How to Create a Lasting Author Career

In a world of instant gratification, it's easy for authors to get sucked into a vortex of "you must make this current book succeed or else!!!" 

Except... Most successful authors didn't become a success from one book.

And even among the tiny percentage of authors who had a debut novel explode in popularity, it's exceedingly rare for an author to never publish again and financially survive the rest of their life off that one title's royalties.

(I'm sure there's a handful of these people in the history of book selling, but it's so rare that I've never found it worthwhile to look them up or try to model my career after them.) 

When we look at the authors who have careers that stretch across decades, the most important factor I've found is their ability to continue writing and releasing new books. 

Seems simple enough, right? 

Except so many authors these days find themselves burnt out, exhausted, and low-key dreading the page. Writing stops being fun. The writing itself gets shuttled to the side in favor of marketing and trying to build a social media following. Or endlessly "optimizing" the writing process until it becomes a chore rather than a delight (even when it's hard work).

If you want to have a lasting author career, we need to flip that around and put writing (and actually ENJOYING it) back at the center of what we do. 

Prioritize Writing Over Marketing

When you're trying to increase the success of your books, it's tempting to throw all your time, energy, and money into marketing one particular title in hopes that it'll break out and become a household name.

And while there's nothing wrong with having high hopes for a particular title (I definitely did for my adult debut, With All My Haunted Heart !), wrapping up your sense of self -- and whether you believe you can publishing more in the future -- in that one title is a recipe for disaster. Especially if your focus on that title means pushing yourself past the point of exhaustion because "if this doesn't work, I'm a failure who will never publishing again!!!" 

First, because working from that headspace that feels terrible, and you didn't embark on this career to make yourself feel like garbage. (Remember when writing was actually FUN? When it was the thing that made you feel giddy and excited and fulfilled??) 

Second, if that book does take off but you're too burnt out and exhausted to write the next one, you can't capitalize on that momentum. Readers want more from you, and with that comes a whole new level of pressure, and if you're already burnt out? Those aren't fabulous conditions for peak creativity.

And that doesn't even account for the panic of "oh shit, do I have to do that for every book now??" that comes from achieving your goal in a way that felt miserable. 

Instead of placing all your hopes on one particular book, you want to structure your author time in a way that prioritizes your ability to write the next book.  

That means spending more time writing than marketing. 

And it means learning how to reduce all the mental pressure so you can actually enjoy that writing time. (And if you need help with that, it's a big part of what I teach in The Confident Author Academy.)

If you need extra encouragement to prioritize writing time over marketing time, here's an (incomplete) list of why continuing to publish new books is such a smart move:

• Each new book you release is a fresh opportunity to connect with new readers
  • If your goal is "a book blows up and sells a bazillion copies" (which, I should note, is NOT the only form of success), would you rather have one chance to do that? 10? 20? 50? 
    
    
• When a reader does find one of your books and falls in love with your writing, the more titles you have out, the more books they can buy from you. 
  • Case in point: this post is a few hours late because I read a free book by KJ Charles on Saturday (The Magpie Lord) fell absolutely in LOVE with the story, and then bought the remainder of the series and plowed through two more books on Sunday.
  • After which... I bought 10 more. Several (though not all) of the ebooks were under $5 and this isn't the first time I've found a new-to-me author and then binge-purchased a ton of their backlist. 
  • Note: If you're a debut, do not fret! It's okay that you only have one book so far. We all have to start with that first book. This is a LONG game, played out over several years. Don't let this be a reason to panic and rush. If anything, it's a reminder that new people will be finding your book for many years to come! Your month 1 sales (even your year 1 sales!) are NOT the whole story for your debut.
    
    
• Also, you LIKE writing! You didn't get into this to become a marketing expert. You got into publishing because you love telling stories. When your focus is on building your list of books, you get to do more of what you actually love: writing.

How you'll go about prioritizing writing and publishing more books may look wildly different from mine, and that's okay! If you're working a full-time job outside of writing, if you have young kids, if you have a chronic disability that affects how much you can work, your publication speed will be different! 

You may never want to write full-time, in which case maybe you put out 3-5 books in 10 years while someone full time puts out 10-20 books in that time. 

It's not a race. It's about enjoying the process while you grow your list of books at a speed that is fun and sustainable to you. 
 

Solve for Sustainability Over Speed

This is the part in traditional writing advice where you'd get tips on how to write faster, so you can put out more books in a shorter about of time.

I recommend a very different approach.

If the only problem you solve is writing speed (either through more hours at the computer or shifting your writing process) but you never address the things that make being an author stressful, you'll end up overwhelmed, exhausted, and feeling like you're constantly behind.  

So instead of worrying about speed, you need to identify the sources of stress that take the joy out of writing. 

Because if you hate the writing process (or feel "meh" and uninterested in your story) it's going to be hard as hell to consistently get yourself to the page and actually use any of that "how to write faster" advice. 

As you do this, be careful not to blame all your stress on other people. You want to look for sources of stress that YOU can control. 

This is also not an opportunity to be mean to yourself. Be truthful about what's going on with your career (including the less-than-helpful habits you've developed) without shaming yourself for those things. 

Example Sources of Stress: 

• Things you tell yourself that feel terrible:
  • This book is my last chance to succeed 
  • No publisher will buy new books from me with this track record 
  • I don't write fast enough to keep up with the industry 
  • My books are too quiet/not splashy enough 
  • I need to hurry and do X before it's too late and I miss out! 
  • This book isn't good enough / I need to get this first draft right 

• Things you do that make you feel bad: 
  • Posting a marketing graphic and then constantly refreshing to see how many likes or comments it gets
  • Checking your sales numbers/Amazon rankings several times a day
  • Regularly skipping writing sessions in favor of author admin/marketing and then feeling stressed about your deadline
  • Scrolling social media for hours / seeing everyone's good news and telling yourself you're the only one with no exciting updates  

Be careful not to let your brain trick you into thinking these types of things are unchangeable. 

Your brain probably thinks some of those thoughts are objective facts. You might have all sorts of "evidence" that you really are "too slow" or that your sales record has factually doomed you.  

You might have successfully convinced yourself that tracking your social media metrics is beneficial. 

But if those things make it harder to write, they've got to go.

 
Pick ONE Place to Start

Once you have your list of things that suck the joy out of writing and make it hard to write consistently, it may be tempting to address ALL THE THINGS all at once. 

Resist that urge. 

Instead, pick ONE thing to focus on that will reduce your stress and make writing more fun. 

While there's no perfect thing to pick, I recommend choosing the one you think will be the easiest to change first.

Get that quick win rather than tackling the hardest thing on your list!

Let's say your social media is full of authors sharing exciting updates (new deals, cover reveals, stellar trade reviews, etc.) and you always find yourself feeling frustrated, defeated, and small after the barrage of updates. 

Your first change might be taking social media off your phone, or using something like Freedom or Brick to block social media until late in the day when you know you'll be finished with writing. 

Or, perhaps you find yourself deeply worried that future books won't sell, and the stress of that has left you with zero motivation to write the one currently under contract. 

In that case, you might create a rule for yourself that every time you think "I'll never sell again" you'll take a deep breath (maybe even go for a walk or spend 2 minutes dancing to a favorite song to get the emotions out) and then write a list of 5-10 reasons why you're excited about the story you're contracted to write.

Again, don't expect yourself to nail each of these in one day. If you tackle just one thought or behavior per month, you'll feel a hell of a lot better a year from now. 

And you'll be writing a lot more, too. 
   

Final Thoughts

While the process I outlined in this post is simple, actually following through on making these kinds of changes--letting yourself try things, fail, pick yourself up, try again--is hard for most people to do on your own. 

Having someone on your team who can help you create a plan, implement it, and troubleshoot when it doesn't go perfectly the first (or tenth!) time, is the best way to ensure these changes actually stick. 

You can do this exact kind of work with me (and a small group of fellow authors) inside The Confident Author Academy. The next round of the program runs from January-June 2027, and enrollment is happening November 9th-16th. 

Join the waitlist here.

Until then, happy writing!
Isabel 

PS - Don't want to wait until January to do this work? I currently have openings for new private clients. Click here to learn more and schedule your free enrollment call. 

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