Any
business, small or large, will regularly review and evaluate output and
productivity. What is selling? What isn’t?
Is the reward commensurate with the time expended to produce it? (Okay, this is a perennial issue for all
creators, not just writers. Creating can
be hugely draining and time consuming; also frustrating and difficult, as well
as spiritually satisfying. And we
aren’t supposed to be doing it for the money (!) But that is for another
article….) Back to the topic. So how
many writers analyse their output in terms of volume and results? For example, have you ever gone through your
records detailing work sent out (you do keep records, don’t you?) to ascertain
the ratio of work published to work submitted?
My
core work is writing short pony books for children and teenagers, which I have
done for more years than I care to remember.
However, I am a big advocate of not putting all your eggs in one basket,
so have always tried to establish a parallel writing career that is independent
of this; particularly since the publishing industry is so fickle and
dynamic. I have written articles, comic
strips, poetry and advertising copy, but my first love was always the short
story form. When I started to analyse my
non-pony book output, I discovered that on average only 12% of my speculative
submissions resulted in publication, and this was consistent over several
years. Was I producing quantity rather
than quality? Or failing to target my
work effectively? Investigating further, I undertook a breakdown of the
successful output, to see if any trends were apparent. The results were illuminating. I spent a lot of time and energy writing
short stories but had disappointingly few accepted. Repeated editorial feedback
indicated that my fiction lay uncomfortably between “commercial” and “literary”
– a situation I guess many writers will be familiar with. However, to my surprise, writing features and
articles, which I had never seen as my strength, had actually proved more successful
and earned more money. This boosted my
confidence writing non-fiction, and as a result of this analysis, I decided to
concentrate more on feature writing.
Being
a glutton for punishment, I then scrutinised competitions. I had given myself three years to make some
headway with short story writing competitions.
Where had it got me? In my best
year, I’d been awarded 2 prizes out of a total of 18 competitions entered. The following year, I’d more than doubled my
output, and entered 46 competitions and was awarded one prize. Ouch!
I hadn’t realised I’d entered so many and when I totted up the total
entry fees, I was shocked. Ouch again.
Admittedly, I had recycled some of the unsuccessful competition entries,
and several of these were, eventually, published elsewhere. But I was in a situation where I needed to
pay the bills, so in terms of time and money, entering competitions was a poor
use of both.
So
what did I learn? Well, what you enjoy
writing and what you are good at writing are not always the same. And that can be quite hard to accept. Writers need to be flexible and open to
trying anything. You can’t afford to be
precious, especially if you intend to rely on income from writing in the
future. I also learned what I should be
doing to use my time efficiently and effectively. (Note the use of the word ‘should’. I am still the mistress of procrastination!)
I
would urge any writer, particularly if you are seeking to earn an income from
your words, to regularly undertake this kind of analysis and evaluation. Writers need to think about their occupation
as a business, and successful businesses understand what they are producing,
what sells (or doesn’t) and the reasons for it.
Or at least to try. And from a
creative viewpoint, it can actually be quite a liberating process. It is easy for writers to pigeonhole
themselves, and discovering that you have hidden talents is always exciting.
About the author:
Jane had her first
short story published in a UK pony magazine when she was 14. Her latest title, Valentine Horse, is available from
Amazon. A passionate cat lover, Jane is
donating all author royalties from her e-book Coming Home to the charity Cats
Protection. See the trailer here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aweX0y3lvL4&feature=youtu.be
Amazon author
page: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Jane-Ayres/e/B004MWCTD8/
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