How to be Wikipedia ready

I wish I could tell you how to automatically get a Wikipedia page but unfortunately you have to be famous for Wikipedia or at least notable.

This page is more about how you can make yourself ready for the wonderful volunteers, when you do reach that stage of being notable enough for Wikipedia, that you will be easy to make a stand alone page on Wikipedia.

Step 1

Add a photo of yourself to Wikimedia.

The next time you are at an event get a photo of yourself and upload it or ask your fans to upload a picture of you to Wikimedia. You can't use promo images. For instance I have some images of my mother's books. Firstly I only have the rights to use that image in relation to advertising and therefore I don't have the rights to share the image on Wikipedia. Secondly I did that photo to promote the books. Instead I have a picture of myself in full cosplay at an event. This makes it easy to add it to my page whenever it gets made.

Step 2

Get your name into reputable sources.

Newspapers and other forms of media. This way they can use them as a source to say you must be notable because you are mentioned in all of these places. I've always been quite chuffed to see my name in a newspaper so here is a good reason to actively seek these.

Step 3

Links and more links.

On your website, on your bio page make sure there are links to other sites where you are mentioned. To be even more useful to Wikipedians you can have a list of links where you solicited it. For instance when you give out ARC's for reviews or do a guest blog. The other list should be links where you have randomly popped up because of fans and newspaper articles.

Step 4

Have a good Bio.

On my books I have a witty bio where I play up the cool things about my life like living in the shadow of a live volcano. But the Bio on your site should be a little more comprehensive. This allows for accurate info on your page.

Step 5

Don't write your own page.

I know you are tempted but it is actually against the rules. Because you aren't allowed to do self promotion etc on Wikipedia as it is only an encyclopedia and not a database for authors.