Anna David's Blog, page 15
December 29, 2021
2021's Most Popular Topics: Media Attention, Book Relaunches & Book Parties
Featuring the three most popular episodes from 2021
#1 Most Popular Episode: How Do I Get Media Attention From My Book?
Your Book is Not Newsworthy
It is not a newsworthy event except for your mother. Unless you're J.K. Rowling or Brene Brown or one of these people, nobody cares that you have a book out.
It used to be different. Back when I first got into this, it kind of was newsworthy when people had books out.
But essentially it's quite self-obsessed of us to believe our book is newsworthy to anybody. So you need to give the media a reason to cover you. And since journalists and TV bookers are often overworked and underpaid, coming up with a way to do their work for them is the most effective way to do it.
How I Did This
With my most recent book, I said, "Okay, I have written a book about writing and making a messy life into a memoir. What on earth does that have to do with the news?"
I thought about the pandemic and how statistics about depression were rising all the time. And so I corralled a couple of those news stories and studies about that and thought about writing has been very healing for me.
So I came up with a pitch about how writing about what we're going through can help us heal. And then I had a publicist friend pitch that to Good Morning America. And I was able to go on to Good Morning America and talk about how writing helps heal our depression.
That idea is not anywhere in my book. And it didn't matter because they introduced me as New York Times bestselling author of this new book, Make Your Mess Your Memoir. They showed the cover.
How Ryan Holiday Does This
Ryan Holiday talks about something called News Jacking, which was apparently popularized by somebody named David Meermin Scott. And basically, you make the news. When Ryan Holiday sold his first book, he wasn't known as a writer so he wrote the then existing website Gawker and pretended to be someone else, talking about how that guy Ryan Holiday got a book deal.
And then Gawker wrote about it. And then he sent the Gawker piece to someone else. And he really knew how to how to snowball it and make himself the news. So think about your book.
We are publishing at Launch Pad a memoir about somebody with a special needs kid, so we could pitch an outlet on the impact covid has had on parents who are already overburdened.
If you have a self-help book on the importance of meditation and it's near the new year, pitch an outlet, a story about making a New Year's resolution to meditate—basically you come up with the story.
How Cameron Herold Does This
Previous podcast guest Cameron Herold has a book called Free PR and he says go to Twitter, look up hashtags of who's tweeting about your book topic, identify those journalists and if you can't reach them on Twitter, find their email addresses, maybe on a site like Hunter IO.
But journalists are very active on Twitter so you can tweet at them. And what Cameron does is he gets their numbers and he calls them and says, "Hey, do you have two minutes? I think I have a good story for you."
He also talks about looking at how what you are teaching in your book, if you are, in fact, teaching something in your book and how it has helped people wherever they live.
He talked about he has somebody who ranks as the number one service in Cincinnati who loves the content of Cameron's book. So he would contact all the Cincinnati business media about how his book content helped this local company. And I think that that's what's really important: You don't think, "Who cares about local news? I want national news." It's all online and local leads to national.
Cameron also talks about using each media hit to its maximum advantage. So that can mean oftentimes driving paid traffic to that story or really it can just be posting it multiple times. He says that he'll post a podcast interview at least five times on Facebook over the next year, five times on LinkedIn, share it five times on Twitter, link to it on the press page of his website and then have it go out on his newsletter list and ask his team to put it on their social media.
And there are programs and websites where you can do that. Lately, which is about a hundred and fifty dollars a month, uses AI so you can basically put a URL for some interview you did into Lately and it will then come up with 40 different social media posts based on the content that's in that and then schedule them over the next however long period of time.
It's not about getting the media hit and forgetting about it. It is getting the media hit, using that media hit to get bigger media and then sharing it.
RELATED EPISODES:
Cameron Herold on Generating Free PR and Having a Vivid Vision for Your Book
How Do I Use My Book to Get on Podcasts?
RELEVANT LINKS:
Free PR by Cameron Herold
#2 Most Popular Episode: What I Learned From the Party Girl Re-Launch
Ohhhhh, does your own book launch teach you some lessons and that goes double when it's a re-launch like my recent one for Party Girl.
In this episode, I broke down what went right (fun events out of town, asking someone I knew to help me get in a cool store), what didn't (Launch Squad, I'm talking to you if you said you'd review the book and still haven't!) and what was kinda ehh for the money put out (a publicist). That last question really comes down to...Is this story worth $5k?
Hear the whole rant in this episode!
AND PROVE ME WRONG ABOUT REVIEWS BY BUYING THE BOOK AND REVIEWING IT HERE.
RELATED EPISODES
What to Do 60 Days, 30 Days and 7 Days Before Your Launch
How Do I Get Reviews For My Book?
How Do I Get People to Buy My Book?
Most Popular Episode #3: How Do I Throw a Book Launch Party?
Know That It Won't Sell Books
Bad news first: your party, no matter how awesome, won't help with book sales (unless the party is at a local book store but even then, you can only count on so many). Chances are, you'll actually be giving books away! So why do it? Because it's fun. Because you deserve to be celebrated. And because why not? So what are some ways to do it?
Rent a Venue
For Party Girl, I rented out the top floor of a (sadly now gone) restaurant next to Book Soup for the few hours after my book signing there. It was fun. It was an investment. I got great photos. End of story.
For my second book, Bought, I threw a party at a New York restaurant and that's when I started to wise up. Yes, I got lovely photos, yes I got to celebrate, yes it even got some press but it was a lot of trouble to go to for not a terrific payoff. And so I thought: I need to have a party that attracts a lot more buzz!
And so, for my next book, Reality Matters, I coerced some genuine reality stars (from The Bachelor, The Real World, Sober House and more) to show up and rallied to get the press there. Again, a lot of trouble for not a huge payoff. So figure out why you're doing your party and whether or not the planning is going to be fun. I'm a slow learner so it took me three times to realize I didn't think it was fun. For my next few books, I didn't do any parties.
But really, I concluded...
It's a Great Idea for Your First Book
That's why we offer what we call a VIP Launch for clients of ours who want to come out to LA to get the celebrity treatment. We get the press there, we gather a crowd, we even get a red carpet featuring their book cover and secure meetings for them with movie and TV producers to discuss the viability of their book as a movie or TV show. My feeling is: if you can afford it and someone else is going to do the leg work, go for it!
And Then There's the Marie Forleo Way
In many ways, Forleo was the first online marketer—and she's certainly the most glamorous. Her first book was called How to Make Every Man Want You and her husband is an actor who’s been on Sex and the City, for God's sake!
As legend has it, she was a bartender who started her mailing list by asking people who came in for drinks to sign up on a notebook. And she’s managed to not only show people how online businesses are done, get endorsed by Oprah and make millions in the process but also to incorporate her myriad interests (hip hop dancing anyone) into her business.
You get it: she doesn’t just break the rules; she makes new ones. And so when she was figuring out how to launch her book Everything is Figureoutable, she basically pulled an Erika Jayne: declaring herself a stage presence.
And she pulled it off, selling nearly 2,000 tickets for her New York launch, with people flying in from 42 states and 21 countries.
What'd she do? She danced! "Imagine," as she put it, "if a Beyoncé concert and a TED talk had a baby, then threw a block party."
Then she took it on the road, securing famous friends in every city to help bring the hype— Glennon Doyle and Abby Wambach in Orlando, Chase Jarvis in Seattle and Brene Brown in Houston. She and her team went on to London and Australia.
Did it work? Well, the book became a #1 New York Times bestseller. Was that solely because of her Beyonce-like tour? Surely not. But it sure looks like that made the trip to the top fun.
RELATED EPISODES & LINKS
A Play-by-Play Breakdown of How Rachel Hollis Launches a Book
Neal Pollack on How He Launched His Book
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
December 22, 2021
How Do I Arrange Readings for my Book?
The number one best thing to do, when thinking of a venue, is to consider it from the venue’s perspective. If you’re approaching a bookstore, think: what does a bookstore want? Easy answer: to sell books. So how are you going to help them do that?
It’s harder than you may think to sell books. That being said, I’m coming from a Los Angeles perspective, where—at least pre Covid and still a bit in Covid 2.0—there are fabulous events every night. So with a reading, you’re competing with premieres, parties and dinners for attendees. Back when readings were all in person, you were also dealing with the traffic nightmare—which is to say you’d lose a lot of people who would otherwise come if it wasn’t at rush hour, which is when most readings are.
The other factor is that a lot of people who come to readings—even your friends—aren’t going to buy your book at the reading. It’s such a Catch 22 as the author: you’re seriously grateful your friends showed up but then you’re thinking, “God damn it, am I not worth $19.95 to you?” if they leave without buying.
Bookstores know this which is why they like to book celebrities—certainly in LA—for their book signings. People, even very popular people, can’t be counted on to bring in the droves. Those with fans can.
What Can You Do If You’re Not a Celebrity?
Try to get a well-known person to host the event with you and bill it as the two of you “in conversation.” Admittedly this is far easier said than done but I was able to do it for my Jeff Garlin Party Girl Book Soup event. (Sidebar: for someone who’s lived in LA since the late 90s, I’m terrible at befriending celebrities—a major bummer when you want to get the movie version of your book made and it’s all about who you can attach as talent. But I happened to become friends with Jeff over Covid and he was generous enough to agree to host the event with me.)
Before I became friends with Jeff, I asked other authors I knew to do events with me (I’ve done this repeatedly, most recently with Lisa Smith). Two authors, even if they’re not famous, are going to bring in twice as many people as one.
Still, if it’s your first book, you may well bring in a crowd. (For the initial release of Party Girl in 2007, my in-person Book Soup reading drew over 100 people; for all my book events that followed, only a fraction of that number showed up. The fact is, people are terribly excited when their friend publishes their first book; by books two and on, it’s just not that exciting to them.) So if you can get solid commitments from people that they’ll attend and buy books, include that fact in your pitch to the bookstore. (Yes, it’s kind of weird to ask a bunch of people if they can promise to show up somewhere AND buy a book but this will make a difference.)
How to Get People There
To get people to show up, remember to make it something people want to show up for. Let’s face it: listening to someone read from their book is boring AF. People don’t come out for book events. They want to feel an emotion and be entertained.
How can you make it more interesting? I once hosted a virtual book promotion by allowing attendees to pitch their own book ideas. Maybe you can ask a comedian friend to tell jokes before and after you read. Maybe you can make up a song about your friends, print up the chorus, hand it out to the crowd and lead them all through a rendition.
Then pull out all the stops when it comes to promo. Boost the Facebook post about it.
What About Non-Bookstores?
Here’s the thing: you can have a book event literally anywhere: a restaurant, a coffee shop, a friend’s house, a fricking street corner. If it’s a restaurant, consider pitching the venue on doing something there off-hours (a Tuesday at 3 pm?), paying for a certain amount of food or arranging to have media there. (A note: obviously, “Author Holding Reading at Restaurant” is not news-worthy so think about ways to make your event newsworthy; for my book on reality shows, I got different people from those reality shows to come and everyone down to People magazine covered it.)
If you’re holding the event somewhere other than a bookstore, you’re going to have to, of course, arrange for your book to be sold there. While there are mobile services, usually local bookstores, who will send an employee to an event to sell books (and thus count those sales for bestseller lists), they usually won’t do that unless the event is massive (so they can justify paying an employee for the trip). It’s far easier for you to order author copies from Amazon or from a printer and just sell them yourself (or get a friend to set up a table and sell them).
RELATED EPISODES
How Do I Throw a Book Launch Party?
10 Free Ways to Promote a Book
How Can I Use Social Media to Promote My Book?
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
December 15, 2021
Should I Create Swag for My Book?
Swag can be tempting. It’s fun to make.
I’ve also wasted more money than I can even imagine on it. Part of the problem is that I get an idea and start having t shirts and other stuff designed before I’ve even thought the concept through. And part of the problem is that I don’t really know what to do with it. I can’t sell it, really; it’s promoting my book, after all. So am I giving it away? If so, to who? And why? What is this going to do? If I want to throw money at a launch, why not do it with something that will have a better chance of paying off?
I don’t have answers to those questions which is why I have a garage full of swag in my garage.
My Party Girl Swag
With Party Girl, I really thought I had the answer. I would create REFORMED PARTY GIRL shorts, pens and stickers and send them to the sober “influencers” that I knew. Each goodie box was painstakingly created with tissue paper in my company color’s theme and specialty boxes with my company’s logo on it.
What happened? Nothing.
Most of the people I sent them to didn’t even respond. Some, when I followed up, just said, “Oh yeah, thanks!” One very sweetly did an Instagram post about it. Why didn’t the others? No clue. Maybe bootie shorts aren’t as desired a commodity as I think they are. One good thing that happened with that expense, however, is I reached out to My 12-Step Store about selling them and they’re interested.
Still, when I did book signings at the Dry Society Gala and Voices events, in Reno and Vegas respectively, I had the REFORMED PARTY GIRL stickers and pens with me and people went crazy for them. Did they use them? No idea.
My Make Your Mess Your Memoir Swag
For Make Your Mess Your Memoir, I had bookmarks made that had the book cover on one side and then the chapter format for writing a “biz oir” on the back. I got the idea from Cameron Herold when he was on my podcast. Again, not sure of the impact that made but it wasn’t pricey.
I also had “I’m making my mess my memoir” thumb drives made. People seemed to like those. Maybe the moral is that the swag should have a practical use? Don’t know.
BTW, Vistaprint offers all sorts of things you can make that it would never occur to you to make (and arguably it shouldn’t). But because VistaPrint is really good at offering you something that could be really cool right when you’re hitting the shopping cart, I ended up with Party Girl pillows and coasters that I like but probably won’t ever use.
My Falling for Me Swag
Back when I was on TV regularly, and thus had a far more active “fan base” than I do now (and that fan base was 99.9% male, seeing as my main gig was as a sex and dating expert on Attack of the Show), I had postcards made up of all the different activities I embraced and wrote about in Falling For Me and had them sent out to anyone who bought the book in the first week. Cheaper than anything else I did and arguably more effective.
Cool Stuff Other Authors Have Done
For the sequel to Rachel’s Holiday, Marian Keyes’ publisher had special books made with a sprayed edge. Not swag but special and cool!
Marie Forleo had computer wallpaper made for her book, which is completely genius because it’s digital and free for her and makes anyone who downloads it think of her book regularly.
I still remember reading about how the people who worked at Random House when they were getting ready to lunch Curtis Sittenfeld’s Prep had special green belts sent out to media to match the pink and green belt on the book’s cover (I remember this because I was bitter my publisher wouldn’t even lift a phone, let alone have a belt made, to support my book!) Alas, I just tried googling the article that mentioned this great gift Sittenfeld got and it’s been lost in thee Google machine.
Ridiculous Swag Ideas
The New Yorker finds the whole book swag thing so silly that they did a humor piece about it!
Knopf did some swag for a posthumous release of Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar but, like, are there people who would wear a Bell Jar shirt??
Finally, here’s a round-up of some cool book swag ideas.
RELATED EPISODES
Cameron Herold on Generating Free PR and Creating a Vivid Vision for Your Book
What I Learned From the Party Girl Re-Launch
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
QUOTE OF THE EPISODE:
"The moral of the story is make swag that people will actually use."
December 8, 2021
What Makes a Great Book Cover?
What Makes a Great Book Cover?
Start with the Basics
Ask yourself which fonts and colors you like and find examples of covers you like; the best place to start is www.bookcoverarchive.com, where you can see famous book covers and nail down ideas. You can also go to the bookstore and look at where your book would be; see what's there and why certain books catch your eye.
Your cover has to go with your genre and feel of your book is. In other words, even though you might love pink and floral and it looks so beautiful and whimsical, if you're writing this deep, dark book, it's not going to work.
Of course, make it original. It’s really easy to make covers that look like everything else but having something that's really distinguished is going to be important because that's what people are going to gravitate to.
What Else to Think About
You also need your cover has to match your story and communicate clearly what your book title is about while also standing out from other books like it
Don’t make it too weird; think KISS: KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID.
Don’t make it too crowded. A lot of times where you'll have people will want their blurbs, a long subtitle and extra visuals. But if the cover gets really busy, it takes away from what you're actually trying to accomplish, which is having people be attracted to your book!
Fonts and Colors
Make sure your font is not too small so people can actually read it when it’s postage stamp size on Amazon but also make sure it’s not big and wild—like a loopy font where it’s really stretched out because then people can’t even read it
Make sure your font color works on your background color—don’t have a cream font on a light pink background; you want something that pops and you can see it clearly
If you’re going to have images, choose elements from your story as images (as opposed to doing that in the title)
Get the Right Kind of Feedback
Once you have it, give it to a few select people for feedback; we had a client whose mother-in-law had a pretty hilarious response which caused us to switch an image on the cover but we’ve also had clients who have asked everyone and their mother for feedback and gotten so twisted by not listening to themselves and us that it’s caused no end of revisions.
Though it’s tempting, don’t ask people on social media to vote. Study after study shows that what people say they like is different than what they buy and people get really influenced by what previous commenters say. If you’re going to do A/B testing on social media, you can do what Tim Ferriss and James Altucher did and create different websites and run ads to them to see which people click on more.
Other Things to Consider
You can be on your cover if it makes sense but most people who aren’t famous aren’t on their book cover.
Remember, you’re the boss so don’t let a designer go too into their own vision (many times your designer won’t have read the book) but DO listen to experts who can tell you what they think works.
On that note, don’t be too attached to your ideas; we see visuals that are really beautiful and they call to us but they're not great for marketing. We’ve had clients who really loved images artists had created and though they weren’t right for the book cover, they got so attached to what they thought their book should be before they came to us that they stuck with that lesser cover.
My Re-Launch of Party Girl
For my re-launch of Party Girl, I decided I wanted a cover that would really take advantage of the current trend of beautiful, bright, Instagram-worthy letters but also be completely original. So I sent my designer images of covers I loved, both ones I snapped in bookstores and ones I took from online—and it’s my favorite cover I ever had. It was also the first time I went in with a really clear vision of what I wanted—but was also open to partnering with my designer to get his take on my vision.
RELATED EPISODES
A Play-by-Play Breakdown of How James Altucher Launches a Book
A Play-by-Play Breakdown of How Tim Ferriss Launches a Book
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
December 1, 2021
I'm Now a Book Critic! Here are the 5 Books I Recommended
Yours truly has become a book critic.
Well, sort of. She—meaning I—is/am now recommending my five favorite books of the month every month on KATU TV in Portland. And I’ll be releasing each of the segments as a podcast episode. Is it because I’m hurting for content? Possibly! But it’s also because I want you to see—and hear—what’s possible when you’re an author.
Yes, sometimes they’ll let you go on TV to recommend other books. So enjoy this mini episode (and especially enjoy hearing me call the Emmy award-winning host by the wrong name).
Here's a breakdown of the books:
No Filter: The Inside Story of Instagram by Sarah Frier
A thorough examination of the creation of the social media platform that has come to take over many people’s lives, this comprehensive page-turner shows how an app created in 2010 came to be purchased by Mark Zuckerberg in less than two years for a billion dollars—and then the power struggles that ensued from there. The author, who’s a reporter for Bloomberg News, where she reports regularly on Facebook, Instagram and the other social media platforms, has earned awards and come to be considered an expert on the whole social media game. The book caused a bit of a sensation when it came out because it delved into Zuckerberg’s obsession with controlling Instagram, despite having assured the creators that they could have independence, just at a time when Facebook’s PR was getting worse and worse.
If You Lived Here, You’d Be Famous By Now: True Stories From Calabasas by Via Bleidner
Written by a 21-year-old and published by a major publisher, this book is basically the female, modern-day version of Fast Times at Ridgemont High if Fast Times was immersed in Kardashian culture. The author is wise beyond her years, painting a hilarious story that manages to cover adolescence in a way adults will find entertaining and illuminative. The most amazing part about it isn’t its wisdom or humor but the fact that the author is so witty and positive that the plastic culture she describes doesn’t seem tragic…just oddly real.
Book Wars: The Digital Revolution in Publishing by John B. Thompson
Covering the recent history of an industry that has undergone a more rapid transformation in the past decade than it had in multiple decades before, this is a decidedly intellectual book by a British author that manages to be incredibly approachable and actually something of a page-turner. It’s clear this author has done his research and is particularly compelling while doing a meticulous breakdown of why companies that seemed to be on the cutting edge of capitalizing on the emergence of ebooks failed. (In short: no one could predict where the ebook market was going; people originally thought entrepreneurs would be the big ebook readers; turns out it’s the romance crowd because they love to devour series books and besides, romance books aren’t necessarily ones you’re proud to put on your shelf!)
Traction by Gino Wickman
This isn’t a new book but it is one of the clearest explanations of how to grow a business that I’ve read in a while. It focuses on six components a business needs to be profitable—Vision, Data, Process, Traction, Issues and People—and gives tips like keeping scorecards for every week, accountability charts for team members, issues lists and process documents. It also stresses the importance of having Rocks—otherwise known as 90-day goals. There are charts, questions to answer, worksheets and examples aplenty. It also emphasizes the importance of creating company core values so that everyone you hire and every decision you make can be weighed by whether or not they fit them.
My Addiction and Recovery: Just Because You’re Done With Drugs Doesn’t Mean Drugs Are Done with You by Ed Kressy
Don’t let the kind of basic title or cover of this one fool you. My Addiction and Recovery is one of the most sophisticated, original, gripping recovery memoirs out there. A first-person account of how a man from an upper-middle-class family descended into meth addiction, this is one of the most riveting accounts of addiction I’ve come across. While describing the paranoid delusions he had that he was being tracked by the FBI because he had played a part in 9-11, Kressy introduces himself as a new voice to the Quit Lit movement. His story is one of going to a place that few survive and even fewer document. Even if you think you’ve read and seen it all, I guarantee you’ll find yourself as shocked by Kressy’s story as you are moved by his writing.
To see the segment, click here. Otherwise, just give this a listen.
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
November 24, 2021
Brianne Davis on Launching a Book on Sex and Love Addiction
Brianne Davis is a gorgeous, successful actress—i.e., NOT the sort of person you’d think would launch a roman a clef about sex and love addiction. But do that she did and Secret Life of a Hollywood Sex and Love Addict came out in 2020 (for anyone who read it and is clamoring for more, have no fear; it’s the first in a series of four).
For someone who’s dyslexic and never thought she’d write a book, Davis pulled the launch off with serious panache—writing articles for huge publications, booking hundreds of interviews, landing big celebrities for blurbs, getting the book in libraries, entering the TikTok universe and so much more.
While she admits that the fact that she’s a “name” helped her, she’s also full of tips for anyone launching a book (spoiler alert: it requires a whole lot of hustle).
Listen in on our chat about why she wrote a novel and not a memoir, the rationale behind her two different covers and how the book launched her massive coaching business and speaking career, among so much more.
RELATED EPISODES
Erika Schickel on How Friends Make Your Launch
What to Do 60 Days, 30 Days and 7 Days Before Your Launch
Sarah Alaimo on Going From "I Can't Write a Book" to Launching Her Book
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
November 17, 2021
The Jeff Garlin Book Soup Event!
You know who Jeff Garlin is. If not, allow me to explain that he’s on one of the most popular current shows (The Goldbergs) as well as what’s widely considered the best TV show of all: Curb Your Enthusiasm. And, while this isn’t QUITE as remarkable, he’s also been on the podcast before.
So why is he back? Because Book Soup hosted us for a virtual event to promote my re-launch of Party Girl, where we had a hilarious chat about how we met, why traditional publishing sucks and so much more. Because so many people told me they wanted to attend but couldn’t, Book Soup gave me permission to release a recording as a podcast! Enjoy the party in this week’s episode.
RELATED EPISODES
What I Learned From the Party Girl Re-Launch
How Do I Get My Book Made Into a Movie?
Should I Give Up on Traditional Publishing?
Jeff Garlin on the Difference Between Selling a Book to a Publisher and Selling a Book to Readers
How Do I Throw a Book Launch Party?
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
November 10, 2021
Ashlea Hearn on Getting Books in Stores and Finding a Mentor
Ashlea Hearn is not only a 1st Lieutenant in the Army Reserves but also the author of Genesis Mortalis, Book 1 of the Take It Trilogy.
We met when she reached out to me about the upcoming release of that book. But here's what's relevant: by that point, I had noticed this lovely person named Ashlea Hearn reviewing me wherever she could—different books, this podcast, on Google...everywhere. But here's what I really noticed: she wasn't just slapping a review up there in order to "do the right thing" but crafting thoughtful, in-depth analysis that showed she really had taken in and appreciated the work. (Her review of Party Girl still comes up as "Most Relevant," which is Amazon speak for "the most thoughtful one.")
Because of all this, not only was I delighted to speak to her about her book but when she declared me her "mentor," I happily took on the role. And it's been nothing but rewarding as I've watched her jump into life and authorhood with enthusiasm and gumption. Then, like the amazing mentee she is, she flew out for a book party I had for one of my clients and made so many friends that when I showed up for breakfast the next morning to meet some, she was there!
So that's our back story. Here's her back story.
She started writing as a little girl because it was a fascinating escape from what she considered to be a mundane life of a girl from the Midwest.
At an early age, she fell in love with the suaveness of James Bond, the action of Mission: Impossible, the gore and badassery of Kill Bill: Volume 1 and the relatable female characters of Totally Spies!—all of which influenced the Take It book series.
Listen in on this chat between a mentee and a thoroughly delighted mentor!
Find Ashlea here:
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
November 3, 2021
Brian Meeks on How NFTs Fit Into the Writing World
Brian D. Meeks writes under his name and the pen name Arthur Byrne. He’s currently working on his 20th novel and has six non-fiction titles, including Mastering Amazon Descriptions: An Author’s Guide. Additionally, he has a thriving author copywriting business.
His digital art began 17-years ago, when he was building corporate spaces in the virtual world of Second Life.
Now, he’s turning that contemporary art passion into a new brand by creating daily NFTs.
In this episode, we talked about how his NFT project has inspired him to love writing again, why he writes some of his books on Facebook and how we can all start selling our writing as NFTs on bitclout, among many other topics (he's what's known in the talking world as a "digressor").
RELATED EPISODES
How Can I Use Social Media to Promote a Book?
How Did Alex Strathdee Get 40,000 Students to Read His Book?
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October 27, 2021
Ed Kressy on Meth Psychosis and Landing Big Blurb-ers
Ed Kressy is not your average human.
He's much sweeter than your average human and his sweetness emanates from him.
He also has a much crazier story than your average addict with a crazy story...and this is coming from someone who's heard every crazy addiction story over the past two decades.
The short version: he went into a meth-induced psychosis for 14 years that left him convinced he was involved in 9/11. The longer version is in his memoir, My Addiction & Recovery: Just Because You're Done With Drugs Doesn't Mean Drugs Are Done With You, which you can get here.
He is one of the most exquisitely talented writers I've come across in a long time—something I found, and tell him in this episode, surprising. I've read almost every book out there about addiction and recovery and few are as brilliantly crafted as this. Please get this book. Not only will you be exposed to some of the best writing around but all proceeds are being donated to prisons.
And that relationship with prisons, for those here for the marketing tidbits, is how Ed was able to get the great Seth Godin to blurb his book.
In this episode, we get into Ed's crazy story, how many drafts he wrote of this book (you don't want to know) and his mission to get the book into every prison he can (so far, it has been accepted by 108 facilities in nine states, serving an estimated 132,000 incarcerated people). Listen in to find out more about the guy whose recovery-related work has appeared in the Washington Post and who's delivered criminal justice-themed talks for groups at Amazon, Cisco, Google, LinkedIn and MIT.
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QUOTE OF THE EPISODE:
"Ed Kressy has a much crazier story than your average addict with a crazy story...and this is coming from someone who's heard every crazy addiction story over the past two decades."
