Writing and Publishing News

We’re entering the fourth week of January 2006. The holidays are over. Are you back to work on your writing project? Is your freelance writing business picking up? Or are you having trouble getting started?

Here are some suggestions designed to help you get back in the groove or get your groove back.

1: Schedule time each day to write. Make writing a priority just like you do feeding the dog, working out and going grocery shopping.

Like most people who go hog wild at Christmastime, I took time off to play and to honor the holidays. But I’m back to work now full-time—10+ hours a day almost everyday. It’s Sunday morning at 7:30 as I contribute this post to my blog. It’s not easy to reestablish a writing schedule. But, if writing is your profession, it’s necessary.

Currently, I spend early mornings catching up on email. I typically have writers’ questions coming in through the SPAWN Web site and my own Web site or from someone who has a copy of one of my writing books. I generally have book orders which need to be made ready for shipping. This is also when I conduct Internet research for pending articles.

Mid mornings find me sending out query letters. And my afternoons are spent writing articles, working with a client and/or doing some book promotion.

I slip out twice during the day. Once to take my 2 or 3-mile walk and once to take outgoing books to the post office, do banking, pick up supplies, etc.

Most evenings find me reading some of the dozen or so newsletters I receive each week and reviewing client’s and potential client’s manuscripts. This is also when I schedule the following day’s work activities.

2: Do five things every day toward your writing goal. Here are five example:
• Write five paragraphs or five pages of your novel.
• Come up with five article ideas (or send out five reprints).
• Contact five new magazine editors.
• Make five new book promotion contacts (book reviewers, booksellers, book festivals, etc).
• Make five follow-up calls or emails related to your article work or book promotion.

3: Spend time at least once a month promoting your writing business. Develop a marketing letter and send it to potential clients or introduce yourself and your expertise to new editors, for example.

On January 2, I sent letters to several local businesses reminding them of our services. We’ve received two potentially lucrative responses so far.

4: Get creative when it comes to your writing business, article work or book promotion.

• Find new ways to work with clients: writing resumes, creating brochures, rewriting employee manuals for corporations, for example.

• Expand your article base. Tweak old articles to fit very different magazines, seek out new magazines and come up with new article topics for familiar editors.

• Seek book reviews. Visit bookstores personally with your book. Schedule speeches to promote your book. Send press releases to libraries.

My latest and greatest promotional idea is taking my book to Hawaii. Pretty brazen, don’t you think? I’m planning a trip to Hawaii next month and I’m trying to arrange a speaking gig for a writers group while I’m there. If I can make a connection, I’ll talk about SPAWN (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network) and I’ll teach something from my latest book, The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book.

5: Find ways to stay positive. As a writer, you are constantly setting yourself up for rejection. Your articles are rejected. Your writers group is sometimes too critical of your work. You are sometimes your worst critic when it comes to your writing. It’s hard to come by positive feedback.

Here’s how I conquer this writer’s curse.

• I display things in my office that make me feel accomplished and loved. There are family photos, treasured gifts from friends, a poem I wrote, signatures and framed book covers from some of my books and some of my best photography, for example. I also keep something nearby that emits a wonderful scent. Right now I have a honeysuckle candle next to my keyboard. It smells so good that I don’t even have to light it to enjoy the aroma.

• I also connect often with my most positive and supportive friends and family via brief emails or a quick phone call.

• I take mini-vacations almost every day. This is when I spend an hour walking amidst stands of oaks, along a nearby river, around a lake or at the beach.

• I frequently engage in something creative outside of writing. I spend time in my garden or working on a needlework project.

January 2006 is almost over. If you haven’t reestablished your momentum as a writer, it’s time that you did. It’s also an opportune time to add to your knowledge base as an author or freelance writer. Educate yourself. Order some of my valuable books now:

The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book
The Successful Writer’s Handbook
A Writer’s Guide to Magazine Articles
Over 75 Good Ideas for Promoting Your Book
How to Write a Successful Book Proposal in 8 Days or Less

http://www.matilijapress.com

Where do you write? Do you have an office where you always go to do your writing? Or do you like to take pen and pad to a lovely spot somewhere for inspiration? Maybe you write using your laptop during your lunch hour, while watching your kids’ soccer practice or when you should be relaxing in the evening.

I’m on a weekend getaway vacation as I write this morning on my brand new laptop. Yes, I’ve entered the technology age to an even greater degree. After all of these years, I finally have a laptop. I look forward to using this mini-computer when I travel to Hawaii next month and I’ll take it with me as I travel to various book festivals and workshops throughout the year. I’m jazzed at the thought of using the laptop to flesh out articles and chapters during the down time that always occurs on work-related trips. And I’m especially excited about having the ability to stay caught up with email when away from home.

This morning, while contemplating how much freedom laptops and other technological gadgetry offers writers today, another question came up. Where is the most unusual place you’ve ever written?

Do you remember, as a child, hiding under your covers at night with a flashlight so you could write even after bedtime? I recall doing some of my best work sitting on my grandmother’s porch steps looking out over the neighborhood and toward the glistening ocean waters in the distance. As an adult—in the 1970s—I carried a tablet and several pens everywhere I went. And I wrote almost everywhere I went. I’d ride along with my husband as he made the rounds related to his job and I’d sit in the car and write. I’ve written in truck yards, out behind packing plants, in the parking lots at rubbish companies and other union businesses up and down California. Whenever possible, I’d walk to a park or other appealing area to jot down article ideas, write a poem or add to a book I was working on. And then I’d go home and type it all up using my electric typewriter. Boy was I high tech when I upgraded from the old, borrowed manual typewriter.

Probably the most unusual place I’ve ever written is atop a mountain in the Los Padres National Forest while on a horse pack trip with my family. Whenever we’d stop to rest the horses and have a bite to eat, I’d plop down on the ground, lean against a saddle and jot my thoughts on a small pad. Many an article was spawned from these notes. I even incorporated some of them in a book, Hints For the Backyard Rider (A.S. Barnes, 1978)—out of print.

Where do you write? Where do you get inspiration? Where is the most unusual place you’ve written?

If you haven’t ordered your copy of The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book, you should do so now. If you are contemplating writing a book, it would behoove you to start carrying this book everywhere you go. Study it from cover to cover, highlight meaningful information and phrases and use it as a guide in writing your next book.
http://www.matilijapress.com/rightway.html

You subscribe to writers’ newsletters and magazines. You join publishers’ organizations. You even enroll in online and face-to-face classes. But do you follow through? Do you read those newsletters, network with others in the organizations and participate in the class assignments? Many of you—if you are honest with yourself—must truthfully respond with a sheepish, “no.”

As the president of SPAWN (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network), I’ve come to know three basic types of writers. There are those writers who strive to get the most out of every opportunity before them. Other writers might reach out and help themselves to information and resources only sporadically—when the inclination strikes or when they have a few spare minutes. Other writers and authors don’t participate, rarely take part, never contribute and usually eventually cancel their memberships and subscriptions. And do you know what they claim as the reason? They say, “I’m just not getting anything out of the magazine/organization/newsletter/class.” As even the intelligent say these days to express extreme sarcasm in the face of a stupid remark, “Well, Duh!”

So which writer are you? An even more important question is, which writer will you become this year? Reach out, study, learn, glean, participate, network and share and you will more likely succeed in meeting your writing/publishing goals in 2006. Continue your habit of staying to yourself, deleting newsletters instead of reading them, avoiding ordering the latest books or reading those books you’ve ordered and you will probably accomplish the same level of success that you did last year. Now that’s a gloomy thought, isn’t it?

I run a fulltime freelance writing business. I have 24 books to promote. I help to run SPAWN, a major networking organization for those interested in publishing. I write articles for magazines, work with clients on their writing projects and I usually have at least one new book in the works. Oh yes, I also write, The Market Update, a monthly 11 to 15-page newsletter for the SPAWN Web site, which involves a great deal of research. And I subscribe to nearly two dozen newsletters and magazines which I read from cover to cover. About a dozen of those newsletters are weeklies. I’m active on about half dozen Web site message boards. I review writing/publishing-related books which means I read several new books each year. I am in constant research mode for my clients and SPAWN members who have questions. Oh yes, and I keep trying to find new ways to put myself out there—like I’m doing with this blog.

You’ll notice that I reach out for three purposes. I want to sell books and to promote SPAWN. But I am also willing to give generously to other writers. I give through this blog, through the numbers of writing/publishing-related articles posted at my Web site and through my writing/publishing books. Sit down and read my books from cover to cover, apply what you learn therein and you will get back hundreds of times the price you paid for them. I also suggest to the writers that I meet, e-mail me your question and I will take the time to respond.

I urge you to put yourself out there—network with other writers, keep abreast of industry trends and continually educate yourself about your craft and your profession. I have two suggestions right off the bat. Join SPAWN (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network).
http://www.spawn.org

And order my new book and READ IT. The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book http://www.matilijapress.com/rightway.html

You might also be interested in reading two recent articles. See my article in the January 2006 edition of the PMA Independent, How to Work a Book Festival So It Works For You. Writing For Dollars ran my article, Booksigning Tips For Authors in their January 3, 2006 edition.

I just wanted to let you know that I’ll be teaching a 3-week workshop in Ventura, CA in February and March based on my new book, The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book.

Sign up at the Focus on the Masters Web site at http://www.focusonthemasters.com/classes/classes.html

Location: 1141 E. Main Street in Ventura, CA.
Dates: February 25, March 4 and March 18 at 1:30 to 4:30.
Cost: $80 per student.

If you can’t make it to the Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book workshop, order the book, The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book at http://www.matilijapress.com/rightway.html and learn on your own.

I am available via email to respond to your writing, publishing and book promotion questions. Contact me through this blog or at plfry620@yahoo.com. I reserve the option to request a fee for my time after I’ve given a reasonable chunk of free time. I have to say this because you can’t believe how some people will try to take advantage.

As a freelance writer or author, you probably set goals, meet them and set new ones several times throughout the year. Or maybe you casually consider setting goals and then never realize fulfillment. Well, here is your opportunity to get it right. The turning of the twelve-month calendar signals the traditional time for goal-setting or resolution-making.

What are your writing/publishing-related goals for 2006? Will you finally finish that book? Are you ready to start thinking about quitting your job and writing fulltime? Maybe this is the year you will try to hit the 1000 mark with book sales or double your freelance writing income. Perhaps your goal reflects a lifelong dream to be published in Woman’s Day Magazine (Reader’s Digest, Playboy, The Smithsonian) or to land one of the major publishers for your novel. Whether you want to write your first novel or children’s book or hit the big time with the book you wrote ten years ago, there’s more to success than just wishing for it.

The first step in reaching your goal is to commit to making it happen. If you’ve never met one of your goals or realized one of your resolutions, maybe it’s because you didn’t make anything resembling a real commitment to accomplishing it.

Secondly, draw up a plan. Uh oh, am I starting to lose some of you? I clearly heard one of you say, “What? I actually have to participate in making this happen?” Yes, you do. Your success is completely up to you. If and when you reach your goal, it is solely because you took the steps necessary—you drove the bus that took you from point A to point Z. But this also means that if you didn’t meet your goal, it was either because you didn’t fight hard enough for it or you set an unrealistic goal.

Your plan includes the actual steps and sacrifices (yes, I said “sacrifices”) that you believe it will take in order to reach your goal. Let’s say that you want to write a novel this year. What is a logical first step? Some of you will say to start writing. And this is a big beginning step. But it might be necessary first to rearrange your schedule in order to make time to write and this, often, takes some sacrifice. If you’ve read my book, The Successful Writer’s Handbook, you know my take on this concept. http://www.matilijapress.com/writershandbookpage.html

Remove all blocks, stops and obstacles that have been getting in your way all of these years or you’ll fail in your attempt to write that novel AGAIN this year. This might mean, cut back on your hours at work, stop watching so much TV, stay up an hour later at night or get up an hour or so earlier in the morning. And then earmark this extra time for writing. This is how you make a commitment. You make the time to write and then you sit down during that time period each day and actually write. Dedicate yourself to your goal and you will come closer to achieving it.

If your goal is to write a book for publication, your plan must include research and study. In order to be successful, you have to understand the publishing industry and the ramifications of your choices within the industry. To this end, I highly recommend that you read my latest book, The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book. http://www.matilijapress.com/rightway.com

Happy New Year. I’d love to hear from you as you launch on your journey of setting, working toward and meeting your goals for 2006.