgets (see lesson 4) these are the links that will displayed. Feel free to add, delete and edit these to your hearts content.
• Add New -  Add the title of the link, the URL and a description. Again, you can add different categories here, and there’s something new called Link Relationship. If you link to someone else’s blog, you can specify whether that person is your spouse, a co-worker or friend.
• Link Category – Blogroll is the category that is default with WordPress. You can add other categories if you like, ie Recipes and Ghost Sightings if you’d like.

• Pages/Pages: Displays pages already on your site, their posting date and author.
• Add New – Add in a new page. Remember! Adding in a new page will also add a new button to your nav bar. Some good ones are Books, Authors, Contact, Armadillos (juuuuust checking to make sure you’re paying attention!)

• Comments: This one is a little exciting. =) Once your blog gets to be well known, other people will comment on it. Sometimes it’s just Hey! Great post! And sometimes it’s an ad for toilet bowl cleanser. Either way, comments will end up here, waiting for your approval or disapproval. Mouseover each comment and you can choose Approve, Edit, Spam and Trash. You can also edit the comment.
• Ratings/Settings: Click the check box if you’d like to enable ratings on your pages/posts/comments. On your page it will give you five stars and let visitors choose to rate your posts, just like RU has!
• Reports – Will give you a report on how many stars you’ve gotten! Woot!

• Polls: If you need to add a poll on your site, this is the spot to do it!
• Click on Auto-Create
• Click Do it
• Click create!
• The top box holds your poll question
• The middle box holds your poll answers
• The bottom box lets you pick a style.
• The right hand boxes let you choose if you want to allow people unlimited voting, or restrict to just once and how you want to show your poll results

TADA! Done with the middle submenu, and we’re heading into the final group of menus, starting with appearance. Stop and have a cookie before continuing on, you’re going to want to keep your strength up! Hi-Ho Hi-Ho!

• Appearance/Themes: Review lesson one if you have any questions here!
• Widgets: Covered in lesson four.
• Menus: Not supported in most WordPress themes. If you have a theme that does support menus, make a very simple one following the instructions and then preview to see how it looks.
• Extras:
• mshots: Media Shots enable visitors to get a peek at the sites you link to. Mouseover and a preview will pop up. Pretty darn cool.
• Display for a mobile phone – check this one, I just got a new Blackberry and I might be wandering by your site for a peek!
• Hide related links on this blog. I keep this one unchecked – the more traffic the merrier!
• Background: If you want to upload your own custom background image, or use a color that you love (ORANGE!) here’s the place to do it. Just for fun I put one of my stripey cat as a background. Luckily it lets you preview your horrifying mistakes before you make it a reality. Cute kitty, but not tiled thousands of times over. Yikes.
• Header: Here you can custom load your own header – the top section of the page with your blog name. What fun! If you like making your own graphics, here’s the place to shine. You can also change the text color to your favorite color if you’d like. (ORANGE!)
• Users/Users: If you want to have multiple posters on your site, like RU has, you’ll need to add them to this area.
• Add user from community – If you’re adding a poster who already has a WP account, add in their email address here, then choose Contributor, Administrator, Editor, Author.
• Administrator has complete control over every inch of your blog. Super Blog Powers. Be careful who you choose!
• An editor can publish, edit, and delete any of your posts and pages, add categories, tags and links and upload files/images. One teeny step down from administrator.
• An author can edit, change and post their own posts, as well as upload images.
• A Contributor can edit their own posts, but have no publishing powers. Once the administrator gives the post the okay, it can no longer be edited by the contributor.
• Invites: Invite someone to post on your blog who does not have a WP account. Follow the instructions, you can’t go wrong! Once they accept the invite, they’ll need to sign up to WP, and they’ll be listed under your Users tab.
• My Profile: This is your public profile, featuring your Gravatar (if you don’t have one, get one at http://www.gravatar.com) and other information such as your name and contacts. This information is public! Don’t put information up there you don’t want the whole world to see!
• Personal Settings: Playtime!
• Fun – Check this box, and every time you publish a new post you’ll get a surprise!
• Visual Editor – don’t disable this unless you’re very comfortable with HTML!
• Admin Color Scheme – your choice of grays or blues. No orange. Darnit.
• Keyboard Shortcuts – Before you click this, read the “more information” link. If you’re a keyboard shortcut fiend, by all means, give it a shot. Me? I can’t remember exactly where the spacebar is all the time. =)
• Twitter API – Send messages from Twitter to your blog. Read the “more information” link on how to set it up, where to send it, and what to write. Okay, I just made that last part up. Sorry.
• Browser Connection – If you sign into WP.com while on a public WiFi, your account could be hijacked. Click this box if you regularly post from somewhere other than your home computer.
• Interface Language – leave as is for English, or specify which language you’d like. 
• Primary Blog – If you have more than one blog, this is the one you’ll be logged in to on WP.
• Proofreading – Much like using Word, or having my old English teacher Mrs. Carter standing over my shoulder. Points out grammar and spelling mistakes, and various others depending on which boxes you check.
• Account Details – Your username (I warned you it was permanent!) email and website. You can also change your password here.
• If you’ve made any changes in this section – click SAVE! Do it!

• Tools/Tools: A variety of tools and totally unnecessary yet fun things to spiff up your blogging life.
• Press This – A bookmarklet that lets you grab pieces of the web and post them to your blog. Be careful you don’t wander off with copy-righted material! You can post YouTube videos and photos straight to your blog with this bookmarklet, without ever going to your blog.
• Category to Tag Converter – Frankly, this button doesn’t work on my blog. =) If they get it fixed, I’ll try to post more about it.
• Post by Email – Let’s you um…post…by email. Slick. =)
• Click on My Blogs
• Click enable next to the blog you wish to be able to post to
• Receive a pretty wild secret email address
• Use this address to send your post TO
• The subject line of your email will be your post title
• Webmaster Tools Verification – If you want your blog to be crawled by various search engines, you’ll need to verify your site with the three search engines linked here. Follow the directions, and you’ll be hooked up in no time!

• Import:  Import posts from other blogs you might have.
• Export: You can export and save your posts, pages, comments, custom fields, categories, and tags. Handy if you decide to change your blog name.
• Delete Site: NOoooooooooooooooo!!! Don’t touch it! This is a forever button.

Okay, only one more lesson to go! Our next lesson will go over Settings – a hugely important button! For those of you who have started your own blog, next week we’ll be asking for your URL’s so we can all go see! Hey, get up off the floor…this is a GOOD thing! =)

***

Carrie is a faculty member on Romance University. In her spare time she manages a restaurant, designs jewelry and websites, and is writing three manuscripts concurrently. She lives on a farm in Iowa with seven cats, a husband from England and, as was discovered in the mudroom last week, a woodchuck. You can visit her blog anytime at Smart Ass Romance.

***

The Dreaded Dashboard

Ok, pull up your big girl panties, and buckle your seat belts. We’re going in, and we’re going in deep. Let’s find out what’s with some of those buttons on the Dashboard.

We’ll take these one by one. One thing to note – this is for WordPress.com blogs only – the one we’ve signed up for in the first lesson. If you have your own WordPress.org blog under your own domain name, your dashboard won’t look like this!

• Dashboard –
  • Right Now – Displays how many posts, pages, categories etc you have on your site right now. Appropriately named, yes?
  • Recent Comments – If someone, say Kevin Costner for instance, has posted on your blog recently, it will be listed here.
  • Incoming Links – You wrote an article so wildly popular, that other bloggers have linked to your eternal wisdom. Those links will be listed here.
  • Your Stuff – When you last posted, what you posted, and links to each one. Think of it as the FBI of your blog stuff. It just knows….
  • What’s Hot – Stuff you might find interesting in the world of blogs. Hot blog posts, top blogs from around the world, who’s up and coming. If Your Stuff is the FBI, this is Interpol.
  • QuickPress – Got something short and sweet to say? Post it, publish it. No fuss, no muss.
  • Recent Drafts – Your recent drafts. These titles are uncanny aren’t they?
  • Stats – Views per day. Just a quick view of your stats. For further information click on View all in that same box, or on your dashboard to Blog Stats. It will go to the same page.
• Blog Stats –
  • This takes a second to load – patience my little chickadee.
  • The graph displays the dates along the bottom, and the rise and fall of visitors to your pages. Mouseover the date and it will tell you how many visitors you had that day. Even if no one commented!
  • Referrers – Where have your visitors come from? Google? Blog-o-riffic? Outer Space? (Okay, technically it might not register outer space, but that would be really cool.)
  • Search Engine Terms – What were those people searching for when they found you? Sometimes it’s quite fascinating.
  • Blog Stats – Table Summary – This is for those of you who love stats and tables and summaries. (Hi Kelsey!!) The rest of the blog stats not in the table neatly summarizes the table for you.
  • Top Posts and Pages – What pages and posts are getting the biggest hits?
  • Clicks – People click on things when they visit a blog. This is going to tell you what people clicked on while visiting your blog.
• Blog Surfer –
  • This allows you to find friends, family and other like-minded (or not!) bloggers on WordPress.com. Simply add in their URL, and WP will bring their blogposts to your blog to read (see Readomattic below) Sweet? You betcha.
• My Comments –
  • If you’ve been out traveling other blogs and commenting on them (which is the best way to get traffic to your site!) this will show your comment and all following comments on that blog post.
• Readomattic –
  • This is where you read the blog posts you’ve subscribed to.
• Tag Surfer –
  • Add and remove tags of subjects you’re interested in. Remember, tags are used to identify what is in your post to the reader. So, if you’re fascinated by aardvarks, add that in as a tag you’d like to search on. Your screen will be filled with posts from around the world, all using aardvark as a tag. Did you really mean artichokes and not aardvarks? Easy mistake to make. Simply “X” out of aardvarks and it’s gone.
• My Blogs –
  • Suppose you have two different blogs – one for aardvarks and one for artichokes. This page will list them both or let you register that third blog, Anemones.
• Subscriptions –
  • Sign up on other blogs and receive emails when they’ve posted new content.
• Akismet Stats –
  • Akismet is pretty darn cool. When someone sends you a spam (and trust me, you’ll be AMAZED at who is spamming you!) Akismet catches it. And tells you about it. And lets you read it. Don’t spammers have a life? Yeesh.
• Upgrades –
  • Do you need more space? Want to post all of your videos of your daughter’s wedding in Jamaica? Here’s where you can buy more of everything you might ever need.

Finally, the end of this little section of the dashboard. Tired yet? Prop open your eyes with toothpicks and then I’ll show you more fun blog maneuvers. Promise.

Fun Stuff –

As your reward for following through with the dashboard parts– hey! Wake up! – Here’s some fun blogging stuff to play with.

Let’s talk about Widgets. Whatzits? Widgets. Fun little items you can add to the sidebar of your blog.  What’s a sidebar? Go to the front page of your blog, and look to the side. Depending on the design you’ve chosen, it could be on the left or the right, and generally is topped with a search bar. Your main content containing the blog will be in the middle, your sidebar on one side or the other.

This is my current sidebar. Borrrr-ing.

Let’s pimp your sidebar shall we?

• On your dashboard go to Appearance>Widgets
• The middle column will show you your available widgets. You have all of these to choose from. Just like shopping in Macy’s.
• With your mouse pointer, grab and drag your widget of choice to Sidebar 1 on the right. A dotted outline will show up, and just drop it there. You can wiggle it around later.
• I chose Authors, as I’m going to have other Authors visiting on my site to talk about website design.
• Plop! Let it go.
• Click the light gray arrow on the right side of your Authors Box and Wallah! Look at all the fun stuff you get to fill in!
• The Title which will show on your side bar. I named mine My Peeps.
• Number of posts to show – 3. Otherwise it gets a bit crowded.
• Avatar Size – 48×48
• Click Save. Wait for the swirly thing to finish
• Click close.
• Zoom back to your front page and see how it looks.

Great start!
By adding in more widgets you can customize your blog to be more about YOU and your likes. Your widgets can be moved up and down on the sidebar by using the same drag and drop method or removed entirely by dragging the widget back to the middle column.

Here’s my NEW and IMPROVED sidebar.

Oh baby. I’m goooood. =)

Experiment with your widgets. There’s too much to go over in just this one post, so grab a widget, drag it, drop it, play with it. Then you can decide if it’s the best thing since spray butter – or if you want to delete it.

We’ll move it along to Lesson Number Five next week – stay tuned!

***

Carrie is a faculty member on Romance University. In her spare time she manages a restaurant, designs jewelry and websites, and is writing three manuscripts concurrently. She lives on a farm in Iowa with seven cats, a husband from England and, as was discovered in the mudroom last week, a woodchuck. You can visit her blog anytime at Smart Ass Romance.

***

Pictures, Tags and Categories

I’m baaaaack! =) And let’s dive right into the deep waters (hold your nose!) and learn about inserting images into your posts. I know you’ve been dying to learn!

First, find an image. One from your computer, one from a website that offers free downloads. Careful here, make sure you aren’t taking a copyrighted photo.

Got your image? Here’s mine. Ain’t he a cutie?

• Open (edit) the post you want to add the picture to.
• First, click your cursor where you want your picture to display.
• Click on the button that matches the one outlined in red here. (yours won’t have an outline, sorry!) This is the upload image button.

Hang on! The entire screen went black! Take a deep breath, it’s supposed to. Whew.

• Make sure the From Computer tab at the top is selected.
• Click on Select Files. A Dialog box will open.
• Navigate to the photo on your computer you want to upload
• Click on the file name once to highlight it.
• Click open on the Dialogue box.
• Wait a few seconds for it to upload and crunch. Yes, it’s supposed to crunch. It’s ok. Really.

Tada!!

Scroll down a bit and you’ll see all this fun stuff.

• Fill out the information by Title, etc. Use Alternate Text and Description to make it easy for disabled readers to “read” what your picture is about.
• Add in a caption if so desired. It will appear under your photo.
• Alignment – Choose one –
• None – The picture will show up in the upper left hand corner, but the text will start at the bottom right corner of the photo.
• Left – I almost always prefer my pictures to be left aligned, with the text flowing to the right of it.
• Center – If you have a larger picture, choose to center it, and the text will flow underneath it.
• Right – The picture will post on the right hand side, with the text to the left.

• Size: I generally choose thumbnail, although you can pick any size including full and edit it down smaller later. Don’t worry, I’ll tell you how.
• Finally, click insert into post.
• Mop your brow.

There you go. One beautiful photo inserted into your post. Click update, view post and sigh in awe at yourself. You go, girl.

Need to make it bigger or smaller?

• In Edit mode, click on the picture. If you click on the skyline looking picture, you’ll go back to the black screen. It lets you change the size and the alignment of your photo.

• On the left hand side under Edit Image there’s a percent slider. If you run your mouse pointer over that, you can see how various sizes look with the random text. You can also change your alignment here. Ah, don’t look under Advanced Settings. There be dragons here.

Need to delete your photo?

• In Edit mode, click on the picture. Choose the large, red, ominous looking “X”. Poof. It’s gone.

Tags – Tags are keywords to help search engines find your post. Eh? Let me explain. Suppose you write a wonderful blog post on How To Raise a Vietnamese Pot Bellied Pig. Who’s going to look for it? First of all, anyone with a VPBP. Where are they going to look? On a search engine, such as Google or Technorati. (links) When Bob in Oklahoma is wondering how to feed his six-week-old VPBP, he’s going to do a search. Now, if your post has tags that list Vietnamese Pot Bellied Pigs, there’s a good chance Bob is going to visit your site to see what you have to say. And he might come back again! This is what builds your readership. Tags help your post find the right readers.

So, let’s add in some tags.

This is your tags box.

• Type in all the tags that pertain to your post (please please please only use tags that pertain to your post!) and separate them with commas. On RU’s post about Challenging Couples in Love, their tags were Attraction, Chaos Theory of Writing, Character Development, Characterization, Relationships, Romance Writing, writing tips. It all fits in with the article.
• Click Add. That’s it. Done and over.

Suppose next week RU writes a post on Writing the Alpha Male. If I click on “Choose from the most used tags” the tags I used previously appear, and I just have to click on Character Development and Characterization to make them appear as a tag for this new post. See how that works? Slick.

What about Categories you might ask? (You didn’t ask, but I watched Carnac the Magnificent a lot when I was a kid, so I just know.)

Think of categories like the Dewey Decimal System. Your blog is going to be awesome (that goes without saying) but every post belongs in a category. If one day you write about Vietnamese Pot Bellied Pigs, and the next day you’re writing about Characterizations, just think how confused your multitude of readers will be. Categories are used to help your reader navigate your blog.

• Click on +Add New Category
• Type in your category name – ie Vietnamese Pot Bellied Pigs
• Click on Add New Category

Like magic – Shazam! Your new category appears. Anytime you write an article on VPBP, you would put a check mark in the category column next to the name, to categorize your article.

And that takes us to the end of Lesson Three. Aw….don’t cry, there’s going to be more! Stay tuned for next time when we’ll discuss more of those fun items on the dashboard!

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Carrie is a faculty member on Romance University. In her spare time she manages a restaurant, designs jewelry and websites, and is writing three manuscripts concurrently. She lives on a farm in Iowa with seven cats, a husband from England and, as was discovered in the mudroom last week, two skunks. You can visit her blog anytime at Smart Ass Romance.

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First, let’s recap from last time – we signed up, signed in, gasped in horror at our dashboard, and then changed our theme. Right? Right.

So let’s take the bull by the horns and move on to Part Deux – Pages, Posts and Bears –  Oh My!

At the top of this section of buttons is one called Posts. A little farther down is one called Pages. Let me explain the difference.

Posts appear on your blog every time you “post.” Sounds simple doesn’t it? Every time you make a new post, it appears at the top of your blog, and the older posts move down.

Pages on the other hand, are static. A good example of a page is an About Page. Also note that any Page will also be turned into a navigation button on your site. If you click on the name of your site at the top of your page, you’ll notice you already have a Home and an About button. Cool eh?

First, let’s work on updating our About Page.

• Go to your dashboard and click on Pages
• In the drop down menu, it says Pages and Add New. Pages is highlighted, and in the middle pane you can see a page named About. This middle pane lists all the pages you have available.
• Mouseover About, and underneath it Edit | Quick Edit | Trash | View appear. Click Edit.

For those of you who use Word or Works, this should look fairly familiar. It’s a word processing program for blogging. Piece of cake!

• Where it says This is an example of a WordPress page etc, delete all of that by highlighting it with your mouse and hitting the delete button on your keyboard.
• Put on your thinking cap.
• Write.

Don’t know what to say about yourself? No problem. Now that you know how to get to your about page, you can change it any time you want.

If you want your About page to say something more clever as the title than About – go ahead and change that too. Maybe something exotic like About Me. Ooo.

Done with it? Happy? High Fives. Now here’s the important part some people tend to forget. On the right hand panel is a button that says Update and another that says Preview Changes.

Preview Changes lets you umm…preview the changes. =) If you click that button a new window will open that will show you the changes you’ve made. BUT, your page IS NOT UPDATED until you hit the Update button. Sorry, didn’t mean to yell.

• Hit the update button now.
• In the yellow bar at the top it says View page. So, let’s go view the page!

If you’ve changed your page title name, you’ll notice right away that has changed on the button in the front. Neato! What’s that you say? You mis-spelled a word? Right under the About text is a little line that says Edit this entry. Click there, and you’ll be right back into editing your about page. Fix your boo-boo, then click update. Voila.

Let’s say we want to make new pages and new navigation buttons. On your dashboard look under the pages button again. The drop down says Pages and Add New.

• Click on Add New
• Add the title of your page – remember this will also be a navigation button on every page in your site!
• Add your info in the bottom box
• Click Update.
• Give yourself a pat on the back.

Oh, you caught me. Yes, there’s a few more new things with a new page as well.

This looks really darn close to the other Publish box. BUT…there’s a Publish button. Click that and whammo, your page is live.

So what are those Status: Visibility and Publish buttons?

Let me explain –

• Status: Draft Edit – If you don’t click Edit, nothing happens. If you click Edit, you have a choice of Draft or Pending Review. Pending review is used if you have other contributors to your blog. A contributor can use your dashboard and edit posts, but only you, as administrator, can publish them.
• Visibility: Public – Under the Edit button here is Public, Private and Password Protected. If you click nothing, your draft is going public. Private means only YOU can see it, and Password Protected will ask you for a password before you can view it.
• Publish: Immediately – Click nothing and your page is *shouting like Emeril* BAM! Out there. Or you can click on Edit and select a date and time for it to post. This is pretty darn handy if you’ve got a post made up in advance because you’re spending the weekend in Aruba, but don’t want to override the posts in front of yours.

Let’s move on to posts, shall we? C’mon, this is easy! Click Posts on your dashboard.

As you can see, Posts is highlighted. If you look to the middle of your dashboard, you’ll see one titled Hello World! We’re going to update that.

• Mouse over Hello World!, and click Edit, just like we did in Pages.
• Change the title of your blog post
• Put in something fun and fascinating in the box below. Tell about your trip to Italy or your favorite artichoke hearts recipe.
• Click update or preview.
• Click view post in the yellow box that has appeared.
• Stand back and admire your genius. Whoa. You’re good.
• Helpful hint? Look at the Publish box above to see if you want to publish now, wait until later or keep it as a draft. I vote we publish now – just do it!

Want to make another?

• Go back to Posts on your dashboard
• Click Add New.

A fresh blank slate has appeared, waiting for your every syllable. Remember since this is a new post, your choice in the publish box will be preview or publish.

Homework for next time? Get some pictures together that you’d like to use in your posts. We’ll be learning how to put graphics in with your text, and how to use categories and tags!

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Carrie is a junior faculty member on Romance University. In her spare time she manages a restaurant, designs jewelry and websites, and is writing three manuscripts concurrently. She lives on a farm in Iowa with seven cats, a husband from England and, as was discovered in the mudroom last week, two skunks. You can visit her blog anytime at Smart Ass Romance.