Unless you have lived under a rock, you probably have known some people who have said some things that they were intending to do that they didn't do. Some people might have promised things they never delivered, and some might have made committments that they never upheld. I'm sure that if you knew those people over a long period of time, after awhile, you stopped listening to what they said they were going to do and eventually their words or promises became meaningless.
At the same time, there are probably people in your life that who say they are going to do things...and then actually do them. People who keep their promises, people whose words are often or always backed up with actions to go with them. Odds are, these are the people in your life that you depend on, rely on, keep going back to and trust.
The simple word for both of these concepts is reputation. Reputation is probably the single most important thing when it comes to someone making their way through the world--and a writer's reputation is VERY essential to his or her success and it is a point that is far too often overlooked.
There is an old beleif that creative types and business don't coexist very well. There is a reason for that--a large number of creative types have proven to hold erratic schedules, show up late for appointments and back out of things last minute. Couple this in a world of the instant gratification culture and it becomes epidemic. I'm sure all of you have seen writers who were talking about a book they were going to write for 5 years that never got written. Writers who started blogs they only posted on once, websites they never updated, went to only one open-mic reading and never went back, started untold numbers of projects that never got finished...but then wondered why it was so hard to "make" it as a writer.
In the fast paced world it makes a great deal of sense that people do not want to spend a lot of time on what they consider to be a project that is dead in the water. Afterall, most people have very busy schedules with the average work-week being well over 40 hours plus family committments, and more. But an unfortunate side effect of starting things that are given up on quickly is that the writer does the exact opposite of what they should be doing while cultivating a reputation. Instead of making a reputatoin for being consistent and reliable with their writing--they inadvertantly give themselves a reptuation for being flakey, inconsistent and all talk with no walk. This can be DEVESTATING to a potential writer's career.
Rule number 1 that all writers should follow: (truthfully everyone should follow this) never announce or say you are going to do something you don't actually do. Actions should always back up your words. It's that simple--words are our greatest resource--our greatest tool. And those tools become rusty when we don't take care with them.
Rule number 2 that all writers should follow: be patient. Nothing yeilds results immediatly (or almost nothing does) and anything worth having is worth fighting for. If things came easy we wouldn't celebrate the hard earned success.
Rule number 3 that all writers should follow: be consistent. Write a lot about your topic, write a lot of poetry, write a lot of essays or stories. Whatever it is you do, do it consitently, and let your audience get used to seeing and expecting a lot from you. (That is what keeps them coming back.
Thousands and thousands of new publicatins, magazines, anthologies open up for submissions ever year. Close to 90% of the announced projects never see publication. So it's no wonder that it takes people a little bit of time to start to trust new blogs, websites, authors to be reliable and as something worth their time to keep coming back to. But once you have broken through the trust barrier and proven to be something they can keep coming back to--then you have build up a good reputation in the eyes of your readers. And once the reputation is established, selling products, books, eBooks, CD's and more becomes much, much easier. People will book you for interviews, performances, readings and more if they know they can depend on you. No one wants to shell out money to what they can't depend on--but they will give money for something they can trust.
A reputation is more valuable than money--because a good reputation can LEAD to money. Sometimes, a great deal of it.
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