First, let me apologize to my RSS subscribers. Last week’s post did not generate the RSS feed for some reason. I’m sure somebody somewhere knows why, but I do not. E-mail subscribers had no problem. Check out last week’s post at this link.

There’s so much good information for writers on the Web these days. I’ve found a number of great articles I want to share with you for this link roundup. Most of them are about marketing, but the last one is about keeping your momentum going.

• 25 Ways to Increase Blog Traffic
• 12 Marketing Skills Every Writer Now Needs
• 11 Blog Proofreading Tips
• Build Your Author Brand in 5 Easy Steps
• Six Ways to Keep Writing When You Feel Like Quitting

Similar posts on Blog4Writers:

• Jumpstart Your Writing with the Four P’s
• Marketing: Developing Your Network
• Do You Hate Marketing?

Photo from Morguefile.com, posted by bozela.

Fall is harvest time. Look what I’ve gleaned from the Web for our quarterly link roundup.

Inspiration

Susan J. Reinhardt on “The Care and Feeding of Writers”

 Self-publishing

Jerry Jenkins, “My Quarrel with Self-publishing”

Rachelle Gardner, “Will Self-pub Sales Affect Your Future?”

 Social Networking

Andrea Merrell, “To Tweet or Not to Tweet”

 Building a Platform

Erin McPherson, “Platform 101 for Regular Not-Famous People Like Me”

 Technology Frustration

Ethan Waldman, “How to Reduce Technology Frustration and Write Distraction-Free”

 Online Writing Opportunities

Neither of these is a paying market, but, if you need to get your name out there, perhaps one of these would work for you.

The Christian Pulse

Christian Devotions

 Subscribers, if you have found good articles on any of these subjects, please share them with us by commenting on this post.

Summer is the time when fresh fruit is plentiful. This week, I’ve harvested the fruit of other writers’ labor to share with you. Below, I’m sharing links to several articles I’ve found both interesting and useful.

• 5 Free E-Books Every Writer Needs by Jane Friedman, Writer’s Digest blog
• Handling Rejection by Ava Pennington (CAN blog)
• How to Study Magazine Markets Online by Susan Titus Osborne
• Five Legitimate Reasons to Self-Publish by Andrew McKay, Believer’s Press blog
• Check Out the New Bible Gateway from Gospel.com
• The Future of Publishing: e-Books vs. p-Books by Jane Urbanski on Faithwriters blog

Subscribers, if you’ve found articles that were helpful to you, please share them by commenting on this post.

Also, help spread the word about this blog by posting to Facebook orTwitter using the appropriate button below. E-mail to a friend using the “envelope” button, or use the last button, “share,” to post to other networking sites.

Readers seem to like the link roundups, so I’m making it a quarterly tradition on Blog4Writers.

• Many of you are interested in using social networks to promote your writing. Take a look at this great article by Donny Gamble: Use Facebook and Twitter to Drive Crowds to Your Blog.
• Earlier this year, I encouraged you to comment on other blogs to help create interest in your blog. See my article here. Then, check out: Don’t Just Read a Blog, Comment.
• Many of you commented on my article, “Should You Write for Free?” A recent post on Faithwriters blog dealt with the same subject in more detail: Should Christians Write for Free?
• For those of you who are still trying to get published, take a look at Terry Whalin’s Strategy for the Unpublished.
• Getting rejections? Consider this: The Positive Side of Rejection.
• If you want to know more about self-publishing, this article will help you: Key Categories of Self-Publishing.
• And, finally, check out this list of time-saving Keyboard Shortcuts for the Busy Writer.

Comment on this article to suggest topics you’d like to see on Blog4Writers in the future.

FREE-–it’s the one word that gets everyone’s attention. Writers, like everyone else, love to use blogs, websites, backup services, and a host of other free-on-the-Web products. Some of them are truly free, while others are free for a limited time or limited purposes, a free trial, so-to-speak. Online businesses have learned that offering the free trial often gains them paying customers. This marketing model is called “freemium.”

Really Free: Google offers a number of free services including Gmail, Groups, Blogger, Google Analytics, Feedburner, YouTube, and many more. Here’s a complete listing. I also use other free services offered by Yahoo, MSN, and Microsoft Office Live in addition to Google.

Free services usually work great, but, if something goes wrong, you have to figure it out for yourself. The “help” section is sometimes no help at all. For example, there was a glitch in the email messages that went to my blog subscribers through Feedburner. Some of the links in the message would not work, and the YouTube embeds didn’t show up at all. I couldn’t find an answer by searching online or in the help section. Of course, there’s no one to call, so I had to come up with my own solution.

Premium (Freemium): Most freemium services offer expanded or premium services for a fee. For example, Mozy online backup offers two gigabytes of storage free. If you need more storage space, you must upgrade to a paid plan. See the details for their free service here. Notice that the free version does not include live chat support or support tickets, which means you’ll have to get help from their support community or knowledge base.

With Mozy online backup, I started out using a free account. I chose not to back up my photos in order to avoid paying for the additional storage. When my computer crashed last year, I lost everything on my hard drive. I restored my documents from Mozy, but I had to rebuild my photo collection from the ground up. Some of the photos I lost did not have backups anywhere. I decided it was worth the fee to have everything backed up on Mozy. Other freemium services I’ve used include Dropbox, Webs.com, WordPress, Bravenet, and Shutterfly.

Time is money? The bottom line is this. Free services may not cost you money, but sometimes they cost you time. It’s been a year, and I still don’t have all my photos restored. I’m waiting for certain people to remember to send me their copies of the photos I lost. The time I’ve spent rebuilding my photo collection could have been used writing new articles. My new rule is that, if a free service becomes a time-saver for me, I’ll probably take the upgrade to the paid version when it becomes necessary.

Subscribers, would you like to recommend a free online service that’s proved useful to you? Please comment and share the URL.

More on the Freemium Concept:

Forbes Blog

Using Free to Turn a Profit

Monday, April 11, 2011

Planning for 2011, I realized I would not be able to get away for conferences this year, so I decided to build my own. Today, I want to share with you some of the resources I’ve found.

Faithwriters.com: As a “free” member, I had taken advantage of some of their services. However, I discovered that the paid membership offers many other services. I joined as a platinum member for one year. I was particularly interested in the free courses they offer. I’m still exploring, but I think the weekly writing challenge will be what I need to get me back to writing new material regularly. The fee is $10 a month or $120 a year, but that is much cheaper than most conference tuition. I’ll share more about Faithwriters later in the year.

Book Proposal Help from Terry Whalin: As I browsed the Blue Ridge Christian Writers Conference blog, I found a video interview between Alton Gansky, conference director, and Terry Whalin. The interview promotes Terry’s conference classes, but what caught my interest was the news of his membership site devoted to teaching people to write a book proposal. You may be familiar with Terry’s book, Book Proposals That Sell. The course-work is based on the book, but Terry offers additional materials on this memberships site, http://www.writeabookproposal.com/. If you are working on a book right now, this would be a great way to get help from an industry pro without leaving your desk. It’s a three-month (twelve-week) course for only $27 a month. Read the FAQ’s on the site here. Also, see the interview on YouTube here.

Publishing Industry Blogs: A new writer can learn a lot just by following blogs offered by publishing professionals. Sign up to receive these blogs regularly. It’s almost like taking classes from conference faculty. You’ll get more out of it if you comment on posts and/or ask questions.

• Rachelle Gardner, Agent
• The Borrowed Book (for fiction writers)
• There Are No Rules (a Writer’s Digest blog)
• Cecil Murphey’s Writer to Writer
• Linda Clare’s Writing Tips

Subscribers, if you have opinions about the sites and blogs I’ve mentioned today, I welcome comments. Also, if you follow a publishing industry blog that’s not listed, please share the URL by posting a comment on this post.

Last week, I posted links to several sites featuring writer helps. Together, the writers featured in that post have published hundreds of books and articles. Who better to help you figure out how to get your work published than somebody who has traveled that road ahead of you?

This week, I want to point out the resources available on my site. First, you might want to know more about me before you check out the advice I’m passing out. See a partial listing of my published work here and visit my bio page here.

I’ll now take you on the grand tour.

• Start with the Resources page, where you’ll find a list of books I recommend for beginning writers, especially those interested in the Christian market.
• Next, go to the Resources Links page for a listing of online resources.
• Visit Blog4writers at this link. The Search box is the fastest way to find articles of interest to you. You can also browse Categories from the drop-down menu in the sidebar, or, if you can browse the Tags list further down on the sidebar.
• If you need marketing ideas, go to the Marketing page.
• Don’t miss my how-to article on writing devotionals.
• If you need editorial assistance, go to my Editorial Services page.
• See my for-sale items in the Store.
• I invite you to read some of my work while you’re visiting. You can follow think links to specific articles on the About page. Read some of my devotionals here.

If you like the blog content, subscribe to updates by e-mail on the sidebar. If you prefer to subscribe by RSS feed, click on the orange RSS icon at top of any page. Or, you can go to the bottom of any page and click on RSS Feeds. For more on how to follow blogs using RSS feeds, see this how-to article.

Now that I’ve tooted my own horn, I’m offering to let you toot yours on Blog4writers. If you are a current subscriber and if you specialize in any topic related to writing for publication. I’m open to guest posts (no pay) of no more than 500 words on any topic in my category list. See that list by going here. and checking out the category drop-down menu. Please query first by e-mailing me at akinemily@gmail.com. Please provide a proposed title and your qualifications for writing on your subject. If your post fits the “editorial needs at this particular time,” I will post on the blog at my discretion. Plus, I will post announcements on Facebook and Twitter to draw attention to your post.

Post-script: Last week, I should have listed Donna Goodrich’s site, The Writer’s Friend. Visit her tips page for a myriad of helps, all easily printable, and check out her books page, too.

Announcement: The second winner of the drawings for

This week I’m sharing links to other sites and blogs that I follow regularly. Some I may have mentioned before, but I think they’re worth a second mention.

• Cec Murphey’s Writer to Writer. Especially useful for beginning writers is the recent series entitled “Articles First?” Many beginners dream of writing a book, but they need publishing credits. Writing articles can help with that. Read the five posts here. Then check out the other posts.
• Jane Friedman’s There Are No Rules. One of the Writer’s Digest blogs, this one has great information on every aspect of writing for publication.
• Sally Stuart’s Christian Writers’ Marketplace. Sally posts regular updates to listings in her market guide.
• Rachelle Gardner’s CBA Rants & Ramblings. Rachelle is a literary agent serving the Christian market. You can also follow her on Facebook and Twitter.
• Terry Whalin’s Right Writing. This is not set up as a blog, but the site offers a wealth of how-to information for the Christian writer, beginner or otherwise.

It’s hard to say which of the computer-based tools are the most useful, but for Christian writers, I have to say having numerous online Bible versions has to be near the top of the list. For my writing, I’ve tried to find one online source that offers all popular translations. I submit regularly to publishers who use the New International Version (NIV) or the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV). In addition, I like to use The Message on my devotional blog.

All sites below offer numerous translations as well as search by keyword or by Bible passage. Let’s take a look at the details.

Blue Letter Bible

• No NRSV or The Message,
• Several commentaries including John Calvin, Martin Luther, Matthew Henry, and Charles Spurgeon,
• Study tools page features charts, outlines, encyclopedias, and dictionaries.
• Images link takes you to several maps.

Bible Gateway

• In addition to search, there’s a topical index,
• Features a number of English translations, including The Message,
• Does not have NRSV,
• Allows you to put the verse of the day on your site,
• Commentary and dictionaries available under Additional Resources.

Bible Study Tools

• Has more English translations than the others, including NRSV, NIV, and The Message,
• Parallel Bible lets you compare two versions on one search,
• Numerous resources including commentaries, dictionaries, encyclopedia, and interlinear Bible.

It can be overwhelming when you try to absorb what’s offered on these sites, so I suggest choosing one and exploring it before going to another. I like Bible Gateway, but, since it doesn’t have the NRSV, I often go to Bible Study Tools instead. Most of the time I don’t need all the stuff that’s on BST, but it does come in handy when research is needed.

I invite readers to comment on these Bible study sites and to offer suggestions on other resources not mentioned here.

The Twitter URL is http://twitter.com/WWGT (What would God tweet). The writer’s moniker is Holy Ghostwriter, and the location is listed as “heaven.”  The Twitter page shows a link to an article on a Web site named Not the LA Times. Huh? And, God Himself is supposed to be the writer.

The writer attempts to craft Bible verses in the latest modern language while keeping it under the 140-character per-tweet limit. Spiced with humor, the writing is very creative.  On the Twitter venue, the writer is sure to reach some people who don’t know or have lost interest in the Bible.

Check out this example of the Twitter “translation.”

“Jesus foresees Twitter, shortens 10 Commandments to under 140 characters: Love God 110%, love neighbor like self. (Mark 12.30-31)”

OK, so I should have called it a paraphrase instead of a translation. I’m going to follow WWGT for a while and see where it goes. Check back next week for my article on the online Bible study tools.