Showing posts with label Writer Tech. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Writer Tech. Show all posts

Getting Your Content on Google


There is a basic fact that we need to get clear here. Other than yourself, there is no one on this planet who wants your content showing up as often as possible in the SERPs than Google.

For nearly two decades Google has spent 100s of 1000s on giving you an education, and telling you exactly what it takes to get you listed as often as possible. They want you to be #1! Reels of Video Training on YouTube,. Free College Credit Classes at Universities across the nation, MOOCs, free advertisement with Adwords (up to $500 at times). Reams of pages, and the best Analytics program money can buy given to you with all the training and needs you could imagine -- for free.

The Willing Suspension of Disbelief
Believe

I grew up in writing under the impression that the Willing Suspension of Disbelief was a fact. I never questioned it, as it fit my personal experience with books and stories -- even movies -- perfectly.  The way it was explained to me by one of my first mentors said, "You can get away with anything. The reader is 'willing to believe' -- just don't remind them they are reading a book. Don't break the spell." What that meant was -- the sky can be purple, the planet square and the ice on the poles burning -- no problem. However, if you have your character put some ice into her glass and it doesn't explode, or you give a lame reason for how the gravity works on a square planet, you break the spell. The reader will toss your novel aside and never return. You broke a trust, a trust that is sacred between author and reader.

There are so few Sacred Trusts left in the world, so you can imagine my state when a Neuropsychologist showed that this wasn't true. The Suspension of Disbelief wasn't how we did things at all. 

September is Rising
Marketing New Titles?




Marketing for authors is a larger job than most realize. In this post I've gathered some decent articles to get you up to speed and to offer insights you may not have considered.






The nuts and bolts of writing a Scene

Want to see a grown writer roll his eyes into the back of his head, stick his fingers into his ears and start chanting "na na na na na" like a four-year-old? Easy, just start talking about structure. Things like outlines and guidelines and scene structure and anything that smacks of planning and non-creative activity that will stifle the flow of electric wow-ness.
This paradigm of belief is based on the misconception and confusion regarding creativity vs creation. Creativity is a force, an energy, and a chaos, which if guided through  a filter of brainstorming often results in plots, ideas, characters and dramatic paradigms for a story. Creation, is the process of structure applied to the wild energies.

Do You Know Your Readership? Do You?

I'm moving back into a day job I had -- part time anyway. This means that I will be picking back up the pseudonyms that I had with the company. These personas havn't put out a new title in over six months. With my Fiction Writers Group I was going to put together a few posts on using Twitter for best effect. I noticed several of the members are on Twitter now fumbling about. In the past I didn't do any marketing for the pseudonyms at all, but the names are cold long enough for proof of concept now. I'm fairly good with Twitter and Social Media I can normally get 3k page views on any given day. In fact I did that on Friday -- again as a proof of concept.

Where you start with Twitter is the hashtags, but not necessarily in the "trending" ones.  What you are  looking for is a set of Hashtags that are frequented by people who would be your readers. Once found you get involved, post interesting news, facts, jokes, and help people with problems they might have. You make yourself a resource. But first, you need to find those tags, which means Demographics.

Fake Twitter

You’re not as popular as you think you are. That’s the lesson that Twitter users are figuring out as news of how many fake Twitter followers celebrities like Lady Gaga, politicians like Mitt Romney, and companies like Twitter have. Yes, even Twitter is the victim of fake Twitter followers.

The problem is far-reaching and the business of buying Twitter followers has helped the fake Twitter followers problem grow very quickly. It’s estimated that the average cost to purchase 1,000 Twitter followers is $18, and it’s easy for people to purchase fake followers online. Ads for fake followers can be found on eBay, Google Shopping, and numerous other popular websites. The more the fake followers cost, the more real they seem. In fact, fake follower dealers are continually looking for new ways to make fake Twitter profiles harder to detect.

Framing
A Useful Tool For Fiction Writers

The Meaning of an Event 
Is Based on Where
We
Experienced The Event
Framing has become an In-Demand field of study since 2000. While it has enjoyed  steady level of interest from researchers since its conception, the field has a  stronger following now, as enough studies have been performed to develop practical applications in:
  • Persuasion, 
  • Marketing, and 
  • Decision Making 
Academic fields interested includes Psychology, Sociology, Neurology, Neuro-Psychology, Leadership Theories and any Behavioral Study area you can think of.

The quick n dirty explanation of what Framing covers, is :
Meaning depends on Context. So -- Control the Context.

The Stroop Effect

In psychology, the stroop effect is a demonstration of interference in the reaction time of a task. When the name of a color (e.g., "blue", "green", or "red") is printed in a color not denoted by the name (e.g., the word "red" printed in blue ink instead of red ink), naming the color of the word takes longer and is more prone to errors than when the color of the ink matches the name of the color. The effect is named after John Ridley Stroop, who first published the effect in English in 1935. The effect had previously been published in Germany in 1929. The original paper has been one of the most cited papers in the history of experimental psychology, leading to more than 701 replications. The effect has been used to create a psychological test (Stroop test) that is widely used in clinical practice and investigation.



The Ever Changing Zen of the Fiction Writer

Has Your Zen Changed without Your Permission? That happens with zen things. If you have discovered that your needs are changing and the style of your writing is also changing, such as – You started as a Pantser, and now you find you need Outlines and Research Notes -- Don't worry, you'll alter that perspective several times before you come to a "workable theory"  of how you work best as a writer. That is, if you ever do. Writers and other Artists use the mind in ways that other efforts do not. But that doesn't mean that this needs to cause strife.

The McGurk effect

The McGurk effect is a perceptual phenomenon that demonstrates an interaction between hearing and vision in speech perception. The illusion occurs when the auditory component of one sound is paired with the visual component of another sound, leading to the perception of a third sound.

It was first described in 1976 in a paper by Harry McGurk and John MacDonald titled "Hearing Lips and Seeing Voices".


Scene/Chapter Transitions(Bridging)
Writer Tech

Ever feel the story is choppy, but can’t figure out why? The transitions between scenes or the chapters are a good place to begin. Transitions are words or phrases, which move the reader from one topic, idea or message, to the next in a sentence, but also this term describes the moving between scenes and chapters. The goal with these transitions
  • covey why the next topic matters
  • introduce an urgency
  • create a tension for the scene ahead 
  • if applicable, introduce characters 
So, a well composed transition reaches back, then forward, and gives a sense of interest, even urgency.

Where the Wild Things Are...

Chess is a Wild game I've only been playing for a short time, but I've gained enough understanding to realize that the angles of ...