Day 130: Challenge Update

As much to motivate myself as to inform you all where I am in the challenge, here is a little challenge update. I've written over 325,000 words as part of the challenge, including two completed books, the first of which has sold about 25 copies, the second of which should be available by February 1st in digital and paperback version! My 130+ blog posts on my website have been a big boon to my Web traffic. I've averaged well over 600 unique visitors per day and my best day is over 1,500! I'm currently averaging over $50 per month in advertising on my site, up from around $20 a month before the challenge. I think that my goal of over $100 per month is in reach, I just need to keep writing and I'm bound to hit it. My book sales are also way up, following the trend from last January and hopefully they'll continue to rise just as they did last year (especially with me putting new books out).

I've had good days and more challenging ones during the challenge. I'm much more suited to get everything done before 9 a.m., as I lose a bit of steam after my freelance articles which I do between 9:30 a.m. and 2 p.m. I've taken on more freelance articles to increase my immediate income and this has been a positive double whammy for my income along with the increased book sales, which will come to culmination after March when I get paid for this month's sales. The toughest part of the challenge is getting started in the morning, but if I don't waste any time and barrel into it right away, I tend to finish things up much earlier.

And that's where I am. Can't wait to keep this going for another 235 days (at least)!

In other news, I continued to work on the comedy memoir today and I wrote a blog post about dealing with conflict.

Day 122: Mercury Rising

This has been a wild month so far, and it's only been 3.5 days! My book sales are following a trend set last January by nearly doubling from December to January. The only thing is, I sold about 200 last December, but this December, I sold over 900! I've enjoyed the trend, to say the least :). It makes me proud of all the hard work I put into these books and I'm very excited to release my 1,000 character writing prompts book when I finally get it out to market. Who knows if the trend of selling 40 books a day will continue through the whole month. If it does, it'll take a nice chunk out of my debt. If it doesn't, it will still have been an exciting few days to have been a part of :).

If it continues throughout 2012, well, let's just say my debt will be toast by the winter :).

In addition to coming oh so close to finishing the character prompts book, I wrote another creativity conundrum article about being cool. Hopefully everyone who has been bullied for their artistic gifts can get something out of it!

Day 105: A December to Remember

Last December, my career as an author took off as my book sales nearly doubled from the previous month, making me wonder if I should give this "writer thing" a deeper look. A year later, I'm experiencing some similar holiday cheer with a healthy boost in book sales. In light of the fact that I may be releasing as many as seven books in January and February with more to come throughout the challenge, I can't help but be grateful.

I'm not yet on par with some of these million copy sellers (I haven't reached 10,000, so I have a few powers of ten to go :)), but I am so happy to have been blessed with the great fortune that allows me to be much more comfortable this year than I was in 2010. I still have debt and a long way to go to take it down to $0, but with continued hard work and writing productivity, perhaps I'll be able to accomplish that goal by December 2012.

Today in writing news, I wrote some prompts about doctors and nurses and created a blog post on the definition of happiness. Happy final shopping days, y'all!