Inside The Writer's Mind

When is plagiarism okay?

cjweisman — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 23:26:11 +0000

Okay, that is an intentionally provocative question. Rather than tease you any more, I will tell you that plagiarism is okay when you are plagiarizing yourself. This subject came up as I began to write the introduction for my forthcoming book, Serious Doubts (working title). The structure of Serious Doubts is very similar to the structure of my most recent book, So Why Have You Been Married? Both books are based on primary research, which includes an online survey and multiple one-on-one interviews.

The introduction of my most recent book has a certain structure to it also, which includes explaining the methodology of my research and sharing some of the research results. The structure of that introduction makes perfect sense for my forthcoming book too, so why change things? I made the creative decision to keep most of the dialogue from the introduction of my last book and use it in my next book, in essence, plagiarizing myself.

When it is complete, if someone were to read my new book immediately after my previous book there is no doubt they would see the similarity in the introductions, and may even become a little suspicious. That isn’t likely to happen because the markets for the two books are so different. But ultimately, who cares? The real content of the book is what happens after the introduction. And if by plagiarizing myself I finish the new book that much sooner, and the consumer gets to read it that much quicker, then it is worth it. How do you feel about this? Do you think it is okay to plagiarize yourself? Let me hear from you.

Posted in Writing

And the beat goes on

cjweisman — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 00:16:06 +0000

Well, I’m back writing again because I finally have the time. The web business I launched is up and running. Now it’s in the “maintaining” mode. For the record, it is much more time consuming to launch a web business than to maintain one, which is what I’m doing now. Much of the furor over my previous book has died down—although I still do radio interviews on a regular basis—which has freed up some time also.

It is a little intimidating to take some time off from your major writing project. For one thing, where do you start when you decide to pick it back up again? For me, I like to start slow. I re-started this time by reading what I had already written, to put me back in the proper frame of mind. I even came up with a working title for the book that I really like: Serious Doubts. Whenever I come up with a potential title for a book I’m working on, the very first thing I do is search for that exact title on Amazon to see if it already exists. The last thing I want to do is come out with book title that has already been used a dozen times. Even if they are on completely different subjects it is bound to cause serious confusion in the market place, which I want to avoid. Turns out, Serious Doubts has no titles on Amazon, which is why I am excited. As for the sub—title, you’ll just have to wait for that. What is the working title of your next book? Let me hear from you.

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Posted in Writer psychology, Writing

A new found enthusiasm

cjweisman — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 16:22:04 +0000

Wow, what a day. As I mentioned previously I invested in a teleseminar, on mass marketing books, led by Matthew Bennett. Matt is a marketing expert—not a writer—that applied his marketing acumen to books. He has sold over 5 MILLION books. Anyone who is that successful, you have to listen to. The teleseminar includes two, 30 minute one-on-one telephone sessions to help in positioning the book and developing a marketing plan for mass market sales. Towards the end of our first 30 minute phone call, Matt came up with a marketing approach that is so unique (and clever), it even excited him. And he doesn’t get excited too often. I think it’s brilliant. Without going into too much detail, his idea is to market the book to the person most likely to buy it, not the person most likely to read it. That’s right. The person that buys a book is not always the person that reads it. Think about books that are given as gifts.

The idea got me so excited, I have a new found enthusiasm for finishing the book. I was languishing a little lately, not working on the book much for several reasons. For one, I have been very busy doing other things. But, I have to admit I was down a little on writing the book not knowing where or how I was going to be able to reach the market. Now I have hope, and new energy to complete it. Can’t wait to get going again. Have you ever had anything re-energize you during the writing? Let me hear from you.

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Posted in The marketing plan, Writer psychology Tagged: Matthew Bennett

When writing becomes a chore

cjweisman — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 21:54:47 +0000

I admit it. This blog has become a chore. It’s not that I don’t enjoy writing, or even contributing to this blog. It’s just that I have so many other things going on right now, which in my mind take precedence over this blog, that I cannot get excited about it. But maybe that’s the best reason to keep going. After all, this blog is called Inside The Writer’s Mind, and my intent is to share everything going on inside of me during the writing of my next book. Perhaps sharing how I deal with writing when it becomes a chore is the most valuable thing I can share. Maybe it’s not what you want to hear. Maybe it’s not what I want to say. But it’s the truth; it’s real, it’s current and it’s what I’m dealing with.

What is my responsibility here? Is it to my readers? Is it to me? Is it to the blog itself? I’d be curious to hear from anyone who started a blog and got tired of maintaining it. What did you do? How did you feel about it? Let me hear from you.
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Posted in Writer psychology

Hiatus

cjweisman — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 18:18:17 +0000

Yes, I have been on hiatus from Inside the Writer’s Mind. Something had to give and it was this blog. But on the bright side, I managed to launch a web business specifically targeted to seminar “junkies”. It is seminarALERT.com and it has the largest collection of personal development and entrepreneur-focused seminars and teleseminars anywhere. There are even a bunch of seminars on writing and publishing. Check it out. I just finished taking an exceptionally good teleseminar called Sell Books By The Truck Load which teaches you how to form corporate and non-profit partnerships to sell a lot of books all at once, rather than one at a time through the more traditional distribution channels.

Putting one endeavor on hold while you pursue another is something you will have to face repeatedly throughout your life. Maybe you want to start a business or maybe you have to take care of a loved one who has gotten sick. Either way, we are constantly forced to choose between what we want to do and what we know we should do. The best part is that my writing hasn’t gone anywhere. It’s still here, right where I left it. I think it is the timelessness of writing that makes it magical. It is timeless to write, and timeless to read. It does not need to be written in any specific time frame nor does it need to be consumed in one either. What have you had to put your writing on hold for? Let me hear from you.

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The one liner and the elevator speech

cjweisman — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 00:44:44 +0000

So, I am taking this teleseminar called Selling Books By The Truckload which will ostensibly teach me just that. It is a different approach to selling mass quantities of books. When it comes to creating a best seller, the first thing most authors think of is publicity—as in how do I get on Oprah? But there is another way to sell even more books than a best seller which has nothing to do with publicity. If you read my post Where do all the books go, then you know that the other approach to selling large quantities of books is about forming partnerships with corporations and non-profit organizations. That is what the teleseminar is about.

My first assignment is to come up with a one liner and an elevator speech. What are they? A one liner is a single sentence about my book designed to intrigue a listener sufficiently to want to say, “tell me more.” The elevator speech is just a longer version of the one liner. It is a 20-30 second speech (short enough to give on a elevator ride) designed to intrigue a listener enough to want to hear more about the book.

While working on this exercise two things occurred to me. First, I do not have a great title for my book yet. And coming up with a great title is probably the single most important thing you do when writing a book. Here is the basic formula as I understand it: Great book + lousy title = no sales.

The other thing I discovered is how difficult it is to come up with a single sentence (or two or three), that creates enough curiosity and intrigue, to get the casual passer by to want to hear more. Here is what I have so far. Keep in mind they are a work in progress and no, I do not have a title yet.

One liner: My Book (insert title here), shows people how to avoid marrying the wrong person at the wrong time for the wrong reasons by learning to trust their inner voice.

Elevator speech: My Book will lower the divorce rate. One of the leading causes of divorce is people getting married, who know before hand, their marriage will end in divorce. My Book shows how to avoid that fate by making better decisions about who, when and why people should marry.

Do you have a one liner or elevator speech for your book? Let me hear from you.

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An impatient writer

cjweisman — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 17:56:44 +0000

This week I found myself feeling very impatient and hurrying my writing. Needless to say I am not doing my best and most creative work. It’s almost as if writing has become some action item to complete by a certain date, without regard to the quality of the story. Such is the dilemma of the overworked writer.

I have too much on my plate right now and when that happens, I become impatient. I write too quickly; I’m not in my creative mind. So I have a decision to make. Put the writing on hold while I develop my web business, or try to parallel process the two tasks. Putting my writing on hold would free up a lot of time and allow me to do a better (and faster) job launching the web business, but I just can’t seem to let go. I fear that if I put my writing on hold, it will be difficult to start up again. But more than that, I feel that I will lose my creative momentum. On top of that, I do feel as though I owe it to all the people who already took time out of their lives to contribute to the book. I made a promise I would try and finish this year. What to do?

How do you slow down your writing when you are in a hurry? Is it even possible to do? I am reminded of a saying that I first heard Alex Mandossian say: Ordinary things done on a consistent basis produce extraordinary results. What does that mean for me right now? I need to stop focusing on the extraordinary results I desire and just focus on consistently doing the ordinary things. Like writing a single (good) paragraph.

I guess you figured out by now I will be parallel processing—it’s all I know. But I will try and slow down by staying focused on the road right in front of me and not too far out in the distance, where the road to the extraordinary is paved with consistently ordinary asphalt.

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Segmentation

cjweisman — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 15:26:02 +0000

Well, I finished the segmentation process for the book I’m writing. What is the segmentation process you ask? It is the process of taking a whole lot of disorganized information and cutting down to a manageable size and breaking it into pieces that make sense. The various pieces, or segments, make up a substantial portion of the book because it consists of the conversations I had with the people I interviewed. But the best part of all, is now that I am finished the segmentation process, I know what the chapters and subchapters of the book are going to be. (I at least know what they will be about, although I may not have settled on their names.)

The segmentation process is a way of organizing a book—be it fiction or non-fiction—because it identifies the chapters and their order. In fiction there is more flexibility because it is common practice to jump back and forth while telling a story. With non-fiction, the book needs a logical organization. Since my current project is about all the things that affect people’s decision to marry, I laid out the chapters temporally (i.e., in time) from who they were before they met their spouse, to who they had become after their divorce. Is it the right approach? I don’t know. But it works for me.

Have you ever had to go through the segmentation process as you wrote? Let me hear from you.

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Where have I been?

cjweisman — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 23:42:49 +0000

I have had to make some difficult decisions lately. Namely to backburner this blog. It’s not that I don’t like doing it or think it isn’t important. It’s just there are more important things I’m working on right now and there are only so many hours in the day. Something’s got to give, and it’s this blog.

The good news is that I am extremely focused on two projects that are so exciting, I cannot sleep at night. But those two projects, along with my full time job, are all I can handle. So for the next couple of months or so, it will be hit and miss with my blog. Hopefully you will be in a position soon where you have so much going on, you have to put something you love on hold. It’s a great feeling. Have you ever been in that position? Let me hear from you.

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Where do all the books go?

cjweisman — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 13:57:02 +0000

As I continue to promote and publicize my most recent book, So Why Have You Never Been Married, I continue to learn about the book business. And the more I learn the more excited I get, especially for any books I write in the future. I am beginning to understand how one goes about selling a lot of books, primarily non-fiction. And I now realize that I must cater my books to a specific audience if I ultimately want to sell a ton of books.

Did you know that half the books sold each year never see the inside of a bookstore (real or virtual)? That’s right, 50% of all books sold do not go through the standard channels of distributor then retailer (i.e., Barnes and Noble). Half the books get sold directly to the end user, usually in large quantity (from hundreds to tens of thousands) buys. Who are these large quantity buyers? Corporations, non-profits, and other organizations. That’s right, these large organizations often times buy books, they deem valuable, in bulk and give them away to their employees. Imagine writing a book on sales that Verizon Wireless decided it wanted all their retail sales people (at all those kiosks) to read as part of their sales training. That could be a 10,000 book sale right there without the book ever hitting a bookshelf. And 10,000 books is more books sold than 99% of all books published. It would be a bestseller that nobody (outside of Verizon) had ever heard of.

In my effort to understand this “other” book market, I came across a couple of resources I think will be valuable. First, I found a couple of books that come highly recommended and deal with this very subject. They are Beyond The Bookstore by Brian Jud and Jump Start Your Book Sales by Marion Ross. These are already on my Amazon wish list. My intention is to read them in the next couple of months while I am writing my next book. By doing so, hope to get a crystal clear vision of the organizations that will benefit from my book as I continue to write it. I anticipate that it will actually impact my writing as I will be writing for a very specific audience: the kind that buy in bulk.

The other resource I came across is a service called Premium Book Company. Now this is not premium as in top quality; this is premium as in an item that companies give away. For a nominal charge and a handful of books, The Premium Book Company includes your book in their catalog that goes out twice a year to thousands of organizations who buy books in bulk. The hope is that one (or more) of these organizations will see my book and want to buy it. And if they do, the one thing I know for sure is they will buy a bunch. Will it work? Who knows. It’s all part of the learning process. But I can tell you that selling books in bulk to large organizations has definitely affected how I think when I’m writing. What do you think about when you’re writing? Let me hear from you.

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