Information Overload

Before computers, the difficult part of research was finding materials. As a kid, I had to ride a bus a half hour downtown to the big county library when I needed to do serious research for school.

Thanks to the internet, I can look up anything that pops into my mind immediately, I can search any question. I can not only pull up a map of a place I want my character to go, I can see the satellite view of it and, most places, pull the little guy onto the map and see what my character would see driving down a road, turning to look side to side.

It’s beyond awesome. I love it.

However, the old dilemma of when to stop researching happens more quickly and is compounded by the necessity of sorting through to discard information of questionable value. Libraries used to do that for us.

Now, even when you’ve narrowed it to solid sources, it’s likely you have an overwhelming amount of information to review. Personally, I procrastinate at this point. I let it all sit, hoping it will somehow sift itself into some kind of logical order.

That doesn’t really work, though. I eventually start sorting through everything, shoving it into physical or computer files labeled by categories of information. Then I attack one category at a time.

This is an imperfect process. For example, I have a four-inch stack of notes on my table about marketing right now, and folders within folders and files that overlap folders floating around in the main folder unfiled. There are a lot of resources that fit more than one part of marketing.

My method to deal with this information overload?

I start with the best resource – the best NEW resource if there are several.

For my marketing project, I’m starting by reading Carla King‘s Self-Publishing Bootcamp Guide, 4th edition. I’ll take notes specific to my project and make an outline or timeline. Then I’ll quickly review old books I’ve read before, scanning for anything to add. If I hit a better outline, I’ll combine the two.

With that solid base, those other piles of pages will read quickly, because most of it will be review. I’ll be skimming through, looking for unique information. That makes the prospect less daunting. And the details will be plopped into the right place on the outline as I find them.

Yeah. It’s not so bad. I’m ready to get to it!

#marketingwriting #research #selfpublishing #CarlaKing #informationoverload #Selfpublishingbootcamp #refiningresearchinformation #Writing

Celebrate Your Success!

Last week I talked about the importance of celebrating others’ successes. It’s part of building a supportive community of writers.

That means you have to let people know when you have a success, too.

After years of trying to sell my screenplay to a major company, imagining it produced with major stars and being released in theaters, making me rich and famous, my first sale went directly to television, with some known actors. It did not make me rich or famous. I looked at it as another step closer to paying all the bills through my writing.

“Your movie went to television. You may never meet another writer who can say that.”

Reality check from another screenwriter, who’s produced his own films. It wasn’t as flashy as I’d always imagined, but it was still a success – a pretty big one.

The same holds true when you’ve been targeting the major markets with your stories or essays for years and a university press publishes one of your stories and you’re paid in copies. It’s still recognition, validation of your skill as a writer. It’s success.

Celebrate with your fellow writers.

#recognizingsuccess #celebratingsuccessnotyours #celebratingsuccess #SupportingOtherWriters #Writing

Celebrating Success – Not Yours

I don’t remember exactly why he was at a table talking to the authors pitching their scripts, but I remember what the successful screenwriter said:

I don’t even like writing. It’s just such an easy way to make lots of money.

I may use that line some day as the spark that pushes a desperate writer over the edge into violence. Personally, I refrained from choking the life out of him. I don’t begrudge him his success, but his attitude infuriated me. I love writing. It’s selling it that’s hard.

However, in general, it’s important to celebrate the successes others have, even when they seem to fall into it. Our Gold Country Writers have a member who didn’t really want to write a book, but over a period of decades it evolved. The unique story caught the attention of someone who passed it to a major producer, who decided it would make a great film and optioned it. Sure, there was a twinge of jealousy when I first heard this, but every writer who succeeds is an example that it can happen.

I went to her website. While she made it sound like this all just fell into her lap, the full story showed me something different. The initial contact may have been luck, but, without consciously planning to create anything, she gave the initial contact time out of her busy live over a period of decades. Then when she decided to write a book about it, she planned and executed a great deal of research to provide the full, unique, story. Then she did a good job writing and promoting the book so it’s not surprising it caught the attention of someone in the film industry.

While luck is always part of success, usually there’s a long history of work behind it. So smile and offer genuine congratulations to others when it’s their turn.

www.sherimcguinn.com www.amazon.com/author/sherimcguinn

#celebratingsuccess #celebratingsuccessnotyours #success #SupportingOtherWriters