Let's Get Platforming!

Ok, writers, here's the deal...I had a blog nearly finished with some good platforming building tips...but my home office has suddenly become home to someone who prefers the night shift. A BAT of all things! I could handle a confused bird, but a bat?! How does that even happen? Well, it's late, the Mr. is in bed, there's no way I'll let my tween boys go near the thing...there's no way I'M going near it...I'm lucky to have made it out alive! So there it flutters around, poor thing...and there my computer sits with my original blog copy...

Fortunately, I have other options for getting this post out. I won't have the opportunity to use my original piece, because I did say I'd get this to you mid-week and I'm keeping my word. Plus, I'll be tied up tomorrow. So I changed my course and took a look at a book by Christina Katz who piped in kindly on this week's blog on Creative Platforming with Publisher Glenn Yeffeth. Katz's book, Get Known Before The Book Deal is probably one of the most comprehensive, meaty books on the subject of building your author platform. Katz, author of Writer Mama and founder of the e-course, Platform Building Basics for Writers, writes regularly on the subject for The Willamette Writer. Check out her book! Lots of great endorsements and pubbed by a venerable press. Just so we're clear, Ms. Katz is not a part of this blogshop - I just found her, but would love to have her on. I'm not highlighting copy from her book, although you'll find similar messages, I'm sure. I just wanted to take the opportunity to direct you to a great resource on platforming I just found.

Let's get to it. As I wrote in Creative Platforming, a platform is the means by which you communicate your overall message...it's kind of who you are. For example, I'm a hybrid of publishing consultant and writing coach. My blog is the way I communicate my core coaching message to the public...hello all you writers over there in Germany and The Philippines! My Lit Coach practice is my profession. I live what I blog and inspire others toward more productive, successful and ultimately fulfilling writer's lives. Nearly ten years prior, I was a literary agent. I couldn't have moved into my Lit Coach role without first being an agent very familiar with the ins and outs of the publishing world and how writers live. This is my platform.

But what if you're starting out from scratch? It took me nearly 10 years of nitty gritty experience, research and blisters (Los Angelians don't do well without their flip flops in New York) to build my platform. So the first rule is, be prepared to put some major hours not to mention years into building your platform. When I was an agent, I was frequently approached by writers who had a great proposal for a nonfiction book with equally wonderful sample chapters, but nobody, not even their neighbor, knew they were THE EXPERT in fly fishing, let's say. Sure, the passion was there, the craft was there, but the author's visibility in the fly fishing community was not. Overall, what this writer needs to do is establish herself as a fly fishing expert. Here's how...

Start Local and Get Noticed!

I think it's safe to say nearly everyone would love to make a career out of what they love doing...and many want to write all about it with speaking opportunities to boot. Put on your volunteer fishing caps, writers, and share the love! What's interesting about the thing you want to build your platform around? How can you share your expertise with the people in your town/city for their benefit? Get ready to volunteer your craft on a regular basis until the locals start to know you as The Fly Fishing Girl or The French Pastry Guy. Reach out to your local area papers and start getting coverage. Let them know what you do, how you're educating the community and why that should matter to them. Editors need specifics - be specific.

Go National!

Now that you're close and personal with the locals, head to your local bookseller or newsstand. Seek out magazines, journals and newspapers that you'd most likely find articles centered around your gig. Invest in the reading that's most closely related to what you do. Pay close attention to the overall voice of the publication and especially, the articles you read. What sounds like you? This is key. Use your original voice, not something you feel could be published in The New Yorker or conversely, People Magazine. Editors from these magazines know a faux voice like Anna Wintour knows Chanel, l'originale. For more tips on this, read Creating Your Original Voice with Marcela Landres.

Once you're clear on which publications are distinctly you, start crafting pitches. There are loads of resources out there online and in bookstores with how to pitch to magazines, newspapers and journals. Start researching and start asking questions. Know any freelance writers, any journalists, editors? Ask them if they would mind sharing the magic formula for making a successful pitch. Most are happy to share a few tips.

Go The Distance!

Once you find the formula, keep pitching. Don't let a few NOs stand in your way; push the negativity to the side and move on to the next one. As a writer, you're going to hear NO a lot. The reality is, editors are bombarded with pitches and slush material, not to mention the day to day of their job. They're looking for a reason to turn you down - but it's nothing personal! Really. Show them the good manners you were raised with and give them a kind thank you for considering my work. Editors (and agents) remember the less than polite writers - you don't want to burn your bridges; your piece may not be right for them now, but that doesn't mean you can't pitch to them again on another piece, right?

But let's not forget about your successes! Soon, you'll have a few published articles under your belt - yea! Don't stop there! Keep going! Running a mile doesn't make you a distance runner. Keep crafting, keep connecting and keep pitching. Keep careful records and files of all your published work so you can easily pull together this impressive info for your nonfiction book proposal an agent will be sure to love.

You gotta start somewhere and sometime. How will you do it?

Have platform tips to share? Success stories? I want to hear about it. Share them with the group.

Aha! The Mr. came down for a drink of water. Who wants to play Wild Kingdom?

Have a great week, writers!

TLC

Creating Your Original Voice

Several years ago when I was a hungry agent looking for edgy fiction, I responded in an interview on Webdelsol that I was looking for fiction writers with unique, powerful voices. I mentioned I was intrigued by Chuck Palahniuk’s work for its brave style...or something to that effect. That’s all it took. The floodgates opened and I was soon inundated with query letters and emails from writers whose style was “just like Chuck’s!" Since likening your style to another published author is fair game when it comes to pitching your work (as long as your pitch is original), I accepted several of these promising submissions. I soon read enough first chapters to know that while these authors were indeed fans of Chuck’s work (and don’t ask me why, but so too were they fans of Irvine Welsh, Hunter S. Thompson and Ginsberg), they were only writing “just like Chuck” and sadly not “just like John” or “just like Jenny." They hadn’t yet developed their own original voice. While writing in the same voice as your favorite author is a very helpful and popular work-shopping tool, this is something you do to strengthen your storytelling muscles, not become your favorite author.

But what’s a writer to do? Hundreds of books get published a year. There’s no such thing as an original voice let alone story, is there? How come you see scores of vampire and chicks- in- high heels books out there? Isn’t that the same thing? Not really. Those are hot genre trends not to be confused with an author’s original voice. I can guarantee you, Chuck is the only Chuck out there writing what he writes. Likewise with David Sedaris, James Patterson, Janet Evanovich and Anne Lamott. All of these writers have put in years of time, discipline, persistence and dedication to the craft, making their writing voice uniquely recognizable.

One of the first editors I met in New York made this point abundantly clear: tell me a good story! Don’t get caught up in a language that’s not your own, just tell a good story! That’s what Marcela Landres communicated very clearly to this fresh faced agent while we sat in her office at Simon and Schuster. Her passion for original yet commercially viable fiction was contagious! And she made it sound so easy! But you and I both know it’s not, when it comes down to you in front of your computer ready to write…a good story.

I knew Marcela was the perfect pro to bring in to this blogshop. I asked her:

TLC: As an editor, no doubt you've seen countless submissions from unpublished authors who want to be the next Candace Bushnell or Dan Brown. How can a beginning author find and promote their unique voice in the sea of commercial fiction published annually?

ML: To quote Ezra Pound, “Make it new.” When you read as many submissions as agents and editors do, you quickly realize most book ideas are not original. Stand out either by telling a new story, or telling an old story in a fresh way. Here’s how:

Read the competition.

The world doesn’t need another thriller—unless you write one with a cool twist. New York Times bestselling author Linda Castillo did just that with Sworn to Silence, a police procedural set in Amish country with a protagonist who was formerly Amish. How many other Amish thrillers can you name?

Publish before you are published.

Many a commercial fiction writer has launched her career by first publishing articles in newspapers and magazines. Case in point, Candace Bushnell wrote pieces about women, relationships, and dating as a freelancer for Mademoiselle, Self, and Esquire. Those gigs eventually lead to the New York Observer column that was the basis for the Sex in the City book--the rest is history. Her freelance articles and column served two purposes: they helped Bushnell hone her voice, and they established a following for her work.

Write what you know.

Regardless of whether you’re a cop, a chef, or a cubicle-dweller, your life can be fodder for your fiction. For example, Cathleen Schine was born in Westport, CT, and lives in New York City and Venice, CA—all pretty affluent places. What does this upper middle class author write about? Yep, upper middle class people. Schine does such a great job People magazine dubbed her “a modern-day Jewish Jane Austen.”

If you must write what you don’t know, research.

Jodi Picoult is a happily married mom of three teenagers who spends her days writing and caring for her family. She has not experienced most of the drama depicted in her work. How is she able to write about what she doesn’t know? Painstaking, thorough research. For Nineteen Minutes, a novel about a school shooting, Picoult: obtained previously unreleased material from the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office, which had investigated the Columbine shootings; interviewed a grief counselor who worked with the families who lost children at Columbine; met with two teachers who survived the shootings in Rocori, MN; and spoke with a young man whose friend died at a school shooting. Infuse your fiction with the authenticity that can only come from experience—if not your own, then someone else’s.

TLC: Learn from the masters. In many attempts to improve his vocabulary and rhetorical discipline, Benjamin Franklin used to outline and then attempt to copy articles he considered written above his talent. According to Franklin’s autobiography, his goal was to “capture the logic and emotion” of the articles he admired. He would then go back to review his work in comparison with the original author’s work, highlight his faults and correct them. This discipline would ultimately lead to Franklin’s publishing success!

Your Exercise This Week:

Fiction Writers: Think of your favorite book. I know it may seem sacrilegious, but imagine if it were YOU writing the same story, how would you change it? How would you make it your own? If I were to take this on, one of my all time favorite books, The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven would take place in rural Iowa. I’ll leave it at that. If you’ve ever read Sherman Alexie and lived anywhere rural, you’ll understand.

Nonfiction Writers: Think of your favorite “how to” book - something that changed you and inspired you to action. How would you write it using your voice and insights? Would the text have a different feel? What new perspective could you offer to the original text? Maybe Dale Carnegie’s classic, How to Win Friends and Influence People becomes How to Win Friends and Influence People: Life Lessons from Sam’s Deli.

Have fun with this one!


Marcela Landres, author of the e-book How Editors Think: The Real Reason They Rejected You, publishes the award-winning e-zine Latinidad, and is an Editorial Consultant who helps writers get published by editing their work and educating them on the business side of publishing. A member of the Women’s Media Group, she has acted as a judge for the PEN/Beyond Margins Award, and was formerly an editor with Simon & Schuster.

Have any success stories or tips you'd like to share? I want to know! Email me at erin.reel@gmail.com.