My new book arrived on my doorstep today: “Writing Tools for the College Admissions Essay.”

If you are counting, that makes 21 books with my name on the cover as editor or author. But it is only with the last eight, published by Little, Brown, that I have identified myself as an author. Since 2006, more than a half million of my books have found their way into print. This includes digital books, audiobooks and translations into eight languages.

I am not as productive as Stephen King, who has written a good book on writing, but eight books in fewer than 20 years seems like a good run.

What is the secret of productivity? (I am thinking more and more about that question as I get ready to teach in a new Poynter program this June on supporting the work of aspiring book authors.)

I don’t want to leave you in suspense. So here are a few ideas to launch your new writing career.

1. Write a little every day

“Remember, Roy, a page a day, equals a book a year.” This was the most important bit of advice among many handed to me by the man I feel is the preeminent writing teacher in American history: Donald Murray.

That advice seemed hard for me to believe, so I did the math. If you take weekends off, that gives you 261 days of writing. A double-space page is about 250 words, so let’s lower the goal to 200 words a day. Over the year, that gives you 52,200 words of text. My books run about 60,000 words, or about 250 pages in a readable typeface and generous white space.

2. Gather your notebooks and make your bed

I look at book writing a little bit like exercise. I want to work out a little every day, but if I miss a day, no sweat. (See what I just did!) So I don’t have to write every day, but I have to develop a habit of regular writing. This means creating a good workspace and having files and notebooks and other resources nearby.

Before I can create, I have to unclutter. Sometimes that means intervals when I am not sitting but making my bed, cleaning the closet (and the bathroom!) and organizing materials well enough so that I can find things when I need them. (While you are doing this grunt work, you can be rehearsing your next writing episode. Rehearsal is the antidote to procrastination.)

3. Lower your standards and build your corps

According to poet William Stafford, the antidote to writer’s block is to lower your standards at the beginning of the process. If you want your book to be too good too soon, you will only face discouragement and delay. Drafts of my books get better and better over time, of course, and I have the help of editors and colleagues when I need them.

Let me add this: Build your own corps of helpers that you control. For example, when I needed encouragement, I always consulted with Chip Scanlan. I knew he would overlook minor problems and urge me to “keep going.” Don Fry was my best friend toward the end of the project when he would focus on the nuts and bolts of making it better.

4. Lean into the zero draft

I like to break my books up into the smallest possible units. “Writing Tools” set the standard: 50 chapters at about 1,000 words per chapter. (Total: 50,000-plus words.) Let’s do the math again: 200 words per day times five days equals 1,000 words, a chapter, per week.

But, of course, this is not the way I write. Sometimes I would sit down and write the 1,000 words in a single sitting. These early drafts were too rough to be called First Drafts, so they became Zero Drafts, the raw material to build what was to come.

If I think I am writing a book, I become too intimidated. But I know I can write 1,000 words, about the length of a healthy news column. I can even run (or walk) a marathon — if you give me 52 days, a half-mile per day.

5. Put the easier parts down first

One key to my productivity is not to start writing the book with the Introduction. That usually comes last. Often, I don’t even write the first chapter first. I begin by writing the thing that I know I can write, and write quickly. Early, nonserial chapters teach you what you already know and point you, down the road, to what you need to learn.

Bonus: Take ‘notes’

One final tip: If you have to attend a lot of meetings for work, do some writing during those meetings. I used to write during faculty meetings. Folks thought I was taking notes!

This was helpful for me to write. I hope some of you will pursue your book-writing ambitions in June at Poynter. Until then, please repeat after me: “A page a day equals a book a year.”