In trying to turn Scrap Paper Entertainment into a more formal business, I’ve taken a step back to try and understand what I need to do in order to just… keep going with it in general. I’ve struggled a lot to think of it as a business for reasons that were very specifically highlighted in How to be Everything.
So I’ve taken a little time to consider it, and here’s a few… Principles? Ethos? Guidelines? Things I can decide to do now that will hopefully make it easier for me to keep working at it when things get tough. These had to be entirely practical, not big ideals, and I think I’ve got at least an initial set that I can work with.
Put myself first
This shows up in two main ways.
First, I am giving myself the permission to pursue things that are creatively fulfilling first and then figuring out how they can be monetized second. This is not really how you do things, as I well know from years in tech, but doing things like writing to an audience has always made me hate the things that I once loved. So I’ll do things for myself first, and figure out how to make it work for the business second.1
Second, I am currently chronically ill. I need to feel like I can step away and recover now and then when I need it. This is a new practice, but one that I’m going to work on more actively because, well, I’m never going to see improvement if I work myself like I once did.
Document everything
This is a general practice that I need to start putting into place. It’s something I do at work, but one that I need to start to put into place for myself as well. I am going to write down everything and keeping documents so that I can look back on how things were done in the past and see how I have been able to evolve. This is also something that leads into…
Repurpose everything
If I have everything documented, it makes creating content easy, right? Blog posts, social media posts, everything is a lot simpler if I can just keep track of it all and then repurpose the documents for when I want to talk about everything.
On a larger scale, though, this also extends to some of the things I am making. Different people have different needs, after all, so if I am making another workbook then I should also make everything in that workbook into something that people can download and re-use over and over again once they’ve finished with the book. Or maybe let them just pick the parts of the workbooks that are useful to them. Maybe that workbook can also turn into a podcast with just the information sessions, or even a small course so that you can hear the instructions instead of reading it. Maybe some of that workbook can be turned into an infographic or a poster for people who just need a reminder and not the whole thing.
Essentially, the idea is to make a thing, and then figure out how to make that thing available to the most people in the most ways.
Create systems for the long term
All of that is a lot of work, so I need to create systems that are going to work for me long term. This shows up in two major ways.
First, I need to focus on making long term sustainable processes for everything I am doing. That’s figuring out how to integrate the marketing into my creation time, and being sure I can balance all of the things I need to do.
The second is that I am not going to jump onto something just because I think it might get me a boost in sales right now. It’s a lot of not doing one time things as I have been doing for so long, but coming up with something that I can sustain and provides some stability.
I’m realizing the last three are all about business process, so let’s step back to something else that’s more of an intentional decision that I can use to help me in the future.
Encourage people to walk away
This is a bad business decision I am making on purpose.
Marketing makes me incredibly uncomfortable because it feels not only like I am bothering people, but also like I am supposed to mislead them in order to get them to try out whatever I’ve made. There’s this feeling that in “enticing” someone into getting my stuff, I’m leaving out information that you would need to make a fully informed decision.
So instead, I’m just going to tell people exactly what’s in it. No trying to create a need that they never knew they had before, no leaving out any important information. I don’t like the term transparent (Tech will make you hate the term, it means basically nothing over there) but that’s the only word that’s coming to me. Essentially, it’s going to be a lot of marketing that consists of showing and not telling. This is the thing I made. Take it or leave it.
And with those now decided, let’s see how this goes! Hopefully putting all of this in place will let me keep a clear head about what I’m going to do next.
- Or decide that it’s not going to be a business or monetizable thing. That is also something that will probably happen. [↩]