Tuesday, February 6, 2018

Publishing Is Like The Weather

I was listening to the NPR this morning and they were discussing the sudden shifts in the stock market over the last couple of days. When they were talking about this, I was immediately thinking of liking this to publishing, but then the person they were interviewing gave a better analogy, so I am going to run with this.

What this specialist noted was that the stock market is like the weather. There will be really bad days and really sunny days. Literally, we can have great weather one day and then hit a complete streak of totally sucky weather (or even the reverse). He then went on to note that if we see a massive rain storm coming in, we don't suddenly pack up and run away. We hunker down and ride it out. We know that although the weather may be bad today, it will get better.

Publishing works the same way. You will have good days and you will have bad days. There will be times when those royalty statements look terrible. There will also be times when the statements look better. But here is the thing I want you to really think about. Unlike the weather, you can control a lot of your destiny.

If you find the books are not selling as well as you like, you can aggressively add in a stronger marketing campaign on your side of things.

If you feel you are not writing enough with your current publisher, you can always supplement the work with other projects, self-publishing, proposals and so forth.

So what is my message? Quit complaining. Do something about your career. It may be a bummer today, but tomorrow can better. 

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