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UMASS

Publishing

3 Key Qualities to a Successful Blogger

First, let me begin by saying that I would not (yet) consider myself a successful blogger in terms of a following or any sort of fanfare.  However, I do have 15 years marketing experience along with a degree in marketing from Sonoma State University.  (NOTE: I also took a marketing and advertising semester-long course at the UMASS Amherst.  This foundation has gained me the ability to recognize effective qualities executed by a blogger.  Below, I’ve bulleted the top three qualities that I believe are critical to an effective blog.

  • INTEGRITY

Be honest with your readers.  Don’t spew on the screen keystrokes full of b.s. this will turn away readers.  If you are not an expert in the field in which you are writing, at least admit it.  This will actually gain you more respect than trying to be someone you’re not.

I talk a lot about gaining favorable attention by an appeal to pride.  Favorable attention only works if you truly mean it.  Although, it may gain you a short-term boost in reader traffic, these readers will eventually catch on.  If you’re not dishonest or the compliments you’re delivering are just an illusion to gain more followers, your long-term retention percentage will be extremely low.

  • CREATIVITY

This can be broken down into 2 elements:

  1. UNIQUENESS:  What sets you apart from other bloggers in your category?  Do you stand out or do you blend in with the rest of the crowd?  Keep in mind, the crowd I speak of is a rather sizable blogosphere of 152 million (as of July 2014) with more bloggers  adding to this population on a daily basis.  Is the topic of your blog creatively engaging?  One of the best ways to answer this question is by following other bloggers within your targeted market?  Are you repeating the same things they’re saying in their blogs?  Or is your blog teaching them something that they can get nowhere else?  Or if the purpose of your blog is to entertain, does your blog have a uniquely magnetic personality?  Kurt Mortensen is the author of the best selling book “Maximum Influence” where he explores his ’12 Universal Laws of Power Persuasion.’  This is a great book for salespeople and I have learned a tremendous amount by reading Kurt’s work.
  2. WIFFM:    What’s in it for your reader?  To answer this question, you need to step outside of yourself and review your blog from your targeted customer’s point of view.  You should be able to identify at least one WIIFM within each of your blogs.  What are some take aways from your blog?  Is there at least one take away that’s either changed or enhanced there reader’s perspective in a way they’ve never looked at that idea before?  As your blog gains popularity you will know if you’re achieving this based on the comments your followers are leaving.
  • ATTENTION TO DETAIL

This is the area in which my blogging struggles the most.  Interestingly enough, attention to detail is a considerable strength in my Extra Innings trilogy.  Of course, writing in the genre of historical fiction, I better pay close attention to detail for if any of my readers were alive during the period in which this story takes place, they would surely call me out on any oversights.  Granted, the McGee twins are fictional characters so that does give me, as the writer, some wiggle room.  As for blogging, I struggle with attention to detail mostly because I am a new author trying to build a popular reputation and so I feel rushed to produce an eruption of blogs.  My advice is to slow down.  Take your time.  Make sure your spelling and grammar are correct before clicking publish.   Review your blog for rambling.  Are you repeatedly repeating yourself?  Repetitiveness and rambling seem to be common mistakes in many of the blogs I read.  In today’s fast-paced society, ain’t nobody got time for that.   Especially, my YA target market.  I’m lucky if I’m able to capture five minutes of their undivided attention.  I recommend saving your blog as a draft, sleeping on it or walking away for a little while.  Then, go back and review before publishing.  Ask yourself: Are you making your point clear and concise?  There’s nothing worse than having a captivating title to your blog but the body that proceeds it is irrelevant.  The details of your blog must be relevant to it’s title AND to your target market.

Hope this helps boost traffic to your blog!  Please let me know and stay tuned for more marketing tips!

July 13, 2014 by
Publishing

My Mission

Recently, I attended a marketing conference in Akron, Ohio.  The primary topic of this conference was how to create a valuable mission statement.  A mission statement defines what an organization or business is and why it exists.  Mission Statements are only effective if they are communicated throughout the organization and reinforced by its leader(s).  This inspired me to think about why I exist as an author and singer/songwriter.  Why do I write?  What am I trying to accomplish with my writings?  Pinpointing this objective was really quite simple.  MY MISSION IS TO CONNECT AND INSPIRE.   I wish to connect with individuals and inspire them in a way that improves their life and way of thinking.

The origin of this objective comes from one of the first songs I ever wrote.  The song is called “Runaway.”  It’s a mostly-acoustic rock ballad that was inspired from a television special my UMASS roommates and I were watching in our apartment in Puffton Village in Amherst, Massachusetts.  The program was on teenage runaway girls.  These inner-city girls had ran away from home for various reasons and were living in poverty on the streets.  With no work experience and little education these girls were resorting to prostitution in order to survive.  As soon as the program was over, I went into my bedroom, picked up my 6-string Ibanez guitar and wrote “Runaway” in about 15 minutes.  The story focuses on one girl and how helpless and trapped she feels needing to “work the streets” to make money.  The song also talks about the girl’s family who is searching for her to bring her back home where she is loved.  One night after performing the song on campus, I told a friend that I hoped that one day “Runaway” would hit the radio.  I imagined that someone would be playing the song on their car radio and a girl who was thinking about running away from home would overhear it and change her mind.  If I could positively inspire just one teenager, I would feel the song was a huge success.

The same is true for my song “Mornie Rivers” which is a edgy rock tune about a friend of mine who overcame his heroin addiction.

As for the Extra Innings trilogy, although my goal was to tell a story that had never been told, I began to discover that Jimmy and Billy McGee’s lives were progressing into a path of constructive value.  I envision many readers extracting a positive life lesson or two from the experiences of these fictional identical twins – I know I have.  Of course, these lessons are not learned overnight and in this case cover the course of 3 books.  I suppose this is true of most people that life lessons are learned over a period of time fashioned by a string of ups and downs.  I look forward to hearing about any inspirations my readers gain from reading the Extra Innings trilogy.  And I hope I have done a good job of painting a realistic picture of the story’s setting and its characters so its readers feel connected throughout every page.

 

June 7, 2014 by
Publishing

What Inspires Your Imagination?

Imagination is the forming of ideas, images or concepts of objects external to our tangible senses.   A good  writer can use words to bring an image to life.  For example, if the reader is being told about a bouquets of flowers displayed at a wedding, a good writer can stimulate the reader’s senses to the point where the reader’s imagination allows them to actually smell those flowers describe in the story.

Real life true stores are what inspire me.  My job is to stitch them among into events experienced by a fictional character.  I have been fortunate enough to have heard a handful of very entertaining tales about my family.  These tales were expressed throughout the Extra Innings trilogy and helped to bring the personalities of its major players to life.

For example, in Chapter 1 of The Diamond Thieves, I spent some time explaining how the story’s main characters: identical twins Jimmy and Billy McGee, had very different personalities.  To express examples of Billy’s wild-side (compared to his more rationally behaved twin) I used two stories from my dad’s childhood.  The first was a story of my dad thinking he could fly like Superman and tying a tablecloth around his neck and leaping into mid-air from the garage roof.  Yikes!  The second was when my dad, Wes Gibson, set fire to his older sister Rose’s bedroom curtains and the neighbor Mrs. McCrosky saw the flames from across the way.  I always loved these stories growing up and felt privileged to incorporate them into the life one of two of the book’s main characters.

My Aunt Rose is famous for using the term: “in all honesty” as is Jimmy and Billy’s older sister Rose throughout the trilogy.  Their older friend Skip Jones is a character who the boys all look up to as my dad and his brother Denny looked up to their older brother Skip Gibson.

My grandma Mary Gibson was famous for her chocolate meringue pies – as is Jimmy and Billy’s Grama Purdy.   I know when I was proofreading this detail of the book my mouth was watering from the imagery.

In book 2 (Race of the Gemini), I incorporated a story my Uncle Jim had told me about collecting RC Cola cans for cash when  he was a kid.   Also, the story of Billy spinning the car tires in a mud puddle that splashed up into his dad’s face actually happened to my Aunt Patty when my Grandpa Charles Gibson was trying to teach her how to drive and became so frustrated that he had to stick his head out the window to curse – another great story!  The book’s hot dog eating explosion came from my Uncle Denny and the story about Skip pulling Stuart through a car window came from my dad and his late teen years.

One of my favorite chapters is when all the boys sneak out to drink at Ol’ Man Hendersman’s barn.  As the boys are sitting around they reminisce a few hilarious tales that my dad had told me from his childhood (read book 2 for these stories).

Billy’s girlfriend Amy Lee Chansey has a brown collie shepherd family dog named Tanker – just like my Aunt Rose & Uncle Jim’s dog while I was growing up.

The description of the twins’ High School prom was an exact description of my mom, Marilyn Gibson’s gymnasium was decorated for her prom.

There are a few small details depicted in the book that really bring a particular room in a house or section of town to life.  My favorite is the mention of a paper mache ghost candy dish that is the centerpiece of the McGee family dining room table in the Halloween chapter.   My entire life growing up I remember that same ghost candy dish on our dining room table throughout October.  My mom had made it with her friend Joan.  I now have this candy dish and I place it out every October.  I believe these small details are critical to effective storytelling.

In book 3 (A Hero Among Thieves), I was privileged to be able to interview the head baseball coach and dean from Ol’ Miss who shared with me some important facts about the campus and its students during the early 1950’s.  This information really helped to enhance the authenticity of this portion of Jimmy’s.  I think anyone who’s attending college and lived on campus will be transported back to their experience in the dorms and campus life.  One particular college dorm room scene in this book was taken directly from my experience at UMASS Amherst.

Lastly, some of Billy’s journal entries were told to me while I was interviewing veterans from the Korean War.  These stores really helped to bring Billy’s experience in Korea to life and I will be giving mention to these brave and fascinating individuals in the credits of Book 3.

When Jimmy meets Maria Regalo, the  supper she feeds him that night at her house is a plate of homemade salami, pepperoni and cheeses that she cut from her supply hanging in her basement – just like my Grama Gibson.

There are many more examples but these are the ones that come to the forefront of my mind.  I hope all who read this trilogy will at some point feel themselves traveling back to a moment of their teen years or childhood and recall the sights, sounds and smells of some good memories and MOST OF ALL … THANK YOU for all those who inspired my imagination with their real life true stories.

June 5, 2014 by