Quality vs. Quantity: The Perks of Writing Every Day

Practice makes perfect, after all.

I read an article a few days ago that bugged me, although I only figured out why this morning. It was somebody or another who was griping about those of us who publish daily articles, and how much bad writing it produces.

We should focus on creating quality content, the argument went, as opposed to grinding out something every day just to appease some self-imposed deadline.

As an example of this, he cited a friend of his — may have been a professor, may have been another writer, I don’t remember — who got a deal with some publication or another to write for them. The friend accepted on the condition that he only be required to publish one article a month. According to this person, the friend held them to it and published exactly one stellar article each month.

First off, that’s a pretty cushy deal if you can get it. Kinda reminds me of the Sex and the City trope where the main character lives a swanky life in New York City as a newspaper columnist despite writing approximately one article a month. Or, honestly, pretty much any show where a writer lives large despite not doing a lot of actual writing.

Now, the implication in this story was that the friend in question was well along in their career and had earned such a valued position based on their experience. However, the other implication was that he only published golden articles since he only apparently wrote one each month, emphasis on one.

I like to think of some old professor somewhere in a tweed jacket and smoking a pipe, hunched over a manual typewriter, clicking away on his monthly article. He types a few words, leans in to look at it, grumbles, pulls the paper out of the machine, crumples it into a ball, and hurls it into an overflowing wastebasket full of similar pieces of crumpled paper.

That is, of course, an overwrought scene straight out of some movie or another, but for me, it illustrates the reverence with which this particular person seemed to hold the writing process. A tortured genius author who is dead-set on producing one perfect piece a month, chiseling away at it day after day, making edits in red pen and writing notes in the margins of their typewritten manuscript.

That’s a load of garbage as far as I’m concerned.

In reality, the friend who got the once-a-month publishing deal probably wrote stuff most days, assuming writing was his job (and probably even if it wasn’t based on how they were described). As a writer who knows many other writers, none of us got to where we are without doing a lot of writing, and we keep our skills sharp by doing yet more writing. I write most days, sometimes even when I don’t want to, because it’s how I hone my craft.

Now, here’s where I get back to the original point of the article I read. This particular person was griping about people who publish every day based on some self-imposed “produce content every day” mindset. Based on some of the writers’ groups I’m part of, yes, some people churn out content every day, no matter how poor quality, because they make money that way. I honestly can’t fault them for that — if that’s their skill set for making money, then more power to them.

However, a lot of writers — myself included — publish stuff every day as part of the process. I write something just about every day if I can. Then, I run it through my editing software and schedule it to go up on my publication. I know that I produce some stinkers in the bunch, but again, that’s part of the process.

What it all comes down to is, publishing something every day isn’t for you, it’s for me. I could write something every day and never show it to anyone, and there are plenty of people who do that. That’s perfectly okay.

There are also people who write every day as part of a bigger project — a book, maybe, or a piece of fanfiction — that may or may not ever get published. I have friends that write fanfiction, which may or may not get put onto a fanfiction website depending on how good they think it is. I also have a friend who is a published author on his fourth novel who writes most days and posts his daily word count on Facebook as a way of keeping honest.

So yeah, most writers write a lot. Maybe not every day, but often enough to keep their skills sharp. And, a lot of us publish our writing as part of the process. I don’t see why that is deserving of critique.

The fact of the matter is, writers write. Even people who are lucky enough to get paid to publish one article a month probably write lots of things outside of that single monthly article.

However, let’s say, for the sake of argument, that this hypothetical person only writes that single article each month. They spend the entire month crafting, revising, and editing that single piece. It’s not outside the realm of possibility, especially considering that some long-form articles can run tens of thousands of words and take significant amounts of time to research and write.

So, if this person only wrote one long, high-quality article each month, the question becomes this: how much writing did they do in their career to get to that place? How many days did they spend hours writing, producing content, even if nobody ever sees it? How many years did they spend writing something almost every day, refining and honing their craft, to earn such a valuable position?

The fact is, most writers write every day, and many of us choose to publish that writing every day. That’s not to say that we never produce quality content — I’ve had articles do incredibly well and get lots of praise that I had bashed out in an hour, and I’ve had articles that I spent days extensively researching flop because they weren’t very good. I know quite a few writers who have the same experience.

All writers have a different process. For me and many, our process is daily or near-daily writing, and everything gets published regardless of quality. In my case, I do it to keep myself honest. By publishing something every day, I ensure that I keep up with my writing every day.

And, if your process is to craft a single, absolutely extraordinary piece each month, then cool, you do you. Keep pouring yourself into your writing and your process. Do it your way, and do it in a way that makes you happy.

Just, please don’t bash me for my process, and I won’t bash you for yours.

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