Blog: Mel's Muse - One Stop Shop For Aspiring Authors & Published Writers?

Posted: Tuesday, 17th August 2010

Whether you are an aspiring author or an established, published writer, you will need to undertake research, from time to time, in order to provide material for the books or articles you are writing. Sometimes the research material you need may be factual; sometimes you may want to understand the emotional response to a given set of circumstances.

PROVIDING YOU WITH MORE RESOURCES TO INFORM, INSPIRE, ENCOURAGE

My aim is to provide you, not simply with help with your creative writing techniques, and a better understanding of the mechanics of writing and publishing a book, but also with the vital research you may need in respect of your book or article. So – because one of my regular readers asked me, recently, how she could search my website more effectively to find the articles she wanted to read again – I decided I had to do something to make what I offer more accessible. Let me explain.

REVISING & UPDATING ARTICLES

Writing a regular blog is a big commitment in terms of time and effort. Consequently, with my daughter and six year old twins about to move to America, and my son-in-law away at sea until a few days before the move, my output has dropped alarmingly in the last few weeks. I’ve occupied the snatched moments I’ve had between looking after grandchildren and helping to offload unwanted items at car boot sales, with revising old articles (to make them more reader friendly) and updating my index.

I wrote about this a couple of weeks ago, in an article titled Do Recycled Articles Increase Traffic To Website? I’d love to hear from any readers who have found evidence of this, either positively or negatively.

NO SINGLE NICHE: I WRITE FROM THE HEART

My blog is, intentionally, multi-niche. This is because my ‘brand’, which may be summarised as ‘bringing hope to the hurting’ or, more prosaically, as ‘resources to inform, inspire, encourage’, has always been the driving force of my writing. Books and articles!

I write from the heart, using my actual life experiences as the basis of what I have to offer: bereavement – the loss of a child; creative writing and publishing a book – especially for aspiring authors because I remember what it was like starting out; divorce, remarriage and step parenting – from personal experience; personal growth and relationships from leading family forums and marriage enrichment courses; and, of course, book reviews and discussion summaries from the book club / readers’ group I lead. Links for each of these Niche Categories are provided below.

ONE STOP SHOP INDEX

I realise, however, that this multi-niche approach makes it difficult for my readers to find what they might be looking for. Readers who are coping with the loss of a child don’t want to have to sift through articles on creative writing techniques to find bereavement poetry, for example. And authors and writers may not realise that an article on step parenting is relevant to them (for its research value).

So in addition to tagging individual articles, I’ve also devised an Index on my Home Page. This not only separates articles into Niche Categories, but also sub-divides them to facilitate readers’ searches.

This is a work in progress. I am currently only about half way through indexing existing articles.

Take a look and see for yourself! I hope you will find it helpful. But don’t forget to keep coming back. Why not click the subscribe button to be sure of updates.

Author of a number of books, one a Sunday Times No 4 Bestseller, Mel Menzies is also an experienced Speaker at live events, as well as on Radio and TV. Book her here for your event.

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