One Week a Month for Non Writing Projects (Month 1 results)
Experimenting with Hyperfocus
In January, I posted about scheduling time to catch up each month and work on non-book tasks. Today, I’ll share the results of February’s experiment.
The Test
The first full week of this month, I chose a single task—setup an online shop. I’ve wanted to do this for quite a while, but it felt daunting. I never could justify taking the time away from writing, because it would likely use up my energy for the day. There’d be no oomph left to put into working on my book. So a shop was the perfect test.
Setting Up the Shop
The weekend before I started, I researched which platforms I wanted to use (Payhip for the store, BookFunnel for eBooks, and BookVault for print). Then Monday, I dug into setting it up.
Creating the Payhip store and adding payment options went smoothly and used up about a day. Adding eBooks to be delivered via BookFunnel took another. But the BookVault integration? Uffdah. Took me 3 days.
After several attempts, I realized that the integration from Payhip to Zapier to BookVault was not meant for a US based shop. Like, not at all! Even the payment amount had to be in £ GBP. I took a ton of screenshots and sent it to BookVault. It took them a while to get back to me, but they verified what I had confirmed.
I’d heard amazing things about the quality of books printed through BookVault, so I was determined to make this work. It turns out that you manually enter the order from Payhip into BookVault. Not ideal for large-scale sales. But easy enough for small scale like I have right now. Making an order was easy and BookVault was pleasant and helpful.
The learning curve on combining the three was pretty steep. If I’d felt I had to write that day too, I’d have hit the overwhelm wall pretty fast. As it was, it took me all week to work the kinks out.
If you’re curious and would like to see the shop in its final form, here’s the link.
Why did this work so well?
I think it was a success because I could stick to a single task until completion. As an indie author, I have a huge list of tasks I need to complete beyond my precious writing time and it can be distracting. Having a week to check off one of those items will be a good thing!
Takeaway
Pick one thing. Do it. Boom. That’s it!
I’ve known for a long time that splitting my attention was not so great for my writing output and various projects. This experiment really solidified that truth for me.
What tips and tricks to you use to get side projects done?
As I sign off, I’ll remind you to…
Be the Difference. Be extraordinary.
All the best,
Amy
Feel free to hang out with me in Substack Notes and share your thoughts.