Hank Quense's Blog: Hank Quense's Blog, page 5

A Graphical Media Kit

I’ve created a media kit numerous times. I find them boring to make and I’m sure they are even more boring to read. I guess they are a necessity for a author, but adding all the book covers and blurbs and other content is time consuming and ineffective. My most recent media kit attempt took a different approach: I eliminated about 95% of the usual text stuff and replaced it with graphics.

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Manage your New Book Project: a new approach

Recently two disparate ideas came together and launched the project I’m currently working on. My first idea is this: One aspect of writing a book that is rarely mentioned is the piles of notes that accumulate before, during and after the book is written. Printed out and storied in a binder, that binder becomes almost as thick as the manuscript binder. While this is an age-old tradition...

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Creating a plot: why is it so hard?

For many authors, creating the plot is the hardest part of writing a story And that includes me. For me, the hardest part of creating a new story is coming up with a plot I can believe in, a plot I’m convinced will make a good story. If I don’t believe that, I’ll never convince the reader to believe the story is good. Why is the plot so difficult? Well, a basic plot calls for the protagonist to...

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Book App Status Report

I’m making progress on my book productivity app. Here’s what I’ve got so far, please click on the links and take a peek. I’m always looking for suggestions and advice, so chime in if you wish. The overview board is located here: https://app.milanote.com/1O2wXN1Siydm... It has a few notes and five sub-boards. The publishing and marketing boards have nothing but temporary fillers at...

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Writing a book: a new productivity tool

Most people including many first-time authors are under the impression that writing a book consists of a single project that ends when the book is finished. This impression is quite wrong. A book project is actually four connected and overlapping projects: 1 planning the book 2 writing the book 3 publishing the book 4 marketing the book Writing the book does nothing to prepare the first-time...

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Content catalog: stuff of interest to writers and authors.

Over the last sevearl years, I’ve created a lot of content related to fiction writing, self-publishing and book marketing. All of it is based on my personal experiences. I finally found a way to catalog it all on a single webpage. The page is pretty large as you may imagine. You can check it out here: https://writersarc.com. All the links are live and will take you to where you can find the...

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Build your own digital planner with Scrintal

I’m a planner. I can’t help it. If I have a project to work on, I need to develop a plan. Occasionally, the thought crosses my mind that planning is just a form of procrastinating, but I’m not giving it up. Besides project plans, I like to create annual and quarterly plans but so far, I haven’t been able to find a suitable planner or app to help me with these activities. I’m an author.

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Book marketing ideas that sell: blurbs

The purpose of the book blurb is to grab the attention of a potential reader. Once you have her attention by means of a great pitch line as the opening sentence, you need to follow that up with a few more sentences that tell her what’s different about your book and what’s in it for her. Many new authors consider a book blurb to be a short synopsis. This is a mistake. Book blurbs and a short...

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Just what we need: another newsletter!

You may be interested in knowing I have a newsletter that is sent out twice a week. On Wednesday it’s a humorous/satiric short story and on Saturday it’s an artilce on a topic relating to fiction writing, self-publishing or book marketing. Sometimes, I sneak in something else. Signup up at https://hankquense.substack.com Here are some recent articles: Do you use Wordplex How to use Milanote to...

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Book marketing ideas that sell: managing luck

If you’re new to book marketing, you probably have a lot of questions that need answers. Here are two that come up a lot: Does book marketing work? Is it worth the time and money? The answer to both questions is a definite yes. To elaborate, let’s compare book marketing to playing the lottery. If you buy a lottery ticket, you have a small, very small chance to win a ton of money. If you don’t buy...

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