Where Have all the Readers Gone?
It’s the summer blues, baby. So here are some writing prompts to get you through the slow season
If you feel like your stories aren’t getting as much traction lately, you might be suffering ISB, the Internet Summer Blues. I’ve watched this trend play out in online readership stats going back to the late 1990s, and witnessed it last summer on Medium, when my newly launched publication, and all its writers, experienced some serious ISB.
People go on vacation, and when they’re on vacation, they can’t goof off at work, which is where a lot of online stuff happens. No doubt there are other reasons. But the point is: Hang in there.
Summer will be slow, but other than taking your own much-needed vacation time, I encourage you to keep writing, so long as you have something worth writing about. If you get paid a flat fee for your stories, what have you got to lose? If you self-publish, take the long view: You are building an audience, and regularity matters as you continue to build followers.
Either way, summer is a good time to challenge yourself and improve your skills.
Try an offbeat topic or writing style.
Change your writing location. Write a story at the beach, in the mountains, or from the coffee shop.
Find a simple story idea and write it start to finish in 2 hours, 600 words max (promise yourself, and set a timer).
Dig deeply into a topic you’ve written about only superficially before.
Slow down on your self-editing. Set a draft aside and let it simmer for two days, while you take the much needed break away from all things electronic.
Ask some kind soul to edit your draft, no rush. Give them as much time as they need. Then buy them a BonBon.
And if you wanna write some drivel, now is the time — maybe you’ll luck out and nobody will read it.
If none of that floats your boat, I’ve got more ideas, intended to get you thinking outside your box, writing a tale worthy of summer reading, one that gets beyond your writing comfort zone.
Summertime means something different for everyone. For me, there’s a lot of nostalgia—weekends at the lake, camping as a kid, coming of age, and from the time I was 10 years old, daily work in the family business! In middle age, summer meant, in part, touchy family vacations (our kids could never agree on what they wanted to do). But now as a preretired person, summer has less meaning, except that I LOVE the heat until I don’t, and then I want to escape to the mountains or the coast.
For you, summer perhaps conjures totally different memories and emotions, and maybe it means something entirely different now than it did back when.
So that’s the prompt: What about summertime stands out in your memory (or your present)? What does summer mean to you, or what did it used to mean? The goal is to tap into a deep feeling that readers will relate to. Tell your story. Here are some thought starters — not headline ideas or even themes, just notions to help you brainstorm:
My best summer ever
That one summer when xyz happened and life was never the same…
That amazing summer travel experience
What summer is for
What I love (or hate) about summer
How summers have changed for me
Why summer vacations are so important for kids
Why summer vacations are so wonderful and necessary (or awful, or ???)
The arc of time: summers then and now
If you hit upon an idea, write it down. Mull it over. Figure out why it matters. See where it wants to go. Then sit your ass down and do some writing. But no rush. You have all summer!
Cheers,
Rob