Monday, April 29, 2013

Home Wedding

The last couple of weddings I conducted took place in a private home.

When I first became a celebrant, weddings took place in the home more often than not. Sometimes the wedding vows were exchanged in the lounge room itself. If the wedding ceremony was viedographed, we would have an immediate replay as we sat down after the ceremony and watched outselves on the television screen!

If the wedding took place on a property, apart from the wedding guests, we would have neighing and moowing, clucking and hissing from uninvited but interested spectators.

Afterwards there might be a barbeque which ranged from the familiar sausages and rissoles to the less common pig on a spit. Handling the catering could be anyone - from a relative of the couple, to a highly trained caterer dressed up like Jeeves.

These wedding were inevitable happy, friendly occasions as everyone felt at home - even if this was their first visit to the home.

Here is a photograph of the latest bride, accompanied by her bridesmaid. The theme was black and white, and the bride looked extremely elegant in a grecian style frock.



Friday, April 26, 2013

Earn $100,000.00 a year selling E-Books

According to Pat Ritter, an Australian author of 12 E-books, marketing is the answer to selling your E-Books.  In this extract from his article, ‘E-Book Publishing’ he shares his experience on successful e-book publishing.

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Smashwords website became the seed I wanted to grow from my own website.

Instantly I converted the books I’d written into e-books. This process is very simple. First register with the website Smashwords to become a member. Once this is confirmed away you go and publish you book/s. Mark Corker (owner of Smashwords) has written a book to help authors publish their own material and upload on the website.

Once the book is published, click on the affiliate section to have your book distributed by Amazon, Apple, Kobo, Diesel and many others.

Each quarter, first quarter being the end of March, payment is made to your account and each quarter thereafter. It is then a simple process of transferring the money from Pay Pal to your account. Presently I have twelve books published on Smashwords website.

For the past years since I became a self-publisher with Smashwords, a trickle of money has been dropping into my account. It’s a pleasure to see when I view the places my books have been selling, such as Canada, Great Britain, USA, Australia and Europe. It’s exciting to think some person across the other side of the globe is reading a book I’ve written and published.

BrianPratt, a fellow author with Smashwords, initially couldn’t get any publisher to publish his books, so he converted his books to e-books and sells them via Smashwords website. Last financial year his income was $100,000.00.

How did he do it? Marketing. Brian recommended once your books are published on Smashwords website to publish them on Amazon website.


Click and have a look at the books I’ve published on Amazon. At the time of writing my ranking for an author in Amazon is 20,000 from 1.86 million which I’m happy with. These figures change within each hour and fluctuate depended on sales of books.

Marketing is the key to selling books. Facebook is another pathway to promoting your books. For instance, each morning I post a page from a book I’ve written under a group ‘Keeping Up With My Writing’.

If anyone wishes to join this group - send a message on Facebook to become a friend and I will include you into this group. If five readers tell five more readers about my books there are twenty-five more people who will know and you never know where the wave will end – if ever.

Mark Coker also mentioned to join Google Plus, Bing and Yahoo – I have. At first I was a little sceptical – however, what have I got to lose – nothing.

Another latest website to spread the word about your writing is:

Have a look at this one and it is another link toward marketing your books. Next marketing adventure is YouTube – I can’t wait to start.
Pat Ritter
Author/Self Publisher
www.patritter.com.au


Article first published on 'Writers Grapevine', April 2013 Edition.








Thursday, April 11, 2013

25 Vows Renewal Certificates

For the many celebrants who have been asking for Renewal of Wedding Vows Certificates, I have just created 25 Certitficates. Each with a different design, as well as a variety of text to suit different situations and themes.

They come as Word Documents, in the same way as the Baby Naming Certificates.

Whether a couple is celebrating a wedding anniversary, or just renewing their wedding vows to celebrate a good marriage, there is a design or wording to suit the particular situation.

They can be can be mixed and matched and then simply printed out on your own printer.

Each certificate is an A4 document that you can edit as you do the letters you write.

Wednesday, April 3, 2013

Profitable Celebrant E-Book

For those celebrants who are interested in being profitable celebrants, they can now purchase my book 'How to be Profitable Celebrants: Practical Tips on Running a Profitable Celebrany' both as a printed book and and as an E-Book.

While they can get the printed copy here, the E-book can be purchased from Smashwords, and Amazon together with my wedding book for the bride and groom '1,000+ Answers to Your Wedding Questions'.