My Publication
So you've listened to the advice, and you're going to start your
own publication. Obviously, you must have some writing ability,
or collaborate with someone who does, and you must be
knowledgeable in the areas you will cover in your ezine.
One of the biggest mistakes a fledgling publisher can make is to
focus their publication on something they don't know much about.
While it is possible to get content from contributing authors,
which does add a great deal to your publication, if you are to
succeed, you must have original content.
Many people can write an occasional article that is excellent.
Writing an article or column however on a regular basis, is a
demanding task. But some folks like Rozey Gean at:
http://www.marketing-seek.com and Larry Dotson at:
http://www.ldpublishing.com have found the secret to doing
just this.
The hardest thing is to get ideas for articles. It seems that
once you do get an idea, the article then flows rather easily.
So, where do you get the ideas?
Actually ideas can come from anyplace. Many come from questions
your readers might ask. Sometimes a simple question can blossom
into a full blown article. Email you receive, even spam, can
contain a keyword that sets your creative juices flowing.
Browsing the web is a great place. Discussion sites, where
people are talking about something might give you an idea. Many
times people get into rather heated discussions and the
controversy itself might breed an idea.
Articles by other authors can stimulate your thinking, but you
have to be careful here. While we all know you can't take
another's work and claim it as your own, you also can't take
their idea and simply rewrite it a bit. There is a gray area
here, and sometimes you may be taken to task even if you have
never seen their work.
I once had someone say I did a rewrite of their article. When
informed of this by the author, I did check the article in
question, and the articles bore very little, if any similarity
to each other. But both articles did have the same title
however, which happened to be a common business term. So even if
you are acting in good faith, it can come back to "bite you".
One great source of ideas is articles that are out of date.
Many people, for example have written on the subject of how to
submit your web site to the search engines to get a high
ranking. Conditions change so rapidly in this regard, an
article could be written several times a year on this subject
alone. What was true just a few short months ago may not be
today.
The web is a dynamic place that is constantly changing. Not a
day goes by that there is something in the newspaper that
could spark an idea. Just this week I read an article about
discount web sites for airline tickets. Another article talked
about the disparity between urban and rural areas for web
access. Still another compared the number of minority
households that had computers - and yet another talked about the
"Spanish Market".
The ideas are there, and if you keep a log of them, the next
time you sit down to write one, you should have a never ending
supply. If you get an idea, simply write down the title of the
prospective article.
Many times, as the article develops, the original title may not
be appropriate. But, even if you do change the title for your
current article, keep the old one. Who knows - a year from now
it may light another spark.
A search of the web on quotes is a fertile place to look. "Power
Quotes" by Kevin Eikenberry - http://powerquotes.net - has a
wealth of information. Dr. Kevin Nunley - http://drnunley.com
is an idea factory. There are others like them that should be
on your required reading list.
When doing research for the current article you are writing, the
web is a fertile place to look. Always keep a paper and pencil
handy, and if you get an idea write it down. Keep that same pad
and pencil next to your bed. If you get an idea, don't trust
your memory to write it down in the morning.
Surprisingly, when I started this article it was going to be
about advertising, but after the first paragraph, I found
myself writing something far afield from this. Guess that
will have to wait for another time.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Bob publishes the free weekly "Your Business" Newsletter
Visit his Web Site at http://1-webwiz.com to subscribe.
As a bonus, get 40,000 FREE E-Books from Larry Dotson,
when you visit http://www.ldpublishing.com