publicity Archives - Women's National Book Association, San Francisco Chapter

You Made the News! Now What? by Nita Sweeney

by Nita Sweeney, award-winning author of Depression Hates a Moving Target and coauthor of You Should Be Writing

A media outlet interviewed you. Congratulations!!

Contributing to articles is a fabulous way to become a well-respected expert in your field!

But once the article goes live, your work isn’t over.

First, share it all around.

I’m so grateful to have landed with Mango Publishing Group. My editor and their social media coordinator share pretty much anything I send their way. So my first step is to send a link to any new piece to them.

Tweet the link and tag anyone else in the piece, including the publication and especially the journalist who wrote it.

Post on Facebook. If you have a business page, start there, but there’s rarely harm in sharing to your personal page at a different time for more visibility. If your friends won’t celebrate your success, why are they your friends? Don’t overdo the promo, of course. But people want to know what’s going on and might be interested enough to share the article.

Also post in any Facebook groups that allow promotional links. Find ones that are the right fit for you and your topic. I belong to many groups but also started my own wellness group where I share relevant information.

Are you on LinkedIn? That’s where the biz folks are. If there’s any business angle post it there.

Pin to a board on Pinterest. Create a board for a specific topic or a “Where I’m Quoted” or “Featured Ins” or some other catchy title related to your topic. Things pinned on Pinterest have a very long shelf-life.

Instagram allows you to use Link Tree to create a link in your bio where you can add articles, social media platforms, and your website since Instagram only allows one link. Post a photo from the article, preferably the one closest to your quote, then say the link to the article is in your bio.

Don’t forget other relevant organizations. Would the piece interest your high school, college, or professional association? Send it all around.

Hashtags

Be sure to find relevant hashtags because that’s how strangers find articles on social media. Check out Frances Caballo’s excellent post on hashtags for authors. Sometimes that’s what you’ll want, but if your feature covers more than writing, use a hashtag appropriate for your topic. Tons of articles cover hashtags. Here’s one I like. Choose hashtags for the correct social media channel. Popular Twitter hashtags may not trend on Instagram.

Blog It

If you’re new to this process, you could blog about the experience of pitching to a journalist and doing the interview. Write about moving forward with a more involved marketing strategy. Or blog about your topic and link to the piece. Be sure to use the WordPress plugin Yoast or another search engine optimization (SE)) tool. I love Yoast because it removes the guesswork.

Email It

Do you have an email newsletter? It’s lovely to include a link to this new “featured in” with your next newsletter. If you were quoted at length, send the whole quote as the newsletter content with a quick “Not sure you saw this” note. People subscribed to your newsletter because they want to stay in touch.

In the News Page

If it’s your first interview, now’s the time to start an “In the News” page on your website where you collect these things. Leave it as a draft at first, until you collect a few, but have them all in one place on your site.

Save It

And do save a pdf of it. In Chrome you can “print” to “save as pdf.” I do that with every article. Sometimes articles disappear and you want to save it for posterity.

Go you!

An earlier version of this post appeared on Nita’s blog.

Nita Sweeney is co-author with Brenda Knight of the writing journal, You Should Be Writing: A Journal of Inspiration and Instruction to Keep Your Pen Moving. Nita’s running and mental health memoir, Depression Hates a Moving Target: How Running with My Dog Brought Me Back from the Brink, won the Dog Writers Association of America Award in the Human/Animal Bond and was short-listed for the William Faulkner—William Wisdom Creative Writing Competition Award. Nita’s articles, essays, and poetry have appeared in many magazines, journals, books, and blogs. She writes her own blog, Bum Glue, publishes the monthly e-newsletter, Write Now Columbus, and coaches creatives on writing and meditation in Natalie Goldberg style “writing practice.” Nita has been featured widely across media outlets about writing, running, meditation, mental health, and pet care. When she’s not writing or coaching, Nita runs and races. She has completed three full marathons, twenty-seven half marathons (in eighteen states), and more than one hundred shorter races. She lives in central Ohio with her husband and biggest fan, Ed, and their yellow Labrador running partner, Scarlet, the #ninetyninepercentgooddog. You can contact Nita via her website or follow her on your favorite social media channel.

Friday January 29 – How to Book Your Book with Jill Lublin

By Admin

Getting Media Attention to Drive Book Sales and Your Career!

Friday, January 29, 2021 at 12:00 Pacific

Have fun, sell more books, and grow a garden of great publicity for your book and your career!

Publicity is the most powerful and cost-effective tool around to attract and retain readers for your book. It can help you make your mark in the marketplace and multiply your profits.

If you want to be the #1 Influencer in your industry, you’ve got to get bigger media visibility. Based on her international bestseller, Guerrilla Publicity, Jill Lublin shares simple strategies to help you go from unknown to newsworthy.

Sharing her proven secrets to understanding what the media wants, Jill provides you with short-term, doable tactics that boost visibility for you and your brand. These tips will drive buyers to your book and profits to your pockets!

Bios:

Jill Lublin is an international speaker on the topics of Radical Influence, Publicity, Networking, Kindness and Referrals. She is the author of 4 Best Selling books including Get Noticed…Get Referrals (McGraw Hill) and co-author of Guerrilla Publicity and Networking Magic. Her latest book, Profit of Kindness went #1 in four categories.

Jill is a master strategist on how to position your business for more profitability and more visibility in the marketplace. She is CEO of a strategic consulting firm and has over 25 years’ experience working with over 100,000 people plus national and international media. Jill teaches a virtual Publicity Crash Course and consults and speaks all over the world. She also helps authors to create book deals with major publishers and agents, as well as obtain foreign rights deals. Visit publicitycrashcourse.com/freegift and jilllublin.com

Where: Zoom –Zoom (link provided via email when you register)

May 26 – Virtual Networking Goals for Writers w/Deb Eckerling

By Admin

Networking is essential for business and personal growth. Fortunately, companies and communities have been working overtime to keep people connected during this challenging time. Conferences are going virtual, while new online groups, mixers, and workshops are popping up each week.

To navigate the new way of networking, join Debra Eckerling, founder of the D*E*B METHOD® and author of Your Goal Guide: A Roadmap for Setting, Planning, and Achieving Your Goals, for a Virtual Lunch N Learn for the Women’s National Book Association – San Francisco Chapter, on May 26 at 12pm PT.

During this workshop, Deb will discuss:

Setting goals for virtual-networking
Finding your “people” online
Following up with new contacts
Networking best practices for writers
And more…

Grab your lunch, a cup of coffee, and a notebook. Join us for a fun, interactive session.

Title: Virtual Networking Goals for Writers

When: May 26, 12pm PT

Where: Zoom –Zoom (link provided via email – RSVP to deckerling@gmail.com – and in the Facebook Event)

About the Book: One of the biggest reasons goals fail is that people often don’t put enough thought into what they really want before diving in. Your Goal Guide by Debra Eckerling starts with that first, crucial step: figuring out your goals and putting a plan in place. Eckerling presents readers with her own tested and proven method: the D*E*B METHOD®, a brainstorming and task-based system, which stands for: Determine Your Mission, Explore Your Options, Brainstorm Your Path. Through a combination of writing exercises and systems, Eckerling provides readers with a process for making and setting goals that is stress-free, easy-to-manage, and even fun.

Debra Eckerling is the author of Your Goal Guide: A Roadmap for Setting, Planning, and Achieving Your Goals (Mango Publishing, January 2020), as well as the self-published Write On Blogging: 51 Tips to Create, Write & Promote Your Blog and Purple Pencil Adventures: Writing Prompts for Kids of All Ages.
A goal coach, project catalyst, and founder of the D*E*B METHOD®, Debra works with individuals and businesses to set goals and manage their projects through one-on one coaching, workshops, and online support. Note: DEB stands for Determine Your Mission, Explore Your Options, Brainstorm Your Path. She is the founder of Write On Online, a live and online community for writers, creatives, and entrepreneurs, as well as host of the #GoalChat Twitter Chat (Sundays at 7pm PT) and the Guided Goals Podcast.

April 30 – Social Media Goals for Writers w/Deb Eckerling

By Admin

A social media presence is essential for any business. This is especially true for authors who want and need to build relationships with their readers and community.

Social media may appear to be overwhelming. However, there are things you can do to make the process much more user friendly.

Want to learn about Social Media Goals for Writers?

Join Debra Eckerling, founder of the D*E*B METHOD® and author of Your Goal Guide: A Roadmap for Setting, Planning, and Achieving Your Goals, for a Virtual Lunch N Learn for the Women’s National Book Association – San Francisco Chapter, on April 30 at 12pm PT.

During this session, Deb will share tips on:
Getting Started on Social Media
Branding Your Profiles
Best Practices for Posting & Engaging
Setting Social Media Goals
And More

Grab your lunch, a cup of coffee, and a notebook, and join us for a fun, informative, and interactive session.

Title: Social Media Goals for Writers

When: April 30, 12pm PT

Where: Zoom –Zoom (link provided via email – RSVP to deckerling@gmail.com – and in the Facebook Event

Five Reasons to Review a Book and a Brief How-To

By Admin

By Nita Sweeney, author of Depression Hates a Moving Target

I’m embarrassed to admit how little I appreciated the importance of book reviews until my own book, Depression Hates a Moving Target, was published. Before that, I posted the occasional review on Goodreads and didn’t even know that some publisher sites (including Mango) accept reviews. I rarely left a review on Amazon.

How times change. Now I am ever-so-slightly obsessed with (I’m always obsessed with something) checking all those sites for reviews of my book. And I’ve gone so far as to spend your precious time telling you about it.

Why Leave a Review?

So just why should a person, especially a busy person with lots of competing interests and precious little time or energy, a person such as you, review the books you read?

To Remember the Book

I’ll go ahead and date myself. I’m old enough that I sometimes forget I’ve read a book, even if it seemed “memorable” at the time. It’s a bit frightening, but also enlightening to scan a review I’ve written. It refreshes my recollection and sometimes makes me want to read the book again.

To Forget the Book

Perhaps it’s part of my mental health challenge, but I don’t think I’m alone here. If I read a deeply moving (or deeply disturbing) book, I get “stuck” in the story. Characters and scenes stroll and scroll through my mind when I should be doing other things. Often I can’t sleep. I toss and turn, trapped by the book. But if I write a review, capturing the essence of what is looping through my mind, it releases me and helps me move on.

To Keep Yourself Honest

Many of us skim when we read. I’m no different. But in order to leave a detailed review, I must read deeply. If I want to review the book, I allow myself to slow down, sink in, and really pay attention. As a result, reading regains a pleasure it once lost.

To Share Your Joy (or Pain)

If I enjoy a book, I want other readers to know. If I detest a book, I want other readers to know. If I didn’t finish a book, I want other readers to know that too. Having said that, I do my best not to pan a book just because it wasn’t what I expected. I’m referring to the 3-star review Marko Kloos received because his novel wasn’t a 36-count package of Jimmy Dean sausages.

To Applaud the Author

I’ve always loved authors. Since my earliest days, people who created books out of thin air were my heroes. But now that I have personally gone through the entire process of not just writing a book and finding a publisher, but also marketing the book, I hold other authors in even higher esteem. I want to shout from the rooftops, “You did a really difficult thing! Great job!”

What Makes a “Good” Review?

As a published author, I appreciate the numbers game. Any positive review is lovely and a review of more than two sentences feels like a gift. But the reviews that stay with me are the ones in which the reader shares something personal about themselves and how the book made them feel. One reviewer said “Nita is inside my head.” Another wrote, “I had to stop at the end of one paragraph and call my mom.” Personal connections like these bring me to tears.

When I write reviews now, I remember how it felt to read reviews of my own book. I search for a place where I connect deeply with the book and share that with the author. This type of review achieves all the things I listed above and writing it feels fabulous since it provides the opportunity to cheer someone else along this twisting, winding, writing path.

[This article originally appeared in Nita’s blog, Bum Glue.]

Nita Sweeney is the author of the memoir, Depression Hates a Moving Target: How Running with My Dog Brought Me Back from the Brink, which was short-listed for the William Faulkner – William Wisdom Creative Writing Competition Award and the Dog Writers Association of America Award. Her articles, essays, and poetry have appeared in magazines, journals, books, and blogs including Buddhist America, Dog World, Dog Fancy, Writer’s Journal, Country Living, Pitkin Review, The Taos News, Spring Street, Pencil Storm, WNBA-SF, It’s Not Your Journey, and in several newspapers and newsletters. She writes the blog, Bum Glue, publishes the monthly e-newsletter, Write Now Columbus, and coaches writers in Natalie Goldberg style “writing practice.” Nita has been featured widely across media outlets about writing, running, meditation, mental health, and pet care. She was nominated for an Ohio Arts Council Governor’s Award and her poem, “Memorial,” won the Dublin Arts Council Poet’s Choice Award. When she’s not writing or coaching, Nita runs and races. She has completed three full marathons, twenty-eight half marathons (in eighteen states), and more than ninety shorter races. Nita lives in central Ohio with her husband and biggest fan, Ed, and their yellow Labrador running partner, Scarlet the #ninetyninepercentgooddog.

Three Ways To Get Buzz For Your Book

By Admin

By Paula Rizzo, author of (September 2019)

A few short weeks ago, my newest book, , was published! I’m super excited.

Many of my clients are authors as well and I always give them the same advice when I’m media training or working on media strategy with them.

So I’m practicing what I preach!

Here’s what I’ve been doing to get my book out there before it hit bookshelves:

Get Traditional Media Mentions: When it comes to publishing a book, I always tell my clients to get media attention well before the book comes out. If you’re lucky you could be like my friend Ilise Benun who got one media mention that brought her ten years worth of business! Check out my video interview with her here.

I spent close to two decades as a television producer and the authors who got coverage were the ones that I already knew. That’s because they were already experts in my eyes and it was easy to say yes to someone who has already proven to be a good source for you. You want to be friendly with editors and producers well before you have a book to sell. It’s much easier to get their attention when they know and trust you already.

As I always say media begets more media, so putting your name out there will create a ripple effect and hopefully bring new potential readers and media to your door. For more on what television producers specifically looking for check out my post on it here.

Here’s a recent interview I did with PsychCentral.com where I was interviewed about how to brainstorm better and be more creative. I took an example from my recent trip to Greece. Creativity is not a topic I typically would speak on but it worked and I got a mention for my book in there along with my quote.

So that’s a lesson – don’t be tied to only talk about your topic. If you can confidently lend expertise in other areas do it – you’ll still get a mention for your book so it’s a win win!

Also remember to never stop doing media. That’s a big mistake a lot of authors make. They only do media when they’re promoting. Make it part of your overall strategy. If you’re serious about this I can help – apply for a media strategy session here.

Produce Video Content: I may sound like a broken record with how often I encourage everyone to do video but that’s only because it works!

When you’re seen on video the viewer gets to know you and like you. It’s a special connection that you can’t get through written word only. This is something you should be doing regularly. But for sure leading up to a big launch you should double your efforts.

There are so many topics that an author can create videos about. You wrote a whole book – pull from that! Remember to teach what you know and it will be much easier.

If you want to learn how to create compelling video – take my free webinar “Produce Like a Pro” here.

Plus, take your potential readers behind-the-scenes of your big launch. Let them see what you’re up to and they’ll get excited as well. For example, here are a few recent videos I’ve done as I prepare for ’s launch.

VIDEO: Unboxing my author copies of Listful Living and seeing it for the first time!

FB LIVE: 30 Days til Listful Living Publishes

FB LIVE: Heading to record the audio book version of Listful Living

Get Booked on Podcasts – Podcasts are so hot right now. You might be hearing that “everyone has a podcast” these days. They’re actually so popular that recording studios are the new must-have for boutique hotels. It’s true!

So what better place to start getting your name out there? Podcasts tend to have a unique and niche audience so you can really target those who you think would be interested in what you offer. And you can even reach new audiences too.

Also – podcasts are a good place to work out your material because they are usually between 20 minutes and one hour. So your answers don’t have to be as tight and concise as with television.

Plus, here’s something you might not know, people who listen to podcasts buy books. Yep it’s true.

Everyone thinks getting on the Today Show or another TV show means your book will fly off the shelves.

It’s simply not true.

Podcasts are the ticket.

In fact, I was just at a conference and a media expert said her client was on The Today Show and sold only 111 books from that appearance. But when she was on a podcast the numbers soared.

Here are some of the recent podcasts I’ve been on to talk about my book – even before it is published!

Profitology Podcast with Kelly O’Neil – Crack the Media Code with Paula Rizzo. Even though this is about media I still got to mention my book.

Good Life Coach with Michele Lamourex – How to Get Booked on TV and in Print. Same with this podcast and the host was so intrigued with my other expertise in productivity and list making that she wanted to record a second show just on that topic.

Good Life Coach with Michele Lamourex – How to Use Lists for a Happier Less Stressed.

Get Published with Paul Brodie – How to Use Traditional Media Effectively. This one combines my journey as an author with strategies to get media attention.

available now and

My book is available everywhere books are sold; if you’re the least bit interested I’d love if you grabbed a copy now:

Amazon:

Barnes & Noble:

Indiebound:

BONUS FREEBIE: Your message deserves the media’s attention. So how do you get out there in a bigger way? I’ve got you covered. CLICK HERE to grab my free “Checklist to Become a Go-To Media Expert.”

As a best-selling author and Emmy-award winning television producer for nearly 20 years, I’ve produced health, wellness, and lifestyle segments with a range of top experts, including JJ Virgin, Jillian Michaels, and Deepak Chopra. I served as senior health producer for Fox News Channel in New York City for over a decade. Today, I work with experts, authors, and entrepreneurs on how to position themselves for media (traditional as well as blogs and podcasts), build their lists, and engage customers and fans for their brands, books and businesses.

I’m also the co-creator of Lights Camera Expert – an online course geared towards helping entrepreneurs, authors and experts get media attention.

I created the productivity site ListProducer.com and am the best-selling author of Listful Thinking: Using Lists to be More Productive, Highly Successful and Less Stressed, which has been translated into 12 languages and has been featured on many media outlets including Fox News, Fox Business, Prevention, Business Insider, Entrepreneur, Brides and made it on Oprah.com’s list of “Self Help Books That Actually Help.”

My latest book: Listful Living: A List-Making Journey to a Less Stressed You was published in the Fall of 2019.

I’m a regular speaker, and presented the keynote address for New York Women in Communications, and have presented at MA Conference for Women, Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO), American Society of Association Executives, and others.