Press Kits are Hard Work, but worth it.

Phew! Just spent the entire day with my twin sis, Tasha, creating press kits. Up till now we've always generated information about our books and ourselves as needed for particular promotions, usually from the Wittegen Press website. However, looking round during the A to Z, and after prompting by author, Chris Votey, who we're working with for some up coming blog posts (keep an eye out on all three blogs for more info), we decided it was time we created some permanent information in downloadable format. Thus followed about four hours of collating data and spinning words.

We decided to use Google Docs (Google Drive) to host our Press Kit, because it makes it really easy to share with just a link, plus we can both edit the directory as needed in order to add new books as they are released. Compared to MS Word, a Google Doc has its limitations, but the press kit isn't supposed to be a wonder in formatting, so there was plenty of functionality to compile the information we needed. Plus we have the inbuilt added security of the kit being on Google Drive and therefore in multiple locations should something happen to one of our hard drives.

When it came to the contents of the press kit, we went with the kind of kits we'd seen from other authors, both via the A to Z and before: author bios, book blurbs and pictures to go with the information, plus, since we run our own publisher, we also have information on Wittegen Press and our logo up in the pack. We decided to duplicate all pictures, a small size inside the documents with the text to keep the docs small and larger higher quality versions downloadable individually for use on websites/blogs.

The book blurbs and pictures were just a matter of cut and paste from the website, so the most difficult bits by far were the author bios and the equivalent for Wittegen Press. I find it quite hard to sum myself up in a couple of short paragraphs, which is why working with Tasha helped, because we both had insights into each other that we used in the bios. As we developed the bios, we also considered how each line would come across standalone, to allow easy editing if shortening was required.

I expect I shall be tweaking my bio ad infinitum, but the important thing is I now have something that I am happy to share quickly and easily with any interested parties, an elevator speech about myself and my publisher that I think conveys something interesting and engaging about me as a writer and as a professional in the publishing industry.