Recently, I decided to go all-in with WriterSanctuary. This means putting a lot more time blocks throughout the week toward WriterSanctuary’s development. And I’ve spent a lot of time over the last couple of weeks pouring over the things that are coming soon.
This doesn’t mean that I am shutting down the other sites. On the contrary, one of the ideas is to get WriterSanctuary to a certain level of success to afford to hire writers and additional help for those blogs. The hope is that WriterSanctuary’s income can offset those expenses.
Essentially, I’m working on one brand at a time, which is something I should have done five years ago when I was first thinking about doing so.
What Is On the Horizon for WriterSanctuary?
Putting all of my effort into WriterSanctuary gives me the time necessary to see some ideas come to life. A lot of these have been on the back burner for so long that I nearly forgot I wanted to do them.
In a lot of ways, I feel like I’m getting back to the root of why I built WriterSanctuary in the first place.
So, what kind of great things are coming soon?
3 Posts and 3 Videos Per Week
I’ve been trying to keep the schedule of publishing three blog posts and three videos every week. Now that I cleared off a lot of my time, I am now able to get things rolling on a permanent schedule.
Of course, it’s going to take me a few weeks to stabilize everything. I would love to be a week ahead for both the blog and YouTube channel. That means making an extra piece of content here and there.
What’s nice is that I can start collecting a better sample of data for the blog vs vlog series and spreadsheet.
Updates to Older Content
Updates can do wonders for a blog, especially when it comes to rewriting obsolete tutorials or lists. I’ve seen old posts gain thousands of views extra per month after a simple 400-word addition and a few tweaks.
I’ve scheduled at least one update each week. Some of these older pieces, I’ll also share through push notifications, as I am sure a lot of new subscribers probably don’t know they exist.
Being able to update old content should make both Google and new visitors happy.
More Reviews, Tutorials, Comparisons, and Lists
Part of not having a lot of time available means I wasn’t able to dive into a lot of new tools or apps. As reviews and tutorials are still among the top pieces of content on the site, I’d like to add more of them.
I’ve been sitting on FocusWriter for about three months now!
I have a massive backlog of all kinds of apps, editing tools, mapping software, and more that I haven’t even started researching. And nearly all of them would probably net me a great deal of traffic.
I’ve also wanted to work on more comparison blog posts and videos. The Reedsy vs Scrivener video is still in the top 10 of the YouTube channel, so comparison content works exceptionally well for views and watch time.
Free eBooks
Using the Blog-to-Book content strategy, I’m going to start publishing free eBooks in the near future. Essentially, these are guides for using specific tools. For instance, I’m working on one right now that covers everything about Reedsy Studio.
I’m not sure if I will build an online bookstore on this site, start a new one, offer the books on Fourthwall, or share the books on MichaelBrockbank.com. Regardless, I’ll have a few of these guides coming out over the next few months.
Another idea I had was to write free novellas that are connected to the books I publish. Perhaps I’ll publish some of the origin stories of the characters in my books. Though, I was thinking about doing that on Inkitt.
More Fourthwall Products
I was able to start working on adding more products to the Fourthwall store. Every week, I schedule at least an hour to work on ideas from the books.
As I am still doing everything myself, it may take a week or two before something new drops. But at least I am able to work on them now.
I would still love to see the book cover of Kingmaker on a throw blanket!
Projects with Traffic and Financial Requirements
Now, let’s look at some of the upcoming projects that have traffic and financial requirements tied to them. The reason for this is to make each one worthwhile.
For instance, do I want to spend so much time putting together an online WordPress course for just one student? What about investing a ton of money into building a bookstore if no one visits?
A lot of these are going to require some marketing cash, which is one of the reasons for having a monetary goal. I want to make sure I can throw the appropriate funds into each one.
These are in order according to what goals I have to hit before launching them.
Writing and Blogging Courses
I’ve been asked quite a few times throughout my career if I was interested in hosting online courses. It’s been in the back of my mind for the past six or seven years. Today, it has moved toward a more serious project.
Now, I can set up courses that won’t cost me anything but time to implement. However, paying for some premium tools and marketing would go a long way to making them successful.
For instance, the LearnDash LMS can run about $199 per year but includes everything I’d need to launch a great course. I could always use the “Cloud” version at $25 per month, but it would be ultimately more expensive over the long haul.
Writing Contests
Lately, I’ve been really interested in running writing contests while helping indie authors market themselves. I’m still working on the logistics of everything, but it might be one of the more fun projects coming up soon.
I got the idea when researching for the flash fiction post and all of the contests others host.
There is a lot involved if you want to host a writing contest properly. It’s more than just giving away prize money. I would need judges, other non-prize incentives, and promotional materials. I would have to answer, “Why would anyone want to enter the contest?”
Indie Bookstore
Quite a bit later is adding an indie bookstore to the mix. I’m not sure if this would be on WriterSanctuary, a sub-domain, or its own website. But I would love to host and market a bookstore specifically for self-published authors.
I want to have one of the lowest pricing schemes available, putting as much money into the hands of authors as possible. Since everything else above should generate revenue, I wouldn’t have to charge a lot overall.
Plus, some of the fees go to promoting those books with paid advertising. Essentially, if someone puts a book on my site, they’ll get a few free advertisements on something like Facebook or other effective platforms per month.
Anyway, I’m still hammering out a lot of the details on this one.
Selling Premade Book Covers
Another aspect I plan to host alongside the bookstore is helping artists sell their book covers. A premade book cover can easily help new authors, especially those who don’t have a lot of money on hand for art.
It’ll be connected to the bookstore in some method, I’m just not sure exactly how as of yet. This is a project that will be much further down the line as it will require a whole lot more development.
Still, there’s really nothing you can’t do in WordPress.
Writing Retreats?
I’m not sure about the requirements for writing retreats. I think they’d be a lot of fun, as long as they were promoted well and had a decent turnout. Not to mention setting up locations and planning activities.
There was the idea of starting them off as virtual retreats, which is something that might happen much sooner than later. However, I want to go into this well-informed, which means spending a bit of time doing some research.
Nonetheless, I think the retreats are a great idea and will be quite fun once I hammer out the details.
Publishing Books and Creative Sanctuary
Although I am putting a lot more time and emphasis on WriterSanctuary, it’s not the only thing I’m working on. A lot of this is more centered around proper time management and how I use the writing sprints on YouTube.
I still plan on publishing books, getting my bachelor’s degree, and making sure the client work is done.
For instance, if I dedicate a two-hour block of time on Thursdays and Fridays to Despair, I can get back to working on Creative Sanctuary’s YouTube channel. This is aside from the fact that I would love to finish that book before Fury comes out.
Part of WriterSanctuary is to work on screenplays. I would love to have a live-action adaptation of a few scenes from my books on the channel. This is in addition to any skits or parodies I’d love to publish on the weekends.
For now, though, the primary concern is putting some time into Despair and finishing that series of books on YouTube and Wattpad.
Yes, that means Despair will be coming back very soon. I think I’ll rewrite and rerecord the episodes, as I have become a much better writer since it started. But with the time blocks available, I can finally put Despair to rest in the near future.
The Goals Are Set in Stone!
These are more than just things I would like to do or am toying with in the background. All of the things I mentioned above are goals that are set in stone with a plan of action that I have been following thus far.
Although some of the bigger things, like courses or contests, won’t happen for a while, I am still working toward launching them sometime before the end of the year.
The added incentive of focusing on time management and working toward the success of WriterSanctuary is being able to afford help for the other blogs. I would love for ColoradoPlays to donate more than a few cents each month to charity.
Yet, I need to stabilize each one before adding another to the mix. The success of each one strengthens the next with much-needed funding.
Besides, it’s a good feeling to have the time available to start putting together the things I wanted to do with WriterSanctuary. And I have a feeling that this is merely the tip of an exceptionally large iceberg.
We’ve Only Just Begun
Some of the things on this list are probably going to take a bit of time to get moving. Currently, I’m working on stabilizing the publishing schedule for the YouTube channel and the blog.
While the publishing schedule is the cheapest and easiest to manage, it’s also one of the more time-consuming aspects. That’s because of the work that entails when researching content and products to review.
And then I am working to get YouTube and the blog a week ahead of schedule. That means a few extra pieces of content as often as I can get it. Plus, I have to make Google’s algorithm happy to help draw in more readers.
So, there is definitely a lot of work ahead of me. But at the end of the day, it’s all worthwhile. WriterSanctuary is my flagship, and it’s high time the brand got a lot more love than it had in the past.
Let’s build something awesome!
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