Good morning. In a writing world that is swamped with information, we tend to ignore some clear early warning signals. I did just that, this week.

The week was actually moving along nicely. I had spent a good deal of time messing around with my website (hope you notice some improvements — let me know if you have any feedback) and was eager to start working on building up a list of writing friends. As usual there was Google/Bing/Firefox/… with their near-infinite solutions to my problem.

People at the local writing group were aghast that I had only three on my friend list. One was me, another my daughter and the last, a nice person from the writing group. No worries with that, but it was now time to step things up a bit. A book and a bit under my belt and a website that was starting to look not bad — even if I do say so myself — egged me on. Always up for friendly suggestions from people like you to help with improvements.

That leads me to the ‘writing gurus’ at the center of this piece. In particular, ones who spruik all manner of jumbled ‘how to’ advice. Most seem to spend their time coming up with myriad schemes to tempt people into buying their book, rather than writing new works. Everywhere at the forefront of advice on how to sell books is how ‘so-and-so’ builds their email lists of loyal followers. Therein lies the problem that many of us encounter — there are dozens of systems. The glare from the glowing promises these people bang on about is like blindingly bright headlights. ‘Do this’, ‘do that’, ‘T.L. from Maine writes they have made zillions of sales in five minutes …’, and testimonial after testimonial. Does anyone ever check them?

Well, there I was, stuck in the middle of the freeway to writing success, eyes blinded by dazzling imagery of magical authordom. My gut warned me, but on I went. Signed up to a thing. I hang my head how much I wasted. Almost all of the material sent to guide me into writer Nirvana was a rehash of stuff I had read many times before. Oh, the shame. I am usually much more cautious.

Lesson learned. My advice from this to writers?

·        Do not try to do too much. Just aim for quality. Most of us do not have time to do everything.

·        Do not spend loads of money on bells and whistles near the start of your writer journey.

·        Focus on a few ideas. Others can be added later.

·        Be patient as you head for your goals.

A good ending. I have found an email marketing tool that suits me. Again, not a fancy one that would suit a business with a thousand employees. I have joined it to my site. Job done for now.

Please find something to say on my contact form and check the box so that I can tell you what is coming up via email.

Hope you have a wonderful week writing. Hope you do not get sucked in like I did. There are always people willing to take your money with little to offer for it.

Have a great day. Damon.