Oh hey I’m back again!
It’s been two years since I started Paperback Kingdom and I’m still here!
I learned a lot of new lessons this year. If you missed my post from last year, you can go here to read it.
This year a lot of good stuff happened, and a lot of bad stuff happened–and I’m going to spill it all. This post has more lessons, more stories, but I wanted to shift the focus this year to highlighting some of my wins!
1) I More Than Tripled My Income Since Last Year
For real, I saw a 400% increase in my income this year.
I know you’re probably sitting there thinking wtf and also remembering how last year I couldn’t even do my own accounting.
Well here’s the golden nugget of advice I have for you–if you’re looking to work with someone and they tell you they tripled their income, ask for proof.
Because heck yes, I did triple my income.
But in my first year I only made $80.00. So of course I tripled my income this year.
To be completely transparent, I made just over $6,000 this year through my business. Which I’m very proud of having done it all on my own, built from the ground up–but it’s definitely not an impressive annual figure.
But at least now I know I’m doing something right!
2) I Got Featured In Writer’s Digest
This has been a goal of mine for a really long time. When it finally happened this year, I was so ecstatic.
(You can read the article here.)
I want to mention that yes, I had my guest article written and pitch prepared beforehand, but I wouldn’t have been able to do this without the help of my publisher connecting me to one of their editors. Remember how last year I mentioned the importance of networking? Well, you’re looking at the results of that. 😉
Speaking of features, I did a lot of publicity this year:
Publicity is something I want to keep doing as I grow.
As for my goal for next year? It’s a feature in Forbes, and I’m dead set about it.
3) I Saw Huge Success For My Clients
One of the most rewarding things about my job is seeing my clients get results.
Between my coaching, my copywriting, my membership community and my group programs, there are plenty of ways for people to work with me.
Rebecca went from feeling overwhelmed with trying to finish her novel to publishing it in the 6 months we worked together–and surpassed her pre-orders goal too. Ember Dragon Daughter hit top 100 in various Amazon categories and it was incredible to see during launch.
Veronica went from not being able to finish a short story to feeling so in flow in her writing and gaining so much clarity around how to write that she was halfway through her first novel by the time we finished working together.
Allison is in my membership community and went through my course, Launch & Sell–during which time her second book received over 500 downloads during the first two days of her launch week. (Read the success story here).
And finally, Jo who is also in my membership started overcoming mindset blocks around writing, promoting her work and building an author brand/online presence. Her audience is growing steadily online and she is working on preparing her series of books to release in the future.
It’s so exciting seeing people have breakthroughs and achieve their goals and I’m so excited to be able to dedicate my time to helping them and improving my own knowledge and expertise to further their results.
4) *BONUS: Lanterns In The Sky Became A Bestseller
This isn’t related to Paperback Kingdom at all but this year my publisher released the first book in my fantasy series, Lanterns In The Sky. It became an overnight bestseller which was truly incredible.
I now have three more books lined up to release over the next 9 months and I can’t wait to see where they take me next. 😍
So, What Didn’t Go To Plan This Year?
While a lot of great things happened this year, business is a roller-coaster of ups and downs. I write these posts so that I can look back on them, but also so that I can share my experiences with others who may want to start their own business someday. That’s why I think it’s important to also highlight what didn’t work out–so that you know you’re not alone if you’re also going through hardships.
1) I went through three months of no income
I survived my first year on my savings and freelance work, which to be completely honest wasn’t earning me a lot.
It became harder and harder to grow my business without income to invest back into it, and during one point I didn’t sell anything for months.
Around this exact same time, I had made the choice to stop freelancing as I was still undercharging for it and it wasn’t sustaining me. I would have been better off investing that time into something that contributed to my business.
This combination of events sent me back to a part time job when my annual expenses crept up. I was very lucky to find something with set hours that still allowed me to work on my business and with my clients in the mornings and two full days a week.
However, this experience undid a lot of mindset work I’d done around my worth, productivity and money that I had to go back to.
2) I went through three surgeries this year
A blessing of working for yourself is that you can set your own schedule–which became a must when I went for three surgeries one after the other this year.
(If you’re curious, it was for wisdom teeth removal, then a tonsilectomy + adenoidectomy, and finally a septoplasty. So, all three surgeries occured in my mouth/nose region. Super fun.)
However, I also had to learn how to balance my recovery time. My first surgery was very minor and I didn’t need to take any time off. The other two were not, and I thought I would have been fine within a week–but ended up having to reschedule and push back all of my client calls and program commitments. In the future, I want to be more professional in this regard because I want to value my clients and their time, their commitment, and their expectations.
I also want to mention here that even if you’re sick, or dealing with other responsibilities–that doesn’t mean you can’t follow your passions and do something big. Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t, or let your own self-doubt sabotage you into not trying at all.
3) I had my first close call with copyright infringement
This whole experience was incredibly stressful and while I’m not going to recap it all again here, I will link you to the article I wrote on it. Read it here.
While I’m upset this happened, I’m also glad that I helped someone by going through this as I had a person reach out to me saying the same thing had happened to them–and in their situation, there was actually no case and no wrongful action committed so my post had advised them on what to do.
So, that’s my year in review. Let me know if you enjoyed it, and also let me know what you think will happen next year!
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