Just as you would outline a book, you can also outline a series.
Consider your series outline as listing the main objective you want to accomplish for each book. Just as each book will have an arc, your series will also have one. Your series outline should reflect the series arc.
Your series outline can be as simple as a bullet point for each book. That’s what I start with. Or you can add more substance to it, but I suggest you save additional details for the book outline, which you will need for each book in the series.
Outlining a series is fun, and I recommend it. Knowing a series arc, through its outline, can inform your writing of each book in the series.
For example, if you know your primary character for book three, make a subtle introduction in book one. This restrained reveal will delight your readers when they re-encounter that person two books later. Or if book eight has a plot development you worry may seem a bit contrived, with shrewd finesse lay the groundwork for it in books two, five, and seven. This unexpected development in book eight will still surprise your readers, but they won’t feel you forced it because you prepared them for it in earlier books.
Keep in mind that if you’re a discovery writer you can’t insert any delicious titbits into earlier books—unless they’re not yet published. But with a series outline to guide your writing, you can foreshadow what is to come in future books.
In addition, having a series outline will keep you from wasting time writing passages you will later cut. And your plan will help make your books richer because readers can connect with your writing and characters more fully.
Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.
Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.
Consider the Role that AI Could Play in Your TAS Operation
By Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD
You may be tired of hearing about artificial intelligence (AI), but get used to it. It’s here to stay, and it will change everything. Not only will it revolutionize business and the answering service industry along with it, but it will reach into and touch every aspect of our lives. In fact, it’s already doing just that, whether we know it or not.
Here are some ways you may want to consider applying AI to your telephone answering service.
Use AI to Supplement Management and Support
AI can function in a support role, assisting the functions and departments that surround your telephone answering service operation. Already, AI is great at producing the first draft of an email or suggesting attention-grabbing subject lines. The same applies for marketing materials and ad copy. But don’t expect AI to make a perfect final draft—at least not yet—but those days are coming, and they’ll likely arrive sooner than you expect.
Look for other ways that AI can assist nonoperation departments, such as accounting, sales, marketing, and technical. These AI tools are either ready today or are close to being ready. All you need to do is find them and implement them.
Use AI to Enhance Customer Service
The same applies for customer service functions. If a concern arrives via email, AI can often make the first draft of a cogent response. All you need to do is verify and tweak.
Chatbots are another area. You’ve likely had experience with them, albeit on the user side. Imagine what AI chatbots can do for your customer service. But before you get carried away, trying to implement a comprehensive system that will cover everything, start simply and address the basics. Once that’s working fine, expand it.
Another area related to customer service is tapping AI to perform agent evaluations. This isn’t just for select calls or random calls but every call. Only outlier results that need attention—either to correct an error or celebrate a success—need to be forwarded to the agent or management.
Use AI to Better Handle Calls
Most of the work—and most of the labor—at an answering service occurs in the operations room and revolves around answering calls or handling communication for clients. This is where AI can have the biggest impact.
Start by considering how AI can better support your telephone agents to allow them to do their job more effectively, quicker, or both. But don’t stop there. Also consider service activities that you can move to AI, with agent oversight and the ability to overrule. And, of course, there are areas you can completely outsource to AI.
But Don’t Avoid It
Some people are technologically adverse. There’s nothing wrong with that; it’s who they are. They just need to realize that ignoring it won’t make it go away, and it will one day put their TAS at a disadvantage.
Consider the last services to switch from cord boards to computerized systems. Or the last providers to stop handwriting messages and start entering them into a database. Though there were holdouts—sometimes for quite a while—they eventually realized they had to embrace the technology. So, too, will be the case with AI.
Artificial IntelligenceConclusion
When it comes to artificial intelligence, the opportunities abound, almost limitless. If you can dream it, it can likely be done—or someone has already done it.
Author Peter Lyle DeHaan is now on Substack, an online resource that “lets independent writers and podcasters publish directly to their audience.”
“My website, PeterLyleDeHaan.com, will remain the hub of my online presence,” DeHaan said, “but Substack will be integral to support that effort and extend it even further.”
Though it looks like a social media platform, Substack is much more, which is why Peter decided to use it, while dismissing presences on other online destinations.
As part of Substack Peter has launched a new monthly digest of recent posts, which supporters can read online, through an RSS feed, or via email. It is available through a free subscription.
Many people use Substack and appreciate its ease of use, along with the lack of advertising in a more civil and safe online destination.
“I am so excited about Substack and the potential it offers to effectively connect with more people.” Peter said.
There’s lots of advice floating around about writing, being a writer, and finding success. Though well-intentioned, some of this advice is bad information or oversimplified counsel. Here are some tips I’ve heard, many of which I’ve also said.
Check out these common pieces of advice and discover the truth about them. Though we’ve already touched on some of them, I repeat them here, so they’ll appear in one place.
Show Don’t Tell: Using words to paint a picture (showing) is more powerful than to state what happened (telling). In general, this tip is good advice, but it’s sometimes better to just tell readers what happened. For example, it would be boring to spend several pages showing readers about a four-hour car ride where nothing significant occurs. Instead just say, “Four hours later they arrived at their destination.” That’s telling, and in this case, it’s the right approach.
Write Every Day:Yup, I said this maxim before, and I share this tip every chance I get. But I don’t mean it literally. I mean it figuratively. What I mean is to write regularly. Although for you it might mean every day, it could be every weekday or only on the weekend. The point is to have a writing schedule and commit to it.
Although this guideline makes sense to me, and I wouldn’t have it any other way, some writers chafe at the thought of writing every day. Instead, they only write when they’re inspired or have a deadline. If this idea works for you, embrace it. Ignore the advice to write every day, but not until you’ve tried it first.
Write in the Morning:This tip is another one of my favorite adages. Many people even claim scientific confirmation that the morning is the best time to write (or do anything important), with maximum productivity and optimum results. My morning production is far better than in the afternoon. Writing in the morning works for me and works well. The early hours are when the good stuff happens.
Some people claim the morning isn’t right for them, that other times of the day work better. If that’s you, and you’ve tried mornings only to find them lacking, ignore those of us who insist you write in the morning. Pick the time of the day that works best for you.
Write What You Know: There’s an element of truth to this recommendation. What we know best, we can write most effectively.
When it comes to nonfiction, writing what I know flows with greater clarity and speed. But that doesn’t mean I can’t research something I don’t know and write an effective piece. I’ve done it many times.
When it comes to fiction, if I only wrote what I knew, it would be a boring piece about a middle-aged white guy living an uneventful, routine life. Who’d want to read that? Therefore, in my fiction, I write about what I don’t know. More specifically, I write what I can imagine. Then I live vicariously through my characters and their experiences that I make up.
You Must Have A Platform:An agent once rejected my submission, not because of the quality of my work or relevance of my idea, but because I didn’t have a platform. He didn’t say I had a small platform. He said I had no platform. Ouch! I doubled down and began working on building my platform in earnest. I hated it. It sapped the life from me. I almost quit writing because platform building distressed me so much. Seriously.
Yes, having a platform to sell our books is important, regardless of whether we want to indie publish or hope to be traditionally published. A platform will help us be successful faster, but it isn’t a requirement.
You Must Be Active on Social Media:This statement often finds itself coupled with building an author platform. I’m on several social media sites, but I don’t get them—not really. And although social media is at times enjoyable, it can be a huge time suck. I’m better off spending that time writing.
Someone who enjoys social media and understands how to use it to connect with people can realize great benefits. But I’m not one of those people—at least not yet. I connect best with people through my newsletter, on my blog, and via email.
You Must Have a Website: I agree that an author website is essential. It doesn’t have to be fancy or extensive, but it must exist and be inviting.
And for writers who think social media is an acceptable alternative to a website, I vehemently disagree. A social media platform can change its rules at any time for any reason, can shut down your account without warning, or not allow your followers to see your content. These actions happen all the time.
But a website is something we control. That’s why it’s essential. Even so, some authors claim to get along fine without one.
You Must Have an Email List: Email isn’t a sexy, new technology, but it is a proven method of reaching people. As authors, having an email list remains our most effective way of selling books. If you don’t have an email list, start one today. Every name you ethically and legally add to your list is a prequalified buyer for your books. Sure, you may get by without an email list, but why is a risk not using the most effective book marketing tool available?
Always Use an Outline: When I write, I always have a plan to guide me. It may be an outline, bullet points, or a destination to write toward. This approach is the most effective way to write quickly, not waste words, and avoid unnecessary amounts of cutting. Using an outline is the most efficient way to write, and as a career author seeking to drive income through my words, greater efficiency means increased revenue potential.
There’s nothing wrong with being a discovery writer (pantser)—and many authors prefer this method, claiming that having a plan stifles their creativity. But this approach isn’t the fastest and most efficient way to write. You decide what works best for you.
Use Microsoft Word: I’ve been using Microsoft Word longer than I can remember. Although I used other word processing programs before it, they’re now ancient. Microsoft Word is the standard throughout the publishing industry. Although alternatives exist and each one has its merits, you’ll never go wrong using what the rest of the industry uses. (See “Word Processing Alternatives.”)
You Must Use an Editor: Although this tip is wise advice, it isn’t absolute. No one forces you to use an editor before you publish your work. But if you want to avoid harsh criticism and one-star reviews, use an editor. And if you say you can’t afford to use one, I say you can’t afford to. Your writing career and your reputation as an author is at stake. (See the chapter on “Editing.”)
I used two editors for this book, as I do with most of my books. I can guarantee you they didn’t catch everything—no book is error-free—but they did make this work a whole lot better than I could have ever done on my own.
Don’t Design Your Own Book Cover:Again, no one makes you hire a cover designer for your book. You can do it yourself. But unless you have experience as a graphic artist and have produced successful book covers for other authors, don’t attempt to make your own.
Your cover is the single biggest means to sell your book, so you need the best cover possible. And you aren’t the one to do it.
Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.
Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.
I blogged parts of two books, and the posts serve to draw readers into my topic, and then point them to my books.
Some people turn blog posts into a book, while others blog parts of their book once they have written it, and a few people blog the book as they write it.
This works great with nonfiction and memoir, but it’s difficult to pull off for fiction. (See my post, “How to Blog Your Fiction Book.”)
Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.
Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.
When we integrate our call center with our stakeholders, this means a better information flow between you and other groups that are ancillary to the call center but also integral to success. Here are some items to consider when it comes to integrating with your stakeholders.
Vendors
First up for stakeholder integration is your vendors and suppliers. They are critical to your call center success, so it’s critical to have a good relationship with them. I’ve been on both sides of adversarial vendor-call center relationships, and the results are never good. For this reason, I always strive for mutually supportive, win-win interactions.
When you lift your vendors up, they’ll lift you up. And if you tear your vendors down, your operation is apt to suffer as a result. Seek interactions and solutions that are in your mutual self-interest. Your positivity will be rewarded.
And when difficulties arise—which they invariably will—seek to work with your vendors to find a solution rather than harass or threaten them. Remember, patience goes both ways.
Investors
Whether you’re part of a for-profit or nonprofit organization, someone has invested money in your operation, and they expect a return on that investment (ROI). If the call center fails to provide the return they expect, they’ll close it down and outsource the work. In a worst-case scenario, the organization will go out of business and close their doors. Either way, all those calls center jobs will be lost.
Yes, it’s the owners of your operation that control the purse strings. They are the ones who can say no to your funding requests. But they are not your enemy, so it’s important to have a good working relationship with them.
Call center investors and owners are the second source of stakeholder integration.
Staff
We’ve already talked about the importance of cross training when it comes to integrating your staff, yet call center employees are also stakeholders. They can be appreciative of their employers or hostile towards them. While this is a choice they decide, management plays a critical role in how well they’re integrated into the mission of the organization.
Key elements include their compensation package, managerial support, and how appreciated they feel for the work they do. Other areas are scheduling, workload, and a sense of a shared vision.
If they’re unhappy they’ll vent their frustrations with their coworkers, their family and friends, and potentially everyone who calls. Since they talk to a lot of people every day, a disgruntled telephone agent can harm your brand and hamper your objectives in quick order.
Thankfully, the opposite is also true. When they’re treated right, they’re much more apt to be happy and satisfied with their work. Then they’ll likewise let other people know, and their work will show it.
Conclusion
When it comes to making your call center the best it can be, be sure to include your stakeholders and integrate them into your operation. Though these groups often go overlooked, they are critical to your success. Don’t overlook stakeholder integration.
Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of AnswerStat and Medical Call Center News covering the healthcare call center industry. Read his latest book, Sticky Customer Service.
To find an editor, your best option is to go with a freelancer. There are many qualified professionals available to edit your work. Here are some ways to find them:
Search Online
You can do an online search for editors and wade through the responses. This method is time-consuming.
Ask Other Writers
A better idea is to ask others in the writing community for recommendations. This approach will give you a vetted editor.
But many authors are reluctant to share the names of their publishing team for fear these independent contractors will become too busy with new business to continue to work for that author.
Editor Groups
Another good source is editor associations and groups. They can connect you with a good editor. Sometimes they’ll give you a list, and other times a real person will provide the names of editors who best meet your criteria.
Networking
Find an editor through networking. I’ve made many great contacts at writers’ conferences.
Online Resources
Finally, consider online resources.
I’ve used Reedsy to find relevant writing professionals.
I’ve also used Fiverr to locate freelancers.
Another option is Upwork (the merger of Elance and oDesk). I’ve not used them recently, but I did use eLance several years ago with good results.
And though I’ve never used it for this purpose, don’t dismiss LinkedIn.
Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.
Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.
Consider These Five Downsides of Traditional Publishing:
1. It Takes Longer
Unless a book is “fast-tracked” it will typically take eighteen months to two years from your first pitch to it sitting on bookstore shelves. Smaller presses may be nimbler. While larger publishers seek to streamline their processes, but the bottom line is, traditional publishing takes a long time.
2. Agents Are Often Required
Increasingly, publishers will only deal with agents. It makes publishers’ jobs easier, as agents become the first level of screening. Unfortunately, finding an agent is challenging. Since agents are paid on commission they won’t take a project they don’t think they can sell.
3. Rejection is Likely
For those publishers who will talk directly to writers, the odds of them being accepted are small, sometimes less than one in a hundred. Even with an agent, rejection is expected.
4. Authors Must Market Their Own Book
Traditional publishers will do a small amount of promotion for all their authors, but the bulk of their attention and dollars go to the A-list authors. If a book is to sell, the author is the best person to make it happen.
5. Be Patient With Royalties
The process of publishers accounting for and paying royalties is confoundingly slow. Don’t rely on book royalties to pay bills; treat them as a bonus—if they occur. Since initial book sales are applied against the advance, some authors never sell enough copies to earn any royalties—ever.
Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.
Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.
Incorporate Best Practices into Your Customer Survey Process
By Peter Lyle DeHaan, Ph.D.
Do you survey your customers or clients? Should you do a customer survey? And if you already have a survey process in place, do the results meet your needs? Or should it be overhauled or even retired?
Regardless of where you are on the survey continuum, don’t rollout a customer survey without first determining if it’s necessary, ascertaining what you hope to accomplish, and having a well thought out plan.
Here are seven tips to conduct engaging surveys:
1. Determine Your Why
Decide what you want your customer survey to accomplish. Never do one until you know why you’re doing it. The worst reasons to do a survey are because everyone else is or because you think you’re supposed to. If it doesn’t make good business sense, don’t do it.
Here are some possible reasons why you should have a customer survey: To improve the level of customer service, to reduce customer churn, or to close more sales. But don’t try to achieve all three objectives with one survey. Pick one.
2. Fine Tune Your Focus
Next, you need to narrow your focus. Don’t expect one customer survey will meet the needs of every department throughout your organization. Thinking that you can conduct one survey to give useful information to your service department and your sales department and your marketing department is folly. Again, pick one.
3. Assign Responsibility
Based on your survey’s why and focus, assign it to the department that will most benefit from the results. Then pick a person in that department to champion it. They may or may not be the person to design and implement the customer survey, but they do need to ensure it moves forward.
4. Design with Intention
In planning your customer survey, be intentional with its design.
In preparation, take as many surveys as you can from other companies to see what you like and don’t like. Common survey issues are ones that are too long or too short. Other pet peeves include forcing users to explain their answer or not providing the option to leave a comment. Posting a time estimate for the survey helps increase participation; displaying a status bar increases the completion rate. Both are nice touches.
5. Test and Retest
With the design of the customer survey complete, it’s time to test it. The survey designer should test it thoroughly before asking for more input. Next, have employees in the sponsoring department test it. Then solicit input from the rest of your company. Last, invite select customers to go through the beta version.
After each round of testing, implement the recommended changes that support your objectives. But don’t implement every suggestion. Just do the ones that make sense.
6. Rollout Your Survey
At this point, you’re ready to publish your survey. But don’t blast it to every potential recipient, through all possible channels all at once. Instead do a soft launch. This way, if there are errors or oversights, you have a chance to fix them before everyone experiences the problem.
7. Iterate and Repeat
If you have a rolling survey that continues to collect data over time, periodically look at it to see if it needs tweaking but do this only after waiting a sufficient time and gathering enough data to do a thorough analysis of its strengths and weaknesses.
And if your customer survey is a one-shot endeavor, look at what went well and what didn’t. This can inform the next time you launch the survey, because—unless you really bungled it—you’ll want to do it again.
Conclusion
When done properly, customer surveys can provide valuable data and critical feedback to inform decision making. To achieve the best results, apply these tips to your design and implementation process.
There are different types of writers. They have different motivations, are at different places in their writing journey, and have different goals. Here are five common scenarios:
1. The Aspiring Writer:I’ve heard many people refer to themselves as aspiring writers. But they’re misusing the label. They say aspiring because at this point in their journey they lack the confidence to say they’re a writer, so they qualify it by tacking on aspiring.
If this characterization describes you, I encourage you to take a deep breath, drop aspiring, and instead say, “I am a writer.” State it with boldness. It will take practice to say with confidence, but you can do it. You are a writer.
In truth, an aspiring writer is someone who doesn’t write; they aspire to write—someday. But they’ll never get around to it. Yes, they act as a writer. They read books on writing, go to writing conferences, and hang out with other writers. They talk a good game, but it’s just talking.
They want to have written, but they don’t want to put in the hard work, to sit down and write. They aspire to write, and it ends there.
Don’t be someone who aspires to write. Just write.
2. The Hobbyist Writer:Next, we have people who write for fun, write for therapy, or write for family and friends. They’re hobbyists. There’s nothing wrong with that.
So if a hobbyist writer accurately describes you, accept it. As a hobbyist, you may not publish much and certainly won’t make much money from your work, but you are writing. And that’s what’s important. Own that label, and celebrate it.
But if you want to realize more from your writing, consider moving beyond being a hobbyist.
3. The Passion Project Writer:Some writers have a book they must write. It’s a compulsion, a calling. They work hard to produce the best book they can. Then they indie publish it. Then they spend years promoting and marketing their book.
This book is their passion.
But it may be the only book they ever write. Or if they do write other books, these works may fall short because the passion isn’t there. And it shows.
There’s nothing wrong with having a passion project or being a one-book author. I know many people who wrote one book, and that’s it. That’s okay. But if you want more, consider the next two categories of writers.
4. The Artist Writer: I know many writers who view themselves as artists. They create wonderful work and produce it regularly. But they only write when the muse hits or when they have a deadline. If they don’t feel like writing, they don’t. They’re often discovery writers (pantsers). Writing speed and output frequency doesn’t matter. They’re artists, and producing art is all they care about.
If the phrase starving artist comes to mind, it could fit this category of writer. They may not make much from their art, and it’s doubtful they’ll earn enough to support themselves. That’s why the artist-writer needs another source of income. This supplemental money could be a day job or a side hustle. It may be a spouse, an inheritance, or a generous patron.
If this is your situation, that’s okay. Accept it for who you are, what you want to be, and what works for you.
5. The Career Author: The fifth category is a career author. Although their words may flow from many different motivations, they have one trait in common: writing is their job, and they strive to make money from it, either full-time or part-time.
They haven’t sold out. They’re being intentional. They value the craft and may even view it as art. They also write with passion. But, in addition to art and passion, they write with purpose. They want to share their words with others and earn money as they do. They have an entrepreneurial mindset. They’re an authorpreneur.
My Journey: At various times in my writing journey I have stopped at four of these five writing destinations. Some of my stops have been brief, and others longer, but where I am now—and where I want to remain—is as a career author.
Right now, I make some of my income as a book author, and my goal is to one day earn all my income through books. But money is not my motivator; it’s the outcome. My desire is to share my words with others. As I often say, my goal is to “change the world one word at a time.” And making money from doing so is a sweet result.
Discover what type of writer you are and embrace it. Don’t let anyone tell you your path is wrong or inconsequential. You are a writer.
Learn more about writing and publishing in Peter’s book: Successful Author FAQs: Discover the Art of Writing, the Business of Publishing, and the Joy of Wielding Words. Get your copy today.
Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.
