The Tech View

by Kelly Lynne Ashton

Blogging your way to the top - using the web as a promotional tool

Promotion is a good thing.  It gets your name out in front of the producer and reminds them who you are and what you’ve done so that they will consider you for their next project. It also helps sell a project to funders – “ah, that’s an experienced writer, we know them, we don’t even have to look at their resume.” 

In the ‘old days’, the only promotion that a writer had control over was networking – cocktail parties, lunches, phone calls, etc.  But now there are many ways that screenwriters can promote themselves online that are easier, cheaper, and not as hard on the liver as networking.  

These days it seems like the first thing anyone does before hiring is to ‘google’ the person to see what comes up. You should always know what comes up under your name so that you’re not surprised. A web savvy producer or funder may also go to IMDb.com or Wikipedia to look for you.   

IMDb is the Internet Movie Database, which has a listing of television and movie productions that the IMDb database managers have uploaded.  You can assist the database managers by suggesting more information (e.g. episodic writing credits on series tend to be incomplete). IMDb has also started a new resume service. For a subscription fee you can upload photos and/or a full resume that links to your credit on productions.   

Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia that contains listings of information, but, like IMDb, only to the extent that someone has uploaded the information.  Wikipedia contains completely user-generated information, so you can add your own listing with your credits, or you can add information to another listing, such as a television program. You can even add a link from a television program to your listing as a writer.  If your information is wrong, another user may challenge you and the content is then removed.  By the same token, you can search to see if anything you were a part of is up there and is correct or needs clarification.  

While checking those listings, you should also check out the websites for the productions you’ve worked on and make sure your credit is on there and is correct.   

Blogs. It’s no secret that writers like to write. Sometimes, when they don’t have a paying gig, or are stuck on the work they’re supposed to be doing, they write as a form of distraction.  That’s where the blog comes in.  A blog is like an online journal.  It can be about your daily events (e.g. how did you waste time today), how to be a professional screenwriter, or your thoughts about the film and television industry. It can even take the form of a production diary.

A blog can be an outlet for your thoughts, a way to participate in an online writer community (writers link from their blogs to other blogs they like and post comments on those blogs), and a way to promote yourself – as your blog will show up in google search listings and google alerts. Writers in Canada, the UK and the US have become known both inside and outside the writer community for the quality and usefulness of the content in their blogs.     

How do you blog?  There are several (some free) blog services that provide a template and will host your blog.  A few are Blogger, Typepad and Wordpress.  It is very easy to personalize (or not) the template and upload content.  You do not need programming skills, just writing skills.  It is key, however, to post regularly, particularly once you have built an audience.  You can also link to other writer blogs (there is an area in the template of most blogs to add addresses of blogs you like) to get traffic flowing back and forth.  Add a bio with at least a brief blurb about who you are and what you do and link to other sites you might have. 

Other sites? Why might you have other sites?  Well, if you are a multi-tasking writer who has other ways of generating income you might want a brochure site that showcases those services – such as corporate writing, consulting, teaching, etc. Brochure sites are useful to provide contact information, client lists and even a portfolio of work. It’s possible to create a simple brochure site yourself with templates that hosting services provide, but if you want something polished and professional looking you may want to invest a few hundred dollars in a professionally designed site. You do have to pay to have the brochure site hosted, but for a simple site the cost amounts to a few lattes a month.   

Once you have your blog or your brochure site or your Wikipedia or IMDb reference, how do you get people to visit it?  The absolute easiest way is to add it to your email signature in your mail program. You can also post responses in other people’s blogs and become part of their community. If you’re not too pushy or overt about it they’ll chose to link to your site and that will drive traffic. Or suggest a mutual linking – traffic benefits everyone.  Eventually (it takes several months) the search engines will pick your blog up.  If you google you can find articles on how to improve your search engine success.   

As you can see there are many ways you can get your name out there online.  Many are free and some take little time at all. Go get out there!