If you’re still trying to land a literary agent, happen to be available tomorrow afternoon, and have your pitch dialed in, spending five minutes at the Philadelphia Writers’ Conference might get you one step closer to getting your book published. Tomorrow, Friday, June 9th from 2:00 pm to 5:00 pm, agents and editors will be […]

I’m preparing for a rash of presentations to audiences with limited exposure to the Social Web, so I figured a glossary of terms would be useful to them, and save some time during the presentations. Anyway, I’m cobbling the glossary together based on what I’ve been able to find, but I’m sure there are going […]

The 62nd Annual Philadelphia Writers’ Conference will take place on Friday, June 11th through Sunday, June 13th at the Holiday Inn at Fourth and Arch Streets in downtown Philadelphia. This year’s theme is: Your Writing Stimulus Package. Our keynote speaker is author and Wall Street Journal columnist, Jeffrey Zaslow. In 2009, Zaslow was the author […]

As Marie Lamba said, crap happens in this business, but when you and your local bookstore go to the trouble of creating an event, the worst thing that can happen is NOTHING! Often a rookie author, unfamiliar with the promotional side of events, is caught by surprise when the only people who come up to […]

Attending elective conferences is one of those decisions I usually leave for the absolute last possible minute. I make the final call after I have a better feel for my workload, core business obligations, travel schedule, and in my case, my daughters’ sporting schedules. What do I mean by “elective conferences”? I mean conferences outside […]

Buckle up for the fastest hour of social media how-to for authors, when the Backspace Writers Conference turns me loose from 1:00 pm to 2:00 pm on Friday, May 28th. I’m bummed that my time slot is up against Karen Dionne’s Agent-Author Relationship panel, featuring Scott Hoffman, Norb Vonnegut, Jeff Kleinman, and Elizabeth Letts, but […]

Kodak’s Jeffrey Hayzlett, a good friend of the #140conf,  has generously donated a sweet Zx1 high definition pocket video camera for us to give away at our Philly meetup next week. Thanks, Jeff. So if you’re attending the Philly 140 Characters gig next Tuesday evening at National Mechanics and would like a shot at walking […]

Being social and remaining effectively present in a social context is, like most skills, easier for some than for others. Maybe “easy” is the wrong word. I was having breakfast with Philly author Jonathan Maberry this past week when the simplest of examples dropped in my lap. I’d seen a blog post earlier in the […]

Chris Brogan talks, in his article yesterday, about Paul Coelho and Scott Westerfeld using the social web to engage their communities in a way that enables readers to congregate, and to participate in the creative energy surrounding a book like never before. While doing this, these guys create real relationships which always amount to the […]

I spent yesterday bouncing between publishers and agencies like a pinball, doing what I do; helping authors and publishers find their readers. One publisher at a time. One person at a time. One conversation at time. One convert at a time. The usual for me. Except things feel different now. From my first cup of […]