Name your favourite book of 2014

At the last RNA meeting in Holborn last Saturday we were asked to bring our fave book of last year. Here are mine:

1. How to write and sell short stories by Della Galton. I got this as a Xmas present in 2013. I started reading it but then got other non-fiction stuff to read. Then I went to a Women's Weekly Fiction Workshop last October where Della was the main speaker and I was inspired. I read the rest of the book, and it made me decide, that yes, I do want to become a womag fiction writer.

2. Having read the above, I wanted more knowledge about writing for womag's. So I bought and read How to write short stories and How to write ghost stories by Kath McGurl. I now want to write ghost stories too for womag's.

3. As an indie author who wanted to be more business-like this year, I read 'Write Livelihood - How to create a business plan for authors ' by Ryan Petty. This is the book that I have been working the last few posts on about creating your plan.

4. I also read the first ebook in the 3-for-1 set 'Indie Author Power Pack' which is called 'Write. Publish. Repeat' by Johnny B Truant, Dave... and I can't remember the name of the third author. Buy it, cos it includes the second version of 'Let's Get Digital' by David Gaughran, and the second version of 'How to market your book' by Joanna Penn. All a v good.

5. Business books for authors by Joanna Penn. Straight forward talking for authors.

So, what have you read last year and what was your favourite book/ebook? Let me know.

Why you should craft your emails to your lists

This blog post I originally put on my marketing blog at http://elitemarketingpro.net/julieaday. I thought it was such a good post, especially when David Gaughran has recently posted about getting killer email lists. So here it is.

Up until now I have been writing my emails to my lists as I go along, but the last few I have sent I have written beforehand and crafted until I am happy with them. Why have I done this? Well, it is from advice that I was given by Rebecca Woodhead. In one of her coaching sessions with me, she told me that her first emails she did to her lists were crafted and she got more clients for that list than any others. So, that is what I am doing. I think if it looks like you have taken more care about what you are saying, informing and advising your leads, then they are more likely to read them and take notice of you. My emails to my new list, ‘hopewithjulie’ are all crafted before I typed them up, so hopefully when I get people on that list they will take more notice of what I have to say.

If you want to know what I have to say about being a newbie in a business or even how to become an Amazon bestseller, then why not become one of my leads. You can do this by joining Elite Marketing Pro at http://julieaday.elitemarketingpro.com/letter-new.php or my 'hopewithjulie' list by emailing me at awlist3493948@aweber.com