Steven Pressfield's Blog, page 108

How Pro Are You?

[Quick note: we're having a Holiday Gift Special right now on www.blackirishbooks.com. For that special someone who could use a good kick in the ass: 6 War of Art/Turning Pro for the price of 3. Help your friends and colleagues keep their New Year's resolutions!]
The question is, “What’s the main difference between a pro and
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Parent and Child

The final three chapters of “A Long Tail Business,” presented here today, are about the emotional side of the industry.
Why do we write songs, or make movies, or bake cookies? What’s the payoff? Is it just money? Then maybe we should stick with our mainstream gig.

What’s great about a Long Tail business, as Shawn and
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Outreach, Part IV: Making New Connections, Finding Lines of Drift

If you watched our show, you’d know we didn’t cover that.
Yes, but I –
Click.
Just out of college, my Rolodex was limited to family, friends, and take-out restaurants. The senior publicist charged with training me through my first PR job forwarded me to the company database and suggested I pull a call list off of
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Built for Adversity

Human beings are built for adversity. Probably all extant species are, or they wouldn’t still be extant. But we humans in particular—lacking claws, fur, fangs, etc.—have needed the evolutionary edge of being designed for hard times.
Almost every great book or movie is about adversity. Moby Dick, War and Peace, The Hangover. The whole concept of
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Monetizing Slush

My first job in publishing was as editorial assistant (secretary/apprentice) to the editor in chief of a major publishing house (since dissolved and folded into a division of Random House Inc.). One of the first things presented to me was a very large pile of submissions that one and all referred to as the slush
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Laser Targeted Marketing

Continuing with the video chapters of “A Long Tail Business“:
Today’s three are Laser Targeting Marketing, Tribes and Authenticity, and Permission to Intrude. We’re stealing from Seth Godin today—his concepts of a “tribe” and of “permission marketing.”

In a Long Tail business, a presence on the web is essential. Through that presence—a site, a store, a blog—a
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Major Keys and Minor Keys

We were talking last week about thinking in terms of multiple drafts. The corollary is to concentrate on only one objective per draft — e.g., stakes, rhythm, theme, length, and so forth.
Another one I like is Major Key and Minor Key.
I’ll go over a manuscript or screenplay, for example, looking only for these. I’ll ask
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Controlling Your Destiny

Today’s three video chapters of “A Long Tail Business” are Controlling Your Destiny, Cottages and Empires and Job Number One.
As before, each video is about two minutes long. The overarching theme of these three chapters is how starting your own Long Tail business can pay off, not only financially, but in terms of the heart.

In
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Outreach, Part III: The Book Trailer

Two weeks ago I watched a work-in-progress version of Josh Hanagarne’s book trailer.
It’s one of the best I’ve viewed. Why? It tells a story—and left me with something I wanted to share.

That thing that stuck with me the most? His mentions of those people who wouldn’t let him fail—those friends and family members
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Thinking in Multiple Drafts

[Quick note: if you're interested in the videos we started here last Wednesday ("A Long Tail Business"), they continue this week—and for the next month—on Mondays. Click here or on "The Series" drop-down menu above to view the other videos.]
I imbibed this piece of screenwriting wisdom from Jack Epps (“Top Gun,” “Dick Tracy”) a few
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