S01E49: When We Hack Our Author Hang Ups

Samantha and Matilda lean into hyping themselves up... using some incredibly creative methods!

Next week, Sam and Matilda will start a new series on How to Believe in Yourself with an episode on luck, preparation and opportunity.

Where to find Sam and Matilda:

SAM IG: @sammowrimo

Website: www.samantha-cummings.com

Book to start with: Curse of the Wild (Moons & Magic Book 1) https://amzn.eu/d/3QHym3m

Most recent book: Heart of the Wolf (Moons & Magic Book 2) https://amzn.eu/d/4HecH3a

MATILDA IG: @matildaswiftauthor

Website: MatildaSwift.com

Book to start with: https://books2read.com/TheSlayoftheLand (book #1 of The Heathervale Mysteries)

Most recent book: https://books2read.com/ButterLatethanNever (book #3 of The Slippery Spoon Mysteries)

Mentioned on the show:

Pickled Walnuts: https://www.bennettopie.com/products/opies-pickled-walnuts 

Transcript:

Welcome to your next step of the Self Publishing Mountain.

I'm Matilda Swift, author of Quintessentially British Cozy Mysteries.

And I'm Samantha Cummings, author of Young Adult Books about Magic, Myths and Monsters.

I've written the books, changed their covers, tweaked their blurbs, tried tools from a dozen ad courses, and I'm still not seeing success.

Now, we're working together to plot and plan our way from barely making ends meet to pulling in a living wage.

Join us on our journey where we'll be mastering the pen to snag that paycheck.

Hello, and welcome to Pen to Paycheck Authors podcast.

I'm Samantha Cummings, here with my co-host, Matilda Swift, and we're here to write our way to financial success.

We're two indie authors with over a dozen books between us and still a long way to go towards the quit the day job dream.

If that sounds familiar, listen along for our mastery through Mis Steps Journey.

Each week, we cover a topic to help along the way, and this week's topic is hyping yourself.

But before we get into that, what are your whims and whinges of the week?

I sort of don't know.

I feel like many, many, I feel like my life is very intense right now.

It's what you say every week.

I feel like it's coming towards Christmas.

I know.

Yeah, but next week it will be calmer.

Yeah, there's a lot going on, and it just feels like lots of it is good, and lots of it is bad.

And, you know, just lots is my life right now.

I've had to pick specific things, which I do because we do every week in the podcast.

My whinge would be that I am annoyed at myself for procrastinating.

But I'm really trying to come to terms with the fact that like that is my process.

I'm someone who does not like to work when they have time to spare, and because I could be doing other things.

And if I, and this is specific in terms of my writing right now, I'm procrastinating because I should be writing more, but I know I've actually got enough space in my schedule because it's coming up to Christmas.

I've got time off and I'll have a bit of a relaxed schedule when I'm not working to catch up.

So I'm sort of letting myself off the hook.

But it's meaning that I'm doing other things.

So sort of a whinge, but also I'm just trying to be more accepting of that.

I've just like I'm a person who does not like to write when I'm not under a hard deadline.

And my win is like sort of everything.

Look, I feel like I'm really changing my interaction with other people in a really positive way.

I've had a lot more interactions with authors recently in ways that I felt very productive and fantastic.

And even though we, for example, missed our monthly meeting yesterday, such yesterday, yeah, because of the horrible storm counting the trains.

We sort of we kept on it and we did like a Zoom version or an online version.

And I sort of still felt like that is such a central part to my life now about like time when we talk together and talk about our careers.

It just felt fundamentally so different to where we were at a year ago when I've really been able to appreciate that now.

We're coming up on the year mark.

I just feel so engaged with a lot of authors and with my writing career, much more than normal and that feels like a big non-specific win.

But that is my big like where my head is at this week.

How about you?

That's a good win.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think my wind is that we couldn't do our meet up yesterday because of the storm, which is kind of I'm kind of one of those people that's like, it's just a storm, big deal.

And then I'm seeing videos and I'm like, yeah, it's a pretty bad storm.

But it did suck that most of the trains that were going out of where I live and coming back were just so like hit and miss.

So we couldn't see each other face to face, which I always look forward to.

But I'm glad we did our own online thing because we had such a big talk yesterday.

That was good.

But my general wins are that I was on holiday last week and had a lovely time relaxing whilst also working.

So I did do like working mornings.

I worked from like nine ish to 12, doing writing and editing stuff.

So it kind of felt like I was living the author life.

I was just doing the stuff and making progress even though I was taking a break.

And that always feels nice because I feel like I'm living, that's my best self when I don't have to go to an office.

And I can just do things on my own time.

And I also drank a lot of mulled wine, so that was great.

And I also this weekend made some big steps in planning for next year.

So I put my 2025 calendar on the wall.

And it's been sat in its box for about a month or two.

And I've been waiting for the inspiration to think like, this is it.

So I put my calendar on the wall.

I have been thinking about when I'm gonna put my pre-orders up on Amazon and tweaking synopses and emailing my cover designer and my editor and my formatter.

They all got emails this weekend about next year.

And I feel like, whoa, that's insane for me.

Yeah, I emailed them with a warning like, this is really me.

You're not getting scammed.

I'm actually being organized.

Low and behold, miracles do happen and only at Christmas.

So I'm not gonna, yeah, no other whinges.

I just feel like I, like you, I feel like I'm building up speed in a way that feels nice.

I wish I was going faster in some ways, but I do feel like if I was going too fast, I would spin out of control.

Okay, that is a good reasonable position to be in.

And sort of connected to the topic of today, feeling like full and full of energy and, you know, pumped up because we're talking about hyping yourself, which is far easier said than done.

How are we helping ourselves?

What are we doing?

Yeah, so we had a big talk about this yesterday.

We were going to record a podcast yesterday, but we had talked so much about it, we kind of needed to step back and we moved the podcast recording to today, which is the day after.

And it's so funny because I always feel like I'm constantly harping on and on about the same thing, which is if I didn't have you to talk to and we weren't doing this, I would never figure these things out by myself.

So when you try and hype yourself up, you have to really confront your insecurities.

And what we talked about yesterday, we really kind of dredged up our insecurities.

I didn't even realize that my insecurities were so...

I was in full fair possession.

Yeah, they all came up.

I was very surprised at how I had been holding myself back.

And it was only from having that conversation with you yesterday about not feeling good enough and not feeling smart enough.

And I'm sure everyone thinks this when they're writing books, because people are going to have to read what you have imagined.

But I really feel like I have been holding myself back because of that.

And I've been too scared to lean into certain messaging when it comes to advertisements and social media posts.

And even just talking to people, like other writers, about what I'm doing, I've never felt like I was the right person to have particular conversations.

And so that's kind of like that that realization really came to a point yesterday that I that that was that I was really holding myself back.

And today, because I've been mulling over it like overnight, and all of today, I've been sat at work kind of half my mind on my actual work and half my mind on, you know, my heart's work.

And I feel like I'm shifting into feeling more positive and secure in my own talent and ambition.

That hyping myself up going forward isn't going to feel so bad.

So before I kind of talk about more of that, how do you feel about hyping?

Yeah, so I think when we picked this topic, it seemed like a really black and white thing, right?

Like we have, we thought we talk about this quite often.

Like we follow a lot of other authors when we come together, we spend a lot of time looking at other authors and then kind of looking at their social media strategies or looking at their kind of any place where they talk about themselves and trying to figure out how are they doing that?

What are they doing?

And we look at those and so often our response is just like, how are they so confident about themselves?

How are they just like talking about themselves as if they really have written the best book ever?

And so we were like, well, why don't we just like work on a bit of hyping ourselves up together?

And it's maybe easier to do for somebody else.

So let's meet up face to face and, and we'll figure out what in each other's work is a thing that we can really be pushing.

And, and actually yesterday session was pre emptied by during the day we had both sent each other some templates of our Canva documents for our social media posts.

And we realize that we both secretly thought about each other's like, Oh, gosh, I can't believe I sent that is such trash compared to yours.

And we both like, Oh, God, I'm just terrible compared to to you.

And we both thought that's obviously not true.

But it's like, so our automatic thoughts to think, gosh, that person is so much better than me, and they deserve to have positive outcomes, and I deserve to just be sat here ignored.

So we already had that kind of revelation during the day of like, we were both in a place where it wasn't maybe easy to see for ourselves, like where we're at, or think positive about ourselves.

And then we came to the conversation about hyping ourselves, I think we both realized that like, I don't know how to do it.

Like, I don't know what I should do to hype myself up, or even how I would hype somebody else up.

And what and this was it was such a therapy session, like, I feel like this is one that we did not need to record yesterday.

It's just like, it was really us talking about why, you know, just why we were unloved enough as children, really deep things like who wronged us in like which teacher made us feel unconfident.

And like a lot of that was really helpful to, to just have it to articulate, like I always think there's such a benefit to articulating things.

It's when they're sort of shadowy and in the back of your mind that they have so much power when you say them out loud, like, Oh, actually, that's nice, I can deal with that.

Like, that's, that's something that I in my head, it was like a big shadowy scary thing.

And when I say out loud, I was like, I can handle that.

So yeah, we talked around the topics a lot and around the topic of like, why can't we hype ourselves up?

Like, I work really hard on my books, I've read other people's books, I think the writing is not as good, or I can see how some people would like them less than my books, if they're this sort of person.

And just everything felt very hedged of just like, I'm really trying my best, and I think this works, and I'm doing this, and I hope it's okay.

And, and really, that feels authentic.

And that is where we came to yesterday, it was like a lot of our conversation was around authenticity.

But I am just not someone who can hype myself up because I can't sell anything at all, unless I believe in it authentically.

Like I've done a lot of sales jobs.

And the only way for me to feel comfortable doing it is to authentically have to believe in something.

So I can sell you anything at all, if I think it is going to improve your life.

So Sam, you had a great example yesterday.

Do you want to talk us through the thing that I think it was so crystal, so crystallized, what we were talking about and like what we were thinking around authenticity?

Do we not talk about, can you tell us about it or do you want me to fill in the gaps?

No, I have no recollection.

It was once your weird food, that you would sell without reservation.

Oh yes, okay.

This was a great conversation to have off air, and now I'll bring it on air.

So, we are both very food-oriented people.

I think a lot of people are.

But just in general, I think a fun thing to think is, think of the one weird food that you love so much that you tried to make all of your friends and family try.

And think of the absolute passion that you put into the speech where you try and get somebody to just have one bite.

You'll love it too.

You'll love it as much as I love it.

I'm sure of it.

And even if they don't, the satisfaction of them even just trying it is so good.

And then it's just, and I have had this conversation so many times.

Me and my family are obsessed with something called pickled walnuts.

I'm a pickle person and I could talk about them for hours.

And everyone that I meet, and me and my, all my family are the same.

We're constantly trying to get people to try pickled walnuts.

Like it's as if we have some sort of share in the company.

You would think that we were involved because we are all so obsessed.

And I think that if you put that much passion into your book sales, then you should be doing that.

Because you created something that you love, you should be trying to sell it to everybody who you think will love it.

If you love pickles, you'll love this.

If you love, for me, it's like if you love things like Buffy, you'll love my book and you should just be launching yourself on people who you know, would definitely love this thing.

And even just like talking about it.

You can't fake that.

So for example, I can't sell people pickle walnuts because I've never tasted it.

I will, I promise you, talk about them enough times that I promise I will try them.

And the only thing that's holding me back is that it will be expensive to buy a whole jar of.

I will, yeah.

But for me, I'm like, I know and I trust you that I will like them, but they're a bit expensive to get a whole jar of and I think I want to wait until I've got a specific reason I need them and also maybe a lot of treat myself situation and also I'm prepared that I might genuinely not like them.

All right.

And I love pickle things.

I think I will but like, I believe you when you say they're this good.

And the thing about like how authenticity I think ties in just to book sales.

Like you couldn't bring that same passion to like squid ink spaghetti, right?

Another black kind of weird food, right?

You could if you had to run a market store selling squid ink spaghetti, you might just be there all day in the cold and the rain be like, it's spaghetti, but it's black.

Isn't it weird?

And, and, but if you had like a market store with pickled walnuts, you'd be sold out in minutes, because you're that passionate about it.

And I think you can feel really hard to figure out like, how do I how do I bring that passion to my books?

Because, like, they're no pickled walnuts.

They're not like the best word is really known has ever had.

So how do I find that passion?

And one, I think one way that it came around to it, to think about it was like, the way you sell pickle walnuts to people is different, depending on the person.

And you're also really happy to counter their problem, right?

Can't count objections.

So for example, I said, I'm not that big a fan of walnuts.

Like I think they're fine.

And I love pickle food.

So I was like, Oh, I think I would like that.

But like, I'm not a huge fan of walnuts.

You're like, they don't taste like walnuts at all.

Nothing to do with walnuts is they're just delicious by themselves.

I was like, Oh, they're really expensive.

And you're like, Yeah, but they're totally worth it.

Like it's a good treat for yourself.

And you had these great objections.

These great ways to handle objections because you genuinely think that I should try them.

And if you're pitching them to somebody else who loved walnuts, you might say, you know, if you love walnuts, and you're not going to pick on the pickle fans, these are definitely worth a try.

This will be the thing that get you into pickles.

And you know, all the facets of them, and you're approaching different people in different ways.

And that for me was such a light bulb, right?

Because we know with books, you're trying to write to market, right?

As in that's, that's a good thing that you want to say, I like people, I like human beings, and I would like them to be happy when they read my book.

I'm not trying to give them a bad experience.

So writing to market is saying, this is my little corner of the market.

And I've learned enough about it to know that my book will please these people.

But when we think about, at least when I think about writing to market, I often think too big.

Like I'm thinking in a really generic level of Cozy Mysteries.

And even when I drill down into like culinary cozies, and then we've drilled down further in our Brandon conversations to like, oh, I write like British culinary mysteries, and they're kind of quirky and villagey.

And think about the audience for that though.

I still think of like a really generic cozy mystery audience, because that's actually quite a broad, broad section of the genre.

And in my head, I just had this like, kind of generic.

And it's not like it's not true, because no, I know a lot of people on my mailing list, and I know from conversations with them, they are a certain sort of person, like they are an older reader, usually, they're usually based in the US, they tend to have, you know, really passionate about their families, they tend to be women who are very smart, but maybe didn't have jobs that challenge them intellectually.

So they really love that sort of book for that reason, like they love a mystery.

So I've got a really good sense of who they are.

But that's just, that's such a broad person.

And how do I make that person interested in my books?

And then we talked around this a lot of ways, it's like, I feel like I'm, it's like I'm trying to sell pickled walnuts by just pointing at the jar and being like, it's walnuts, but they're pickled.

You like food, try pickled walnuts.

And actually, we really have to think about like how to get specific.

And I need to break the audience down to make them more like really real people because I read Cozy Mysteries, and I'm not an older woman.

I'm not even in the US.

And I know there are male readers of Cozy Mysteries, right?

And those are sort of arbitrary ways of defining people.

But it's like, help will start to think that way.

But like, they like different parts of the books.

And that was like an absolute epiphany for me, right?

So I love mysteries, but I don't love the part of them.

Like, I'm, I'm not excited by the part of them that's kind of like, about maybe warm community feeling and families, like that's, that's nice.

And like, it's cute, but it's not the thing that I have to have.

What I absolutely have to have is like, the following a mystery.

Like that is the thing that absolutely gets me going.

So I think when I'm reading a mystery, I like the same thing as other mystery readers, but that's absolutely not true.

And I, I just, I've never figured out before that I need to find ways to appeal to really specific tastes inside a market.

And, and I, I feel like, I'm not entirely sure how to articulate this.

I think one thing to think about is, we're often talk, like people often talk about how you should, like write the best book, and then, you know, and then it will really appeal to readers, and they'll, they'll tell each other and they get on board.

And it's like, yeah, but, but what are they telling each other about?

And, and like, how are they finding you?

What are they, like, what are the things that they're finding?

How do we hook into them?

And so what I've been really trying to think about is like, trying not to think of my audience as like a monolith.

That's not just like this generic Cozy Mystery reader.

I want to figure out hooks that are more specific, because general Cozy Mystery hooks are quite broad, and they're things like, oh, it's got a good community, and it's set in a cute setting, it's got a lot of cakes, it's got a good mystery.

But if you're appealing to like someone who's very family oriented, you might want to play up like the community.

That should be the thing that you're most playing up for them.

And if you're trying to appeal to somebody who, the thing they love about mysteries is the sleuthing, you should play that up to them.

And I just had no idea of like, I just couldn't really conceive of how to meet those audiences or how to talk about the book in a way that was connecting to different sides of the same audience.

And having thought about this yesterday, like what I absolutely feel like that is key to me selling my book is figuring out like, I'm not trying to be all things to all people, even in this, you know, niche.

I'm trying to explain to you why you specifically were like this part of this book.

Like, do you like walnuts?

Try it for the walnutsiness.

Do you like pickles?

Try it for the pickliness.

Do you like weird black food?

You'll love this.

Does that, does that make sense?

Yes, it does, because I'm also going to kind of talk about fatigue that comes in, which kind of dampens like the hype that you got for yourself, is that if you're stood in a room and someone's like, okay, I'm going to let these people in, and they're going to come and have a look at the walnuts that you're selling, and you're like really geared up, and you start talking all the spiel, and everybody that comes in to the room is like, I'm allergic to nuts.

And so, like, you can be so enthusiastic, but if you're talking to the wrong people...

Or even like they're coming in and they're full, they've just eaten a meal.

Yeah, yeah.

So you know that your messaging and your enthusiasm is falling on deaf ears.

They don't care.

They are in no way ready or willing to try.

They can't see themselves doing it in the future, because people don't think, oh, I'm going to buy that book, because I'm going to read that in a few months.

Like people buy books because they lie to themselves and say, I'm going to read that next.

We all do it.

I do it every single time.

That's the next book I'm going to read.

Yeah.

But nobody buys things like, yeah, I'll get that now, because I'm going to read that.

Like, yeah, maybe next month.

So, if you can't whip up excitement immediately, then that's just going to fizzle out so fast.

And so talking to the right people is so key, just for like your own wellbeing, like your own emotional wellbeing as well, because you need to feel like you're, like the messaging that you're saying and your enthusiasm, you want it to be met by at least some reciprocal enthusiasm.

So yeah, like because of our conversation yesterday and talking about this, we both I think went away and I don't know if you actually did what I did, but I went and wrote customer profiles for different platforms, pulling out like different things that I thought.

I thought you didn't do that.

I know.

Okay, that's what I spent my night doing last night.

So I wrote, I think I did like five or six customer profiles, which focused on like the main aspects, the main selling aspects of my books.

And I am going to use those customer profiles.

I'm going to make them all fancy and stuff.

I'm going to use them in my messaging so that every time I go on to Instagram, I can think to myself, oh, I'm going to target Ashley today, because Ashley likes books that are fantasy-based and have supernatural teen romance and some sort of strange magic system.

I know she likes that, so that's what I'm going to talk about today.

And I think just having that so specific, but exciting thing that I'm like, I know that I can hit those marks, gives me that feeling of selling, like OPs need to drop me some sort of like check for how many times I'm talking about.

Yeah, so yeah, I can already, just thinking about like targeting those customers, those fake people, makes me feel excited in posting things on social media because I know who I'm trying to get to.

And it just feels, yeah, I feel...

She's maybe not like the biggest fan of books about sisters and sister bonds.

And like, you're not having to hit every single feature of your books.

You're trying to say like, yes, we really love this specific part of my book.

And I'm going to drill down and say, Ashley, this is what's going to read, excite you.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Don't worry about the rest of it.

You'll get into that, but it's got this like shining fun thing over here that you're going to love.

And it's going to turn you around.

Yeah.

So I just feel like just talking about all that yesterday and then me going away and doing that.

I have this renewed excitement for, which is always what I'm looking for, renewed excitement for social media and ads and emails and all of it.

I feel like something's slot into place in my brain, like something's cloaked.

Yeah.

So what did you...

I was just...

I was so trying to be like everything to everyone, right?

So saying like, okay, I've got this generic idea of a Cozy Mystery reader.

And then it's almost like I'd got a sort of deck of cards.

I was trying to like throw at them of like, oh, do you like culinary things?

Do you like like Small Lingus Villages?

Do you like Twisty Mystery?

Do you like baking programs?

And like, here's a load of stuff by my book.

And not thinking of just like, maybe somebody likes a specific aspect of the book.

And like, what you need to do is just very clearly try and target them with this thing.

And, and so I think I'm not at the stage yet where I want to make customer profiles, because to me, that's, that's the thing I've done at work.

And that feels very day jobby and off putting and what I wanted to do was something that would bring me enthusiasm.

So I started with a social media platform that I have not really used before, because I think it's not a big part of the traditional age range of Cozy readers, right?

So Cozy readers do tend to be older.

And so the place you target them usually is on Facebook.

But I know plenty of Cozy authors who are on TikTok, and there are many Cozy readers on TikTok.

So I thought, what I'm going to do to try and just like free myself up to explore the concept of a specific type of reader is try and make some posts on TikTok that appeal to somebody closer to my sleuth age.

So I tend to write sleuths there in the 30s.

And so if I wanted to try and appeal to Cozy readers who are that age, what would I do to appeal to them?

And they're not, quote unquote, young people, right?

They're not kids.

So I'm not trying to say I'm going to do like fun dances and try and get the hot new trends on TikTok.

That's not what I'm trying to do.

What I'm trying to do is think, like, what do they like?

Like, how can I tap into their emotional hooks?

And also, how can I write hooks to appeal to them?

And that has been so freeing.

Like, not trying to, I'm not trying to sell my book.

I'm trying to connect to a specific person.

And it's someone who I understand because I picked the audience that is closest to me.

And so I've specifically been choosing, like, music that's familiar when I was young and felt fun and, like, free and exciting.

I've chosen a format that's, like, using keywords that I know are really familiar to my generation.

I picked specific parts of the books.

I've really highlighted, like, the family conflict side of the books.

They're like, you don't fit in with your family.

You've tried making a life away from home and now you're having to come back.

There's that conflict of, you know, you're returning to your hometown, but you don't quite fit in.

I'm just trying to do posts that tie in to that.

And not even necessarily with the thought that I'm going to sell books on TikTok, but specifically because trying to hit that format, right, the format of like a catchy, hooky video that appeals to an incredibly specific age range has helped me so much to get a feeling of confidence with my audience.

I've just been like, we know, I'll draft a few different federal posts and be like, oh, this isn't right, but why isn't it right?

If I know I'm trying to target these people with this sort of aspect of the book, what other words do I need to use?

What other language to use?

And I don't think necessarily that I will be TikToking in perpetuity.

That's not a verb, is it?

I'm so sorry, young people.

I don't think I'm going to be on TikTok in perpetuity.

It's not a place I necessarily think I'm going to make that my strategy.

And I might do, it definitely feels a thousand percent easier and more fun than it has in the past.

But I think that's partly because I am doing something for me with it.

I am learning something with it and I'm exploring something that is teaching me something.

And that has felt so useful.

Even when I think about my newsletter, I think it is relatively generic and it's about me, but it kind of keeps a nice even middle tone.

And maybe that's fine, right?

I think maybe your newsletter does, it has to be a place where you appeal to everyone.

But I might try and say, could I bring in like little quarters of the newsletter that are specifically trying to appeal to different people?

If I know that a big part of the appeal of my book series is the like the family conflict, the drama bits, I might put in things that are about, you know, I was telling you off a conflict family, a minor family conflict, like Christmas is coming.

There's all sorts of slight fractious disagreements.

They're obviously nothing at all.

They're just like a bit of misunderstanding.

Do I want to put in something like that?

Or do I want to put in something that appeals to a different part of my audience?

Can I get more personal, I think?

And for me, I am incapable of selling something if I don't feel authentic about it.

And having to drill down into my audience and different aspects of my audience is so helpful to help me feel like I'm trying to give an authentic sales message rather than be like, it's a book, you'll like it, because you like books.

Yeah, I just feel so much more engaged and really, really like I'm improving.

I guess that's like quite a broad way of looking at it.

But it does feel like this.

It feels like a lever in pulling again, which I've talked about a few times that I felt really frustrated without it.

And this feels like I am taking more of control.

Yeah, it's fun to get that feeling again.

I say again, I've never had that feeling about my own books.

But it is fun to be generating that feeling.

Because I finished reading a book last week, and as soon as I finished it, I thought, oh, I know a couple of friends who would love this book.

And then it dawned on me that I would be so willing to sell somebody else's book to my friends.

And I'm not willing to put myself out there with my own book.

I'm still kind of wanting to get it out there, but feeling like I can't because that's so big headed.

Like, why would people like my book?

It's so dumb.

But I'm so willing to do it for the people.

And that's bad business.

Bad business.

I need to be a good business, Sam.

The little part of writing to market I think can be helpful, because if you know you have done things that your audience likes, you don't have to get all the way to that point where you think, Gosh, I'm so good.

I'm a fantastic writer, aren't I?

Wonderful.

All you have to do is get part of the way there and thinking, I know I'm a good writer, right?

I have had enough people say this to me.

I have seen enough pieces of my work from like five years ago and had a thought like, Did I write this?

This is good.

Even I can't feel that way about my current works at all.

I look at them and I can only see the development and the mistakes and the bad days and the things I could have better.

Like, I'm never going to get to authentically feeling like this book in front of me is great.

But if I just don't have to do that, and I can think objectively, I know, despite the voices in my head saying it's not great and the things I remember writing it, it is good.

And I've written it to market.

So I know there are these hooks in here and the tropes that my readers really love.

I can feel confident authentically of saying, this will appeal to you for this thing.

And for me, that feels so different to trying to say, this is the next best Cozy Mystery, everyone's gonna love it.

Because that's not true.

And I don't know why I haven't thought about this before in such a meaningful way, but it feels like such an epiphany to say like, I'm, it's completely wrong to be trying to make really broad, generic statements for me, because I am someone who I can only connect in an authentic way.

I just cannot talk, it feels incredibly uncomfortable for me and like, like lying to say things that are like generically positive.

And what I need to do is find small pockets of audience and I can feel 100% confident if I tell you you'll like it for this reason.

It's true, right?

You will go and read it and you'll like that about it.

And maybe if all the book isn't for you, right?

You might read it and think, oh, you know, actually that thing didn't quite resonate.

But that part of it I have not lied to you about.

Because that is, that feeling of lying is a block to believing in yourself because you are constantly waiting for that one person to say it's nothing like that.

Like you said it was like this and it's nothing like that.

That's what I feel like.

I feel like somebody is going to turn around and say, like, you like, this is nothing like the story doesn't make any sense.

This is nothing like you said it was.

Because I'm still not sure that I'm talking to the right people.

I'm waiting for somebody who likes books about dragons to pick up my book and say, but it's not got any dragons in it.

Well, obviously, because they don't write dragons.

It's got no dragons in it.

Yeah, fantasy, but no dragons.

Like, because, yeah, because my messaging is so broad.

I think we've all fallen in this trap.

And I don't, it's not a bad trap because I do, I like these posts myself, but you know, you see the posts of a book cover and it's got all the tropes, the arrows and the tropes.

Everybody uses this marketing method and I like it.

I've used it before as well, but they are, you're doing the most generic things you can think of in order to try and capture as many people's attention as possible.

But unless you've already got an audience that is super aware of what you're doing and really interested, I don't think those posts are great.

Like I don't feel those posts work for me whatsoever.

I see everybody else doing it, but I've never really thought, well, of course they work for people who've got like 100,000 followers on Instagram and selling consistently.

Like for, you know, just doing well.

Yeah, people who can fill in the gaps themselves, right?

So say you see a book with the tropes outlined and it is like dragons, I don't know what else goes with dragons, like dragons, like war against greater power, secret magic, like evil family.

Those are so generic that you think like, what is that for me?

Like, I like those things, or like maybe three of those things or one of those things.

But I don't know.

It's that that itself, I'm never going to pick a book based on that.

But like that image, plus I've read the person before, I've seen other book reviewers that I know and like hyping it, all those things add together.

And I think you can, I think I've definitely also fallen into the trap of like looking at those sorts of posts, which like putting out the tropes or, or whatever it is, like something equivalent of like, it's a generic marketing post.

I'm thinking, Oh, okay, I'll do the generic marketing post.

That's that's a post that people do.

Or, you know, the same as in your newsletters or ads or like whatever it is, but like wherever you are, you see somebody who's doing the generic thing, and you think, okay, okay, that's what that's what you do, then you put this quite generic post up.

And then the people like, it almost feels ridiculous now, right?

You're asking people to look at something ready to be generic, and they're like, well, I guess I'll give that a try.

Like there's millions of books out there.

They have better choices than like, this thing that says like, it's kind of like if Miss Marple was young, you're like, well, that's, I've got a book like that already.

I've got a series I like like that already.

I'm not gonna take a chance on yours.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I, I just think getting specific feels, it feels like you're narrowing your audience, but in fact, you are increasing, you're going for depth rather than breadth.

Yeah.

In a way that is very meaningful, I think.

Yeah, it is more meaningful.

You're finding it's better to find a hundred people who are super into what you're doing, then a thousand people who are kind of like, yeah, maybe, like, maybe I'll try it.

I'd rather have the hundred people who are like super into it and are gonna be really hyped about it.

And then they tell their friends and then, you know, and then then the wildfire spreads and all of a sudden you're a millionaire and living your best life.

Yeah.

And I think I've always been trying to like, that's definitely what everyone's going for.

Everyone's looking for that that thousand true fans concept that I can't even make remember who came up with it.

But like, yeah, if you could just have a thousand true fans, that's that's how you get success, because those people, if you publish enough and you do various other money making things like that, that's enough money, and those people tell people.

But I have always been sort of trying to sieve through the ocean of everyone to find a thousand true fans.

But my net has got no consistent dimensions.

My net is just full of holes, or sometimes it's dissolving in the water.

Oh gosh, I'm back in torture, metaphor territory, I'm so sorry.

I mean, like, whereas what I'm doing is like, yeah, I think it's like I've been trying to pan for gold, right?

Okay, okay, shifting, we're shifting, right?

Whereas what I'm actually doing is like literally digging through the earth.

I'm pulling out nuggets of gold myself, right?

And I'd be like, that is, I'm going to move aside all this dirt and physically pull out a gold nugget and like find it and cherish it and look for where it's going to be.

And it's more deliberate than just like, I'm just going to stand in a river with a pan and just hope.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

As far as analogies go, I guess we'll take that one over the fishing net.

It's not my best.

It's not your best, but I get it.

I get it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm there.

Yeah.

Oh, dear.

Do we have anything else on this topic?

I feel like it seems so obvious, doesn't it?

Just to say like, oh, you should be looking for your audience.

Like that's effectively it.

Like look if you have the right audience.

And obviously that's a huge thing is finding.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I think I have definitely been thinking of, okay, if I want to have big sales, I need to think of having a big audience.

So then how do I, I'm like shouting into a canyon.

Oh, I'm on the metaphors.

I'm so sorry.

Here we go.

But I'm-

At least we're sticking in gold country.

No.

Yeah.

I'm in the wild west.

Yeah.

I'm envisioning a big crowd that I'm shouting to.

And actually, because also if you are almost like hand settling, right, you're trying to really, really pick people out.

That's really-

that's emotionally vulnerable to say, like, I think confidently my book appeals to these people, and I'm going to put in the time and effort to work at finding them and to appeal to them.

And then maybe someone does turn around and says, like, you compared your books to, like, Agatha Christie or whoever it is, like, that's embarrassing for you, you're terrible.

You're like, oh, I'm so sorry.

I was trying my best.

But I think if you, for me, if I can feel authentic enough, even if someone were to criticize and say, it doesn't fit the bill of this, I'd be like, I'm sorry you felt that way.

Like, I, this part, I think I feel confident it does.

And so it is an emotionally vulnerable thing that you have to feel like you know the market and your books and your audience, all those pieces well enough to make that pitch towards saying, this part of my book would appeal to these people, genuinely.

Yeah, yeah.

I'm really looking forward to writing, like you've been doing, like writing copy and coming up with concepts for social media stuff that is really specific about certain things in the books.

Like I'm really looking forward to it.

And I think that's probably what I'm gonna spend the rest of this month, although I'm obviously doing other work, but I'm gonna spend a lot of time this month really thinking about that and having fun with it.

Like I love making graphics for social media.

I love taking pictures of my books.

And I really want to come up with a good strategy for next year that feels authentic and feels like I'm putting like my best self into it without the negative stuff that I've been holding on to.

I just want to be starting fresh and feeling like I'm like I've made I'm making the right choices rather than making choices with like tinged with fear, which is just not fun.

Yeah.

And that is it.

I think I've always been waiting to like suddenly become that really confident version of like that you of the person you see online, right?

I've been waiting to for somehow to write a book that's good enough that I will feel really confident about it.

But that has ignored the fact that I can only sell things that I feel authentically positive about.

And I think we come back to so often, right?

It's about knowing yourself and knowing how you work.

And I really wish I had.

I mean, I say this, and we'll probably look back at an earlier episode, and we've had this conversation before, but I really wish I had acknowledge previously that authenticity is such an important thing for me.

And now I'm saying this, I think we haven't this conversation before, but I think we have to come over these same topics again and again, like with a different layer of understanding.

And it does feel like not only do I have to be authentic, but I have things now with this new series that I have worked on very deliberately, that I can be authentic about that I feel like I've intentionally put in that I know people will like, and I can confidently tell them that they will like it and why.

Which feels so different.

Yeah.

I know.

I think we've come so far, even though we do touch on the same topics continuously, it's because you have to look at the same things.

Like as you go down the track to just to take all the lessons that you've been learning as you've been running the business and then applying it to all of these topics that we cover.

And each time we go over, I feel like we're chipping away another bit of armor.

It's not really armor, it's just like chipping away at the wall that we're blocking ourselves off with.

In my head, I can see this thing that I'm thinking.

Yeah.

Like we put a wall around ourselves and every time we come back to it, we're chipping it away.

Soon we will just have clear sailing in front of us.

Let's go back to the sea.

Clear sailing on the river in which so much planning is involved.

If you can...

And this is why I don't write fancy poetry books.

This is why we write and we don't talk generally.

Like I need to be able to delete these phrases from my books.

Yeah.

Oh, God.

Life.

So I feel like we've done a good job with this.

I feel like we've covered off a lot of stuff.

And I really feel like I've turned a corner after our conversation yesterday and this conversation today.

I'm feeling confident.

Are you...

Any more analogies or are you happy for me to wrap this up?

Good.

I'm all out of metaphors for today, but I will think of some more for next week.

Fantastic.

So for next week's topic, we are ending this series on how to believe in yourself with an episode on luck, preparation and opportunity.

Do you have any initial thoughts on this?

I forgot I was going to have to answer this one.

I thought it was you.

Yes, I do.

I really wish I had looked up more about this because I heard this on an Instagram video from Bo and Yang recently, where he was talking about this.

But it just clicked, right?

The concept of there's so much in this business that is not really about going from A to Z.

It's about just making sure you are as prepared as possible for a lot of different aspects of the career.

And I think we've both had things recently that have not been things we would have planned if we were making it really clear, like, I'm going to go from like this pattern to this pattern, January, March, May, I'll do all these things.

We have both been doing lots of general preparation and make ourselves better and understanding ourselves more and and putting ourselves in the right place for the right time and various things have happened.

And I'm not sure we'll necessarily be able to talk about like lots of details of things next week, but some details of things next week we should be able to talk about.

And also just generally kind of the way in which we have been able to position ourselves for new and interesting things to happen that would not, you couldn't have made them happen.

Yes.

Yeah, I think that's going to be a big part of the conversation next week is the preparation is something that we are all more than likely doing every day in this business.

The luck and the opportunity are the random things that happen that you couldn't stumble upon unless you have the preparation and all that jazz.

So yeah, I think it's going to be a fun conversation.

I can't wait to talk about all of the woo woo things like manifesting and all of that stuff.

That's definitely going to come up next week.

Apologies if you are not into that.

But if you are into that, next week is going to be for you.

Yes, so thank you very much everyone for tuning in.

I hope you enjoyed this episode.

Don't forget to give us a follow on Instagram, subscribe to this podcast, and leave a review if you wish.

And we will be back next week.

Goodbye.

Bye.

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