Writer Biz #11 - ROI – A Time Suck or A Success?

What is ROI? It’s Return On Investment. Another one of those business-ey terms authors need to become familiar with.

ROI is about creating measurements which will tell you how effective a particular marketing effort is on your marketing goals. This is why you need to be sure your goals are as specific as possible. The more focused they are, the easier ROI is to measure. As time goes by and you’re following your marketing plan, doing the promo, and twittering your little heart out, you need to know if what you are doing is working. Or not. Was it a time suck, or a success?

Let’s say for your marketing plan, you set your timeline for one year. The first quarter flies by, and then before you know it, your looking at the end of the second quarter. You need to take time out, look at your measurements and see if things are moving in the direction you want them to. This really depends on the goals you set at the beginning of your plan. Are you garnering more readers? Selling more books? Are more people wanting to engage with you?

You need to be sure you are moving in the direction of your goals. If you are not, then what you are doing may not be working, and you’ll want to adjust your strategy. The unfortunate part about all of this is that there is no hard and fast rule about what works and what doesn’t. It really seems to be unique to each author and how they connect with people.

How do you track ROI? With analytics. Which is the next post. Don’t worry it’s not as awful as it sounds.

And I can hear you naysayers out there. ‘Some things you just can’t measure. You have to go with your heart.’ IMO, that’s an excuse to be lazy and to allow failure. Save your heart for your stories. This part requires your head.

A Visit to the Windy City

This time, it wasn't particularly windy. The weather was gorgeous. Which only made the trip that much more enjoyable.

Little did I know, there were surprises in store for me. Like a surprise birthday party for one. And a new Sony reader for the other. Doesn't that just rock? I think so. Count me totally floored by both. And totally thrilled. I'm very lucky to be surrounded by people (okay, so they're a couple hundred miles away, who's counting?) who would care enough to take time out of their busy schedules to participate in such an event.

Honestly, I'm telling you this as an explanation of sorts, as to why there have been no posts the last few days. And to let you know that as soon as I recover from the travel, which one good nights sleep in my own bed should take care of, I'll be back to the regular posts.

To that end, tune in tomorrow, for the next installment in the Writer Biz segment.

Today's Smile

Some days you just need a laugh.

You Know You’re Lost When...

You’ve taken a detour, and come upon a hand-painted sign on the side of the road that reads, The GPS is wrong, turn back.

No kidding. We laughed ourselves silly. And then drove for two hours trying to find our way around a rock slide. Some days are just like that.

Have a great weekend!