Help Those Resolved to Write
One year ago, in the very first issue of Books & Whatnot, I wrote Resolutions, Schmezolutions–a piece about helping customers with reading resolutions and reading journals.
“Reading more” will appear on many lists this year, too. But there are other lofty goals–resolved with conviction–that you can assist through your profession. Why not help those who want to write every day?
Go to your shelves and choose a variety of your favorite writing tools–both new titles and tried and true favorites. Now scour them for your favorite writing tips and prompts. You can share a month’s worth of writing prompts on Facebook for the month of January, referencing the book where you found the prompt, in case your follower wants to read more of the book.
To save yourself time and the headache of remembering each day, gather all of your prompts and title information at once, then sit down and schedule the posts to go out each day ahead of time.
If you’d like to promote you email services more than social media, you can encourage customers to sign up for a monthly e-mail writing prompt, and continue the project throughout the year. Just as in Facebook, you can create the monthly emails at the same time and schedule their release. Since you’d be sending 12 prompts instead of 31, and the recipients have a month to complete them, they can be more detailed.
No matter which method you choose, keep a running list on your website of the prompts you send. If you have an eCommerce site, be sure to include buy buttons for the books you reference. And, if your using email, include a link for any new people who want to sign up to receive the email through the year.
