Monday Mishmash

Monday Mishmash is hosted by Kelly Hashway.

1. Writing Class- So I've signed up on for a class on writing/life balance and so far it's been great. The instructor is a graduate of Seton HIll, where I'm doing my MFA. Keeping track of time has been a major part of the assignment, and it's been eye opening.
2. Marketing- Keeping track of time, I have learned that marketing has been my demise as a writer. Attempting to market leave me frustrated very quickly to the point that I can't think and it's hard to not just quit writing. This tells me I should quit marketing. The problem is you can't quit marketing completely, so I'm trying to work out a plan that involves some form of marketing I won't find draining.
3. The Indie Author Survival Guide- I picked up this on Amazon, and it has been very helpful. Don't let the name scare you. I think it could be helpful for authors outside of the indie circuit, and so far there isn't much of the "the man" rhetoric. It's help me see that over the past 5 years, my goals have changed and became more specific.
4. Mission statement- After realizing my goals have changed, I've written a mission statement. You will see more about this tomorrow.
5. Branding- Having a mission statement and clearer goals has helped me find my brand. Helping other writers is very important to me, because this community has helped me in every aspect of my life. I want to be known as a writer's writer, but if, you know me very well at all, you know this was always true. I started teaching in a blurb writing workshop in 2012. I've taught this class now more times than I can count. And only one of those sessions came to a close without a student writing me a thank you letter and inquiring about other classes. Teaching these classes helped me to connect to other writers and hopefully gave them a new skill. It cleared a path for me to make money writing without freelance/editing/or being a bestseller. It's true that much of what I write now is lesson plans or instructional, and it does involve some editing, but that didn't change anything. I started blogging in 2010. The first six months were just book reviews (which do help writers), and the reviews focused on what I learned which helped writers two fold. 1. The writer whose book I reviewed obviously got an extra line of press that day. But if I learned from the book other inexperienced writers could learn from my review. Within six months, I'd learned a lot about a quickly changing industry and realized that I knew a lot about writing due to my education. (I have a B.A. in English then studied law for a year with additional in Legal Research and Writing). I started writing informative posts either about craft or the industry. Teaching is as integral to my writing journey as writing is. Now that I know this, I just have to figure out how to make it the backbone of my marketing plan.