Goals and Such

It's nearing the end of January, which means I get to check some things off of my 2020 list. I've been working to get a better draft of my TV pilot, but most of that time has been spent working up the show bible, not writing those extra scenes that I need. For coverage, I don't need the show bible, but it does help me see where it could go if the project had a future.

I can also check off the first contest entry of the year. I took a chance on a story I've never sent out before, so I hope I didn't waste the entry fee. Now I'm prepping an application for a residency. The work I'm sending is poetry, but for this particular contest, I have to have a good cover letter to go along with it. Although I think I write a good cover letter, I know how rarely they are read, so I find going through the motions a bit pointless. Maybe that's why all my job applications go unnoticed...

Coming Up in February

I'm dedicated the shortest month of the year for the most frustrating part of my professional life--meeting goals that depend on the actions of others. What does that include? Getting more book sales, acquiring more patrons on Patreon, getting more paid views on Medium, having more reviews on Amazon and elsewhere. I know I haven't tried every possible way to boost these numbers yet, but I do think I'm running out of the most cost-effective (=free) options.

The only other goal for February is to get my Book Spotlight gig back up on Fiverr. Since the posts will now appear here, I need to craft two or three samples before I relaunch. I've been putting it off because I thought I would have moved this blog to its own domain by now, but that's not the case. I'll revisit the idea of moving to a new domain in June. For now, I'm staying put on Blogger.

The Good, The Bad and the Undetermined

After a lovely acceptance letter last week, I got another rejection. Not a big deal, but this is the one that I've been talking about because I really do think I can make it into this specific poetry publication, but the third time was certainly not a charm. I know I'm flipping the process upside down since normal writers write something, then look for a publication that fits the style of what they've already written. This is what I do with 99.9% of my work. It's just that this publication for some reason is very enticing, and I want to get in it. So I've been tailoring work towards the style of the publication. Both tactics have not worked. So, I'm giving that one a break and focusing on hundreds of other publications out there for a little while.

In freelancing news, I'm reluctantly back on Fiverr. The only gig I have available at the moment is the blog spotlight gig. The others are still in the process of being revamped so that I can ensure a higher percentage of clients who have a clear understanding of the parameters of the gig. I know I'm going to run into another jerk who doesn't read the description, but I'm not going to let issues arise due to something on my end. But the good news is that Fiverr sent out an email today saying that sellers no longer have to endure an additional Paypal fee on top of the company's 20% cut. That'll save me about $0.22 per gig, which does add up.


I'm also thinking ahead to January and what my major goals will be for the coming year. Mostly I would like to build my audience (who wouldn't?) and build it primarily on Patreon. I still haven't figured out the secret to that success, but that's not stopping me from trying. So I'm going to get back to that stack of poetry ready for revision which is the fun part of this whole wild ride.

Just A Week Away

November is Coming...

NaNoWriMo is almost here! I can't wait to try and finish my project. It's not going to be easy, but I think I will be able to carve enough time out of each day to get things rolling. That, and I'm excited that the title and the cover will finally be revealed to everyone. Watch my NaNo novel page to see when it happens.

I also want to keep everyone updated on how I'm doing, so this year I'm going to try and keep a daily log. I've tried updates in the past like this, so I don't know how it will go, but I'm going to make the daily logs exclusive to Patreon, so there's another awesome thing you have to look forward to if you sign up now.

A Note on Fiverr Freelancing

Even though there is so much to do for November, I still have to also split my time with the day job, though that load has lightened a bit. As of midday yesterday, I'm no longer taking new work on Fiverr. All of my gigs have been paused. It's unfortunate that I have to do this, but I got scammed twice within the span of a couple of hours. By scammed I don't mean anything as serious as stolen personal information, but I was scammed in that I did the work, then the customer turns around and says it wasn't what I portrayed in my gig description (it was VERY clear, by the way, and to the dozens of others who have successfully ordered it). They got out of paying me while probably running around using what I wrote for them. This does nothing to the customer on the Fiverr platform. To me, it dropped some of my stats below the level I need to maintain for Level 1 status, which means on November 14th, I will lose that status. Again. And for the second time, this demotion wasn't something I did--except, you know, trust that a customer was serious about the job. I get it. Fiverr protects buyers over sellers because without any buyers, they make $0. It still sucks.

I know that pushing through it would be the best choice because I've developed quite a few repeat customers who love the work I provide. I am sorry for them, but I know they'll go off and find someone else to fill my place if it's that urgently needed. For my sanity, I have to take a step back. I was already so frustrated with many of the one-time customers I had because they were asking for things I just didn't provide, and it was always a long back and forth that was not worth a whopping three bucks and change. And sometimes if it was small, I gave in, which made me feel worse because I knew that had this been a gig extra, I could have charged $5 extra for every one of those jobs (assuming, of course, that they would have agreed to pay for the extra). I know I shouldn't admit this, but I'm terrible at upselling.

If only Fiverr had a platform where I as the expert in the situation would be able to pick and choose who I work with instead of any old yahoo who pressed the order button, it would be a lot different. I like working for myself, but right now Fiverr is like working for a terrible employer who doesn't even have to bother to pay benefits, yet takes from all its employees. The 20% cut per gig is one thing, but plenty of my customers have given me generous tips, and guess what? Fiverr took 20% of those, too.

There's no set return date for me on that platform. If I truly want to have a good holiday season (minus the income I was bringing in), I don't see myself coming back before January. I probably should rewrite my gig descriptions and be that jerk that I hate to be, but as I've noticed with most of these orders, people read just about as well as they listen, which is not much at all. My gigs weren't saving the world, so I'm sure the world will keep turning without them.

The plus side? I get to work that much more on my poetry project and my NaNo project. That's a big plus for me, so I'm still smiling. See you in November!

Reassessing and New Pricing

I've always felt like I knew the value of my time, especially when we are talking about my skills as a professional. That being said, I've known for years that I'm accepting far less than my time is worth. It's imposter syndrome, plain and simple. As much as I know I deserve a certain price per hour, I get weirded out when people are willing to pay that much. It's something I'm always working on.

This has led me to to rethink my Fiverr gigs. I have been getting a lot of work from that platform lately, which in a way is good. I like working on the gigs I offer there. However, over the past three weeks I have had to put myself as away from the office more often than available to new customers. There are many reasons for this. First, I like my Saturdays and I always mark myself out of the office on this day. I already have to work six days a week, so Saturdays are my time. I've also had to do this when I keep getting gigs ten minutes before I go to bed. While it's true I have at least 24 hours to complete the work, it makes me too anxious that I won't get it done, and it ruins any chance of good sleep. If Fiverr would let me put my status as away for a specific number of hours instead of a minimum of a full day, it would be a different story.

The other issue is that the quality of the buyers is sometimes lacking. I (and every seller on the platform) would love to be able to work with customers who provide clear instructions tailored to complete the gig. But often I get 40 questions from someone who doesn't end up buying a gig, or little to no information from someone who has purchased a gig, and I have to drag it out of them. For the price I'm paid, that saddles me with a lot of extra work just trying to get the information I need to get started.

One of the many perks of being a freelancer is negotiating prices.

I'm also running into a new problem--the middle man (or woman, of course). I will admit to doing a lot of work for middle men, and that's fine as long as the situation is transparent. I know that some work I do I'm only getting paid 20% of what the customer pays for the work--and I manage my availability for these projects accordingly, knowing I'm being paid less when I take those jobs. On Fiverr, I have no idea if I'm working for a middle man unless they leave clues, and they have been. I still wouldn't mind doing the work, but through Fiverr no one has to tell me they are getting paid $100 for what they turn around and pay me $5 to do. I just want transparency about what I'm losing. If it's too much, I might as well slap "consultant" at the end of my name and become their direct competitor.

This has led me to reevaluate the prices I charge. This is everyone's official heads up about the changes coming to my Fiverr gigs on November 1. My blog editing gig is being removed completely--no one has purchased it, and it would be very time consuming at this point with all of the other projects and freelance jobs I have going on. My gig for social media posts will double in price. I actually still consider that a little low, but I don't want to lose every customer I have. My blog spotlight gig will continue to be offered at $5 for the cheapest option, but the price will be raised for the top two tiers to counteract the fees I'm charged.

Yes, I'm announcing these changes before I make them, but I'm pretty sure my Fiverr base and my Blogger base don't have too much overlap. Even if they do, it's fair warning to get the lower priced gigs while you can.

Holiday Work Magnet

It never seems to fail -- as soon as I sit back and relax with, I don't know, a hot dog or whatever holiday-related goodies I have on hand, it happens. I get that ding on my phone telling me I have work to do. For the past year, I rarely get work on certain platforms (Fiverr, Guru, etc.) unless it is a holiday. You read that right. I seem to get loads of work almost exclusively on official U.S. holidays. If everyone else gets the day off, I'm at my computer typing away. I'm wondering if this happens to all freelancers, or is it just me?

I know that the biggest reason this happens is because I have many international clients. Don't think I'm complaining -- I love the fact that these clients trust me with this work, and if you have ever worked with Fiverr, you know that the world domination map on where you've sold a gig is kind of cool (I'm at 5% world domination so far). And there wasn't a big holiday in June, so I was waiting for an influx of work to come my way. I just find it curious that even for those who are outside this country, why would they choose to hire me on the day where it's likely, if I was a normal person with a normal job, I wouldn't be available? Am I just that awesome, or am I just really bad at hiding the fact that even if I did have the day off I wouldn't be doing anything different anyway? A riddle I must unravel...

Communication Conundrum or Just Plain Obstinance?

I know that talking about my freelance work is like walking a tight rope--I could make it harder for myself to find the right clients to work with. However, there's an imposing gap in communication, especially when it comes to my most popular Fiverr gig. I'm putting the blame and responsibility on me--I need to find a better way to communicate exactly what I offer and what I don't.

What I Do and What I Don't Do

My book spotlight has brought in consistent work since I posted it. It's not a life-changing amount of work, but I'm glad I have it. The problem I'm having is that so many people think that it's a book review. It's not. It is a marketing tool used to help promote a book. I do not read the book. I do not need a copy of the book to write up the blog post. It's simply an affordable way for writers to reach a wider audience. It's not a book review. And that's because...

I Won't Risk My Livelihood for You

No. I won't do it. Fiverr, Amazon (and by extension Goodreads) have all banned paid book reviews. BANNED. A big no-no. I'm sure other platforms have similar rules and regulations. What does this really mean? That means if I'm found to have taken money for a book review, the least they could do is pull down that review. The most they could do is ban me from one or all of these platforms. That wouldn't just take away my Fiverr gigs--that would also take away my ability to publish my own work and market that work in the future. I would also like to point out that while clients think they are paying me at least $5 per gig, I'm only taking in $3.92 per $5 gig because I'm hit with multiple fees each time I complete work. Would you risk your job and your entire livelihood to earn $3.92 from me? Didn't think so.

I get that there are a few loopholes to these restrictions, some of which I take advantage of--like being able to get free books in exchange for reviews. And yes, while getting a hardcover with a MSRP of $26.00 or more does seem like being paid, it's still allowed on Amazon and Goodreads with proper disclosure. But this cannot happen through my gig. I would love to be able to take a position with a respected publication to do book reviews and get paid for it. These jobs are few and far between, plus you have to have a wide publishing/journalism/writing network to even hear about them before they are snatched up. I'm still working on that whole networking thing.

I Don't Want to Be One of Those People...

Introverts don't want to be the center of attention. They don't really want to be noticed by too many people. This feeling can carry over into online communication very easily. The quickest way to communicate that a book spotlight isn't a book review is to put it out there in big, bold online yelling: I DO NOT WRITE PAID BOOK REVIEWS. I feel this is too in-your-face, and on the rare occasion I'm on the other side of this needing to work with someone, this immediately signals to me that they are already defensive and would be difficult to work with. So I don't do that. I'd rather be the person in the room that has all the answers but no one listens to than the loudest and most obnoxious.

Then again, maybe I should because a lot of people just aren't listening. This doesn't just waste my time--it impacts my Fiverr ratings and my potential to be promoted. I had a cancelled order a few months ago because someone bought a book spotlight gig and told me to write a five-star review (yes, they specifically requested five stars) for a cab company in Arizona--clearly not the parameters of a gig that promotes books and writing contests. Cancelled orders are bad for sellers, so thanks for that.

Also, once Fiverr switched to rating sellers on a monthly basis, I've conveniently gotten just enough spam messages to ruin my response rate (by the way, Fiverr sellers out there: IMMEDIATELY report and delete spam otherwise you'll wind up like me, which I didn't know until I dug into all the terms of service). This demoted me as a level one seller and now I have to meet the new requirements to get it back, including $400 in lifetime earnings instead of the old $50 in lifetime earnings. This is going to take awhile.

From now on, accurate communication is my top priority. If I have to spend hours rewriting my gig description so that everyone gets the gist, I will. I have all the marketing skills I need. Now I just need to activate those superpowers and save the world--or at least save my sanity.

Tools of the Writing Trade

Freelancing is not always a free-for-all. Sometimes you have to find the right tools to get started and stay motivated. Just recently it was announced that Fiverr bought And.co, which made And.co's services free. That sounded great, though not a lot of us working with Fiverr knew what that meant for us.

The And.co Experience

First, And.co and Fiverr are not integrated (and probably never will be). And.co seems to be a great tool for those who have offline clients. You can set up clients, projects, contracts and more. I was particularly interested in the time tracking feature. I never really know how much time I spend on writing different things for clients, mostly because the ones I work with have everything at a set price, rather than an hourly wage.

I signed up for And.co so that maybe I could track my time doing different freelance work. Turns out, you really have to have offline clients for it to be useful. I first tried using the tracking feature. But to use that, you need to have a project to attach it to. Okay, that's not a problem. I got to create a project, but to create a project you have to have a client attached to it. Ugh. I go to create some dummy client just so I can see how it all works, and creating a dummy client does not work. I didn't want to create a client with my own information, because I didn't want to end up sending invoices to myself.

The verdict? I need to go find a few offline clients to see how well this tool works. So far, it's not for me. I have online clients that already have payment and invoicing systems set up that work for both of us.

Time Tracking is Not Lost

I didn't want to give up the idea of tracking my time working on various projects, so I went on a time tracking hunt. It needed to have features for tracking multiple projects, ease of use, and most importantly it needed to be free. I found TopTracker from Toptal and so far, it's working out well. I'm tracking my time spent writing this blog post now (a few hundred words in only 8 minutes--not bad). I mainly want to use this tracking in order to see what I really make per hour, even though the working world doesn't completely rely on hourly wages anymore. I'm hoping that this analysis will help me determine the best use of my time when it comes to both freelancing and creative writing. I know I'm going to find out that I'm making fractions of cents on the creative stuff, but it will show me where I am now and when I start to improve those numbers.

What types of writing tools do you use for freelancing or creative writing? Does it make it easier to write?

Organized and Feelin' Fine...

I'm totally organized to take on the rest of the year, including projects, freelance work, and other fun stuff. And it helps to have a few good tools to stay organized--my new Sarah Scribbles calendar and organizer are keeping me motivated (and entertained).

The new Fiverr gig has been up and running for a few days now, so if you need blog editing services, you can check it out. Also, Fiverr has introduced an Available Now option that lets you tell customers you are online and ready to work. So, I've decided to hold something like office hours for the editing gig as well as my book spotlight gig--I'll try to stay available for at least an hour or two a week. It will probably be at different times, depending on what's scheduled for that week, so I'll announce my availability on Twitter.

The Patreon page is coming along. I want to get it all snazzy and looking good, so the page will not launch until November 1. I know. The same day NaNoWriMo starts. What am I thinking?! Anyway, I'll be providing more information once it launches. I'll also be providing more information on this year's NaNo project once I figure out what it will be.

I'm not sure if I announced that Seeing What Develops is now available for purchase on a range of platforms, but if I didn't, here I go. The book is now available as an ebook through Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Scribd, Inktera, Playster, 24Symbols and outlets that sell books for Tolino. I'm still working to update my book page on the blog, and that's why it's hidden at the moment. It should be back up soon.

Have a happy weekend full of writing!

September Updates

I am working hard on a number of projects. I'm sure I need to be telling myself it's crunch time, but for what? Perks of being my own boss, I guess. I treat my employees like superstars. ;-)

Like any good writer, I'm also looking to diversify my business and take full advantage of my skills. Along with the current gig I have on Fiverr, I'll be adding another one soon to help with editing blog posts. That, and I'm looking to take the first step in making my presence uber-professional, so I need to complete enough gigs to pay for that logo I've been wanting. I'm also embarking on a way to focus more on my fiction work (hint: rhymes with Smatreon), but you'll be hearing more about that in the coming weeks.

I know you're wondering about the writing. It's going as well as it can be. I have poetry ready to go for submission on Friday, MoL #3 is still coming along, and I'm nearly finished with revisions on my latest short story, which I hope to be submitting somewhere by the end of the month. I've also been slowly finishing a first draft that's been taking forever, and since I've switched what project I want to try with Kindle Scout, there are more plans to be made and writing to be done.

What are you working on this week?

October's To-Dos and Shameless Promotions

The first full week in October and I started out kind of slow. I really needed a nap yesterday, but I persisted through sleepy eyelids to keep everything on track. My writing calendar is a more than a little full. This month I will:

• launch a book
• revise my project for Kindle Scout
• outline my 2015 NaNoWriMo project 
• write, revise and release a novella by the end of the month

I'm glad I didn't throw any short stories or poetry in there. Those projects are still waiting patiently for their turns.

I've also launched my Fiverr gig for anyone who wants a little help promoting their books. I'm running a book spotlight on Book Review Bin and I hope you find this affordable advertising within your marketing budget. I put up one of my books to provide a sample of what the spotlights will look like.

And since I'm in promo mode, don't forget that the ebook of Seeing What Develops is available for pre-order now until the 15th. The print version should be available from Amazon and Createspace by the 15th.

Many Plans in Place

As you can see, I've planned out my next three and a half months of writing projects and some marketing stuff to go along with it. I've never been so organized about my own writing in my life. I usually save my organizational skills for my day job. I knew that if I just gave myself solid deadlines, it wouldn't work. I have to see the space between today and the deadline to make sure I stay on track. If all goes according to plan, Seeing What Develops will be released soon and I'll have plenty of drafts on the road to publication in 2016.

Of course all of this planning makes me think about my future, so I was looking for ways to supplement my income doing what I do best. I had the idea of offering services on Fiverr, but for the price of the work (and the service fee subtracted from price), it had to be something within my time constraints. I want to offer a book spotlight on this blog or Book Review Bin, but my biggest concern is my followers will think it's too many posts. I may have to limit the amount of spotlights I do per week, but I think it can be a great way to help other authors with exposure. I'll get back to you on this one once I have my job posted.

Until next time, Folks...