Archive for July, 2011

Oh My Aching Fingers and Back!

Sunday, July 31st, 2011
By , @Writing2Day

My goal for the day was to do an entire chapter. 9,857 words later the first draft of Chapter 7 is done. A huge pat on the back for myself although now I think I need a masseuse! Does anyone else get really tense between the shoulder blades when doing an extended session of typing? Really wish I could figure that one out.  Love, love, love to write but maybe I will have to take more frequent breaks. I’m thinking maybe once I get the rest of the WIP typed in, the typing pace will slow down and solve the aching back and fingers problem.

I had to take a look at my daily progess log and I’m now up to 62,487 words. With my projection of roughly 120,000 words total that means I’m over the hump.  If I could just write a little over 1,200 words per day, my rough draft will be finished by mid-September.  Seems it would be much easier on the back/finger issue if I would write everyday instead of playing catch up on the weekends.  I’ve got three days off in the middle of this week, so we’ll see what sort of progress is made.

I am all about goal setting and the Word Count Target and Daily Progress Log is one feature of yWriter5 that I really like. When you’re looking at writing an entire novel the prospect can be overwhelming. But, when it’s broken down into 1,200 words per day it doesn’t seem nearly as unattainable.

I’m thinking about posting Chapter 1 on my blog for comments and feedback. Has anyone out there done this? Did you find it helpful? Would also love any tips for the aching back, lol!

Best of writing success to you all,
Kendra

Posted in Novel in Progress | No Comments »

WIP Just Went Over 50,000 Words

Friday, July 22nd, 2011
By , @Writing2Day

Wow, this feels like quite the milestone.  This means I am just over half way through retyping my manuscript which is at 95,000 words.  The reason for the retype?  I started writing this novel in my early twenties.  I finished writing Chapter 9 the night before my first child was born in 1990.  Age then 25, age now 45 – yikes!

That’s twenty years that my book has sat dormant.  I actually started writing on an old electric typewriter in the mid-80’s.  From there, I was so thrilled to get a word processing typewriter.  I thought I was in heaven when I could see my words going across that 3″ strip and actually save them to a disk.  Looking back, I’m not really sure how I managed it but I did manage to get my manuscript from the word processor to my first computer and kept saving it and putting it on to each new computer I have owned.  I think that’s quite an accomplishment in itself and speaks to the fact that I always knew I would return to writing.

As you can probably imagine with the way technology changes and programs get updated, this work in progress did not continue to load in each new device in its original form.  For the most part it translated quite well, but it is intermixed with lots of fun characters here and there – anything from squares to fun symbols that I can’t even describe, lol.  Rather than proof and fix through 95,000 words, I decided I would much rather retype the manuscript.

This actually is killing two birds with one stone as not only did the manuscript need to be fixed but after twenty years I definitely needed a refresher on where the book was going.  I lost my outline years ago, but it is still in my mind that I had three more chapters to write in order to wrap up the story.  It is really quite amazing that I can be typing away and anticipating the words I wrote that long ago just like I had sat down at the typewriter yesterday.  I figure by the time I’m done typing those last three chapters will come to me.  And, focusing on typing has helped me to focus on truly reading what I wrote.  I have a tendency to gloss over things that I have written since I basically know what’s coming.  I’ve definitely found some glaring spots that are calling out to me for a rewrite but for now I am just making a note and moving on.

I am looking forward to completing this phase of the project and really getting back in to writing.  Is there anybody else out there who started out following their writing dream and set it aside for such a long period of time?  I would love to hear from you.

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Beyond Pay Per Click: Advertise your eBook for Free on Plugboards

Sunday, July 10th, 2011
The Closet Entrepreneur by Kendra Leah Fuller

By , @Writing2Day

A good online marketing campaign incorporates many different advertising venues such as, pay per click, banner ads, and social networking. Along with paid advertising, there are many places a person can advertise for free online. After ten years of doing business on the internet, I thought you couldn’t teach this old dog any new tricks…enter plug boards.

This neat little tool is very simple. Basically, it is a board of advertising that someone is displaying on their website or blog. All you need is the right size image, along with the url for that image (where it resides on the internet) and the url of the page you want to link to.
To find out the url for your image, right click on it then click properties. You will see the http:// address for the image. Just copy and paste it into the form on the plug board. Obviously, you can only do this with images you have the right to distribute. (more…)

Posted in 5. Advertising Your Online Business | No Comments »

Beyond Pay per Click: Create a Buzz with Social Marketing on Facebook

Friday, July 8th, 2011
The Closet Entrepreneur by Kendra Leah Fuller

By , @Writing2Day

Ask any business owner what is the best form of free advertising they can think of and they will invariably respond with “Word of Mouth”. Known as “Viral Marketing” on the internet, social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter should be used to create a buzz for business services and products.

The first step in creating your business page is to go to www.facebook.com. Towards the bottom right of the page, under the Sign In button, you will see a link to “Create a Page for a celebrity, band, or business. Click this link, choose the type of business from the drop down menu, name your page, and click “Create Official Page”. (more…)

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Designing Your Business Website

Saturday, July 2nd, 2011

 

The Closet Entrepreneur by Kendra Leah Fuller

By , @Writing2Day

I recently had a conversation with a newbie to the world of e-commerce that really brought to mind some of the mistakes people can make when first bringing their business online. For those of us who can not afford to pay a web designer, we find ourselves tasked with building our own website. And, take it from someone who has evolved from a self-taught beginner, there are many mistakes that can be made from concept to design and implementation.

The business mentioned above is selling home-made goat’s milk soaps straight from their farm here in South Dakota. They are currently utilizing a Facebook fan page as a means of advertising and selling their product with some success. Kudos, they are using social marketing which many existing online retailers have yet to embrace. The problem here is if they are serious about growing their online business, they need an e-commerce website. (more…)

Posted in 3. Building Your Business Website | No Comments »