Category Archives: Publishing

The Blog-To-Book Deal at the Shebeen Club

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Canadian writer Darren Barefoot.

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We’re back!

UPDATE: this just in, the venue is the upstairs lounge of Revel Room, 238 Abbott Street just south of Gastown in Hipsterville! Chef is working up some special entrees just for us!

Finally, a real Shebeen Club meeting at last! After a several-months-long layoff, we’re restarting with a bang with the hot topic of the Blog to Book deal. Who doesn’t want to put their already-posted words to work for them? What publisher wouldn’t love an author with a pre-existing following and 400,000 words or so already out there, ready to be judged by an editor? How do you hook up one of these deals? What’s the market looking for: recipes? fiction? poetry? dirty stories about Julian Assange? Duh, all of the above and more.

Join us on Monday, February 21st at 7pm for a timely, lively presentation by Darren Barefoot, one of Canada’s pre-eminent social media personalities, and Trena White, Acquiring Editor of Non-fiction at our own Douglas & McIntyre. Bring your questions, and your URL!

As always, tickets are $20 in advance (available till Feb 16th) or $25 at the door and include dinner and a drink. We’ll announce the venue in a couple of days, once we’ve locked down the menu. The venue is the upstairs lounge at Revel Room, 238 Abbott Street just south of Gastown. Chef is making some special entrees just for us!

Darren is a writer, marketer and blogger. He’s a co-founder of Capulet, a web marketing agency, and a co-founder in Northern Voice, one of Canada’s largest blogging and social media conferences. He’s the co-author, along with Julie Szabo, of “Friends With Benefits: A Social Media Marketing Handbook”. In 2011, he’s only consuming Canadian products, media and services, and writing about the experience at OneYearOneCanadian.ca.

Trena White

Trena White

Trena White is a book editor. She joined Douglas & McIntyre, a Vancouver-based independent publisher, as Acquiring Editor of Non-Fiction in 2010. Before that, she spent six years in Toronto as Editor at McClelland & Stewart, where she worked with emerging and established non-fiction writers in a wide range of subject areas, including memoir, current affairs, politics and history. She has a Master of Publishing from Simon Fraser University.

7-7:30 meet & mingle

7:30-8 listen & learn

8-whenever pitch, link, Add, Friend, Follow and schmooze!

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CBC Celebrity Tip with Margaret Atwood

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Margaret Atwood protects her net with mountains of hardcovers

Margaret Atwood protects her net with mountains of hardcovers

Canadian National treasure and international powerhouse Margaret Atwood is a multi-talented woman. She’s an inventor, she’s a poet, she’s an award-winning novelist.

But first and foremost, she is a goalie.

“As the late Robertson Davies once told me, ‘Peggy, a good goalie anticipates play. A great goalie influences play.’…If a shooter can see net, he’ll deke, and you don’t deke Margaret.”

Selling Out: How Presales Can Make Your Book a Hit

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To whom it may someday concern, in a minor way

Dear Author Arbitrageur

Who: The Shebeen Club presents author, speaker, and sales trainer Shane Gibson

What: Selling Out: How Presales Can Make Your Book a Hit

When: 7-9pm Monday, October 25th (one week later than our usual date)

Where: A private dining room upstairs at Revel Room, 238 Abbott Street just off Gastown, near the Woodward’s Building

Why: Because Shane’s latest book sold out its entire first printing before it was officially available for sale. We want to know how, and so do you!

How (much): $20 early-bird tickets/$25 at the door includes dinner and a glass of wine or beer

I worked as Shane’s editorial assistant on his latest book, Guerrilla Social Media Marketing (co-authored with Jay Conrad Levinson, the Guerrilla Marketing Guru) and while I was typing it up, I kept thinking what a great book it was. This is by way of disclosure, not puffery. Seems thousands of others feel the same way: the book officially sold out its first printing on September 30th; it wasn’t actually in stores until October 3rd.

That is what you call a successful book launch.

Shane is here to tell us how he and Jay did that, and teach us techniques that we can use on our own book launches, whether we’re publishers, editors, or authors. I only know one tip: 85% of life is showing up, so show up on October 25th and prepare to learn powerful tools for marketing your book from an author who’s not afraid of success! At this point, it just might be scared of him!

Shane Gibson

Shane Gibson

Shane Gibson is an international speaker and author who has addressed over 100,000 people over the past sixteen years on stages in North America, Southern Africa and South America.

Shane’s books include Sociable! How Social Media is Turning Sales and Marketing Upside Down, Closing Bigger: the Field Guide to Closing Bigger Deals, and his new book published by Entrepreneur Press (McGraw Hill) called Guerrilla Social Media Marketing, co-authored with Jay Conrad Levinson.

Blogging since 2002, and podcasting since 2004 Shane drives the majority of his business from social media, and social networks. He has been published in numerous publications as an authority on the topics of leadership, marketing, social media, and sales performance. Some of these publications include CMA Magazine, the Financial Post, the Globe and Mail and Profit Magazine.

7-7:30 Meet & Mingle

7:30-8 Listen and Learn

8-9 Grinning maniacally while counting on your fingers and phoning your accountant

Going Pro at Rogue! Roundup

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Sylvia Taylor

Sylvia Taylor

Just a few (long overdue) notes from our last event, Going Pro featuring Sylvia Taylor.

  • We introduced our new online registration system, which worked well. Remember: preregister and save $5.
  • We moved from our old location of the Shebeen to the new one of the Everything Cafe, but at the last minute had to move from there again, because of a licensing issue. Rogue Wetbar stepped up and donated a private room (which normally costs $600) and made us a terrific custom menu. I had the halibut tacos, and they were fantastic.
  • We lost two people who’d preregistered, because they went to the Everything. I have issued them refunds.
  • We had one of our largest groups since the Social Media for Nonprofits night this past Spring, with 17 members showing up, including some new faces.
  • It was a very engaged and enthusiastic audience, thanks to Sylvia. Her presentation on professionalism and an entrepreneurial approach to a literary career was a big hit with the attendees, several of whom whipped out their business cards to see if they passed the Sylvia test!

So, if you missed it don’t fret too much: you can always reach Sylvia, thanks to her website and contact details. And god knows, we’re sure to have her back soon!

Harry Potter and the Homework of Vengeance!

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Harry Potter and the Chamber of Spammers

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Spammers

Oh, this is good. This is goooood. Or bad, but really GOOD bad, if you know what I mean, and you will, instantly, once I tell you that this is a true story involving the now-standard Nigerian Email Scam turned around by a very, very smart man who, instead of paying the scammers, played on their greed and got them to write out BY HAND (for, they thought, $100 a page) all of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, then stiffed them.

Awesome.