by Gus | Oct 30, 2014 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tips - Books
Here’s a quick overview of things to keep in mind when you write your book, look for publishers and agents, or decide to publish your book yourself. The Publishing Connection can help with any phase of this process.
Writing Your Book
• Collect your blogs, articles, or journal notes into a book
• Use transcripts from your workshops, seminars, or talks to groups
• Do interviews and have them transcribed
• Develop a chapter by chapter outline for what to include and target future blogs, articles, journal postings, interviews, etc. to fill in each chapter
• Dedicate 1-2 hours a day for writing, or consider a ghostwriter
What You Need to Pitch Your Book to a Traditional Publisher
• If your book is fiction and you are unpublished, you normally have to complete the book, plus create a 1-2 page single spaced synopsis.
• If your book is nonfiction, you generally need to write a proposal plus 1-3 chapters to submit to agents and/or publishers, even if the book is completed. The beginning of the proposal is generally 10-15 pages, and includes an overview of the book, chapter by chapter outline, and plan for completing the book. It also should include a market and competitors section listing similar or related books already published, the publisher, and how the book is doing; an author’s bio; and an author’s platform section, indicating what PR you have gotten in the past and how you can help support the book in the future.
• Unless you already have an agent or knowledgeable rep pitching your book, you need to write a query letter or have one written for you to send to publishers/editors and/or agents.
Contacting Publishers and Agents about Your Book
• If you can contact publishers or agents at conferences, workshops, and through personal referrals, that’s ideal.
• If you already have an agent, make sure your agent is continuing to pitch your book; you might also propose supplementing what the agent does by making some contact with publishers yourself; some agents will welcome this; others not so much. If you do make some of your own contacts, be sure to check with your agent in advance to make sure not to contact anyone your agent has already contacted. Then, keep your agent aware of the responses, and refer any editor or publisher who expresses interest to your agent for follow-up.
• If you feel your agent is no longer actively representing your book, it’s time to end your agreement and find a new agent or pitch the book yourself.
• If you plan to query traditional publishers and agents, don’t self-publish the same book, unless you have a very powerful platform and can build large sales for this book. Publishers don’t want to publish a book that already has been published, unless there are big sales.
• A good approach is self-publishing a book to build your platform and sell it yourself; then pitch a follow-up or related book to mainstream publishers and agents.
Sending an E-Mail Query to Publishers and Agents
• If you don’t have an agent or personal connections for contacting agents or publishers, an e-mail query can be an effective way to contact them.
• You can contact a large number of editors and agents with a personalized query, so they respond directly to you. We can help you send out these queries to hundreds of agents and editors based on your type of book. For details: www.thepublishingconnection.com.
• While many editors at major publishers want submissions by an agent, some will accept queries from writers and some will make exceptions for a really good query letter.
• When you send a query don’t include attachments or graphics, since a regular text query is more likely to be received and read, but you can include links to a website. Editors and agents often will not open any attachments due to fears about viruses, trojans, and other malware.
• Keep your query letter short and to the point, since a successful query letter is typically about 300-400 words, and no more than 500 words, and includes these key components:
1) A strong subject line to attract interest; it should indicate specifically what your book or script is about and be in upper and lower case, Title Case, or Sentence case.
2) A short summary statement of 1 or 2 sentences highlighting what the book or script is about and what makes it especially interesting and salable.
3) Two to three paragraphs describing the plot of a fiction book, the main topics covered in a nonfiction book, or the main plot points in a script.
4) A sentence or two about the book or script’s key selling points and why the book or script is marketable to your main audience.
5) A short paragraph about your own background, including what may have inspired the book or script, and recent highlights about previous publications or films, writing, and relevant work experience.
6) A sentence or two about any PR or promotion you have already gotten.
7) A final sentence indicating if the recipient is interested, you would be glad to submit a more detailed synopsis, proposal, sample chapters, or the complete manuscript.
8) Be prepared to follow-up within a week or 10 days with a proposal, synopsis, sample chapters or complete manuscript, or a script treatment.
9) Include personal contact information at the end, including your name, company if any, city, state (full address and zip is optional, though good to include), website if you have one, phone, and email.
Self-Publishing Your Book
• A simple low-cost way to publish your book is as a Print-On-Demand (POD) book through CreateSpace and Kindle, though there are multiple services with various pricing plans. You can use one of their templates or design your own cover, and you can order as many or as few books as you want at about 1/3 of the retail price.
• Generally you need the final copy formatted according to the publisher’s guidelines in a WordDocument or PDF, with appropriate margins and any graphics or photos in the text.
• While you can self-publish yourself, we can guide you through the process or set up everything for you.
• Keep the pricing low to attract sales – about $9.95-14.95 is a good price point for a paperback book; $2.99 for an e-book.
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Gini Graham Scott, PhD, writes frequently about social trends and everyday life. She is the author of over 50 books with major publishers and has published 30 books through her company Changemakers Publishing and Writing. She writes books and proposals for clients and has written and produced over 50 short videos through Changemakers Productions. Her latest books include: HOW TO FIND PUBLISHERS AND AGENTS AND GET PUBLISHED and THE BATTLE AGAINST INTERNET BOOK PIRACY.
by Gus | Oct 30, 2014 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tips - Books
How do you decide which publisher to go with if you have publisher interest? If you have already chosen an agent to work with, the answer is simple. Usually, you will turn over the contact information for each publisher and the agent will follow-up, along with contacting other publishers the agents feel is right for your book. Then, your agent will recommend which publisher or publishers to negotiate with and work out the details.
However, if you don’t have an agent, you will need to decide yourself and negotiate any agreement on your own or perhaps with some input from an attorney. Though make sure your attorney is familiar with publishing; otherwise the attorney may bring up some points that are not negotiable and could kill the deal.
When you do have multiple publishers or any publisher interested, the initial process is much like what you would do in evaluating an agent. You do an assessment to decide the best fit, and after that, if there is more than one publisher in the running, look to your intuition or gut feelings to help you decide.
As part of this assessment, look at the size of the publisher. If it is one of the big six, now five, including any of the big five’s imprints, that’s usually a strong plusfor that publisher, since the clout of a big publisher will increase your credibility and is likely to result in better distribution, promotion, and sales, though there are no guarantees.
In the event that you have more than one editor from a publishing house interested in your book, you need to tell them about this situation. A good way to do this is to initially work with the first editor who has expressed interest and let the other editors know. You can explain that you weren’t sure who to contact and let the editors work it out for themselves who will handle your book.
Next, in conducting your assessment, look at the different books the publisher handles to see what other books have been published in your category. There should be others for this to be a good fit. You can get a sense of how well these books have done by looking at each title on Amazon and checking the ranking – the lower the number the better. Consider any rank under 10,000 to be a good showing. Generally, the other books that have been published will be in your subject area (i.e.: business books, self-help books, general interest, etc.). But sometimes a publisher may want to move into a new area or create a new imprint for a different type of book, which is fine. In fact, a publisher may even give these books a greater promotion to establish the category. However, if there’s clearly a mismatch and this is a small publisher, this could be a warning sign, such as if you have a business book or memoir and the publisher is specializing in health and nutrition books.
Another important consideration is the size of the advance, since this is often the only money you will get, because the majority of books don’t make out their advance. On the other hand,, some small publishers only start with a small advance or even no advance, and their books do well, plus they may have a good reputation in the field. So that could offset a low advance if the publisher is otherwise a good fit for your book. Generally, for a book from a new author, you can expect about $5000-20,000 from a larger publisher and about $1000-5000 from a smaller publisher, though in some cases, especially if this is an academic press, there will be no advance and limited sales. But the prestige of the house can make the sale worth it and open up doors for future books.
Consider, too, how enthusiastic the editor and marketing team is about your book. Ask about the publisher’s plans for distribution and promotion, as well as what the marketing and PR people expect you to do. Often publishers expect authors to pick up much of the promotional effort after their publicity department sends out about 50-200 review copies. So assess how much the publisher plan to do for your book in comparison to other interested publishers.
Also, review the contract you are offered. Many terms are fairly standard, such as a 10-15% royalty on hardcover retail sale or net receipts from paperback book sales, which start at 10% and go up with increased sales. A standard royalty on e-book sales is now 25%, though some publishers may offer up to 40%. Usually, publishers offer 50% of net receipts on the sale of other rights, such as serial rights, foreign sales, and video rights. These are details which you can work out once you decide on a particular publisher, and they are less important in making a decision on which publisher to choose.
However, one clause to be careful about – and which most publishers are willing to drop – is the first option on future books clause. While it is reasonable to have an option on books on the same or a related subject or have a non-compete clause about your publishing other books on this topic that might undermine sales, it is not reasonable to tie up any of your books in the future, especially if you write books on different topics. So the publisher should be willing to strike such an option; if not, that’s a warning about working with that publisher.
Another caution, as in dealing with agents, is that you should not be asked to pay the publisher to publish your book. While there may be an exception for some academic publishers, where academics are asked to help subsidize the publication of their book because of the “publish or perish” syndrome and the limited sales of most academic books for a specialized audience, trade publishers should not ask for any payment. Even if the publisher is asking for extensive rewrites, this should be something you do yourself or hire your own editor. But it is a conflict of interest if a publisher has its own pay to play editorial service. The publisher should make its money from publishing, not from editing manuscripts of the writers it publishes. And normally, publishers only take on books when the manuscripts are ready to go or require very little editing, apart from line or copy editing, which publishers normally do as a matter of course, with no charge to the writer.
In some cases, a traditional publisher may expect a writer to commit to buy a certain number of books. But unless you are likely to sell that number of books, say on the speaker circuit, cross that publisher off your list. Also avoid any publisher who has a substantial charge for publishing your book, even with a promise of a much higher than usual royalty rate (ie: 40% of net versus a more usual 10-15%), since that is often the sign of a vanity or author subsidized publisher, where the publisher has little distribution and its main income is coming from authors who are paying to publish their books. If that’s the only alternative, it’s better to self-publish than turn your book over to a vanity press.
If after weighing these various factors, you are still left with several contenders, focus on how enthusiastic the publisher is about your book and how you feel about working with that editor and publisher. For now, you are ready to let your intuition or gut level feelings help you decide.
And if you only have one interested publisher, the question is whether you want to work with that publisher or not. If not, you can always self-publish, seek to build sales and your platform, and then try to sell the book to a mainstream publisher. You can use the same title if the book does well, or if not, you can always change the title and pitch it again.
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Gini Graham Scott, PhD, writes frequently about social trends and everyday life. She is the author of over 50 books with major publishers and has published 30 books through her company Changemakers Publishing and Writing. She writes books and proposals for clients and has written and produced over 50 short videos through Changemakers Productions. Her latest books include: TRANSFORMATION: HOW NEW DEVELOPMENTS IN SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, BUSINESS AND SOCIETY ARE CHANGING YOUR LIFE and THE BATTLE AGAINST INTERNET BOOK PIRACY
by Gus | Oct 30, 2014 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tips - Books
Say you have sent out queries to agents and now have to weigh offers from multiple agents or decide if you want one interested agent to represent you. Ultimately, your decision may come down to a matter of personal chemistry – who you would like to work with. But before you trust your intuition or gut to make the decision, find out what you can about any interested agents and weigh what that agent can do for you.
In some cases, writers living near an agent may get to meet personally, but normally a face-to-face meeting with an agent isn’t common or necessary. You can easily use the phone, fax, email, Skype, or mobile apps to communicate. And for most agents, it’s fine that you are considering multiple agents at the same time. They recognize that choosing an agent is a little like getting married or at least getting involved in an exclusive dating arrangement. Before then, the agent is assessing both your manuscript and what it will be like to work with you, just as you are assessing whether this is the right agent for you.
Normally, figure on a few days to make your assessment. In the event, you get a request from an agent for an exclusive period to look at your manuscript, such a request is rare and is usually from a smaller agent, who may not be your first choice anyway. So unless an agent asking for an exclusive really is your first choice, I would regard these requests this way. Just because the agent has asked for an exclusive, you don’t have to say “yes” to an offer of representation, and I typically regard this request for an exclusive as more like asking for a right of first refusal. You should not let such a request hold you up from following up with other agents at the same time.
Generally, there is no reason to tell other agents what other agents have expressed interest in your manuscript, just as you don’t need to tell a person on a first date about who else you are dating. The one exception is if the agents are from the same agency. Then, you need to tell both agents or if you have already sent your material to one agent, tell the agent who contacts you next that you have been in touch with this other agent. Additionally, explain that you didn’t know who to contact in that agency, and if that agent wishes he or she can talk to the first agent and they can decide between them who might like to represent you. Then, weigh that agent against any agents who have expressed interest in other agencies.
To help you determine what to do, keep a list of the agents who have expressed interest in our project, along with their agency name, website, and contact information.
Then, once you have determined what agents are interested, the next step is to do some research both by asking the agent some questions and by doing some research on the Internet. Be aware of the likely responses and what to expect.
First, there are typically standards that all agents adhere to – generally the agent’s commission is 15% for U.S. sales and 20-25% for foreign sales, since an agent will typically work through a foreign agent and share royalties, though some agents will handle foreign sales themselves. So don’t try to negotiate commission percentages.
Secondly, pay attention to any options clause or agreement for the agent to represent more than the one book or group of books, such as a trilogy, you are pitching together. In some cases, an agent will ask to represent you on all of your books now or in the future or both, until a representation agreement is terminated. I even had one agent who wanted a one year continuation of rights to a manuscript after the agreement was terminated. Ideally, start with the agent representing one manuscript and see how it goes, before committing everything to an agent. Generally, if there is any option, it’s best to limit this to a first option on future similar manuscripts, unless the agreement is terminated.
Whatever you agree about representation for one or multiple books, the agent will expect to get a commission on all future royalties on any sale to a publisher that agent contacted, even if the sale is made after the contract is terminated. In the event an agent wants to tie you into a longer relationship on future projects from the outset that can be a caution to stay away. But if the relationship works out, of course, you will want to have the agent represent you on even more projects. Ideally, though, seek to have the agent represent just one project to start, though if you have similar projects which would appeal to the same target audience, it’s fine to agree that the agent can represent them in the future, too, unless the agreement is terminated.
Third, just as an agent will want to know about your platform, you want to know about the agent’s track record. Normally an agent will be glad to tell you about successful sales to publishers. In fact, agents often have this information prominently displayed on their websites. While the sales price of different books may be confidential, you might ask about what the agent typically gets from a sale, so you have a ballpark figure of what to expect. The past track record of the agent – and how long the agent has been in business – are important qualities to consider.
Fourth, ask the agent what he or she expects to gain from your book and get a sense of how eager the agent is to represent you, since you want an agent who passionately believes in your book. Commonly, agents won’t take on a project for an author unless they believe in you and their ability to sell your book. But there are levels of passion and in the agent’s time and ability to represent you, along with other clients. So assess how committed the agent is to representing you.
Additionally, you might check out the agent on the Internet to see what others have said about that agent and if there any negative reports, such as on the website Preditors and Editors (www.pred-ed.com) . If so, any negative comments are a warning sign, though you might ask the agent about this, since the posting could be from a disgruntled writer whose book the agent wasn’t able to sell through no fault of his or her own.
Another caution is if the agent asks for any money from you or has a related business of editing manuscripts and asks you to pay for a review or for editing your manuscript. A small monetary contribution might be appropriate, should the agent have to pay for any long distance phone calls, copying or postage for sending out manuscripts, or messengering services to deliver a manuscript quickly. However, in today’s Internet age, most of these expenses no longer exist, since phone calls, except to another country, are normally free and manuscripts are commonly sent via PDF or Word documents. But if there are any small charges, often an agent will simply keep you informed and deduct them from the sale of the manuscript. In any agreement, you should be able to approve any charges over a certain amount – say $50, though most contracts now don’t require any author expenses.
In the event an agent does do editing or ghostwriting, this is fine if it’s a separate business. But an agent shouldn’t ask to edit or polish your manuscript as a requirement for representing you, since that’s a conflict of interest. Sometimes agents will at no charge give you extensive feedback about making changes in a manuscript, and then it’s up to you to make the changes. But the agent shouldn’t ask you to hire him or her as an editor, since any offer of representation should come with no strings attached – and typically agents will only want to represent a project that is ready to go – or involves very few final edits.
Finally, after you have assessed the agent based on these criteri, that’s when it’s time to listen to your intuition or gut in deciding whether you want to work with that agent. Or if there are multiple agents you might like to work with, consider how you feel about working with each of these agents, for ultimately your choice should come down a matter of personal chemistry and which agent you feel will do the best job for you based on your agent assessments.
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Gini Graham Scott, PhD, writes frequently about social trends and everyday life. She is the author of over 50 books with major publishers and has published 30 books through her company Changemakers Publishing and Writing. She writes books and proposals for clients and has written and produced over 50 short videos through Changemakers Productions. Her latest books include: TRANSFORMATION: HOW NEW DEVELOPMENTS IN SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, BUSINESS AND SOCIETY ARE CHANGING YOUR LIFE and THE BATTLE AGAINST INTERNET BOOK PIRACY
by Gus | Oct 30, 2014 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tips - Books
While many writers are ecstatic when they get one publisher or agent to express interest in publishing or representing their manuscript, in many cases, writers get multiple offers to publish or represent them. So what do you do then? How do you choose which publisher or agent to go with? Or even if you only have a single offer, should you go with that publisher or agent ? Or should you try another approach, such as sending an improved query letter or proposal, waiting 6 months to a year to develop a platform, or using self-publishing to build your platform?
The following guidelines will help you decide when you have interest from both agents and publishers. The next sections will describe what to do if you have interest from agents or publishers.
When you have interest from both agents and publishers, that’s a happy situation to be in. First, decide if you want to work with one of the agents, as discussed in the next section. This is a good choice, if you can work with a good agent, since the agent can contact additional publishers the agent works with, as well as follow-through with the publishers who have already expressed interest to you and help you get a better deal. An agent will also know about contracts, so he or she can advise you on what to expect and where you can negotiate and where you can’t. (For example, you can often get rid of a first option clause on your next book, keep the film and audio rights, or get a higher percentage if you initiate a contact that results in a sale. But you normally can’t do much to increase the advance or the royalty rate, though you might get a graduated increase to kick in sooner for sales above a certain level).
Your agent should be receptive to your initial query to publishers which has resulted in publisher interest. Most agents will be, since this positive response gives the agent a lead on interested publishers. You then need to refer any of these publishers to that agent, and let the agent know of any publishers who have turned down your query or your proposal or manuscript, if a publisher asked to see that. Later, should you get a further response from any publishers, you need to refer them to your agent. A good way to do this is by keeping a list or spreadsheet indicating how publishers have responded to whatever you have sent to them. The agent needs this information, since he or she doesn’t want to be embarrassed by initiating a contact with editors you have already contacted or in following through when a publisher has already said no.
Generally, under this arrangement, agents will get their normal 15% commission when they follow-up with your leads, although in some cases, I have worked with agents who have taken 10% or even 7 ½% for following-up, while getting 15% for their own contacts. However, this may not always be a good idea, since the agent’s incentive will be to pursue his or her own leads and might not follow up as enthusiastically with your leads. Plus, if you are a new writer, you have to be careful that this offer to pay the agent less for follow-up with your contacts could backfire and the agent could walk away. So tread lightly if you raise this possibility, and if the agent is reluctant, don’t pursue it. Generally this approach for the agent to talk less will work best with the smaller agents who are less established; while the larger, more established agents will be more apt to turn it down.
In some cases, this joint arrangement can work very well when you are working with a new but enthusiastic agent. Often such an agent may have had extensive experience in publishing by working as an editor for a publisher. But due to layoffs resulting from consolidations in the publishing field, the former editor may have become an agent, who is now building up a list of contacts. If you can approach publishers by sending out query letters, the agent may be very willing to follow-up, whereas a long-time agent may already have developed a list of contacts and be less receptive to do this. In any event, once you have an agent, ask how the agent would like to work with you in the future in contacting additional publishers and take your lead from the agent.
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Gini Graham Scott, PhD, writes frequently about social trends and everyday life. She is the author of over 50 books with major publishers and has published 30 books through her company Changemakers Publishing and Writing. She writes books and proposals for clients and has written and produced over 50 short videos through Changemakers Productions. Her latest books include: TRANSFORMATION: HOW NEW DEVELOPMENTS IN SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, BUSINESS AND SOCIETY ARE CHANGING YOUR LIFE and THE BATTLE AGAINST INTERNET BOOK PIRACY
by Gus | Oct 30, 2014 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tips - Books, Marketing Tips - Films
Whatever you send to an editor or agent, should be perfectly edited and polished – whether it’s an initial query letter, synopsis, proposal, sample chapters, or the complete manuscript, since you will be judged on how you write as well as on your content. And both editors and agents tend to be sticklers for good writing. So if your letter or other material is peppered with errors, you might not get past first base on your way to a writing home run.
If you don’t have the time, interest, or ability to do this fine editing and polishing, hire an editor or ghostwriter. However, don’t explain in your query letter that you hired a professional ghostwriter or had your manuscript professionally edited. This mea culpa sounds like the sign of an amateur, since an underlying assumption of making a submission is that whatever you are submitting has been edited – and it doesn’t matter by who. So don’t call attention to your lack of expertise. It a different situation if the outside writer or editor is a named co-writer or “with” writer. Then, do mention the collaboration, but don’t refer to the editing of the manuscript.
The only time to mention what has or hasn’t been edited is when you are including some edited chapters in the proposal but have additional chapters that haven’t yet been edited. Then, it’s fine to explain this and point out that these unedited chapters will be polished up when you prepare the book for publication — this way you prepare the editor or agent for the drop-off in the quality of the manuscript in the additional chapters compared to those in the proposal. Or you can mention the unedited manuscript when you submit a proposal that doesn’t have any sample chapters and the editor agents requests some chapters or the whole manuscript. There may be a few other exceptions where the editor or agent knows the manuscript isn’t yet fully edited but asks for it anyway, and you send it out unedited in the interests of time. But normally, expect to have your manuscript fully edited and polished when you send it in.
Here are some basic guidelines for doing an effective edit and then correcting the manuscript accordingly.
– Check for spelling and grammar errors and correct them. While Spellcheck or the grammar corrector in your Word program can help point up likely errors, just like a GPS in a car, it isn’t infallible and can steer you wrong. For example, Spellcheck will not identify those cases where you have spelled something correctly, but it’s the wrong word, and Spellcheck will incorrectly claim some proper names or new expressions are wrong because they aren’t in its dictionary. Likewise, the grammar checker can sometimes wrongly suggest there should or shouldn’t be punctuation and may miss many popular shortcuts in modern writing. So, yes, do use Spellcheck and your grammar program if you have these when you edit, but also check the document yourself.
– Unless you have a time deadline or want to edit something as quickly as possible, edit off the computer initially and then enter your corrections. This way, you’ll see the manuscript in a more global, comprehensive way, like an ordinary reader rather viewing it as a linear series of pages on a computer. Doing this off the computer review also enables you to more easily compare pages, such as if you are checking for previously written material that is similar in concept though not written the same way, since a “find” command on a computer won’t pick this up. Then, too, when you can look at the pages off the computer, you can easily move things around if you want to make changes. Later, you can enter all of these edits into the document on the computer.
– Besides looking for the obvious spelling errors, typos, and grammatical mistakes, look for overlong sentences you can break into two or three sentences and any writing that is unclear. As necessary, change any pronouns, whether subjects or objects of sentences, such as he, she, it, and they into the name of a person, company, or character, so it is clear who or what the pronoun refers to. Also, be careful to use the same tense, so you don’t switch suddenly from present to past or vice versa, and check that the singular and plural forms of the subject and verb agree.
– Streamline the manuscript by cutting out any unnecessarily repetition, such as reiterating the same idea in several different ways or duplicating the description of something after the initial introduction.
– Where possible, change any passive constructions to active constructions (such as saying “he did something” rather than saying “something was done to him by,” or saying “a great upheaval occurred” rather than “there was a great upheaval.”
– If you are working with another author or co-writer who is reviewing your manuscript, a good idea is to submit your initial draft for feedback, and explain that you have not edited the material yet. Then, you can incorporate any changes based on this feedback when you do your final edit and polish. This way you don’t edit and polish the manuscript a first time only to have to make changes again after you get this feedback when you do a second edit and polish.
– Finally, recognize the difference between a line or copy editor and a developmental editor or writer doing a rewrite. In the first kind of edit, you are largely looking for the most obvious spelling and grammatical mistakes, plus breaking up overlong sentences and clarifying thoughts. In developmental editing or rewriting, you are not only doing a line edit but revisions and reorganizations, too.
So now happy editing – or if you don’t want to do it yourself, find an editor, and choose the right kind of editor for the amount of editing you need. If you only want line or copy editing, choose an editor who only does that, since your cost will generally be less.
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Gini Graham Scott, PhD, writes frequently about social trends and everyday life. She is the author of over 50 books with major publishers and has published 30 books through her company Changemakers Publishing and Writing. She writes books and proposals for clients and has written and produced over 50 short videos through Changemakers Productions. Her latest books include: TRANSFORMATION: HOW NEW DEVELOPMENTS IN SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, BUSINESS AND SOCIETY ARE CHANGING YOUR LIFE and THE BATTLE AGAINST INTERNET BOOK PIRACY
by Gus | Oct 30, 2014 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tips - Books, Marketing Tips - Films
People have often asked me, how have you been able to write so much, citing the more than 50 books and over 20 feature scripts I have written? The answer lies in cultivating your creativity, so you can more quickly come up with ideas, select among them to choose the best ones, and then develop and polish them into the final article, book, or script.
To this end, I have used a variety of techniques for increasing creativity, which anyone can learn and practice until they become second nature. It is important to make these techniques a regular practice, so you don’t have to think about them and simply apply them as needed. When this occurs, the techniques essentially become an intuitive part of you – an automatic response whereby you can generate a lot of new ideas and sense which is right to follow up on, through a kind of inner wisdom or knowing.
For me, the process of developing my intuitive inner creativity began when I took a workshop on tapping into one’s intuition or knowing in the late 1960s after I first came to California. In the workshop, we did a visualization in which we imagined a swirl of energy bubbling up from the ground into our bodies and then imagined another code of energy pouring in through our head. Then, we were told to imagine the two energy streams from the earth, which provided grounding, and from the air, which provided expansion, meeting in the middle of our bodies and streaming out into whatever project we were working on to infuse it with this energy. In my case, I imagined the energy pouring out of my hands as I rushed to the typewriter – yes, we once used typewriters in the pre-computer days – and began to write. So initially, that was the image I brought to my typewriter each day as I worked on writing something, and after a while, I didn’t need to see the image anymore. I would just go to the typewriter and write – an approach I continued to use no matter what technology I used for writing – from typing and handwriting to writing on a computer keyboard.
Another thing I learned early on is the secret of separating the creative process from the editing process. In other words, you just write whatever you are thinking about your subject initially, so you get whatever you want to say down and don’t interrupt the flow of ideas. Then, you go back and review your writing as an editor and do a final edit and polish. Importantly, you don’t try to mix the two processes, or you will slow yourself down. If you are writing for someone else, it is important to explain this process, if you are showing them your first draft to get their input. This way, they understand that there may be numerous typos and grammatical errors because of this initial creative process, but you will correct any errors when you do the final polish.
Initially, when I started writing anything, I used an outline, which I either prepared or an editor or client gave to me. But after a while, I found I generally didn’t need a written outline, since it would automatically be there in my mind, and that increased the speed of the creative process even more. Likewise, as you work with these techniques, you will find that many things you doing rationally at first will become part of the intuitive you, so you can come up with ideas and write even more quickly.
Still another technique I learned early on is the power of visualization. That first workshop on visualization laid the groundwork. But then I continued to go to a series of workshops, most of them at Esalen near Big Sur, which was a big center in the 1960s and 1970s for all kinds of personal growth programs. There I learned about altered states of consciousness, shaman journeying, hypnosis, automatic writing, biofeedback, meditation, and other consciousness techniques. I experienced just about any altered consciousness state as a form of visualization, though the imagery which was used to guide these experiences might differ. For example, on a shaman journey, the workshop leader might lead us on a journey through a forest to gain insight from a wise man at a tree; in hypnosis, the guide might lead us down a tunnel, escalator, or count down of numbers; in meditation, the leader might instruct us to focus on a word, chant a mantra, or clear our minds of all thoughts until we experienced a state of exaltation or inner knowing. But for me the feeling or state of consciousness was much the same, as I tried out different types of imagery, after I started with a question or goal for the session, such as what should I write about in a chapter or script. At times, I also worked with a guide who led me to a place where I saw the answer to my question or a story unfold.
Then, applying these techniques, I looked for insights from whatever I was experiencing or learning about to turn it into a book, article, blog, or script. For example, if something negative happened, I would think about what I could learn from that or how I could turn it into an interesting story. If something in the news caught my attention, I would think about how I might incorporate that into something I was already working on or transform it into a new project.
In sum, I used many techniques to become more creative – techniques which anyone can use. These include increasing your powers of visualization, separating the creative/intuitive and the editorial/ analytical process, transforming a formal outline into an organic one which you can see in your mind, and looking to the experiences and events in your life for ideas on what to write about next.
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Gini Graham Scott, PhD, writes frequently about social trends and everyday life. She is the author of over 50 books with major publishers and has published 30 books through her company Changemakers Publishing and Writing. She writes books and proposals for clients and has written and produced over 50 short videos through Changemakers Productions. Her latest books include: TRANSFORMATION: HOW NEW DEVELOPMENTS IN SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, BUSINESS AND SOCIETY ARE CHANGING YOUR LIFE and THE BATTLE AGAINST INTERNET BOOK PIRACY
