I’ve decided to take Marissa Meyers advice and create a business plan for my writing. As she explains, “A business plan is like a roadmap that will give you an at-a-glance picture of your goals and priorities. It helps you focus and challenge yourself, and it will let you know when you’re falling behind.” Specifically, she recommends that you set for yourself writing goals, promotional goals, professional development goals, and reading goals.
- Keep track of my weekly writing schedule, in the form of Excel spreadsheets, so I can understand when, where, and how I write the best.
- Hold myself accountable to a regular writing regiment.
- Blog regularly, twice a week.
- Restart So, You Want to Work in Publishing guest blog series.
- Launch and promote Byberry State Hospital.
- Finish first draft of WIP #3.
- Using critique partner suggestions, do major rewrite/revision/overhaul of WIP #1.
- Query agents with reworked and more awesome version of WIP #1.
- Review and begin revisions on WIP #3.
- Read 60 books, focusing upon historical fiction and YA titles. At least 6 must be writing craft books, to learn more about writing. Start with Hooked by Les Edgerton and Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott.
Now that I have my list of overall goals, I have to “break it down” by organizing it into an actual plan, complete with “deadlines and monthly goals.”
JANUARY
Continue writing first draft of WIP #3.
FEBRUARY
Re-launch So, You Want to Work in Publishing blog series.
BSH page proofs?
Finish first draft of WIP #3.
MARCH
Start WIP #1 revisions.
Write article for Bloomsburg University Honors Program newsletter about the research process and BSH.
APRIL
Continue WIP #1 revisions.
MAY
Byberry State Hospital launch!
Develop Goodreads Author account.
Blog contest giveaway! (More on this later…)
JUNE
Finish WIP #1 revisions.
Begin querying agents with WIP #1.
Author Jessica Spotswood also outlined her 2013 Business Plan, if you care to take a look. What does yours look like?
(Image Credit: National Library of Australia Commons, Flickr Commons)
Hannah Karena Jones 
Great idea! Think I’ll develop my own now. 🙂
LikeLike
Oooh awesome! Send me the link if you do a write up about it! I’d love to read other people’s writing plans/goals! They’re so encouraging.
LikeLike
I love these goals, and the idea of making yourself an annual plan. I actually did this for the first time last year, and while I did not accomplish many of those goals and benchmarks, I made it to the end of the year having accomplished many things that weren’t even on the list. Of course, many of the goals I had outlined for myself were not dependent on what I could do alone (get a new book deal, for e.g.) For 2013 I will be making a list of goals again, this time of things I can accomplish by myself, that way I will really be able to take a stab at completing the list, and checking back on my progress at the end of the year.
LikeLike
I like your idea of only setting goals that are based on your own work. It is SO disappointing to set a goal of “getting an agent” by the end of the year, and then feeling like a failure when that doesn’t happen. I’d feel more accomplished–and probably more organized and actually more likely to reach the previous goal–if I set a goal of sending out fifty query letters.
I love reviewing a year of goals and accomplishments. It’s the ultimate check-off list satisfaction :]
LikeLike
Great idea. I used to run the SBA department for a regional bank and have looked at hundreds of business plans. Unfortunately, I never thought of this idea. Thank you for bringing it up.
LikeLike
Glad I could suggest the idea! Good luck with your own business plan!
LikeLike
You are so motivated, and I am such a slacker. 😉
LikeLike
I am THEORETICALLY motivated. Thus far through January and I’m not really meeting any of my goals (except the reading goal, of course. But I usually read when I’m procrastinating doing everything else, so…) Getting myself on track is so hard! I feel like such a slacker myself, haha. :]
LikeLike
Is it mere coincidence that I am reading this on New Year’s Eve? Resolution-time! I so relate to the impulse here, and admire your motivation and ambition. I hope I don’t sound like a wet blanket if I express a wee bit of caution with my admiration: Don’t beat yourself up if you get sidetracked. Yes, it’s important to stay the course. But what if March rolls around and your writing energy isn’t focused on WIP #1? Please give yourself permission to go where the energy is — if that doesn’t sound too Californian… Something new & unexpected that you can’t now foresee may open up, and give yourself permission to follow it. I’m sure, from what you’ve noted here, that you’ll have a fruitful year. I look forward to reading more about it.
LikeLike
I actually wrote all these goals on my calendar in pencil–to allow myself the chance to rearrange and erase and write new goals. Once I write stuff in pen…that’s serious and I can’t break those deadlines or I panic. It’s a mental thing, so the pencil is giving me some leeway and room to relax. Thank you for reminding me to be inspired and open to my writing–it sounds so official and business professional in this post…it almost doesn’t sound like fun! WIP #2 is turning out to be so much better than I thought it would…I might end up prioritizing it over WIP #1, which means the original 2013 business plan goes out the window. Whatever makes the writing better!
LikeLike