• How to Marie Kondo Your Writing

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    Maybe you read her book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing or you watched her series on Netflix. Either way, you’ve likely heard of the esteemed, Marie Kondo. She’s pretty popular these days for her ability to help families de-clutter and organize their homes. Her intention is to help families keep only the items that spark joy. While watching the series on Netflix, I wondered if Kondo’s methods for tidying living spaces also applies to writing. Episode after episode, I studied the underlying structures that facilitate change and the emotional responses of the…

  • Writers and Websites: The Importance of Owning Your Brand on the Internet

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      The internet is a fascinating place. We can shop online and receive our items in as little as two days. We can complete book research easier than ever, explore new places without buying a plane ticket. And thanks to social media, we can even meet new people and build entire communities of support. If you ask me, the internet can be a pretty great place—especially for writers. Credibility is king these days, and anyone who doesn’t have a website is in direct competition with those who do. Case in point, I’ll often try a new restaurant that has a…

  • Your target audience matters! Follow along as we go into the reasons why.

    Why Your Target Audience Matters

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    You’ve done it! You’ve written your book and have committed to publishing it. You’re probably excited to share the final product with the whole world. Well, maybe not the entire world, but your target audience is definitely all Christian readers, right? Think again. Believe it or not, many authors enter the publishing process with their target audience focused on Christian readers of all ages. In other words, people ranging from elementary school to the nursing home. This wide range of potential readers doesn’t help when crafting the book’s content and marketing efforts to the right readers. Limitation is actually a good thing. One important step is defining the target…

  • writing

    Top Secret or Not: Sharing Your Writing with Others

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    There is a common writing stereotype doing more harm than good for the writing community. Writing is not, and should not be viewed as a solitary confinement type of punishment. The task of sitting down to write has been glorified as this painful and disparaging task that segregates the writer from the rest of their community. No one else could possibly understand how torturous it is to sit down and stare at a blank screen, willing yourself to type even just one decent sentence that doesn’t fall victim to the “delete” button on your keyboard. That thought has gone through…