Book of Poems Finds Common Thread

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Book of Poems Finds Common Thread

by tom hannah
(cincinnati ohio usa)

The Endless String

Self published, Outskirts Press

I began writing poems over 20 years ago. My wife and i were always big fans of Shel Silverstein. The poems for children and adults was a labor of love for me as we raised our 4 children. The poems were put under the couch and taken out many times.

My wife Tess stayed home with our 4 children for 17 years and went back to teaching as we were faced with college expenses. Tess has a great gift for drawing so i asked her through the years to do a a few things for certain poems.I new that the only way to make our book live was to have some clever drawings. We have now put 3 children through college and now the last one is a freshman at U.C here in Cincinnati. One year ago my wife and i took a walk and i told her that i was going to publish our book and needed her help. She agreed and edited my poems added some of her own and spent most of her summer making corrections and deciding which of our many poems were worthy to be included. We clashed on a few occasions, but found a common ground to proceed. The cover design was our choice. My youngest son was a great help in sending our content to Outskirts since Tess and i are not tech wizards, and yet Tess did design our website. This really was a family affair as our oldest son Mark helped us launch our site. I new that we had to have a website to promote our book. Outskirts has provide us with the chance to have our book on Amazon,Barnes and Noble. The internet has allowed me to find several people to review our book and leave some nice comments at Amazon. Recently i found a great childrens store here that agreed to sell our book,which for me was very exciting. Our local paper did an article abou our book. Book sales have not been tremendous but each book sold has been a thrill knowing that we had a chance to share our voice with others and bring a smile to a child or a parent. My wife has lesson plans for teachers to use our book in a classroom setting on our website,and the icons on ou site our drawings from our book. Sure i would love the chance to sell a million books but publishing our book has been worth a mmilion bucks to me. I have enough poems for a second book and already have a very snappy title. My next dream is to someday do book 2. Someone said to me that the journey has always been the destination for you and i now realize how true this is. Sorry for any typos or grammatical errors as my editor has just gone to bed and did not proof read this. I told my wife that i did not want to die and have our book under the couch,and now for me our book lives every day. Our Best to you Tom and Tess

Visit Tom and Tess and The Endless String.

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Book of Poems Finds Common Thread

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Nov 24, 2008
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homage to Silverstein
by: Steve B. (webmaster)

Tom, thanks for submitting. I love what you've done. It looks to me like your book pays true tribute to Shel Silverstein. I like that.

Now I want to talk about your site. Because I like to tell authors how they can get more traffic online. Also because I recently discovered another site that I think says a lot about what you could do to upgrade your online presence.

Did you know that you mentioned Shel Silverstein as often in your post (once) as you do on your entire site?

Here's why I mention it: it strikes me that your most likely customers are fans of Shel Silverstein, but there's little on your site to indicate that. Little on your site to communicate that to the search engines. Hence...

Search engines aren't going to bother sending your most likely customers to you! In fact, because I keep mentioning Mr. Silverstein here, this page is going to get more Shel hits than your site!

That's how a search engine driven internet works, for better or worse. I'M going to get YOUR traffic.

Now I want to show you that site I mentioned. It's called, I Love Dr. Seuss.

This is a new site. It already looks to have nearly 300 pages. Pretty soon, you're going to be able to Google DR. SEUSS and have this site come up on the first page.

That's what it takes.

And if this guy were to have written his own book in the style of Seuss, he's going to be able to sell a hundred for every one you sell.

Partly because he's going to have the traffic. Partly because he's authenticated himself with his expansive online tribute to Seuss. Partly because visitors are going to appreciate the free resource he's created for them.

But, to make money, he doesn't even have to sell his own book. He's selling Dr. Seuss books out the wazoo on eBay and getting commissioned for it. Also, his well-trafficked site is peppered with Google ads (in Dr. Seuss colors!) that earn him regular income.

Tom, you and Tess aren't even registered as affiliates at Amazon! That means you're surrendering at least 4% of the cover price that you're entitled to!

You could be selling Tom and Tess AND Silverstein. How's that for a tribute?

I hope it doesn't feel like I'm taking you too much to task. Your site is like the majority of author sites. But the majority of author sites don't attract the traffic the author had hoped for.

The Seuss guy and I - as it turns out - used the same company and the same strategy to build our sites.

May I suggest that you might want to take a look?

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Nov 24, 2008
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Submitted by: Steve B. (webmaster)

Title

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Tom, thanks for submitting. I love what you've done. It looks to me like your book pays true tribute to Shel Silverstein. I like that. Now I want to talk about your site. Because I like to tell authors how they can get more traffic online. Also because I recently discovered another site that I think says a lot about what you could do to upgrade your online presence. Did you know that you mentioned Shel Silverstein as often in your post (once) as you do on your entire site? Here's why I mention it: it strikes me that your most likely customers are fans of Shel Silverstein, but there's little on your site to indicate that. Little on your site to communicate that to the search engines. Hence... Search engines aren't going to bother sending your most likely customers to you! In fact, because I keep mentioning Mr. Silverstein here, this page is going to get more Shel hits than your site! That's how a search engine driven internet works, for better or worse. I'M going to get YOUR traffic. Now I want to show you that site I mentioned. It's called, <A HREF="http://www.ilovedrseuss.com/">I Love Dr. Seuss</A>. This is a new site. It already looks to have nearly 300 pages. Pretty soon, you're going to be able to Google DR. SEUSS and have this site come up on the first page. That's what it takes. And if this guy were to have written his own book in the style of Seuss, he's going to be able to sell a hundred for every one you sell. Partly because he's going to have the traffic. Partly because he's authenticated himself with his expansive online tribute to Seuss. Partly because visitors are going to appreciate the free resource he's created for them. But, to make money, he doesn't even have to sell his own book. He's selling Dr. Seuss books out the wazoo on eBay and getting commissioned for it. Also, his well-trafficked site is peppered with Google ads (in Dr. Seuss colors!) that earn him regular income. Tom, you and Tess aren't even registered as <A HREF="http://www.shared-self-publishing.com/selling-on-amazon.html">affiliates at Amazon</A>! That means you're surrendering at least 4% of the cover price that you're entitled to! You could be selling Tom and Tess AND Silverstein. How's that for a tribute? I hope it doesn't feel like I'm taking you too much to task. Your site is like the majority of author sites. But the majority of author sites don't attract the traffic the author had hoped for. The Seuss guy and I - as it turns out - used the <A HREF="http://buildit.sitesell.com/writingsuccess.html">same company</A> and the <A HREF="http://ctpm.sitesell.com/writingsuccess.html">same strategy</A> to build our sites. May I suggest that you might want to take a look?

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