writer & independent publisher

Making Your Book Your Business… to Write, to Publish, to Sell!

Saturday, September 24, 2016
08:30 to noon
727 – 11 Ave., S.W., Calgary

Led by Monique Achtman

Author of:  Am I Next In Line?: Preventing Hereditary Breast and Ovarian Cancer

Many of us have different reasons for writing a book, but regardless of our reasons, to be successful we need a plan. The plan can start out simple, including Included in the plan should be “why” you’re writing the book; and how you plan to market the book when it’s complete.

Over the next seven meetings we are planning to facilitate a ‘course’ of sorts to walk our members and guests through the process. At this first meeting Monique Achtman, a published author herself, will lead a discussion on the importance of setting goals for completing an outline, writing so many words, or a chapter, by a deadline… not written in stone, but nevertheless a plan.

Tim SchaufeleWe’ll also have a presentation by Tim Schaufele CGA on the importance of financial planning for your book project. Tim will explain how we can be financially successful with our writing, and our book, and that a good starting point is to consider, and claim, all the expenses that we (will) incur during the process of writing the book.

Click here to register through MeetUp (if you see the meeting time listed at MeetUp as 7 p.m., that is incorrect; we meet at our regular time of 08:30 a.m.)

More about IPAC Meetings

As always, you will have a chance to meet and talk with other authors and self-publishers. Our members tell us over and over how much this has helped them along the writing and publishing journey.

We meet from 8:30 until noon on the last Saturday, September through November and January through May or June. The meeting fee is $20 for members and $25 for non-members (cash or cheques only), payable at the beginning of the meeting. A full breakfast is included in the fee (the meal cannot be deducted from meeting fees because our room rental is based on the number of attendees).

Location: Danish Canadian Club, 727 – 11th Avenue S.W. Lots of free parking in the club parking lot, on the west side of the building. Enter through the Club doors on the west side of the building and watch for directions, or check with Club staff.

Schedule

08:30: Breakfast buffet
09:00: Members and guests briefly introduce themselves
09:45: Monique speaks
10:30: Break and networking
11:00: Tim’s presentation
12:00: Adjourn

Click here to register through MeetUp (if you see the meeting time listed at MeetUp as 7 p.m., that is incorrect; we meet at our regular time of 08:30 a.m.)

Marketing Your Book by Building Connectedness

What is your message and why does everyone need to hear it?

An interactive, energetic  Workshop

Saturday, June 25, 2016
08:30 to noon
727 – 11 Ave., S.W., Calgary

Led by Dr. Margot McKinnon

Author of The Exquisiteness of Being Human

You’ll develop your own connectedness plan while learning how others have done this and/or are doing it right now!

Let them help you while you help them!

5 Steps to creating awareness and compelling interest in your book (Your book is a  Business, whether you know it or not!)

Step One… Review and critique your print materials (eg. Biz Cards, book covers, website  appearance)

Step Two…. Review and cririque your Book’s biz plan, costs, contact lists etc.

Step Three.. Find the Spirit of your Book, the one/two sentence reply to, “so, what do you do?”

Step Four…. Articulate your business’s purpose statement

Step Five…. Create your Plan for building connectedness.

Click here to register through MeetUp

More about IPAC Meetings

As always, you will have a chance to meet and talk with other authors and self-publishers. Our members tell us over and over how much this has helped them along the writing and publishing journey.

We meet from 8:30 until noon on the last Saturday, September through November and January through May or June. The meeting fee is $20 for members and $25 for non-members (cash or cheques only), payable at the beginning of the meeting. A full breakfast is included in the fee (the meal cannot be deducted from meeting fees because our room rental is based on the number of attendees).

Location: Danish Canadian Club, 727 – 11th Avenue S.W. Lots of free parking in the club parking lot, on the west side of the building. Enter through the Club doors on the west side of the building and watch for directions, or check with Club staff.

Schedule

08:30: Breakfast buffet
09:00: Members and guests briefly introduce themselves
09:45: Margot speaks
10:30: Break and networking
11:00: Further presentations or networking time
12:00: Adjourn

Click here to register through MeetUp

This will be the last IPAC meeting of the season, but we will return on the fourth Saturday of September.

To Tweet or not to Tweet

Speaker: Donna Dahl

Saturday, May 28
08:30 to noon
727 – 11 Ave., S.W., Calgary

Donna´s practical introduction to Twitter will give you the basics you need to:

  • expand your audience,
  • grow your following, and
  • support your your next blog article, book launch, and
  • book signing

To Tweet or not to Tweet . . . 

is specially designed for authors and people in sales/business wanting to expand their social media skills and practice teamwork via the soft-sell style of social media self-promotion.

Twitter is one of the easiest social media tools to learn. You, too, can learn how to be on Twitter no more than 10 minutes a day tweeting on purpose and by design.

Participants may bring their lap top computers and access the WiFi onsite or may prefer to take notes and work through the material after the presentation.

Click here to register through MeetUp

More about IPAC Meetings

As always, you will have a chance to meet and talk with other authors and self-publishers. Our members tell us over and over how much this has helped them along the writing and publishing journey.

We meet from 8:30 until noon on the last Saturday, September through November and January through May. The meeting fee is $20 for members and $25 for non-members (cash or cheques only), payable at the beginning of the meeting. A full breakfast is included in the fee (the meal cannot be deducted from meeting fees because our room rental is based on the number of attendees).

Location: Danish Canadian Club, 727 – 11th Avenue S.W. Lots of free parking in the club parking lot, on the west side of the building. Enter through the Club doors on the west side of the building and watch for directions, or check with Club staff.

Schedule

08:30: Breakfast buffet
09:00: Members and guests briefly introduce themselves
09:45: Donna speaks
10:30: Break and networking
11:00: Further presentations or networking time
12:00: Adjourn

Click here to register through MeetUp

This will be the last IPAC meeting of the season, but we will return on the fourth Saturday of September.

Understanding Indigo/Chapters/Coles

DaveReynoldsSPEAKER: Dave Reynolds

Saturday, April 30
08:30 to noon
727 – 11 Ave., S.W., Calgary

Have you wondered how books actually get on the shelves of these major retailers, and/or are offered  on their website?

Would you like to be the author at the front of the store greeting readers and signing copies of your book?

Join us for a morning with Dave Reynolds, Chapters/Indigo Acquisitions Manager, who will explain how the books you find in their stores, and on their website, get to be there.

Dave will also share his thoughts on why he sees as trends in the shift from printed books to electronic publication.

Dave always welcomes questions from the audience, so please feel free to bring them up after his presentation.

Dave Reynolds has been a regular presenter at IPAC meetings for many years, and has helped so many of our members introduce their books to his customer base.

Click here to register through MeetUp

More about IPAC Meetings

As always, you will have a chance to meet and talk with other authors and self-publishers. Our members tell us over and over how much this has helped them along the writing and publishing journey.

We meet from 8:30 until noon on the last Saturday, September through November and January through May. The meeting fee is $20 for members and $25 for non-members (cash or cheques only), payable at the beginning of the meeting. A full breakfast is included in the fee (the meal cannot be deducted from meeting fees because our room rental is based on the number of attendees).

Location: Danish Canadian Club, 727 – 11th Avenue S.W. Lots of free parking in the club parking lot, on the west side of the building. Enter through the Club doors on the west side of the building and watch for directions, or check with Club staff.

Schedule

08:30: Breakfast buffet
09:00: Members and guests briefly introduce themselves
09:45: Dave speaks
10:30: Break and networking
11:00: Further presentations or networking time
12:00: Adjourn

Click here to register through MeetUp

March 26, 2016 Meeting Cancelled

Sorry, the meeting scheduled for Saturday, March 26 has been cancelled.

Please join us for the April meeting, when Dave Reynolds of Indigo/Chapters/Coles will speak.

Previous Speakers and Presentations

SPEAKER: Lyn Cadence

Saturday, February 27
08:30 to noon
727 – 11 Ave., S.W., Calgary

Our speaker for February is Lyn Cadence, a public relations consultant, publicist and coach. Lyn has 25 years’ experience promoting book publishers, authors and other influencers. Check out her profile on LinkedIn to find out more.

Marketing a book can be a lot of work! To maximize your efforts, Lyn talks about creating an effective plan for marketing and promoting your book no matter where you are in the publishing cycle  –  business plan, marketing plan, social media strategy, publicity plan. Even before you hit the print button, know how you are getting those books into the hands of readers. Build your own personalized, streamlined strategy that draws on your strongest skill set and introduces some new tools for experimentation.

Authors Speak: “How I published my book”

authors, publishers, ipac, independent publishers association of canadaSaturday, November 28
08:30 to noon
727 – 11 Ave., S.E., Calgary

Following on to the October presentation of Getting Your Book Ready for Self-Publication, our November meeting will feature a round-table discussion of authors’ actual experiences with editing and interior design, getting into print, their choices of conventional print vs print-on-demand, the results so far, and what they will do differently for their next book.

We particularly want to encourage authors to bring copies of their book(s) and answer questions about how they made it all happen.

Looking forward to (as usual!) a lively discussion with lost of sharing, learning and affection.

Click here to register at MeetUp

More about IPAC Meetings

As always, you will have a chance to meet and talk with other authors and self-publishers. Our members tell us over and over how much this has helped them along the writing and publishing journey.

We meet from 8:30 until noon on the last Saturday, September through November and January through May. The meeting fee is $20 for members and $25 for non-members (cash or cheques only), payable at the beginning of the meeting. A full breakfast is included in the fee (the meal cannot be deducted from meeting fees because our room rental is based on the number of attendees).

Location: Danish Canadian Club, 727 – 11th Avenue S.W. Lots of free parking in the club parking lot, on the west side of the building. Enter through the Club doors on the west side of the building and watch for directions, or check with Club staff.

Schedule

08:30: Breakfast buffet
09:00: Members and guests briefly introduce themselves
09:45: Authors Speak
10:30: Break and networking
11:00: Further presentations or networking time
12:00: Adjourn

Click here to register for the meeting at MeetUp

Getting Your Book Ready for Self-publication

Authors and publishers meet at IPAC
Photo by Josep

Saturday, October 31
08:30 to noon
727 – 11 Ave., S.E., Calgary

 You have many choices to make before you send your manuscript to the printer, to Amazon, or some other service.

There is no one right way to get ready. This presentation is not about how to make it perfect. But it is about you being fully aware of the choices that you are making along the way so that you can be confident that you are making the choices that are relevant to you, to your book, to your audience and to their reading habits.

The presenter, John Breeze, is a long–time IPAC member who has worked on more than 50 book publications over the past 15 years, as designer, editor, and on occasions book producer. He will be sharing his experiences of supporting authors in creating their books in a variety of formats, but with the emphasis on printed publications.

The presentation will be at least partially interactive. It’s not just about telling you what to do, it’s also taking the opportunity to invite participants to share their own experiences: the good, the bad, and the ugly. By the end of the morning you should be in a position to make your own decisions for your own publication with confidence and purpose.

Click here to register for the meeting

More about IPAC Meetings

As always, you will have a chance to meet and talk with other authors and self-publishers. Our members tell us over and over how much this has helped them along the writing and publishing journey.

We meet from 8:30 until noon on the last Saturday of each month. The meeting fee is $20 for members and $25 for non-members (cash or cheques only), payable at the beginning of the meeting. A full breakfast is included in the fee (the meal cannot be deducted from meeting fees because our room rental is based on the number of attendees).

Click here to register for the meeting.

Location: Danish Canadian Club, 727 – 11th Avenue S.W. Lots of free parking in the club parking lot, on the west side of the building. Enter through the Club doors on the west side of the building and watch for directions, or check with Club staff.

Schedule

08:30: Breakfast buffet
09:00: Members and guests briefly introduce themselves
09:45: Getting Your Book Ready for Self-publication
10:30: Break and networking
11:00: Further presentations or networking time
12:00: Adjourn

Click here to register for the meeting.

Promoting Your Book with Facebook

Please Note: this meeting was held on September 26, 2015

Of the literally thousands of places online to promote your book, why Facebook?

Targeting.

Because of all the information we volunteer and Facebook collects, it knows where we live, what interests us, and much more.

Facebook shares this information (in the aggregate only) with advertisers. This allows advertisers, like us, to spend our advertising dollars extremely efficiently.

At the September 26 meeting of the Independent Publishers Association of Canada (IPAC), we’ll explore how to use this knowledge to promote our books.

This will include live searches for authors attending the meeting and also include targeting of journalists and influential people in our genres.

Bob Abbott, long an advocate of online book sales and promotion, and a Past President of IPAC, will lead this interactive meeting.

Meeting Details

As always, you will have a chance to meet and talk with other authors and self-publishers. Our members tell us over and over how much this has helped them along the writing and publishing journey.

We meet from 8:30 until noon on the last Saturday of each month. The meeting fee is $20 for members and $25 for non-members (cash or cheques only), payable at the beginning of the meeting. A full breakfast is included in the fee (the meal cannot be deducted from meeting fees because our room rental is based on the number of attendees).

Reserve for this session at MeetUp (click on ‘MeetUp’).

Location: Danish Canadian Club, 727 – 11th Avenue S.W. Lots of free parking in the club parking lot, on the west side of the building. Enter through the Club doors on the west side of the building and watch for directions, or check with Club staff.

Schedule

08:30: Breakfast buffet
09:00: Members and guests briefly introduce themselves
09:45: Promoting Books with Facebook
10:30: Break and networking
11:00: Further presentations or networking time
12:00: Adjourn

Reserve for this session through MeetUp (click on ‘MeetUp’).

October’s Meeting

Veteran book designer and consultant John Breeze will answer your questions about the printing of your book. This will include issues such as:

  • Hardcover or paperback?
  • Traditional offset or print-on-demand?
  • Book sizes, optimal number of pages,
  • Which paper, which fonts?
  • And more…

That’s at 8:30 a.m. on Saturday, October 31 (costumes not necessary)

WorththeWait

We’re Back In September

IPAC takes a summer break, but meetings will resume in September. Here’s our schedule for the Autumn 2015 season, with topics to be announced in early September:

  • Saturday, September 26, 2015:
  • Saturday, October 31, 2015:
  • Saturday, November 28, 2015

All meetings held from 08:30 a.m. until noon, at the Danish Canadian Club.

Please visit our website again in September for details.

Image above: Written & copyrighted by: Neveen Wadie (QueenNeveen),

calgary_lrt_south_front_sm

“The Story of My Book”

Saturday, May 30, 2015

Four of our members, all of them published authors, will tell their own stories of what inspired them to write their book(s) and how they successfully delivered their book(s) into our world. Their publications span a wide range, from children’s books to the outdoors, to Retirement planning and the connections between Art and Mathematics.

This part of our meeting will be moderated by David Peyto, who will also be one of the storytellers. David is the author of a number of popular books about the many interesting walks within the Calgary City limits and has interesting family connections with, among others, Bill Peyto, after whom the famous lake is named.

The other 3 storytellers are:

Irene Naested, author of Art in the Classroom and Exploring the Math and Art Connection

Valerie Walker, author of 5 books about Headley the Hedgehog and at least 3 others.

Nell Smith, author of the recently published Retire to the Life you Love

Meeting Details

As always, you will have a chance to meet and talk with other authors and self-publishers. Our members tell us over and over how much this has helped them along the writing and publishing journey.
We meet from 8:30 until noon on the last Saturday of each month. The meeting fee is $20 for members and $25 for non-members (cash or cheques only), payable at the beginning of the meeting. A full breakfast is included in the fee (the meal cannot be deducted from meeting fees because our room rental is based on the number of attendees).

Reserve for this session at MeetUp.

Location: Danish Canadian Club, 727 – 11th Avenue S.W. Lots of free parking in the club parking lot, on the west side of the building. Enter through the Club doors on the west side of the building and watch for directions, or check with Club staff.

Schedule

  • 0830: Breakfast buffet
  • 0900: Members and guests briefly introduce themselves
  • 0945: Presentations by our authors/publishers
  • 10:30: Break and networking
  • 11:00: Further presentations or networking time
  • 12:00: Adjourn

Reserve for this session through MeetUp.
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