​​MARKETING IS AN ONGOING PROCESS:
 
Many times, authors are at the risk of not knowing how an event might go. It can be risky times in which one event might be a successful time of selling your heart warming books, but the consumer has other ideas about buying a book the next time. So, to combat that, I stay busy marketing with passing out my business cards, swag, and having conversations that may lead to a sale or future reader for my books. I might even end up with a contact for a future event, school visit, daycare visit, or a previous customer who comes by to see me.
 
 
FRIDAY NIGHTS IN THE PARK
 
This was very evident in two of my Friday Nights in the Park that I have attended and at two bookstore events. These events are typically for two hours at a time.
 
 
My Friday Nights in the Park events are a terrific opportunity to have a visibility in the community that I live in. This event usually lasts from May to September.
 
Sometimes, there are also unique events held at the park that I also attend to further my mission. The event usually brings lots of crowds to the local area.
 
Visibility is so important that you need to be present at events so that your name and books can be at the forefront. The community needs to see a face with a book.
 
My relative who lives in another community passed on to me that she met a person who goes to Friday Nights in the Park. The person mentioned that they remembered meeting me at the author table I set up there.
 
I give out “pickle stickers” to represent my book, “Nicoli Picoli.” Apparently, the children like getting the stickers when they go to the Friday Nights in the Park, so they always want to go to get them from me.

​BOOKSTORES GALORE!
 
My first bookstore event this month was at a bookstore. I had a low turnout. I did read to one child though. I was also able to meet a lady who announced to me that she was pregnant. She asked me to dedicate a book to “My future baby.” I have done this dedication before in the past which I thought was kind of cool.
 
Then, I spoke with another person from Texas who had some similar interests as I do since I also used to live in Texas before who wanted to buy my book for his nephew. This happened to be my first military book, “Did You Come Home for Lunch?” The dad also worked on C-130’s which happens to be on the front cover of that book.

​During the next book event, I was participating with three other authors who have written nonfiction, romance, and mystery. Then, I was promoting my children’s book fiction book, “Eli’s Shenanigans.” The attendance of customers was low in the bookstore due to graduation activities and possible severe weather coming to the area. So, most of the time all of us authors collaborated on our writing career.

MARKETING SUCCESSES
 
 
This month like all others has been all about marketing. This month is special because I have been recorded reading “Eli’s Shenanigans,” been on a podcast called, “Trauma to Triumph” (all about military Veterans) recorded for a podcast review of the writer’s conference and am looking forward to being on a podcast next month.
 
 
I have learned from my mentor, currently reading my mentor’s book, and reading books that I got at the writer’s conference to learn more about being an author, especially about marketing. I was also in an international kids’ magazine called, “Kidlio Magazine- www.kidliomag.com. 
​

​Finally, I am currently working on a new book which hopefully will be done in June 2025. Then, the marketing for that book will be in process. This will be my 12th children’s book. After that, I have book 13 which will start with the illustrator in July 2025.
 
This is the day in the life of a children’s book author. It is rewarding, fun, and challenging but with great determination and heartfelt stories, I will prevail with my faith always remembering that “I can do all things through Christ which strengthen me.” (Philippians 4:13). I even have a shirt that has this verse.

INSPIRATIONAL QUOTES:


So, I follow the advice of many different inspirational quotes as well:
 
“It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop. Confucius
 
“You can’t wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club” Jack London
 
“Only those who risk going to far can possibly find out how far one can go.” T.S. Eliot
 
“Life is a journey. When we stop, things don’t go right.”  Pope Francis
 
“Success is the sum of small efforts-repeated day in and day out.” Robert Collier

Being an author since 2020 and publishing my first book in 2021, I began to think about how to distribute my books in different kinds of formats. So, I tried to begin the process of creating e-books, Kindles, Audibles, Nook, and libraries. As you may or may not know, doing an Audible and creating a Kindle can be time consuming but worthwhile.
 
Because technology is advancing so much, readers need the options to explore Audibles, e-books, and Kindles in a variety of ways. I think this really depends on how a reader likes to see the print or hear the story on Audible.
 
As you are reading a book, an Audible that goes along with the book can sometimes be helpful. If you choose not to do this, just reading it in a book or listening to an Audible is fun. I listen to many different Audibles as I am a passenger in a car a lot.
 
So, I have a variety of different ones that I like to listen to such as biblical, history, and other types of interesting Audibles that suit my fancy.  In my opinion Audible must have an outgoing personality for me to listen to or I go to sleep if the Audible is too mellow or monotone.
 
With creating my Audibles, I choose to work through parents and have a child read the books for me on Audible. Narrators charge by the number of words that are in the book so the process can take a long time with the recording, the author’s approval timeframe, and Audibles quality control process.
 
For e-books and Kindles, I believe that there are many readers who choose to go this route rather than a print copy. Through technological advances, a reader can use an app, websites, e-book readers, and digital e-book libraries on the computer with e-book to display on a screen. I also have books on Nook that can be read on those devices as well.
 
Finally, I began the process of getting some of my books approved in local and out of state libraries by contacting the developmental offices of each library system that handle purchasing the books for the library. Once approved, your books will be in the library for checkout. This is just another method of getting your book out in the library.
 
I have listed below some of where a reader can find more of my books from e-book distributors, Audibles, Kindles, and at libraries that I have books in currently. This list is not all inclusive since I am still working on creating more opportunities for readers to receive my books in different formats.
 
 
 My E-BOOK SITES:
 
SOME OF MY OTHER BOOKS IN E-BOOKS:  
 
-Babbling Betty
-Did You Come Home for Lunch?
- I Was Just About…
- Living on A Military Base
-Rules, Rules, Rules !,
-The Problem Is
-The Toilet Paper Caper of 2020.
-More to Come !
 
Distributors:
 
Amazon
Apple
Baker and Taylor
Barnes and Noble
Borrow Box
Cloud Library
Everand
Fable
Find Away Voices
Gardners
Hoopla
Libby
Odilo
Overdrive
Palace Marketplace
Rakuten Kobo
Smashwords
Tolino
Vivlio
 
AUDIBLES:
 
-Did You  Come Home for Lunch ?
-Rules, Rules, Rules !
-I Was Just About…
-The Toilet Paper Caper of 2020
 
 
Kindles:
 
-Did You Come Home for Lunch ?
-Living on A Military Base
-The Problem Is…
-Rules, Rules, Rules !
-Babbling Betty
-The Toilet Paper Caper of 2020
-I Was Just About…
 
 
Libraries:
 
LIBRARIES:
 
Florida Libraries –
Okaloosa County Library-
https://readokaloosa.org/
 
Santa Rosa County Library-
https://www.santarosa.fl.gov/975/Library-System
 
Oklahoma Library
Metropolitan Library System-
www.metrolibrary.org 

This week, I had the opportunity to relax at the Home Away From Home Community Center for Veterans. During the week, I usually go several times a week. This center caters to only Veterans of different services. While I am there, I have great opportunities for health, wellness, and personal growth. The director , Kimberly Richardson,  and her amazing staff do a great job of taking care of the Veterans.
  
There are so many activities that you can get involved in like arts and crafts, bible study, dominoes, cards, and lots of other fun activities. You can play pool, Pacman, and participate in Bingo. Sometimes, the center will have a local barbershop to cut your hair. Meals are also provided for Veterans.
  
There are also special activities like Father’s Day events, Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and other special day on which a party is held, and different food is prepared differently than the food on the menu. Birthdays are also celebrated with pomp and circumstance.
 
Bingo is my favorite activity. According to research on the Internet, Bingo was created in 1929 by Edwin S. Lowe, a Brooklyn toy salesman,  (The History of Bingo | Back Then History ). He was observing a game called, “Beano” when he got the idea to create the Bingo game. Beano used beans and markers making it a precursor to Bingo as far back as 1530 in Italy. (The History of Bingo | Back Then History ).
 
 I seem to be somewhat anxious when I play Bingo. I guess you could say that I am extremely competitive. Since childhood, I have always been that way, so I am trying to tone this down somewhat. I was a “high achiever” in youth with in some ways as being a “perfectionist” which is something on which I am working. When I was in high school in Composition 1, I would write compositions at home. If I made any mistakes on the paper, I would tear up the paper and start over.
  
During Bingo, we are allowed to use two cards except when we do the game of Blackout. We play straight bingo, double bingo, kite (four corners and a diagonal together forming a kite), small diamond around the free space, large and small picture window, form a lazy “T” ( form a “T” in different directions to include upside down) , pick numbers bingo, form an “X”, and Blackout. Usually, I get more chances at a Bingo on a “Blackout” since many winners can win during this time. Usually, four to five bingo winners are usually the case.
 
When you win, you get monopoly money that you can use to go shopping in the local award shop in the facility. They have all kinds of different items to choose from like snacks, hygiene supplies, electronics, and household items.

The best part of it is the social interaction. I am a social butterfly with so much of my characteristic being an extrovert. During the time I am there, I make my rounds talking to me. When I am not socializing, I participate in stretching exercises and movies. There is so much to do at this center.
 
 Many of the Veterans are from different branches of service, participants in wartime and conflicts, and from separate times of service in the military. I am truly in awe over the sacrifices and stories these people share with others. I am proud to have been part of the Air Force and Air Force Reserve.
​

This past weekend, I attended the Oklahoma Writers Federation Inc. Conference in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The conference began with a cool skit to open the training sessions for the weekend. This skit included one opposing person reading a script of negative thoughts on the left side of the stage and one positive person on the right side of the stage all near the main narrator (author) . When the negative person reads bad thoughts, the positive person cheers the author on with pom poms and encouraging thoughts. After that, the narrator (author) introduced the weekend sessions by mixing all the instructors and sessions in songs and narration.

​​My first session on Friday I went to was “Taking Out the Mystery of Poetry.” I needed this session since I do not often write poetry. When I authored a poem, I was not sure of all the ins and outs. The instructor mentioned that poetry is an economy of expression for connecting personal to universal connections and personal growth. Poems should be accessible, meaningful, flexible, and emotional. What poetry is not is a dissertation on emotion. Also, using literary devices like metaphor, simile, and imagery is important. One of the websites that the instructor mentioned was:  https://www.writersdigest.com/write-better-poetry 
 
I was so excited when I met another author in the poetry session that remembered me as a  previous guest speaker for the Oklahoma Christian Writers. I   received some positive feedback from the author that I did an excellent job as a presenter. I mentioned this was my first author guest speaker opportunity, but I have been on author panels.

​After this session, I was interviewed by some podcasters asking a little bit about my author’s journey and how I liked the conference. I believe the clip will show up in a future podcast release.
 
Next, I went to work at Basket Wars which is where authors donate a basket of books and swag for an auction . The money from the auction helps with scholarships to the conference. I won a “one day conference” scholarship. The scholarship recipients are required to work at the Basket Wars station.

​I then attended “Improving/Creating Blurbs and Keywords.”  One thing I learned was the blurbs should be no more than 150 words on the back of your cover of your book. Then, I began to think about how my upcoming book cover description should be. So, I have some work to do on getting my next blurb ready for my upcoming book. During the keyword part of the training, the instructor said that the keywords on Amazon are designed to be about 50 words for each keyword. I mentioned to the attendees that sometimes if you put too many words in the keyword blank, it can be too much especially realizing that the reader may not want to put that many search words in the search line on the Internet as long keywords. So, limiting to a couple of words can be better in one keyword blank.
 
A lawyer and publishing company CEO held another session that I attended called, “All the Legal Smeagle Staff Writers Need to know” where discussions were about intellectual property, trademarks, trade secrets, patents, copyright laws, and ISBN’s- 13-digit identifiers for identifying a book and e-book. A question that was answered related to getting a copyright for your book. The question was “How long is a copyright for?” Death plus 70 years. The instructor mentioned that it is not necessary to get copyright from the copyright office, but it is necessary to have the copyright symbol on books you publish to include drafts to protect your work. For more information, go to www.copyright.gov .  Also, it is free to get a Library of Congress Control Number.
 
During the session on “Book Launch Success: Marketing Strategies for a Successful Release,” the instructor asked us to assess our strengths (what we are naturally good at), what is your target audience, and needs for authors such as a website, newsletter, and a launch community.

The night rounded out with the Famous Author’s Banquet. I was recognized for putting out a blog on the Five P’s of a Successful Author (purpose, passion, persistence, patience, and possibilities) , my published book, “Eli’s Shenanigans,”  and two published works in two anthologies called “Flights of Fantasy” (Night-Light! Night-Light poem), and “Visions” (Poor Pluto Story).

On Saturday, I learned about the “Business of Freelance Writing” which discussed keeping track of expenses and income on your business. There are a lot of programs out there for keeping track from printed ledgers to online programs like QuickBooks, Excel, and other similar programs.
 
All the sessions were great but I liked “The Art of Hustling” which really broke down the word “Hustler” as an acronym for Honing (Know your Niche), Unconventional (Think outside the box), Simplifying (Be intentional), Timing (Seize opportunities immediately), Learning (Stay in the know), Engaging (Network, Socialize, and Collaborate), and Recharging (Relax, Reflect, and Reward). I had the most fun with this presentation. The instructor later sent me a Facebook post stating, “Mark, thank you for attending the Art of Hustling ! You’re a natural!”

​Saturday night rounded out with a banquet with some authors dressing up as different characters like superhero’s, gangsters, 40’s and 50’s, and other interesting costumes. After the costume contest, the writing contest winners were announced. There were over 700 entries in 37 categories. I entered three categories but did not win. That is okay. Now, I can prepare for next year’s contest.
 
I am super excited about attending next year!