I volunteer for a couple of writing groups. As part of my duties, I email writers, and other professionals on a regular basis.

One thing I’ve noticed lately is the high number of people who use strange names for their email accounts.

As a writer, you should be branding your name wherever possible. Names like elfprincess, edit845, or yrgm33 won’t help you gain name recognition, or even help people associate your name with your email account.

If you are serious about your writing, you should take steps to be viewed as a professional when using email.

• Use your name or your pseudonym if you possibly can.
• Don’t use your family’s email account for business.
• Don’t send professional email using your husband’s name on the account.

Be professional with your social networking. Allow your personality to come through in your writing, but don’t share anything that you wouldn’t want published in a national magazine.

Also, no one cares what you are having for lunch, unless you write cookbooks and are teasing folks with your newest, greatest recipe.

Editors, agents, critics, and your readers are active on the social networking sites. You never know who may read your next post.

It’s become common for editors, agents, employers, and other business contacts  to “Google” the name of people before entering into a business relationship.

• Make sure you aren’t writing anything online that will reflect badly on you.
• Protect your online presence by setting up a Google alert on your name to see what others are saying about you.
• “Google” yourself regularly to find out if your entries project a professional online presence.
• Check your pseudonym(s) as well.

Act as professionally on the Internet as you do in face-to-face meetings with your business contacts and your readers.

Here are some examples of folks who didn’t project a professional online presence.  Have a laugh, but don’t let this be you.

http://www.resumebear.com/blog/index.php/2009/04/10/30-ways-to-loose-a-job-on-twitter/

Write on,

Lynn Jordan

Voltaire said, “The perfect is the enemy of the good.” Actually Voltaire said, “Le mieux est l’ennemi du bien.” As writers, we need to take these words to heart.

I know when I’m worrying over which font I used, and I’m spending time making sure that all the pages have exactly 25 lines, I know there’s something I’m avoiding.

Sometimes I run spell-check after spell-check and grammar check after grammar check (even though I argue with Microsoft’s grammar checker).

I have a friend who was obsessing over how the bold didn’t show in her blog when viewed with the Firefox browser. No one ever left a blog never to return because there wasn’t any bold.

I can spend a whole day checking out blog themes, down loading blog themes, uploading blog themes to my hosting account, and then editing them when they don’t look right. Does this get any posts written? Does this move my career forward? Can I tell myself I’m being productive?

When we send our words out in the world, we are putting ourselves on view for anyone who reads them. That takes a lot of courage.

We all know how the gremlins put in the typos the minute we hit send or drop our packet in the mailbox. This is the way writing is.

› Continue reading…

Like some of you, I just got back from the RWA National Conference in San Francisco. It was a super conference with great workshops, the chance to get together with old friends, and a great city to explore.

My brain hasn’t returned yet. If you see it, please point it toward home. My muse is also missing. Apparently she was last sighted getting into a limo with Nora. I picked up some items to bribe her with at the Midnight Bazaar, but nothing that can compete with whatever it is Nora uses. › Continue reading…