Coach Teresa, how do I continue promoting myself after an event or a book signing or a reading?

Here’s my answer:

You’ve spent weeks, maybe even months, publicizing your event.  You deliver the event (and I hope you had fun), then you, the audience, everyone involved in coordination . . .  you all go home or on to another event. Have you forgotten something? That something is “follow up” work.  Who did you talk to at the event?  What did you promise? Below is an example – how to follow up. Angela Pang and her coworkers at AsianWeek work extremely hard each year orchestrating the Asian Heritage Street Celebration.  This is my Email to her; I cc’ed my booth partners Margie Yee Webb and Patricia Tsang, M.D.

May 22, 2011

Dear Angela,

If you need quotes from us for post-event newsletter . . . here goes;  also, 3 photos attached.

Who were the authors at this year’s AHSC? Margie Yee Webb (Cat Mulan’s Mindful Musings: Insight and Inspiration for a Wonderful Life), Teresa LeYung Ryan (Love Made of Heart; Build Your Writer’s Platform & Fanbase In 22 Days), and Patricia Tsang, M.D. (Optimal Healing: A Guide to Traditional Chinese Medicine).  Margie Yee Webb says: “California Writers Club is proud to once again be part of the Asian Heritage Street Celebration to encourage everyone to write their stories.  We are also pleased to support schools through donations to the School Raffle Program.” Teresa LeYung Ryan says: “I thank Margie and Asian-Week Foundation for re-connecting me to the Asian-American community. My third year at AHSC, I had so much fun with my friends.”  Patricia Tsang, M.D. says: “A street fair with food, culture, art, literature, martial arts, health science, and more. What can be more enticing to an Asian?  The celebration gave me a chance to reconnect with my roots as well as share information about my book.”

Angela, thanks again for making our experience enjoyable!   Margie & Pat, I’ll email you more photos later 

Sincerely,

Coach Teresa LeYung Ryan  on facebook!

Check out Teresa’s YouTube videos http://www.youtube.com/teresaleyung

http://writingcoachteresa.com

You notice how I embedded our URLs in our names? (so that if Angela or AsianWeek e-newsletter readers want to read more about us and California Writers Club. . . they’d be taken to our websites).  By the way, my two booth partners and I are also members of Women’s National Book Association -San Francisco Chapter.

Coach Teresa here has a lot of follow-up emails to send and photos to resize and rename. To see a partial list of people I met at the Asian Heritage Street Celebration, please go to my May 22, 2011 post . Thanks.

Have fun building your writer’s platform!

Coach Teresa LeYung-Ryan (click on my name to get to my YouTube videos)

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Coach Teresa, what happened at Asian Heritage Street Celebration?

Everyday is an adventure for us writers.  The AHSC street fair (on Larkin Street between Grove St. and Ellis St.) was yesterday May 21, 2011, 11:00am-6:00pm

Margie Yee Webb and I rendezvoused a bit after 8:00am at our booth to set up; we were assigned booth F-18 (the 300 block of Larkin St., just yards away from the Asian Art Museum).

Margie is a pro at staging–she brought strings of colorful paper lanterns, red table clothes, a pot of silk irises, California Writers Club literature, and her vibrant display of her gift book Cat Mulan’s Mindful Musings: Insight and Inspiration for a Wonderful Life.

I brought the blow-ups of our book covers; Margie had clips.

AHSC volunteers were friendly and helpful. Special thanks to Angela Pang of AsianWeek Foundation.

Patricia Tsang, M.D. was the third member of our booth.  Dr. Tsang’s book is Optimal Healing: A Guide to Traditional Chinese Medicine

The public couldn’t wait until 11:00am; they started browsing around 10:00am.

Here’s a partial list of delightful people I talked to:

Harvey of Eastwind Books of Berkeley told me he carries my novel Love Made of Heart and asked me to deliver a presentation at his store. I’d love to do that, and, also present my workbook Build Your Writer’s Platform & Fanbase In 22 Days.

Beverly Lee wants to invite me, Margie and Patricia to her authors series at On Lok Senior Center.

Gemma Nemenzo invited us to exhibit our books at the Filipino American International Book Festival this year.

Mary Moreno gifted me a copy of Tao I: The Way of All Life (Soul Power series) by Dr. & Master Zhi Gang Sha.

Margie Yee Webb’s sister Pearl introduced me to Jeff Adachi, director of the  film You Don’t Know Jack: the Jack Soo Story.

Lucian Dang, ESL teacher, invited me to be a guest speaker on his online class.

Margie’s sisters Pearl, Linda, Anna, Betty, and her nieces and nephews came to cheer for us. Patricia’s former patients were delighted to see retired Dr. Tsang at the street fair.

Dear friend Jonathan came by with his bicycle and baked goods!

Mona!  What a surprise.  Inge Horton, fellow member of  Women’s National Book Association, showed up — what a treat!

Fred Glynn came by to show me his book Authors of the Bible .   Fred said he was on the Internet looking for information on Claudia Boutote of Harper One . . .  because I had “tagged” Claudia in my May 6, 2011 blog post, Fred found me through my blog !   My clients (if you’re reading this), are you smiling?  Don’t I always encourage you to spend time “tagging” on cyberspace?  Help your fans find you.

Elliotte Mao !!!  Elliotte trekked all the way from the mid-Peninsula.  CWC-SF Peninsula branch guest speaker was Scott James (aka Kemble Scott) and I would have been at that meeting if the street fair was another day.

More magic.  James Scott (not Scott James) and his partner Richard came by our booth.  James Scott illustrates architecture.  He demonstrated this talent for Margie, Patricia and me to see.

Writing Career Coach Teresa encourages illustrator James Scott to pursue grants

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Renel!  The KISS 98.1 booth was directly across from our booth.  Here I am — a Renel fan.

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Did Coach Teresa have fun?   Yes!  Being with colleagues, seeing friends, meeting folks who like to read and share the joy of reading, celebrating Asian American heritage, eating a Thai lunch, seeing the red dragon . . .

Writing Career Coach Teresa says: "Reach out not stress out"

“Building your writer’s platform ought to be fun!”

I’m cheering for you!

Sincerely,

Coach Teresa

Click on book cover to go to Amazon

Kim Randolph helps her clients promote their E-waste businesses so Coach Teresa dubs Kim "E-waste Liaison"

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It’s going to be so much fun!   Saturday May 21, 2011, 11:00am – 6:00pm

Look for me (author and writing career coach Teresa LeYung Ryan) and my colleagues on Larkin Street, Booth F-18 (on the 300 block of Larkin St., between McAllister St. & Golden Gate Ave. ), the block north of Asian Art Museum, same side of the street.

Margie Yee Webb has orchestrated our California Writers Club booth.  I went to Copy Edge (the folks are nice there) on University Ave. in Berkeley to get blow-ups of our book covers.  Dr. Patricia Tsang will join us this year.  Lloyd Lofthouse might be there again this year. Look for Booth F-18 with our beautiful book covers and the California Writers Club “sail on” logo.   See you at Booth F-18 !

I wish I could bring the street fair to my friend Diane . . .

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Build Your Writer's Platform & Fanbase In 22 Days: Attract Agents, Editors, Publishers, Readers, and Media Attention NOW

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Love Made of Heart - get this book for your mom or sister

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California Writers Club - supportive colleagues

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Cat Mulan's Mindful Musings: Insight and Inspiration for a Wonderful Life

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Optimal Healing: A Guide to Traditional Chinese Medicine

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A recipe for a fun book launch:

• 1. Consider your guests – audience – readers
• 2. Choose location location location
• 3. Pick a meaningful date

Cat Mulan’s Mindful Musings: Insight and Inspiration for a Wonderful Life

1. For Margie’s delightful gift book–cat lovers, pet lovers, friends of cat lovers, animal advocates.

2. The Market Place in Rancho Cordova, CA – lovely showroom setting in a home and garden improvement mall.  They provide cashiers. Plenty of parking.

3.  People for Animal Welfare in El Dorado County (PAWED), Animal Rescue League, FieldHaven Feline Rescue, and Sacramento SPCA were able to send representatives and bring felines to Margie’s book launch on March 12, 2011.

I met Shaun who was taking plenty of photos of author Margie Yee Webb, her festive exhibit, and the representatives and cats from above referenced organizations.

I met authors Kevin “James” Richardson and Don Ricardo.

I chatted with author Hazuki Kataoka of http://storycardtheater.com We had met when I presented “Build Your Name, Beat the Game” at the 2010 Northern California Publishers and Authors Conference (Margie had connected me with NCPA).

It was pure joy to see Margie interact with her old fans and new fans; it was delightful to see Margie’s mom, siblings, nieces and nephews.

Margie had created over half a dozen cat-theme gift baskets–raffle ticket donations support the animal organizations.

Lakshmi Kerner (LakshmiLove), thank you again and again for driving and cheering and staying to meet Kimberly A. Edwards (Lakshmi and Kimberly both write memoirs).

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Margie, I am so very happy for you and Cat Mulan.  Kimberly had the purrfect description of your event–Margie’s book launch is a model for authors.

Look what Angela Pang of AsianWeek wrote about Margie and Cat Mulan:

http://www.asianweek.com/2011/03/10/chinese-american-releases-new-inspirational-cat-book/

Margie Yee Webb promotes pet awareness and encourages people to make a difference in the lives of cats and other companion animals. A portion of every sale of Cat Mulan’s Mindful Musings will be donated to animal welfare organizations and shelters.

Cat Mulan and Margie encourage you to support your local animal welfare organizations and shelters.

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