Those Deadly Deadlines

Those Deadly Deadlines
 by: Pamela White

My back hurts and head throbs. The lights are too bright; the temperature too cold. Is it the flu? Some as-yet unnamed dread disease? No, it’s just that it’s already 8 p.m. on a Sunday and I have a deadline for my weekly column in a short twelve hours.

I have asked writers I’ve met over the years how they feel about the bane of my existence: deadlines.

“I love deadlines. They keep me motivated,” one giddy writer told me.

Another squealed, “I love writing so much that I’m always turning in assignments two weeks before they are due!”

Sheer insanity, I think, as I flip through the television channels. Who can be happy at the thought of a looming deadline? I look at the clock; 8:30 p.m. Still time to have a snack and maybe read a chapter in that new mystery. By 9 o’clock, with full tummy and unable to find that novel, I pick up a notepad.

“Duck confit, mixed berry coulis, a side of mixed greens wilted with a bacon fat and vinegar dressing, and roasted parsnips.” The meal was eaten two nights ago, but I’m just now forcing myself to write the notes I’ll use to weave my restaurant review.

The High Cost of a Six-Figure Book Advance

The six-figure book advance, like the New York Times bestseller, is the object of many a writer’s fantasy. Whether it’s also a realistic goal is something else again.

Can you really get a six-figure book advance?

When Susan Page wrote The Shortest Distance Between You and a Published Book in 1997, she included the following list of the qualities that you and your book have to have if you’re going to get a six-figure advance.

Your book is on a topic of wide general interest that could excite a large number of readers.

Your book has a distinctive angle and makes an original contribution to its field.

You have substantial credentials to write on this topic OR you have a co-author who does, OR you can get an extremely famous, well-credentialed person to write a foreword for you.

You have prepared an extraordinary proposal and are working with a competent editor already.

You have a show-stopping title.

You secure the services of a well-known, experienced agent who believes the book can earn such an advance.

You are both willing and able to promote your book on radio and TV and in print. This is not a mix-and-match list. You have to have all of those things to get the big advance, unless you are an international celebrity or a best-selling author.

How to Pitch to a Reporter

How to Pitch to a Reporter
 by: Paul Wilson

Crucial to good public relations is pitching to a reporter. Effective pitching involves extracting and conveying, in less than 30 seconds the core of any story. Be sure to introduce yourself.

Keys aspects are:

• Building a data base of reporters and their beats.

• Developing a friendly working relationship with a small group of responsive reporters.

• Maintaining and nurturing contacts throughout the year even after the media coverage is over.

• Being friendly, approachable, and accommodating.

Essentials to pitching are:

• Be brief and to the point. Get their attention by highlighting the essence of the story or event.

• Write out the pitch and practice it before contacting the reporter. Jot down all important details. Make an outline to use as reference while you pitch. Cue cards are effective.

• Find out when it is convenient for a reporter to speak to you. Never interrupt when he or she is working towards a deadline. Be considerate.

• Enquire whether the reporter is familiar with your story. If no, then you must explain in detail otherwise be brief.

Are You Submitting Your Articles?

Last month, I began promoting Jason Potash’s "Article Announcer." I always take time to research new products on the market. I don’t believe in "magic bullets." There is a principle taught in physics, chemistry, biology and even Algebra 101. Nature seeks dynamic balance, equilibrium. If you add something to the left side of the = sign, the right side moves to balance it.

I anticipated a reaction to the introduction of this new software. I was right. I chose to submit last month’s article, "Penury Perpetuates Poverty" the "hard way," one by one to various submission sites on the Internet. Out of about 80 submissions, I discovered about 25% have temporarily (I hope) ceased accepting new authors/articles. Some submission pages came up with a 404 Error upon clicking the "submit" button.

One came up with the following: "Wére being plagued by so many automated submissions, duplicate article submissions, etc. that we spend too much time in selecting the real articles that matter. For this reason we are temporary not accepting new submissions until we have implemented some security measures to block bad submissions. We hope you understand. Please come back in about 1 month to submit your articles."

How to Find a Niche For Your Blog

How to Find a Niche For Your Blog
 by: Mike Seddon

It is important to realize that your choice of a niche can have a significant influence on the success or failure of your new blog.

Deciding on a theme can be a daunting task. What exactly are you going to write about? Your niche needs to be a popular topic that many people are interested in.

If you are going to blog about yourself, then you better have a very interesting life, or you will have difficulty keeping your readers coming back for more. You should choose a topic that will make it comparatively easy to grow your readership and build a strong following.

Since many bloggers write about their favorite subjects, it’s not a bad idea to start brainstorming by writing down a list of your hobbies, interests, and any areas of professional expertise. Now try to determine a niche you can target within one of those areas.

Should you blog about automobiles in general, or the latest sports cars? If you choose too narrow a theme then you may struggle to come up with regular, fresh content. And if you choose a topic that’s too general your readers may be confused by a jumble of seemingly unrelated posts.

3 Things You Need to Do to Turn Net Information into Cash

Although we are in the information age, very few people have been able to turn the colossal amount of free accessible information available online, into cash or business success.

a) Specialize One of the reasons for this is that there is actually too much information available online. Actually so much of it that it gets overwhelming sometimes. When you consider that there are about 40,000 new blogs being launched daily, and that is not even counting the new websites or the updates going in in both websites and blogs, it becomes clear that the information is coming at us in gigantic levels. And it grows daily.

The only way to handle this colossal information is to focus and specialize on a certain area. This the only way you will be able to effectively process the loads and loads of information and find a way of profiting from it. For example a person specializing on affiliate marketing should not touch any other area. Not even affiliate financing or any other aspect of affiliate schemes. If they do this, they will find that within a very short time they will become an expert in an area that they can easily profit from tremendously.

Freelance Technical Writers - How Much Are You Worth?

Where can you find out about freelance technical writing pay? Is there a place where you can go and find out where you stand? As with any field, pay is determined by several things, not just because you can do the work. Instead, it is about how you work, what type of work you do and how well you work with other people. It is often said that you cannot get experience without experience. That is true when it comes to these jobs as well. But, if you want to know about technical writing pay, then look at the characteristics you possess first.

Here are some basic things to consider about yourself before you go looking for the pay that you believe you should get.

• How experienced are you? Yes, we mentioned that sometimes it feels that you need experience to get it, but have you had any employment in which your skills were utilized?
• In your completed work what type of reference do you think your boss would give you? It doesn’t even matter if this is something totally unrelated to your current employment position. Will your boss say that you were a hard worker, dependable, and honest? These qualities go a lot farther in some cases than your resume can.

You can Master Article Marketing In 7 Days or Less

You can Master Article Marketing In 7 Days or Less
 by: Dawn Wentworth

Let me clarify my definition of an “article marketer”. An article marketer provides helpful information in the form of articles written about the industry they work within. Article marketers focus on writing quality content and publishing techniques to complement their existing marketing channels.

It is a win/win situation. The author gains many benefits for being published, and the reader satisfies a thirst for knowledge of the topic being discussed.

Have you considered article marketing?

Anyone can enjoy the benefits of writing content articles for the Web. I am living proof.

2 years ago I was introduced to the idea of using articles as a marketing strategy. Like so many other ideas we are subjected to, it didn’t sink in right away. Excuse after excuse, I let procrastination stand in the way.

I had never written an article before

As I began to see more and more SEO consultants and successful marketers discussing article marekting, I decided to dig in deeper and see what all the fuss was about. It sounded good, and I wanted in too.

Guidelines For Reviewing Writing

Guidelines For Reviewing Writing
 by: The StoryMaster

Writing detailed reviews is time well spent.

Reviewing itself is a writing exercise. At Writing.Com, creating detailed feedback for a fellow writer is one of the best tools available for improving your own writing. That said, if you’re going to spend the time to do it, helping the author is important. There is a better chance for the ideas in a review to get through to an author if they are well presented.

Key Characteristics For Reviews

* Reviews should be honest. Helping writers improve their craft should be the mission of any reviewer. Honest opinions are what help writers improve. Giving false feedback doesn’t help anyone and can lead an author down a long road to bitter disappointment.

* Reviews should be encouraging. Everyone at every level should be encouraged to continue writing! Encouraging reviews are more likely to be used by an author which means the time creating the review was well spent. Whether the author decides to use the reviewer’s honest suggestions or not, the review should be motivating and encourage the author to keep writing.

Writers Block - Find an Article Topic in Minutes Anytime Anywhere with These 7 Tips Guaranteed!

One question I get asked all the time is how to you get Ideas for your Articles? How can you churn out 5 Articles in a Day? Use these 7 Tips and You too will be able to Churn out Article Topics in Minutes Anytime Anywhere Guaranteed!

As you go through your daily routine Article Ideas present themselves all the time you just need to pay more attention to what you do and How You Do It.

As an Example Today I was looking over my Web Site Counter to see which keywords Web Surfers were using to Find my Web Page. Basically I look over the referred by logged and click on the link to see where the Surfers came from. If it happened to be a Search engine I look at the Search Term and My Position in the Search engine.

A light bulb went off in my head Wow I could write an Article about that. I jotted down in my blog to write an Article on How I find Article Topics. Like many of you I operate an Online Home based business. I use my DVD-RW to backup my critical Home Based Business Files. That’s an Article just waiting to be written.

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