Post #14–Two Women Business–Kendra Bonnett and Matilda Butler

The Blog Carnival, that is. And we’re about to tell you how you can have some fun while increasing visibility for your blog or Website. But first, you’ll need a little background.

When blog writers and editors want to collect a lot of information on a subject and share it with their community of interested readers, they often turn to the Blog Carnival for content. You can think of a Blog Carnival like a magazine; it brings together and reports on information from any sources/writers. The Blog Carnival host will set a schedule and topic. Blog Carnivals usually come out on a regular schedule, such as every second Monday or the last Saturday of the month. Topics can be as broad as general interest or as narrow (first-time writing experiences from sci-fi geeks) as the host chooses. Contributors with content that fits the subject can submit links to their blogs and Websites. If you make the cut, the host will provide annotation and links to your content. This is a great way to build your readership.

Since there are no guarantees that your site or post will be accepted, here are a few tricks that will help you increase your chances of making the cut:

1. Study the hosting blog. Can you detect any patterns or topics that suggest what the host likes? These are your cues.
2. Consider the hosting blog’s audience. Your best bet to make the cut is to deliver content that the host will agree serves their readers.
3. Deliver solid content. Since this is your chance to attract new readers, don’t waste your opportunity with vapid, vacuous content. You want these readers to return.

Your first step is to find Blog Carnivals that match your requirements. Here’s the place to start looking: The master list at BlogCarnival.com.

For fun, I ran a sample search on the category “writers.” Here are a few of the results that came up:

Carnival of beginning writers (first Monday of every month)

Creative carnival (exercise your creative writing muscles on every second Saturday of the month)

Just Write (share writing experiences every Wednesday)

Scribes (for any kind of writing or publishing on the last Thursday of every month)

The Mad Editor’s Round-up (both subjects and deadlines vary)

Writing Success Blog Carnival (chronicle one’s writing or blogging career due 25th of each month)

If you follow this blog, you may know that once a month we coordinate this post with a companion post at the Story Circle Network blog, “Telling HerStories.” This month the subject is creativity. You’ll find a link to a nice little test of your creativity. One of the exercises evaluates your ability to make associations. It’ll give you a little insight into how your mind works. Now, here’s your opportunity to put that creativity to a real-world test. My Blog Carnival sample above was the obvious first search a writer would run. You have the tool, now put it to work. How inventive are you? Good luck.

Post #11–Two Women Business–Kendra Bonnett and Matilda Butler

Serendipity Books III by dweekly on Flickr

Earlier today I read a post by Hugh McGuire, entitled “What If the Book Business Collapses?” McGuire started out lamenting the presence of the big box store, the power of stockholders over the book business and the many changes and closings we can expect. I have to admit that my irritation grew with each sentence and woe. Not because I applaud declines in readership or the disappearance of quirky independent booksellers and musty secondhand book shops. Actually I love both. In fact, I met a boyfriend years ago in Santa Barbara through the secondhand book shop. I bought and sold a lot of books in my grad-school days and always put my name inside. This one man kept buying my books. He became so enamored of our similar tastes in history and literature that he tracked me down to my new home in San Francisco. But that’s another story. [click to continue...]

Post #5–Two Women Business & Publishing–Kendra Bonnett and Matilda Butler

Traditional media has been taking a beating of late. Well not just of late. Newspapers and magazines have been reporting declining readership, lost ad revenue, and dwindling stock values for some time now. Seemingly the only thing going up are the number of layoffs. And now after about a century of daily publication, the Christian Science Monitor will cut back to a weekly. Last night on the NewsHour with Jim Leher, we heard an interesting segment, called “Old Media, New Media,” and I’ve included a link to the audio file.

There’s no question print media has to change to remain at all competitive. And digital media is the cost-effective choice. Paper, printing and distribution costs make it difficult for publications to compete aggressively for readership that’s drawn to 24-hour news, cable TV channels tailored to virtually every interest, mobile media and the Internet. Add economic uncertainty to the equation and it becomes virtually impossible.

So what does this have to do with blogging? It’s this. For all I read and hear from the traditional media about the need to cut costs and reposition themselves in the digital arena, I hear very little about how they’re going to build their Web presence.

I grant that the major magazines and papers have a stronger brand than you and I, and that many of their loyal readers will follow them online. But will they stay? It all depends on how effectively the old media make the transition. Will they embrace interactive formats, encourage forums, blog effectively? Will they be able to compete with social networks? Some will. Many will not. The new media is not traditional media sans the paper and ink. Success requires a new template.

The same applies to authors and entrepreneurs moving online from traditional publishing and brick-and-mortar businesses. Blogging and social media are key components that we’ll continue to explore there. But I want you to leave you this link to a discussion between author-entrepreneurs Seth Godin and Tom Peters recorded for American Express’ Open Forum.

“I just don’t know what to blog about.” I can’t tell you how often I hear that one. While the obvious answer is, “Then don’t blog!” I suspect the problem is more fundamental. Many people who blog or think they should blog don’t know why they’re doing it…except that it seems everyone else is blogging. So before you start blogging…or give up on an apparently unsatisfactory blogging experience, consider these 21 steps. They’ll help you know how (or even if) you should go forward.

Now, as a twist today, I crafted this post in response to a challenge over at Copyblogger. Author Brian Clark suggested we all take a page from a current issue of PC World and create a post with a list headline. You can see his post by clicking here.

I’m not going to elaborate on any of these 21 items as my post would be impossibly long. But I promise to return to some of these subjects in future posts and explore them in greater depth. Also the items are in no particular order. Enjoy.

[click to continue...]

Unless you don’t use Amazon at all, you probably are aware of the Kindle digital book. It’s very cool. The basic unit:

* weighs just 10.3 ounces with a 6? screen capable of 600×800 pixels and gray scale images
* holds more than 200 titles (more memory available)
* has a library of more than 160,000 books, blogs, newspapers, magazines and ebooks available for download
* charges just $9.99 for most books
* handles audiobooks and music as well as text
* uses cell phone technology to link (so you don’t have to find a wi-fi hot spot
* lets you read for about a week on a single charge
* charges you only for what you download, no monthly wireless bills, contracts or service plans
* allows you to annotate text
* makes available free samples and first chapters for your review before buying

But even with all this to commend the Kindle, you may be thinking the price is still too high for you (at $359). Kindle: Amazon’s New Wireless Reading Device Are You Thinking Kindle? But did you know you can get a $100 rebate if you buy with your Visa card? And conventional wisdom suggests the price will continue to fall. Still some readers think it best to wait for Kindle 2.0 to come out before they buy.
.
But as writers, you should know that about 250,000 Kindles have been sold. This is a platform you should probably be considering for your book or ebook. Amazon now has a section for authors to go to learn more. So check out the Digital Text Platform and start preparing to publish for Kindle.