Some Valuable Advice I Learned Through the Years

 

by Heather Weidner

I am so grateful for all the encouragement and support from my writerly friends over the years. They have been so gracious with their time and advice. It’s been invaluable to me on this writing journey, and I have learned so much from their experiences. Here are some of the ideas that resonated with me.

• Mary Burton taught me that the job of a writer is to write your next book. It’s so easy to get entangled in marketing, book events, social media, and everyday life that you forget that you need to keep writing.
• Alan Orloff explained BICFOK to me, and it works. (It means Backside in Chair and Fingers on Keyboard.) I found that I need to write every day if I want to be able to finish my novel. 
• Donna Andrews taught me the importance of daily word goals. This helps me stay on track when I’m working on my first draft.
• Not every reader is going to buy, read, or like your book. Your book is competing with millions of books for attention. You need to target your book marketing toward people who read your genre. The good news is that readers read and buy more than one book a year (month, week…).
• You will not be everyone’s cup of tea. There will be bad or not-so-good reviews. Learn what you can from them and move on. For some reason, authors tend to gloss over the hundreds of great reviews and fixate on the one icky one.  
• You need to be social on social media. It takes time to build fans, followers, and readers. Don’t be that “buy my book” author all the time. Readers want to know about you and your interests. Use your platform to network and share others’ successes and celebrations.
• Your email/newsletter list is valuable. You own it. It takes care and feeding to grow it. If your social media platforms shut down, you have no way of contacting your followers. Make sure you have a sign-up option on your website and don’t forget to collect emails at in-person events.
• Writing is more than creating books and cashing royalty checks. It’s work, and it’s a business. If you’re serious about your writing, you need to treat it like a business.
• Don’t be afraid to try new ideas to improve your writing or book marketing techniques. There’s not one perfect way to do things. You need to find what works for you.

What other ideas would you add to my list, and who gave you the most valuable writing advice?

Through the years, Heather Weidner has been a cop’s kid, technical writer, editor, college professor, software tester, and IT manager. She writes the Pearly Girls Mysteries, the Delanie Fitzgerald Mysteries, The Jules Keene Glamping Mysteries, and The Mermaid Bay Christmas Shoppe Mysteries.

She is a member of Sisters in Crime: National, Central Virginia, Chessie, Guppies, and Grand Canyon Writers, International Thriller Writers, and James River Writers. She lives in Central Virginia with her husband and a pair of Jack Russell terriers.