On and Off Days

It's HUMP DAY! We're almost into the weekend so everyone hang in there (even though we all know that if you're a self-published author the online marketing never ceases no matter what day of the week). Today I'd like to talk about ON and OFF days when it comes to marketing your book online. So you've got your social media sites up and running and you have a decent amount of people looking at your blog and following your tweets. You've got a few people reviewing your book but you need more, so you tweet out to book lovers, offering free books in exchange for a review. Just yesterday this tactic seemed to be the master key you've been looking for! However, today it seems as if all the locks have changed. What am I doing wrong? You may ask yourself. Is it the way I'm wording it? Is it the time of the day? What changed? Sometimes you may just have to realize that there will be good days and there will most definitely be bad days in this hectic world of online marketing. Don't be discouraged! The best thing to do in this situation is keep at it the way you were doing before - send out a mass amount of tweets and in due time the people will get back to you! It's not the end of the world. Keep pushing!

Maybe the Best Way to Sell is to...Not Sell?

Good afternoon (or whichever time of the day it is for you :) everyone! How are you today? I've been spending my days off completely immersed in the social media world pushing my book as if my life depended on it. We all know how tiring online marketing can be whether you're doing it for your book or a business in general but I think I might have reached a breakthrough - don't sell. WHAT?! You might ask, as I asked myself as well. However, you have to think about it. Imagine that you're a tourist in Times Square in New York City and you see all of these flashing lights advertising items and services of various sorts and you also have people on the street in your face trying to get you to purchase something. Everything's moving so fast and you can barely catch up. That's kind of how it is on social media, EVERYONE is trying to get something out there! So how about a new approach? Make friends, talk to people, and slowly ease them into what you do. Lead them to your blog or your twitter and most importantly build a following. In this day and age, having a following is so much more important than the product you're pushing, that is a guaranteed fact. Yes, you may have created a masterpiece but in all honesty no one is really interested in what you've created unless they're truly interested in you. With that being said, head off into the rest of the week with these words marinating in your mind. Happy Tuesday!

#MinuteMondays - An Excerpt from Ch. 6 of 'The Improbable'

Hey everybody, I hope you enjoyed your weekend! As I continue to grow my presence online, I'm learning new ways to engage with readers from all over. With that being said, I want to start something called #MinuteMondays. This will be where I share excerpts from books that I've read and from my own book, just to to enjoy or discuss. I hope you like it! :)

In this scene, David is with his best friends Timmy and Chris at Chicago's Prestigious City Club for a drink. He sees Eva-Marie outside and wants to apologize for his unpleasant behavior but things don't go exactly as planned....

“What do you have to do?” Chris asked.

“Trying to take down Chicago’s Trioxytin producer,” I shrugged. “I’ll be undercover so from now on I’m not David O’Neil…I’m David Finley. And I’m not a cop and my father isn’t the chief.” It was imperative that I let them know in case anyone asked them about me.

“So what do you do…?” Chris eyed me.

“Can we tell whoever asks that you’re a male prostitute?” Timmy asked, looking at me expectantly.

It went silent as Chris and I stared him down with questioning looks followed by our laughter. It was a great feeling taking a break away from the seriousness of the station. “Just say I’m a law student,” I shrugged.

“David Finley, attorney at law!” Chris said in a voice that made me sound like a superhero.

“He said law student you goof,” Timmy shook his head.

“It’s the same thing you idiot.” Chris argued.

“Do you not hear yourself?” Timmy looked at Chris and rolled his eyes.

While they bickered back and forth, a couple eating on the porch outside caught my eye. How long had they been out there? The female was partially facing me; I could only see her lower profile with her sun hat covering the rest. At least seven shopping bags surrounded her feet and a black man who I had recognized from the party sat across from her – Ray. Instantly, I knew it was Eva-Marie. I wanted to see her; I actually felt…bad for being so rude to her.

After she had blown up on me in the elevator, I was mad at myself for being such a big prick to gorgeous woman. She had looked stressed as it was and it was clear that I had only made it worse that day. Everything she had said to me made sense, she’d set me straight like no one ever had. It was…a bit of a turn on. Something inside of me that I couldn’t quite put my finger on just desperately wanted apologize to her. I had no plan of action and I didn’t even think she’d listen to me after the way I acted towards her.

Without thinking about it for too much longer, I rose from my seat and made my way outside. My palms broke out in a cold sweat and I had no clue what I was going to say. Not even a hint at what I was going to say. It felt like my throat had gone dry but at that point it was do or die since I was already standing at their table, behind Ray.

“Eva?” I wasn’t sure if I had meant to say her name as a question or statement. I wanted to go back inside. What was I doing? Usually I had no soft spot for anyone in my heart.

She slowly set down her iced tea. The brim of her sun hat covered one eye but her dark eye was still as intense as if both were uncovered. My God, those eyes! Her brown skin looked radiant against the navy blue and floral print of her thin, short-sleeved dress. Not a curl was out of place and her lips were colored perfectly red once again. She was every bit as stunning as I remembered.

“Yes, that’s me.” She said. Eva lifted her head and her dark eyes focused on me. She raised her eyebrows, probably wondering what I could possibly have to say to her.

The man she was with rose from his seat and turned to see me. “That’s Eva-Marie to you, do you know her?”

“I’m David. David Finley.” I answered and offered him my hand to shake.

Ray shook my hand while he stared at me with squinted eyes. I didn’t like him already with the way he was staring. “Do you know her, Mr. Finley?”

“I do, actually. We met–” I began but Eva cut me off.

“Ray, honey, this is the man that saved me from drowning the night of the party.” She stood. “Now I never got to thank you Mr. Finley,” Eva-Marie took a step closer to me with her arms crossed across her chest, staring at the ground. “As we’ve discussed before.” Her eyes bore into mine and by that I knew she was referring to the elevator incident. “And judging by your attitude in the previous times we’ve ran into each other, I don’t see why I should.” She looked at me expectantly with Ray behind her appearing as if he was ready to jump between us at any moment.

I was in a tough place because I had come to apologize and Eva-Marie didn’t seem like she was willing to accept anything I had to say. Well if she didn’t want it she was going to get it and that was going to be the end of it. I didn’t need her annoying attitude. “Well if you must know that’s why I came out here. Not for a ‘thank you’ but I, myself, wanted to apologize to you. In the incidents that occurred between us, I was out of line. I had no right to yell at you in such a way and for that, I’m sorry. But it seems like you’re not willing to let it go so I’ll just leave it at that then.” I heard her gasp as I turned to walk away. I tried to do something nice and she didn’t want to accept it, I knew I never should’ve walked out there in the first place!

“Hey!” Ray called. He caught up to me and placed a hand on my shoulder.

I turned around immediately and swiped it away forcefully. “You get your goddamn hands off of me.” My anger began to boil.

“What in God’s name possessed you to come out here and speak to my woman like that?” He demanded.

“Maybe if you could control your bitch and her attitude I wouldn’t be talking crazy to her!” I hissed, getting in his face. Eva-Marie’s attitude had lit the fuse and he was going to make me explode. At that point, I was ready to take him out.

“Okay fellas, okay, c’mon break it up!” Timmy’s voice came from behind me and Chris appeared in front of me, pushing me back away from Ray.

Ray chuckled haughtily. “You keep that dog on a leash.”

“Whatever he says doesn’t matter, man.” Chris said trying to get me to make eye contact with him.

“As long as you keep yours on one,” I spat and reluctantly followed Chris and Timmy back inside.

On Twitter and It's FREEBIE FRIDAY!

Hey everyone, happy Friday! What do you have planned for this weekend? I'll be working as usual. Sigh. I'm also going to through myself into marketing in all of my free time this weekend so pray I don't hurt myself trying to do this (haha). Also, I'm now on Twitter (@_tiarajames) so feel free to follow for any updates :) ATTENTION TO THE MONEY SAVERS: Today (Jul 24) and tomorrow I will be giving away my book, The Improbable for FREE! So tell everyone and head on over to Amazon to download it - you can also click on the 'books' tab here on the blog and it will direct you to the download link!

For Readers AND Writers!

It's been a while...once again! Lol. Well between working every day of the week and stressing over only to get accepted into my dream school in New York City (The Fashion Institute of Technology!), I found some time to escape to Georgia with my two closest friends and forgot to post this video. I would really like to get this going so by the time I'm in school I've racked up a good amount of followers! Spread with your fellow readers and writers!

Author Request - Itsy Bitsy Book Bits

Hello everyone and happy Monday! Yet again it's been a long time since I've posted anything. However, now that I have a full week off of work due to a vacation that never happened... I have time to get to work on marketing and blogging! It took a lot to get myself in the mood to want to get on the computer and puts hours into this but then I just had to keep thinking - 'The book is not going to put itself out there'. So after I logged onto Facebook, I saw that I received a message from Itsy Bitsy Book Bits asking to fill out a form to let them know whether I wanted to participate in an author interview, a giveaway, and plenty of other activities to just kind of get my name out there as an author as well as my book. I wanted to share this with everyone just in case you are an author or know an author trying to get themselves started in the industry! Also, Itsy Bitsy Book Bits was one of the first Facebook pages to promote my book. So spread the word! Here's the link to the form for you to fill out!

http://goo.gl/forms/7Ro8qbwh1Y