Writing Tip: Prioritizing a Task #MFRWauthor #amwriting @kayelleallen

How to Prioritize a Task 

Writers deal with shifting priorities all the time. If we have children, we put their needs before just about anything else. A spouse often comes before our needs. We face deadlines with books, with blog posts, with friends' expectations... you name it. There are always things tugging at us. Asking us to decide which is more important.

How do we decide? By putting them into a chart like the one shown here. There are four quadrants: Important, Not Important, Urgent, Not Urgent.

Important implies something that must be done, but perhaps not this moment. Urgent means it's something that must be done now. Not important means it can wait until a better time. Perhaps nothing bad will happen if we don't do it at all, or at least the consequence is something we can live with. Not urgent means it should be done, but can be put off.

What's the difference? An urgent task has a looming deadline or one that has passed. It can have a significant impact on your life. Important tasks don't have a deadline, but they have an impact anyway. Urgency is associated with time and impact. Importance is associated more with impact.

So how do you decide what to do first? Consider whether the task at hand has a deadline. Must it be done right now? Paying the light bill by a certain date to keep the lights on is an urgent task. Changing a burned out light bulb might be important if it means you can't see to pay the light bill.

Think of the Urgent and Important tasks as putting out fires. They are extremely important. Things could get worse if they are not handled now.

Important but Not Urgent tasks are things we do to be proactive. We can do them at a pace that allows us to spend "quality time" on them, without rushing. But they must be done.

Urgent but Not Important tasks are things we have to do right now (answering the phone) but that you might be able to shuffle a bit.

Not Urgent and Not Important tasks are things we do that don't add to our goals, such as shopping, playing a game, even some driving. These are more "time wasters" than productive items.

Tarthian Empire
Companion

Plug a few tasks into this chart and see how they fall. If they are not urgent and not important, they can wait. The urgent and important can not. Determine where your tasks fall in this chart and you will be well on your way to prioritizing your next task.

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Kayelle Allen is the founder of Marketing for Romance Writers. She is a multi-published, award-winning author, and the owner of The Author's Secret, an author support company. Her unstoppable heroes and heroines include contemporary characters, futuristic immortals, covert agents, and warriors who purr.

Homeworld http://kayelleallen.com

Unstoppable Heroes Blog http://kayelleallen.com/blog

Twitter http://twitter.com/kayelleallen

Facebook http://facebook.com/kayelleallen.author

The Author's Secret https://theauthorssecret.com

The Business of Writing for #MFRWauthors #amwriting

I’ve said several times that when it comes to marketing I feel like a toddler trying to teach a baby how to walk. That was why I joined MFRW, I wanted to learn how to market myself better. Oh I know the basics. I have a facebook page, a twitter account, a pinterest account, a blog my and website. I try to promote myself when I have a new release by visiting blogs and doing chats. I try to get reviews on my books. But I don’t know it all.

My forte is writing. I’ve been at it for years. I was a president for two of RWA’s chapters, the newsletter editor for the same two chapters plus I was the editor for the WRW’s magazine (it was a short lived magazine but it was beautiful). I’ve done programs and workshops on writing. I worked with critique groups. Now, I’m a senior editor for a small press. I still don’t know everything but as an editor I have seen things that let me know some writers could use a little help.

So that is what I’m going to post for the MFRW. Writing tips, editing tips, and formatting tips. Here’s one of my favorites...

** TODAY'S TIP **

I was attending a panel on editing and a new writer asked, “How many times should I edit my book?”
One of the authors on the panel paused for just a moment and then said, “Until you’re so sick of it you want to throw it against the wall.”

There is no set in stone amount of times. It depends on your manuscript. Do you feel it shines like a diamond? As you read through are there still parts that snag at you? Make you wonder if there is more you need to add? Only you can be the judge of that.

Let's Talk About It.

How would you have answered that new writer's question? How many times should you edit a book?

Barb :)

Barb will be posting a monthly blog feature "The Business of Writing".

Hey #MFRWauthors! BLOG TITLES That Drive Traffic!

Explore more infographics like this one on the web’s largest information design community – Visually.

MFRW Monthly Quote - July 2014 #MFRWauthor

"An artist must have downtime, time to do nothing. Defending our right to such time takes courage, conviction, and resiliency. Such time, space, and quiet will strike our family as a withdrawal from them. It is…. An artist requires the upkeep of creative solitude. An artist requires the time of healing alone. Without this period of recharging, our artist becomes depleted."
-Juila Cameron



Emerald
Emerald is an erotic fiction author whose short stories have been featured in anthologies published by Cleis Press, Mischief, and Logical-Lust. She serves as an assistant newsletter editor and Facebook group moderator for Marketing for Romance Writers (MFRW), and she selects and posts the monthly inspirational quote on the MFRW Marketing Blog. Find out more about her at her website, The Green Light District.

Hey #MFRWauthors! Just LINK IT!

Let's talk about LINKING. My rule of thumb is when in doubt, just LINK IT! What am I talking about? Really, everything. All of your social networking accounts, blog, website, tumblr - literally everything - should be linked.  Because then you are doing the work once while your impact is huge. It's that easy.

Are there accounts you shouldn't link? Nope but there may be some more geared towards different types of posts. It's still okay to link them because there is always overlap and as long as you aren't spamming out oodles and oodles of promo, your goal should be to extend your reach (and sell more books).

Now time to get to work!

First and foremost, have your blog connected into your social media sites, particularly facebook and twitter. This means each time a post goes up on your blog, it automatically goes to these programs for you. Here's promo without anymore work than setting up your single post. You can set up these links in the SETTINGS account of your blog. Blogger allows you to link with Google+ also and I recommend you do it even if you do nothing else with Google+ (yet).

Link your blog to Networked Blogs on facebook. You can search for the app on facebook and select SYNDICATE to connect your blog. Here is another way for potential readers to find your blog and follow you. It is becoming more and more popular so jump on it! Doing this also means your blog posts are automatically sent out via facebook. If you have an author's page, you can even choose to have them sent there instead of your profile.

Other TOP TWO places to link your blog (that have a bit more to it than just linking):

Triberr - Build your reach exponentially. See my previous post with specifics on this site. This is a bit more involved than just linking though completely worth it.

Goodreads - Thousands of readers use this site. If you don't create an author's page and utilize it by linking, you are missing a big opportunity for networking regardless of the horror stories we see with reviews on goodreads. Check in about twice a week to see if you have any messages, reviews, etc. Most importantly, link your blog to post to your author page! See mine here.

Another place to link your blog is in search engines that give potential readers more places to find you. Most have widgets for you to add to your blog but some just simply place you into a database to be more searchable. My favorites are: BlogNation - BlogTrain - Blog Lovin' - Writing Blogs - Linky - AuthorsDb. Be sure to set up all your links in each of these - most require your blog rss feed so have that handy - so each time you post in one place, your information spreads out across the web.

Finally, make a list of all social networking sites you belong to or any on-line accounts.

Here are some of the most common: facebook - twitter - google+ - Pinterest - LinkedIn - tumblr - stumbleupon - YouTube - Picasa. Go into the SETTINGS options in each of these and be sure you have linked as many of them together (and with your blog!) as possible. There are other sites you might choose to use and regardless of which ones you choose, just be sure to link them.

Remember every time you link it, you reduce your work in half while doubling your reach.

I don't suggest you spend hours a day on these sites.

In fact, linking your accounts means your time spent on marketing decreases even though you are visible in more places. Once these accounts are established (& LINKED!!), you will need to do little more than your regular blog posts. A few of these places I mentioned take extra maintenance but it's minimal and worth it.

How does this help your business?

You will advertise to a wider audience as you increase your reach. You will write more because your time spent marketing will decrease. It's a simple case of Win-Win.

So, what are you waiting for? Just Link It!

And Keep Writing!

Paloma

Paloma Beck is a Romance Author living a life of contradiction... she's a happily married carpooling mom writing erotic romance. It's almost naughty! Paloma writes full-time and has three series in the works with others on the fringes. Her books span both the contemporary and paranormal romance genres.

Paloma serves as MFRW's Blog Director.