This content comes from a talk I did for a local chapter of the Romance Writers of America and is all about niching down to be profitable. My show notes will be sparse, because I’ve got a lovely podcast episode and slides that you can use to follow along!

When you are able to niche down with your writing, you will be able to increase your productivity and your profits.

• Your productivity will increase because niching down gives you a clear framework of reader and genre expectations.
• Your profits will increase because you are satisfying the reader expectations. When you satisfy those expectations, readers trust you and they come back for more books. It builds superfans!

So…how do you niche down? Listen to this episode and scroll through the slideshow to see how I niched down to go from making $30 in January 2018 to making $8.5k in January 2019. That’s one year and a crazy increase in profits. I can’t even math that high!

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LISTEN TO EPISODE 150 – NICHE IT DOWN A NOTCH

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app!

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WATCH THE SLIDESHOW -NICHE IT DOWN A NOTCH

Use the little navigation buttons to scroll through the slideshow at your own pace or in time with the podcast episode! 

Niche It Down a Notch slideshow

***In the slideshow and podcast, I used the reporting for income that happened before Amazon announced the pageread payout for the month of January. Because the payout went down, so did my income. Still impressive! But if you’re wondering why it was $9k in the slides and audio, that’s why!

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While some might think that niching down or writing to market stifles creativity, for me, it’s increased it. I love the challenge of finding my way and writing my voice within genre constraints and reader expectations.

Have you tried niching down?

 

In this post and podcast episode, I’m sharing two equal and opposite errors: over-investing (and in the wrong places) AND not investing any money but thinking that you can make money. 

*mostly specific to writing and being an indie author, but this will also apply and I’ll share some examples from blogging and platform-building as well

I hear and see both of these mistakes a LOT in various Facebook groups where people share that they have spent sometimes thousands of dollars and have not made any money. Or maybe they JUST made that money back, but no profit. I also see people who are frustrated that they aren’t making strides, but will say that they have NO money to invest to help make those strides.

We need to invest. Period. (Well, assuming that you’re doing more than a hobby!) If you are trying to bring in income or if you are building a business and being professional, you will have to make some investments. That does NOT mean you have to go crazy! We have to find the right places to invest and then invest wisely, invest over time, and continue to invest where it makes sense.

LISTEN TO EPISODE 149 – Over-Investing and Under-Investing

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app!

OVER-INVESTING & INVESTING IN THE WRONG PLACES

People say you need to invest when you start up and I agree–there will be some costs. But your success will NOT match dollar for dollar what you put in, especially if you put it in the wrong places. I’ve seen multiple posts lately from people talking about how they’ve put in literally thousands of dollars into blogging or writing books and aren’t seeing any return.

• Make sure you have a solid product first – beta readers, ask for advice from others, if there’s a cheap coach who will do a session with you ($100 or less), free call with Jim Kukral, ask in a FB group. If you run ads on a book and the cover is terrible, you’re setting your money on fire.
• Make sure you ask the right people – This is hard. Go to a Facebook group and everyone has a different opinion and you don’t know who to trust. Look at book rankings. Look at social proof- the numbers. See if others have given reviews of their product or services, etc. I see people all the time giving advice, but then in another thread they’ll say they are struggling.
• Make sure you aren’t just buying everything – I feel like we should all go in with a little bootstrapping. You’re learning as you go and if you invest like crazy up front, you’ll be burning your money because you haven’t honed your voice, your brand, your product. My books got good last year by book four. Yeah, I liked the first three. But they don’t sell as well, get as good reviews, and weren’t as solidly written to the market. Invest a little up front, then as you get better and see where that ROI is, then invest more.
• Make sure you aren’t just doing what everyone else does – I hired out AMS ads and paid a ton of money for two months– and did not see enough return. There isn’t a high enough margin in AMS ads to pay someone $200 a month, no matter how many ads they are running. Other people did it, I knew I should invest in ads, so I did it. Did not pay off. I knew it was a test and I did it for two months, then stopped. Made more money the next month, spent less.
• Make sure your goal isn’t just to spend the most to make less profit – I hear people talking about how much they made. Gross or net? And yes, I get confused and had to google these so I didn’t sound like an idiot. Gross is the total, net is after expenses what you keep. Some people claiming these giant amounts also have expenses. So they may say, “I made 20k last month.” But then they’ll say, “I spent 12k.” Still positive! Don’t want to downplay that. But when it comes to throwing down money, that makes me nervous. I want to scale up, but at what cost? I’ll make just over 8k this month and my expenses are under $1k. I’d rather be there, even though that other person and I made the same amount. Are you chasing a number? A status? So you can say you made x amount? Be practical.

A helpful post might be:  Six Questions to Ask Before You Invest

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UNDER-INVESTING

As people start out, they often will say that they don’t have money to spend. Bootstrapping is a reality for many! You have little to work with and you’re trying to stretch it. That’s okay! But sometimes people say they have NOTHING or are unwilling to spend some at the beginning to build something that is lasting. Investments made at the beginning sometimes take time to bring in a return.

• Invest, but wisely – I know that email sells. I know that I don’t run amazing FB ads YET. So the best bet for investing in my books’ marketing is in email newsletter services like Robin Reads, E Reader News Today, etc. They do the work, they have the audience, no learning curve. If you have to learn it or test it to get it to work, wait a bit. Maybe don’t START with FB ads.
• Don’t complain if you can’t invest – We all can’t invest, but don’t complain about your lack of profit if you aren’t. Books that you throw up on Amazon won’t just sell. Typically. Newsletter swaps are free, so if you can’t pay for ads, partner with other authors. Build a community. Help each other out for free.
• Invest so it hurts – Author Jami Albright wanted to launch her first two books with the right covers. She couldn’t afford them. She literally sold plasma to pay for the covers and editing. And her two books made (gross) $50k in one year and allowed her to quit her day job.
• Invest realizing there is ROI – I hear authors a lot saying they can’t afford to pay for the email promos I talked about. I can’t NOT afford them. I did less at the beginning when I had less money. This past time, I tracked the results. Not only did every one (except for one) make more money that day than I spent, it was often double or triple. Plus it increased my rankings and visibility in Amazon.

Invest believing in yourself – If you want to do these things professionally, you have to invest something. Maybe it’s not a ton. But SOMETHING. And if you don’t, it’s a hobby. Sometimes you’ll invest and it’s still a hobby because you want it to be. I pay for some things because I like them, not because they’re paying my bills. If you want to get serious, you DO have to spend money.

 

Go back to Stop Wasting Your Money to make sure you are making the right choices where it comes to invest!

 

To conclude: Can’t spend money thinking that every dollar will be two dollars back. Can’t not spend money and think you’ll make money.

Confession: I’m going to talk about how to cut your wasted time in this post. As in, how you can STOP WASTING SO MUCH STINKING TIME. But I’m not great with some parts of this. I’ll share exactly which ones, but I hope I’ll give you some other perspectives on wasted time as well. 

Last year (2018) I declared that it was the Year of the Emma Empire. I wanted to use the things I’ve learned over the years about marketing, email lists, and everything else to launch a fiction pen name and do amazing things.

Happily, I reached my goal of having a $5k month of book sales by December 2018. (It was actually $6k in November!!) January isn’t over yet, but I’m on track to blow my goal of $10k in a month of book sales out of the water already.

Yes, I plan to talk more about this whole journey with you! (And yes, I’m grinning like an idiot and doing all the happy dances and completely disbelieving that I’m doing this.) 

But for now, I want to focus in on how thinking about time helped me accomplish these goals. And it’s probably not what you think!
Listen to Episode 148 – How to Cut Your Wasted Time

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app!

HOW TO CUT WASTED TIME

Many people think first of time-tracking apps and the like when they think about how to identify and cut wasted time. For me, I start with a more big-picture view. It relates in some ways to another post and podcast episode where I talk about How to Cut Down on Your Business Expenses.

When it comes to waste, it starts with ROI.

People compare time and money, saying your time IS money. So think of it that way! Consider your time as an investment. Where are you investing AND seeing a return? Those places are where you want to continue investing and perhaps invest MORE time.

As for cutting down on time, it’s the flip side of that question. Where are you investing time and seeing NOTHING in return?

Remember that the return doesn’t just mean money. It could be that you have joy. Or more time. Here are the questions I posed in the post on cutting your business expenses with a few tweaks.

Ask these questions about each recurring investment of your time: 

• Does it bring in money?
• Does it save me time or make more time?
• Does it bring me joy?
• Can I do without it?
• Does the amount of time spent bring forth a comparable result?

These questions can help you determine the ROI for some of your activities. Because we aren’t always the best judges of our time, I’ll link to some great apps and ideas that members of my community suggested.

WHERE TO SPEND YOUR TIME

When I went to the 20Booksto50k writing conference in Vegas last fall, I kept hearing one thing again and again: double down on where you are finding success. I don’t think that’s the exact wording and it wasn’t a theme of the conference, but it’s what I heard and what I needed to hear.

For my Emma Empire, I had planned to switch genres and launch a new pen name in early 2019. But seeing my income rise and then explode, I kept hearing that I needed to stick with what was working and keep my focus there. At LEAST for a little longer. In essence, I need to earn the stability and the time to shift my focus without a loss of my current trajectory.

When you have something that’s working well, double down. Drop what you need to drop to make that a priority. Stop chasing the butterflies and shiny objects. Stick with what works.

That is very simplistic advice, but I know I need to remind myself of this. I know that it works. On a large and small scale.

Thinking about this convinced me to keep writing sweet romance and not switch to YA spy novels. (Though I’m writing those in my “spare” time.) But in an even more focused way, when I realized that my billionaire books were outselling my beach novels, I shelved the other books (even ones I’d outlined) to double down on the series that was working well.

And THAT’S how I’m breaking my goals into the new year.

TOOLS TO IDENTIFY AND CUT WASTED TIME

I confessed in the beginning that apps and the like are really not my thing. I know they are useful, but I can’t make myself use them. Maybe I’ll try in 2019. We’ll see.

But my community shared a few things that helped them focus their time.

• Rescue Time

Roland Denzel from Eat Move Live 352 recommends this app, which helps you identify where you are spending time on your computer. He pays for the upgrade, which does fancy things like sends warnings when he has been doing time-wasting things and will allow him to block certain things to stay on task.

• Toggl

Sarah Merchant from Work a Day Services uses this app to track how many hours she spends on tasks for herself and her clients. This one has a free and paid version as well.

• Atracker

Community member Melody Hansen utilizes this for personal and client work to plug in where she spends her time. It helps break it down by category and sends you a report at the end of the month showing what you did where.

• F.lux

Suzy Oakley likes F.lux, which is not a time-tracking app, but one that dims your computer screen based on the light you’re in. She sets it to alert her and change the screen color when it’s time to go to bed.

• Fresh Books

When it comes to tracking time and expenses, Catherine Turner from Path to the Bestseller List uses Fresh Books to track her time, both billable and non-billable.

 

A non-app option I want to recommend is Amy Lynn Andrews‘ book, Tell Your Time. I have this bad boy for years and though it’s been a while since I’ve read it, I love the practical and uplifting way Andrews handles this! The subtitle is How to Manage Your Schedule So You Can Live Free. That about sums it up. 🙂

BREAKING DOWN THE STEPS

When it comes to cutting your wasted time, it’s a pretty simple process. Now you need to DO IT.

• Identify where you are actually spending time
• Identify the ROI of where you are spending your time (remember ROI is more than just income!)
• Cut out, adjust, schedule, delete, or whatever action you need to focus on the tasks that have ROI

Sure, that SOUNDS simple. Now how about actually DOING the work?

I’ll say that this process hurts. It hurt me several times last year to set aside things like this podcast. (Which I might do again this year at some point.) I cut out A LOT of things. Some I missed. Some I didn’t. Some I should cut and just am not doing it. This process doesn’t always feel good.

And, depending on your goals, you don’t have to be so cutthroat. Maybe you have some areas where you just chill and those matter to your mental or emotional health or happiness, but might look like a waste on a time-tracker. My goals last year were laser focused and so were my cuts. If you aren’t trying to reach a really tough goal, you can have a little more room for flex.

Do you have particular apps or time-tracking tools to help you cut wasted time?

 

This post on how to cut down on your business expenses is a great one at the start of the year, but really ANY TIME. We’ll walk through how to identify the things you need to stop paying for, pronto!

Do you realize how many things you pay for when it comes to your creative business?

I think I know. Until I do an audit and realize that I am paying for SO MANY things I forgot about or don’t use. Here is a simple method that I use to cut back on those expenses to stop the bleeding and stop wasting my own money!

LISTEN TO EPISODE 147- How to Cut Down on Your Business Expenses

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app!

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STEP ONE – IDENTIFY YOUR COSTS

The first thing you have to do is figure out what you’re paying for. I’m mostly going to focus on recurring costs here. If you want to look at what different things you’re paying for each month, that’s a really different kind of evaluation. The recurring costs are a good and easy place to start!

How to Find Out What You’re Paying for:

• Check Paypal recurring payments (my recurring payments don’t show up, but you can try this)
• Check your bank automated withdrawals
• Check your credit card
• List out all of your paid tools that are recurring, not one-time
• Look at whatever you spent the last few months on your business (non-recurring)

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STEP TWO – TAKE STOCK OF YOUR COSTS

Once you’ve got them all, make a big list somewhere. (Or a spreadsheet, if you’re that kind of person.) Then break down the costs in the same way. You can break it down so that you see how much they each cost monthly or annually, but make it even. (As in, don’t look at one in annual and one in monthly, as that doesn’t make sense.) Now it’s time for the deep, soul work.

Ask these questions about each recurring cost: 

• Does it bring in money?
• Does it save me time?
• Does it bring me joy?
• Can I do without it?
• Do I have another tool that does the same thing?
• When is the last time I used it?

You don’t have to have a positive answer to one or all if you want to keep something. But these are the kinds of questions that will help you evaluate. I may keep something that brings me joy but no income. I may cut something that saves me time because my budget changed and I can do without it.

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STEP THREE – CUT AND KEEP

If you can’t measure what it’s bringing you, haven’t used it in a while, and don’t plan to use it again, cut it out! Even if it’s a $4/month thing.

You might consider keeping something that you don’t use or that isn’t helping IF If you have upcoming goals and you WILL use it. Or if you think you might use it and the price will go up if you leave, then come back later. If you’re going to keep something for this last reason, make sure you’re not justifying to yourself. 

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STEP FOUR – USE YOUR THINGS

Whatever you keep, make a plan to USE it. If you are keeping a scheduling app for Pinterest, plan out when in your week you’ll use it. Really make these things you pay for work FOR YOU. Otherwise, cut them!

I’m a super clutter-y person and it feels so amazing to get rid of these things! I’ve been cutting down on some major expenses and it’s fabulous. I hope you can do the same and feel the same!

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Want more planning tools?

Check out my annual planner!

Or sign up for the Digital Detox, a quick and fast email series with a small actionable decluttering item.

 

In this post I want to talk about something super fundamental that’s sometimes overlooked. And it’s simple! Let’s dive into how to keep your audience happy.

If you want to build an audience of raving fans, it can seem daunting at times. Do this! Do that! Post here! Write this kind of thing!

But when it comes down to the foundation, it’s REALLY simple: set up expectations with your readers and then keep them. This means building trust and keeping trust. It’s like you are creating a contract with your audience, even in things like your email sign-up forms when you tell people you will send every week.

Keep reading or listen to episode 146 – How to Keep Your Audience Happy

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app!

HOW TO KEEP YOUR AUDIENCE HAPPY

This boils down to setting up and keeping expectations, but there are multiple ways you may be doing this or NEED to do this.

• What you SAY – The most common way to set expectations is when you explicitly tell people what you’re going to do. Ex: when people sign up for an email list, book descriptions, your blog tagline
• What you DO – Your actions set the expectations. Ex: how often do you post on the blog, publish a book, send an email.
• What people HEAR/UNDERSTAND – You may not realize that you are communicating something other than what you think, so it’s a good idea to get an outside perspective. Ex: book covers, your tagline, BIG things. (Don’t do this with every blog post! But good idea with bigger things or as you start out.) 
• What people SEE – You may not realize how much your visuals impact expectations. Ex: book covers, how your blog looks, images you choose to use

TIPS FOR KEEPING YOUR READERS HAPPY

• As much as you can, tell your readers what to expect up front. Be clear and up front about who you are and what you do. Surprises are only good when they are GOOD, like a free book. It’s not a good surprise to get emails every day for your product launch when people expected only weekly emails.
• As much as you can, keep to your word. Life happens and people understand that. But whenever possible, stick to your word. Which means…
• As much as you can, don’t set up expectations you can’t keep or that you hate! If you don’t like sending weekly emails, DON’T START. If you aren’t sure you could keep up a weekly podcast, DON’T COMMIT TO THAT! Set realistic and sustainable goals.

This may seem very simple and obvious, but there are so many small ways we could all do this better!

When we are clear with expectations and then commit to following through, we build trust with our audience and end up with raving fans.