Write His Answer

Guest Blogger
Karen Whiting

Before a book hits the shelves we need to plan ways to reach people with its message to generate excitement. That means marketing. One of the best ways to develop a plan is to see what others have done.

Take a little journey with me on ways I promoted Nature Girl: a guide to caring for God’s creation.

I needed a good pitch and to know my reason for writing the book and why it can make a difference in lives of girls. My life and Romans 1:20 sparked the idea. I grew up in dairy farm country in Connecticut and married a Coast Guard officer that meant living near waterways around the country, including Hawaii. That gave me a great passion for this land and God’s creation. The words of Romans 1:20 remind us that creation is a witness to the existence of God. Nature reveals his power and divine nature. So, if we care for the earth we help preserve that witness. That’s a powerful thought. So, I want girls to develop a passion for nature and for preserving the witness of God’s existence in fun ways.

My daughter (co-author) and I brainstormed ideas. We made a list and started working on them.

• We started with creating an acrostic of the words Nature Girl to reflect the fun and significant contents. Our publisher put it on a bookmark (http://tinyurl.com/nwo4s6y).

• We created a pitch for media: Nature and fun go together. When we work to preserve the earth we also preserve the witness of God (Romans 1:20). The book presents a balanced view to motivate girls to care about nature from a biblical perspective and get girls to hang outdoors instead of in malls. Activities help girls explore the earth through experiments, earth care projects, crafts, scriptures, quizzes, and other activities while exploring nature, energy, critters, and more.

• To connect to teens we wrote an article for Sisterhood magazine that was published the month of the book’s release.

• We partnered with American Heritage Girls on creating materials to coordinate with their environment badge. This included ten pages in their leader magazine with ideas on holding one-day seminars to earn the badge and explore nature.

• Speaking is important too, so I applied to speak at the American Heritage Girl leadership conference where I sold many copies.

• I started writing for Molly Green magazine and wrote some articles to promote the book plus created some blog posts for it.

This is only part of the list. We also did more than a dozen radio shows, a number of TV shows, and a blog tour. We are connecting with a TV station now to be regular guests on topics related to the book. The publisher helped too, including flying us to Texas to sign books at the Texas Library Association convention, helping us with media, and providing books to sign for retailers at events.

One review can be found at http://bit.ly/1lG4LGw and links to others are on my website.

One radio interview is at http://www.shepherdshillacademy.org/blogs/traceembry/tag/nature-girl.

So, start your own brainstorming with where to pitch article ideas and media appearances, bookmarks that engage the audience, speaking ideas, etc.

What to learn more — come  listen to Karen at the Lancaster Writer’s Super Saturday on April 11^th. Check http://lancasterchristianwriterstoday.blogspot.com/ for details.

Sign up for appointments with Karen at the May 13-16 Colorado and July 29 – August 1 Greater Philly Christian Writers Conference www.writehisanswer.com She’ll be doing a special marketing clinic at the Philly conference.