Top Picks Thursday 6-16-2011

By the Numbers

1) 10 Truths about Self-Marketing. Honest advice for those in the writing world.

2) 3 Ways to Add Pizzazz to Your Author Bio. Author Keli Gwyn shares tips she learned from social media guru Kristen Lamb’s workshop.

3) 7 Weekly Book Marketing Goals You Can Adopt Today. Most of these tips can be used even before you have a published book, and are easy enough that even I can do them!

4) 5 Excellent Tips on Platform Building. Jane Friedman shares tips she gleaned from the Writers’ League of Texas Agents Conference in Austin.

5) 8 Easy Ways to Promote Your Book Signing, Workshop or Event. Don Lafferty tells us how to leverage today’s social media to make your events successful.

6) 12 Easy Steps to the Making of a Book Trailer. Author Judy Croome shares her experience making her first book trailer.

7) 10 Tips for a Winning Website. Once you’ve got a website or blog, here’s how to keep readers coming back.

8 ) 7 Secrets to Successful Book Promotion. The planning starts long before the book is published. Dana Lynn Smith shows how to plan for success.

9) When the Dust Settles: or 5 Ways to Reignite Interest in Your YA Novel. Author Rusty Fischer shares his tips for keeping the public interested in your book after the “honeymoon” period has ended.

10) 15 Social Media Tips from Dr. Suess. A clever take on what the good Doctor might have told us about navigating the social media landscape.

11) 5 Steps to Subconscious-driven Creativity. Patrick Ross shows us how our subconscious can help us break through problems and increase creativity—all while we’re asleep.

12) Three Reasons to Research Right. Don’t fear or loathe research—use it to fuel creativity and depth in your novels.

13) Four Ways to Make the Most of a Critique Group. Almost every author either is or has been in a critique group, and Jane Friedman tells us how to use this tool to best advantage.

14) Five Reasons I Might Not Finish Your Book by middle grade and YA author Laura Pauling. Don’t let these happen to you!

15) Five Reasons Being a Writer is Both the Best and the Worst Job Ever. Austin Wulf gives an incisive, funny-because-its-true look at the writer’s life.