The Great Escape: How to Make This Work

Well, for cryin’ out loud. I just sat down and earned $240 for four hours of work.

Meanwhile, Friday the community college district deposited $486.60 for three weeks of work. Uhm…since they don’t count grading and course prep, that actually was for 18 hours of work, not for the de facto 54 hours of work I’ve put in so far this fall.

Do we need anything more to convince of the rightness of my proposition?

So right. So right is it that I even have an inchoate plan. It goes along these lines:

Create goals to be accomplished by quarters. Within each quarter, establish monthly and weekly to-do’s. This should break down some rather large, broad targets into manageable chunks.

How on earth would this look? Well, let’s look at some inchoate schemes:

Fourth Quarter 2012

• Develop plans.
• Lay groundwork to put plans into action.
• Begin marketing program.
• Begin advertising program.

 Looks pretty easy, but each of those four little bullets represents an amazing amount of work and hustle. The marketing plan alone, for example, entails these tasks:

Focus sharply on two specific networking groups.

• Become actively involved.
• Volunteer for specific roles.
• Revisit regularly to perform these roles.
• Gain recognition.

Develop a “presence” in Arizona business community.

• Local Arizona
• Better Business Bureau
• Rent space at appropriate business or arts fairs.

Volunteer actively for two carefully targeted groups that attract active business people and “old Arizona” elite.

• I’ve already identified those and moved to join them (in one case, to rejoin it).
• These activities will require considerable work, energy, and entrepreneurship.
• Set aside time to handle these projects.

Approach mainline national publishers and literary agents.

• Emphasize textbook publishers, since this is about the only part of the book publishing industry that’s still making a profit.

Develop “product packages.”

• This idea comes from our SBA counselor: lines of closely related services that could be delivered in packages.

Develop a social media campaign.

• LinkedIn
• Yelp
• Angie’s List

Launch a public relations initiative.

• CofC’s newsletter: ask about writing a column.
• PBJ: try to pitch columns to it.
• Send press releases to PBJ and other local rags.
• Track down [friend from long ago]’s magazine and try to get mentioned there.
• Try to get publicity for FaM, too.
• Ask clients to plug CED on social media sites.

Advertise.

• CofC’s radio program: get on it.
• Small local publications and websites.
• Update website!!!

Then we have a few other small schemes:

Improve revenues all the way around.

• Raise rates again.
• Market CED to mainstream publishers and major scholarly & scientific publishers.
• Design “packages” to sell at specific rates.
• Create e-books; market on FaM and Amazon.
• Develop social media campaigns for e-books.

Identify at least two types of subcontractors and establish reasonable pay rates for each of these:

• Interns
• Proven professional editors, writers, and designers

Visualize an organizational plan that will provide a way to handle more work than one person can handle.

• Establish amounts that subcontractors can be paid. For example, reserve project management to Tina and charge enough to make a profit on subcontracting her skills.
• Start lining up work for them.

Create a time management program that will accommodate all of the above.

LOL! That’s just for what remains of 2012. Don’t ask for much, do I?