Other than work or school, what do you use your computer for most regularly? I’ve listed some common activities below, but feel free to mention something that’s not on the list… and please keep it clean.

• Play music
• Watch movies or video, including YouTube
• Play games
• Look up stuff on the Web, including answers to questions or solutions to problems
• Email
• Socialize – Facebook, Twitter, blogging, etc.
• Date
• Share photos
• Shop, including looking at product reviews
• Sell stuff
• Get directions
• Get news, including sports, movie reviews, etc.
• Manage finances, including online banking & tax prep
• Find a job

Twenty years ago, all you had to do to be a successful author was write a good book on a topic of interest to consumers. The publisher would get it into the bookstores, people would buy it, and all you had to do was run to the bank to deposit your royalty checks. (You had to run to the bank, because in those days they didn’t have direct deposit.)

Now, even before you write the book, the publisher wants to know what you can do to help market it. The two most important sections of any book proposal have nothing to do with the book title, description, author bio, or table of contents. The two most important sections are “Market Analysis” and “Author Platform.” Publishers want to know who’s going to buy the book and how you are going to sell it.

Just prior to the publication of Take the Mic and Stage a Poetry Slam, my coauthor (Marc Kelly Smith) and I received an author questionnaire from the publisher, Sourcebooks. It was 11 pages long, six of which consisted of marketing questions. I think we each spent two days filling out our forms and another day editing out the profanities inspired by the dullness of it all.

The marketing folks at Sourcebooks wanted to know whether we had blogs or websites we could use to market the book, whether we knew of any other Slam poetry blogs or sites that would help us spread the word, our media contacts, the organizations we belonged to, schools we graduated from, any seminars we might be involved in, special events, and so on. They seemed more interested not in what we knew but who we knew… or, more precisely, who knew us.

I’m not knocking Sourcebooks. It’s that way in all publishing houses and it’s the way you sell more books. In addition, Sourcebooks invests significant resources in helping authors market their books. I’m just sharing some insight into what first-time authors or people who want to get published should expect. Being a successful author is no longer just a matter of knowing something of value and being able to write about it. Having a solid author platform in place is equally, if not more, important:

• High profile in your field
• Plenty of contacts in your field who can help spread the word
• Popular website or blog
• Media contacts
• Well-stocked email address book
• Regular seminar presentations with lots of attendees
• Popular video clips on YouTube
• Active presence in field-related social or professional networks, online and off
• Regular articles in publications, print or electronic, where the target audience seeks information

Having your own publicist, a marketing kit, and a history of appearing in the media, especially on high-profile TV broadcasts, helps, too. In other words, having celebrity status in your field of expertise can pretty much guarantee that your book will be published and you’ll get a decent advance.

If you want to be a successful author tomorrow, start building your platform today.

I team up with experts to write about topics I know little or nothing about, so the marketing I do to promote the books usually has little impact. Unlike my coauthors, I lack the credentials and expertise to speak with a voice of authority on most topics we cover, and except for my mom, nobody’s going to show up for a Joe Kraynak book signing at the local Barnes and Noble.

Still, I try to contribute to in my small way to promote the books I coauthor. In this post, I share my “secrets” with anyone out there who may be able to make better use of them – especially my coauthors.

Register Your Own Domain

For about $10/year, you can register your own domain and then use it for your website and email. Take some time choosing a domain name that’s easy for people to remember and will give you a strong brand presence.

I register all my domain names through Bluehost, where all my sites are hosted, as well.

Tip: Create a Bluehost account before registering your domain name, so you can get the domain registration for free. If you already paid your hosting fee and Bluehost charges you an extra $10 for the domain registration, contact them to have the fee credited back to your account.

Build a Combination Website/Blog

A combination website/blog functions as your online base of operations. Once this is in place, you can branch out to other areas, including Amazon (if you’ve authored a book), Facebook, and Twitter more efficiently. Instead of posting individually to each one, you can set up feeds to automatically transfer content from your site to these other venues. To build a combination website/blog, I use the following tools:

• Bluehost for actually hosting the site. Cost: $6.95/month if you sign up for a couple years, but your $10 annual domain registration is free for as long as you keep using Bluehost.
• WordPress blogging platform, which is free. You can install it from the Bluehost Control Panel, making installation and setup a snap.
• Thesis – a commercial theme for WordPress that makes it easier (not necessarily easy) to customize the site design and includes tools to help with SEO (search engine optimization). Cost: $87 last I checked.
• WordPress plugins to add features to the blog and improve its performance. Plugins I use include Google XML Sitemaps (for SEO); Askimet, Peter’s Custom Anti-Spam, and Simple Trackback Violation (to keep spammers at bay), and Secure and Accessible PHP Contact Form (so people can contact me via email and I don’t have to stick my actual email address on the site). Cost: Most plugin developers ask for donations.

Create a Separate Page for Each Book

If you launched a site to promote your books, create a separate page for each book, describing the book’s content and providing links to various online bookstores where people can order the book.

Blog Regularly

Blog two to three times a week for maximum effect. This makes your site a bigger target for search engines and keeps people engaged.

Tip: Keep your blog focused on a single topic to send a clear message to visitors and search engines that your site is the place to go for information about your specialty. If you want to establish yourself as an expert in several areas, create a separate site for each. (Because I dabble in so many areas, I don’t follow this rule myself, but I still think it’s a good one.)

Create a Google Profile

Create a Google Profile and include a link to your site.

Tip: If you have a business listing on Google, make sure it’s up-to-date and includes your site address.

Add Your Site to Other Online Profiles

If you belong to any organizations that allow you to add yourself to a directory or create a profile, take advantage of it, make sure your information is complete and up-to-date, and be sure to include your site address.

Google Yourself

Google your name or business name, and check at least the first page of listings to make sure any information about you on the Web is accurate. Take any steps possible to provide complete and accurate information to the source.

Add a Signature to Outgoing Email Messages

Promote your site via email by adding a signature to the bottom of all outgoing email messages. You can use any text editor to create an HTML-coded signature file, something like this:


<strong>Your Name</strong><br />
Blurb about yourself and what you do. <br />
Phone: 555.555.5555<br />
Email: <a href="mailto:yourname@yourdomain.com">YourName@yourdomain.com</a><br />
Website: <a href="http://yourdomain.com">YourWebsiteName.com</a>


Save the file to your hard drive, and then add it to your email program. In Outlook Express, you click Tools, Options, and then click the Signatures tab to access options for adding a signature. Your email program will then insert the signature at the end of your outgoing email messages either automatically or only when you choose to include the signature. (Sorry, but too many email programs are out there for me to provide detailed instructions for all of them.) Your signature will look something like this:

Your Name
Blurb about yourself and what you do.
Phone: 555.555.5555
Email: YourName@yourdomain.com
Website: YourWebsiteName.com

Join Amazon’s Author Central

With Author Central, you can stake a claim on Amazon by posting your mug shot and bio. You can also set up an RSS feed to pull entries from your blog onto your Author Central page. Cost: Free, but you must provide contact information for your publisher so Amazon can verify you’re an author.

Send Review Copies of Your Book

Positive reviews and ratings go a long way. Send out review copies of your books. Here are some tips to get a better return on your efforts:

• Identify influential reviewers, if possible. Solicit a review from a big-name in the industry. Think of industry groups, publications, support groups, and other organizations where people are likely to share information about your book with one another, and then try to contact the leaders of those organizations.
• Contact prospective reviewers first via email or phone to let the person know when you’re sending the book.
• Include a letter with each book you send out expressing your appreciation for the review and requesting specifically that the person post a review on Amazon.com in addition to whatever publications the person has access to, such as the organization’s newsletter. (Even if your readers ultimately buy the book elsewhere, they’re likely to check Amazon’s book reviews before making a purchase decision.)
• Ask the reviewer to email you a copy of the review along with permission to post the review on your website. After posting the review on your website, email the reviewer with a link to the review and your sincere thanks.

Create a Facebook Fan Page

If you have a Facebook account, you can create a Facebook Fan Page to promote yourself or a book you’ve written. Don’t worry, it’s free. Just login to Facebook, head to the bottom of the screen, click Advertising, click Pages, click Create a Page, and follow the onscreen instructions. Be sure to include a picture of whatever you’re promoting.

Where’s my Fan Page?!
After creating a Fan Page, you may wonder how to get back to it to edit it or change settings. The easiest way is to pull up your Profile, click the Info tab, scroll to the bottom, and click link to your Fan Page.

Feed Blog Posts to Your Fan Page

Now that you have a page, populate it with content or nobody will care to look at it. The good news is that since you already have a blog, all you need to do is create a feed to pull posts from your blog onto your page. To set up a feed, open your page, click Edit Page (below the photo box), Edit, Import a Blog (under Notes Settings), and follow the onscreen instructions.

Promote Your Fan Page

You have a Fan Page, great, but nobody knows about it. To attract fans and enlist them in spreading the good word about you, promote your Fan Page:

• Become your own fan. Access your page and click the Become a Fan button (to the right of the Page title). This notifies your Facebook Friends, via their Newsfeeds, that the Fan Page exists and you’re a Fan of it.
• Invite your Friends. Send a Message to your Friends you think will be interested in the Page.
• Link your Page to Twitter. Open a Twitter account (see the following section), and link your Fan Page to Twitter. This way, whenever you post something to your Fan Page, or a new blog post is fed to the Page, Facebook can “tweet” it for you!
• Place a Fan Box or Page Badge on your website/blog. Open your Page and click Promote with a Fan Box (below the photo box). Click Fan Box or Page Badges and follow the instructions. This gives you a code you can copy and paste into the code for your website/blog to display the badge of box.
• Place a Share icon on your website or blog. Facebook can provide you with a Share icon for your blog, so people can click the Share icon on your blog to share your posts with their Facebook Friends. However, if you’re using WordPress, consider using a plugin instead, like Add to Any: Share/Bookmark/Email Button, which enables users to share your posts via email, Facebook, Twitter, Digg, or a host of other social media sites.

Give your Page its own vanity URL. As soon as your Page has a certain number of Fans (the minimum number seems to be a moving target), go to facebook.com/username and claim a vanity URL &ndash a Web page address that more clearly and simply reflects the Page title.

Tweet About It on Twitter

Twitter is another popular social media venue where you should establish a presence.

Head over to twitter.com, set up an account, and start tweeting… which may be easier said than done. Tweeting is easy. Tweeting regularly isn’t, at least for people like me who think Twitter is for the birds.

If you’re not fond of tweeting, or even if you are, consider automating the process at least partially:

• Link your Facebook page to Twitter.
• Install a blog plugin that automatically tweets your blog entries.
• Use a program like Ping.fm to update all your social networking sites from one place.

Promote Your Tweets

Add something to your site to promote your presence on Twitter. This informs Twitter users that they can find you on Twitter, so they can choose to follow you and hopefully help you pass along your tweets to other users.

To obtain a Twitter widget or button for your site, head to Twitter’s home page at twitter.com, scroll to the bottom of the page, click Goodies, and follow the onscreen instructions.

Offer to Write an Article

Publishers and organizations are constantly in need of quality content for their magazines, newsletters, and websites. Identify the high-profile outlets and offer to write an article for them. Be sure to add a credit mentioning yourself, your website address, and whatever it is you’re trying to market, such as your most recent book.

Create an Amazon Associates Account

Some authors sell books on their own, collecting the money and shipping the book to readers. That’s fine, but it’s not something I do. Instead, I set up an Amazon Associates account. If someone clicks one of my links (usually to order one of my books), I earn a small commission. I haven’t earned a whole lot, but it covers my Bluehost bill and then some.

Now it’s your turn. If you have a tip or trick of your own for promoting a book or something else on the Web, please share it with me and others. And please post a comment to let me know whether you’ve found this helpful.

I have been teaming up with experts in different fields for about five years now to produce books on a variety of topics, including bipolar disorder, food allergies, slam poetry, and real estate investing. I even co-authored a book on oceanography.

I could probably write books on these topics myself, but they wouldn’t be nearly as informative and would require about four times the effort in research alone. My co-authors have the requisite knowledge, but they lack the skills, time, or desire to write a book on their own… or they feel overwhelmed by the prospect. By teaming up, we complement one another and develop higher quality publications more efficiently and confidently.

Team writing benefits everyone involved – the content expert, writer, editor, and reader.

Content Expert

• Time savings: The most time-consuming aspect of writing is re-writing. The writer takes that off the expert’s plate. The writer can also take the lead in communicating with editorial, especially during the author review process.
• Scheduling: A deadline-oriented writer can keep manuscript development moving forward at a sufficient pace to meet or beat deadlines… assuming the expert cooperates.
• Table of contents (TOC) development: Good writers are analytical and able to break down a topic into chapters, headings, and subheadings. With a detailed TOC in place, the writing process is like shooting ducks.
• Lighter edits: The writer essentially does a very heavy pre-edit, which typically results in fewer and less involved editorial changes.
• Improved focus: The content expert can focus on providing comprehensive and valuable content rather than on making it read smoothly and clearly. Division of labor allows each team member to do what he or she does best.
• Improved marketing: The writer and content expert can team up post publication to promote the book. Promotional activities may include developing a website/blog and populating it with engaging content, writing articles for industry-related publications or websites, setting up an Amazon Author Central account, developing book descriptions, and preparing press releases.

Can the content expert write a book on his or her own? Probably. But most of the content experts I team up with earn substantially more money per hour in their field than by writing books. They write books more for recognition and positioning than for royalties, so teaming up with a professional writer to complete the project as quickly and efficiently as possible is a sound financial decision.

Writer

• Reduced research overhead: Research is time-consuming, and often writers don’t even have the insight to determine whether their sources are accurate and timely. A content expert is a walking library on his or her area of expertise. Research consists of merely transferring what’s in expert’s brain to paper. (That’s not always as easy as it sounds, but it’s a whole lot easier than having to become an expert.)
• Platform: Some professional writers develop a following and build their own platform, but writers like me are no names. For example, I can’t speak as an authority on food allergies, but my co-author, Dr. Wood, is a renowned expert in food allergies. Having a platform, a recognizable name, a website, speaking engagements, connections with influential members of a community, and so on sells books.

The writer must do some research to gain a general understanding of the topic. How much research depends on the expert’s ability to deliver essential information. In some cases, I write from research and then have the content expert review it. Very often, the information I provide is inaccurate or incomplete, but it starts a dialog that generates the necessary content.

Editor

• Experienced go-between: A seasoned writer can ease the burden for editorial by performing substantial edits before an editor steps in. The writer can also assist in project management.
• Fewer formatting headaches: A writer trained in preparing a manuscript in the required format can save editorial hours in re-formatting.
• Improved focus: Editors can focus more on improving a good manuscript rather than fixing a broken one.

Reader

• Another technical edit: Every how-to book goes through a technical review process in which an unbiased expert checks the content to ensure it’s accurate and complete. With two experts reviewing the manuscript, the content is sure to be even more accurate and complete.
• Better book: The bottom line is that team writing produces better books, assuming, of course, the content expert, writer, and editors all deliver.

Collaboration is key. When the content expert, writer, and editors join in a true collaboration, the project takes on a life of its own, and all parties drive each other to higher levels of passion and creativity. When it works right, everyone on the team inspires one another, writer’s block becomes a non-issue, and everybody wins.

In the publishing biz, one of the hottest issues is the Google Book Search Settlement. The debate is over whether Google should be allowed to scan pages from books and post them on the Web. The Authors Guild, the Association of American Publishers, and a handful of authors and publishers filed a class action lawsuit against Google Book Search, and the parties in the dispute have agreed on a settlement.

What I’d like to know is how this case ever reached the negotiating table. Google clearly broke the law and continues to break the law by posting pages of copyrighted material on the Web. They even mark the pages as copyrighted! Here’s a page from my book The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Computer Basics, which was just published this year.

Now I’m no copyright lawyer, but this looks like an open and shut case. Yet, Google has employed the old strategy of asking for forgiveness rather than permission and has gotten away with it. I guess if you have enough money and power, breaking the law earns you a seat at the negotiating table rather than a court order to cease and desist.

My co-author for Take the Mic and Stage a Poetry Slam, the Slam Daddy of poetry slam Marc Kelly Smith, was recently featured in a piece by Mike Thomas of the Chicago Sun Times entitled “Poetic Musings of Slam Daddy.” The Q&A is interesting and informative, whether you know nothing about slam or think you know everything. Please check it out and let me know what you think.

I never liked March, because my hopes for the coming spring are usually frozen solid by a last blast of arctic air or buried under a late winter blizzard. Ever since I co-authored my first book in the Dummies series, however, I’ve had something to look forward to that takes the chill out of March – Dummies Month. This is a time when John Wiley & Sons Publishing ramps up promotional efforts for its Dummies series, and I have the opportunity to do my small part to support its efforts. Please join me in celebrating Dummies Month and saving a few bucks on your next purchase of a Dummies book. Following is a list of Dummies titles I’ve co-authored with links to the Dummies Store, where you can purchase the books and find out more about the $5 rebate available during Dummies Month:

• Foreclosure Self-Defense For Dummies
• Flipping Houses For Dummies
• Foreclosure Investing For Dummies
• Food Allergies For Dummies
• Bipolar Disorder For Dummies
• Financing Real Estate Investments For Dummies
• Advanced Selling For Dummies
• Cross-Cultural Selling For Dummies

You don’t have to buy the books from Wiley to get the $5 rebate, but be sure to save your receipt. You can then download and print the Dummies Month $5 Rebate Form, complete it, and submit it to Wiley along with your receipt to receive your $5 rebate. Check out my Books page to find links for ordering these books and others on Amazon.com.

The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Computer Basics, 5th Edition

Price: $19.95, February 2009, Penguin – Alpha Books

Most introductory computer books focus on hardware – CPU, RAM, motherboard, hard drive, expansion cards, and other high-tech gear. The Complete Idiot’s Guide® to Computer Basics, Fifth Edition, takes an entirely different approach. It assumes computer users are about as interested in what’s inside their computer and how it works as drivers care about what’s under the hood of their cars. People want to use their computers to perform practical tasks, such as typing letters, managing their personal finances, shopping online, communicating with friends and family using email and online messaging, editing digital photos and videos, listening to music, and tuning in to YouTube. The Complete Idiot’s Guide® to Computer Basics, Fifth Edition shows them how.

This book puts the “personal” back in personal computing. It places the power of the computer back into the hands of the people. Instead of expecting readers to understand their computers, it shows readers how to put their computers to work for them – how to make them more productive and improve the quality of their lives.

In The Complete Idiot’s Guide® to Computer Basics, Fifth Edition, readers discover how to:

• Compose letters and create custom publications.
• Track down lost and misplaced documents.
• Decorate documents with professional clip art and other graphics.
• Shop at mega-malls and specialty shops without leaving their home – and save money, too!
• Send and receive e-mail with the click of a button.
• Carry on conversations with friends, relatives, and complete strangers anywhere in the world free with instant messaging.
• Plan their vacation, get medical advice, and find maps and directions to nearly any location.
• Copy music clips from the Internet and from their CD collections and burn their own custom CDs.
• Take photos with a digital camera, transfer them to the computer, make prints, or e-mail photos to friends and family.
• Create their own websites or blogs (web logs) to express their views, communicate with family and friends, or market their products and services.
• Edit their home videos and copy video clips to CDs, DVDs, or VHS tapes.
• Tune up their computer to keep it running at peak performance.
• Practice green computing to reduce, reuse, and recycle.

My plan to become rich and famous is off to a roaring start… the famous part, anyway. Fellow freelancer Tara Swords recently wrote a piece for The Online Family entitled “Tricks to Buying Good Used Computers,” with several quotes from yours truly. Now, I just have to figure out how to leverage my new found fame into a life of opulence. Thanks, Tara!

Over the past several months, I’ve been working with Michael Soon Lee of EthnoConnect, a leading expert on the topic of selling to customers from diverse cultures, and sales guru Ralph R. Roberts to develop Cross-Cultural Selling For Dummies®. We just wrapped up the writing phase of the project and are currently working through author review – when we have the opportunity to review changes and suggestions from editorial and answer their questions.

We’re developing the book primarily for salespeople who want to expand their business into any of various multicultural markets across the country and around the world. (According to the Selig Center for Economic Growth, the combined purchasing power of the multicultural market has grown from $1.39 trillion in 2000 to over $2 trillion in 2006 and is estimated to reach $3 trillion in 2011.) However, the book is useful for others, as well, including small-business owners, entrepreneurs, and any front-line sales or customer service staff. Cross-Cultural Selling For Dummies® provides readers with practical tips and strategies showing them exactly what they need to do to appeal to clientele from different cultures:

• Assess your multicultural readiness (a self-test)
• Develop basic multicultural competency
• Hone your multicultural customer service skills
• Adjust your marketing campaign to make it more appealing to clients from other cultures
• Go beyond marketing to make your entire business multicultural friendly
• Redesign your store or office to make it appeal to a broader clientele
• Adapt your product line for multicultural sales
• Meet and greet prospective clients without turning them off
• Adapt your sales presentation and techniques
• Recognize multicultural buying signals
• Acquire closing techniques that are more effective with clients from other cultures
• Negotiate with clients who may have more experience and expertise with haggling than you do
• Build your referral base in the ethnic community
• Assemble and manage your own multicultural sales team
• Discover commonly held myths about your own culture and others that may be holding you back
• Uncover a host of multicultural resources that can help you transition your business for other markets

The book will be available in bookstores by November 17, 2008 – just in time to make the perfect Christmas present, or Kwanzaa present, or Hanukkah present, or ….