Can what works for music work for poetry as well? The people behind poetryspeaks.com hope so. At their website you can search for poems by topics, by poet, or by name of the poem. You’ll also find the biographies of poets, be able to listen to (or watch, in the case of videos) 30 seconds of any poetry products for sale on the site, and upload your own poetry and get feedback on it.

Regarding this last function, the site says:

“Discover and be discovered! YourMic is your online stage for poetry. Not-yet-published poets can upload their video and audio poetry performances to YourMic. Register for a free account on PoetrySpeaks.com to upload your poetry to the site. PoetrySpeaks.com is a community where you can rate and review poetry performances. Join the community for the opportunity to be critiqued or discovered by like-minded peers. Your poetry performances may also be viewed by published poets who are on the PS•Voices and SpokenWord sections of the site. Build your following on YourMic.”

There’s lots more on the site, both free and for a fee, and the creators (Sourcebooks) say they’ve invested five years and a quarter of a million dollars in it. Using iTunes as a model they’ve set it up so you can download an individual poetry reading for 99 cents, or a video version for $1.99. They’re hoping that the interactive elements will draw people to the site, saying that “in essence, it’s a social network for poets and poetry lovers.”

In my experience, poets have often been more interested in writing poetry and selling it than in buying it. We’ll see whether this venture can find enough of a balance to make a profit.

(Want 100 techniques for being more creative? They're in my newest book, "Creativity Now!" --check it out on Amazon and other online retailers or, in the UK, at WH Smith travel outlets)

Yes, I’m also sick of all the ways the media are spinning out the story of the (non) Balloon Boy, but we can’t deny that it’s a story that gripped the world. Whenever a story does that, I’m interested to consider what elements made it so compelling and this time there are two levels of story to learn from.

The original story was a simple one, with familiar elements:

• a child in danger
• a ticking clock—how long can the balloon stay aloft?
• a mystery: is he really in there?
• someone whose emotions we can share: the distraught parents
• a weird twist: the kid isn’t down a mine or trapped in rubble (which would also work for dramatic purposes), he’s up in the sky in a UFO-style balloon
• a strong emotional image: him dropping out of the balloon while it’s still up high or crashing with it to earth;  like looking at a car crash—we don’t want to see it but we can’t help looking (or imagining)

 Anybody writing a thriller could take a cue from these elements, and many have: have you noticed how many thrillers are about a missing child?

 The second story layer appeared when it turned out the whole thing was a hoax. Now it’s not about life and death, it’s about psychology. Now we had:

• a villain: the father who deceived us and forced his child to go along with the plan
• an innocent victim: the little boy, who was so uncomfortable with lying that he threw up—twice!
• an ambiguous character: the mother—was she a willing accomplice? Or was she bullied into it by the father? Why did she tell on him?
• a new mystery: what will be the father’s punishment? Will the kids be taken away?

 That has taken us into the realm of motive and of course our response is also fueled by outrage that we were fooled in the first place. My hunch is that this emotion is stronger at the moment than it would be in good times. We already feel like we’ve been fooled by the bankers and politicians and we know we still don’t have the full story, but it’s hard to pin down exactly who is lying and about what.

 With Balloon Boy father, it’s a lot simpler. My guess is that there’s going to be a big market over the next year or two for stories in which pinning blame is easier than it is in real life.

(for guidance in writing your book, get a copy of mine: "Your Writing Coach," published by Nicholas Brealey--see more information at www.yourwritingcoach.com)

I just finished reading “The Disenchanted,” a fictionalized version of the time a young Budd Schulberg (the author of the book) spent with F. Scott Fitzgerald toward the end of the latter’s life. Fitzgerald, broke and suffering from alcoholism, took on the job of collaborating on a movie script about a winter carnival. Unfortunately it all ended badly.

 Knowing the background of the novel makes it worth a read. The book starts from the point of view of Schulberg’s alter ego, Shep, and then veers into a very long flashback about the famous novelist’s fall from grace, then brings back Shep but ends on the Fitzgerald character. This handling of POV leaves something to be desired but there are plenty of positives to compensate.

 Isn’t it weird how having even a tenuous connection to a book or film makes it more interesting? A good friend of mine is a distant relative of Fitzgerald and that has always made me feel that I have a slight link to him.

While I was reading this book, there was an article in the Wall Street Journal about Fitzgerald’s Hollywood short story collection, “The Pat Hobby Stories.” It’s about a hack writer in the movie business, set in the 30’s --but not that much has changed. I think of these stories as the literary precursors of “Adventures in the Screen Trade.” If you’ve never encountered these stories and are at all interested in the film business, you’re in for a treat.

(Interested in writing your own novel? My book, "Your Writing Coach," published by Nicholas Brealey, will guide you from idea through to publication.)

According to the blogger Destructive Anachronism, the formula for post-print literature may be “high quality content + innovative marketing + multimedia.” This was referenced in an article in the New York Times about a new quarterly literary magazine called “Electric Literature.”

 The publishers are making the magazine available on paper, as an ebook, on the Kindle, on the iPod and as an audiomag. They’re augmenting it with YouTube videos featuring collaborations between their writers and artists and musicians, and one of their authors is writing a short story using Twitter. For the first issue they had animations created for each of the short stories.

 I admit it: as an old-school reader and writer, sometimes I revel in the silence of paper. But I think it’s important to be aware of the new options available to us. As the article points out, we’re going to have to be innovative because writers “drown in the great middle between the mega-sellers like Dan Brown and the avant-garde work produced in small quantities.”

 At the moment, the magazine is still on the small side: 800 subscribers and 1600 single-copy sales, but their readership is growing quickly. (For more information see the New York Times article, or go to the electricliterature.com web site.)

 I like the attitude of one of the founders, Andy Hunter: “We have an optimistic message at a time of pessimism. As writers, we got tired of the doom and gloom. The future is not something you acquiesce to, it something you create.”

(for help in being more creative and productive sign up for my free monthly Brainstorm ebulletin by sending an email request to BstormUK@aol.com; also get my new book, "Creativity Now!" published by Pearson.)

Simon & Schuster is going to sell individual chapters of medical books. People can search for an answer to their questions on the Ask Dr Oz site, and then purchase a related chapter—and go on to buy the entire book if they like.

 S & S’s chief digital officer said, “We plan to expand both the chapter selling model and use of our e-commerce widget in other content categories.”

 This could be a way to go a step beyond the “look inside” feature at sites like Amazon: let the potential buyer purchase a chapter for a low price, on the basis that if they like what they get they are pretty likely to buy the rest as well.

 If you’re writing non-fiction you could aggregate enough single-chapter purchases to make some money even when the sampling doesn’t result in the person buying the whole book.

 If you write fiction, maybe you’d offer the first chapter for a low price and end with a strong cliff hanger or tease. Of course you could also offer it free (which many authors already are doing) but if you can coax even a dollar out of the potential buyer, persuasion psychology tells us that having made that commitment makes them more likely to go on to buy the rest.

(for more innovative ideas on how to write and sell what you write, get my book, "Your Writing Coach," published by Nicholas Brealey; and to ramp up your creativity, get my book, "Creativity Now!" published by Pearson--both available from your favorite online retailer.)

A fascinating story in the Independent about Vivian Maier, a French nanny whose hobby was photography—maybe that’s an understatement, it seems more of a calling. A young Chicago real estate agent named John Maloof happened to buy much of her archive for a few hundred dollars, not really knowing what it contained. He ended up with 20,000 negatives and a thousand rolls of undeveloped film, each with 12-14 images, mostly of Chicago and New York.

 He put some of them online and it has caused a sensation, with Maeir being called a new star of mid-century American photography.

 Maloof found out she was still alive but too ill to see anyone and when he decided to make an effort to meet with her, he found out she’d died the previous day. He’s writing a book about her, featuring some of her best work.

 You can see examples of her work at the blog www.vivianmaier.com and read a bit more about the story. They’re brilliant black and white images—what an eye she had! One of the things that fascinates me is that she never showed her photos to anyone (and never saw many of them herself in print form, apparently). She must have been truly in love with the process for its own sake.

 A heartwarming PS to the story is that when, in old age, she fell upon hard times, three brothers she had nannied bought her an apartment and paid her bills until she died.

Writing on his Fast Company blog, Adam Pennenberg said this about book reviews:

 “Book reviews don't sell books anymore. All they do is act as marketing fragments for publishers and authors to spin for promotion.

Good reviews help, at best, incrementally, and bad reviews hurt, at worst, incrementally. They're published then they disappear, living on as pithy testimonials on authors' Web sites, or on the back covers or in the fronts of paperback editions.

It wasn't always this way. A rave review 20 years ago in, say, The New York Times, Washington Post, or Publishers Weekly could usher an obscure author into the limelight.”

He mentions that his first book got about 30 reviews in a variety of publications, his second got seven, and his third (and current) looks to get just three, because the number of publications carrying book reviews keeps shrinking. I’ve noticed the same trend with my own books (even though I was never ushered into the limelight…).

Now it’s bloggers and Amazon reviews that make a difference. Pennenberg cites a study that shows the impact of a one-star review is greater than that of a five-star review.

Of course with Amazon reviews you’re at the mercy of anyone. Some years ago one of my books got a review in which I was called names and was accused of stealing someone else’s book title. It turns out this fellow had self-published a book with a vaguely similar name and had posted hate-reviews for half a dozen other books as well. Fortunately Amazon took down the reviews as well as the reviews of his own book (he’d either written them all himself or happened to have half a dozen reviewers with the same habit of using exclamation marks in every sentence).

On the other hand, I’ve been fortunate to receive emails from people who have enjoyed my books and usually I ask them to please post a review on Amazon or their other favorite online site—and some are nice enough to take the time to do it. (Hint: if you’ve read one of my books and liked it, it would be great if you could do the same.)

 Write articles for distribution services like ezinearticles.com. They don’t charge you for uploading your articles, and in your bio box you can include a link to a blog, a website, a podcast or the other location where people who are interested can find what you’re offering. Naturally the articles should relate closely to the thing you’re offering.

 Create “trailers” to put up on YouTube. Be sure that the key words you put with the video are precise so that people who are searching for videos on your topic will find them.

 Let bloggers who are in your field but not directly competitive in terms of what you offer know about it. I know from the experience of writing a blog post every day that bloggers are happy to get material they can use.

 Consider the use of low-cost online ads on sites and blogs that are closely related to your topic. These can cost as little as a few dollars or pounds and while the readership typically is low, they will have a high degree of interest in your arena.

 Cross-promote. If you have a blog, be sure people who visit it can sign up for your e-bulletin, if you have one. If you send out a free report, include your website and blog addresses in big print and in several locations. Use the auto-signature feature on your email to include links to your blog or website.

 Consider using ads in offline media. Again, ideally this would be in a specialist publication that targets exactly the group you want to reach. These don’t have to be huge ads—in fact, start by testing whether classified ads work for you, and then try small display ads. Haggle—very few people pay the amounts on a magazine’s official rate cards.

 I hope this series has been helpful. If you have other ideas or are willing to share your experiences in building a platform, please get in touch at jurgenwolff(at)gmail.com. And keep reading this blog because I’ll be adding new ideas and strategies from time to time. You can also get more ideas from my book, “Your Writing Coach” published by Nicholas Brealey and available from Amazon and other online and offline retailers and if you’d like me to guide you through to your writing goal over the course of 60 days, see my new Breakthrough Strategy coaching program at www.jurgenwolff.com.

In the previous post I mentioned that it strengthens a story when the story’s key event interrupts something else more normal that’s going on. One more tip in terms of story dynamics is to try to make sure each scene reveals character as well as advancing the plot.

 For instance, I gave the example of a sitcom plot in which the son in the family is being bullied. We might have a scene in which the father tries to teach his son to defend himself and the mother objects and says violence never solves anything. So far, so predictable. But if the father reveals that when he was a kid, he tried to reason with a bully and the boy humiliated him in front of a crowd of other kids, suddenly we find the father a more vulnerable and sympathetic character and have discovered something about him that we didn’t know before.

 If you watch a well-written drama or comedy series like “Mad Men,” you’ll soon spot a lot of examples of how good writers consistently manage to reveal character as they move the plot forward.

(Would you like me to guide you through to your writing goal over the course of 60 days? See my new Breakthrough Strategy Program at www.jurgenwolff.com)

A subscriber emailed me asking whether I can give any advice on plotting short form fiction, such as sitcom episodes or short stories.

 The tip that comes to mind immediately relates to one of the first questions I ask myself when plotting a sitcom episode. Whatever the main plot—let’s say it’s how the son in the family will deal with being bullied—I ask, “What else is going on that is in some way interrupted by these new developments?”

 For example, maybe the family is planning a party or someone is coming to visit. Having the new development (the bullying) intersect with the more normal activity adds another dimension to the story.

 The same thing can work in a short story—the moment in time that we encounter the characters usually features an unusual event, but it gains resonance when we also understand what the norm is.

(For more tips on constructing great stories, see my book, "Your Writing Coach," available from Amazon.com and other online and offline retailers--and when you have the book you'll also find the secret code words that unlock the chapter bonus material at www.yourwritingcoach.com.)

 “If you must have a protracted verbal exchange, then damn it, give your characters something to do. By that I do not mean give them a cigarette or a beer. I mean make them grill a steak or attend a carnival or splat together a papier-mache volcano or inch their car through a long stretch of construction.”

 He calls these tasks a lower-order goal—in most scenes every character wants something but in this case there is something else, relatively pedestrian, to be achieved as well.

 I’d add that the activity you choose may, of course, have some meaningful relationship to the deeper meaning of the scene.  If they’re making plans for their wedding while washing and drying the dishes, for instance, if he drops a valuable plate, that might act as foreshadowing for an emotional crash coming up somewhere later.

Percy

Percy

(To write good dialogue, you need to create great characters. That's one of the many topics covered in my book, "Your Writing Coach," published by Nicholas Brealey and available from Amazon and other online and offline retailers.)

 “Brown has done a lot of thinking about what makes a successful Dan Brown thriller. He has found that it requires a few essential elements: some kind of shadowy force, like a secret society or government agency; a ‘big idea’ that contains a moral grey area; and a treasure. The treasures in Brown’s four novels have been a meteorite, anti-matter, a gold ring, and the Holy Grail.”

 “When all of Brown’s elements come together, doled out over cliffhanging chapters, with characters that exist to ‘move the plot along,’ it is like mixing the ingredients to make a cake.”

 Here’s what Brown himself says: “All of my novels use the concept of a simple hero pulled out of his familiar world.”

“The trick is to make your characters experts…then you pair them with an expert of a different discipline, making it convenient for the experts to assay to one another at some length, in the process spilling all the research you have done for your novel.”

 I don’t advocate trying to follow anybody else’s pattern but having a look at what works for somebody else might inspire you to figure out your own version.

(Want to be guided through to your writing goal over the period of 60 days? Check out my new Breakthrough Strategy Program at www.jurgenwolff.com.)

 If you ask people to register with their contact information before you give them access to your report or video or audio or other product, you will have the information you need in order to stay in touch with them. You can let them know about your latest products and services, special deals, appearances, etc. Of course you must make it easy for them to unsubscribe from anytime they want to, but this way you can build up a good list of interested people. Some internet marketers stress that having a list like this is absolutely crucial.

 The downside is that a certain number of people will be put off by the need to register, either because they can’t be bothered to fill in the form or they fear that it will lead to getting unwanted email.

 If you make your content readily available without any need to register and specify that you are happy to have anybody distribute it, it will be seen by more people. It’s a good way of building up awareness of your name and what you offer.

One time management coach created a small guide to using your time better and distributed it this way and he said it has been downloaded more than 60,000 times. Because it included his email address and a blurb about his services at the end, it did serve a marketing function. His guess is that if he’d required registration in order to allow downloads only a couple thousand people would have done it. He has gotten business as a result of it, but of course there’s no way of knowing how much more—or less—business he would have had from it if he’d required registration and sent a variety of messages over time to that list.

 Your decision is this: do you want to get your name out there in a general way, or do you want to build a list of people who are interested enough to give you their name and contact information? Of course you can combine the two and use it as a test: create one report or video to distribute freely (from a download site that doesn’t require registration) and another on a related topic for which people have to sign up. Then keep track over a period of several months the contacts and new business you get from each. Overall, I suggest the list-building approach.

(Do you want to be guided through to your writing goal in 60 days? See my new Breakthrough Strategy Program at www.jurgenwolff.com and my book, "Your Writing Coach," published by Nicholas Brealey and available from Amazon and other online and offline retailers.)

 As the article points out, it was more like a theatrical one-man show than a typical author’s appearance. It has some distinguished ancestry via the lectures of Charles Dickens and Mark Twain.

 The article’s author, James Harkin, the director of talks at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, sees Gladwell’s show as part of a trend encouraged by the success of TED, the festival of Technology, Entertainment and Design which features 18-minute talks by a variety of innovators. (You can see videos of many of these at www.ted.com and they’re well worth your time.]

 Are such talks going to save authors whose income from their books may be declining? Well, as usual, it’s a big help to be successful already. Gladwell’s best sellers, “The Tipping Point” and “Blink” paved the way for him to become a star of the lecture circuit. It also helps if you are a good performer—there’s no doubt that Gladwell feels confident in front of a crowd.

If you also feel comfortable speaking to groups and have an entertaining message that will appeal to an easily-identifiable target audience, it may be worth exploring whether talks could be a part of your repertoire. You won’t start out by filling the Lyceum, but it could add to your income and increase interest in your books or other writing.

(If you'd like an affordable writing coaching program that guides you for 60 days through to your writing goal, check out my Breakthrough Strategy Program at www.jurgenwolff.com)

 Julia Cheiffetz is an editor there and she told Fast Company magazine about some of their activities:

 “At HarperStudio, there’s an R&D element to what we’re doing. For instance, we gave all of our authors Flip cameras and asked them to start video blogging, opening up their writing process and cultivating an audience as soon as a book is acquired. We’re looking at multimedia packaging…with each project we think about what kind of experimentation is appropriate.”

 Of course you can think the same way if you’re self-publishing or if your book is published by a more traditional company—as long as you’re willing to do the work yourself. For inspiration, have a look at their YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/user/TheHarperStudio

In previous posts in the series, I’ve suggested how to find your target audience, what kinds of content to use to attract them, and how to decide which media to use. Now let’s move on to the action phase.

 The next step is to create the incentive that you’ll use to get people to connect with you. As we discussed in previous posts, you can use text, podcasts, reports, e-bulletins, videos, etc. Here are some tips on that:

 Create a series. As with this series of posts, if people are interested in the first part, they’ll come back for subsequent instalments. That could be a series of articles, a series of videos, several related blog posts, etc. You can later gather them together and offer them as a free or paid-for report.

 Make it personal. This doesn’t mean you have to reveal all the details of your personal life, but be sure to emphasize the things you can offer that others can not, and let your readers or viewers see that they’re dealing with a real person.

 Use each message as a way to lead people to what else you offer, just as in these posts I have referred to my podcast, e-bulletin, and books.

 Encourage feedback. On your blog, allow comments, in your e-bulletin include an email address, on your online articles include links in your bio box, etc.

 Whichever medium you choose…do something different! Your message will be competing with many others (on YouTube, with millions) so if you want people to be interested, offer them something unique in terms of content, presentation, or both.

 Should you require people to register (that is, give you their name and email address) in order to get your free content? That’s what we’ll look at in the next post on this topic.

 (For information on how to use traditional and new media to market yourself and your work, see my books, “Your Writing Coach,” available in the US and UK, and “Marketing for Entrepreneurs”—UK only at this stage).

 “In the next 10 years, we’re going to see all the forms of entertainment—films, television, video, games, and print—melding into a single platform ‘story engine.’ The Model T of this new platform is the PS3. The moment you connect creative output with a public story engine, a narrative can continue over a period of months or years. It’s going to rewrite the rules of fiction.”

 He indicated that such a story engine could tell many stories simultaneously:

 “We are used to thinking of stories in a linear way—act one, act two, act three. We're still on the Aristotelian model. What the digital approach allows you to do is take a tangential and nonlinear model and use it to expand the world. For example: If you're following Leo Bloom from Ulysses on a certain day and he crosses a street, you can abandon him and follow someone else. “

 That sounds like a game scenario, and del Doro says that although game companies are conservative about trying new things, “in the next 10 years there will be an earth-shaking Citizen Kane of games.”

I don’t even have a PS3… maybe that’s why I’m having a hard time envisioning this story engine…although I can imagine that it could be possible to get drawn into, for example, a drama that has a weekly TV episode (which could be delivered via the computer), augmented by mini-episodes that appear on your mobile phone or as messages via email. Maybe something like Second Life, but one that comes to you instead of you having to go to it. Certainly food for thought as writers struggle to see our future… (and one thing that needs to be re-booted is the ‘search’ function at the Wired website—trying to find this article there was like pulling teeth. As usual, I should have Googled right from the start).

(Want guidance in reaching your writing goals? See my Breakthrough Strategy Program at www.jurgenwolff.com)

Someone described the essence of wisdom as being aware of what everybody else is doing…and doing the opposite. Hmm, I wish I’d done that when everybody was buying stocks…

 It’s true that the breakthroughs in any field tend to come from contrarians, not from people doing more of the same. Yet most of us come under pressure—not least from ourselves—to go along with the majority. “Nobody else is doing this” feels like a reason not to do it, rather than what it is—the best reason to do it.

 In fiction, it’s zombies and vampires at the moment. Good reasons to flee!

 In non-fiction, it’s about how to make do with less. I’m not suggesting you write about how to have a larger carbon footprint or splash money around, but if I were trying to come up with a self-help angle I’d be looking at thriving rather than just surviving.

In marketing, everybody is scrambling to Twitter their way to riches. Might be a good reason to take a closer look at the old-fashioned print media.

 What are the people in your field doing? What’s the opposite? Might there be a way you can capitalize on the opposite?

(for tips on how to be more creative and productive, sign up for my free monthly Brainstorm e-bulletin. Just send an email request now to BstormUK@aol.com)

 “Analyzing her first effort, McDermid recognized that her weakest skill was plotting. ‘So, I consciously worked very hard on storytelling and the structure of the next books. For a long time I literally would outline each book, chapter by chapter, on file cards.’ …As the plots in the Kate Brannigan novels became more complex, McDermid found she had to use multicoloured file cards to keep track of the plot strands.”

 “With each new book, McDermid says, the breakthrough for getting into the writing comes when she finds a structure that works to tell the story. …About five books ago, despite stories that increasingly required structuring, McDermid found she no longer needed coloured index cards to manage the multiple plots. ‘I could do it all in my head,’ she says.”

 When working out storylines for a TV series, I use Post-It notes stuck to the wall, with one horizontal line (and one colour) for the main plot and then extra horizontal lines each in a different colour for the subplots. If structure is a challenge for you, too,  give it a try.

(If you want a complete guide to writing, get my book, "Your Writing Coach" from Amazon or your favorite online or offline retailer. If you want a 60-day coaching program that guides you through the process with coaching calls, tons of tools, and email feedback, see my Writing Breakthrough Strategy at www.jurgenwolff.com.)

 Which medium do you think would be most attractive to your target audience?

 Possibilities include:

•  Text: articles that you can distribute via sites like ezarticles.com; print or electronic newsletters; e-mail courses, reports, White papers, e-books.
  

•  Video: fictional series; interview series; tips and techniques. You can put these onto YouTube and other video distribution sites, or on your own site, or both.
•  Audio: fictional series, interview series, tips and techniques.
•  Facebook or MySpace pages: for yourself, for the book, for the protagonist or other characters – your entries on these pages could include text, audio and video.

You also need to consider what media you find the most appealing to create. Fortunately, all are getting easier all the time to produce. I suggest that rather than trying to use all of them at once, you now choose one or two.

 In the next post in this series, we’ll look at how to put your decisions into action. (for more on how to use traditional as well as new media to market yourself and your work, see my book, "Your Writing Coach" and in the UK, my newest book, "Marketing for Entrepreneurs.")