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An Interview with Christina Katz

An Interview with Christina Katz
Author of Get Known Before the Book Deal, Use Your Personal Strengths to Grow an Author Platform & Writer Mama, How to Raise a Writing Career Alongside Your Kids

Christina Katz is the author of Get Known Before the Book Deal, Use Your Personal Strengths to Grow an Author Platform (Writer’s Digest Books). She started her platform “for fun” seven years ago and ended up on “Good Morning America.” Christina teaches e-courses on platform development and writing nonfiction for publication. Her students are published in national magazines and land agents and book deals. Christina has been encouraging reluctant platform builders via her e-zines for five years, has written hundreds of articles for national, regional, and online publications, and is a monthly columnist for the Willamette Writer. A popular speaker at writing conferences, writing programs, libraries, and bookstores, she hosts the Northwest Author Series in Wilsonville, Oregon. She is also the author of Writer Mama, How to Raise a Writing Career Alongside Your Kids (Writer’s Digest Books).


Q: What is a platform?

CK: Long story short: Your platform communicates your expertise to others, and it works all the time so you don’t have to. Your platform includes your Web presence, any public speaking you do, the classes you teach, the media contacts you’ve established, the articles you’ve published, and any other means you currently have for making your name and your future books known to a viable readership. If others already recognize your expertise on a given topic or for a specific audience or both, then that is your platform.

A platform-strong writer is a writer with influence. Get Known explains in plain English, without buzzwords, how any writer can stand out from the crowd of other writers and get the book deal. The book clears an easy-to-follow path through a formerly confusing forest of ideas so any writer can do the necessary platform development they need to do.


Q: Why is platform development important for writers today?

CK: Learning about and working on a solid platform plan gives writers an edge. Agents and editors have known this for years and have been looking for platform-strong writers and getting them book deals. But from the writer’s point-of-view, there has not been enough information on platform development to help unprepared writers put their best platform forward.

Now suddenly, there is a flood of information on platform, not all necessarily comprehensive, useful or well organized for folks who don’t have a platform yet. Writers can promote themselves in a gradual, grounded manner without feeling like they are selling out. I do it, I teach other writers to do it, I write about it on an ongoing basis, and I encourage all writers to heed the trend. And hopefully, I communicate how in a practical, step-by-step manner that can serve any writer. Because ultimately, before you actively begin promoting yourself, platform development is an inside job requiring concentration, thoughtfulness and a consideration of personal values.


Q: How did you come to write Get Known Before the Book Deal?

CK: I already had a lot of momentum going when I got the deal for a very specific audience. I wrote a column on the topic for the Willamette Writer’s newsletter. Then I started speaking on platform. When I gave my presentation, “Get Known Before the Book Deal,” at the Writer’s Digest/BEA Writer’s Conference in May 2007, Phil Sexton, one of my publisher’s sales guys, saw it and suggested making the concept into a book. Coincidentally, I was trying to come up with an idea for my second book at that time and had just struck out with what I thought were my three best ideas. My editor, Jane Friedman agreed with Phil. That was two votes from people sitting on the pub board. They converted the others with the help of my proposal, and Get Known got the green light.

Q: Why was a book on platform development needed?

CK: Writers often underestimate how important platform is and they often don’t leverage the platform they already have enough. At every conference I presented, I took polls and found that about 50 percent of attendees expressed a desire for a clearer understanding of platform. Some were completely in the dark about it, even though they were attending a conference in hopes of landing a book deal. Since book deals are granted based largely on the impressiveness of a writer’s platform, I noticed a communication gap that needed to be addressed.

My intention was that Get Known would be the book every writer would want to read before attending a writer’s conference, and that it would increase any writer’s chances of landing a book deal whether they pitched in-person or by query. As I wrote the book, I saw online how this type of information was being offered as “insider secrets” at outrageous prices. No one should have to pay thousands of dollars for the information they can find in my book for the price of a paperback! Seriously. You can even ask your library to order it and read it for free.


Q: What is the key idea behind Get Known Before the Book Deal?

CK: Getting known doesn’t take a lot of money, but it does take an in-depth understanding of platform, and then the investment of time, skills and consistent effort to build one. Marketing experience and technological expertise are also not necessary. I show how to avoid the biggest time and money-waster, which is not understanding who your platform is for and why – and hopefully save writers from the confusion and inertia that can result from either information overload or not taking the big picture into account before they jump into writing for traditional publication.

Often writers with weak platforms are over-confident that they can impress agents and editors, while others with decent platforms are under-confident or aren’t stressing their platform-strength enough. Writers have to wear so many hats these days, we can use all the help we can get. Platform development is a muscle, and the more you use it, the stronger it gets. Anyone can do it, but most don’t or won’t because they either don’t understand what is being asked for, or they haven’t overcome their own resistance to the idea. Get Known offers a concrete plan that can help any writer make gains in the rapidly changing and increasingly competitive publishing landscape.


Q: What is the structure of the book and why did you choose it?

CK: Writer Mama was written in small, easy-to-digest chunks so busy new moms could stick it in a diaper bag and read it in the nooks and crannies of the day. Get Known is a bit more prosaic, especially in the early chapters. Most of the platform books already out there were only for authors, not writers or aspiring authors. To make platform evolution easy to comprehend, I had to dial the concepts back to the beginning and talk about what it’s like to try and find your place in the world as an author way before you’ve signed a contract, even before you’ve written a book proposal. No one had done that before in a book for writers. I felt writers needed a context in which to chart a course towards platform development that would not be completely overwhelming.

Introducing platform concepts to writers gives them the key information they need to succeed at pitching an agent either via query or in-person, making this a good book for a writer to read before writing a book proposal. Get Known has three sections: section one is mostly stories and cautionary tales, section two has a lot of to-do lists any writer should be able to use, and section three is how to articulate your platform clearly and concisely so you won’t waste a single minute wondering if you are on the right track.


Q: At the front of Get Known, you discuss four phases of the authoring process. What are they?

CK: First comes the platform development and building phase. Second comes the book proposal development phase (or if you are writing fiction, the book-writing phase). Third, comes the actual writing of the book (for fiction writers this is likely the re-writing of the book). And finally, once the book is published, comes the book marketing and promoting phase.

Many first-time authors scramble once they get a book deal if they haven’t done a thorough job on the platform development phase. Writers who already have a platform have influence with a fan base, and they can leverage that influence no matter what kind of book they write. Writing a book is a lot easier if you are not struggling to find readers for the book at the same time. Again, agents and editors have known this for a long time.


Q: What are some common platform mistakes writers make?

CK: Here are a few:

They don’t spend time clarifying who they are to others.
They don’t zoom in specifically on what they offer.
They confuse socializing with platform development.
They think about themselves too much and their audience not enough.
They don’t precisely articulate all they offer so others get it immediately.
They don’t create a plan before they jump online.
They undervalue the platform they already have.
They are overconfident and think they have a solid platform when they have only made a beginning.
They become exhausted from trying to figure out platform as they go.
They pay for “insider secrets” instead of trusting their own instincts.
They blog like crazy for six months and then look at their bank accounts and abandon the process as going nowhere.

I’ll stop there. Suffice it to say that many writers promise publishers they have the ability to make readers seek out and purchase their book. But when it comes time to demonstrate this ability, they can’t deliver.

My mission is to empower writers to be 100 percent responsible for their writing career success and stop looking to others to do their promotional work for them. Get Known shows writers of every stripe how to become the writer who can not only land a book deal, but also influence future readers to plunk down ten or twenty bucks to purchase their book. It all starts with a little preparation and planning. The rest unfolds from there.


Q: What are three things my readers can do today to get started building their platforms?

CK: Don't start building your platform until you have clarity and focus. Otherwise you will likely just waste your precious time spinning your wheels. Or worse, fritter away your time with online distractions (and trust me, there are plenty!).

But once you know what your expertise is and what you are doing with it and for whom, then consider these three steps:

Start an e-mail list: Who are the people who like to hear about your writing success? Why not start a list in your address book with them and keep adding to it as time goes by. You can start by sending out simple regular announcements of good things that happen—just be sure to get permission. One way to get permission is to send an announcement about your work out to everyone you know and tell them that they can unsubscribe if they don’t want to be receive future messages from you on the topic. I strongly recommend that all writers read Permission Marketing by Seth Godin.

Create a simple website: Although social networking is fun, a proper writer’s website is not a Facebook or a Myspace page; it’s not even a blog. So save the detailed descriptions of your quirks and faves for the social networking you will do after you’ve built yourself a solid website to publicize your genuine writing credentials (creds) across the ethers while you are sleeping. And if you don’t have any genuine writing creds yet, getting some is an important first step. The step-by-step instructions are in Get Known.

Blog when it makes sense: Blogging can be great for writers assuming three things: 1) You have ample material to draw on and time to blog regularly. 2) You take the time to determine your appropriate audience, topic and your specific slant (or take) on your topic for your specific audience. 3) You don’t plan on starting a blog, blogging like mad for six weeks, and then disappearing from the face of the blogosphere without a trace. Preparation can prevent this common pitfall from happening to you.

Don’t forget that platform development and building takes time. Once you are ready to get started, just do a little every day and you’ll be amazed what you can accomplish over time.

Thank you Christina for joining the Kindred Heart Writers today!

Milestones and Memories

Do you remember Laura's imaginary boxes? She wrote, "I organize my life into boxes … and then I live out of them, opening only one box at a time.And I find that, for me, this works – especially with the writing life. If I can compartmentalize and prioritize, it’s easier not to get overwhelmed. The trick is in being disciplined enough to stay out of the boxes you don’t need to peek into yet" ("The Writing Life in a Box" posted March 19, 2009).

Good news: Laura recently opened, closed, and shelved (at least temporarily) two major boxes within days of each other. Her "Thesis Box" contains her completed master's thesis on Spenser's The Faerie Queen with all the required departmental signatures and approvals. It won't be long before she'll receive that master's degree which has consumed so much of her time and energy the last couple of years.

The second box contains Laura's completed manuscript, And Then I Had Boys, written especially for moms of multiple sons. As the red-headed mom of four red-headed boys (and the wife of a red-headed husband), Laura draws on her personal parenting experiences to provide wisdom and insights in a friendly, conversational style. The manuscript is now with the publisher and we're all eager to know it's publishing date.

So, congrats to Laura for sticking with two major projects simultaneously and showing the rest of us that her imaginary box system really does work!

On a completely different topic -- I'm writing this from a small rural Midwest community more than a thousand miles from my Sunland home. My daughter and her husband allowed me the joyous blessing of being with them when their first baby emerged into the world on Thursday, June 25th at 6:27 p.m. Kaydi-Paris Alexandria weighed 6 lbs. 6 oz. and was 19 inches long. A week and a half later, she is as adorable as ever. This is one of our first photos of the little sweetheart.

Whatever your box may be, get it open, get it done, get it closed!

But take time out for memory-making miracles*

Johnnie

4th of July Trivia for Writers

I love trivia.
I love holidays.
So, of course, I love holiday trivia.

Writers’ brains collect enough information to fill a storehouse packed with fun facts that add details to light up the reader’s imagination, paint a story’s settings in a lively and vivid manner and is useful to impress friends at a party.

Enjoy the following 4th of July information:

The first Independence Day was celebrated in Philadelphia not on the July 4th, but on July 8 1776.

John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, both signers of the Declaration of Independence, died on July 4th, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the event.

America’s birthday is also celebrated in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and England. In Denmark, where people listen to songs and speeches about the friendship between the United States and Denmark, the celebration is known as ‘Rebildfest.’

Up until Henry Ford and his millions of cars came along, the Fourth of July was traditionally the most miserable day of the year for horses, tormented by all the noise and by the boys and girls who threw firecrackers at them.

The word ‘patriotism’ comes from the Latin patria, which means ‘homeland’ or ‘fatherland.’

The Statue of Liberty is a 151-foot statue (including the torch) of a woman with a 4½-foot nose and a 3-foot mouth. In her left hand she holds a book, upon which is written ‘July 4, 1776.’

'The Star Spangled Banner' was written by Frances Scott Key and was originally set to the tune of an English drinking song.

July 4th was not a federal legal holiday until 1941.

The origin of Uncle Sam probably began in 1812, when Samuel Wilson was a meat packer who provided meat to the US Army. The meat shipments were stamped with the initials, U.S. Someone joked that the initials stood for "Uncle Sam". This joke eventually led to the idea of Uncle Sam symbolizing the United States government.

Take a moment over this holiday weekend to say a prayer of thanks for this wonderful country.

Happy Birthday, U.S.A.

Jeanie

Nuturing a Long-Distance Writer/Reader

As a long-distance grandma, I miss the growing and learning experiences with my grandkids. I always read to my children when they were young which instilled a love of reading and books. So how to do that while far away?

I’ve come across several ideas to pass along.

If both you and your far-away children have a web cam, you can start early by reading and showing books to babies, of course while cooing at the same time. That way they will learn your voice and face and get a little reading in too. If you do not have a web cam, a CD or DVD will work too, but without immediate interaction.

For elementary age, plan a long distance story to write back and forth to each other and draw pictures to stimulate their artistic side. I’m working on a story with my 8-year-old granddaughter. I began the first page with the character and beginning. Then I left my last sentence incomplete so she could finish it and go from there. This was to be a project to cover the summer time, say maybe 6-7 pages at least. However, when I got her second page, the story was finished. Now I need to somehow continue the story with clearer explanation of what I want. I plan to save and copy it, that is-if the story is longer than 2 pages, for a keepsake.

If they are pre-teens or teens you can email, send pictures, encourage them in their activities, and maybe, just maybe they will write back. Or check their My Space/Face Book and leave goofy comments.

Of course always send age appropriate books, check out what’s being read and sometimes read it first for content. Then you will have a better discussion than, “did you like the book?” Find books that are about their special interests and be involved. Note: if they are into books you do not think are suitable, you might read one to be able to intelligently discuss the negatives. They might even think you are cool that you took the time to read their book. (Maybe)

I know I’m missing a whole host of ideas, what other things might I do to create a reading/writing interest? What have you done?

Wish I was there,

Karen

SOUTH AFRICA CONNECTION

A few days after my last post about conferences I received the following e-mail. I post this e-mail in its entirety to illustrate how one obscure blog (or perhaps not so obscure) can bring writers together in a common bond.
Map is taken from Shirl's web page.
Red dots indicate location of those who have visited her web page
Shirl on right above




Hi, I’m Shirley Corder from South Africa (aka Shirl). I see from your blog that you live in PARIS?. Okay, I’ve just done a search on Google World and I see there are a number of cities called Paris in N. America. (And by the way there are 23 towns names Paris-my insert)

As you may have read on TWV2, God willing I will be attending the above(Florida) conference, together with a friend, Marion Ueckermann (also a member of TWV2). I would love to get some input from you re the conference. As you can imagine it's a huge task for us both to get from S.Africa to the conference. I will leave home on the Sunday morning before the conference, and meet up with Marion at the Egoli (Johannesburg) airport. We fly via London and Miami, then coach to Orlando, finally arriving in Orlando at midnight on Monday evening. (Hence my need to speak to someone who knows Orlando. We will need a hotel for a couple of nights, and it’s not easy to choose one on the web.) (Please note that Johnnie of the Kindred Heart Writers will be helping Shirl and Marion find lodging.)

Please would you write and tell me a little about the conference? We really need to get the most out of it, and the more we know the better we can plan. And planning is so important for attending the conference.Could you also mention what sort of clothes the ladies wear? Are long pants okay, or do we need to bring dresses? Is there a "banquet" or evening function when we need to have something more dressy?( A woman after my own heart. Anyone who has been to conference or who knows me will know that clothes (especially jackets) are on my list second only to my manuscripts.)

One final question. Will you be there again next year? If so it will be super to meet you.Thanks in anticipation,

I immediately answered and we now have what is known in the Kindred Heart Writers group as the South Africa Connection. "For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. 1 Corinthians 12:12" In her blog Shirl writes: "Isn't this just what the Lord means by this Scripture? There's an ocean between us, but we belong to the same Body. I just can't wait to see how this works out!" And neither can I! I am so excited about our South African Connection.

To learn more about Shirl and her friend as they plan for their Florida conference check out her web site at http://www.shirleycorder.com/ While you are there be sure to go to her photo section as she has beautiful photographs of her part of the world and also of her family.

Excited with our new friend and looking forward to sharing her with our readers.

Connected to S. Africa andf Connected to God
Clella

A Summer Grammar Lesson

You thought school was out? Surprise – school is always in session for the writer. For this little review of confusing words, I chose words that are frequent victims of incorrect usage. In the spirit of bettering one’s writing, read on!

accept / except

Accept -- to agree or to receive
Except -- but or with the exception that

I proudly accept the Pulitzer Prize.
Everyone except me was published!

advice / advise

Advice – (noun) recommendation
Advise – (verb) the act of giving a recommendation

I took his advice and rewrote the first 875 pages.
“I’d advise you to get an agent, pronto!” cried the acquisitions committee.

allot / a lot

Allot – to parcel out
A lot – always two words, meaning many

I decided to allot sarcasm sparingly in the dialogue.
Completing a manuscript is a lot of work but quite an accomplishment.

all ready / already

All ready – means all are ready
Already – refers to time

We are all ready for another writers conference.
“Is it already time to go back home?” cried the writers.

among / between

Among – involves three or more
Between – involves just two

Who among us has not wished for a book contract?
I can’t decide between the newest Grisham novel and Davis Bunn’s latest book.

assure / ensure

Assure – to promise or say with confidence
Ensure – to make sure something will or won’t happen

“With just a little rewriting this will be perfect,” the editor assured me.
If I spend time rewriting, it will ensure success.

cue / queue

Cue – a hint, a stimulus
Queue – a line of people waiting (also used as a verb, to wait)

The author cleverly planted subtle cues for the reader.
He stood at the back of the queue, patiently waiting for the author’s autograph.

I hope this quick grammar lesson jogged your memory a bit and maybe even ironed out some word difficulty that has puzzled you. I refuse to dismiss class, however, without calling attention to recent news of the decline of the English language in, shall we call it, the mother country. About two months ago, the Brits revealed they would be dropping apostrophes from street signs (as in St. Peter's), and today I read that their government has decreed that teachers are not to pass on the mantra "i before e except after c." All I can say is, July 4th, here we come!

Happy writing,

Laura