Guest Post by Donna Wright

Getting Your Career Off Life Support

If you’re like me, your career is on life support. It shouldn’t be. You’ve done some of the things other authors have done to be successful, yet here we are. Your career is like your body. To remain healthy, we need to put in certain things to our careers and take out certain things. If we were talking about our careers, we need to put time in front of the keyboard. Time for marketing, etc. I could list a thousand things. But, how about taking out? If we want to be healthy, we remove an over-abundance of carbs or sweets. But, there are three things that really could be hurting your career. Now, before I go any further, I am going to put it in terms of me. This is truly why my career is on life support. Don’t make it yours.

1. Chasing Benjamin. I don’t mean my handsome son. I mean that almighty dollar. I am guilty of listening to everyone who says to me that I should write this or write that. I drop what I’m doing and hope to make a little money doing something else. Also, I’m guilty—very guilty—of not writing because I have found another type of second job that should yield that extra money that I’m looking for. It hasn’t happened. I doubt that it will. If you do what I do, you’ll never finish anything. I can’t light on an idea and finish it. It’s sad because I wrote four books that were very well accepted, but can’t seem to find my place in the writing world. I’ve based every decision on money. It has not worked for me. I have to assume, it won’t work for you.
2. Cause over career. A long time ago, I watched a very talented author decide that she was going to E-pub before it was fashionable to do so. That was fine, but she bad mouthed every traditional publisher and burned all her bridges. I can’t actually back up this next statement with a statistic, so I ask that you be aware of the successful authors around you and see if this statement jives. Very successful romance authors do all the different types of publishing. They Indy Pub, Small Press Pub and Traditionally Pub. I think that is probably the way to success. Don’t decide that any of the above are beneath you. Do not write blog posts burning bridges. Write and publish, however you choose. Try to stay out of the fray. Try to keep in mind that with all the ways to communicate today, sometimes just keeping your business private is hard to do. I suggest, you do that.
3. The Controversy Button. Today in this country, most people are not moderate on politics. People have chosen sides. I advise you strongly to forget your politics on your pages and in your tweets, here’s why: if I’m right, about half the people are going to agree with you. Sounds nice. But, that means that the other half are going to disagree with you. I used to be VERY political online. It didn’t hurt my sales, but then again, it didn’t help them. And, over the past few months, I’ve had to block and unfollow several people, some authors due to their political rants. It has just been ridiculous. This is only advice, but here is why I say this. If you upset someone with something you post on your author pages, they are going to not only block/unfriend/unfollow you, they are also going to not buy your books, and tell all their friends, “I unblocked Author Jane Doe because I wasn’t listening to all that. I’ll never buy a book from her after what she said.” And, her friends? They are her They could very well say, “Yeah, me too.” I can’t stop you from doing this. It’s your right as an American to say whatever you want. However, taking from the Bible here: just because something is permissible, doesn’t make it profitable and in our case, it could be literally profit.

That is my advice for getting our careers off life support. I hope you’ll let me know how it turns out for you. Put your tushy in the chair and write. Let all these other things go by the wayside. Put your time where it will be useful to your career. I wish you many blessings. You can find out more about Donna and her books at:

Amazon

And don’t miss my newest story Liam’s Secret in the upcoming anthology—Masquerade.

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

Donna Wright will be attending Romancing the Smokies

March 17-18, 2017 | Hilton Knoxville Airport, Alcoa, TN

Romancing the Smokies, a production by Sweet Romance Author Donna Wright, is a romance readers dream with a Emerald Isle event, author meet and greet, an elegant luncheon, book signing, Masquerade Ball including fun casino games, plus tons of swag and giveaways. Here, readers get to meet their favorite authors and authors get to connect with readers. We have put together authors from every sub-genre of Romance and even some Mystery authors so you, the reader, can make a personal connection and really get to know the authors whose books you’ve loved.

See full details at our website HERE.

See ticket options at Eventbright HERE. (the book signing from 2 to 4 on Saturday is free to the public)

Find out how to win the