The Truth About Being a Writer in 2012

Writing is the best job in the world.

What other job encourages you to be who you are, explore life daily, create something from nothing, build a limitless future for you and those you love, while adding to your legacy with every word you write?

Without construction tools, loud noise, or substantial waste, writers create something from nothing that can last an eternity. And the modern writer’s ideas can endure even if they never see print. Print On Demand and eBook technology means your work won’t go out of print, even if books were suddenly to become as archaic as eight track tapes.

I know you love books. Me too. Always will. Yet, in many ways, books as we’ve known them are a primitive way of delivering ideas. It is easy enough to imagine a world in the not-so-distant future that has developed a collective amnesia toward the notion that we must be able to turn the pages, or smell the paper and binding, or feel the texture of a book cover in order for a book to have value. Anyone can publish to e-readers. That alone is not remarkable.

When writers learn to anticipate the needs of their audience, take the time to nurture their crowd and deliver something unique and valuable, there are no limits to the worlds writers can build or the amount of money they, or you, can make.

That’s as remarkable as the time we live in.

Writers want attention. They long for their words to be heard and recognized, yet the modern writer is fortunate enough to have what no artists in world history have ever had — instant access to a global audience.

With easy-to-use and freely-available tools, you have access to worldwide attention in minutes. Learn how to harness attention, then convert it to currency. The world will read, celebrate and reward your words.

The same tools that make it easy to get online make it simple to see the reward. Sales letters are no longer subject to risky postage and printing costs because you can place them on an online landing page in minutes. The same skills that get people to read your copy can get people to share it — driving traffic to your site, converting readers into buyers, buyers into fans, and fans into devoted evangelists. It won’t happen overnight, but stick with it and it will.

I know many writers who are also millionaires. You can be one too.

Despite the myth of the tortured writer (which I don’t buy at all), the writers I know are among the happiest people I’ve ever met. You could argue that  the money makes them happy, and I would agree that money definitely helps! But I think the true source of their happiness is rising each morning to do what they love — write.

Writing for a living is truly remarkable, but only if you do the hard work to establish yourself, get known, and fuel the attention that will drive you forward.

How to Succeed as a Writer

To succeed as a writer you must not only have passion, you must also be clear about what the profession requires. Ambling through years as a freelancer will make your life difficult. You will chase clients, worry about money, and postpone your dreams for far too long, finally wondering where the time went and why you’ve done nothing for yourself?

Passion points you toward a destination. It may not give you an exact road-map, telling you step-by-step how to get there, but it can be a picture-perfect postcard in your mind, helping you focus on where you’re going, then giving you the drive and determination required to get there.

Ask yourself: What do you want most from your writing career?

Your goals will change as your career evolves, but it’s best to have a vision before getting started. Would you like to become well known and build a stable of freelance clients to help you pay the bills and fund your passion projects? Or maybe you’d rather write the Great American Novel? Maybe you want to build information products, coaching others for a large return on your investment of time?

Whatever your goals, passion must fuel them. Chase the money and your audience will know. But feel true passion for everything you create and you will create loyal fans who will be happy to buy from you over and over again.

The common denominator for nearly all successful people I know is passion.

True passion followed by drive and determination lead right to results. And a steady string of results will always lead to success. You’ve probably read enough books by now to know that success is the safest way to a happily ever after

What Being a Writer Is

Being a writer is hard.

It’s important we get that out of the way immediately. False illusions leave no benefit behind.

Too many writers start their online adventure with delusions of grandeur, believing they will get discovered overnight, and secure a strong stable of steady clients or an enormous audience hanging on their every word, even though they’ve not taken the time to build one. Then, a month into their new profession, they’re scratching their heads wondering where all the readers or clients are.

The good news is, building your online identity does get easier.

What starts hard is soon simple. Tools that are difficult to use and concepts that seem difficult to master become as easy as learning your ABCs. Connections that seemed hard to make at first, become as simple as pressing send.

Then one day, seemingly out of the blue, you will go from having few opportunities, constant struggle, and a crushing schedule, to turning down lucrative offers on a daily basis.

But you must build the road brick-by-brick, and then walk it step-by-step. Even if you are fortunate as I was to have friends and colleagues to help pour the concrete and walk beside me, you will be there for every moment of labor and difficult step forward.

Yet, it’s all worth it, even the struggle. Better than the eventual success is the constant reward of self-discovery. There’s no better way to know yourself than through the words you lay on the page. You could spend years on a psychiatrist’s sofa, but it would cost you thousands of dollars and you wouldn’t know yourself nearly as well as you would when tapping into the human emotions that drive buyer behavior, or set your hero on a journey and put words into the mouths of characters you’ve created.

Sitting at your desk, then picking up the pen, or letting your fingers fly across the keyboard, will teach you an infinity about who you are. Pay attention, and it is immeasurably satisfying; more so for me than the many premiums I’ve earned in my short success as a writer.

Being a writer has helped me grow, not just as a writer, but as a person, husband, parent, friend, and partner to any team I’m lucky enough to be part of. Being a writer is awesome without measure, especially if you’re smart enough to know what being a writer isn’t.

What Being a Writer Isn’t

Being a writer isn’t easy.

If you’ve bought into any of the pixie dust sold online that shows an entrepreneur kicking it with his laptop on sandy beaches, exchanging his golden thoughts for money, wrapped in serenity and swallowed by overnight success — I’m sorry, that writer isn’t real.

The writers I know making it big are some of the hardest working people I’ve ever met in any profession.

I’m the first to say that if you make it, it’ll be worth every minute of misery. Being a successful writer can make you happier than you ever imagined. But I’ll also be the first to tell you the truth. At times, carving a living from copy is like climbing a chalkboard Everest with a handful of nails.

But you don’t need to make writing more difficult than it needs to be. Know what to expect and it will make the hard work a little easier. Understand what being a writer is, and what it isn’t, so you don’t reach for a romanticized notion of what it might be, rather than the reality of what it must be if you expect to succeed.

You’ll have days when you have nothing to say.

You’ll have days when you feel so empty you’ll swear  nothing‘s left inside you.

You’ll have days when clients are asking for revisions on your best copy as the pillars of your personal world start to crumble around you.

Being a writer isn’t glamorous, at least not at first. Perhaps one day you’ll fly first class and live from your laptop, lounging on the sunny beaches of Brazil. But before you do that, expect to wear out the paint on your keyboard, drain your bank account, several times, and fall into fissures of frustration, infinitely deeper than you ever imagined.

Without great risk, there is no great reward. Work hard and be ready for both.

The Future is Written by Writers

Future writers will look back at this time and marvel.

Before the Internet, writers needed publishers, publicists, marketers — entire teams devoted to ensuring their words reached as many eyeballs as possible. What the extraordinary, yet still primitive, Internet started, chat rooms, forums, blogs, and social media have nurtured into a promising future, pregnant with possibility for anyone who can weave words.

Writers didn’t change the game, but they’ll be writing many of the new rules.

Communication fuels the online engine of commerce. Businesses need content to connect with their audiences, hold their attention, and help the audience spread their messaging to other like-minded friends, colleagues, and acquaintances. A working writer who knows how to navigate the Web and network throughout its many channels will never starve for work. Yet, once a solid foundation has been established, a writer never need trade his time for money again, at least not directly.

Writers are getting the power that others once held.

Once upon a time, published writers surrendered their copyright. Not anymore. Now, smart writers will have a choice. They can choose a mainstream publisher who will help them with their marketing and publicity in fair exchange for profit and copyright, or they can self-publish and produce their words as products.

Self-published writers must assume all the responsibility for their marketing and stacking assets higher and higher until they’re finally writing whatever they want, whenever they want. Make no mistake, this isn’t easy and isn’t for every writer, but at least we now have the option.

The future looks brilliant for writers, and I couldn’t be more excited. I’m also excited that you’re coming along for the ride, and that together we might realize your unlimited potential.

The Unlimited Potential of the Writer

The modern writer has unlimited potential.

Learn to write well and internalize the rules of audience engagement. This will lead you toward tremendous personal satisfaction and wealth, so long as you’re willing to build it.

Three non-negotiable skills you must learn are:

• Build your audience
• Consistently add to your portfolio of assets
• Learn basic entrepreneurial and online skills

Nothing is more important than building your audience. If you can’t do this, you will be reliant upon ye olde gatekeepers. This has no bearing on the quality of your work, but it does mean you must play by their rules, if you can even get their attention.

Build your own audience of avid fans and publishers will come to you. This means you need to engage in social media. For most people, it means you need to start a blog, (or even a microblog such as Tumblr) at a minimum. You will also likely benefit from other forms of social media including Twitter, Facebook, and video at websites such as YouTube. You must find where your audience is and build your brand in those places.

One of the best benefits of building your online audience is that once you bond with your readers, they can become evangelical in spreading your word and helping you grow. It’s one thing to write in isolation, or to a small crowd, but build a large following, and before long you will see an exponential effect where everything you write spreads with the speed of a sneeze.

Once you have an audience, you must build assets to keep them happy. You can spend your life writing for clients, but if you have more than a single creative molecule inside you, which you do, the novelty will wear thin and you will find yourself wanting to write for yourself.

Especially, as you see other writers in your community making good money and getting great attention. And to make matters worse, many of those writers won’t be nearly as talented as you!

Building assets may sound complicated or rather businesslike, but it’s easier than you probably imagine. Every website you start, email list you build, book you write, or product you create, is an asset that can make you money even when you’re not on the clock.

Knowing how to leverage those assets is where your basic entrepreneurial and online skills come into play. Some people are born entrepreneurs. They smell opportunity and embrace risk without flinching. For others, it’s learned behavior.

Building your business is something you can master, but before you do, you’ll have to make it through the first year.

The First Year

Your first year will be rough.

Of course, I base this on my own experience, but I also base it on that of everyone I’ve met online, both successful and those who have long since surrendered.

Most of the online millionaires I know used good writing to get where they are, but none did so in less than two years. For most, it took most of them at least three. Be ready for the challenge, and willing to see it through, and the finish line will feel like a first kiss after a long courtship.

You’ll start hopeful; your voice strong and your drive stronger. Whether your audience is small or large, you will feel the unique, yet immeasurable, reward of having someone pay attention to you.

Word will spread; your list will grow.

You will fall to sleep at night thinking of the many opportunities that lay ahead. Books, movies, clients, a rapidly-climbing hourly rate. Your dreams may come true, but they won’t happen fast. Because things take longer than you thought they would, and you’re working harder than you probably ever have, you will find yourself wandering down the lonely road of discouragement.

This is the hardest part to get through. Which is why so many people give up.

Millions of blogs appear each year, though most are quickly abandoned. It’s easy to start with the best intentions and undiluted dreams. But it is also easy to get distracted, discouraged, and eventually, despondent. I could probably count the success stories I’ve seen first hand, but could not count the friends and colleagues I’ve lost along the way, who started out strong only to wither upon the blogging vine.

For most writers and bloggers, the six-month slog seems to be hardest. This is perfectly normal and will probably happen to you. Break through that first wall and things tend to get easier. Just know, starting is simple. It’s making it through the first year that’s truly difficult. Taking time to prepare mentally now can make all the difference in the world later.

Mental Preparation

Mental fitness is everything.

Start out ill-prepared, and as much as I hate to say it, you’ll end up like so many other writers, surrendering your dreams to a stack of manuscripts gathering digital dust on your hard drive.

You must have the right mindset to achieve your dreams, but you also need it to build the profitable business and online writing career you deserve. It may seem slightly pie-in-the-sky, but it’s precisely what I’ve done for myself. You can do it too.

The key to getting it together is having the right blend of goals, timelines, and conviction.

Goals get you where you’re going. They’re not a map to tell you how to get there; they are the mile markers along the way. Your timeline is important because it stamps your goal with specificity, and that specificity makes it easier to drive toward your destination in a straight line.

I’d love to see Italy. I’ve wanted to go there since I was a teenager, but I’ve not yet been. Saying I’d like to visit Italy someday is a goal; saying I’d like to see the canals of Venice by the winter of 2014 is a timeline.

Attach your goal to a timeline and it will far more likely become your reality.

It’s impossible to make it through without a fair amount of conviction. Many people in your life – friends, family, and even those you thought had your back no matter what, will wonder to your face and behind your back whether you’ve completely lost you marbles.

No, you haven’t.

You are saner than they, for you realize where the future is going and are making a conscious decision to get there ahead of the crowd. Yet, just because you’re doing the right thing and know it in your heart, doesn’t mean it will be easy. And when things are at their worst and you feel like you’re sinking, only faith in yourself and your decisions will keep you afloat.

Mental preparation is key. If you don’t feel as though you have the right mindset for this adventure right now, that’s okay. Take time, read up, breathe deep. You can always return to the dream later. But under no circumstances should you start before you are ready to see it through.

For those with the stamina to see their dream through, though, I assure you, the hard work is worth every ounce of sweat and every tear of frustration that you shed. You will be living a life that’s easy to love, the kind most people only get to dream about.

It Will Be Worth It

My first two years online were testament to the fire and ice truth of being an entrepreneur. Most millionaires chew a few mouthfuls of gravel before they ever sip champagne.

But that’s what being an entrepreneur is — living a few years of your life like most people would never dare, so you can spend the rest of your life living like most people never will.

Wherever you are, keep going, so long as it’s forward. No matter how hard it might be, it’s worth it. If it’s truly difficult, keep going. Chances are, you’re at the edge of a breakthrough.

I’ve no idea how many nights I fell to sleep with a knot in my stomach, then rose in the morning with soaking bloodshot eyes, steeped in weary and worry (more than I’d care to admit).

Always do your best, even when doing the most insignificant of jobs. Every success makes you stronger and drives you forward. You never trip over the mountain; it’s the pebbles in your path that stand in your way. Dodge enough and soon you’ll learn to waltz right by.

Will it be worth it?

Absolutely. But only if you believe, refuse to surrender, and promise yourself that even if you fall down 1,324 times, you’re willing to stand up 1,325.