SFFMP 130: Better Marketing, More Productivity, and Turning Your Writing Hobby into a Career with Monica Leonelle

Today, we interviewed young adult urban fantasy and paranormal romance author Monica Leonelle. In addition to writing fiction, she also blogs at Prose on Fire and writes the non-fiction “Growth Hacking for Storytellers” series. We talked about improving productivity for writers and some of the basics of marketing that get overlooked in the urgency to just make more sales.

Here are a few more details of what we discussed:

  • Going from writing 1,000 to 3,500 words an hour.
  • How doing some extensive pre-planning (world-building and creating characters) before getting started can make the writing process smoother.
  • Using “thematic” world building as a way to help discover motivations for characters and also various factions in your worlds.
  • Outlining stories and scene beats before sitting down to write for the day.
  • Breaking up your goals into manageable chunks (i.e. I’m going to write 15 or even 8 minutes today rather than starting out saying you’re going to write for 2 hours).
  • Setting yourself up to meet your goals by having a good mindset.
  • How important is a regular schedule for productivity?
  • Monica’s Spanish translation of one of her books and whether it’s been worthwhile.
  • When it comes to marketing, giving out samples to get new readers to try you rather than simply trying to go straight to the sale.
  • Moving a person from being a reader to a fan to a true fan or evangelist.
  • Doing things to “activate your fans” to get them to take actions to help you get the word out.
  • Whether you should focus your efforts on your most recent release or if the back list should always get attention.
  • Whether permafree is still working as a way to get “samples” out there.
  • Taking your writing efforts from hobby to career.

You can find Monica online on her website or at Prose on Fire. If you’ve found her advice useful, you can check out her books such as 8-Minute Writing Habit: Create a Consistent Writing Habit That Works With Your Busy Lifestyle and Prosperous Creation: Make Art and Make Money at the Same Time.

 

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