It's Vegas Baby!
This week I am in Las Vegas attending the 20Booksto50K conference.
There are roughly 1900 writers at this conference. All in various stages of writing, publishing, and earning. It’s the largest indie publishing event in the world.
There are sessions on business, marketing, craft, publishing, mind set, author panels, and genre meetups. It’s like the Caesars Palace Bacchanal Buffet of the writing industry.
I’ve been primarily attending data-driven sessions and learning about optimizing technology for book marketing. I’m very excited about what’s possible and what’s becoming more and more possible for authors.
But I want to tell you about the opening session on Tuesday. It was a panel of five high-powered authors.
They all:
Are earning mid six to seven figures a year.
Have at least twenty published books.
(One had 250+ published books.)Are women.
Have assistants or teams to help them.
Couldn’t quit their “real” jobs for years.
Treat their writing like a job.
Several had had traditional publishing contracts, but weren’t able to make a living from their books and had to keep working day jobs. One of them writes 15,000 words a day.
None of them said publishing books was easy. None of them were overnight successes.
That’s been the story over and over this week.
Yes, there are people who are making a lot of money, but they’re also working very hard to make it. And no matter how you go about it, the writing industry is a gamble. There are no guarantees.
Wherever they are in their journey, no books published or hundreds, 1900 writers came together for a week to learn, share, and be with each other for a few days.
Wherever you are in your journey, you're not alone.
Hello!
My name is Jocelyn.
Story warrior, book lover, day dreamer, gardener, and creative. I help serious writers roll up their sleeves, get their novel ready for publishing, and reach readers. When I’m not elbow-deep in the story trenches, I’m outside world-building in my garden and battling weeds with my three criminal mastermind cats.