Calculating ROI - and Accounting for the Intangible

Our topic at the SFF Seven this week is our worst ROI ever. So many to choose from!

ROI is industry shorthand for Return on Investment. It's basically a calculation for financial health of a business. I looked up the origin and found out that Donaldson Brown created the term.

As the Assistant Treasurer [of DuPont] in 1914, Brown developed a formula for monitoring business performance that combined earnings, working capital, and investments in plants and property into a single measure that he termed “return on investment.” It later became known in academic and financial circles as the DuPont Method (or Model) for Return on Investment. The measure was widely taught in business schools and adopted by many companies as a means of benchmarking the financial health of their products and businesses.

That's interesting, because I wondered if it was an old model. Turns out it's over a century old!

Also, the term comprises much more than I think most writers mean when they use it. When I hear writers talk about ROI, it's always whether a particular effort - a conference, buying an ad, buying into an anthology - will be more expensive than the sales it generates. Many reduced it to the simplest math: "If I spend this much attending a con, will I earn more than that on sales of my books?" Often husbands are cited as putting forth this equation, usually as justification for wives not attending cons.

When asked for my opinion there (and sometimes even when NOT asked), I have always said that conferences of all types provide an intangible ROI. Networking and getting your books in front of people give long-term results that aren't always quantifiable. Since I was doing a bit of research, I looked up if anyone thinks the DuPont Model for ROI is antiquated. Turns out there's this:

We demonstrate that firms 'assets are becoming increasing more intangible, and the traditional DuPont Analysis omits this crucial piece of a firm's ability to generate profit.

Those folks are talking market equity, but it occurs to me that many authors looking at simple math and short-term sales are failing to account for the intangible value of building recognition for their work over the long term. 

But I digress. 

The topic today asks about my personal worst return on investment. Since I don't really do the calculations - see above - I don't know a precise metric. I can, however, share an investment regret. When my very first book came out, the essay collection Wyoming Trucks, True Love, and the Weather Channel, a friend of mine, Chuck, told me one of HIS great regrets was not buying a case of his first book. The first edition was worth a great deal and he was sorry not to have done that. So, I bought a case of my books!

Reader: I still have most of them.

See, my first book didn't sell tons of copies and I have not become an NYT bestseller with a TV miniseries based on my books, unlike Chuck. He meant well, and I adore him for thinking that I would have the same trajectory, but I'm not C.J. Box, alas! 

I suppose the key takeaway here is that there is no one size fits all advice. 

Also, that the ROI on cats is always solid.

 

Book Clubs - Love 'Em or Leave 'Em?

 Introducing my new supervisor: Killian! He loves being present for the podcast, this blog, and morning wordcount, though he has a tendency to fall asleep on the job. Still, I have high expectations and the Cuteness Quotient™ is off the charts. 

This week at the SFF Seven we're talking book clubs. We're asking each other what bookish groups we belong to and what do they provide?

Like KAK, my answer is: none.

Oh, I have belonged to book clubs in the past. I was in one for a while back when we lived in Wyoming - though it was, in part, a thinly veiled subterfuge to get people to read MY newly published book. Which they did! And discussed, which was fun. Mission accomplished. 

Otherwise... I don't love being in a book club. It's fun to chat with people and I love to talk about books. Book clubs are, however, rather noteworthy for not actually discussing the books (or reading them) and devolving into gossip instead. I'm also a steady reader, finishing a book every two-three days, so I don't need incentive to read. I find I don't like "required reading" either. One cool thing about book clubs is they get you to read books you otherwise wouldn't; they also get you to read books you otherwise wouldn't because you don't want to. While I know there are genre book clubs out there, most tend toward the erudite and fashionable books, and not the kind of thing I love to read. 

Besides which, I can always find people to discuss the books I *do* love to read. Or there's always the cats. Killian's reading comprehension needs work still, but he's an excellent listener. 

Thank You, 2022, for All the Fish

 As we wind down the last few days of 2022, looking forward to a new year and the waxing of the light, this week at the SFF Seven we're offering thoughts or blessings for the year that has been or the year to come. 

For me, 2022 delivered a kick of a ramp-up back to life closer to pre-pandemic levels. Though spring started slowly, with several in-person conferences canceled, I was able to return to hanging again with other writers in person in April at the Jack Williamson Lectureship. It was SO GOOD TO PEOPLE AGAIN. One of the great lessons of the pandemic for me has been how much of my social life depends on conferences and conventions. (Can I just call them both "cons" for short? What even is the difference?)

Seeing people in-person again meant I also made new friends this year, which has brought light into my life I didn't realize I was lacking. Not unlike as the days grow longer and sunshine returns, warming the earth, and you begin to realize just how long and dark the winter has been.

I had a less productive year, wordcount-wise - in fact, my lowest year ever for wordcount, though I'll give final numbers next week - but it looks like it will be my best income year ever. So, looking ahead at goals for next year, I'm considering decoupling my wordcount goals from my sense of success and focusing on what makes me most comfortable financially. 

{{Content Warning: eating and body image}}

I'm also completing a year of 16/8 intermittent fasting, where I fast for 16 hours and eat during an 8-hour window. I also vastly decreased added sugars from my diet. I'm thrilled with the results. I'm down 18 pounds since January 3, 2022, 16 pounds of that from body fat, and I'm down over 4" around my waist and hips. It feels like really healthy weight loss, like I'm no longer so insulin-resistant, and I just feel tons better overall. 

{{Content over}}

While in many ways, it's been a difficult year, the work I did at the end of 2021 to break the stress cycle has really paid off. While we're facing the loss of our senior cat Isabel, who is 17 and declining, we've also welcomed in a new life, with kitten Killian joining our household. So many wonderful things have happened to me this year - including wonderful people entering my life - that it feels truly miraculous.

I'm grateful for the blessings of 2022 and eagerly look forward to what 2023 will bring.