SIMON SAYS – Author Visits, Presentations and Workshops by Children’s Writers – Promotion

If you plan on doing school and library vists, you do, of course, have to let people know that. A website is a must these days and without one, you might as well not exist professionally. The section of your website by which you intend to to secure school visits needs to be enticing and filled with details if you are hoping to get teachers and librarians interested enough to contact you. Details of my school visits are HERE and I also have pages including comments on my appeances at schools from children and teachers, as mentioned last week.

My website has a LIST of all the schools I have ever visted, as well as some libraries, festivals and young writer’s conferences, since many of these also have websites, where a visit that took place several years ago will be archived, which all increases your visibility on the web.

I have information on the books on my website, including the background and influences behind the stories. This can be a good selling point when you are trying get the teachers interested in a visit. The Emerald Curse, for example, is all about the comic book genre and teachers are often very fond of this topic, considered a good way to reach reluctant boy readers. I also have pages devoted to the historical background of The Sorcerer’s Letterbox and The Heretic’s Tomb, since the medieval period is also often of interest to teachers. The Doomsday Mask background page deals with the end of the Second World War, the city of Atlantis, ancient mysteries, crystal skulls and so on. The more interesting you can make your material, the better your chances of attracting someone’s attention. My website has study guides to all my books, as well as puzzles about each novel and an online scavenger search.

I do post articles about my school vists on my own blog periodically to draw people to my website and also regularly post on Facebook, Twitter and other places online about my school and library programs. I also have flyers about all my services, as well as business cards, on my table at any book signing events I do in the run up to Christmas. You never know who might be listening.