when she speaks

It feels like 37 years ago, but I did attend the She Speaks Conference again this year. I was humbled to speak to a room full of women about my journey from writing a blog to writing a book, a phrase that still kind of makes me shudder. Mainly because when you hear “from blog to book” you might be tempted to think that the person who is teaching it values book-writing over blog-writing. And I certainly do not.

I did this session with Andrea Doering, one of the executive editors with Revell Books. She has years of experience in the industry acquiring both fiction and non-fiction titles. She is a professional, and she is a friend. She is also the editor who acquired my book and who I hope to work with for a long time. Do you want to know one of my favorite things she said to this room filled with writers and bloggers at She Speaks? She said this:

“One question bloggers should not ask themselves is, What does it take to get published? If you have a blog, you are already published. People are reading your work. In fact, if you have 2,000 readers, then you already have more readers than 95% of authors who have books in bookstores.”

Andrea and I gave this same talk last year – but last year she didn’t say this. In fact, I said a lot of things this year I didn’t say last year, either. Want to know why? It’s because things are changing, and they’re changing fast. If you have a blog, my suggestion to you is to treat it with respect and make it the best art you have.

But what if you don’t have 2,000 readers? Maybe you have 30 readers. Do you roll your eyes at those 30 readers? Do you think of your work as valuable even if only 30 people read it? Consider this: what if 30 women showed up in a room to hear you speak. Would you see it differently? Would you roll your eyes at them? No way! You would prepare and plan and maybe even get nervous. And you would look forward to meeting with these 30 people who made the effort to show up and listen. Lysa TerKeurst said something similar to that a few years ago and I haven’t forgotten it.

I have a lot more I could share with you about our session at She Speaks and I’m considering doing that next week. Would you want to hear more? What types of things would you like to hear?