Deranged Penguin

First, and this is very important, write an imperfect one. Then revise it so that it’s perfect. Easy, right?

This is one of the hardest things for people, I think, and it’s not surprising that those who do it well are seeing real and sustainable success. Folks like Brian Clark pour tons of work into free subscription-based lessons on a variety of topics. When you look at what he’s doing, it’s likely that all you see is a towering stack of writing assignments, and no easy way to chunk it out into tasks.

Here’s what I finally did that worked – I started a campaign with only an opt-in message (thanking folks for subscribing and outlining the general plan of the e-course) and then I started advertising the course. That’s right, no content pre-loaded, only the loosest idea of what I was going to cover and in what order. Suddenly, I had signups. Not an avalanche, but enough people that if I let them down, I’d be kicking myself for the entire year. So I added some emails on the first topic. I created a quick WordPress blog on my HostGator account with additional material about that first topic, and created all the skeleton categories and whatnot for future topics. I experimented a little with themes, but at the end of the day I stuck with simple. For the first time ever, I did not flick the “make my blog searchable” switch to “on.” You don’t invite strangers into the lab – only the folks who signed up.

All of a sudden the mailing list was a test case for content that I knew was in my head but hadn’t found a reason to write down. Are the emails perfect? Hell no. Will I change them a bazillion times? Probably. But that’s the point – you can’t revise something that isn’t written. You have to begin.

So begin. Ask people to subscribe to your email newsletter about [insert thing you know well here]. Promote the ideas that you’re going to be covering in whatever venues seem appropriate. Once you have signups to the list, it’s amazing how the words start flowing. I don’t know about you, but I’m deadline driven – if I know people are waiting for the next installment of super-awesome newsletter X, I’m 100% more likely to apply fingers to keyboard. Treat it like National Novel Writing Month: don’t sweat the details (although checking spelling and grammar is advised), just get the text on the page. Hopefully the information will be useful to your “beta” signups – but even if it’s only useful some of the time, it’s a fair trade.

Later, when you have time to reflect on the entire arc, you’ll have an opportunity to make it so much better that you’ll glow with pride at what you created. For now, just stay ahead of the vanguard, write like there’s no tomorrow, and be sure to place teaching and advising above selling and promoting. Your subscribers will thank you.