EIGHT members of the Macleay Island Inspirational Writing Group (MIIWG) are on track to creating an online presence for their books following a professional development workshop delivered by Redland author Marianne de Pierres.
Marianne is the award-winning author of the acclaimed Parrish Plessis, Sentients of Orion and Peacemaker science fiction series.
Group member Robbie Kirk said the seminar helped the emerging writers assess why they wanted to create an online presence for their work.
"It showed how we could do this from our desktops and successfully create an audience before our work became available in bookstores or online."
Robbie said.
"The writers who attended the seminar were keen to share their knowledge about author branding with other island writers and arts workers."
Robbie, whose book Keep it Simple Sailor - easy recipes for small boats without a fridge will soon be published as an ebook, said several other writers in the group were achieving success, including Desmond Kelly and Trish Cation, who have written novels that have been professionally edited though RADF grants and are ready for publication.
She said the seminar, held at Macleay Island Progress Hall, was self-funded by the attendees, with support from the Macleay Island Progress Association, which supplied the hall, projector and screen, and Guy Hickey from www.macleayisland.net.au , who helped with the setup.
ENDS, who uses social media to help promote her books
During the workshop, she used several online tools, including Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook and Wordpress to demonstrate finding markets for books and helped group members through the steps of identifying their own writer brand and developing a platform to support their books.
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