Romance and Mystery Authors on Writing: Conda Douglas on Marketing Made Easy, Giveaways

Hello and welcome to this Thursday's writing tips in the Romance and Mystery Authors on Writing series. Humorous author Conda Douglas is our tipster with her own writing tips on Marketing. AND Conda has brought along an e-book copy of her award-winning mystery, Starke Naked Dead. Congratulations on winning third place in the mystery category in the Idaho Author Awards! 
Please leave a comment to be eligible to win the drawing for this entertaining mystery. Winner announced after 9 pm on Sunday evening. 

PLUS today, Conda has a FREE gift for you, a cookbook filled with Conda's tried and true recipes. Just in time for the holidays!

Click here to order

Conda, you maintain an author can actually enjoy marketing. Say what? Please tell us how.

MARKETING MADE EASY...UH...EASIER 
by Conda Douglas

Once upon the time before eBooks, marketing and promotion were straightforward, they followed a laid out process that everyone accepted as protocol. Now, authors, whether traditionally published, self-published or hybrid, are expected to promote their own works and author brand. Add to this that no one knows what works in social media, except that it does appear to add sales. Add to this that all social media is continuously changing and many authors throw up, uh, their hands and maybe their breakfast too.

Breathe, relax, and unclench those fists. Here are a few tips that will have you enjoying, yes, enjoying, marketing.

There are myriad ways to promote on the Internet, enough to find your own way. If you choose social media that you enjoy, you're more likely to visit, post, comment, whatever, more often and get more followers, views, whatever. I adore Pinterest so visit it and pin often (it's like having hundreds of great teapots, all free and none that need washed!). Because of my activity, I have many followers.

Provide content pertinent to your interests (see teapots above). I have writing boards on Pinterest, but most of my boards are about my interests, jewelry and jewelry making, recipes, fitness and of course teapots, some tangential to my novels. One of my main characters is a jeweler, for example. People will discover you as an author instead of being annoyed by endless pitching.

Note: An easy way for more promotion is to link your social media accounts, Pinterest to Twitter to Facebook, etc. Then when you post to one it posts to the other sites as well.

Think outside the promo box. Because I love writing reviews on TripAdvisor I have over 100 reviews with 41,000+ people plus having read them. The cover of my novel The Mall Fairies: Exile is my bio pic. If only a tiny portion of readers see and my name and cover...

Use cross marketing. Get into groups of authors and bloghop, tweet each other's tweets, promote each other's books for content, etc. Authors adore helping other authors!  

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The gossiping women of the Widows Brigade in the new ski resort of Starke, Idaho love a good scandal—this time it’s a murder mystery, and a stark naked corpse!

BUY LINK  for Starke Naked Dead 

by Conda Douglas

About Conda:

Award winning Conda grew up in the ski resort of Sun Valley, Idaho. Her childhood was filled with authors and artists and other creative types. She grew up with goats in the kitchen, buffalo bones in the living room and rocks in the bathtub. Now her life is filled with her cat and dog and permanent boyfriend and writing.

She's traveled the world from Singapore to Russia (in winter!) and her own tiny office, writing all the while. She delights in writing her cozy Starke Dead mystery series with amateur detective jeweler Dora Starke. The more Dora discovers cursed jewelry, her aunt digging graves, and a rampant poisoner, the more fun Conda has--although sometimes Dora complains about her plight! 

When she's not writing Dora into her quirky and quixotic mysteries, Conda writes the popular tween fantasy Mall Fairies series. The fairy inspiration for her Mall Fairies came from the sparrows that live in the Boise Towne Square Mall in Boise, Idaho. Conda works hard to rescue the fairies from humans, cats, pixies and themselves.

Find out more about Conda at  Conda's Creative Center 

I am thrilled to announce that Conda Douglas and I are bundled together with Heather Fraser Brainerd, David Fraser, and Sara Jayne Townsend in a four mystery e-book set releasing from our publisher, MuseItUp Publishing. 

You can pre-order now and get the special Black Friday price-- $1.99 for ALL FOUR BOOKS. Price goes up on December 2. For more information and the buy link, go to MuseItUp Publishing. Also available at amazon.

Seeds of Inspiration Author Conda V. Douglas and Giveaways

Welcome author Conda Douglas to the Seeds of Inspiration Spring Event. Conda is giving away a copy of her new cozy mystery, Starke Naked Dead. Release date is tomorrow April 25. You can be one of the first readers to enjoy her book just by leaving a comment for the drawing.  Drawing closes on Sunday at 12:01 a.m. EDT.

PLUS For everyone, her cookbook Starke Deadly Delicious Recipes is FREE today and tomorrow. It's a delicious taste of some of her favorite recipes along with a taste of the characters and world of Starke! Clck on the link for Starke Deadly Delicious Recipes at Amazon to get your copy! Thank you so much, Conda!

Conda Douglas grew up in the ski resort of Sun Valley, Idaho. Her childhood was filled with authors and artists and other creative types. She grew up with goats in the kitchen, buffalo bones in the living room, and rocks in the bathtub. Now her life is filled with her cat and dog, permanent boyfriend, and writing.

Conda and pal, Puck

She’s traveled the world from Singapore to Russia and her own tiny office, writing all the while. She delights in writing her cozy Starke Dead creative woman mystery series with amateur detective jeweler Dora Starke. The more Dora discovers cursed jewelry, her aunt digging graves, and a rampant poisoner, the more fun Conda has—although sometimes Dora complains about her plight! Next up, Starke Raving Dead, in which Dora’s mad Aunt Maddie proves the aptness of her name.

When she’s not writing Dora into her quirky and quixotic mysteries, Conda writes the popular tween fantasy Mall Fairies series. The fairy inspiration for her Mall Fairies came from the sparrows that live in the Boise Towne Square Mall in Boise, Idaho. When not rescuing fairies from humans, cats, and themselves, Conda works on the last title in the Mall Fairy trilogy, The Mall Fairies: Destiny.

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Places you can find Conda:

Conda's Blog: 

Facebook

Pinterest

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Conda_V

Amazon author page:

My Wonderful Fifth Grade Teacher, Mrs. Loringer
by Conda V. Douglas

JQ's question about what inspired me to become a writer brought back a stupendous memory of my true writing inspiration. Thank you, JQ!

I grew up in the tiny odd town of Ketchum, Idaho. Odd because it's a mile away from the Sun Valley ski resort, filled with luminaries, including one famed writer, Papa Hemingway. In contrast, Ketchum at that time was the place where all the middle class people who worked in Sun Valley lived.

Ketchum's one and only school, the grade school, was understaffed and underfunded. For my fifth grade year, the new young teacher hire taught the advanced students of third and fifth grades. All 24 of us happened to be girls. All day scrunched in the same classroom with equipment so old that our desks had inkwells.

Mrs. Loringer's response to this bizarre configuration was life changing for her students. She must have figured that since she was teaching two grades two years apart, why not often let the students go at their own pace, spend time working on their own? It worked great.

One thing we could do was write poems, short stories and essays for extra credit. I did that so much Mrs. Loringer finally told me that I had an A+ in English. I didn't need any more extra credit. I burst into tears. I'd lost my audience. An audience of one, but at age 10, I believed that "real" authors were gods, like Papa, not a little girl living in Ketchum, Idaho. Mrs. Loringer gently teased out the problem, in between my sobs, and then she said, "You're a good writer. Good enough to become an author, if you want."

My tears vanished. That my beloved teacher had validated me as an author made my writing career possible. My first acceptance! I've been writing ever since. In honor of the first in my cozy mystery series, Starke Naked Dead, being released from my publisher, Muse It Up, I'm offering a copy of it free! Please note that currently it is only available in various eBook formats and PDF. Starke Naked Dead is set in a tiny mountain town that is about to be Idaho's newest ski resort, hmmm...

Back Cover

The gossiping women of the Widows Brigade in the new ski resort of Starke, Idaho love a good scandal—this time it’s a murder mystery, and a stark naked corpse!
Jeweler Dora Starke believes creating her own jewelry line with no money and no time is her biggest problem. She’s mistaken. When her recluse dad shows up and thrusts a stolen, cursed jewelry piece worth millions at her and demands she sell it or he’s dead, she knows this must be her biggest problem. She’s wrong. When she pursues her father to his Idaho mountain cabin and instead of dear old dad, discovers a stark naked corpse, she’s certain she’s found her biggest problem--whodunit. Nope. Dora’s problems are just beginning…Follow Dora as she becomes an amateur sleuth to solve the mysteries of cursed jewelry and murder, in this, the first of the Starke Dead women sleuth cozy mystery series.

BUY LINK

MuseItUp Publishing 

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Thanking a million teachers float in the 2014 Rose Parade

Finally, a huge thank you to Mrs. Loringer and all those other teachers out there who make such a great difference.