Have We Connected?

You can join my Yahoo!Group, the BBT Cafe, which is all about blog book tours.

Join me on Facebook, too.

Here I am on Twitter.

And don't forget Pinterest.

What about you? Leave me a comment with your links so we can stay in touch!

Photo Friday

Have a relaxing weekend, everyone!

Break it Up

Yesterday I warned you about blog posts that are too long for your hurried readers. How do you avoid posts that are time-consuming to read quickly?

First, just write without regard to length. Say what you have to say. But then really look at your writing with a critical editor's eye and notice where you can split the writing into two or more sequential blog posts. This critical eye will get you a week's worth of posts and return visitors in one writing session! With a little practice, you'll see how the mind naturally links related chunks of information that can easily be broken into segments and published over the course of a week.

I know many bloggers who write their blog posts over the weekend using exactly this approach and you can, too.

Keep It Short

Photo credit: shopwasteland.com

One of the most important tips about blogging is to keep your posts relatively short - no more than 500 words. Blog readers are always in a hurry, and they just won't stick around to read a long post.

Writing short is easier said than done, especially if you tend to procrastinate about blogging. Sounds contrary to logic, I know, but when you don't blog often, you tend to cram in as much information as you can. Who knows when you'll be back, right? Better say it all now, which usually results in a long and rambling blog post.

Don't do this.

Tomorrow I'll explain how you can use this problem to good effect!

Happy New Year!

What better time to spark up a blog than the first day of the year? I've joined the Ultimate Blog Challenge because I know from past experience how important daily blogging is to heating up the popularity of a blog. I often include a blog-a-day challenge in my blog book tour classes.

So what will I blog about for 31 days? How about my journey completing the Blog Book Tours Kindle book? I'll start by offering short daily tips to help you organize your own blog book tour.

Are you planning to have a blog book tour this year? Leave me a message and let me know what book you'll be promoting! I plan to host a few more blog book tour stops at this blog this year, so if you have a book related to these topics, keep me in mind as a host for your tour:

• Children's picture books
• Cozy mysteries
• History mysteries
• Organic and environmental non-fiction

May we all enjoy the best year ever in 2013!

Oh, How I Miss You Blogfest

One of my favorite peeps of all-time, Alex J. Cavanaugh, is an instigator of yet another blogfest. This one I can handle!

Here are the bloggers I've missed lately:

Ann Parker who writes the marvelous historical mystery series set in Leadville, Colorado. The Silver Rush Mysteries blog is so... dead. Ann, where are you?

My own fault I don't visit Susan Wittig Albert's blog more. She always has interesting updates about her life in the Texas Hill Country, and what's new with her latest novels. Yes, she usually is cranking out at least three books, and the latest is a novel exploring the life of Rose Wilder Lane and her mother, Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Another fave blog I miss is Crunchy Chicken. I do stay caught up with this author on Facebook, but still... you know that good posts like the most recent one are worth it to fans, right?

Who would I miss if they disappeared? So many to choose from, but here are three:

The Little Pickle Press blog, because I helped bring it to this state of wonderfulness over the past two years. It's a blog any company can be proud of. I certainly am! If you have children who are readers, do bookmark it and visit often because they have great specials on their new releases.

I'd also miss Pat Bean's blog. Pat travels the country in her little SUV with her pal, Pepper and shares stories of her adventures. She's writing a travel memoir that I'm sure will be a bestseller some day.

Finally, a group blog because I love them. One of my faves is Jungle Red Writers because these are authors I read, they post regularly, they write really well. Oh, I'd miss them if they were gone. Please don't go away!

Okay - onward to discover more great blogs. What are your favorites - leave me a comment!

Promoting Your Blog Book Tour

The first day of a blog book tour is always a bit stressful for everyone involved, because it sets the tone for the rest of the tour. Also important is getting the word out about the blogs hosting you and this is a process that you "work" all through the day, each day of your tour. Here's the basic procedure:

1. Go to host blog and make sure the post is up
2. Get the permalink (by clicking on the blog post title to expand the URL which is
the unique URL for just that post), then make a shortened link if you are set up
to do that (I use bit.ly)
3. Leave a comment on the blog
4. Post the permalink or bit.ly to your Facebook page and post a status update explaining a little about the tour stop
5. Share the link with your online groups and mailing lists (no reason your
friends and family can't help, right?)
6. Use the bit.ly on Twitter throughout the day
7. Share on Pinterest if you are set up over there
8. Promote all through the day and be certain to drop in on your host blog for the day and check the comments - then join in the conversation. You should be addressing the questions and comments throughout the day as any good host would

Today, Little Pickle Press kicks off a blog book tour for their new picture book, Ripple's Effect. Here's a link to the first host:


http://bit.ly/U49qE9

You can follow the tour for the next two weeks. The entire schedule is here.



If you have questions or comments, please share them here!