Category: indie writers

Balancing Social Media With Actual Writing

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So, I don’t know if this is a strength or weakness for me, but I really hate, loath and despise social media.  I hate Facebook, don’t have a private account.  I sort of like Twitter, if I’m very careful who I follow, (I am downright allergic to gossip.  Don’t care about celebrities, who’s doing what and all that mess.)  I have found recently that I like twitter chats, if peopled by cool people.  I love blogging because I’ve met some awesome people, but do I spend hours reading my Facebook feeds and chatting?  Um, no.

Here’s the problem, though.  Writers need social media.  Not just freelance writers.  There’s an anthology coming out with my story in it, and I get paid based on how many of them sell.  I kind of want people who like my writing to know about it.  Actually, I kind of want people who like my writing to be able to find it in general, know when it’s coming out and such.  I also like knowing this about my favorite indie authors.  So, while it’s taken me some time, I’ve warmed up to social media.  (Pintrest is the exception.  I fell in love, and I an never leaving Pintrest.)

There are a lot of people that don’t feel the way I do.  There are people who seriously need an intervention when it comes to social media.  They don’t have the struggles I do, trying to remember to tweet at least once a day and thinking of something witty to say on Facebook.  But they’re losing writing time to gossip time.  That’s fine, I’m not one to judge how someone spends their leisure time.  Just don’t spend an hour in a flame war with some jack ass from the other side of the world because they don’t like your favorite movie and call it work.

So, which side do you fall on?  There are pros and cons to each.

Social Media Haters-

Pros-

  • We have a lot more time to write, which is good because time is our biggest commodity.  When I googled average hours spent on social media, the average result was three hours.  So ask yourself, what kind of writing could you get done if you spent three hours doing it every day?
  • Social media is a great place to make a horses ass of yourself.  I did it myself more than once, before I got wise.  I am really political, (not that you all might have noticed,) and it is so easy to lose my temper online.
  • I’m all about being super loud about what’s going on in my life, but I am very particular about what about my family gets shared.  Social media encourages people to share way, way, way too much.  We are trying to be household names here, people.  I want to be on the cover of Writers Digest, not The Sun.

Cons-

  • I have to schedule tweets.  I have to think about what I’m going to say, unless responding to someone else.  Or tweeting Ray Donovan information.
  • I forget to update things.
  • I forget to read my feeds, which means when I open it after days and days, I’ve got so much to catch up with.

Social Media Lovers-

Pros

  • You get the word out, you writers who are all over social media.  Man, do I know when your books are coming out, and I am all over them.
  • You encourage followers to look at you over all sources.  So if you miss someone on one, you’ll get them on another.
  • When people love you, they share you.  They share your posts, your comments, your thoughts.  And that, I mean that feels great.  It means that if you’ve got a fan, he might share you enough that his buddy becomes a fan, or his niece, or his high school chum who stumbled upon you on his Facebook feed.
  • You have the opportunity to brighten someone’s day.  Which, I think, is one of the best things about being a writer to start with.

Cons-

  • Time.  That’s the biggest thing about social media.  Time is precious, and social media takes up too much of it if not kept in check.

So, you’ve go to strike a balance.  Here are my tips, for no matter what side of the wall you fall on.

Tips for the haters, (like me)

  • Schedule it.  Put it on your to do list.  I might not like tweeting, but I do like checking things off my to do list.  It gives me one really easy thing to check off my list.
  • Take advantage of the fact that you really want to get on, write something, then get off by doing so.
  • Don’t connect with your friends and family on social media.  This sounds really hard, but you’ve got to set that barrier.  If your friends understand you, they will understand why you’re not friending them.  Besides, you’re probably already not friended to them anyway.
  • Don’t play games.  That was the quickest way I lost time when I was a Facebook addict.  It got to the point where I didn’t even want to log on, because it was going to take so much time to get through everything before I even got to reading my feed.
  • Reward yourself by enjoying the good side of social media.  I’ve made friends, joined in live chats for my favorite shows, and followed people I adore so that I enjoy reading my twitter feed.

Tips for the social media atticts

  • Again, a timer is your friend.  Decide before you get on how long you’re going to spend on Facebook, and get off when the time is up.
  • It’s hard to not want to multitask when it comes to social media.  You can tell yourself, “It’s okay that I’m checking up on my high school crush, because I’m also making important contacts.  To avoid this sort of self sabotaging talk, have two social media accounts.  One that’s personal, and one that you use as you, the writer.  Then, when you’re on to have fun, you’re on to have fun.  When you’re on to work, you’re not distracted by Farmville.  It also helps you get into the right mentality.  You are not you, the person when you are on your business site.  You are a writer, and you are here to do a job.
  • Once you have two sites, stick to friending and following writing and business related topics, so your feeds don’t get crammed with useless nonsense.
  • Have a buddy, perferably a writing buddy, hold you accountable.  Have them friend you, and take you to task if you start talking about useless crap or starting a flame war.  Then, do the same for them.

Finally, two tips for everyone

  • The internet is forever, don’t say anything you wouldn’t want your boss or an agent to know you said.  Unless you’re really ready to back that shit up.  I mean, I am all about being a democrat, feminist, pro gay marriage and all that.  These are things that, if they lose me a business relation, I didn’t want it anyway.
  • My general rule of thumb is this.  For every hour I spend writing, I should spend ten minutes, and only ten minutes, tweeting, pinning, or commenting on Facebook.  No more, no less, unless I’m attending a specific event.  (Though, as a tip, when I’m attending a twitter chat, I use that time to get caught up with Facebook, since it is my least favorite.)

What do you think about social media?  Does it annoy you, or control you?

4

Making your own self employed work schedule, so that you get shit done.

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I am not yet a full time writer. In fact, I am currently a more than full time day jobber. Even so, I have work hours for my writing. I have to if I ever intend to be a full time writer.

I used to be a full time writer, when my little one was very little. Actually, I was a stay at home mom when I was with my ex. I learned a lot about making my own schedule during that time. Things that I use now while I’m trying to fit at least part time writing hours into my day. Things that will be essential to my life when I get my dream life.

Do you have a writing schedule? Or do you currently have more of a fly by the seat of your pants mentality about your work? Trust me, your writing and life will benefit from having a schedule. This is even more important when you’re becoming your own boss.

When you’re making your self employed schedule, here are some questions you need to answer for yourself first.

Your own internal clock needs to be your first concern. No amount of bullying and self hate will make you create good work if the time you spend at your desk is when you’re so tired you can’t see the keyboard, it’s just a fuzzy thing sitting on your desk. Now, I’m a morning person. I’ve been getting up at 5:30 to write before the day job, which I didn’t really think was going work at first. But it has to my joy. Writing after the day job has not worked, try as I might. By the evening I don’t have any creative energy left, so that’s never going to be prime writing time

You have to consider the schedule of people around you that you can’t control. If you live alone, go ahead and skip this part. If not, your partner’s work schedule, kids school and sleep schedule, these things will play into your writing time. Even your room mate can be a distraction. I have found that, since my writing space is in the living room, I work best when either everyone is gone or everyone is watching something I can tune out.

(That, by the way, is one of the secrets to my success. I learned as a little girl to read and write with the tv on. My mother, sadly, was a huge fan of trash tv. You’d be surprised how many novels I read and short stories I wrote while Jerry Springer was on.)

You should strongly consider the schedules of the people around you that you have control over. Like, for instance, if you have small children who nap. Or older kids that can be sent to play outside at opportune times. Or if your partner can be asked to go take the little ones to the park. Whatever pull you have on the actions of others, take it. Be loving, be flexible. Be willing to compromise. I find that if I take the monsters out of the house so my stay at home dad can have some personal time, he’s more willing to take them on errands so I can have some desk time. As for the monsters, they have learned that I need to be left alone for exactly twenty five minutes at a time, and then they can have my undivided attention.

Once you’ve taken some time to consider all of this, there are some tips that I, and many other awesomely productive people, take advantage of. Five, to be specific.
1. When you look at your to do list for the week, you want to consider what sort of work you have to get done. A week’s to do list for me might include a certain amount of chapters for Woven, editing a short story that I wrote a week before, a few stories that had been rejected that need sent back out, my Paper Beats World blog posts and a new rough draft of a new story to write. The first thing I consider is how much creative energy each of these projects is going to take me. Fiction takes the most creative energy. Rough drafts are the most draining, but editing takes a lot too. So I use my early morning time to write fiction. Whatever Woven book I’m working on comes first, followed by my short fiction. Sending stories takes almost no energy at all, because I can write a cover letter in my sleep. So I can spend an hour after work sending out some of my pieces without a problem. My blog posts also take little creative energy after I’ve planned out my posts for the month, because it’s basically talking. I really like to talk. So that’s another thing that I can do after work if I must, but it really is best done earlier in the day if possible. So think about how much energy each of your projects is going to take.
2. Deadlines are you friends, trust me. I know, it might not seem like it, but they are. Otherwise it is way too easy to say, “I don’t really need to get that done today. What’s it going to hurt if I leave it until tomorrow?” Make yourself realistic deadlines, and stick to them!
3. And when I say realistic deadlines, I mean it. You need to schedule days off, and even vacations. Why? Because you need to charge your batteries, that’s why. You need to switch off, watch bad tv, go to the beach, play video games all day, read comic books. Look, I love writing, I do. I understand the desire to keep going, every second I get. And while I’m still at my day job, I take almost every second I can get to write. But I always take one day a month where I don’t work, don’t write, don’t clean house and don’t stress about it. My family and I also take at least one vacation a year, and none of my writing goes with me. I also take my monster’s birthdays off, and spend the whole day not only celebrating their day, but the anniversary of the days that made me a mommy and step mommy. I’ve got to live my life, and so do you.
4. Finally, do have set work hours, and don’t write outside of them. Have a time when you are done for the day, as a rule (see below.)
5. Understand that there are going to be times when all of these tips go right out of the window. There are going to be nights when your stop time comes, and you just don’t want to. Let yourself keep going sometimes. There are months that I get to my day off, and decide to devote the whole day to my current writing project instead. And a deadline, for me, can always get pushed back if life happens, as I’ve said many times before.

Here’s the biggest thing to remember about making your own writing schedule, though. The whole point of being your own boss is working how you need to work. It’s all about writing our stories, and getting those stories to other people. Whatever you need to do to make that happen, do it so long as you’re healthy and happy. If you’re your own boss, be a good one.

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