Your long-term success is a key reason why you need a writing community. I started writing alone, just typing on my laptop hour after hour until I hit 130k words. That manuscript? I hope it never sees the light of day!
The next book I wrote, I wrote in community with other writers, including a book coach. This book opened doors for me I never dreamed were possible…including working with writers with audiences of over 10 million and sales in the multi-million.
What was different? I may not have immediately understood why I needed a writing community, but the payoff of having one proved it. We’ve taught over 8,000 authors how to write, publish, and market their books over the last 10 years.
Today, I combine my decade of experience in publishing with our decade of experience helping students find success to show you why you need a writing community. Let’s get straight into it.
Why you need a writing community: what’s covered
- What is a writing community?
- Fantastic benefits from a writing community
- Key places to find a writing community
What is a writing community?
A writing community is a place that writers can go to meet other writers and hit their writing goals. Now, each writing goal can be completely different depending on the community you intend to join.
Maybe you want to join a community that helps you publish a book, develop a writing habit, connect with other writers, and so on. Regardless, a writing community is a group that comes together to help each other meet their goals or give support and feedback.
Fantastic benefits from a writing community
While some people are intrinsically motivated and don’t need any extra support to get things done, having a community helps you take next steps you could never take on your own. If you want to truly make it as a writer, a community is vital.
Having a community not only helps you stay on task, but it can also help you think outside the box, stay accountable, and meet people you would not meet otherwise.
The ability to connect with people who have gone through the writing process and succeeded can help save you a ton of time. Let’s go over some other reasons you might need a writing community and then talk about where you can find them.
1. Learning and development
If you’re new to a specific type of writing, the first and most obvious benefit of a writing community is helping you learn and develop your skills. Most of us don’t just wake up one day with the ability to write well. I certainly didn’t.
It takes deliberate practice and time, but having a group to help direct you and give you writing tips and feedback can help a ton when it comes to developing your story and your skills.
You will often be able to improve faster with a group than you would on your own trying to figure it out. The popular saying says, if you want to go fast go alone, but if you want to far go together. For writing, this is not at all the case.
A writing community helps you learn all kinds of things, such as how to design a book cover, how to self-publish, how to work with an editor, and more.
Learning from people who have far more experience than you is a privilege, even if you don’t end up using all of their tips. Sometimes one single tip that helps you launch your career is more than worth the price of the subscription fee to a writing community.
2. Support and encouragement
Having people who understand your career and your lifestyle can make a huge difference in your overall mental health. When you tell your community, “My query was just rejected,” it’s so helpful to have them understand what this entails.
Sometimes it’s difficult to find people understand what it’s like to write a book, to spend time alone, and to have a creative career in general. Having writers who understand what writer’s block is like, how hard it is to put your chapters together, and everything else that goes with it, can help you make it through the hard steps.
My writing communities have helped me continue on when I wondered if I should. They also provide the encouragement (and constructive criticism!) I need to continue forward with intention.
3. Accountability
If you self-publish or are not yet on a deadline with a publisher, you need to set your own deadlines and stick to them. The ability to write on a deadline and meet that deadline will play a crucial role in your future writing career.
In publishing, so much hinges on meeting those deadlines: your editing timeline, marketing, release day, etc.
With a writing community, you can get that extra accountability step that you miss when you write alone. There will be other people counting on you to keep up your daily or weekly word count and do the next steps that are crucial for success (like pitching editors).
4. People to ask for help
When you’re stuck writing or in your publishing process, it’s tremendously helpful to have people to go to for advice. I’m often reaching out to my writing mentor and writing communities for feedback.
Figuring it out on my own takes a lot of time and creates the risk of making decisions in a vacuum without outside feedback. This is rarely, if ever, a good plan.
Having a community where you can go in and get feedback when you need it most can save you a ton of hassle down the road. Plus, the more you learn, the more you can give back.
When I joined my first writing communities I asked a ton of questions. Now, while I don’t have it all figured out, I get to answer a ton of questions for others.
Key places to find a writing community
Now that you know some of the benefits of a writing community, you might be wondering, “Okay, where do I find these great groups?”
First, you’ll want to pick the top goal you have in mind for needing a community. Finding a writing community that helps you write every day will be different than a group that helps you get your first book published.
While some groups can do every part of it, for the most part, you’re going to want to search for a group that will help you focus on your primary goal. Once you have that down, you can find a community to help you achieve your writing goals. Here are some options.
Forums
If you’re low on funds or not sure if you’re ready to commit to writing and are just dabbling, free forums online are a great place to start.
For example, there are a ton of writing communities on Discord, AbsoluteWrite, and Reddit where you can start to learn about this path, as well as standalone sites like Scribophile.
Selfpublishing.com
Selfpublishing.com has great options for aspiring authors. It’s not for the faint of heart, though. It’s a serious program designed to get you up and running to publish your book, with support and community help along the way.
Genre-specific writing groups
If you’re trying to write a specific type of book, it can help a ton to find groups that are specifically about that genre. For example, if you’re trying to write children’s books you’re going to want to join groups for children’s book authors.
Realm Makers is great if you write science fiction or fantasy. Either way, joining genre-specific groups helps focus the advice you receive and can help you get your book finished and published faster, to join the ranks of others who have experienced that huge life milestone.
Events for writers
Events are some of the best places to find other writers and groups to join. Check out this list of writing events to find a few! You might also want to look in your local area or in the nearest big city close to you. You might be surprised at the kind of events available for writers.
I once met an editor at a writing conference during a one-on-one meeting. She asked me to if I’d be open to creating a two-person writing group. I was humbed, and thrilled! You never know where opportunity may pop up.
Social platforms
Writers often flock to social media for their writing group needs. There’s a writing community on Threads, for example, along with a writing community on Substack.
You can find sections of writers on any social platform if you know where to look. Use the search functions, and utilize hashtags to find them.
Now that you know why you need a writing community…
If you’re serious about writing a book, now is the time to take your next step. Don’t push off to tomorrow what you can take action on today. Use our free resource below to get started!
This blog was rewritten from the original version published by Jackie Pierce.
