Lindsay - January 7, 2021For this week’s show, which we recorded right before the end of the year, we took a look at what worked and what didn’t for authors and publishers in 2020. We also discussed some of the things we learned from the strange year, and then went into our writing, marketing, and publishing plans for 2021.
Here are a few highlights from the show:
- Jo found Habitica to be useful for staying on track.
- Andrea dealt with health issues but had good luck putting out courses for authors.
- Lindsay lost a few Patreon supporters who couldn’t afford the service anymore but had a record income year overall.
- No surprise, but traditional publishers struggled with transitioning their marketing efforts online when in-person events were all canceled.
- For indie authors who had the time and ability to make things work this year, they found they were uniquely suited for marketing and selling online and focusing on digital products (we’ve been doing it all along, after all).
- We debated if things will ever go “back to normal,” or if people will continue to favor digital products and online book shopping even after vaccines roll out and Covid is on the wane.
- We also talked about whether you really need to spend a lot of time tinkering with ads (especially Amazon ads) or if you can tinker a bit at the beginning of a campaign, pick the winners, and then leave things running with only occasional check-ins.
- Both Jo and Lindsay are planning epic fantasy series in 2021 and neither has plans to rapid release what will doubtless be longer books. We’ll keep you updated on how things go as the year progresses.
What are your author plans for 2021?
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Love your podcast!
I started my sole proprietorship in 2014 and after all this time, I think a babysitter makes more money than I do. So I plan to increase production. Here are my 2021 writing goals.
1. Write a novel a month (50,000 – 70,000 words)
2. Publish a companion short story to the novel every week.
3. Every month publish something like Smith’s Monthly, but different. Maybe call it Connie’s Collection and put the novel and companion stories in it.
4. Write three monthly novels in a row, in the same universe, so I can bundle them.
5. Post free chapters on my website and put Google Adsense on those pages.
6. I will edit as I write because I hate revision and I’m a slow writer. The editing gives me time to ruminate.
7. Stop restarting my website and starting over.
8. Keep Heinlein’s rules handy.
Now I just have to do it. LOL
Connie Myres
Hey, Connie!
This sounds super ambitious! I might just focus on the novels. I’ve found those make orders of magnitude more for me than short stories. I only do shorts for bonus material these days and only 2-4 a year maybe. And that’s as a full-time author!
Glad you’re ambitious and have plans though!
Lindsay
Thanks for the advice, Linday!