Thinking about self publishing and don't know where to start? Join the SPA Girls each week for 30 minutes of honest advice, tips and resources.
This week we had as our guest the lovely Melissa Storm, who runs several author businesses, and is also a very successful indie author in her own right. Along with her training courses through the Author Engine, and editing, marketing and formatting services through Novel Publicity, Melissa also runs LitRing, an author promotions company that helps authors connect with readers. This year, through LitRing, she created a survey that asked readers about the books they were reading, what they wanted to see from authors, and whether they read mostly free or paid books, among other questions. With an extensive background in research and in particular survey creation, Melissa was well served to design, implement and analyse the data from over 10,000 readers, making it quite possibly the largest survey conducted by an independent author. She talks to us about the insights we can take away from this amazing survey!
Fiction strategist and owner of FFS Media, Claire Taylor publishes her fiction through her company, under four pennames. She also helps authors through her Story Alignment and Author Alignment services, as well as her masterclasses and non-fiction for authors.
An Advanced Certified Instructor through the Enneagram Spectrum Method, as well as an Accredited Practitioner of the Integrative Enneagram (iEQ9), Claire uses the Enneagram framework to help authors create stories that stand out and careers they love.
Today we'll learn just what an Enneagram is and how it can affect us.
Procrastination takes many forms for writers, and it holds us back from writing, publishing and promoting our work. We discuss how to get out of your own way with our guest today, Kathryn Burnett. Kathryn is an award-winning screenwriter, playwright, author and writing coach who has worked in the television/film/arts industry for over 25 years.
“It's never been easier to put your work into the world and yet many writers don’t write as productively as they'd like to. They have the best intentions in the world but find themselves distracted, anxious about their work and deeply unsatisfied with their progress.” Kathryn Burnett
Kathryn offers practical tips for us all to:
✔️ Identify the red flags of perfectionism
✔️ Uncover how you are procrastinating and then how to deal with this
✔️ Why self-reflection is so important - ask yourself “Why am I not prioritizing my writing at the moment?”
Kathryn Burnett has been a working writer for over 25 years and truly understand the challenges that come with creative work. When she’s not writing, she runs craft workshops and programmes under the Beginner’s Guide Writing Workshops umbrella – and facilitate an awesome subscription-based group called The Writing Room.
Sign up to her newsletterfor regular insights, tips and workshop updates at www.kathryn-burnett.com
💗 The SPA Girls podcast is sponsored by everyone who supports us on Patreon. Thank you so much, we love our listeners and our patrons!
⭐ Join us at the $10 tier, and you'll be invited to our private Self-Publishing Mastermind group for authors, where we discuss all things self-publishing, marketing and writing PLUS answer all your burning questions.
⭐ Get personal online coaching with the SPA Girls each month through our $100 tier. Spots for this are strictly limited and on a first-come-first-served basis.
Creating and running Facebook ads has got a lot easier! Wondering how to delve into facebook advertising or had poor experiences in the past and wondering where you went wrong? This episode is for you!
We’re joined by Senior Marketing Manager of Written Word Media, Clayton Noblit, who’s an expert in getting authors books in front of the right readers through advertising and promotion.
Clayton generously shares his top tips for getting your ads working well, and takes us through setting up your first facebook ads, the campaign structure, as well as the best targeting, budget and ad creative tips for beginners.
We then discuss Promo Stacking, which is broadly defined as “a lot of marketing tactics conducted over a short period of time to increase your books' rank and get more sales”.
And finally, Clayton covers off some key insights from WWM’s Author Survey 2023 results: specifically around AI and Direct Sales.
Clayton Noblit is a senior marketing manager at Written Word Media. He is passionate about helping authors find their readers and finding ways to sell more books. When he’s not helping authors, he enjoys spending time with his family, playing sports, and making beverages.
💗 The SPA Girls podcast is sponsored by everyone who supports us on Patreon. Thank you so much, we love our listeners and our patrons!
⭐ Join us at the $10 tier, and you'll be invited to our private Self-Publishing Mastermind group for authors, where we discuss all things self-publishing, marketing and writing PLUS answer all your burning questions.
⭐ Get personal online coaching with the SPA Girls each month through our $100 tier. Spots for this are strictly limited and on a first-come-first-served basis.
Ever hesitate over making an important decision because you were trying to figure out what the 'right' thing to do was... and then miss out on an awesome opportunity because you didn't take a leap of faith? Yeah, us too. That's why this episode is all about making good decisions in your author career.
In fact, we're not only advocating making decisions and moving forward, we're also suggesting that a FAST decision is even better than an average speed decision. Research has shown that fast decisions are often higher quality, perhaps proving that our subconscious brain can move faster than our conscious brain... or maybe it's just our intuition is more capable than our overthinking brain? Whatever the reason, it's a powerful reminder that we know more than we think we know...
In this episode you'll learn some ideas and techniques on how to assess decisions, learn when to make fast decisions and hear about some of the decisions we did and didn't make in our careers and what we learned from them.
Today we’re interviewing Dan Wood, Chief Operating Officer at Draft2Digital, one of the best known distributors for eBooks, print and audio books.
We last spoke to Dan in 2019 and a lot has happened since then!
D2D has not only merged with Smashwords to make their reach stronger, they build tools and services that let you focus on writing while they take care of layout, publishing, distribution, print-on-demand paperbacks, and more.
If you’re a new author or simply want to level up and expand, Dan has lots of tips to help you, including promotional opportunities and Books2Read, an author promotions powerhouse that includes New Release Notifications, Universal Book Links (UBLs), B2R Author Pages, B2R Book Tabs, and so much more!
Heather Hildenbrand is a bestselling author and business coach for creatives. This episode she demystifies how our results are determined by our beliefs first, and our efforts, second.
Listen up for amazing (and do-able!) mindset tips for authors and how to overcome our blocks with less woo and more “do”!
About Heather:
Heather Hildenbrand was born and raised in a small town in northern Virginia where she was homeschooled through high school, and says she's only slightly socially awkward as a result.
She’s an award winning author who has written more than 50 paranormal, urban fantasy, science fiction and contemporary romance novels, and in 2016, her Imitation series was purchased by Warner Bros and optioned for TV by Jerry Bruckheimer studios.
Heather also offers business and life coaching to authors and other creatives to create more abundance and attract the life & business they desire. A certified life coach, Reiki master, and public speaker Heather helps authors understand how to better attract their desires AND heal their wounds in the process.
💗 The SPA Girls podcast is sponsored by everyone who supports us on Patreon. Thank you so much, we love our listeners and our patrons!
⭐ Join us at the $10 tier, and you'll be invited to our private Self-Publishing Mastermind group for authors, where we discuss all things self-publishing, marketing and writing PLUS answer all your burning questions.
⭐ Get personal online coaching with the SPA Girls each month through our $100 tier. Spots for this are strictly limited and on a first-come-first-served basis.
In this episode we chat to YA Fantasy author Katie Cross. She has so much passion and enthusiasm for what she does, and loves her readers! We talk about direct sales and how to relate to your readers, and these are just two of the topics we covered. Sit down with your favorite beverage and enjoy because it's action packed and full of information!
We first interviewed Katie back in 2017. Then she talked about a military wife, and learning to be a nap-time authorpreneur, and making every moment count. This was another informative podcast and well worth a listen! Link below ⬇️ ⬇️ ⬇️ ⬇️
💗The SPA Girls podcast is sponsored by everyone who supports us on Patreon. Thank you so much, we love our listeners and our patrons!
⭐ Join us at the $10 tier, and you’ll be invited to our private Self-Publishing Mastermind group for authors, where we discuss all things self-publishing, marketing and writing PLUS answer all your questions. Come on in and join us, we’d love to see you there!
You are your own publishing house when you self-publish. There’s lots to do, and lots to think about, especially the first few times you publish a book.
That’s why we’ve created this helpful, back-to-basics SPA Girls Podcast episode – to help you go from rough manuscript to published book, with our notes on what you need to plan for and schedule, and how to figure out what you’re going to need to actually do to get your book published on all the platforms.
We haven’t given a specific order for these tasks to be done in – we know too many successful authors who get different aspects of the checklist done at different times. There are also tasks that can be finished quickly and others that will take time. The important thing is to know what you need to do, to work out a schedule that suits you and your life, and then to actually do the tasks!
To help out, we’ve also created a handy checklist for you to download; just click the links to find it, or head to the show notes for the episode on our website!
💗 The SPA Girls podcast is sponsored by everyone who supports us on Patreon. Thank you so much, we love our listeners and our patrons!
⭐ Join us at the $10 tier, and you'll be invited to our private Self-Publishing Mastermind group for authors, where we discuss all things self-publishing, marketing and writing PLUS answer all your burning questions.
⭐ Get personal online coaching with the SPA Girls each month through our $100 tier. Spots for this are strictly limited and on a first-come-first-served basis.
This episode, we’re joined again by the effervescent Kathleen Sweeney from Bookbrush. Book Brush is a platform where authors can easily create their own professional-looking ads and marketing images for social media.
Kathleen is going to update us on best practices, new additions to Book Brush software and added service options that can save authors time and stress producing graphics.
Kathleen’s kindly given us a coupon code for listeners that gives you 15% off a single author plan. Visit bookbrush.com and use SPA15
Bio: Kathleen Sweeney is the Customer Service Manager & Marketing Lead at Book Brush. She loves creating images. She brings over 20 years of client service experience, business assurance, strategy and problem solving to Book Brush.
💗 The SPA Girls podcast is sponsored by everyone who supports us on Patreon. Thank you so much, we love our listeners and our patrons!
⭐ Join us at the $10 tier, and you'll be invited to our private Self-Publishing Mastermind group for authors, where we discuss all things self-publishing, marketing and writing PLUS answer all your burning questions.
⭐ Get personal online coaching with the SPA Girls each month through our $100 tier. Spots for this are strictly limited and on a first-come-first-served basis.
Inspired by Dr Michael Moseley’s JUST ONE THING (https://michaelmosley.co.uk/ ) we use his framework to give practical tips for uncomplicating your writing and author business life.
Keep It Simple
Be Realistic
Create A Trigger
Know Your Why
Stick With It For At Least A Month
Try To Replace Bad Habits With Good Ones
Try To Do It Daily
Involve A Friend Or Loved One
Be Kind To Yourself
Keep A Record
Dr Michael Mosley is a No. 1 international bestselling author and journalist. He trained as a doctor at the Royal Free Hospital in London before joining the BBC, where he spent three decades as a science journalist and executive producer.
💗 The SPA Girls podcast is sponsored by everyone who supports us on Patreon. Thank you so much, we love our listeners and our patrons!
⭐ Join us at the $10 tier, and you'll be invited to our private Self-Publishing Mastermind group for authors, where we discuss all things self-publishing, marketing and writing PLUS answer all your burning questions.
⭐ Get personal online coaching with the SPA Girls each month through our $100 tier. Spots for this are strictly limited and on a first-come-first-served basis.
