Mastering the minimalist book marketing approach

Delve into the world of book marketing with our guest, Emily Enger, who wears many hats, including that of a book marketing and publicity coach.

Emily brings a fresh perspective to the table, advocating for minimalist marketing strategies for authors and sharing profound insights on the choice between traditional or self-publishing.

 Emily offers expert guidance to a speculative fiction author, laying bare the intricate maze of marketing decisions for maximum ROI.

In this podcast, we examine the potential of social media platforms such as Twitter and TikTok in enhancing your reach and amplifying your platform.

We also reveal the importance of publicity tactics like penning engaging articles and making impressions through podcast appearances. 

Traditional publishing under the microscope

We also put under the microscope traditional publishing, discussing the urgent need for innovation in the industry while sharing inspiring success stories of authors who have triumphed against the odds.

Emily also opens up about her own journey, how she became an accidental book marketer, and the lessons she learned along the way.

Emily's marketing strategy hinges on a minimalist approach, and she shares the secret sauce behind successfully marketing her own business. 

Don't miss this episode filled with valuable tips to market your book.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:05

Yes, it's true that the top of the line of traditionally published authors are selling better and making more money than the top of the line of self-published authors. But right now you are comparing two groups that are quote unquote, like at the top right, and nobody likes to think of their art as being rated that way. Right, these books are your passion projects or these stories that live inside of you. But if you just look at the numbers, yes, that's true.

Speaker 2: 0:38

Hi friends, this is Read and Write with Natasha podcast. My name is Natasha Tynes and I'm an author and a journalist. In this channel I talk about the writing life, review books and interview authors. Hope you enjoy the journal. Hi everyone, and welcome to another episode of Read and Write with Natasha. So today we have with us Emily Enger. So Emily Enger is a book marketing and publicity coach. She teaches poets, fiction and creative nonfiction authors how to incorporate minimalist marketing strategies into their creative process so that they can become successful without feeling overwhelmed. So, emily, hi, nice to meet you. I'm so excited to have you today, mostly because you're a book coach. So, for anyone who's listening or watching, can you please, emily, explain to us what a book coach is?

Speaker 1: 1:47

Hi. Well, thank you. First of all. Thank you so much for having me on your show, natasha. So I'm a book marketing coach. So the first thing I always have to do is, anytime I'm interviewed, is explain the difference to audiences between what a book coach and a book marketing coach is. So a book coach is someone who helps with the writing process right, so that's somebody who's like an accountability partner with you that will help make your book the best that it can be.

Speaker 1: 2:13

And then, after you're done with that person and you have finished your book and you have started along the publishing path that you choose whether it's traditionally published or self-published in the published authors then that's where I come in as a book marketing coach to help authors understand okay, what do I do now? Now that my book is the best that it can be, how do I get visibility for that book?

Speaker 2: 2:38

I see, I see not the difference. See, I didn't even know the difference, so that's good to know. So there's a book coach and a book marketing coach, okay, yeah, so you're a book marketing coach, Correct? So you help authors to market their books and, from what I read from your bio, you used a minimalist approach. What does that mean? What is your approach If you can share this with us for free, absolutely All?

Speaker 1: 3:07

right, absolutely, that's. My favorite thing is coming on to shows like yours and just getting to explain to authors who are overwhelmed how to not be overwhelmed. That is my, my shtick, I guess, for lack of a better word. If you try to do the marketing on your own, without doing any research on book marketing especially, let's say, you're a first time author, so you don't know how the business works, and you start Googling, you start following different book marketing channels on, say, social media, you're going to get overwhelmed very, very fast because there's going to be this just barrage of content coming at you telling you all the places you need to make sure your book is is listed, all the activities you have to do to make sure that you find new readers, all the the effort you need to put into getting reviews for your book and how quickly those reviews need to come in, and it suddenly becomes like a full time job. Correct, yes, yes, right. For some of you like that. You, you love that part of the job, so you maybe thrive on that.

Speaker 1: 4:10

But for authors who don't, for authors who are maybe a little bit more introverted or they have another book that they need to write next, or for many authors who are not making a full time living writing, and so they actually have a day job that they go to as well, like they don't have time for all of those things. So my minimalist approach is we just have to simplify this, right. We have to decide what are the pieces that matter the most in marketing. That's going to get you the best what we call ROI, or return on investment, and that investment isn't just money. It's time you know of all the time that you put in to marketing your book, which of those efforts give you the biggest rewards, and only focus on those and not worry about everything else out there.

Speaker 1: 4:56

That isn't. That is a strategy that's just not working for you. Now, in terms of specifics as to what that is, it's going to vary from author to author, because every author's voice is different, but also it varies from genre to genre. Right, unfortunately, I don't have a magic wand where I could be like every author's on TikTok and just tick, tock, that'll. That'll work. It will work for some authors of some audiences, but it might not work for others, and so really, my belief and my strategy is all about figuring out what works for you. So it's a little trial and error at the beginning, when you're first getting ready to launch your book, but then, once you figure out that road, to focus on that road and not get distracted by all the shiny new ideas, all right, so let's do some sort of a role play.

Speaker 2: 5:39

Okay, I want you to coach me. Okay, so I have, I'm working on my second novel. I finished it and just tweaking it and you know, thinking about marketing, I'm going to self publish, or I'm not sure if I'm going to self publish and I'm going to go with a published, with a publisher, and my genre is speculative fiction. It's kind of mystery, specular urban fantasy. You know things that you know things are normal, but weird things happen, like in in suburbia, right when. What works for me? What is the best ROI marketing thing that I need to do?

Speaker 1: 6:18

Okay, so let's, let's turn the table a little bit then. I'm going to ask you some questions and do you have any interview inside this interview to learn more about what you already done? So this is your second book. So with your first book was did you go through a traditional publishing path or are you an indie publisher, the first one?

Speaker 2: 6:36

Yes For the first. Oh, traditional small press.

Speaker 1: 6:40

Okay, and with that book, the number one question is how have you been talking to your readers? And so what I mean by that is social media newsletter. Even in person, events count, but in what way do the people who are already fans of yours, how do they talk to you?

Speaker 2: 6:56

Some some on Twitter, some on email and some Instagram. Actually, I had some on Instagram.

Speaker 1: 7:06

When you say email, are they sending you like fan email to your personal email? Are you sending out a newsletter in their reply?

Speaker 2: 7:14

Some of them, a few of them fan email, but the fan email usually come via social media, either Twitter or Instagram.

Speaker 1: 7:23

Yeah, so two social media platforms is not bad. Two is kind of a manageable number. So if you're doing both Twitter and Instagram, I think you could probably, if you like them both. I would still continue to do them both, but tell me which one your favorite is, not in terms of numbers, but in terms of joy for you. Which ones do you like to use? Which platform?

Speaker 1: 7:43

Twitter, twitter, okay, so then what I would say, because you're, you have to enjoy what you do, right? So joy has to be a factor that is considered when you're coming up with a marketing client. So then I would say, your number one focus should be Twitter the next book too and then second would be Instagram. Don't lose Instagram, but but think of, in the front of your mind, Twitter as your, your place to be Okay. So then the second issue becomes frequency how often do you post on Twitter?

Speaker 2: 8:12

So I use Twitter for other stuff besides my future. I use it to like to get writing clients, other clients, because I'm you know, I'm a full-time writer and not only fiction but but other parts, non-fiction, ghost writer and others. So I use Twitter at least I schedule tweets. So I tweet at least four or five times a day.

Speaker 1: 8:33

Oh, that's fantastic.

Speaker 2: 8:34

Okay.

Speaker 1: 8:34

So then you're, you're golden. Usually when I talk to um, there's Twitter's a little different, but other social media they're like, well, once a week maybe, like they don't like to see these platforms where you happen. So if you're, you're already doing great work then on Twitter, and so I would, I would lean into that when you're talking about the book, I would, I would push your audience to Twitter when you're talking to new audiences and make Twitter kind of your, your connection point between you and the reader. Okay, so then the next issue. So if that's so, that's the hub, that's where you're going to have, you know, your readers, your connection point. So then it becomes getting new readers right, and so that's when we get into publicity.

Speaker 1: 9:16

Correct yeah so you are a podcast host, so you already know the back end of how podcasting works. But it becomes being a guest. Now that could be on podcasts like you and I are doing now. Obviously you're comfortable with podcasts because you run one.

Speaker 2: 9:33

I would hope so.

Speaker 1: 9:35

You know you can be looking at your local media you can be looking at, you know your TV. You can be looking at radio. Also, online publications like online magazines. One of the great things that you can do is you can write an article something nonfiction, because you do touch on different genres and submit it to a publication that has to do with. That's the same type of place that readers of speculative fiction would hang out.

Speaker 2: 10:07

Right.

Speaker 1: 10:08

So then, what you're going to want to do is a little bit of research at the front end of just like what are these publications right? I'm assuming you like to read speculative fiction as well. If you're writing, so, think of the magazines you like to read that are not necessarily for other writers but are for consumers, for readers, and can you contribute something to that publication. What happens when you do this? Not only does it get your name in front of new audiences, but at the bottom, usually, of the article there'll be a spot for you your bio, the bottom of your bio. You're going to link to your Twitter, because that's your number one. That's your choice, right? Your number one hub of choice, but also your website.

Speaker 1: 10:45

If you have a website and I believe you do, because I think I've done it I'm pretty sure you have a website, right, I do, yeah, and so with that that website, what that link to your website does is it creates something called a backlink to your website. A backlink helps you with SEO, or search engine optimization, so that your website starts to look more and more legitimate to the Google gods. So when people are looking for speculative fiction or for other things, that might be the same words that are on your website. It's going to give your, it's going to help your website rank higher on Google search. So people are finding you organically because because your website is being treated more legitimately, because you have several backlinks linking back to your website, if that makes sense.

Speaker 2: 11:35

Okay, yeah, that makes sense. So you know, since I published my novel, which is almost four years ago, things have changed dramatically in social media, and one of the biggest changes is book talk, and everyone is talking about book talk and the rise of Colleen Hoover, of course, who's number one bestseller. Many people are attributing that to tick tock or book talk. So don't you think that maybe the first advice we should tell everyone go on book talk. Look what happened to Colleen, who will forget about all the other channels. Let's just all embrace tick tock. Do you agree with that or no?

Speaker 1: 12:22

Here's my, my careful advice that I give all my, my authors right now, because I don't want everyone to dissuade anybody from doing that, something that they are are gamed to try to do, great, go and try, tick, tock and use the book tock hashtag to get involved in that community If that's something you're excited to do and you want to try. However, if you go in assuming that you are going to be the next Colleen Hoover, that's going to set you up for disappointment, right. So you have to go into it with realistic expectations. So here's what happened with book talk. It did do really, really well. It's still doing pretty well for authors, but it is doing less well than it was doing a year ago, right. And all these trends, they. What happens is they peak and then they settle, and they peak and then they settle. The same thing happened with booktube on.

Speaker 1: 13:11

YouTube. The same thing happened with bookstagram on.

Speaker 2: 13:14

Instagram.

Speaker 1: 13:15

All of these channels still work. I'm not saying that that booktube is dead it's for sure not. But then book talk became the new sexy thing, right, but it's big moment has slightly passed. It's still better than some of the other ones. So if you are wanting to try it, do it. But it requires you to know how to do it. So you need to know how to do the video piece, because TikTok is all about video and it requires you to feed the beast very regularly.

Speaker 1: 13:44

So when I teach minimalist marketing and I'm saying you know, post often but not so often, you get burnt out. You're going to have to, at the front end at least, as you're building your platform from zero on TikTok, you're going to have to post pretty frequently in order to build up that platform again. So that doesn't mean that doesn't mean don't do it. That just means go in with realistic expectations.

Speaker 1: 14:07

And the other big piece about social media marketing is what we call networking. So you have to go in and make friends with other people who are already there. Right, you have to build relationship with other content creators that are on TikTok, and that's another investment of time. You have to go in and you have to be liking and commenting on other people's posts. You have to be connecting, even outside of the platform if they happen to have a channel on Instagram or Twitter as well and start to kind of build relationships to make those connection points as well, to grow your own platform and your own channel. So absolutely give it a try if it's something that you are game for. But if you are somebody who's intimidated by video, it's it's. You're not going to see the same level of success.

Speaker 2: 14:54

So so you're saying that book talk sort of peaked right.

Speaker 1: 15:00

So it's not dead, I'm just saying.

Speaker 2: 15:03

Okay, so can you predict? Predict what's the next big thing? Do you have any predictions?

Speaker 1: 15:08

I actually can't because the reason TikTok, the reason TikTok did so well, is because it was new platform. Okay, it was because TikTok was relatively new and then TikTok became like, really successful, especially among the younger crowd, at first in a crew, and I don't. I don't see another social media platform being developed right now that you know Instagram. The same thing happened with Instagram. Instagram was doing amazing when it was like the new kid on the block and everyone was trying out the new thing and social media or social media platforms, they, they pop up and they die and they pop up and they die. There's actually a lot of them out there that most of your audience has never heard of because they weren't successful. Right, if you're in, if you're in the tech development world, it's a big risk to start a social media platform, so nobody could have guessed, you know. So Instagram got kind of lucky I mean, instagram is on my Facebook, of course TikTok kind of got lucky in that they you know they were they actually took off when so many other ones didn't.

Speaker 1: 16:15

I do know of a new platform that just came out this year that it is specifically devoted for books, but I wouldn't be able to say, oh, they're the next TikTok. But if you want your readers, or you see me, or listeners, if they would like to know that, you can check out Copper Books C-O-P-P-E-R. They're basically trying to be the new Goodreads. Goodreads has been pretty disappointing for authors, for a lot of them, unless you're again, unless you happen to do it really well or be really lucky. Goodreads is owned by Amazon and they have not really developed updates platform to make it easier, and so there is a new social media channel that is specifically about books. So you literally go in and you create a profile and there's threads and little group videos that you can do and you just talk about books and your favorite books and so it's just, it's literally a social media platform that is about readers and writers. So we'll see what happens with it, but it sounds like I'm on there and I'm really into it.

Speaker 2: 17:16

Oh, I need to check it out. So when did it launch and who's behind it? Do you know?

Speaker 1: 17:21

Yes, it launched. I don't know the exact date, but it's less than a year, less than a year.

Speaker 1: 17:26

Like it's brand new. So it launched and I have actually met the developer. Her name is Allison Trowbridge. I don't know a ton about her other than I mean I'm not her other writer's retreat. That's how I heard about the platform and she is an author who was also she wrote nonfiction and when her first book came out she was kind of disappointed in the marketing kind of you know options like we're talking about now and there wasn't a good way to connect with her audience around the topic she wrote about and have really good conversations right, and so she saw you know that you know all the different platforms kind of specialized in something else. So TikTok specializes in video, instagram for photography. There wasn't really anything for readers and writers that was a platform focusing on them, and so she went out to change that.

Speaker 2: 18:20

Okay, do you give different advice to self published authors that, like traditional published authors, or those are published with the big five or published with a small press. So what kind of advice would you give to, you know, traditionally published versus self published?

Speaker 1: 18:41

So if you're, first of all, if you're with the big five, I wouldn't really give you advice at all. Because if you are published with the big five, you've got a team who's going to help tell you what to do and what your expectations with their expectations of you are for the marketing. If you are traditionally published with any other press small or medium size or even big, but not the big five that that I do have some specific advice for. And then indie authors, you know if you're self published, then there's a lot more of the load on you. So the benefit to being self-published is you have access to the data of your book and you don't if you're traditionally published. So you can look at how many book sales are happening, whether you're selling on Amazon, whether you're selling, you know, to bookstores through IngramSpark. You actually know what your sales are like. You can take out ads in some of these places like Amazon ads or the bookstore catalog at IngramSpark. That goes to bookstores. So your bookstores has done well for some of my authors and just getting their books onto bookstore shelves and that's an option for you when you are traditionally published or self-published. When you're traditionally published, that's not an option for you because your publisher owns the book. Your publisher is in charge of sales, ads, distribution. You are at that point.

Speaker 1: 20:06

As a traditionally published author, your sole focus is connection with readers. I shouldn't say solars, too, there's one that's connection with readers. That's the biggest one, and the second one is visibility through interviews. Yeah, you know, like this, like going on podcasts, now you might have a publicist if you're traditionally published, that will help get you on interviews, but they will likely not get you on enough interviews and even if they do, the ball is still in your court to do well on those interviews and to then push those interviews forward as much as you can. So, as you know, it's a podcast host. One of the things I'm imagining is frustrating on your end is when you have a guest like me on your show and I come and I get to talk to your audience and then afterwards I say bye and I never listen again and I don't post to my audience that I was on your show, like I don't tell my audience about your podcast, right, which is bad. Consider bad practice and bad form.

Speaker 1: 21:11

What I'm going to do after we're done here, once this interview comes out, is I'm going to go on my social media and I'm going to go on my newsletter that I curated and tell them all about Natasha Tynes and her amazing podcast that I got to be on, and I'm going to get you new listeners as well, so that this is kind of a mutual relationship.

Speaker 2: 21:27

Okay.

Speaker 1: 21:29

And what authors sometimes don't realize when they are doing publicity is they come and they perform well on the podcast or the radio show or whatever, and then they don't really do anything after that and I think that it's up to somebody else to push it out to their readers, and it's not. It's actually up to you and you need to be telling all of your readers that you're on the podcast and you can do it more than once. Sometimes what I'll see is they'll be like, yep, here's the link to the show I was on, and then they say it one time and they never touch it again. And you can repost that episode or that link two or three or four times in the next couple weeks to make sure that all of your readers get a chance to see it, and the host of that interview will be very grateful to you and that will help the interview perform better. It will help get more visibility, both directions. And that links to your book, right? That links to information about you, which is how they find your book.

Speaker 2: 22:26

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So now you know like the market is changing. As I said when I published my book, now like everything changed. You know, kdp now is huge. They, you know, changed it dramatically. It's very easy, I played around with it. And do you think people should just skip the gatekeepers and self-publish? I talked with one of the author. I mean, I talk with authors all the time and one of them also works in a traditional publishing house. One of the things that he was telling me is that self-published authors, you know, still do not sell as good as traditional published authors. So, like you have, you know, self-published authors still lag behind when it comes to the numbers. Do you agree with that, or is the trend shifting? So I'd love to hear from you.

Speaker 1: 23:23

I do. Yeah, no, I agree with that that if you can get a traditional publishing deal, I still do think that that is the best path to more sales and a bigger career, Traditionally speaking, I guess the way we would think of career, of a writing career. There are a few reasons for that. One, the one at the very top, is money, Money, money, money. It's all about money and if you are an indie author, there are definitely self-published authors who have done very, very well, who have gotten certain bestseller rankings in different places, but it has been A exhausting and B they have to pay for everything.

Speaker 2: 24:07

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 24:07

Right, you have to pay for not just the book design and the book editor which, right up front, just to create the package of what makes your book a book is many thousands of dollars and it has to be good to stand out amongst all the other books on KDP, right. So it has to be professionally done so you cannot cut corners. And then for the visibility, if you want to use some of the best, some of these strategies that a lot of the best selling authors use, you're looking at spending money on advertising or getting into places. I don't know if you've heard of Bookbub, but there are. There are newsletters that will recommend your book. This is for both traditional and indie authors. They do, but the difference is that traditional press would have a press to pay that fee to get mentioned, and if you're an indie author, that's still coming out of your pocket too.

Speaker 1: 24:55

And so usually what happens is is where. Where the indie author kind of stall out is. When the money stalls out, it's it's not for lack of it's not for their book not being good, it's not for lack of desire or effort or fulfilling their dreams Like they're doing all the right things, but there's only so much money, especially before the profit comes back, because if you're publishing, also through KDP, you have to realize that there's a delay in when you get your paycheck from those books that you can't. I think it's a couple of months before when a book is sold that you don't, in two weeks you're not seeing your profit from that sale. It's there's a window that Amazon leaves open, at least as of this, as of the timing of this recording. Of course these platforms change all the time, but there's a delay and I believe that's to allow for returns in case somebody doesn't want the book anymore or made a mistake. They allow for returns before they pay out the author, but your expenses are still there and so that that piece is is is something that that holds South publish writers back a little bit, unfortunately.

Speaker 1: 26:00

The other thing is there are certain doors that are still close to self publish authors when it comes to media coverage. Even if you go through a small press if you have, you know the letterhead of a small press that is on the pitch letter to go to a book reviewer at thus and such magazine it is hard to get a book review at, say, a newspaper or a magazine these days. It is hard, even if you're traditionally published, but they are more likely to choose the books that have a traditional press and they are getting really good at being able to tell the difference between when they're when they're seeing the publishing logo of a self published author, a traditional press or a hybrid press. Right, because these people aren't dummies, they. They're in this industry too and maybe a few years ago you could have, you know, you create a logo for your, for the publishing arm of your books and you, you send it out and you act out professional and maybe the book reviewer doesn't realize it.

Speaker 1: 27:01

You even have a website, right, but that's not the case anymore. All these book reviewers know they can tell the difference, they can do a little bit of digging and and they're going to look more favorably on your book because they're still biased there and their audience is huge. I mean, if you get a, you get a book reviewer from a you know, from a newspaper, from the book section of a major newspaper, let's say that's going to do really good things to your book sales. That it's going to be hard for you to do as a self published author.

Speaker 2: 27:28

Yeah, I mean I was just smiling because I have my own LLC and my own, you know, media LLC. So my, I'm actually gonna. I took my rights back from the, my traditional publisher, and I'm going to publish my first novel and I'm publishing under my LLC, so it doesn't have my name as publisher, it has the name of my LLC. But I was thinking, but like, how would they know it's me? They would know.

Speaker 1: 27:58

They, they'll, they'll figure it out. But that said, let me, let me do say yes, it's true that the top of the line of traditionally published authors are selling better and making more money than the top of the line of self published authors. But right now you are comparing two groups that are quote unquote, like at the top right, and nobody likes to think of their art as being rated that way. Right, like these books are your passion projects or these stories that live inside of you. But if you just look at the numbers.

Speaker 1: 28:32

Yes, that's true, but could you do better as a self published author, climbing the ladder faster than you would through the traditional path? Right? Because, let's say, I mean, if you never get through the gatekeepers, or if you do, but they barely touch your book because you're not their favorite pony in the show this year, which happens all the time, then you have nothing, whereas if you had self published and your goals were smaller, you could be significant in the self publishing sphere versus not even breaking out the gate in the traditional publishing sphere, right? So when authors are considering which path they want, they really. I would really caution you to not just compare the people at the top, because as much as we all think that we're the best, there does have to be a little bit of a Reality check. And the question is I'm not the best 1% anyway. And if not, then let's pick the path that gives you more control, because then you would make more money if you could control, you know, within your bracket, if you had more control of the money and Could see the numbers, and that's different, right.

Speaker 2: 29:40

Mmm. Well, the issue with traditionally published is, for me, the bottleneck is getting an agent, and getting an agent is really really tough. And how long are you gonna wait to get an agent before you publish? I mean, you might as well, just you know, pass away before even getting an agent, and which happens? You know People have all these amazing stories to tell, like memoirs or whatever. How long can you wait for this to happen? Do you think we need some sort of a change in the way agents are being? Maybe we need an app Picking an agent? That's an idea, you know. Let's find someone.

Speaker 1: 30:20

You should be an app developer Money would make if you could develop.

Speaker 2: 30:26

I'll hire a developer. I'm just the brain behind. Don't make a lot of money that way. But I mean, it's just I don't see it picking an agent. I don't see like I don't see it as sustainable. It's not time efficient, it's. There should be some sort of a change when it comes to finding an agent. Well, what do you think?

Speaker 1: 30:49

I 100% agree with you. Yeah, this, the publishing industry as it exists, it's, it's, it's broken. There's no other way to say that. And I don't know anyone who does not agree with that. I would bet that if you interviewed people working in the big five industries that you know, if you, if you, you know, got them in a quiet corner, maybe the after they had a few, you could get them to admit themselves that that the industry is not serving us the way it should.

Speaker 1: 31:18

Yeah, I can tell you so many horror stories. I mean, I just signed a new client who he's not a new, a new author. He's had tons of success as an author, going through significant, not the big five presses, but close to the big five, really significant presses, and he Couldn't get a new agent. You know he had one years ago but couldn't get a new one, even though he had all this success to show for it. And the same story with my husband. My husband is an author. He wrote a fantastic book. I'm a little biased, but I thought it was fantastic. I read a lot of books, you know, and in in my line of work and in my whole life. That's why I'm in this industry and I thought his work was something very unique that was outside of what a lot of people were publishing right now, couldn't. It was crickets back, like they don't even send you rejection letters anymore. You just don't reply to your email and so he ended up publishing through a university press, and that's what the change that I see happening is.

Speaker 1: 32:18

There's a lot of these small presses that don't require Agenting to submit your manuscript. I don't know if that's a perfect solution either, but that is. That is a path that I am constantly reminding writers about. When they reach out to me and they have questions, because this is the stage they're at, I always say try for the agent first, because if that, if you can go that path, that's the one that's gonna set you up for the best success. But eventually, if you don't hear back, you gotta. You can't just let your books in a drawer, right, I mean, that's just creatively devastating. You have to find a secondary path.

Speaker 1: 32:50

And so you know what has been found a great university press, and and you know what they treated his book with so much respect. Yeah, that's the one nice thing about a small press is, because of their size, they they can be human beings with you. You know, they don't just see you as a commodity and the thing that wrote a product for them and then that and that can be a very wonderful relationship, but they don't have the budgets that the big guys do. So then you're back again talking to somebody like me and we're having the marketing conversation because it'll say, like I mean, just in my husband's contract it literally says that basically they're gonna do, they're not gonna do any marketing beyond the basic distribution channels, right, and that the rest is up to him. So then, even though he's not a self-published author, he is still somebody who has to do 100% of the marketing himself.

Speaker 2: 33:40

But he has you so. He's lucky he's got me. He's like so do you take on clients after they get published or when they had their manuscript ready? Because you mentioned yeah.

Speaker 1: 33:52

Yeah, so what I do is a little so. I don't take one-on-one clients at all. I need work. I did at the beginning of my career and I would basically do what's called done for you services where you hire me and I Create some social media posts for you. If you're not on the right distribution channels, I'll literally upload your book there. I will serve as a publicist and I was like sending out kind of pitch letters for on behalf of authors to Media and other industry professionals and I was trying to do all these things. That was just. It was too much for one person, first of all, but also it. What happened is I also, as you said, the industry is changing.

Speaker 1: 34:31

Yeah and just like you hear crickets back from I'm sending to an agent, they were starting to be a lot more crickets back from the media too, even though previously I had I had not had that. And and one of the big pieces is that we live in an era right now, because of social media, where people expect access Right, and I was being the go-between between the author and their audience through social media I would sometimes run their social media channels for them, yeah, and also between the author and the media, creating another like step you know. So they had asked me for the phone number of the author just to order to get a hold of him or her. I'm just gonna be, and it was creating barriers instead of helping. So that's why I became a book marketing coach instead of a marketer, so I just teach authors how to do it themselves.

Speaker 2: 35:21

Okay, okay, what.

Speaker 1: 35:22

I do when I take on new clients. Mostly it's just an interview and if they need a Little beginning assistance to set up a plan for themselves, I'll help them come up with a plan, but that's all I do for them anymore. The rest that of what they get for me is they can sign it for my newsletter and I do at the Educational newsletter. That's free and eventually. I am in the middle of finishing up my first course and I'm gonna have courses available that people can purchase and kind of go at your own pace type of thing where they can walk through the different steps, where I actually teach you how to do the different pieces of what makes a good pitch letter to the media. What does it need to include? How, when do you follow up and how much you know? What should that follow up? Look like stuff like that.

Speaker 2: 36:06

What platform are you using for the course?

Speaker 1: 36:09

I'm using Podia.

Speaker 2: 36:10

Podia. Okay, so you're not. Yeah, you're not doing like cohorts or anything like that, it just you're just recording the video and people will watch it.

Speaker 1: 36:19

Yeah for now, my, my plan eventually is there will be, there will be a little piece, a little cohort piece, but only temporary. So what I have found? I used to run a membership group that was for. You know, that was a lot like a cohort, where you'd pay a recurring subscription fee and you would work with me inside the platform Regularly, but it would be like a coaching thing. But it was. I found it was not necessary, like I want to give people an off ramp as well as an on ramp, because I think we're all Weary of paying subscription fees for eternity.

Speaker 1: 36:51

And then you know, yeah, when are we done type of a thing, and so I realized doing a temporary cohort around a course would better serve people. So eventually, what I plan to do is for some of my more significant courses Along with the course would be, say, four weeks, six weeks, kind of a group conversation and help, but then Actually like set people up, so like it now. Now you have the information, now I've worked with you, now you're ready to go and fly from the cage.

Speaker 2: 37:23

Okay, got it. So I just want to go back a bit and ask you about how did you even get into that whole business of being what I call it a book marketing coach. How did you get to that? Yeah, I want to hear you like back story.

Speaker 1: 37:41

I call myself an accidental book marketer. I did not set out to do this. I wanted to be a writer when I came up. That's the. I wanted the path that a lot of the authors that I work with, okay, or that I helped them take. That's what I intended. It's why I went. I got a degree in English. You know, I did all the. I got a certificate in publishing years ago. Right, I'm thinking it was just more for me, though, like I was just gonna learn how the publishing industry works. But then I made the mistake of taking this, this marketing course in college. It's advanced marketing class, and I think it just loved it. Like I found that I just really thrived off of that kind of business side doesn't and the Thinking about the data and the visibility and I just I just enjoyed it.

Speaker 1: 38:26

And so after college, you know, wait, you need a job to pay off the school loans and Write the books. You yeah there's this little delay right inside to get a job. So I got a marketing and marketing To various industries not always in books, but just in marketing for about 15 years and my my last like nine to five traditional job was at an art center, a regional art center here in Minnesota where I live, and we served Nine counties and with four Native American reservations. It was a and I get to be their communications director. It was a really incredible job and an incredible opportunity for me and and it was really a fulfillment for me because I was back to working with artists, which was my favorite group of people.

Speaker 1: 39:12

Okay and we worked with all kinds of artists, not just writers, but writers was was included, you know, in the term artist, of course. Okay, and so I would. I would help authors through my, through our center with like their book launch and with writing press releases and stuff like that. And so when I, when I had my second child and I decided I was gonna stay home with her and try to do some, some part-time freelance work I had some connections I had made there with authors were like hey, could you do this just on a freelance capacity for us? And at first I was like no, this isn't what I was going to do.

Speaker 1: 39:51

And then I was like I'll just try it. And then pretty soon, just like that marketing class back in college, I realized I loved it. And then the next thing I do, I have a whole business around this.

Speaker 2: 40:05

So this is a bit meta, but how do you market your marketing business?

Speaker 1: 40:09

This way right now with you. Besides, I reach out to podcasts. I also have reached. I've been doing some events lately so, like Zoom events, where there's a lot of different industry professionals that are in the domain I teach. So I do a lot of teaching through that way. I'm also taught at writer's retreats, stuff like that. But just looking online and I find writer's retreats or events or speaking engagements that sound like they'd be a good fit for what I want to do and that want to talk about the industry more the industry and not just the writing piece and I reach out to them. I send a pitch, just like I teach authors to send a pitch to the you know to when they want to get coverage for press. I send a pitch too to say, hey, do you want to talk about book marketing?

Speaker 2: 41:03

So what is the number one social media that gives you the biggest ROI Social media platform?

Speaker 1: 41:11

yeah, yeah, are you ready for this? Yep, I don't use social media to market my business. I do have social media. Personally. I have, like I have an Instagram. That's probably my biggest platform and a lot of my authors follow me there because they know I'm there. I use my newsletter as my connection point to my followers.

Speaker 2: 41:32

Why not social media? I'm curious.

Speaker 1: 41:34

Because of my minimalist strategy, because social media is a beast that constantly has to be fit. So for me to grow my business on social media, I need to give new advice every single day and is as a mom of two little kids my oldest is finally in kindergarten, so I have a little bit of a break but I just, and I still need to create the content for my you know, current clients and current clientele and all the newsletters I put out. There's not also a time to do, say, a TikTok tutorial video and do it well. And so this is. This gets back to kind of. My philosophy in marketing is pick one connection point or two if you, if you, you know, if you have it in you, but I only had one in me. So I chose my newsletter because that's the best way that I found to give educational content, especially in long form, and I also found, like a lot of authors were, they appreciated that more because they are trying to write, so they're not on, they're not checking social media all the time.

Speaker 1: 42:33

So, instead, they get a once a month comprehensive newsletter from me that comes to their email that they can read whenever they're ready for it, and they will see it. The algorithm gods might not aren't going to like hide it from them. So that has been very successful for me, actually, and I was, you know. I went in the same as I tell my authors. I experimented with a few things. I did use my personal social media to kind of try see, to dip my toes in the water to see what's the marketing content, what's it going to look like, what's the response going to be, and I found the most success with the newsletter. So I went with the newsletter.

Speaker 2: 43:09

So how do you market your newsletter?

Speaker 1: 43:13

Through. I do do it through social media. I will post on my personal one, you know, saying hey, I'm getting ready for new newsletter and with with Instagram, you know you can use hashtags that are relevant to the topic of the post, and so that brings new people.

Speaker 1: 43:27

But then it's the same thing as this Every time I go on a podcast, a few more people go to my website and sign up for my newsletter. Every time I ask to teach at an event, a few more people go to my website and sign up for my newsletter. And so the, the work, the creation of the content itself, it actually becomes my marketing.

Speaker 2: 43:47

I'm going to sign up for newsletter now. I'm really, I'm really curious, okay, so before we conclude, what are like top five tips you would give to new authors or aspiring authors to market their books? So I'm just five tips.

Speaker 1: 44:05

Five tips. Okay, you may have to keep track of me. What number? Five, five, five quick tips. Okay. So quick tips focus on the current audience you have first. Okay, everyone thinks, oh, I need to find new readers and you do. But what you don't realize is that your readers find more readers for you. So if you treat well your core readers, they're going to start talking about your book, sharing your posts, et cetera, et cetera, and that's going to grow organically.

Speaker 1: 44:32

And that's going to be some of the best. That's the best marketing. That's called word of mouth advertising that you can do, because if a friend recommends a book to you, you're going to read that book, right? Yeah, you see an ad on you know, on Instagram you might be am I interested, but the chances of you buying the book from that ad are pretty low. So you won't get that great word of mouth advertisement advertising if you don't treat your core people well.

Speaker 2: 45:00

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 45:01

So focus on the readers you already have is my first tip. Second of all is choose a marketing, create a marketing plan. There's an A part and B part of this one. First, create a marketing plan at the beginning, when you are getting ready to publish your book. That is just kind of an outline. Don't think of it as something super legalistic.

Speaker 1: 45:18

It doesn't have to be like get an exact this many podcasts every single week, but just a rough outline for what you want the marketing to look like, and create a plan that is sustainable, which which might mean looking smaller than you think that you intended it to be.

Speaker 2: 45:34

Right.

Speaker 1: 45:35

It's much more important to be sustainable than it is to, you know, to make something top heavy.

Speaker 2: 45:42

Okay.

Speaker 1: 45:43

Because then that's number three, which kind of ties in, which is don't stop, because the worst thing that you can do in marketing is to stop. Right what happens.

Speaker 1: 45:54

Authors think, oh, I have a year to market my book, and that is roughly true when it comes to media coverage Once your book is more than a year old and newspapers probably not going to want to interview you, but then they're like this little date is in their mind. So then, when they hit that first anniversary, they're like now I can stop, so sick of talking about this book, right, yeah. And then they just shut up, right, and they never talk about their book anymore. And you don't want to do that. You want to if you create, if you're, if your point number two, which was to create something that's sustainable, is not bringing you out, then you can keep talking about it without it dropping away, which is which is very, very important. So that's three. Number four is to use borrowed audiences, which means media coverage, right, so using a borrowed audience means you need to go and have a conversation with somebody else in order to talk to their followers.

Speaker 2: 46:53

Okay.

Speaker 1: 46:54

So if you go on a podcast, that podcast audience hears you. If you have a conversation on, let's say, do like a YouTube live with another person, or an Instagram live or Facebook live with another author maybe it's not even media coverage, maybe it's two authors collaborating together Right, then both of your audiences are going to watch your conversation and so each of you will get followers from the other person.

Speaker 2: 47:21

Okay.

Speaker 1: 47:22

So that that would be number four.

Speaker 2: 47:25

Okay.

Speaker 1: 47:26

Let's see. And then number five, which is the first one that we talked about, is just, whatever you do, make sure you have a connection points that your readers can connect with you somehow. It doesn't mean that you have to give them full access. I believe in setting boundaries, but there has to be a hub spot where you can gather your people. That could be social media, and it can be any platform you choose. It can be your newsletter, which is what I do.

Speaker 1: 47:50

If you are an author who's maybe more of a local author, you're not trying to, you know, get out on Amazon. You're just. Maybe you wrote a book that is about, you know, a historical event that happened near your hometown. Maybe for you your marketing goal is to stay kind of a big deal in your hometown, then it's literal events, right, but just make sure that you have provided some kind of connection point so that people who are fans of you get a chance to see you, because then they're going to feel like they're building a relationship with you. And then that loops back right to my first point, which is then you're treating. You're treating your audience well, you're treating your current fans well and it's breeding that loyalty.

Speaker 2: 48:30

Well, I mean, this has been wonderful and eye-opening, and you got me fired up about marketing.

Speaker 1: 48:40

I'm just trying to do that.

Speaker 2: 48:41

Yeah, I've been just so busy with everything that I'm kind of forgot about all the marketing part when it comes to my books, but I'm going to go ahead and subscribe to your newsletter. What's the name of newsletter for anyone who's listening as well, or watching?

Speaker 1: 48:56

It's the same as my website. So if you go to goodenoughbookmarketingcom, it's my website and right on the homepage will be the place that you can sign up and you'll see, you'll get a free download too, with also some tips that I have.

Speaker 2: 49:09

Oh nice.

Speaker 1: 49:10

Okay, so there'll be even more. In fact, I don't even know that we talked about some of the tips that I have on there, so there's even more content there.

Speaker 2: 49:17

That's fantastic. So thank you very much for spending an hour with me and I'm sure everyone is going to enjoy all your tips, and if anyone wants help marketing their book, you know where to go, so thank you very much.

Speaker 1: 49:35

Thank you so much, Natasha. This was a fun conversation. I really enjoyed talking to you.

Speaker 2: 49:39

Oh, yeah, me too. Thank you very much and enjoy the rest of the day. Take care, and for anybody who's spent an hour with us, thank you so much for your time, thank you for listening or watching, and until we meet again.