How to create a business plan - Step 2

I have posted about writing what you have achieved this year, so how about writing down what you haven't achieved. I am going to put down what I haven't, why I think this is and what I am going to do about it next year. Here we go:

1. Ebooks - I didn't achieve to write and publish as many ebooks as I wanted. I believe this was because I didn't make use of all the time I had because I was distracted by other ventures I was trying, which wasted time for me. What I plan to do - I have already started to make more of the time I have in the day to write.

2. Sales - I didn't achieve as many sales of my ebooks that I wanted to do. Why? I think this is because of the low price. All my ebooks are at 99c, which is a discount price. I now think that this is only suitable for discount buyers and not serious readers. So, next year, or even after Christmas, I am going to up the prices of all of my ebooks. I am going to think like a publisher. Lots of trad publishers have joined the ebook world and indies have to compete with them now, so I am trying to match their prices.

3. I didn't get my Asperkids series of books out there. Why? The publisher I had emailed the partial to hadn't got back to me about it. Next year I want to get my characters out there myself. Get the ms professionally edited, get an illustrator to do the cover and drawings in the book I want. Will be researching that next year.

4. I didn't get a short story in a magazine. I hadn't done the proper research and find out what sort of stories they publish. I have been to workshops by Woman's Weekly and know what they like now. I have been reading the magazines to get a feel for the type of stories they publish. I now have a better idea of what stories I will be sending to which magazines.

So, are there things that you haven't achieved this year? If so, what are you going to do about them? Let me know.

How to create a business plan - Step 1

I got this idea from the current issue of Writer's News magazine, and thought it was a good idea so am using it to create my plan for next year's writing. The first step is to write down what you have achieved this year. So here I am doing this here.

1. Ebooks - I published three ebooks (2 short books and one story). They were 'Life in the Old Dog', 'The Vanity Quest' and 'The Leaping Angels'.

2. I wrote a children's book, the second in the series about Asperkids finding confidence via a magical world at school.

3. I had published several letters in magazines this year, and got more rewards than I've done before doing this.

4. I started to give more talks at a local library, helping new authors get on the path to indie writing.

5. I created a new marketing website, to help other authors get discovered. This goes with a blog.

6. Finally, I wrote and sent off a story to Woman's Weekly magazine, after attending their workshops and realising what sort of stories they publish.

Despite all that I have achieved this year, there are things I haven't, and I will be mentioning those in the next post, and why I think this is.

So, what have you achieved this year that you are proud to have done? Let me know.

My healthy eating plan - how it is going

I am now in my 5th week of doing the Slimming World healthy eating plan. I have had a few days here and there where I have lapsed, like yesterday, when I ate a few treats. Anyway, yesterday I weighed myself and got a shock. I had gone down 5lbs in weight yesterday. But after yesterday's treats, I put on another 3/8s of a lb. I don't mind cos I know that the next day I can go back to sticking to the plan and lose that extra bit I put on.

So here are the stats:

I started the plan on 6 Jan. I weighed 10st 1/8

4 weeks later on 3 Feb I weighed at 9st 1/8.

I would like to go down to 9st 7lbs. We shall see.

So, have any of you out there tried Slimming World and got good results? Let me know in the comments below.

New business plan for new business venture

If you have read this blog before you will know that I have begun a new venture - attraction marketing it is called. So far I have 3 leads but no commissions yet, but I am working on it. Which is why I now am working on a business plan, inspired by a suggestion from Rebecca Woodhead. Thanks, Rebecca. It started yesterday when I upgraded to the annual level of Magnetic Sponsoring and its companies. Now I have to get promoting. So, here is my plan (only in my mind but will write it down later). Once a week, starting with this blog, I will aim to promote my business to others somehow in a major way whilst still messaging on FB. This includes learning how to do a FB ad and how to make videos of myself now I have got the Webcam working on my laptop.

Now that I have been upgraded, there are more higher level products to advertise. For instance, if you want to be great at blogging and want to get leads to it try

http://julieaday.problogacademy.com/

Or, if you want to learn how to be a better marketer you can check out

http://julieaday.theultimatesalesfunnel.com. Now on offer at a reasonable price.

For other products where you can learn how to build good relationships with customers, there is 'My Affiliate Page' on my website.

Come and learn with a team led by someone special and different - me. I have Asperger's Syndrome and this is a challenge for me to be a leader. Let's be challenged together.