Author: Iola

I provide professional freelance manuscript assessment, copyediting and proofreading services for writers of Christian fiction and non-fiction books, stories and articles. I also review Christian novels at www.christianreads.blogspot.com.

11 March 2020

Punctuation 101 | How to Use Commas in Fiction

The comma is one punctuation mark where there is a large degree of judgement and personal preference. Our struggle with commas isn’t helped by some of the misinformation we’ve heard over the years.

However, there are clear grammatical rules about how to use commas in fiction.

Examples of correct comma usage include:

To link coordinate clauses to form a compound sentence.
To separate items in a list or within a sentence.
To separate strings of coordinate adjectives.
To link a dependent clause to an independent clause.
Between an introductory adjectival phrase and the rest of the sentence.
Between an introductory adverbial phrase and the rest of the sentence.

There are two main guidelines to remember with commas.

First, the comma should be used when it is needed to prevent ambiguity. For example, this sentence is inviting Grandma to lunch:

Let’s eat, Grandma!

But take out the comma, and Grandma is lunch:

Let’s eat Grandma!

(Yes, commas save lives).

The second rule is this: there are grammatical rules about when a comma can be used. If your English teacher (like mine) told you to add a comma when you’d pause for breath when reading aloud, then your English teacher was wrong.

That advice, leads us, to the Walken, comma. Or, worse, the, Shatner, comma. (I may have mixed those two up. But you get the point).

Commas are used to separate clauses in sentences.

There are two main types of clauses:

An independent clause contains a subject, a verb, and an object. It can form a complete sentence.
An independent clause can’t form a complete sentence—it’s usually missing the subject or object.

Linking Coordinate Clauses

Coordinate clauses are two independent clauses of equal importance. Coordinate clauses are joined with a comma and a coordinating conjunction, which forms a compound sentence.

There are seven coordinating conjunctions in the English language, and they can be memorised using the acronym FANBOYS:

For—And—Nor—But—Or—Yet—So

Let’s look at an example:

I was supposed to be on a diet, yet I still ate the entire bar of chocolate.

“Yet” is a coordinating conjunction, so (there’s another one!) it is perfect for joining two coordinate clauses. I often find authors join coordinate clauses with just a comma. This is often referred to as a run-on sentence.

There are several ways of correcting a run-on sentence, and it is up to the author to decide which is the most appropriate in the context (there is no one-rule-fits-all solution!).

Correcting a Run-On Sentence

As stated above, we can use a coordinating conjunction. We can also split the sentence into two:

I was supposed to be on a diet. I still ate the entire bar of chocolate.

We can use a semi-colon, which is stronger than a comma but weaker than a full stop.

I was supposed to be on a diet; I still ate the entire bar of chocolate.

We can use a colon where the second thought amplifies the first:

I was supposed to be on a diet: I still ate the entire bar of chocolate.

Note that colons and semi-colons are rarely used in fiction, although they are common in non-fiction (and are especially useful in lists).

We can also use an em dash or em rule (so called because the dash is roughly the width of a capital M):

I was supposed to be on a diet—I still ate the entire bar of chocolate.

Note that no comma is used if the second part of the sentence is a dependent clause (usually because it doesn’t include a subject).

I was supposed to be on a diet but still ate the entire bar of chocolate.

Oxford Comma (aka serial comma or Harvard comma)

A comma before the conjunction at the end of a series is often referred to as the Oxford comma, but can also be called the Harvard comma or serial comma.

Some authors, editors, and publishers require the Oxford comma. Others say it should only be used when needed for clarity. This is a matter of personal style, but my preference is to use the Oxford comma. Why? Because it’s important to edit a document to a consistent style throughout, and using the Oxford comma for some lists and not others isn’t consistent. It’s also easier in the long run: deciding to use the Oxford comma means authors and editors don’t need to look at each sentence to decide whether the Oxford comma is needed for clarity

For example, this sentence doesn’t use the Oxford comma, and is ambiguous:

I’d like to thank my parents, Mother Theresa and the Pope.

Am I thanking four people, or two? Are my parents Mother Theresa and the Pope? No. In this example, it’s important to use the Oxford comma to clarify that I’m thanking four people:

I’d like to thank my parents, Mother Theresa, and the Pope.

Coordinate Adjectives

Another type of list or series is a list of adjectives describing a noun. Many of us were taught (again, incorrectly) that we add commas between adjectives.

But we don’t always need commas.

The Chicago Manual of Style has a dual test as to whether a comma is needed between two adjectives:

Will and fit between the two adjectives without changing the meaning of the sentence? (CMOS 5.90 and 6.33)
Can the order of the adjectives be reversed without changing the meaning of the sentence? (CMOS 6.33)

If you can answer yes to both questions, a comma is needed. If the answer to either (or both) questions is no, then no comma is needed. For example:

She was a faithful, sincere friend.

This sentence needs a comma because she was faithful and sincere, and because you can reverse the adjectives and the sentence will still make sense:

She was a sincere, faithful friend.

This next example does not require commas, because we can’t change the order of the adjectives:

His crisp white linen shirt.

What happens if we change the order? The sentence sounds wrong because the adjectives are in the wrong order e.g.

His white crisp linen shirt.

There are nine different types of adjectives, as outlined in the Royal Order of Adjectives . They are:

Determiner (a, four)
Observation (beautiful, ugly)
Size (big, small)
Shape (square, long-stemmed)
Age (antique, new)
Colour (blue, yellow)
Origin (Italian, Hawaiian)
Material (wood, silk)
Qualifier (wedding, touring)
Noun

So …

I wore a beautiful princess-cut antique ivory Spanish lace wedding dress.

That’s eight adjectives in a single sentence.

Commas with Adverbial Phrases

At the risk of stating the obvious, an introductory adverbial phrase is a phrase at the beginning of a sentence that includes an adverb (an adjective which describes the verb). That sentence was an example: “stating the obvious” is an adverbial phrase. I therefore added a comma.

However, CMOS 6.31 says no comma is necessary for a short introductory adverbial phrase unless it’s likely to be misread without the comma. This leads to a common comma mistake: adding a comma after “so” at the beginning of a sentence.

In general, there shouldn’t be a comma after “so”, despite what Word or Grammarly might tell you:

So will you be home for dinner?

Yes, “so” is an adverb. But it’s a single word, not a phrase, so no comma is necessary. In fact, the example above would be better without the “so”:

Will you be home for dinner?

“So” also functions as a coordinating conjunction (like “and” and “but”). CMOS 6.22 says there is a comma before a coordinating conjunction, but not after (as in this sentence).

Mother is arriving to visit tonight, so will you be home for dinner?

Some people justify adding a comma after “so” by saying you should add a comma where you’d normally take a breath when reading aloud. We’ve already discussed that (in my first post), and concluded it is bad advice

When is it correct to use a comma after “so”? Only when there is a parenthetical phrase (CMOS 6.48). A parenthetical phrase is a comment that could be deleted without changing the meaning of the sentence:

So, John, will you be home for dinner?

“John” adds to the sentence but could be deleted. The comma after “so” is therefore correct.

What about Well?

Is there a comma after “well”? It depends. Merriam-Webster’s shows that “well” can be a noun, a verb, an adverb, an adjective, or an interjection. If “well” is used at the beginning of a sentence, it is usually (but not always) an interjection, and therefore uses a comma (CMOS 5.206 and 6.34):

Well, what have we here?

But the adverbial form of “well” can be used at the beginning of a sentence:

How many marbles do you have?

Well over a hundred.

In this case, no comma is needed.

Those are the most common errors I see with commas. Do you have any questions on how to use commas in fiction?

26 February 2020

Intellectual Property for Writers | What is a Trademark?

I was contacted by someone with a question around trademarks on book titles. No, I’m not a lawyer and this is not legal advice, but it’s an interesting question to consider. A trademark is a form of intellectual property, as is copyright. But they are not the same thing.

What is Copyright?

Copyright applies to creative works such as books, screenplays, magazine articles, and even blog posts. The intention of copyright law is that the person who created the written work should have the sole right to profit from that work. They can either exploit those rights themselves, or they can licence the rights to others (e.g. a publishing contract licences the publisher to publish the book in agreed formats, countries, and languages). For more information on copyright, check out my previous blog posts:

Copyright is automatic, meaning you don’t have to apply for or pay to register copyright (although you can pay to officially register a copyright in the US). But there are certain works which can’t be copyrighted, including book titles—they are deemed to be too short to comprise a “work”. For an example, check out how many books there are titled Secrets or Twilight—a lot. But either word could be trademarked.

What is a Trademark?

Trademarks apply to products or services, and the intention is to give the consumer confidence in their purchases. If you buy a Ford motor vehicle, then you expect a certain level of quality and styling—a different level than if you bought, say, a Lada or a Ferrari. As such, you can’t just manufacture a car and call it a Ford (or a Lada, or a Ferrari). But you might be able to trademark Ford for another product, as long as there is no chance the average consumer will confuse your Ford product with a product supplied by the Ford Motor Company. That means selling a different product, and marketing it with a different visual brand.

This is because trademarks are limited in their application.

You can’t universally trademark the word “dove” because it’s a common word in the English language. You can only trademark it for a specific product or class of products, and you must be the first to use that word in association with that product. So you couldn’t trademark “dove” as a brand of beauty products, but you might be able to trademark Dove Clothing (maybe. I haven’t checked).

Intellectual Property 101: What is a trademark, and can someone trademark three words and stop me using those three words in my book title? #WriteTip #Trademark Click To Tweet

If you want a trademark with broader usage, then you might need to invent a word e.g. Kodak or Tupperware or Rollerblade. Rollerblade is one of many companies who have gone to a lot of effort to defend their trademark. In their case, it even meant creating a new phrase to describe their product (inline skates), so their brand name didn’t default to becoming the generic term (as happened with linolieum).

The Twilight Trademarks

Twilight is an interesting case. There are pages and pages of “Twilight” trademarks owned by Summit Entertainment, who made the movies, covering everything from bookmarks to electric blankets. Each is a separate trademark, because you can’t apply for a blanket trademark or a word or phrase. You have to specify what kinds of products or services the trademark is going to be used for … whether that’s bookmarks or electric blankets (which are two separate categories). There were also trademarks for “The Twilight Saga”, and these were owned by the publisher, Hachette Book Group, Inc, but they haven’t been renewed.

Note that the trademark isn’t just of the word “twilight”. It’s a trademark of the word in a specific stylised font–so you can still write and publish a book called “Twilight”, and you can even sell matching bookmarks. But you can’t use one of the trademarked fonts or anything that looks like the trademarked font–that could be considered passing off, or could lead to trademark dilution. (As such, it’s probably best to make sure your book isn’t about sparkly vampires in the state of Washington.)

So, back to our original question:

Can someone trademark three words and stop me using those three words in my book title?

Short answer: maybe.

It’s unlikely for a trademark for three words as part of a book title to be granted. Rather, the three words probably should be the name of a series of books (e.g. the Harry Potter series, or The Twilight Saga), or in a specific font (as with The Twilight Saga).

However, if the trademark has been registered for a series, then it must be used on a series–not a single book. If the trademarked words are used for a single book, that could be seen as a defence, because:

Using [the trademark] in the title of a single book, under most circumstances, cannot constitute trademark infringement.

However, given the point of a trademark is to provide the consumer with a certainty over the origin of the product, if the single title book looked too similar to the trademarked series, then the trademark owner could still argue it was a case of “passing off” i.e. the publisher of the single title book was deliberately making their book look like the trademarked series to confuse potential readers and gain sales.

So it’s probably a bad idea to publish a book called “Twilight in Forks” featuring a black cover with a bright red strawberry and white text in a font similar to that used in The Twilight Saga. The trademark owners could successfully argue that your use of their cover design, font, and the similarity of the title are designed to confuse customers. That would be trademark infringement.

How can you find out if your book title or part of it is trademarked?

Google.

(Actually, Google is a trademark, and me using it in that manner potentially dilutes the trademark. Instead, I should be telling you to search online using your favourite internet search engine. My favourite is Google, just in case you were wondering.)

So, search online for your phrase and “trademark”. So if you want to find out about Harry Potter trademarks, search for “Harry Potter trademark”. That will usually bring up the Justia website, which is a treasure trove of US trademark information.

As it happens, in this case, it look me only a few minutes to discover that two separate authors had trademarked the phrase in question. One was planning to use the phrase on clothing and other merchandise, and the other had trademarked the phrase for self-help books–the genre my questioner was enquiring about.

Protecting a Trademark

Once a trademark has been registered and accepted, the trademark holder has the legal obligation to protect that trademark. In other words, they have to actively ensure no one else uses or attempts to use that trademark. If someone else uses the trademark and it becomes diluted or generic, the original holder can lose the rights to that word or phrase. The trademark owner is obliged to contact people who might be infringing their trademark and request they stop using it.

So What’s the Answer?

My entirely nonlegal opinion is that the author is probably safe if they have only published—and only intend to publish—one book with this title, and they are contacted by the actual trademark owner.

Probably. I’m not a lawyer, remember, and this is not legal advice.

But if the author is contacted by a lawyer or receives an official cease and desist letter, then the options are to either comply with the request, or seek professional legal advice.

19 February 2020

How Do I Organise a Blog Tour? | An #AuthorToolBoxBlogHop Post

Over the last two weeks, we’ve discussed what a blog tour is, some of the different types of tour, and the tasks a tour organiser will need to complete.

If you decide to organise your own blog tour, you’ll need to make time to undertake most of the activities a professional organiser would undertake. Today I’m sharing some tips on how to organise your own blog tour, based on my experiences as a reviewer and tour participant.

Start Researching Early.

The hardest part of organising a blog tour is finding bloggers, especially book reviewers. There is no easy way to do this—it’s going to take a lot of research if you’re starting from nothing. I suggest:

Identify three to five recent novels in your genre that would appeal to your target reader.
Check the four-star and five-star Goodreads reviews for those books.
Check the profile of each reviewer—most bloggers will include their blog address in their Goodreads profile.
Visit their blog and see if it looks like a good fit for your novel e.g. does it appear the blog features or reviews books in your genre, or does it look likely to appeal to your target reader.

If so, follow the blog (e.g. via WordPress or Feedly). Also, note the blog name, website address, and a link to their guest post or review policy. If they don’t have a policy, then you have nothing to lose by making a polite enquiry through their Contact form.

If one of your objectives is to get book reviews, then make sure that you’re approaching book bloggers who are also active reviewers on your target sites (e.g., Amazon). You can’t require a blogger review your book on Amazon, but you can ask them to review on their blog and on their favourite booklover and retail sites.

Interact with your Target Bloggers.

Bloggers find it easier to say yes to someone they already know and like, so:

Sign up to follow their blog (e.g. through Feedly or WordPress).
Visit regularly.
Comment when relevant.

In particular, if they review a book you’ve enjoyed or that’s similar to your book, comment on that post about how much you also enjoyed the book. Don’t mention your own book at this stage—your objective is to get the blogger (and possibly other blog readers) to recognise your name.

Contact the blogger as early as possible.

Many bloggers plan their editorial calendars several months in advance, especially their review posts. I’ve had to decline to participate in many blog tours because I already had posts scheduled or planned for every day in the blog tour window. I’ve declined others because the author wanted a review and wasn’t prepared to offer an author interview or guest blog post instead.

Yes, I understand that authors want—need—reviews.

I also understand that guest posts and author interviews take time to write, and there is no guarantee of book sales from a blog tour. Even if your objective is to build reviews, a feature on a large blog might still be useful for visibility.

If you’re asking for a review within a specific timeframe, then it’s wise to ask at least three months in advance (the longer, the better). If you’re looking for an interview or guest blog spot, then six weeks might be enough time—but again, the more lead time you can provide the blogger, the more likely they’ll be able to say yes.

[Click here for more information on working with book bloggers and reviewers.]

Consider a ‘Save the Date’ request.

One of the first authors to contact me requesting a review or interview as part of a blog tour sent her first request a full six months before the release date. Her initial email introduced herself, her book, and why she thought my blog was a good match for her novel.

She asked if I’d be prepared to offer an author interview spot, a book review, or both within a certain date range. She also told me the book wasn’t yet ready, and the date she expected to get me a review copy (which was a month before the release date). Giving me six month’s notice made it easy to say yes because I could reserve the slot on my blog, and time in my reading schedule.

As a first-time teenage author, she set a high standard for other authors to follow.

Respect the Blogger’s Time.

If the blogger is only able to offer you a book spotlight post or author interview, then accept gratefully. Don’t resent the fact they wouldn’t review your book (it’s more likely that they couldn’t, especially if they don’t know you, or you asked at the last minute).

Deliver the requested materials before the blogger’s deadline—especially if you’re dealing with bloggers in different time zones. Most bloggers have a set time each week when they upload their posts. If you miss their deadline, you’re putting extra pressure on them to find time in their schedule to upload your post. It also means the post might go up with missing information if you didn’t leave enough time for them to get back to you with any issues.

Respect the Blogger’s Audience.

When your post appears, visit the blog and leave a comment to respond to any comments and thank the blogger for interviewing you, featuring your blog post, or reviewing your book. Visit the blog a couple of times over the next few days to respond to any additional comments.

If you have offered a giveaway, also visit the blogs to thank people for entering, and announce the winner.

Conclusion

Yes, there is a lot involved in organising a blog tour—more than I thought when I started writing what I thought would be a short post! Can you think of any other tips, or anything I’ve missed?

Have you ever run a blog tour as an author, or participated in a blog tour as a blogger? What lessons can you add?

This post is part of the monthly Author ToolBox Blog Hop, organised by Raimey Gallant. We now have over 40 blogs participating. To find more Blog Hop posts:

12 February 2020

Dear Editor | How Do I Get my Book on a Blog Tour?

Last week, I discussed several different types of blog tour post. This week I’m looking at why you might choose to undertake a blog tour, and share two options around organising a tour.

Unfortunately, your book doesn’t just “get” on a blog tour. Someone has to organise it—usually the publisher or the author. But before you plan a tour, know your objectives.

Know Your Why.

Why are you considering undertaking a blog tour? You need to have a reason—otherwise you’ll never be able to assess whether the tour was a success or not. Possible objectives are:

Raise awareness
Get book reviews
Get backlinks
Sell books

Let’s look at each of these.

Raise Awareness

A blog tour is a good way of raising awareness about your book, assuming you’re able to get your book featured on blogs that are popular with your target reader.

An Instagram tour can also be a good way of raising awareness, especially if you write Young Adult fiction, or another genre that’s popular with on #Bookstagram.

Raising awareness is especially important for new authors, because they don’t have an established fan base to buy their books. Experts say someone has to see or hear about a new product (like a book) seven to twelve times before they will decide to purchase. A blog tour or Instagram tour can help your book be seen many times in a short timeframe.

Get Book Reviews

Book reviews help sell books (well, assuming the reviewer enjoyed the book). No, Amazon don’t promote your book more once it has 10 or 20 or 50 reviews. They also don’t send you a free unicorn once you get to 100 reviews (sorry!).

Amazon promote the books they think the reader is most likely to buy, and their bestseller lists are based on book sales. Nothing else.

But book reviews, especially those on Amazon, provide social proof. They show people are reading and enjoying the book. And when that review is from a reviewer or influencer the reader knows and trusts, the reader is more likely to influence a purchase.

Where you have the choice, find reviewers who will review on their blog and cross-post that review to Amazon (and other retail sites), and to Goodreads (and other reviewer sites). Bloggers who also share their reviews on social media are a bonus.

Note that even critical reviews help on Amazon.

It looks suspect when a new release from an unknown author has only five-star reviews. A few four-star and three-star reviews (and possibly even a one-star review) suggests to browsers that someone other than the author’s friends. Many readers will report having bought a book based on a one-star review.

Get Backlinks

A backlink is the technical name for when another website links to your website. Backlinks contribute to your site’s Alexa ranking, which is an attempt to measure how popular your site is relative to all other sites. Getting links from more popular sites can help improve your ranking, which can help you appear in online searches.

Sell Books

If your objective is to sell books, then you might be better investing your time and money in advertising. Blog tours might sell books, but you might not show an immediate sales blip. Blog tours are more about raising awareness of you and your new release.

Here’s a tip: if you do want your blog tour to sell books, don’t offer a giveaway of your book.

That will incentivise people to not buy, as they’ll wait and hope they win a copy. Instead, offer a fun gift such as bookmarks, a handcrafted item, local chocolate or coffee, or something related to your book (e.g., when Thomas Nelson published The Baggage Handler by David Rawlings, they ordered custom baggage tags featuring the book cover image. Unfortunately, they didn’t step up and offer a branded camera when The Camera Never Lies released 😉 ).

Once you’ve decided why you want to undertake a blog tour, you have two options:

Hire a blog tour organiser to arrange the blog tour for you.
Organise the tour yourself.

Working with a Blog Tour Organiser

Hiring a blog tour organiser will mean paying someone, but there are advantages. A good blog tour operator who works in your genre should already have list of relevant bloggers they have established relationships with, and can contract. The advantage of this is that bloggers are more likely to say yes if they know and trust the organiser, which is particularly useful for first-time authors who don’t have an established platform or network of blogger friends.

[If you don’t have an established platform, then it’s time to get started. Click here to find out about the Kick-Start Your Author Platform Marketing Challenge.]

A reputable blog tour organiser will also have a defined process, and will be able to tell you which tasks they will complete (most of the organising), and what you will need to do (e.g. write guest posts, or supply review copies of your book). They will also have the technical skills to perform tasks like setting up a Google form or mailing list, or creating social media images.

Note that you will have to book your tour in plenty of time:

Allow at least three months before your desired tour date.
Six months is better, especially for blog tours where you’re seeking book reviews.

A blog tour organiser will undertake some or all of the following tasks:

Working with the author to confirm blog tour dates.
Individually contacting bloggers or Bookstagrammers who are actively in the genre.
Setting up a Google form or similar to recruit bloggers.
Posting on the author’s website and social media accounts to attract bloggers.
Validating applicants and advising the successful bloggers.
Sending physical or electronic review copies to reviewers.
Providing all bloggers with a schedule, media kit, and social media graphics.
Liaising between the author and the bloggers to ensure all bloggers receive their requested guest posts and author interviews.
Sharing blog tour posts on social media as they go live.
Liking and sharing social media posts from bloggers.
Pick a giveaway winner and distribute the prizes.
Following up with bloggers to ensure they fulfil their promises.
Provide the author with feedback on the tour e.g. how many bloggers participated, and what was shared. This list can then form the basis of an initial contact list for future blog posts.

Blog tour organisers working in the Christian fiction genre include:

(An online search may also bring up the Christian Fiction Blog Alliance, or LitFuse Publicity. Both have ceased operation.)

If you don’t want a full blog tour, then there are other options. For example:

Celebrate Lit offer a podcast tour, giving you the opportunity to be interviewed on relevant podcasts.
Just Read offer Instagram tours, to get your book in front of popular bookstagrammers.
Prism Book Tours offers themed tours, and excerpt tours.
Relz Reviews will help you set up a street team or influencer team who can review your book and share on social media.

The exact tasks and processes will depend on the services the organiser offers, and what you hire them for.

Your other option is to organise a tour yourself, and that’s what we’ll talk about next week.

Meanwhile, do you know of any other Christian blog tour companies?

5 February 2020

Dear Editor | What is a Blog Tour and Do I Need One?

Yes, this is another blog post prompted by a question on Facebook.

An author had seen blog tour posts, spotlighting books from authors, and wondered how an author got that kind of opportunity.

It’s a good question.

A blog tour is the modern online equivalent of a book signing tour.

The author will “visit” several blogs over a day, a week, or longer. There may also be a giveaway associated with the tour, usually a copy of the author’s newest release. The author may also offer bookmarks or other book-related gifts (often referred to as swag). Depending on the tour, visitors can enter the giveway either by commenting on one or more posts, by signing up for the author’s email list, or by sharing the post on social media.

[Read this post to find out more about online giveaways.]

A blog tour is a great way of raising awareness about a new or upcoming release.

They can be used to refresh an older release, but most book blogs focus on new releases. As such, bloggers are less likely to be interested in featuring an older book without a good reason e.g. three or more older books combined into a box set.

Types of Blog Tour Posts

Blog tours can have a variety of types of post, depending on the purpose and timing of the tour. As such, the exact content will depend on the type of post. However, all blog tour posts usually have:

An image of the book cover.
The book description.
Sales links.
Author photograph.
Author biography.
The author’s online website and social media links.

The purpose of a blog tour is to raise awareness, so there’s no point in embarking on a blog tour without something to sell and somewhere the interested reader can buy.

Cover Reveal

A cover reveal post or tour is the first time the cover has been revealed to the public. The key to a great cover reveal should be obvious: a great cover. You’ll need to be prepared to share the cover with bloggers ahead of time. Many will make their decision whether or not to feature your book based on their perception of the cover and how they think it will appeal to their readers.

As with all blog tours, it’s important to target bloggers who regularly blog in your genre.

The cover reveal occurs before the book is published, and the objective is usually to raise awareness and (hopefully) kick-start pre-orders. Personally, it annoys me to see a cover reveal without a pre-order. If I’m interested in the book, then I want to be able to pre-order it there and then, so I don’t forget. As such, my personal recommendation is to ensure your pre-order is live before spending time or money on a cover reveal blog tour.

Guest Post

Some blog tours feature a range of different posts related to the book. As a reader, this is my favourite type of tour post, because each post is unique, and each post is an opportunity to find out something interesting about the book and/or author.

How does a guest post work?

In the tours I’ve participated in, the author has contacted me with a list of suggested post titles, and given me the option of choosing to do a book review, author interview or one of the post options. This is the easiest to agree to as a blogger, because we know what we’re getting, so can pick a topic that fits our blog and audience.

The author writes the posts in advance. When each blogger requests a post topic, the author sends through an original post and deletes that topic from the list. Here are some suggested topics:

An interview with the hero.
An interview with the heroine.
An interview with both the hero and the heroine.
An interview with the hero or heroine’s mother or best friend (who is also a character in the book).
The inspiration behind the story.
The inspiration behind the characters.
The inspiration behind the setting.
The novel’s theme and why that’s important to the author.
Interesting facts the author discovered while researching the novel.
A devotion based on a key verse featured in the novel.

Many of these posts can be written months in advance.

For example, historical fiction authors often undertake a lot of research. This research can’t all be incorporated into the novel, as that would slow the story. But it could form the basis for one or more blog posts.

Alternatively, the blogger might have a specific theme you could write to. For example, International Christian Fiction Writers has a Wandering Wednesday feature in which the author introduces readers to their book’s setting. The only proviso is that ICFW want international settings—either non-US authors, or US authors featuring a non-US setting.

A blog tour based on guest posts can be a lot of work for the author. However, it’s also less work for the blogger, which means they’re more likely to be open to participating in the blog tour.

Author Interview

Blog tours will often include author interviews. Some authors (or blog tour organisers) send through a series of questions with the author’s answers. Others will invite the bloggers to submit questions for the author to answer.

From an author perspective, I can see the appeal in writing one master interview and sending that out to all participating bloggers and asking them to pick and choose five to ten questions to feature.

But from a reader perspective, it can get monotonous to read the same interview on several different blogs. In that respect, reader-me prefers it when the blogger asks their own questions. I also prefer it when the author provides detailed answers—the purpose of an author interview is to allow the reader to feel they’ve gotten to know the author. That’s hard when the author only provides one-word answers (unless the questions were clearly designed to elicit a one-word answer).

Book Review

Authors want book reviews because positive reviews from reputable reviewers help sell books.

When you ask people what persuades them to buy a book, they’ll often say a recommendation from someone they know. That someone might be a real-life friend or acquaintance, or it might be a book blogger they follow and trust.

But a book review is a bigger commitment from the blogger than other blog tour posts because they have to read the book, write a the review, and load up the blog post. That’s eight to ten hours, compared to an hour or less to schedule a cover reveal or author interview. As such, a blogger is more likely to be able to agree to a guest post or author interview than a book reivew.

Book Spotlight

A book spotlight post has much the same contents as a cover reveal post. Some also include an excerpt from the published novel. They’re the easiest kind of blog tour post for the author and the blogger. Why? Because it’s mostly a cut-and-paste exercise with little formatting required.

I don’t tend to pay a lot of attention to book spotlight posts, especially when they’re part of a larger blog tour that also features book reviews. Book spotlights on a review tour suggests the bloggers either didn’t get time to read the book, or they didn’t like it.

A spotlight-only tour helps raise awareness and provides the author with backlinks. But it doesn’t provide the reader with any incentive to read the post. As such, I suspect this is the kind of post that’s least likely to drive sales.

I’ll be back next week to discuss the two main kinds of blog tours, and offer some hints for organising your own blog tour.

Which is your favourite kind of blog tour post? Do you know any others?

29 January 2020

Marketing 101 | Why Isn’t My Facebook Advertising Working?

Why aren’t my Facebook Advertisements Converting into Sales?

This question came from a Facebook group I’m a member of. The author said they’d spent thousands of dollars advertising their book on Facebook, yet never had an advertisement that actually “worked”.

I’m going to leave aside the obvious question of why someone would spend thousands on advertising with no results.

While I’m no expert on Facebook advertising, the advice I’ve seen is to start at $5 per day and scale up, focussing on repeating and tweaking the advertisements that get results.

If you spend $5 a day for a month (i.e. $150) and get no results, then I think you take a step back to try and figure out what’s not working. You don’t wait until you’ve spent thousands. Surely that’s just common sense.

As my father told me, common sense isn’t that common.

The other issue is the questioner didn’t make clear how they defined “work”.

If we’re advertising on Facebook (or any other media network), then we need to have an objective, and we need to measure our results against that objective. The most common objective is to make sales, and I assume the original questioner was advertising in the hope of making sales. But some authors have run Facebook advertisements to build their email list by offering a free book, or even to boost the effect of a free giveaway. Those are also valid objectives. So was the questioner’s objective to sell books, or build their list? We don’t know.

Leaving those factors aside, and acknowledging that I’m no expert on Facebook advertising, I can see three main reasons why a Facebook advertisement (or series of advertisements) might not “work”:

The advertisement isn’t engaging the target audience.
The Amazon book page isn’t engaging viewers.
The product isn’t up to standard in some way.

Marketing 101 | Why Isn’t My Facebook Advertising Working? Click To Tweet

Advertising to the Target Audience

I’ve never tried advertising on Facebook, so the little I know comes from the blog posts and social media posts I’ve read on the subject (if you want to know more, I suggest checking out Bryan Cohen, Mark Dawson, or David Gaughran).

What I do know is that Facebook holds a lot of personal information about its users, and authors can target their advertisements based on a range of factors.

Facebook also reports the response from advertising, including how many people have viewed and clicked on each advertisement. What Facebook can’t tell you is how many people who click go on to take action (e.g., buy the advertised book, or sign up for the author’s mailing list, or whatever objective the author had for the advertisement).

If your advertisements aren’t “working”, the first place to look is your Facebook statistics.

How many people viewed your advertisement? If no one views your advertisement, then it could be you’re targeting the wrong people, or not paying enough for the advertisements. In that case, ask a Facebook ads expert for advice.

Assuming people do see your advertisement, do they click? How many click? What is the normal percentage of viewers that you can expect to click?

If people are viewing your advertisement but not clicking, then the problem is probably a mismatch between the people you’re targeting, and the advertising copy. Perhaps you’re targeting British male thriller readers aged 30 to 50, but your advertisement copy appeals more to a female audience.
If people are viewing and clicking your advertisement at acceptable rate but that isn’t converting to sales (or newsletter signups, or whatever your objective is), then the problem might not be your advertisements.

If the problem isn’t your advertisement, then it might be your Amazon book page.

Amazon Book Page

I’m the curious type, so I checked out the author’s Amazon page—mostly because they specifically stated they had professional covers, brilliant book descriptions, and good reviews. My experience as a reviewer is authors who think their cover, book description, and reviews are all brilliant does not make it so.

I was right. (Sometimes I hate that.)

(I’m not the first person to point out that if a book isn’t selling, the problem is likely to be the book. For example, see this excellent post from Kristen Lamb: It Isn’t the Reader, It’s the Book … Really.)

The author had three books on sale—two novels in a series, and a nonfiction title. I looked at the first novel in the series.

The novel had an intriguing juxtaposition in the title, but the subtitle was confusing. It implied this was a standalone novel, but also part of a series. On one hand, I can see why the author mentioned it was a standalone novel—they were trying to make clear this was a complete story, and didn’t have a cliffhanger ending. That’s good—a lot of readers (including me) loathe cliffhanger endings. But I think this would have been better stated in the book description than the subtitle. Leave the subtitle to tell the reader what they need to know: [book title] is the first book in the [series name] series.

I liked the cover. But that’s not necessarily a good thing.

The book was supposed to be a hardboiled thriller, and I mostly read sweet and Christian romance, and romantic suspense. There’s a big difference between a female-led romantic suspense novel and a hardboiled thriller with a male lead. A reader should be able to look at the cover and know which they’re getting. In this case, the cover looked more like a female-led romantic suspense novel than a hardboiled thriller.

The book description needed work. My editor brain noticed all the unnecessary capital letters and missing hyphens. Other commenters noted telling, mixed tenses, overlong sentences, unnecessary information (like the weather), and an excessive use of passive voice (passive voice isn’t a great way to sell any novel, let alone an action novel).

Title, cover, description. All bad.

That’s three strikes. Already. And we haven’t even looked at the reviews or the first page yet.

The book only had eleven reviews, and the top three featured reviews were three, two, and one-star. That’s hardly “good”. Those three reviews all commented that the first quarter was very slow, and the story didn’t get going until halfway through. That structure can work in literary fiction or women’s fiction. It won’t work for a so-called thriller, where readers expect compelling action from page one (like in a James Bond movie).

The book was relatively expensive for the first book in a series from an unknown author—$4.99 for 300 pages. That’s not overpriced (unlike the author’s nonfiction title, which was $4.99 for 69 pages). But I suspect it’s more common for authors to use Facebook advertising for first-in-series books on sale at $2.99 or even 99 cents. The idea is that a loss leader will entice the reader into buying the full-priced sequel. People who click through to Amazon are likely to look at the price, and click away.

At this point, I doubt many readers are going to consider reading the Look Inside or the Kindle sample. If they do, then they’ll make their purchase decision based on the quality of the opening pages.

Product Quality

The formatting of the book looked fine, with a readable font, a drop capital at the beginning of the chapter, and a nice (if geographically vague) graphic between the chapter head and the text. But the chapters had names, and that’s not something I see in modern fiction for adults. It suggests the author doesn’t know or understand current trends in fiction … which is not a good sign.

The story opened with the point of view character waking up alone in his London flat. There are two problems with this opening:

It’s considered a cliche for a novel to start with a dream, with the character waking up, or with the character at a funeral. A clever writer can twist the cliche in to something original and compelling. This opening was neither original nor compelling.
Any time there is only one character in a scene, there is a good chance the scene will be telling rather than showing. This scene was told. And told. And told.

Cliche aside, I’d decided by page two that I didn’t like the point of view character.

He complains about the “badly behaved foul-mouthed children” then comments about how he hates being wakened by that “****ing racket”. Pot, meet kettle. As I said, I’m not the target reader for a hardboiled thriller (whose readers probably expect this language).

But let’s leave my personal preferences aside and focus on the writing.

We have a one-sentence summary of the previous night (telling), and a too-detailed description of our hero’s morning routine (more telling, and no action. Unless you count getting out of bed slowly as action).

We then have the cliche scene of the character looking in the mirror to discover what he looks like (tired, probably a result of last night’s beer).

We have direct thought in italics. Direct thought in italics isn’t incorrect, but does suggest the author doesn’t know how to use interior monologue correctly.

He then has breakfast (in summary, fortunately), before swearing a bit more and checking his calendar to see what he’s doing today. Yes, more telling.

Then we have some backstory, and I gave up reading about the time he inexplicably decided to drive from Seven Sisters to Finsbury Park instead of taking the tube (it’s only one stop).

Suffice to say, I congratulate anyone who gets through the Kindle sample. They are a better person than I am.

The sad thing is that all of this could have been addressed by a manuscript assessment or edit from a competent editor. It would have cost money, sure. Perhaps even thousands. But less than the thousands the author has spent on advertising.

It’s not that this author’s Facebook advertising didn’t “work.”

It’s that the author has spent their time and money on advertising an overpriced product that doesn’t fit the market. Instead, that time and money should have been spent on improving the product.

If your Facebook advertisements aren't working, ask yourself: are the advertisements the problem? Or is it the book? #WritingCommunity #BookMarketing Click To Tweet

And that’s the lesson.

It doesn’t matter how good your cover is, or how much you spend on advertising (on Facebook or elsewhere). If your basic product (book) doesn’t shine, then no one is going to buy it.

All the advertising dollars in the world can’t fix a bad book.

22 January 2020

Writers Life | Four Steps to Declutter your Electronic Life

It’s a new year, the time when many of us consider our plans for the year.

If you’re anything like me, plans are often about the new things we want to do. The problem is we all have the same 168 hours in the week, and they’re already full. So where do we fit the new plans?

Saying yes to something new means saying no to something else, often something we’re already doing. It might mean saying no to several somethings.

One of the things I want to say no to in 2020 is clutter, both physical and digital.

I am a firm believer that clutter affects our mental wellbeing.

Well, it affects mine. I find it difficult to relax in a cluttered space. It’s not necessarily that I want to get up and clean that space. It’s more that I know it needs to be done, and that makes it harder to relax … or to get on with what needs doing.

I have trained myself to not be bothered if I can’t see the clutter (e.g. my son’s bedroom), or if it’s not my clutter (e.g. in someone else’s house). But it does bug me if it’s in “my” space, and I could do something about it. I think that’s why I like going to a cafe to write—if the clutter is out of sight, it’s out of mind. Then I can write.

But physical clutter is only half the battle. The other half is electronic.

That’s both easier and harder to ignore. Easier, because one tiny icon on a smartphone screen hides hundreds of unread emails or unread blog posts or podcasts we’ve been meaning to listen to. It’s easy to ignore that little icon (especially if you’ve turned notifications off—which I do recommend).

But it’s also harder, because it’s all too easy to let one unread email become one hundred … or one thousand. And the common advice of deleting the email app (or social media apps) from your phone doesn’t necessarily solve the problem. The email and text messages and Facebook messages are still there, even though we can’t see them. Just like the clutter in the junk cupboard.

I’ll leave you to Marie Kondo when it comes to physical declutter (and I give you full permission to ignore her 30-book rule).

I’m going to focus on decluttering your electronic life:

Declutter your blog notifications.
Declutter your email subscriptions.
Clear your email inbox.
Keep your inbox clear.

I’ve recently heard that we spend an averages of 720 hours a year on email. That’s two hours a day! It doesn’t take a maths whiz to work out that decluttering your email will save serious time—time that could be spent on a more productive pursuit, like finishing your current manuscript, or writing your next.

Four Tips for decluttering your electronic life: declutter your blog notifications, declutter your email subscriptions, clear your email inbox, and keep your inbox clear. #WritersLife #Declutter Click To Tweet

Declutter Your Blog Notifications

Most websites and blogs give you the option to follow them by email subscription. Sometimes you can even read the entire post via your email app, without even visiting the blog.

This is a great idea, but if you follow a lot of blogs—especially prolific blogs—you’ll soon find your email inbox overrun with emails about blog posts you haven’t read. There are two issues with blog notifications:

They clutter up your inbox.
You run the risk of missing an important email because your email inbox is full of clutter.

There are two simple and logical solutions to this problem:

Review and delete email notifications as you receive them (at least daily).
Don’t follow so many blogs by email.

Yes, I can hear you. You’re following these blogs because you want to see (and perhaps read) their posts.

But there is another way: an RSS feed reader.

RSS is Really Simple Syndication, and it’s the way those blogs deliver you an email about each blog post.

I use a the free version of Feedly. I can use it on my phone or PC, which means my reading is synced between devices. This means I can browse Feedly while I’m waiting in line at the supermarket, or read it at home during the day or in the evening on my tablet or PC.

I recommend using Feedly to keep track of those blogs you browse, read, or share. I follow very few blogs via email. I follow my own blogs (to make sure the posts go live and that the RSS feed is working). I follow (maybe) three other blogs via email. I realised most blogs either sent the same information via email as they posted on their blog, or they sent a link to the blog post. So I unsubscribed and followed the blogs through Feedly instead.

If you plan to comment on blogs (e.g. because you’re part of a regular meme or blog hop), then I recommend using the WordPress reader app. It makes it easy to view, approve, and respond to comments on your own blog, and to follow, like posts, and comment on other blogs.

Action Tips:

Sign up for Feedly (or another RSS reader).
Install the WordPress reader app your smartphone.
Unsubscribe from those inbox-cluttering emails.
Add any subscriptions you want to keep to Feedly or WordPress.

If you already follow blogs through Feedly and have a habit of clicking “Read Later”, take some time to go through your Read Later tab. Read the posts, or delete them. I’ve just done this, and found I had unread posts from two years ago. I suspect I deleted over 1,000 unread posts.

My new resolution is to keep that Read Later list to under ten posts.

Declutter Your Email Subscriptions

I don’t know about you, but I seem to end up on a lot of email lists:

Some are lists I need to be on (e.g. power bills and information about when my tax payments are due).
Some are from retail sites where I’ve signed up to their loyalty programme (because that saves me money).
Some are notifications about products or training courses I’ve bought online.
A lot are random—I remember signing up, but I can’t always remember why. And I certainly don’t read the emails.

Again, there are two issues with email subscriptions:

They clutter up your inbox.
You run the risk of missing an important email because your email inbox is full of clutter.

So the objective is twofold:

Reduce the number of emails in your inbox (ideally to zero).
Reduce the number of emails you receive overall.

Reducing the number of emails you receive will automatically reduce the number in your inbox (obviously!). But how?

Set up a new email address e.g. a free gmail address.

That might not make sense at first, but I promise there is a logic to it. The point is to divide important personal emails (the ones that could affect your family relationships or credit rating) from the unimportant (pretty much everything else).

It means you’re less likely to miss an important email (as that stays in your main email account), and that’s a stress-saver itself. It also means you can easily review and delete the emails in this inbox, as most of them won’t require any action from you.

Use this new address for:

Retail sites (especially the ones that send you the daily sales emails).
Training courses.
Online product subscriptions.

Whenever you receive a subscription email in your main email inbox, decide:

Is this a personal email i.e. not from a mailing list? If so, it can stay in your main email box.
Is this from an important business e.g. the tax department? If so, it can stay in your main email box.
Do you know this person, product, or service? If not, unsubscribe.
Do you still want to hear from this person, product, or service? If so, update your email address to your new address.

You should be able to update your information by clicking a link at the bottom of the email. If your only option is to unsubscribe, do that, then resubscribe with your new address.

This will take a few weeks (or longer, depending on how many email lists you’re on, and how often they contact you). But it will only take a few seconds per email to change your details, and that will help keep your main inbox clear.

Clear Your Email Inbox

But how do you clear your email inbox and reach the magical (and possibly mythical) inbox zero?

Use Folders

All email programmes allow you to set up folders. You can then file the mails you’ve read and want to keep so you can access them again, but they’re not cluttering up your inbox.

What folders do you need? That will depend on you, how many email addresses you have, and what you use them for (e.g. you’ll have different folders on your work email than your personal email).

I recently listened to an episode of The Content Fix podcast which suggested using no more than three email folders. The logic was that only having three folders makes it easy to assign each email you want to keep to a folder.

If you want to start with inbox zero from today, create a “Old Emails” folder, and move all the emails your current inbox into that new folder. That way, you won’t lose anything but can still access old emails if necessary.

Check Out Unroll.me

But what about all those email newsletters you kind of want to receive, but still don’t want to clog up your inbox?

Check out unroll.me. It’s a free Gmail application that shows you what email lists you’re subscribed to, and gives you three options:

Keep in inbox
Roll up
Unsubscribe

You will then receive a daily email from Unroll.me with the introduction to all your subscribed emails, and the option to click through and read the full email. Yes, it takes longer to read the full email than if you received it directly. But I find this slight inconvenience is made up for by the fact I only have to skim through and delete one email, not twenty. If you do find yourself always wanting to read a specific email, simply go into Unroll.me, and move that subscription back into your inbox.

Bonus tip:

If you already use Unroll.me or a similar service, take a few minutes to go through your subscription list and unsubscribe from any newsletter that you can’t remember subscribing to, or no longer read. Businesses have to pay to have you on their email list, so you’re doing them a favour by unsubscribing.

Check out Boomerang

If you email through Gmail, then sign up for a free Boomerang account. Boomerang is an email management app that helps you get to the magical inbox zero by taking emails out of your inbox and returning them on a set day.

For example, if I’ve agreed to review a book, I’ll let the author know when the review is due to go live, then Boomerang the email to come back on that day. The returning email prompts me to check the blog post has gone live, and email the link to the author.

I also use Boomerang for managing my to-do list e.g. by returning the emails relating to an editing job a couple of days before I’m due to start work, or by emailing me the link to a training course, so I can work through some of the (many) training courses I’ve signed up for.

This means I can keep my email inbox empty enough that everything fits on one screen.

This makes it easier to see everything and helps ensure I don’t lose track of important emails or emails that require an answer.

There are free and paid versions of Boomerang.

The free version allows you to Boomerang ten emails per calendar month. The paid version allows for unlimited emails. I use the free version on my personal Gmail account, and the paid version for my editing account (as I kept running up against the ten emails per month limit).

Check out these apps that help you keep your inbox clear: Feedly, Unroll.me, and Boomerang for Gmail #WritersLife #DigitalDeclutter Click To Tweet

The result will be an email inbox that only contains emails relevant to what you need to do today (or this week). I can promise that decluttering your inbox will reduce your email stress.

Action Tips:

Set up a dedicated email address for bookish subscriptions.
Redirect subscriptions for retail sites, training courses, and online subscriptions to your new address.
Unsubscribe from anything you’re not genuinely interested in.
Sign up for Unroll.me and add so-so emails to your daily rollup.
Sign up for Boomerang and use it to keep your inbox at zero.

Keep Your Inbox Empty

The trick to making this work is keeping on top of your email. Get it down to zero, and set yourself a target of getting back to zero at least once a week. This will mean developing a system for managing your email and setting aside time to respond to emails, but the effort is worth it.

Joanna Penn recently interviewed behavioral psychology expert Nir Eyal, who pointed out one of the reasons email is such a timesuck:

The time wasted on e-mail is wasted not on the checking, not on the replying, but on the re-checking.

What does this look like? In my case, I would open an e-mail, read it real quick, put it away, open it again, put it away, open it again, put it away. We forget what’s in the e-mail, so we touch each e-mail way too many times.

I’ve read before that we should only check our email when we have time to deal with it. That reflects Nir Eyal’s point: it’s not the checking that takes time. It’s the rechecking. So our aim should be to reduce the number of times we recheck an email by either:

Dealing with an email message the first time we read it, or
Moving the email out of our inbox (e.g. by moving it to a folder or by using an app like Boomerang) until we are ready to action it.

We then need to make time to action those emails. Eyal says he sets aside time every Monday afternoon to respond to the second category of emails. What he finds is that by then, a lot of the problems and requests have already been sorted out.

This is similar to the 4D method of managing email:

Delete: If you don’t need to keep it, delete it.
Do it: If it can be actioned in two minutes or less, do it now.
Delegate: If someone else can do it, delegate it (harder for authorpreneurs and other self-employed people).
Defer: If it can’t be actioned in less than two minutes, defer it.

The challenge is then to make time to deal with those deferred emails, whether that’s once a day or once a week. And that’s my challenge for 2020!

Do you have any digital declutter or email management tips to share?

18 January 2020

Book Review | The Balance Point by Jordan Ring

Jordan Ring is one of a new breed of entrepreneurs, a “digital nomad” who has achieved what many people dream of—a work-life balance that means he and his wife earn enough from their online activities to support themselves and their dream lifestyle (at least for now. They don’t have children yet, and children do have a habit of changing priorities).

One of the myths of entrepreneurship, a myth fostered by business titles such as “The Four-Hour Work Week” is that entrepreneurs don’t work a lot. Ring points out the opposite is true: entrepreneurs just as likely to overwork, or to find it difficult to balance their work and non-work lives.

This book is Ring’s analysis of eleven areas where our lives can get out of balance:

Preparation vs. Action
Work vs. Play
Yes vs. No
Purpose vs. Passion
Reactive vs. Proactive
Intention vs. Perception
Consumption vs. Production
Instant win vs. Delayed Gratification
Hustle vs. Health
80 vs. 20
Potential vs. Contentment

Sure, a lot of his tips aren’t original. I’ve seen tips like these before:

Make a consistent time to plan each week, each month, and each year.

(You could also add “each decade”, given we’re at the beginning of 2020.)

Set aside time every day for the most important tasks for your business.

And just because these quotes aren’t original doesn’t make them any less true:

Filing to plan is planning to fail (Alan Lakein)

But there are also some useful productivity tips like clustering tasks, or setting up filters in Gmail so you’re not distracted by junk email.

If you love the work you do, you won’t work a day in your life. (John C Maxwell)

Ring then encourages readers to determine which two or three areas they’re strong on, and which two or three areas are their biggest problem, and take action on those areas. Of course, that’s the challenge with any business book, especially those discussing productivity.

Will we take action?

In this case, I think so. Ring hasn’t left us with a prescriptive list of unattainable goals. Instead, he encourages readers to recognize their biggest struggles, and start with whatever works best. I think that’s achievable.

Thanks to the author for providing a free ebook for review.

15 January 2020

Dear Editor | Should I Pay to Enter a Writing Contest?

There used to be a view that legitimate writing contests were free to enter, and that any contest that charged a fee was suspect.

That’s no longer true—but it doesn’t mean that all writing contests are created equal, or that all contests are legitimate. Unfortunately, just as there are too many vanity publishers out to separate unwary authors from their hard-earned money, so too there are vanity writing contests.

How do you tell the difference between a reputable writing contest and a vanity contest? Check out these 5 questions. #WritingContest #WritersLife Click To Tweet

So how can a writer tell which contests are legitimate, and which are vanity contests?

Here are some questions to consider:

Who runs the contest?
How much does the contest cost to enter?
How many categories are there?
How quickly are the entries judged?
Who are the past winners?

Who Runs the Contest?

Many contests are run by writing organisations. For example, American Christian Fiction Writers runs the Carol Award for published authors, and the Genesis and First Impressions contests for unpublished authors. Romance Writers of America run the RITA Award for published authors. In Australasia, Omega Writers run the CALEB Award.

Other contests are run by chapters of larger organisations. For example, the TARA is run by the Tampa Area Romance Authors, and the MARA is run by the Mid-America Romance Authors.

Some contests are run by publishing organisations. For example, the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association run the Christian Book Awards for nonfiction, and now manage the Christy Awards for fiction. Others are run as part of a writer’s conference e.g. the Selah Awards are linked to the Blue Ridge Mountains Christian Writing Conference, or run by a not-for-profit e.g. Stories of Life.

These are generally legitimate awards. Sure, some are more expensive than others (it costs USD 125 to enter a single book in the Christy Award, plus the cost of providing paper copies for judging). But the purpose of the contests is to recognise the best in the industry, and the contest attracts entries from major publishers.

But some contests are run by less honourable organisations.

Some vanity presses run awards, with the prize being a free publishing package (“worth $10,000!”). Sure, the vanity press might sell that publishing package for $10,000, but there’s a lot of profit in that. These contests are simply a way for the vanity press to solicit sales prospects.

Other contests are run by for-profit organisations. Now, I have nothing against a for-profit organisation (after all, if organisations such as bookstores, publishing companies, and freelance editors didn’t make a profit, then there would be no bookstores, publishing companies, or freelance editors). But a writing contest run by a for-profit organisation means the objective of the contest isn’t to find and recognise the best writers in the genre.

It’s to make a profit. Let the buyer beware.

How Much does the Contest Cost to Enter?

Contests run by writing organisations will often have two rates—a member and a non-member rate. The non-member rate is often expensive, but that’s not because the contest is a vanity contest. It’s a not-so-subtle attempt from the organisers to encourage entrants to join the organisation. Some writing organisations only permit entries from members, but potential entrants can join and enter at the same time.

Other contests (such as the RITA) allow the first entry at a relatively inexpensive rate, but additional entries cost more per entry. This is because they’re disincentivising authors from submitting multiple entries—they want each writer to enter their best book, so the contest represents as many different authors as possible (given the contest is capped at 2,000 entries).

In contrast, vanity contests will often offer a discount on the second and subsequent entries—because they make money by having lots of entries, and because they use the number of entries as a marketing point. These contests range in price from very expensive to free. But free isn’t always good—some vanity contests claim copyright on entries, which means the entrant is effectively giving away that writing and getting nothing in return.

What is the Money Used for?

To properly gauge whether a writing contest is too expensive or not, authors need to assess what the entry fees are used for.

For example, some writing contests award cash prizes, so a portion of the entry fee will be used to fund the prize. The Indie Book Awards offer cash prizes. I can see that’s an attractive proposition for many authors:

$1,500 Cash Prize and trophy awarded to the best Fiction Book
$1,500 Cash Prize and trophy awarded to the best Non-Fiction Book
$750 Cash Prize and trophy awarded to the second best Fiction Book
$750 Cash Prize and trophy awarded to the second best Non-Fiction Book
$500 Cash Prize and trophy awarded to the third best Fiction Book
$500 Cash Prize and trophy awarded to the third best Non-Fiction Book
$100 Cash Prize and a Gold Medal awarded to the winner of each of the 70 categories
Finalist Medals will be awarded to up to five finalists in each of the 70 categories

$100 sounds relatively generous … except that it costs $75 to enter one book in one category of the IBA, and $60 for second and subsequent entries. That means the category winners only come out $25 ahead, and that’s assuming they only entered one book in one category.

Overall, IBA promises $12,500 in prize money across 70 categories, plus the cost of producing and sending six trophies and up to 350 finalist medals. Let’s say the trophies cost $50 each, and the medals are $5. That’s another $2,000.

But that means the contest expects to get at least 350 entries. At $75 per entry, that’s over $26,000. More if there are more than 350 entries.

That’s a lot of money for a “not for profit” contest with direct expenses of less than $15,000.

Where does the rest of the money go? Well, some will go to web hosting. Some will go to paying the person who emailed me about the contest. Maybe they pay the judges (you can apply to be a judge—you’ll be in the illustrious company of people like Terry Whalin, Acquisitions Editor for Morgan James Publishing, yet another vanity press).

Is that writing contest reputable, or is it a vanity contest? One way to decide is to check the entry fees and where the profit goes. #WritingContest #WriteTip Click To Tweet

Other legitimate expenses include administration (the RITA has 2,000 entries, each of which are judged by seven judges in the first round. That’s a lot of administration), or prize trophies. Contests may also require specialised software, which will come out of the contest budge.

Some writing organisations don’t say what happens to contest proceeds, which probably means they go back into general funds to further the objectives of the organisation. Some say a portion of proceeds will be used to fund conference scholarships (e.g. the CALEB Awards from Omega Writers, or the Selah Awards from BRMCWC).

How Many Categories are There?

One way for-profit contests make money is by attracting lots of entrants and awarding lots of prizes—the Indie Book Awards above are one example. Reader’s Favorite are another, with over 100 categories.

Yes, everyone’s a winner in these contests.

In contrast, the RITA has 2,000 entries across 13 categories (including debut), and only 4% of entries final. The ACFW Carol Award and the Christy Award both have three finalists in each category. although they don’t specify the number of entries.

How Quickly Are Entries Judged?

I’ve recently seen an author say they published their book four months ago and have already been a finalist in three awards. My first reaction is that these are vanity awards: legitimate awards operate on a much longer timescale, and restrict entries based on copyright date i.e. their 2019 awards are for books with a 2018 copyright date. Books published in 2019 won’t be eligible for awards until 2020. Any annual contest that accepts books older than a year needs to be looked at carefully—do they only offer categories in alternate years? If so, it’s probably legitimate. If not … you can figure it out.

In contrast, legitimate awards usually have two or more rounds of judging over several months. After all, it takes time to send the entries to the judges, who then need a month or more to read and assess their entries, especially if the contest is a whole-book contest like the RITA. Even a contest that only judges the first five pages (such as the First Impressions contest from American Christian Fiction Writers) allows a month for first-round judging, and another month for the final round.

Who Are the Past Winners?

Most contests provide lists of past winners. Check those lists. What books have previously finaled and won this contest?

If it’s a major US or international contest, then the list of finalists and winners should include authors and books you’ve heard of.

They might be books you’ve read or want to read (depending on the genre). They should be books with professional covers that suit the genre, professional editing, and lots of reviews—including Amazon (or similar) reviews from readers.

If it’s a smaller regional or national contest, then you may not have heard of the authors if it’s a different country. But the winning books should still look professional. You should be able to read the Amazon sample and not see obvious errors.

But if you’ve never heard of any of the books, authors, or publishers and the book covers are ugly and the Amazon Look Inside shows obvious errors, then that tells you something about the legitimacy of the contest … and whether it’s one you want to enter.

Because that’s the key.

It’s great to win a writing contest. But only if you can tell friends and colleagues you’ve won without being given the side-eye because they wonder if you’ve been duped.

It's great to win a #WritingContest. But only if you can tell friends and colleagues you've won without being given the side-eye because they wonder if you've been duped. #WriterBeware Click To Tweet