Small Press Blog

Choosing a Partner

I have recently written an article for the Virtual Earner website about how to select a partner for creating your web presence. One thing I mention over there is that it is about more than web development skills.

I encourage you to go take a look at:

Choosing a partner to develop your web presence

Should I Write for Exposure? (Part 1)

As a general rule, I am not a big fan of writing for free. I wouldn't ask my doctor to work for free. I wouldn't ask the person who collects my garbage to work for free. I rather think that people who are offering "exposure" and not cash are running a scam. Perhaps a legal scam, but a scam nonetheless.

And yet you see this sort of opportunity offered in many different places. As in: "While we can't pay you, we do offer you exposure that might result in..." This has only increased as the Internet has increased.

I do understand that many of these publications have little cash with which to pay writers. Fine, if you don't have money, write it yourself. That sort of exposure for writers is not really exposure. Exposure is being published in something that someone actually reads. Obscure websites are rarely that.

Now, there are a very limited number of sites where you write because you are part of that community. Science fiction fans have built up some nice sites along those lines. Yeah. This isn't that. I understand why someone might do that and enjoy it.

I am talking about sites that are clearly commercial endeavors, but which refuse to pay for commercial work.

However, there are very limited places where I will occasionally right for free. All of these places have significant website traffic that gets folks to come to my websites. Two of them are here and here. Notice, though, that these are sites where I went, signed up, and wrote articles that point toward me.I get traffic and share in the Adsense. These are not some faceless email that promised me riches through lots of exposure. 

Some time back, I wrote a couple of articles for a website that is very large in my field. I did that for free. These articles include links to my online high schools website. These links result in noticeable and significant traffic each month. Also and importantly, I can trace those links to actual money earned through Google Adsense.

To recap, writing for free with the idea that it helps your bottom line almost immediately? Good.

Writing for free for exposure? Bad. 

Mike Rounds on Credibility

Steve Harrison on marketing your book

 

Penny Sansevieri: How to maximize and monetize social media

 

The Successful Publisher

So how do you become a successful independent  or self-publisher? Certainly you need to start with a good idea for a book, but it goes beyond that. I have seen many unsuccessful publishers and many successful ones. The ones who are successful:

• Are in a niche where they have become (or are working to become) a major player. A good example is my online high schools site, but there are so many other possibilities. Take a look at what Michelle Dunn has accomplished writing about how to do collections. Yes, really. How many other books do you think there are on that topic, but consider the economy. It seems like a very viable niche. Also, she has taken that niche and has now branched out into other areas (like marketing).

 

• Have a book that is part of a platform. A book rarely creates a platform; you use the platform to sell the book. Why is it that famous people are regularly approached to write books that are outside of their specialty (cooking, poetry, whatever)? Because they already have an established platform. How do you create a platform? It could be a website. It could be a blog. Whatever it is, the key is to get people to come visit.

 

• Have a website that provides a service. And, oh yeah, you might want to purchase my book while you are there. What kind of service? On my website, I provide listings of online high schools even for schools that don't pay to be listed. I learned this the hard way and initially only had featured schools. Very few listings. As I added more and more free (but reduced text) listings, I got more traffic to my site, but also interest from other schools in being featured.

 

• Provide related services. For a couple of years, I did independent school counseling helping potential students choose the right online college or high school. That also feeds into that whole "creating a platform" thing. You become recognized as somewhat of an expert.

 

• Multiple revenue streams. You rarely can make enough off a book (or two books) to make a living. Yes, there are exceptions, but for most of us that is not a reality. If you have a website (and you had better have a website), you should consider ways to make money with it. Yes, I sell my book there, but I also have Google Adsense, banner ads, and featured listings. If money is down in one area, perhaps it is better in another.

 

• Keep writing books. Remember that one book doesn't get you there. Write another book on the same or a similar topic. Keep working to increase your niche.

So is it really this simple? Certainly not, but it isn't rocket science either. Create a niche, have multiple ways to earn revenue, and keep writing.

 

 

Internet Business for the Masses

I have recently had the pleasure of writing an article for Bob Martin's brand-new Web Earner website. Not surprisingly for people who follow what I write, you will discover that I talk about books, but the greater emphasis is on how to have a successful, web-based business. It is very difficult to subsist on one or two books.

However, if it is a non-fiction book, there is likely a website in there somewhere. For me, it was about online high schools. For you, it is likely something else. Whatever it may be, find that connection and you are much closer to having a viable business publishing books.

Also, I would encourage you to go over to the article, Internet Business for the Masses, and have a read.

Accidental Success

I have done some things that have been successful. I have done some things that have not been so successful. Today I discovered some accidental success.

I have written a significant number of articles for Hubpages.com. I have found this to be quite successful because most of the articles are targeted specifically to my writing niche and include multiple links. I am able to:

1. See how many folks click on those links and come to my sites; and
2. How much I make through Google Adsense because they share the clicks with writers.

Interestingly, my #1 article is not about online high schools. It is about the Kindle. To date, I have had over 5,000 readers. That is significantly more than my next most popular article. You might be wondering why that is (because I was).

Here's the deal: Hubpages has serious Page Rank. Having articles on a site with such high page rank is a very good thing for you (no matter your topic). As it happens, a while back I wrote an article about Amazon's Kindle. And here's my accidental success:

1. Go to Google.
2. Type in: What is a Kindle?
3. What do you see?

What you see is that Amazon's article is #1 on the topic. Look below that. Yes. Tom's article is #2 on the entire Internet for that search question. And what you should know is that many people type questions into Google.

Accident. Completely. It's even, I suspect, making me a few dollars (because I know I get Adsense money from Hubpages because I track it as a channel).

Imagine if I had done that, but used a question that relates to my primary writing area. As it happens, I have imagined it and within the next few days I will have few articles up using that same question format.

Learning from my success. What do you learn from your success (and from your failures)?

Why do you need to respect your customers?

United Airlines broke the guitar of this musician and then would not pay for the destruction. Here's a clue, United: Musicians write songs. This particular musician wrote a song about his poor treatment by United and the ensuing video has now been viewed by 2.5 million people.

Increasing sales by driving traffic

This summer I am working on a second edition of my Complete Guide to Online High Schools. I hope to be finished by the middle of August, but it will have about twice as many schools, so this is a much bigger project than the first time around. The hope with this book has always been that I publish a new edition no further apart than two years. And, yes, that means I need to publish it this year!

In anticipation of that publishing, I have begun to ponder how to have greater sales with the second edition than I did with the first.

One of the things that I have learned about book sales, at least my book sales, is that I need to drive traffic toward the book. In this case, I have a website that is the largest website in its niche. I sell many books using that website. Truth be told, near as I can tell, it is my top "store."

While being the largest in that niche, I readily admit that this week it is not a large niche (although it is growing by leaps and bounds). I decided this week that others will soon decide to stake out part of my niche, so I need to pursue a preemptive strike. I purchased nine domain names that I will be populating with WordPress blog software. Why WordPress? Because I thought it was something that I was capable of learning in a reasonable enough fashion not to embarrass myself and my book.

You can see the first two here:

California Online High Schools

Wisconsin Online High Schools

Not great and I will be adding more as I go, but I put up both those sites today. You will note that there are three ways that I can earn money from the site now. They are:

• Google Adsense. I will adjust the ads somewhat, but there are some up now.
• Amazon ad for my book.
• Many links to Best Online High Schools website that also has Google Adsense and my book.

As I have said time and again, small publishers are successful who have multiple revenue streams (and, yes, that could be multiple books). One book does not get you there.