Approaching our 25th year as a national literary nonprofit, the Small Publishers, Artists & Writers Network is changing our name to the Writers and Publishers Network. The change reflects the direction the organization has taken over the last few years, focusing on the needs of writers and small publishers in the digital age of publishing.
We still support artists, but our primary members are now indie authors, freelance writers, and small publishers, along with book marketers and those offering publishing services such as cover design, interior layout, and more. The original intent of the organization was to be an online group. But twenty-five years ago, that goal wasn’t easy to accomplish. With new online services and educational programs, we hope to expand even wider over the next two years. Technology had to catch up with our ideas.
The new programs include a series of webinars by top publishing professionals, launching in May. The W&PN Publishing Webinars will cover a wide range of topics on the business of writing, which is the book-marketing element for either indie authors or small publishers.
“Many genre-specific organizations handle the basics of writing,” states Kaiser, WPN President. “WPN has transformed into being more about the business of writing. Our focus in the future will be business, though we are investigating a series of master classes for the craft of writing.”
The May issue of WPNews introduces the new name and the new title for the monthly newsletter: WPNews. The newsletter is free to anyone signing up on the website and emailed to more than 8,000 readers. The monthly members’ exclusive newsletter, WPN Market Update, will also feature the new logo and name in May.
Writers & Publishers Network’s new website will be live in May at WritersAndPublishersNetwork.com. We will send out an eblast announcing the new site.
We planned our introduction to be at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books this month. With the festival rescheduled to October, all of our graphic materials will be ready. Already we have eighteen authors who will participate in the booth over the weekend, most for one full day or both.”
Until everyone is familiar with the new name and domain, WPN.org will forward visitors to the new website later in May.
We hope everyone will take advantage of all the new benefits of membership (discounts on all services, webinars, and events) that more than save the price of membership.
BUT, all webinars, services, and events will remain open to nonmembers at a slightly higher fee.
Please take advantage of these many programs. More details about the webinars will be released soon.