You are a writer. If your work is good enough, people will throw money at you, right?

Yes, they will, but they need to know that you exist. And this means you need a

marketing plan. What Marketing Works Best? All marketing works. But you need

keep going, even when you don’t seem to get any results.

Let’s imagine a couple of scenarios. Writer A wants to be a full-time writer. She

you know that to do this you need to sell X number of items and sell one

Book proposal per year. Writer A knows that in addition to writing the plays,

need to market them. Writer A creates a marketing plan. It takes 30 minutes

his computer. You decide that you will submit five article proposals a week, and

she will research and write a book proposal.

She sets aside the time to do those things in her daily schedule. She knows these

tasks are not negotiable. Whatever happens, she will perform those tasks.

daily. Even on your worst day, when your car breaks down, your child needs to go

to the hospital, and has a fatal migraine.

Writer B also wants to be a full-time writer. Like Writer A, she knows she will have

sell X items and sell a book proposal. Writer B doesn’t make a plan. She gets

I started writing an article proposal. She realizes she needs to gather research

resources and send five emails.

The next morning, you download your emails and get instantly depressed. Nobody has

answered. You decide that you will give potential sources a few more days to respond.

She goes on with her life. You will get to write when your sources respond.

A week later, one of the sources turns to writer B, who suddenly remembers

I was researching an article proposal. Reread your notes. The idea has

deflated. He is no longer interested in writing it.

The point of these two scenarios is that real life is complicated. It’s easy to lose track

what you’re doing if you don’t have the process written down somewhere. This

means, create a plan and then create checklists and mark them every day to

be sure to keep working on the plan.

QUESTIONS TO ANSWER IN YOUR MARKETING PLAN

=> Q: What kind of writing do you want to do and sell?

Make a list: copywriting projects (writing for companies), magazine articles,

novels, non-fiction books, etc.

=> Q: What is the market for each type of writing?

This section will take longer, especially if you are a new writer. It does not

help the online discussion groups of many writers to actively discourage talking about how

many writers charge. However, you CAN find out. Here are some URLs that help:

Writersmarket.com:

http://www.writersmarket.com/

When all else fails, ask someone who is writing the type of writing you want.

do.

=> Q: What makes your writing unique?

This is a “know yourself” question.

=> Q: How much can you produce?

You must make production goals part of your marketing plan. If you are a part time

writer, how many salable words can you produce per week? 2000?

If you are a full-time writer, set a goal of salable words produced for each day. Do

This is a goal that is easily achievable.

=> Q: Create a list of target markets

This is self explanatory. It is a marketing database.

=> Q: How will you reach your target markets?

Email, mail, fax, phone?

=> Q: What is your long-term monetary goal? How will you achieve that goal?

Set a goal for three years from now, one year from now, for this month, for this

week and for today.

You are less likely to waste time if you know the time you spent on the phone

It will cost you $ 90.

=> Q: How much are you earning from your writing now?

If you haven’t made your first sale yet, that’s fine.

If you’ve been earning the same amount for the past two years, that’s a red flag:

you have reached a level that is too comfortable for you. You will need to do a concert

effort to get out of your comfort zone.

There you go. Answer the questions and you have a basic marketing plan that

it will work for you. Good luck.