Event! Three Wishes hosted by Kirstin Pulioff

Introduce your characters in the "Three Wishes" event hosted by Kirstin Pulioff at The Literary Closet. Answer the following question from the perspective of your main character, and Kirstin will highlight your answer and either your webpage or buy link.

The Question: If you found a magic genie lamp, what would be your three choices?

To participate, mail your answer and link to Kirstin.

The event will take place on 7/22.

Event! Art Fiction Gala hosted by Lucie Smoker! Sign up!

Submit using the contact form at http://luciesmoker.wordpress.com/contact/

1) Send 50 words or less about how your published* work of fiction promotes the visual arts--through featuring an artist, painting, sculpture, performance art, etc. It must involve the visual arts--the crossover between literary and visual arts is the focus of the event. Music is not the focus unless it also involves ballet or some other form of dance as a primary inspiration for the fiction)

2) Send a pdf or any e-book link with a free, substantial sample of your work, minimum 3 pages.  You may also include a buy link.  Note that this is family art event so while some nudity/violence is acceptable, it must be such that would be appropriate for an R-rated film.  No hard-core or erotica, please.

3) Send a link to a photo of you, your book, the art that inspired it--or all three-"dressed up" as for a gala.  Again, these photos should be family-appropriate, less nudity accepted here and only if key to the art theme in your book.

* The purpose of this event is to promote fiction that highlights the visual arts.  As such, the work must be published, self or traditional, and available to the public.  If a book is to be published in the next three months, you may include a public pdf link which readers can access free or with a substantial sample (minimum 3 pages).

ARTISTS: As a side-event, I will host a gallery of art featuring reading. This is for serious artists who were in some way inspired by literature.
 Submit a brief description and photo link to the address above. Links only, no attachments.  I will be featuring small to mid-sized imges on my site, but will link to your larger image.  Again keep in mind that this is a family-friendly blog, so while some nudity and violence is acceptable, as is featured there currently, I reserve the right to decline works I consider inappropriate for my blog.

BBF All-in-One Announcement!

Okay! Lot's going on in the upcoming BBF, means we have a lot to announce! First, I'd like to thank my fellow organizers for agreeing to help me out. They are Fel Wetzig, Julie Flanders and Pereza Thompson. Each one will be playing a very important role in the upcoming BBF!

Next, I'd like to announce the dates and theme of the next BBF. The dates are July 22nd through July 26th, so mark your calendars! The theme will be Book your Trip! We'll be using the line, "Check-in to the Blogger Book Fair Resort, and BOOK your trip to Far Away Places!"

You can "Grab" this button on the right side panel>>>

Since the BBF is getting so big, we've developed a Code of Conduct which must be read before signing up for the BBF.

Our next announcement is that sign ups are now open, so you can head over to the sign up page after reading the Code of Conduct, and fill out the forms. There are a few different forms over there. Here is an explanation of the different forms:

The Author Sign Up Form: Deadline is June 15th
One of the major changes we made is that you MUST have a blog to participate. We feel that it is the most fair way to make sure everyone gets exposure. If you don't have a blog, I highly recommend getting one. The BBF is the perfect event to get followers to a new or old blog.

We are also manually assigning people to their hosts/guests. On the sign up form, you will be asked how many spots you would like to open up to other authors on your blog, this will reflect the number of times you are hosted as well. Keep in mind how much work you can take on. You will be able to request to work with certain authors and we will try to meet those requests, but we CAN'T GUARANTEE anything.

The Book Blogger Sign Up Form: Deadline is June 15th
This form is for book bloggers who want to participate by hosting authors. You'll be asked some questions and your blog will be a bonus to any author you take on. You will also be asked if you'd like to review books specifically for the BBF.

The Event Sign Up Form: Deadline is July 8th
This form is if you want to host an event on your blog. Events can be contests, mini-features, mini-interviews, or anything you can think of. The event must be open to all participants, but it can be genre specific.

The Free and $.99 Book Sign Up Forms: Deadline is July 15th
Your free or $.99 book must be free or $.99 during the entire fair if you fill out this form. It is not required that you do this. These forms are simply to help us get the word out for you. If your book will only be free during part of the fair, you may fill out the giveaway form.

The Giveaway Sign Up Form: Deadline is July 15th
The giveaway form is also on the sign up page. Giveaways are no longer required. They are encouraged, since it will drive traffic to your blog, but again, not required.

Our last order of business is the BBF Donation Fund. To help get the word out about BBF, we would like to place ads on Facebook, Goodreads and other places, but to do, so we need a little help. We'd also like to have some BBF sponsored giveaways, so money donated would also go toward prizes. NO MONEY WILL BE KEPT BY ANY ORGANIZER OR PARTICIPANT.

We also have a page dedicated to people who donate. you can get a book spine in your name and your actual book spine placed on the supporters page, along with this lovely button for your blog!

Code of Conduct

Blogger Book Fair Code of Conduct

Blogger Book Fair is a fun event, but it should also be taken seriously. There are many participating authors who make their money from the books they sell. To them, this is their business. It is essential, that even if you are a “hobby” writer, that you are professional when dealing with the other authors. Listed below is the code of conduct that every BBF author and blogger must agree to before being allowed to participate.

Blogger Book Fair is hard work, and although things are getting simplified every time it is held, it still involves work. If you don’t want to do a lot of work, then please do not sign up. This fair is for professionals only. Treat it as you would a real book fair or national conference with very important clients attending.

When writing and answering emails, please conduct yourself professionally. This means acting like the person you are emailing is an important business contact—because essentially, that’s what they are. If you build a more casual relationship with them, during the fair, that's fine, but don't assume that everyone wants to start out your first contact with a casual email. You must treat the other participants with respect.

You are matched with other authors according to the genres you write in and the type of content you are willing to provide and host. These authors deserve your full attention. Do not take on more than you are comfortable with. When you sign up, tell me how many spots you will have open on your blog during the fair, this will also be the number of times you are hosted on other blogs.

When providing content to a host, please be clear and precise. Follow any and all directions on interviews or post templates provided by your host. If you do not provide your host with the correct information, do not expect to be hosted. Read through their emails and documents they send you.

When hosting authors, please tell them exactly what they need to provide. If they fail to provide the information, send one reminder to them that tells them what they missed or clarifying your instructions. If they do not respond, or respond poorly, please report the situation to head organizer, Kayla Curry.

Please be respectful of deadlines. If you have missed the current fair, please sign up to be notified of the next one by sending an email to bloggerbookfair@gmail.com. All sign up form deadlines are important, so be sure to mark them on your calendar.

Blogger Book Fair will only contact your email for Blogger Book Fair business.

This list is subject to change, and the organizers will update as they see fit.

BBF Team! Open positions for volunteers!

As you all know, the BBF is growing and keeping up with it means I need help. That's right. I'm not afraid to ask for help when I need it. Below are two positions I have open for the BBF team. Email bloggerbookfair@gmail.com if you are interested in one of these positions. You must have enough time on your hands to donate to the event and you must be good with computers and preferably know about Google Drive, Blogger and the social media platforms I've listed in the first position.
 

Free, $.99 and Giveaway Management AKA Promo Management: You would be known as the Promotion Manager. I have already set up Google sign up forms for people to enter their free, $.99 and giveaway info. Your tasks would include managing the sign up forms (I will share them with you on Google Drive), using the information to update the corresponding pages on the BBF site, and using the social media platforms (Facebook page, Google+, Goodreads and coming soon: twitter) to promote these deals during the fair.

 

 

General Organization: You would be known as the BBF Assistant Organizer. I can not forsee all tasks that I may need help with and therefore, your tasks would be helping out when possible with participant organization, promotion, ad management and more. Nothing too crazy, just smaller tasks that I can delegate or larger tasks that I will need help with.

There is one more position: Event Management. This position has been filled and an announcement will follow after the other two positions are filled.

I wish I could afford to pay you if you decide to take on one of these positions, but I can't. So instead you will be included on the "About Us" page with links to you and your sites. There will also be space allowed on the side panel for a button leading to your blog.

BBF Reader's Choice Awards!

At the February Blogger Book Fair Sheri at the Shut Up and Read blog hosted the BBF Reader's Choice Awards. She was also our host at the first BBF Reader's Choice Awards.

You can see all the winners on the Reader's Choice Awards Page and simply click on the images to check them out on Amazon!

There were some awesome books and lots of very close races. If you are looking for a new read a great one is bound to be on this list and there are tons of genres to choose from.

Survey results and decision time for me!

Alright participants! As you know I put up a survey to be taken by those of you who participated in the BBF last month. I've gotten some interesting results and I'm going to share them with you and explain how they influenced my decisions.

First, let's get a little info about who took the survey. (Not specifically of course, just an overview) For the BBF the participants were about 1/3 second timers and 2/3 first timers. That's not a surprise since this BBF was much bigger than the first and it's only the second one. Let's see the ratio of people who took the survey:

Pretty darn close to 1/3 first time and 2/3 second time, so I'm pretty happy with this.

Let's move on to question #2 Would you like to participate in the next BBF?

Most of you said yes, other said maybe, so I'm pretty happy with the fact that no one said "no." Let's look at why there were "maybe" answers in there. For the most part, the ones who said "maybe to this question, said "no" to the next one. Did you see any positive results from the fair?

Now, a few people said "no" and does not make me happy. I will say that BBF is not a guarantee that you will sell books. It is merely a means to get your name and the title of your book out there. The road to sales is paved with the possibility of discovery. How will you get discovered by your potential readers? That is the goal here. There is no proven method of selling books. That being said, I still want to work to get this number up. I want everyone saying "yes" to this question next time around. I'm working to streamline things a bit and we'll talk more on that soon.

The next question is: How did you feel about the 4 day length of the BBF? Here are the results:

Only one person said it was too long. I have a feeling that it may be due to the complexity and the email chaos that made this person feel this way. It could also be that not everyone wants to blog everyday, but I do not require that you blog everyday of the BBF. I only require two posts from you for the duration of the fair. If you'd like to do more, you can. That is up to you. Six of you said it was too short and twelve said it was just right. This has lead me to extend the BBF to five days instead of four. As for the days of the week it will be on . . . well, look at these results:

At first glance it looks like the results are all over the place. No one is agreeing. That's somewhat true. four of you said you were apathetic about the days of the week, so I'm going to assume you're down for anything. Those of you who said "other" had explanations that ranged from starting it on Wednesday to starting it on a Friday. Since it seems so divided, I made an executive decision after doing some research. My research pointed out that the most click-throughs (clicks on links posted to twitter) happen Monday through Friday. Therefore, in the interest of getting the most click-throughs, the BBF will be Monday through Friday.

On to the next controversial subject. How do you feel about being paired with authors by the organizer according to genre? Here are the results:

I was pretty astounded that 73% of you were willing to let me pair you up manually. I honestly though the results would be more of a 50/50 split. I'm still a little uncomfortable with the 21% who said they would not want to be automatically paired up. This is where I have to make a hard decision. 

For the next BBF I will be assigning partners based on genre and other factors. During sign ups, you will be asked how many spots you will open up to individual promotion on your blog during the BBF. That number will also represent the number of times you will be featured on a blog in an individual post. (There will be more opportunities to be featured through book bloggers and events open to all participants) There will be a spot on the sign up form where you can REQUEST to work with certain authors. I will try my best to meet all requests, but there may be times that I can't fulfill all of them. This is a trial and if it goes well, I'll be assigning partners for all future BBF's and if it doesn't, I'll have to come up with something else.

What I'm trying to do is cut down on the crazy email so that we can focus on creating interesting and remarkable content for the BBF. Please give this system a chance and you might be pleasantly surprised.