Publish Or Perish Publishing For Newbies
Hillary Jane Patersen as seen by Georgios Sousa
reVAMPED 16/10/2014
I was on the Metro the other evening with a former client I use to serve from a bar, his name was Mr. Angelo. A McGill professor, of what I can ‘t remember. We were talking of things between then and now when we got on to the subject of publishing. As we discussed it, he revealed to me an old academic idem that ominously stated “PUBLISH OR PERISH”. He said it’s a rule old academics adhere to, as without publishing funding can get pretty sparse. It’s the same concept in marketing of ideas on the internet. More blogs or posts the higher your ranking comes in on the list when certain key words are typed in the hits on your website more hits equals more sales er stature er what ever. Par example I write about art and creativity at some point my name will come up under those words(actually you will only ever find me if you google my website) I know I should have been publishing more lately. I know the excuses I have been using to not publish more. Well nobody else is, AHHH…I don’t know what to say, or oh it’s too much energy and nobodies reading this anyways. None of these thoughts help move me towards the direction of my chief aim.
Those words keep lingering in my head, I hear them echoing in his thick Mediterranean accent as I go to sleep at night. “PUBLISH OR PARISH” They wake me from my dreams and my nights are restless PUBLISH OR PARISH. I want them to HAUNT YOU now, “PUBLISH OR PERRISH” read these to your self. Frightening aren’t they?
If I was to look back at the last year of my career, I have seen massive leaps, bounds and movements in the direction of my dreams. I would say much of that is directly linked to the writing of ideas and publishing of essays. Through seeing shows reviewing them, interviewing others and writing down creative ideas for business. I have had the chance to look at my own practice in a different view. As writing has had such an impact on my work and direction of my career I thought I might share some ideas, that might help someone who was looking to give a project a push or give an idea some new momentum. Start a Blog.
Starting a blog is super easy you as can sign up almost anywhere and write about anything. If for some reason you are unsure about using your real name you can easily set up an account under another. The wonderful thing about that ambiguity is it allows you to reach out to an audience while you practice your writing. Most blog spaces will have a “dashboard” that tells you your number of hits per day, per week, per article and so on. That allows you to see how what you write resonates with your audience. It also allows you to see what words where used in searches to tell you if you are hitting your target audience.
Some basic first posts could be an introduction to the writer and what the column is about. You could do a top five list, how about interviewing a friend or a mentor, or you could even give a review. Just start writing. I think a great example of this in action is HILARY JANE PETERSEN’s site. She has all sorts of fun stuff going on art, pinups and adventures. She is making and doing all this stuff anyways. She just takes a sometime to reflect and share her experiences with her audience.
So there you go kids a super easy way to help humankind, market your skills and creatively process ideas. All for the low, low price of taking some time out of your day and writing down your experiences ideas and thoughts. You will find your network expands effortlessly and you will be continually stimulated with new ideas. And that would be a word count of 620 words, 120 words over the 500 word mark that is another lesson though. Remember PUBLISH OR PERISH” YOU DECIDE…..
More Publish or Perish:
Power Writing
Winning Friends and Influencing People
Keep it Simple Silly
Taking it Professionally
Using What’s in Front of You
Stat Obsessed
Sales Notes
Rossetto Ink 