How I Wrote and Published a Poetry Book: Four Goals

So I searched on Amazon and found a book about writing goals. I stumbled upon this gem, Goal Setting for Writers, by Sandra Gerth. I love the fact it was concise and to the point with actionable tasks. I have no quarrels with authors releasing 300-plus pages of nonfiction books filled with fluff to increase the book’s price tag. Still, I’m more inclined to snap up the ones less than 200 pages long and tell me what I need to know to get started rather than to fulfill a publisher’s word count to sell an ebook copy for 15 bucks. 

In Sandra’s book, she begins by explaining the difference between a dream and a goal: 

“Dreams are something passive that you just think of but never actively pursue, while goals are something you act on. Goals have a plan of action attached to them.” Sandra Gerth, Goal Setting for Writers. 

My aspirations include being a best-selling author and having my book turned into a movie or video game. Nevertheless, they were out of my hands. If I ever had a chance to pursue these aspirations, I would have to focus on what I could control: creating and publishing excellent books. They’re not the main reason I write every day, other than those.

• Creative expressions, adding my experience and my perspective into something that seems original
• It satiates my demons by subtly conveying the human condition we all share
• I want to share an insightful message with the world which has value to others.
• Writing is therapy. Cathartic, healing, and homeostasis experience
• I want to better understand human nature.
• I struggle with my own insecurities and self-imposed limitations, and I believe my message in writing can help others with their own
• Financial freedom
• Getting emails from people not just for praise but how my message made their life better, wiser, and well-informed

With any aim in mind and before developing systems in your life, the first questions you should ask yourself are: why is it important? I don’t want to sound like I” m parroting Simon Sinek. Still, there is value in why you do anything at all. Your ‘why’ should align with your values and the identity you’re crafting and shaping in your life’s journey. Once you have a clear idea of your “why,” you can start establishing categories of goals, habits, and systems to set you up for success—like a dream manifested in reality.

Four Areas of Focus

“I want all areas of my life to be about the journey, not the destination, but the destination serves to guide my focus.”

As a preface, goals help us aim, and as a marathon rather than a race, hitting milestones are great wins but are short-lived. What matters in the marathon is being present and enjoying it even when you’re not feeling it. This is especially true for managing energy and mood levels with a day job. Making time to write a book can be challenging because there need to be more positive feedback systems to keep you motivated.

I thought about giving up because there was no external reward: raving reviews and selling large volumes of pre-order copies. I had to remind myself why I was doing this; I referred back to my ‘why’ and the regrets I would have on my deathbed for not trying. So in choosing to stay consistent on this path, I needed to set up four goals to remain constant, relevant, informed, and brand awareness in a crowded market:

• Writing goals
• Publishing goals
• Marketing goals
• Education goals

Writing goals

The writing goal is to set up the discipline to show up to my writing and follow through with my SMARTER plan, which I shall get to soon. Among the writing goals is the lifestyle I want to live as a writer. It also includes the identity I’m cultivating through my deliberate effort to show up and put in the work. In addition, that broader scope is broken down into timeline goals like my writing goals in five years, e.g., I have published over 25 books. Next, it narrowed down in one year, e.g., I published five books and several dozen blog posts. 

Again, it narrows down in the next quarter, e.g., finishing the rough draft for a book and publishing 17 blog posts. And in the next month, e.g., I wrote a quarter of a book and published four blog posts. Let’s not stop there… for the next week, e.g., meeting weekly writing goals, whether by word count or writing sessions, research, writing a blog post, revising it, and publishing it. And finally, daily, e.g., accomplish a 500-word count or compose 3-5 poems and brainstorm a blog topic, research, and rough draft. So, my friends, that sums up what the writing goal is.

Publishing goals

This part of the author’s life depends on where you’re in your writing journey; are you starting out, have a couple of books on the market, or have several books on the market? Many authors had varying levels of success with their publishing goals and different opinions on this topic. I needed clarification as I kept bouncing between being exclusive with Amazon on ebook or publishing wide. Ultimately, I still needed to gain an existing presence as an author in the industry or even the clout to draw in several fans to pick up my first book.

I chose Amazon KDP’s exclusivity for the ebook edition with their KDP Select: Enrolling your eBook in our optional KDP Select program allows you to reach more readers and earn more money. You can earn a share of the KDP Select Global Fund based on pages read by Kindle Unlimited customers. Enrolling in KDP Select also grants you access to a set of promotional tools: Kindle Countdown Deals and Free Book Promotions.

Amazon is the biggest bookseller; it has a broader consumer base. I plan the allotted five Free Book Promotions days with a book promotion website like Freebooksy to acquire thousands of free downloads in the hopes that they would post a book review on Amazon to raise the book’s ranking and increase brand awareness. Additionally, sell printed copies for their store.

Also, I have partnered with IngramSpark for all online and local stores, libraries, and international markets to print copies of paperback and hardcover. Once I have a momentum of brand awareness and have written and released more books, I will reassess if it is wise to forgo my exclusivity with Amazon and list my books on Apple Books, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Google Play Books, and international markets with a distributor like Draft 2 Digital.

Marketing goals

I thought writing and revising a book was a challenge, and boy, was I wrong when I got to the meat of marketing. Coming up with a plan for how you set up a website email list, create several social media accounts, and then post some content in the hopes people will like it enough to go down the sales funnel and purchase your book. Planning and executing marketing tasks is a job on its own. So, I had to be intentional about what platforms were necessary and what other media I could make time for. 

Oh, it does not stop there… regarding the book, you must develop a book description and identify categories, keywords, and prices. If you played your cards right ahead of the launch date, you created a launch strategy to set it up for success upon release and the first few days to soar up the ranking system to draw more eyes to it. I’ll share more at length when I get to the marketing section of this several-part series—what I did, what worked, and what didn’t work for me. 

Education goals

The author’s life would be the center of fortune and fame if only these were the days before smartphones, the internet, social media, video games, television shows, and movies. Nowadays, a book is competing in several mediums of entertainment. I appreciate society’s technological advancement, connecting our reach worldwide in seconds. This made the world seem smaller but also crowded and quite noisy, making it nearly impossible for anyone to discern fact from fiction. So, with the common folk, the average attention span of a person is low, and platforms like YouTube or Instagram are far more enticing than the engagement required to read a book.

What does all this have to do with educational goals? Well, a wealth of information is available these days and updates quickly. How do I keep up with the industry and discover the latest techniques in writing or marketing? What changes in publishing would affect all authors? It’s in our nature to be the best version of ourselves by constantly seeking ways to improve, whether that’s the writing process or discovering an app that makes managing a book project smoother. The education aspect taught me how to narrow what information is relevant for my journey as an author, which includes:

• Which podcast do I want to follow and glean so much value from?
• Which books on writing, publishing, and marketing will enhance my knowledge to remain relevant and fresh
• What tools will save me time and money
• Should I join a writer’s conference and meetups?

So I approach the educational goals by asking what the best sources of information that will help me be more productive and add value to others are? My philosophy is only to learn what you need more knowledge of a topic, whether for a specific skill or to understand the theory more intuitively.

I sometimes like to learn things just to understand them, even if theirs no immediate need for it. Still, in most cases, I choose resources that complement a project. Remember, time is the most valuable asset we have, and by being deliberate about how to spend it, we can make room for what’s meaningful. The next step to going from broad to narrow starts with developing a smarter, better, and faster goal strategy.

The Gist

This post focuses on the author’s goals and a strategy for achieving them. This is accomplished by establishing a mindset and set of always-present behaviors. Still, much guidance may be used in any aspect of your life. I hope you find the ideas presented here helpful and that they help you live more peacefully. To shape the concepts described here, imagination is needed. To tie everything together, I’ll express the key ideas from each topic below.

• Dreams are passive that you just think of but never actively pursue, while goals are something you act on. Goals have a plan of action attached to them.
• With any aim in mind and before developing systems in your life, the first questions you should ask yourself are: why is it important? Your ‘why’ should align with your values and the identity you’re crafting and shaping in your journey. Once you have a clear idea of your “why,” you can start establishing categories of goals, habits, and systems.
• Ideas are many but do little use without clear directions on manifesting them into reality, so having the right goals is essential. Specifically, when you want to write and publish books, there are goals to serve as your northern star: writing, publishing, marketing, and education goals; thus, the more you can visualize and set up some basic foundations to ride the marathon, the more likely it sticks, the more likely it’s not a fleeting notion.
• Self-publishing poetry can be a challenge compared to the more popular genres, especially when other poetry books hold the top ranking for months, with a small few for a couple of years. If your goal is to publish poetry, traditional publishing is not for you. Self-publish that book of poetry because if it changes your writing, it will change someone else’s life.