OLD POST ALERT! This is an older post and although you might find some useful tips, any technical or publishing information is likely to be out of date. Please click on Start Here on the menu bar above to find links to my most useful articles, videos and podcast. Thanks and happy writing! – Joanna Penn
Four years ago in Sept 2011, I gave up my job as a business consultant to become a full time author entrepreneur.
Every year since, I have reflected on what I have learned along the way. To recap, here's the post when I gave up my job, here's lessons learned from year 1, year 2 and year 3.
Things have definitely changed since I started out!
In the last month, I have reported on the breakdown of my six figure income and I have hired my husband out of his corporate job to join me in the business.
Here's what I have learned in the last year.
Lesson 1: Understand and embrace Plato's Chariot
I have written before about the struggle of maintaining my two author brands and the two halves of my business. I have attempted to divest myself of some things in the last year. I even considered giving up the podcast (shock horror!) but recently, I think I have finally understood why I need both halves to be happy.
The lesson of Plato's chariot is that there is a dark horse and a white horse and both must run together, in parallel, in order that the chariot may run straight and true and win the race.
J.F.Penn, my dark horse, writes stories.
She loves to get lost in a world of research and adventure and she is happiest alone, plugged into the sound of rain and thunderstorms, writing words that create books that readers can escape into. J.F.Penn is a chronic introvert, she does not play well with others. Her role model is Stephen King, beloved dark fiction author of millions of readers.
Joanna Penn, my white horse, is passionate about creative entrepreneurship and the empowerment of the creative.
She loves to teach people about how they can write, publish and reach readers as well as make a living with their writing. She loves to help writers realize their potential in this new world of digital opportunity. Her role model is Tony Robbins, self help speaker and changer of millions of lives.
Plato's chariot allegory is about the soul, but it works just as well for these aspects of personality. I need both of these to be whole. You mainly see Joanna here, happy and smiling but I also embrace what emerges when I let J.F.Penn run free on the page.
Now I understand I need both, I have begun to allow them equal space.
Can you apply this same idea of balance to your life?
For example, what about writing vs marketing? Or the artist vs the entrepreneur? Or your writing life vs ‘real life?'
Lesson 2: The indie movement is diverging from the traditional industry
While I don't like the ‘us' and ‘them' dichotomy, I am increasingly feeling it as the indie movement matures.
It's almost as if we are living a parallel life, creating and selling in a shadow industry that is not even measured by the traditional industry statistics. We are also less bothered about what the other lot is up to, increasingly focused on our own separate business models.
I think that the term shadow industry as applied to self-publishing was first coined by Joe Konrath, but has also been picked up by Author Earnings to describe the 30% of ebook sales that do not have an ISBN.
However much some people may care about ISBNs, many indie authors don't use them anymore.
You don't need an ISBN to publish an ebook on Amazon, where the majority of indies make most of their money. You don't need one to publish direct on Kobo, iBooks, Nook or Draft2Digital either. You can get a free one from Smashwords. You can get a free one from Createspace to publish a print book, but ebooks are where the shadow industry really lies and these ISBN-less indie sales are not counted in any reports trumpeted by the publishing industry media.
Indies can just get on with writing books that readers want to buy, selling them through the distributors and making an income entirely ‘off the grid.'
More and more I see indie authors who are doing well just getting on with it under the radar. You don't know their names. You don't have to. They are not submitting to publishers or agents. They are reaching readers and making money on their own terms.
And I believe this will become the model for more and more creatives over time. I make a good living without a publisher, without a ‘job,' as do many others.
As Orna Ross writes in her brilliant manifesto for self-publishing,
“I do not ask anyone for permission to publish, or for a pat on the back, or for a contract that insults my skills and existing readership … I acknowledge that I am more nimble, and closer to the reader, than any other player in publishing. I understand this gives me more power than any other individual publishing stakeholder (though only if I claim it) … I am proud of my self-publishing status.”
My plan for Author Entrepreneur Year 5
My plans and focus for the next year include:
- Continuing to build my fiction body of work as J.F.Penn. I have more in the ARKANE series to come, as well as a spin-off series from that. I'm working on my first co-written novel and will hopefully do more of that as I am learning the importance of collaboration. I also have a ton of other ideas to work on. Now my process is more organized, I expect to put out 4 more novels in the next year.
- Now I have my husband, Jonathan, working in the business, we are going through a process of streamlining and organizing TheCreativePenn.com site which is pretty huge after nearly 7 years of content in the form of text, audio and video. We're redoing email lists and will be changing the design as well as loads of other things. It's a big piece of work! I also have more non-fiction on the way and expect to do more collaborations with that too.
I'll also be doing more online courses. I still love speaking live but I can't reach a global audience that way. The Creative Freedom Course is my flagship product now, but I will be adding a whole load more online training courses in the coming months to answer all the questions I get daily in my email inbox.
This indie movement will only continue to grow as it expands into the rest of the world, so I am preparing for massive growth in the coming years.
I look forward to sharing the next year with you!
Please do leave your comments below and join the conversation – I value each and every one!
I appreciate your reference to Plato’s chariot. For me, it’s not two aspects of writing, but writing vs real life. Writing is more than a hobby for me – I want to be financially successful and be read by lots of people – but at the same time I could never give up my career because I love what I do. I need both halves to be happy, but it’s difficult to find a balance between the two, as well as explaining my need for both to writers without a day job or nonwriters.
Congrats, Joanna! I remember when you quit to be an entrepreneur full-time. I can’t believe I’ve been reading your blog for so long—I guess it’s just that good. 😉 Keep up the good work and I wish you success in the future!
Thanks for your support over the years 🙂
Joanna Penn is my white horse inspiration. 😀 Thanks for consistently going forth into the unknown and sharing what you learn.
Thanks Kelsye 🙂
What a total inspiration. Thanks Joanna.
I have been reading your posts recently and found them really helpful. I live in Greece, in the island of Syros however resources for emerging writers are scarce. I participated in Nanowrimo last year for the first time and finished a draft of 50018 words. I am now in the process of planning this year’s novel and your posts help me to make a better draft hopefully i complete my goal.
Thank you and I shall continue to follow your tips and tricks and share with you my progress.
Great post Joanna. Like many others, I’m glad you didn’t give up the podcast. Looking forward to seeing the changes here on the site too.
You continue to inspire me, and your posts and podcasts urge me to create more. In fact, the last one I listened to (when The Worried Writer interviewed you) had me pausing the podcast so that I could start plotting out a new novel for Nanowrimo!
I love your content, and *you* are my role model and mentor.
Joanna, we know each other for quite a while now, and I visit regularly both your websites. I mull over the decision to write fiction for some time but so far keep going with my copy editing.
Your comparison with Plato’s chariot gave me the final push. Why not doing both? I’m going to cut back on my editing, and use the released hours to write fiction. It’s time to follow my gut feelings. It’ll be a new experience but a liberating one – thanks to you and your blog. 🙂
Great to hear, Hans! I think you will enjoy it 🙂
It’s great to see that it is possible to make a full time business from writing. I’m now working on my first fiction book after having my non-fiction book published last year. I also freelance for several magazines but I’m still a long way off writing being my main income, but your blog certainly gives me hope along with lots of useful advice. 🙂
I’m glad it’s helpful 🙂 It took me about 3.5 years to move fulltime – and then around 3 before I considered the income to be decent 🙂 But it’s worth it for the long haul!
Looking forward to your courses Joanna,
I have been looking at being an indie writer for a year now and have some great book drafts. I enjoy following you because you seem to have reliable trustworthy information. Love the podcast, very informative.
Thanks Kristin 🙂 Creative Freedom is out now: http://www.creativefreedomcourse.com
and I have more to come.
What do you have to do to include quotes from newspapers and court transcripts to your book?
Hi Joanna,
I’ve been following along on your blog for the last couple of months and finally decided it was time to make a comment.
I love how you referred to your two writing identities: J.F.Penn, my dark horse, writes stories. J.F.Penn is a chronic introvert, she does not play well with others. Her role model is Stephen King, beloved dark fiction author of millions of readers.
Joanna Penn, my white horse, is passionate about creative entrepreneurship and the empowerment of the creative.
Congratulations for taking that step to become a full-time author-entrepreneur. It shows there is hope for the newer writers beginning their journey.
Exciting news for your 5th year coming up.
I’m so glad you found that useful, Monna – it’s taken me years to reconcile these two sides and now I feel I can allow both in my business. All the best for your books 🙂
You are amazing, Joanna, and such an inspiration!
I’ve learned so much from you, and I’m pretty dog gone proud to be a member of the shadow industry. : )
And for those writers who may seen this and have that dream, you don’t even have to be as good as Joanna to make it. I’ve somehow managed to pull off the full-time writer gig.
Just have some faith, believe, and work hard. (And don’t quit your day job until you have quite a few works out.)
Thanks Stan – but don’t underplay your own achievements 🙂 Any author who makes it to fulltime is doing extremely well and is still an outlier. All the best with your books!
I love your blogs, Joanna.
Your website is my first port of call for great information.
Best wishes,
Rupert
Thanks Rupert 🙂
Hey Joanna,
I came to your website from time to time. But only now, I saw your yearly posts on being author-entrepreneur.
I can relate to your lesson #1 point. I also have two horses. Sometimes, I want to be fully creative and tell stories, other times I want to teach. I’m confused what kind of author I should be. I’m so glad to have read your post. I can manage two brands!
Thank you! I’m just starting out. You are a great inspiration. 🙂
I’m so glad this helped 🙂 It’s something I continue to personally wrestle with and I think it’s just part of our personalities. Although I love writing fiction, and it’s what makes me most creatively proud of my body of work, I also need to help people and like to share and teach. Luckily, we can all do multiple things now 🙂 Have fun!
Hi Joanna ,
Thanks for writing such informative article regarding your experience. I do believe that life teaches us not just lessons but also success ratio. When you shared your experience I really felt like I was in same situation.
Surely this article changed or gave me boost to analyze what would be my next step. Writing article is one the biggest task. Online courses, is excellent.
Thanks for such great article. You keep us inspiring….
I just received this newsletter. It is very interesting and informative. Thanks.
I am an indie writer of non-fiction books. I also speak whenever and wherever I can. I’ve had audiences ranging from fifteen to 2,000.
My books need a boost and I am trying to find a way to get reviews and more publicity for my books. Can you tell me how to get both reviews (who, where, etc) and publicity?
Hi Joanna,
I know I’ve come into these posts very late, but I’m so glad I finally found them! They are so inspirational. I think I’m at the point where you were when you started (and am also in the IT industry making good money but feeling like I should be off writing spec fic instead).
It is so kind of you to share your journey so honestly like this. I think I’m now going to lose a few hours in the rest of your site!
Thank you!
I’m so glad you’re finding it useful 🙂 It took me 3.5 years of IT consulting part-time before I was able to leave (2011) and then a few more years to grow the income enough for my husband to also leave his job (2015) and surpass my old salary. So it can be done!
I have an idea for you, dear author.
You shared this article at 2015
A lot of time passed, and now You can write a new article named „Lessons Learned From 10 Years As An Author Entrepreneur”. We are waiting!
It’s coming next week 🙂 In the meantime, you can see them all here – https://www.thecreativepenn.com/timeline/
Amazing! I will check here: https://www.thecreativepenn.com/timeline/