Updated Straight Talk

Last October, I wrote about the Amazon Short program as a way for authors to gain additional exposure with a short original article. Some people will recall that I created Straight Talk From The Editor, 18 Keys To A Rejection-Proof Submission as a part of this program. A number of people have purchased this Short and especially when it released it was the number one ranked Short at Amazon. Part of the arrangement with this Amazon program is that they receive an exclusive arrangement on the material for the first six months then they switch into a non-exclusive arrangement. I suspect many of the authors have pressed on to other things and don’t think about this arrangement.

Over the last few weeks, I've been working toward using Straight Talk From The Editor for some other purposes. It's part of the suggestions I've made to repurpose content. I took the edited version of this manuscript and updated it for my own purposes. I added links into the PDF file which will be a greater benefit for the reader. Plus I've switched from working for a publisher to being a literary agent since Straight Talk From the Editor released. I wanted the updated version to appear as professional as the Amazon version. With a brief Google search, I learned about Ebooks Graphics.com which sells templates for Ebooks along with simple instructions for using it. I created this version of Straight Talk From the Editor as you can see from this different graphic.

How do I get the maximum use for this updated version? I'm still working out the details but I have a partial answer with this entry about The Writing Life. I used Marketing Makeover Generator to create a squeeze page. If you don't know the term "squeeze page" it's a place where you send people to give their first name and email address. When they give this information, you give them the item or in this case they get Straight Talk From The Editor as a free download. Marketing Makeover Generator is simple to use and I've arranged for you to have a trial subscription if you click this link.

I created the form and made it easy to locate and download with this new link: http://www.straighttalkeditor.com/.

Why go to such effort? It is another means to collect first name and email addresses so I can continue to increase the number of subscribers to my free Right-Writing News.

OK, here's my question for you: can you follow my steps and do the same thing? Absolutely. Literary agents, acquisitions editors and publishing executives are looking for people with visibility in the marketplace or some people call it platform. I see it all the time with some good writers who have good ideas--yet they are stuck marketing and remarketing their single book manuscript. It doesn't matter if they have written nonfiction or fiction because I see it in both cases. Maybe they have written for a few magazines (which I recommend) but they have never started a newsletter or have not done the work to continually increase the size of their newsletter list (get this free resource, download it and read it). They do not understand why their good material is consistently rejected. The reason is simple: it takes a tremendous effort for a publisher to push and promote a new author into the marketplace. It's not impossible and it is done but infrequently.

As a book author, you need to do everything you can do to increase your attractiveness and value to the publisher. Last week I was listening to Mark Victor Hansen from the Mega Book Marketing University last March and he said that to get into the bestselling area of the book market, you needed to have at least 100,000 people on your newsletter list. Doesn't that sound like an impossible dream? It's not everyone has to begin some place. Make a plan and get started today.

And if you can, spread the news about my free resource, Straight Talk From the Editor.