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How to Fund Your Writing Project
The traditional method of sacrificing your savings to pay your expenses while you write or for those lucky enough to have an advance for their writing project is not the typical experience of most writers. Most of us write when we can, get little sleep while we work a full time job, watch the kids, etc, etc, etc. There are ways of getting financial help to make your writing dreams come true. That is if you are really serious about it. Yes, you can apply for grants that take a lot of time filling our applications and stuff and if that is your thing, to for it! You can always participate in the contests that you read about on the FUNDS FOR WRITERS website. And that is great and may help you get some money over time.
In addition to all of these things we believe you really should join the KICKSTARTER community. This is a resource for all kinds of artists, writers included, to create a financing campaign for your writing endeavors. They have all kinds of projects that you can review and tailor your own campaign towards. We are not saying that financing is guaranteed but if you have a story that is ready to be published and cannot get a “traditional publishing house” to take on your project this may be a way to get your book published yourself. There are so many options out there to help you all you have to do is read through the requirements, decide on your strategy and GO FOR IT! Below is an example of a current campaign that we are running for one of our sister sites: “Our Great Adventure – Three Southern Women Hit the Road”
Happy New Year
Happy New Year fellow writers we apologize for not writing any new articles but one of our New Years Resolutions is to post more articles for you to enjoy and hopefully find useful. To that end we hope that you and yours had a safe and holiday season and have made some New Year’s Resolutions of your own. And we would hope that you have made a New Year’s Resolution to write more, participate in writing contests and to subscribe to helpful writing resources newsletters. We have been working hard this past year creating websites and blogs, keeping up with our writing resources, reading writing newsletters and gathering more information to share with our fellow writers.
One of the best writing resources we have found for finding new writing contests, sources of publication and much more is the website and weekly newsletter put out by Funds For Writers. C. Hope Clark produces a FREE weekly newsletter for writers filled with inspirational stories and writing funding sources each week. She also has a PAID subscription that gives a lot more resources. I encourage you to sign up for her FREE newsletter and if you find it helpful then by all means scrounge up the $15 for a yearly subscription to the TOTAL FUNDS FOR WRITERS. She does have separate newsletters for Small Markets and Kid Writers. If you are hoping to find funding sources in a particular area she sells what she calls TWEETBOOKS for $1.99 each that are extremely informative.
Our other place to find funding for your writing projects has to the the KICKSTARTER website. If you haven’t checked out this website yet it will be worth your while to read through some of the projects currently asking for funding, read through some proposals and watch their videos. When you are ready then you can sign up on their website and create your own project page. Remember this is an All-OR-NOTHING funding source so keep in mind that you want to ask for the best funding amount that will accomplish your goal but not be too much that you run out of time before you reach your funding goal. You can always try again but you will have adjust your goals and create a whole new campaign. And, please, should you actually win your funding make sure you honor your Gifts that your offer in return for your funding.
Last, but not least, our sponsor, Jolene’s Books and More, has created a new website to launch a writing contest. It is called the Contemporary Limericks Contest. You will have to pay a small fee of $5 per individual for turning in 1 to 5 Limericks and the currently monthly cash prize is only $50.00 for 1st Place and $20.00 for 2nd place but the Top Ten Finalists will have their winning limericks placed into the Best Limericks of 2012 eBook that will be published on their website at the end of the year. This is a monthly contest with the first winners announced on March 1st. You can enter each month for the monthly prize. Now, you might be telling yourself, Hey, I don’t Write Limericks! I say, what do you have to lose? The limericks can be about any subject you wish. They do have to be family oriented or rated “G”. And what better way to practice writing than to actually try doing a few limericks. They are fun and can be easy to do. It is a great exercise for putting together a very short story and let’s face it as much as we love the written word, what can be more fun than putting together some rhyming words about your friends, family, pets, neighborhood or your favorite hobby. Just go to the website: http://all-about-limericks.jolenesbooksandmore.com and check it out!
How to Get Funding
Everyone who writes a book about anything wants to be paid for their efforts. I am certainly not any exception. I like to write and encourage anyone out there who likes to write about whatever they want but we have to look at reality here. We all want to be able to earn money from our work. I earn a few dollars here and there from advertising that I have on my websites and blogs. Granted, the money is pretty slim but it does encourage me to go forth and write more articles on each of my sites. I haven’t delved into the fiction arena yet and I don’t write poetry but I do enjoy a good limerick now and then. For those of you who do write fiction and/or poetry there is a great resource that I read every week called Funds for Writers. This is a tremendous resource for those of us who would like to write for a living. The author of the website/blog has a FREE newsletter that you can sign up for and start receiving every Friday night.
The Funds for Writers website has other resources for writers about contests, grants, submission requirements and little booklets for sale for the low price of $1.99 that concentrates on one particular area of writing. For instance, if you like to write romance novels there is a “TweetBook” about which publishers specialize in that particular genre and their contact information. The newsletter also covers tips for the writers on a variety of subjects that interest us as well as encouragement from her and other writers as well. The paid subscription is offered with twice the information as the FREE newsletter and is well worth the price of $15 a year. She is branching out with newsletters for Small Market Writers and Kids Writers as well (For younger writers and those who write for them). Hope Clark is the Editor and Writer for this tremendous resource and is having her own Writing Contest with the top prize being $300:
FundsforWriters.com and Literary Database team up this year to co-sponsor the 9th Annual FundsforWriters Essay Contest. Theme: Writing that made a difference. Both entry fee and no entry fee categories. First place winner receives $300. Six awards given. Limit 750 words. Deadline October 31, 2010. Winners announced December 1, 2010.
Golden Rules for Writers
If you are a beginning writer or just thinking that you would like to be you might want to read up on the subject before you begin. There are lots of different websites out there with all kinds of information available for aspiring writers that is FREE to read. Depending on your learning style you can either read these websites, get a book on the subject or even attend some classes at the community learning center. One article I was reading has the Top Ten Tips for New Writers. In it they stress Learning the Rules of Punctuation, Grammar and Spelling as well as doing research on your subject, writing about what you know and being interested in your subject. You can even get tips from other writers as well. So check your favorite author’s websites to see if they post writing tips or FAQ section that has writing advice.
Another article I was reading had 12 Fiction Writing Tips that are quotes from other authors and publishers. Some of these include: show don’t tell your readers; make your fiction make sense; writers write wannabees talk about it; start with the truth and twist it around your imagination; and know your audience!
What Do Writers Blog About?
There are lots of different things that you can blog about. What you blog about is entirely up to you. Some suggestions you might want to consider from an avid reader might be some of the following: Readers love to read about upcoming books, readers like to hear stories about their favorite authors, readers like to hear about how you came up with your characters and story-lines and mostly readers want to know if and when you will be available in their area for autographs and/or personal appearances.
You want to make sure you set aside some time each and every week or at the very least once a month to post an article for your subscribers and fans. Our service includes a subscriber database function so that your subscribers can create a user id and password then they will automatically get your updates when they happen. Keep to the schedule as best you can and your fans will come back often just to see what you are doing. We can also include a Guestbook page so that those fans who do not wish to subscribe but would like to post something to your site can do that. Remember that only subscribers should be able to post comments to your blog posts. That will keep down on the spammers. You will have the ability to delete any comment or Guestbook entry that does not relate to your website specifically
Computer Tips for Writers
Your computer is part of your trade. Now-a-days every single writer should have a personal computer or laptop. If you are just beginning price will determine what kind of computer your get. We deal mostly with Windows Based systems so if you have a Apple or Linux Computer you will have to look elsewhere for computing advice. (Our service here does not depend on what kind of computer you have.) Once you get your computer you will have to do a few things to maintain it and keep it safe.
On a regular basis you should do the following:
1. Run the Clean-Up Program once a week (This is included in Windows)
2. Run the Defrag Program after that (This does not pertain to Windows Vista or Windows 7)
3. When given the options to have Windows Update Automatically choose that option. However, once a month you will have to run Windows Update manually and choose the Custom rather than the Express Scan. This will give your hardware as well as optional updates not included with the Critical Windows Updates)
4. Once a Week Update Your Virus Scanning Program. And once a month run a FULL SCAN (this will take a little bit of time so be patient)
5. Delete your internet browser history, cookies and temporary files at least once a week.
And finally, this is not a tip but a MUST DO. As soon as you can go out and buy yourself an external Hard drive. The easiest to use has a USB plug-in. The prices of the external hard drives are coming down every day. To begin with you just need one as big as your current hard drive on your personal computer or laptop. Make sure you COPY your data files, music and pictures to the external hard drive at least once a week. When you get a lot of files this may take time so be patient with this as well.
What is a Blog
Being a writer you probably already know or have heard of a Blog. Simply, put it is a web log or an page that is updated on a regular basis. For our purposes here your choice of either a BLOG or a regular website is really irrelevant. The process is basically the same for both only a website is generally only updated only a couple times a year whereas a Blog allows the writer to keep it’s readers updated on what the author is working on, which books are coming out soon and what, if anything, may be available for FREE, as well as upcoming book signings. Keeping your readers informed about what you are doing is very important to keeping them coming back. Most fans look for a BLOG on the website first. With our service we put the BLOG as the first or Home page whereas the regular website a BLOG page can be added somewhere else on your site.
Welcome
Welcome to the Blogs For Writers website. Us along with our sister website at www.websforwriters.com will be giving our subscribers and or customers a fast and inexpensive solution for you to communicate with your readers. We know that you want a professional website and or blog that doesn’t cost an arm-and-a-leg. And you would like to be able to communicate efficiently with your readers however starting a website takes time and patience. It requires that you keep it updated regularly. We can do as much or as little as you need us to do. We utilize the Invoice System and will not do any work until your payment is processed through the SECURE SERVERS AT PAYPAL. We will NOT post to your blogs. That and any links or pages you need to fill out and any emails that you get will have to be answered by you or your representative.
This website concentrates on Blogs. The Blog format is the similar to a regular website EXCEPT there is an interactive component built into the site. Blogs generally have their postings as their homepage but that is not necessary. You can have a static page as your homepage with the blog posting pages on another part of the site. We utilize the Wordpress Content Management System and can create different themes for your blog that you can change back and forth as many times as you want. Whereas, a website has to be manually changed through the use of coding.
The posts will be information for our subscribers on anything we come across that will help our customers with their websites, their computers and informative writing resources so subscribe and stayed tuned.