The Business of Writing

Success as a writer, even if defined as simply “getting my words out there,” often requires a business mindset and strategy.   A Word document entitled “Published Works” consisting of nothing more than contact information began my slow acceptance of a business mentality 10 years ago.  “Published Works” remained blank for what seemed an eternity, but, despite its simplicity and “blankness,” it made my vision of becoming a published writer something concrete.  A sheet of paper divided into three parts became my business strategy; the headings “management,” “marketing (platform),” and “projects” organized the managerial part of my writing efforts.  Without such fledgling and nebulous goals, I would not have had a starting point or any chance of ever including titles on my “Published Works” list.

Creating a system for collecting and organizing submission resources and correspondence became the first real management goal to tackle.  Long before my thoughts on business, a writer friend brought his guidelines notebook to one of our writer’s groups.  Clear plastic sleeves held photocopied submission guidelines and correspondence organized by publication.  Today, I use a digital version of his filing system.  Firefox folders labeled by genre organize submission guidelines, resource pages, and helpful blogs.  Gmail folders labeled by publication keep all related emails together and easily referenced.   The occasional hour spent organizing and updating these files saves me much more time later when I am searching for the right contact information or deadline for my submissions.  Repeated net searches and scouring an inbox to find important communications can really mess with one’s creative flow.

My second management goal involved a system for tracking submission dates, titles, responses, expenses, and non-electronic communications like snail-mail and phone calls.  An excel workbook with individual worksheets labeled “submissions” and “correspondence” was simple to create, manage, and flexible enough to have morphed with my growing and changing professional needs.  The “sort” function allows me to rearrange entries to view quickly submission histories for specific works, submissions pending, and a variety of other inquiries.  There are professional software packages available to writers, but I have found keeping the tools simple increases efficiency allowing more time to interact with the data or to write.

As for marketing goals, this is it– or, at least, part of it.  Admittedly, I am late in the game when it comes to this part of my business strategy.  I’m just getting up to speed with Facebook and Twitter as I write this entry.  I attended the Philadelphia Writers’ Conference recently, and several presenters stated bluntly agents and editors rarely give sideways glances to writers without a pre-existing platform:  webpage, active blog, Facebook page with many “likes,” even a Twitter account with a follower list are necessities for getting noticed by those in the publishing world.  For those looking at self-publishing and distributing ebooks, these tools will be your primary modes of self-promotion.

Lest I forget, there is also the actual writing.  I listed drafts in my hard drive in the short-term goals section, and those merely swimming as ideas in my head in the possible projects section.  Since I did not have any contracted projects, I prioritized my short-term goals according to how developed and inspired my drafts were.  Completing the high priority pieces helped me to improve my writing, generated new ideas for other projects, and encouraged me to continue writing.  Taking a few moments to consider which of my drafts were most likely to develop into finished works helped me to invest my time and efforts wisely.  Listing and prioritizing projects, particularly those I would soon do “on-spec” and, even later, contracted works, enabled me to set more specific time management and word count goals.

Time is almost as valuable as words to writers, and there is never enough of it.  Investing even an hour or two a week to organization and planning can seem counter productive, especially when projects lay waiting on a desk, but the long-term benefits of working a business strategy– vision– will increase productivity, efficiency, and focus efforts on projects with the best chances of being published.  As much as creative people may want to resist the nuts and bolts of business planning, realizing its importance will result ultimately in more time and energy for creativity and the encouragement only publishing success offers.