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Progress

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The poem Progress by Mark Anderson Smith with a greyscale background of a wooden grid

I wrote last week that I was setting a new target to write 5,000 words a day.

Why do I do this to myself?

The results are in. I think I managed a thousand words one day that first half week, then I’ve managed 4,790 this week.

That’s not even a fifth of what I’d imagined might be possible.

I think it’s okay though. I’ve written several new scenes and expanded on both the character and plot for a main character in this new season. I’ve also broken out my initial synopsis and plan, using Scrivener, so that every key scene I’ve planned is in order, so that it will be easier to focus on a specific character’s story while writing.

If you are interested, after splitting out the synopsis and looking at what I feel I can actually use from my initial writing, and including the scenes written this week, I now have 30,292 words. My goal for Season Two is 120,000 words which would give 6 20K episodes. A bit shorter than Fallen Warriors, but with my publishers hat on, cheaper to print!

Since I started using Scrivener, I’ve found it really helpful for dealing with the complexity of the stories I want to tell. I can group scenes by chapters and by episodes, keeping the TV theme I’m using for the Fallen Warriors series. I can search for a character name and filter so that only scenes where they appear are shown. This allows me to read through their story and check I’ve covered everything I need to happen. Also so I can check their story is consistent all the way through.

I can add notes to each scene so i can remember why I wrote something, or add hyperlinks to research I’ve done. I can backup each scene individually as many times as I want. And I’m probably not even scratching the surface of what the application is capable of.

I’m still aiming to work up to 5,000 words a day, but am conscious that might not be possible unless I try something radical like switching to dictation. I’ve been looking into Dragon speech to text software, but at £350 for the professional edition which allows you to record and transcribe later, I’m hesitant to shell out that cash.

I think 2,000 words a day might be a more realistic daily target for the next month as another issue I’m facing is that I need to spend time setting up marketing and promotion of my next book: Double Your Salary. There is no point in publishing a book if I don’t make an effort to promote it, and it makes a lot of sense to start that promotion now.

I’ve been able to look at what writing 2,000 words a day might mean. I could finish the first draft of Fallen Warriors Season Two by mid August. That might then allow me to edit and ready for publication by Christmas, or if not, the three year anniversary of Season One’s publication date.

I would be happy with that.

I thank God for the progress I’ve been able to make. I’m conscious I’m still not really well. Finished the course of antibiotics, but am still coughing and my sinuses are full. If I could complete 10,000 words over next week, I would be delighted with that, especially if at the same time, I’m able to make progress towards promoting Double Your Salary.

I would appreciate your prayers.

Progress

I tell myself
my novel is a book
made up of words.
The first word
followed by another,
each word building
on the words before,
creating something of beauty,
of purpose,
of insight.
The novel does not yet exist.
But it will,
if I keep writing,
one word at a time,
until it is finished.

Copyright 2019 Mark Anderson Smith

A new target

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Photo of street map of York

I’ve taken a couple of months away from contracting to work on the sequel to Fallen Warriors and ready another book for publication. I ended up needing almost all of the first month to ready that book and was finally able to send it to the printers at the weekend and am now focusing back on Fallen Warriors.

I like big targets for my writing. Huge, seemingly impossible goals that are quite at odds with how I tackle other projects. I had in mind that I would write 5,000 words a day and produce a 100,000 word draft by the end of May, then perhaps even go on to write the first draft of the final book of the trilogy in June.

I started actually writing today and managed 1,000 words.

Considering that I’m trying to switch my gears from editing mode to creative mode, that might not be too bad. In the last month of “editing” Fallen Warriors, I actually first draft wrote most of the final chapters. They were then edited, they were proof read, but the story just flowed out as ten years of subconscious thought made itself known. That was while I was working full time.

Over four weeks I virtually wrote 2,000 words a day in three hours or less. It should be possible to write 5,000 words a day when I’m working full time at it.

In theory.

5,000 words a day seems like a goal worth pursuing. The first draft of any book doesn’t have to be perfect. It just needs to get the story out and since with each of my books there has been a process of rewriting and editing, I know I can and will improve on the first draft. Also, I have always needed to delete scenes and chapters. So why waste time carefully writing scenes that may eventually have to be cut?

I already know I’m not going to have all of June available, other commitments have taken priority. It might take me a week or two to get up to speed, but that’s okay. My main goal is to tell a gripping and enjoyable story. If I can do that faster, fantastic.

If it takes a bit longer, that’s also okay. I’ll be posting daily updates from Thursday onwards. Tomorrow is a different kind of day, but more about that later…

Instagram

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View from Cliffords Tower in York looking towards the Minster

I signed up to Instagram months ago on the recommendation of fellow writers. Followed a few people, but just didn’t get it. I’ve struggled to know how to use Facebook and Twitter, and Instagram seemed like just another social media platform that I didn’t have time to use. Until a couple of weeks ago…

Turns out I quite enjoy using Instagram and maybe I do “get it”. At least, I get how I can use it.

I drove down to York (taking our electric car which may inspire another post shortly) for the weekend to do some research for the sequel to Fallen Warriors. I wanted to walk through the city, remind myself of how it feels to be there, and scout out locations to use in the next book.

As you’d expect I took a bunch of photos, and thought I might share some of them on Instagram as the weekend progressed. I added some short descriptions, not really understanding the potential the descriptions gave, until I posted this one of Monk Bar: https://www.instagram.com/p/BxkwnuUBiF_/

I hashtagged it #FallenWarriors, wondering if hashtags work the same way as on Twitter. Turns out they do! And of course, descriptions are searchable…

I’ve tried posting photos on Twitter and on Facebook, but neither platform really seems to fit for what I’m trying to convey. Instagram does. I want to be able to post a photo that intrigues me, a scene that has captured my attention, and share a short sentence about that photo. I also want to drop clues about my books, things that only readers will understand. Add cryptic notes as hints towards what I’m planning to write. Maybe even lead people up a blind alley, after all, it’s all about the journey, right?

And there is no pressure. I can post one photo a day, or not, and regardless, everything I’ve posted will be there for people to stumble across. Unlike Twitter which feels every time I use it like I’m trying to drink from a fire hose!

So, if you’d like to see what I’m up to on Instagram, you can find me here: http://www.instagram.com/my100goals/

I intend to post at least one photo each weekday for the next month and then review. Look forward to connecting with you on Instagram!

Uphill most of the way

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I started a new contract last week and now have a longer walk to work after the train gets into Waverley Station in Edinburgh. It’s not actually uphill all the way, but first thing in the morning those steps were quite daunting the first week. At the end of my second week I’ve managed to take a few two at a time. Maybe in a few more weeks I won’t be out of breath at the top…

I sent out my first ever proper mailing email last week and am planning to do the same again today. If you didn’t receive an email, that’s either because you haven’t signed up using my new process using the link at the top of the page:

(Don’t try clicking here, go to the menu at the top of the page!)

…or because you did sign up and your email client/provider is shunting my emails into your spam or junk folder. Please do check! If you do find emails from me and you want to stop them being flagged as spam, add my email to your email clients address book.

I had set what I thought was a reasonable stretch target of 1000 words a day for this week. I failed miserably. I managed an hour and a half, but ended up getting bogged down in editing, moving scenes about.

It didn’t help that I’m meeting friends on the train and I’d rather catch up with them than write. Also that I’m conscious that friends are emailing and I’m not managing to respond. Or that starting a new contract always takes it out of me for the first few weeks.

By mid week I was disillusioned and tired.

I think I need to admit that I’m not done with the adjusting I started last month. There are too many interactions between characters in the scenes I’ve written to allow me to move on until I’ve got it all in order. Hopefully then I can move from editing mode back into writing mode and begin to make real progress.

So, my commitment for next week is simply to spend an hour each day getting what I’ve written in it’s logical order so I can start to continue the story. Fallen Warriors Season Two will make progress!

Analysis of Sales of The Great Scottish Land Grab Part Two

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Yesterday I started an analyis of what worked and what failed as I attempted to market my first fiction ebook: The Great Scottish Land Grab.

Today I want to look in more detail at what I was doing to market the book and what results it had.

The chart below shows the lifetime sales of Land Grab book one since June 2014:

First thing to point out is that Orange/yellow shows sales where I got paid, blue is sales of the book after I set the price to free.

One of my biggest mistakes was not making book one free right away. Instead I priced it at 99p.

I was marketing Land Grab every single day during the summer of 2014. I printed up business cards, approached random strangers at village fairs and at train stations. I posted on Facebook and Twitter and while I sold over a hundred copies, look at the difference in numbers from October 2016… I did almost no marketing at all for the three months from October 2016 and people still found and downloaded the book!

I wonder how many more downloads I might have had in 2014 if I had enticed people in with a free offer.

The next two charts show life-time sales for books two and three respectively:

The numbers are not huge so I can’t make any hard and fast statements about what worked and what didn’t work, but it does seem to me that releasing Land Grab as a series did allow people to try at a low price and then free, and then go on to buy the other books in the series.

Both in 2014 and since October 2016, I’ve seen people go on to buy book two and three after downloading book one.

The chart for the full trilogy looks very different:

The fact is that I still carry business cards with me and still give them out or leave them in cafe’s and other venues for people to find. The business cards only advertise the full novel and I think that people who are intrigued by the cover image on the cards or maybe by something I’ve said will go on to buy the full novel.

Contrast the final chart with the first three and you see that huge dead area from November 2015 till August 2016. Without advertising I don’t see sales.

That’s a really important statement. Early this year I had an offer from Facebook. A £30 credit towards Facebook advertising. I used £12 of that voucher to advertise The Great Scottish Land Grab and later worked out that I made a slight profit off the back of it. (In reality a full profit as Facebook gave me a free voucher, but looking to see whether I would make a profit in future, it was small, but there.)

Tomorrow I’m going to try and round all this up into some sage advice to anyone thinking about how they can sell their book.

A Quarter Quell

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Today will be my 25th post in my 100 day challenge to write 100 words a day. I decided I would review my progress every 25 days.

So far I’ve made good progress, managing to publish at least 100 words a day. I’ve written almost every day, excluding Sundays when I take a day off which means for the 21 days I’ve actually been writing my average daily word count has been 410 words.

However, that only includes published posts. I had a look at draft posts I’ve added, but not published – there are 24 of those – and taking those into account I’ve written an average of 600 words a day.

Total words written and published: 8617
Total words written inc draft: 12,753

All this in a little over three weeks which is encouraging as one of the reasons I wanted to restart this blog was to get into a daily habit of writing.

I haven’t been keeping track of time spent writing though. I timed myself last night and estimate from that that I’m spending 15 minutes writing and editing every 100 words. If that is accurate, I’ve spent 31 hours writing on this blog over those 21 days.

That’s not great. Ultimately I want to spend the bulk of my writing time working on my next novel and if I only need to spend 15 minutes on this blog each day, that means I’m losing 75 minutes that could be towards my novel word count. I only posted two posts during this time that were exactly 100 words long.

Over the next 25 days I should make an effort to time myself while writing and make sure that I’m prioritising time to work towards my longer term writing goals.

It’s worth my noting what impact my blog is having.

I’ve had one blog post which has been highly relevant to a lot of people and am still seeing people turning to it for information. However, the rest of my posts are falling into a vacuum:

Ultimately I want to build up a readership, but will have to do some research into what people actually want to read.

It might make sense to focus on posting flash fiction to draw readers who may want to buy my novels, but if so, I need to find a way to do that. If I’m going to market myself and advertise, it would make more sense to advertise my novels directly.

That’s enough for now… If you have any feedback on this blog, do let me know.