Amanda Luedeke is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary. Every Thursday, she posts about growing your author platform. You can follow her on Twitter @amandaluedeke or join her Facebook group to stay current with her wheelings and dealings as an agent.

Using Facebook to promote yourself as an author seems like a no-brainer. After all, everyone’s doing it. You should too. Right? Well…

I think I speak for all of us when I say that I roll my eyes, groan loudly and hit “delete” when faced with “like” requests from pages like Kaufmann Realty or Investors’ Insurance or … and I’m not making this one up … the Cardinal Fitness Cardinal. It’s not that I don’t like those companies. It’s just that they haven’t answered the million dollar question…

What’s in it for me?

While Facebook is highly commercialized, it’s still a very personal experience. It’s a representation of who you are. And while you may not know every person on your friends list, you certainly want to give them the chance to know you. So, you dig around for only the best timeline cover photo. You painstakingly rearrange your activity so that only the most impressive things show up. You carefully select music, movies and hobbies that reflect who you are.

And as for “likes?” You only “like” things that reflect your personality. Your style.

UNLESS! Unless they offer something in return that is simply irresistible.

Cardy the Cardinal had nothing to offer.  No coupons for free spin cycle classes. No updates on “dead times” at the gym. I couldn’t even find updated information on local running events or gym hours. There was nothing in it for me. And since I had no connection with Cardy the Cardinal other than the fact that I was a member of his gym, I deleted the request.

This, my friends, is an example of the main pitfall of using Facebook

Brant wrote and asked a question that I figure goes through every writer’s mind at one point or another, so it’s probably worth giving it some thought. It’s not rocket science—but because it’s not rocket science, it can be easy to overlook. He asked, “I’m trying to decide if I should move from part time writer to full time writing — what advice would you have for someone who just needs to make major career decisions as a writer?” 

1. Go slow. The decisions I’ve raced into have a tendency to be the ones I’ve regretted. There is rarely a time a writer MUST make a decision today, rather than thinking about it and sleeping on it for a night. 

2. Listen. I’ve found my gut will tell me if I’m right. I hate to be so vague, but I always found that to be true—when it didn’t feel right, it probably wasn’t. So learn to stop and listen — to trusted friends, to people in the industry, to that voice in your head. 

3. If my gut fails me, my SPOUSE will tell me if I’m right. While I hate to admit this, my wife is probably right more often than I am. (But don’t tell her I said this.)

4. If I’m doing something solely for the money, I’m probably making a mistake. The worst situations I got into as a freelance writer were the ones where I didn’t want the job, or didn’t understand the job, but needed the money. (“A book detailing your…what? Your history? And your business decisions? And your thoughts on life? And include a rant against the US parrot-importation laws? Sure, I can do that.”) 

5. Everybody needs a calendar and a to-do list. Trust me—it makes saying “no” much easier if you can say, “I’m busy that day.” Even if all you’re busy with is taking your daughter to the school play.

StoneHouse University is offering a webinar on “maximizing your book and Kindle sales on Amazon,” and it’s led by Thom Kephart, the Amazon Community Outreach Manager.  A lot of authors are posting ebooks and looking to boost sales, so here’s a chance to get good info straight from the source. You’ll hear about Amazon’s publishing programs, their tools, and you’ll have opportunities to ask questions of one of their top people talking about Author Central, KDP Select, Amazon Advantage, Createspace, Look Inside the Book, and the other tools Amazon offers authors.

Just thought you’d like to know. The webinar is this Tuesday, April 24, from 10 to Noon, Mountain Time. And the cost is $79. To register go to: http://stonehouse.enterthemeeting.com/m/RC1S9JN9

Okay, after months of having people tell us that we need to update the blog, we’ve finally made the change to WordPress. All the old posts have transferred over (though not all the comments have yet), and we’re going to have a whole new look soon. Thanks for reading — Writers Digest again named us one of the top 101 writing sites on the web!

Okay, I’m back from my vacation (a bit of free wisdom: Given the chance, move to Kauai), and I realize I need to catch up on a BUNCH of questions from people. This one seemed appropriate — Denise wrote to say: “I used to work as a waitress. After my shift, I would go home, cozy up to my laptop, and write. Writing became a sanctuary, and I filled pages effortlessly. Now I work at a busy office job, so I spend the better part of my day staring at a computer screen and contracting carpal tunnel. I come home from looking at other people’s writing all day, and I don’t have any energy left to spend on my own writing. You’ve just had a vacation, so you know what it’s like to have free time to do what you want. What advice would you give a writer who seems to spend everything on other people’s projects?”

You know, I went through that same thing, Denise, and had to ask some writing buddies what to do. They gave me advice that I hated…but it worked. The suggestion? Get up early. Spend two hours on your OWN work before heading to the office to work on somebody ELSE’s stuff. That way you’re mentally charged when you do your own writing.

So I did. And trust me, it was hard. I’m not a morning person. But I got up early, before my kids were awake, and wrote for two hours every day. EVERY day. Then I’d leave for my office. I hated it, and wanted to take the first hour to make coffee, look at headlines, whine to friends in emails… but eventually I started writing. And with the combination of no interruptions and a clear mind, I finished my book in about four months. No kidding. Two hours of focused writing time to try and finish a thousand words per day.

Amanda Luedeke is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary. Every Thursday, she posts about growing your author platform. You can follow her on Twitter @amandaluedeke or join her Facebook group to stay current with her wheelings and dealings as an agent.

Amazon’s KDP Select program (part of their Kindle Direct Publishing platform) comes with a lot of strings. First, the author must agree not to have their book published elsewhere for a period of 90 days. Second, they must agree to have their book be part of the Lending Library Program. And third, they have to be ok with the fact that there’s no set structure for payment of titles lent out through the Lending Library. You basically just get a portion of the money pool based on how many books you lent in comparison to the total number of books lent (quite a mouthful).

In exchange for all of this, you get 5 days to offer your book for free on Amazon.

Is it worth it? Absolutely. But only if you’re smart about it.

Amazon is designed in such a way that the more an item sells, the more air time it gets. And the more air time it gets, the more it sells. This happens through their recommendation program (that list of Amazon Recommendations that appears at the bottom of a product page) and their “Customers who bought this also bought…” program. When your book hits these promotional venues, it can find fans who never knew you or it even existed. And if priced right, shoppers will throw your book in their cart, assuming that since they like Joe Schmoe, they’ll like you.

So what does this have to do with KDP Select? Everything. KDP Select is the quickest way to get your book air time. When it gets air time, it will start selling. And when it starts selling as few as 300 or 400 copies a

Amanda Luedeke is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary. Every Thursday, she posts about growing your author platform. You can follow her on Twitter @amandaluedeke or join her Facebook group to stay current with her wheelings and dealings as an agent.

Amazon’s KDP Select program (part of their Kindle Direct Publishing platform) comes with a lot of strings. First, the author must agree not to have their book published elsewhere for a period of 90 days. Second, they must agree to have their book be part of the Lending Library Program. And third, they have to be ok with the fact that there’s no set structure for payment of titles lent out through the Lending Library. You basically just get a portion of the money pool based on how many books you lent in comparison to the total number of books lent (quite a mouthful).

In exchange for all of this, you get 5 days to offer your book for free on Amazon.

Is it worth it? Absolutely. But only if you’re smart about it.

Amazon is designed in such a way that the more an item sells, the more air time it gets. And the more air time it gets, the more it sells. This happens through their recommendation program (that list of Amazon Recommendations that appears at the bottom of a product page) and their “Customers who bought this also bought…” program. When your book hits these promotional venues, it can find fans who never knew you or it even existed. And if priced right, shoppers will throw your book in their cart, assuming that since they like Joe Schmoe, they’ll like you.

So what does this have to do with KDP Select? Everything. KDP Select is the quickest way to get your book air time. When it gets air time, it will start selling. And when it starts selling as few as 300 or 400 copies a

While Chip is vacationing in Hawaii, look for posts from the rest of the MacGregor Literary staff. Not surprisingly, “Favorite Books” is the topic of choice for our crowd of book lovers. Don’t be afraid to chime in with your thoughts on these top picks.  

Erin Buterbaugh is our newest agent; her areas of interest include children’s, middle-grade, and YA fiction, as well as women’s fiction, suspense, and non-fiction.

Okay, first of all, I want everyone to appreciate the fact that I’m writing this blog entry at 12:49 a.m. the day it’s supposed to be posted, not because I put it off all week, but because that’s how crippling I found the task of picking my “favorite” book to blog on. Seriously. I’m one of those people who stand, helpless, for hours in the deodorant aisle, eyes glazed over, unable to cope with the four dozen choices before her, so you can imagine my complete apoplexy when attempting to pick out one favorite book from my overstuffed bookshelves. Suffice it to say, there was a lot of weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Since I have more to do in the next three months than to create a system by which I compare every book I’ve ever read and definitively pick the favorite, I decided instead to narrow it down to my favorite book within a category, which I realize is a total cop-out, but one that I’ll hopefully get away with because I’m the new kid and everyone’s still being really nice to me. In honor of last Friday being Friday the 13^th, I decided to go with my favorite ghost story. One of Poe’s, you ask? Nope. Well, then, perhaps Washington Irving’s THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW? Wrong again! My favorite ghost story comes from that well-known master of the supernatural thriller, Charles Dickens, and is entitled A CHRISTMAS CAROL.

(If you think I’m cheating