If we haven't met, my name is Joe Bunting, and I'm a Wall Street Journal Best-selling writer, dad, the founder of The Write Practice, and the author of Crowdsourcing Paris. I've also been known to cry in every movie. In my newsletter, I share tips about the writing process and the business of being a writer. Sign up to get free emails about creativity, deliberate practice, and the writing process.
Writing is an asset
Hey Reader,
Writing is an asset.
A book can earn passively for decades. A blog post can get search traffic for years.
Writing is an asset.
But most people don't manage it well.
I talked to a friend this week who used to have a thriving blog with thousands of readers per month.
But then they got busy, stopped updating it, and let it sit idle. After a while Google updated their alorithms and stopped sending them new readers. Now their writing is lucky if it reaches a few hundred people each month.
Writing is an asset. You write something once and it can live forever. If you manage it well, anyway.
What does it look like to manage your writing like an asset though?
A couple of quick stories.
Story #1: Managing a Dying Blog
In 2019, I was panicking. Over the previous 8 years, I had written hundreds of articles on The Write Practice, and my team and I had built one of the top websites for writers in the world.
Then, over the course of of six months, we lost more than two-thirds of our readers.
Just gone.
So I did some research and got some help, and we completely changed the process we use to manage our articles at The Write Practice.
Over the last few months, we've doubled down on those strategies, almost quintuppling our readers from when we were at our lowest.
We learned to better manage our asset, and it has transformed our work.
Story #2: Managing a Dead Book
In 2004, my father-in-law published a book called The Art of Listening Prayer, a spiritual book about how to hear God's voice in your life.
But by 2019, it was selling only a few copies per week. The book had a terrible cover, had been published by a small-press that wasn't doing anything with it, and needed a new edit.
So I volunteered to help. I got the rights for the book from the publisher, worked with a designer to get a new cover, did a round of editing, and started an advertising campaign.
The book took off. It has since sold more than 20,000 copies, been a bestseller in it's category for months at a time, and received over 500 reviews.
Not bad for a 15 year old book!
Don't neglect the work you've done years before. You don't know how it could change someone's life today if it's put into the right context.
Your writing is an asset. It deserves to be managed like one.
How can you refresh and re-share something you've written years ago today?
This Week in Photos
This week I had the pleasure of attending Plywood Presents, a great conference here in Atlanta about entrepreneurship and doing good.
Alright folks, that's it from me. Have a great weekend, and see you soon.
Joe
Hi! I'm Joe, and I'm a writer.
If we haven't met, my name is Joe Bunting, and I'm a Wall Street Journal Best-selling writer, dad, the founder of The Write Practice, and the author of Crowdsourcing Paris. I've also been known to cry in every movie. In my newsletter, I share tips about the writing process and the business of being a writer. Sign up to get free emails about creativity, deliberate practice, and the writing process.
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