2025 Goals
I’ve always made a goal list for myself at the end of one year for the next. Two years ago, I actually turned it into a bingo board because I saw something on TikTok about making your goals a game because it pushes you to complete your goals so you can happily scream, “BINGO.” Hehehe.
But since one of my goals of 2024 was to post more on my blog (that no one reads anyway) I decided to post my 2025 goals on a website that has created so much for me. These goals are writing/career specific goals.
- Publish 4 books/novellas: Now to me that sounds like a crazy number. To some of you, you might think it’s unreal as well. But it’s a feasible option for the first, and probably only, time. Because Kindle Vella has closed its doors, or is in the midst of closing, I had one book fully finished on there, and one I was working on. The one I was working on was my real first ever published book (I had mentioned it in another recent blog post). But I decided I wanted to rewrite it and began posting it on Vella. Now these two books are not in the Korean From Context world, which is why I was never planning on publishing them in actual book form. But now I realize, 왜? They are still books I wrote, and I’m proud of. I want to dip my feet into all kinds of romance novels and so these books are my dips into Romantasy, and your everyday Contemporary. I’m also hoping to share the next TWO novellas in The Idolized Series. Fan Café and ??? You thought I was gonna give you the title that easily?!?!
- Reach 10,000 books sold: As I write this, since I published Seoul Searching in 2021, between Amazon and all other platforms, I have sold around 7,300 books so hitting 10k is going to be difficult to reach in one year BUT with those four new books I can see a reality where it happens. My lifetime goal is to sell one million books. If I were to ever reach that feat, I would throw a massive party! Haha.
- Sell a book in every state on Ko-fi: I have done pretty well this year. I was able to cross of close to 10 states! But now I want to fill the whole map! I love seeing where my books go. I’ve even sent some to Germany and Poland!
- Rerelease Seoul Searching and Matching Set: I mentioned I had planned on taking down Seoul Searching to fix it up. A bunch of the Korean is wrong, which as a book that supposed to help, isn’t good. And the book is thicc (yes two c’s) and the reason it was so big was because I: A. Never planned to publish it and would update it on this site B. Wanted to fit as much Korean as I possibly could in it. And C. Never planned to write another book. (We see how that has changed. Anyway since I want to edit and rerelease I want to make it worthwhile for those who already have a copy of the book and offer not only a special cover but some special artwork inside as well! I have been working with another amazing artist to bring a scene or two from the books to life. And as for the formatting, one of the biggest complaints was that readers didn’t like having to go to the end of the chapter to find the Korean definition. And the reason we had to do it that way was the formatting software my friend uses didn’t have the option to create footnotes. But guess what the software has now? YAY!!! Footnotes! It’s going to be like you’re getting a whole new book!
- Become a full-time writer: Another wild dream but hey, these are my goals, and I can make them as out of this world as I want! If I raise my book sales to reach the 10K goal I will certainly be able to follow through on this. I currently make enough to cover my costs of publishing and book events. However, next year I am doing a LOT more book events which means I will be spending more money. In order to spend more, I need to make more, but also be able to cover costs at home. (I now have a little baby boy to think of as well.) I will say my book sales are pointing in a positive direction as I’ve made more this year, which isn’t over, than I did last year. If I continue that trajectory, it’s possible.
Well, these are my goals for 2025. Big goals and 365 days to accomplish them! LET’S GO!!
Book Events
As I cruise into the world of trying to make writing my full-time gig (somewhat part time as I would like to be a SAHM) I know one thing is very important. Putting yourself out there. That statement technically covers two things. Putting your books out there and putting YOURSELF out there.
While social media is the biggest way for you to put everything out there for the world to see, one other effective way is book events.
I have mentioned several times since restarting my writing of this blog how I always guess my life plans incorrectly. Book events are no different.
The only signings I had ever done were the ones at the end of the LSF Writers conferences I was a part of. My mom has traveled the country going to different events throughout her 20+ years in the business and I always thought it was so cool! When I was younger, I would join her to the RWA conferences she would go to, and I never really got to experience them because I was young and so my dad would take me around the cities we visited while my mom was at the conference.
Last year I finally got to go to a readers’ conference with my mom as her assistant. It was such a different type of world than a writers’ conference. There was such a production to make the magic of book worlds come to life in the real world for the readers. It was freaking cool to put it bluntly.
After going to that one I decided I wanted to go to one as an author and not just my mom’s assistant. And I started small and somewhat local. A Day (or two) of Wine, Romance and More is hosted by a dear friend to me and the LSF Writers organization Roz Lee. Every May for the last 9 years she has invited around 60 authors to participate in the signing event. And last year was the first year she asked me to join! I was so excited because it really was my first dip into the world of book events. Reader-centric events to be most specific.
I had an amazing time and sold so many books! More than I ever thought I would. I even met a woman who loved K-dramas and K-pop so she was shocked and excited to find me and my books. I knew that at the end of the second day I wanted to come back AND I wanted to do more book events.
Now here is the truth about a lot of these events. If you’re a small indie author, like me, you’re most likely not going to make money. You might break even and that is actually fantastic!
This is where that whole putting yourself out there comes into play. Someone may not have purchased your book at the event, but most authors come with ‘swag’. AKA: free stuff to give to readers in the hopes they will keep it, use it, and inevitably remember the author and purchase their books. Usually, mine consists of Korean candies and Korean instant coffee sticks with some photocards of my book covers. And people love it! I will say at this last event I did see an uptick in sales after the event and I want to guess that it was from those swag grabbers.
Now I need to take a bigger step if my goal is to keep growing as an author and again make this something I can do full time. That means stepping out of the local/statewide books events and traveling to bigger book events.
I have applied for and have been accepted to two as of now. One in 2025 and one in 2026. I know that seems far away but these things can take years to come together and can take years to get accepted into.
I know that going out of state is going to cost more which means the amount of books I would need to sell would need to nearly double to make it monetarily successful, but I also know I need to step out of the comfort zone of local events and venture to places where people don’t know me. That makes me nervous and excited, which makes me happy. So here is to the next few years and the next few books!
Wish me luck!
