A guide you don't have to follow: On Writing trackers
A while ago I wrote a post on how I outline and that this might work for me and not for you. Well, I decided to make this into an entire series called: A guide you don't have to follow.
In this series I will give you advise on writing, editing and general author stuff, but as the name suggests, you don't have to follow any of it and if you do, I don't want any responsibility on how well it works for you :)
This part will cover writing trackers in general and my personal writing tracking methods.
1. Online Trackers and Apps
There are some great writing apps out there with trackers already included, I use an app called WriteOmeter which I'm sadly no longer able to find anywhere to link it for you, but other apps you could try out are Wordly (IOS) or Writer Tools by AJP-Tools (android). Both of these have a timer function so that you can start a timer for however long you want to write and then enter the word count once the writing sprint is over. I personally really like those trackers, especially for times like Nanowrimo where I join sprints online and want to log the individual word counts for each sprint and not an entire writing day.
On the computer I would recommend WriteTrack by David S. Gale because it is both free and very detailed, with a calender overview, different goal settings and a userfriendly surface. It doesn't have a timer function as far as I can see, so I personally don't use it as much for writing sprints but rather for seeing my monthly progress and the calculated amount of words for the rest of the month.
Find WriteTrack here.
2.Excel or Google Sheets
If you don't need a fancy system to calculate your writing goals for you, then you can easily use Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets (the later is free to use) to track your progress.
You can use them for both either only tracking writing days or like I do for individual writing sprints (see picture) but I will get more into detail with my version later.
The good thing about Excel is that if you are a bit of a computer whizz and know your way around then there are a bunch of cool features to see your monthly progress, create a pie chart of your different writing sprints and probably a bunch more. I am not very good with computers, so my writing tracker on Excel looks a little bit simple, but again, if it works for you, then do whatever the hell you want to.
3. Notebooks, Bulletjournal spreads and more
This is probably the most creative and "work intensive" way of tracking your word count. From lists and boxes to colouring in squares there is a bunch of different methods out there for you to try out.
I put pictures of my Nanowrimo and my Camp Nanowrimo tracker down below (yes I am aware that it wasn't a good month) to show you how I keep track of my daily word count during writing challenges. They are slightly messy and sometimes not 100% accurate when you compare them to the websites, but still, they are ways of keeping track with your writing in your bullet journal
In this series I will give you advise on writing, editing and general author stuff, but as the name suggests, you don't have to follow any of it and if you do, I don't want any responsibility on how well it works for you :)
This part will cover writing trackers in general and my personal writing tracking methods.
1. Online Trackers and Apps
There are some great writing apps out there with trackers already included, I use an app called WriteOmeter which I'm sadly no longer able to find anywhere to link it for you, but other apps you could try out are Wordly (IOS) or Writer Tools by AJP-Tools (android). Both of these have a timer function so that you can start a timer for however long you want to write and then enter the word count once the writing sprint is over. I personally really like those trackers, especially for times like Nanowrimo where I join sprints online and want to log the individual word counts for each sprint and not an entire writing day.
On the computer I would recommend WriteTrack by David S. Gale because it is both free and very detailed, with a calender overview, different goal settings and a userfriendly surface. It doesn't have a timer function as far as I can see, so I personally don't use it as much for writing sprints but rather for seeing my monthly progress and the calculated amount of words for the rest of the month.
Find WriteTrack here.
2.Excel or Google Sheets
If you don't need a fancy system to calculate your writing goals for you, then you can easily use Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets (the later is free to use) to track your progress.
You can use them for both either only tracking writing days or like I do for individual writing sprints (see picture) but I will get more into detail with my version later.The good thing about Excel is that if you are a bit of a computer whizz and know your way around then there are a bunch of cool features to see your monthly progress, create a pie chart of your different writing sprints and probably a bunch more. I am not very good with computers, so my writing tracker on Excel looks a little bit simple, but again, if it works for you, then do whatever the hell you want to.
3. Notebooks, Bulletjournal spreads and more
This is probably the most creative and "work intensive" way of tracking your word count. From lists and boxes to colouring in squares there is a bunch of different methods out there for you to try out.
I put pictures of my Nanowrimo and my Camp Nanowrimo tracker down below (yes I am aware that it wasn't a good month) to show you how I keep track of my daily word count during writing challenges. They are slightly messy and sometimes not 100% accurate when you compare them to the websites, but still, they are ways of keeping track with your writing in your bullet journal
4. Writing Tracker Lena Fiala style:
I really like to work in sprints especially when I first get started with writing for the day, a 5 minute sprint seems the best way to get into the mood. For that I use either Excel (see the photo above), if I only have my computer with me, or my notebook with my writing tracker in it
The way my tracker works is that I assign every sprint a colour and then fill out one grid square for 100 words in that sprint colour. At the end of each session I compare the amount of squares to the word count and fill in those extra words (since I only do it by hundreds, but sometimes write 132 or 185 words). If there are any words I wrote outside of a sprint, I will add them in black.
At the same time my writing tracker works as a writing journal. At the end of a writing day I like to sit down for five to ten minutes and reflect on the sprint, so that I can look back and not only see a number and some coloured squares, but see that on a day where I only wrote 300 words, I was still proud of that progress.
Some days it can look a little messy and maybe I won't journal in the end, but this is generally how my notebook looks like.
It is honestly so easy to do, all you need is some grid paper and a few coloured pens or pencils and you are good to go. It also doesn't ask for a lot of calculating while you write because you just colour in as many squares as the first digit in your sprint. We are not even rounding up or down, we'll take care of that in the end when you compare your overall word count to your amount of squares.
If cou don't like to go back and compare or you don't write in one projekt then I would recommend using Excel and write down the exact number into the coloured field, like I did the the picture above.
For those who would like to, I created a little downloadable template (PDF or JPG) so that you can create your own writing tracker with your own time slots and asigned colours. (but keep in mind, this is a guide you don't have to follow, so don't complain to me, when it doesn't work for you ;) )
Go here to download your writing tracker.
How do you keep track of your writing? Or do you keep track of your writing at all?
I would love to hear from you over on Twitter or on Instagram and see if there are any ways that I missed or would like to try out myself.
If you did decide to follow a guide you don't have to follow then I would love to hear about it or see your versions of my writing tracker, so please tag me in photos or let me know in the comments if I did inspire you to try out a new method of word count tracking.
As always,
Take care and write on,
Lena
Follow me and stay in touch:
Twitter: @lena_fiala
Instagram: @lena_fiala_
Business inquiries: lena.fiala99@gmail.com
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| this is an example of how to fill out the template, which I linked down below |
I really like to work in sprints especially when I first get started with writing for the day, a 5 minute sprint seems the best way to get into the mood. For that I use either Excel (see the photo above), if I only have my computer with me, or my notebook with my writing tracker in it
The way my tracker works is that I assign every sprint a colour and then fill out one grid square for 100 words in that sprint colour. At the end of each session I compare the amount of squares to the word count and fill in those extra words (since I only do it by hundreds, but sometimes write 132 or 185 words). If there are any words I wrote outside of a sprint, I will add them in black.
At the same time my writing tracker works as a writing journal. At the end of a writing day I like to sit down for five to ten minutes and reflect on the sprint, so that I can look back and not only see a number and some coloured squares, but see that on a day where I only wrote 300 words, I was still proud of that progress.
Some days it can look a little messy and maybe I won't journal in the end, but this is generally how my notebook looks like.
It is honestly so easy to do, all you need is some grid paper and a few coloured pens or pencils and you are good to go. It also doesn't ask for a lot of calculating while you write because you just colour in as many squares as the first digit in your sprint. We are not even rounding up or down, we'll take care of that in the end when you compare your overall word count to your amount of squares.
If cou don't like to go back and compare or you don't write in one projekt then I would recommend using Excel and write down the exact number into the coloured field, like I did the the picture above.
For those who would like to, I created a little downloadable template (PDF or JPG) so that you can create your own writing tracker with your own time slots and asigned colours. (but keep in mind, this is a guide you don't have to follow, so don't complain to me, when it doesn't work for you ;) )
Go here to download your writing tracker.
How do you keep track of your writing? Or do you keep track of your writing at all?
I would love to hear from you over on Twitter or on Instagram and see if there are any ways that I missed or would like to try out myself.
If you did decide to follow a guide you don't have to follow then I would love to hear about it or see your versions of my writing tracker, so please tag me in photos or let me know in the comments if I did inspire you to try out a new method of word count tracking.
As always,
Take care and write on,
Lena
Follow me and stay in touch:
Twitter: @lena_fiala
Instagram: @lena_fiala_
Business inquiries: lena.fiala99@gmail.com
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