Reflections on Self-Publishing

Reflections on Self-Publishing [2024]: Year Five, Geneva Health Files

(In no particular order of importance)

• Own your voice
• Business development is nearly everything
• While journalism is not mincing words, entrepreneurship is biting your tongue
• Journalism is the soul of the business, it is why media entrepreneurs wake up everyday
• Focus, focus, focus
• Diversify content
• Diversify revenues
• Bring in guest contributors to cross-pollinate audiences and readership
• Be bold: it matters, it counts
• Standing up is more important than standing out
• Be brutal with time management
• Seek time with humility
• Interrupt less (does not come naturally to reporters)
• Read more, write less
• The big picture matters as much as details
• People want to know what you are thinking (mostly)
• It is fine to take positions
• Rely on expertise for business development
• Make strategic hires
• Look at audiences with their specificities, not only as reader-revenue targets
• More analysis
• Stretch a little more to lift content
• Push back! It is ok for journalists to have “an attitude”
• Journalism conferences are worth the effort
• Humor diffuses (nearly) everything
• Accept your limitations
• Walk away from burning deadlines
• Sleep early, rise early
• Say no, more often
• Brainstorm with peers
• Balancing motherhood and media entrepreneurship is not a walk in the park