5 Things About Being a Writer
by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig
The writing life can be a wonderfully rewarding one. But there can be headaches along the way.
Here are five things I’ve learned about being a writer: some of them apply solely to self-publishing and some to both traditional and self-publishing.
There is always something else to consider with self-publishing.
This might be expanding your formats (print, audio, translation, digital, hardcover). This might be expanding your distribution (to aggregators like Draft2Digital and Smashwords, to the library market through Overdrive via PublishDrive or Street Lib, to international markets through PublishDrive or Street Lib), or it might mean expanding your social media presence by exploring Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter.
Consistency is better than racking up huge word counts, unless you can do both at once without burning out.
Unless you can maintain a daily high word count goal, I think it’s easier to be productive by simply being consistent–showing up most days to meet an easy goal.
Book production can take longer than planned.
Things always seem to take longer than you think they will. This includes the editing process, cover design, formatting, and even the process of uploading to retail sites (if you go wide). To combat this, it’s helpful to do as much as possible in advance … and get on your production team’s calendar early.
In terms of back matter, newsletters, etc., one shortcut is to keep a template handy. Keep a back matter file so that you won’t forget any of the usual elements (acknowledgments, list of titles, where to find you online, etc.) And your newsletter can be worked on while your story is with the editor. It can help to have as much done in advance as possible.
Promo can be subtle.
My most effective form of promo is sending out my release newsletter to the readers who’ve subscribed of their own free will. The second most effective is changing my Facebook cover to the new/upcoming book cover and pinning a simple announcement that my book is available for preorder/sale. Aside from that, my ‘promo’ consists of making sure that my book page SEO returns rich results on Google, that my Amazon product pages connect to my author page and to each other (for print and ebook), and that I include back matter in my books that point to my other books and series.
Once you end up with control over your writing and publishing, it’s tough (impossible?) to go back.
Having self-published exclusively for the last couple of years, it’s hard for me to imagine going back to traditional publishing (and I have had offers). I feel as though Penguin Random House didn’t do enough to make the material I wrote work harder. It could have sold overseas (as it does now), it could have branched into audio, etc. And, having gotten used to playing a part in the cover design and every other bit of production, it’s tough to think about handing over my manuscript and not even having control over the release date.
What have you learned as a writer?
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