Begin Self-Publishing Podcast: Recent Episodes
Tim Lewis
This podcast will take you through how to self-publish your eBook onto Amazon, Apple and the other global eBook Stores, how to market a book and general online business techniques needed to be a successful self-publisher.
Discover how May King is getting along with her book writing process as she returns to the Begin Self-Publishing Podcast.
You can find show notes here: https://beginselfpublishing.com/may-king-returns/
We discover how Ben Roberts got on with his book release and say goodbye to Ben from the podcast.
In this episode I talk to May King Tsang about how her book project is going and the mistakes she has made and why she is behind with the project.
You can find show notes at https://beginselfpublishing.com/may-king-mistakes/
In this show Ben Roberts is almost at the point of releasing his book. We talk about how he is going to launch his book and answer some questions he still has.
You can see show notes at https://beginselfpublishing.com/ben-finish-line/
I talk to Niklas Myhr, the Social Media Professor about his book project. He's already got funding to start the project putting him in prime position.
You can find full show notes at https://beginselfpublishing.com/niklas-myhr-joins-the-show/
You can contact the show host at timlewis@stonehampress.com
In this episode I talk to May King again about how she is going with writing her book and we talk about a whole number of subjects, including what categorises success for a book project.
You can find show notes at https://beginselfpublishing.com/what-is-success/
In this show I interview Ben Roberts and discover where he is going to be the chosen one on the podcast and actually hit his book deadline in mid-February.
You can find the show notes to this show at https://beginselfpublishing.com/is-ben-anakin/
You can contact the show host at timlewis@stonehampress.com
Jen Cole's behind in terms of her word count, but feels that she works best with a deadline so needs to catch up to meet her April 30th deadline.
You can find full show notes here https://beginselfpublishing.com/jen-needs-to-catch-up
You can contact the host at timlewis+show@stonehampress.com.
It's Come to This: The Christmas Clip Show Special. A remixed, not entirely genuine interview with @andrewandpete...
You can find the full transcript here : https://beginselfpublishing.com/andrewandpeteremixed/
May King returns to the show talking about her plan to her book and Tim takes May King through what she needs to consider in actually writing the book.
You can see show notes at https://beginselfpublishing.com/may-king-plans
In this show, Ben Roberts has now completed his manuscript; we discover what he is working on now with his book and how the writing process has affected his life.
You can find a transcript of the show at https://beginselfpublishing.com/ben-manuscript/
In this episode I talk to Holly Chessman about the final steps she needs to take her completed and edited manuscript and designed cover from her computer and into the Amazon store.
A full transcript for this episode are available here:
https://beginselfpublishing.com/holly-discovers-the-final-steps
In this episode I talk again to Jen Cole about her book plan, which she has now completed and talk about the next steps in her book writing journey.
https://beginselfpublishing.com/jen-finishes-her-plan/
In this show I talk about my experiences in the release of my latest book and first non-fiction book, Social Media Networking.
You can find full show notes at https://beginselfpublishing.com/social-media-networking-book-release/
In this episode I talk to May King Tsang, Twitter Supremo, tea pun aficionado and tea expert about what kind of book she should write out of the many ideas she has for a book.
You can find a full transcription here:
https://beginselfpublishing.com/may-king-tea/
Meet Ben Roberts, host of the Marketing Buzzwords Podcast - discover his publishing journey. He's already run a successful crowd-funding campaign for his book and now he's looking to self-publish the book.
You can find show notes here: https://beginselfpublishing.com/meet-ben-roberts
In this show we begin the task of getting the multi-talented marketer Jen Cole to start writing a book by first committing to complete the project.
http://beginselfpublishing.com/jen-commits-to-publish
The Format of the Begin Self-Publishing Podcast is changing to add in many more tutorial shows where I follow/help people in their self-publishing journeys. http://beginselfpublishing.com/format-change-and-update
In this show we conclude our quick guide to self-publishing by talking about Book Marketing, the greatest challenge to most self-publishers.
Full show notes are available at http://beginselfpublishing.com/quick-guide-part6
Continuing my Quick guide to Self-Publishing Series I talk about formatting, that is creating a version of your document that can be sold either as an eBook or as paperback. I talk about ePubs and mobi files for eBooks and PDF files for paperbacks.
Show notes for this episode are available at https://beginselfpublishing.com/quick-guide-part5-formatting
In this part of the quick self-publishing guide I talk about the editing process : what editing is and why it matters; how to find an editor and how to choose the right one for you.
You can find show notes at https://beginselfpublishing.com/quick-guide-part4
In this part of the Quick Self-Publishing Guide I talk about book covers, fresh from the experience of creating the cover for my new book "Social Media Networking"
Full show notes available at : https://beginselfpublishing.com/quick-guide-part3
In this second part of my audiobook about self-publishing I talk about the art of actually writing a book. How do you get that book finished?
You can find full show notes here: https://beginselfpublishing.com/quick-guide-part2
Realising that if I create a test audiobook, I might as well serialise it on my podcast, I'm now releasing a series of shows with extracts from my new to-be-released audiobook The Quick Guide to Self-Publishing. In this show Preparing to Self-Publish.
You can find full show notes here: https://beginselfpublishing.com/quick-guide-part1
In this interview we talk to Harper Bliss & Caroline Manchoulas, successful Lesbian Romance authors about Lesbian fiction and it's differences to normal fiction.
You can find full show notes at https://beginselfpublishing.com/lesbian-fiction-harper-bliss
In this show I give you a behind the scenes glimpse of how I put to together the Begin Self-Publishing Podcast and the equipment I use to make the show.
You can find full show notes at https://beginselfpublishing.com/behind-scenes
In this episode I talk about killing my sacred cow of not trading time for money as I'm going to start offer a limited amount of consulting calls. What Sacred Cows do you have? Are they still valid? Do you need to kill the sacred cow?
You can find the show notes to this episode at https://beginselfpublishing.com/sacred_cow
We talk to Azriel Ratz about how to best use Facebook Ads to sell books, discussing whether it even makes sense and how much you need to spend and how best to go about doing it.
In this show I talk about the importance of having confidence in your product and how not having it can affect sales, regardless of the quality of your book.
http://beginselfpublishing.com/power-confidence
I haven't talked much about my own books on this show. I lost confidence in them, and I shouldn't have done. In this episode I talk solely about my books.
Full show notes are available at http://beginselfpublishing.com/my-own-books
GDPR or the General Data Protection Regulations are new EU regulations affecting how small businesses can use customer data - especially e-mail address lists. I talk to Annabel Kaye about the issues involved for self-publishers.
You can find full show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/storm-gdpr-annabel-kaye
Roger Edwards is an experienced marketer and I talk to him about the bits of marketing that tend to get overlooked - those bits like research that aren't about communication or advertising.
You can find full show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/forgotten-bits-marketing-roger-edwards
In this show I talk to Ian Sutherland who has been using Twitter to grow his author platform for several years. I talk to him about how his Twitter strategy has needed to change due to Twitter clamping down on automated tactics and his new Author Platform service.
For show notes go to http://beginselfpublishing.com/twitter-authors-ian-sutherland/
I talk with fellow self-publishing Podcaster, Paul Teague, about how things have turned out in 2017 and what we reckon will happen in 2018.
Full show transcription is available here:
http://beginselfpublishing.com/self-publishing-2018-paul-teague/
In this not entirely serious Christmas show I talk to zany expert marketers Andrew and Pete about how to improve your content to make it stand out.
Full Show Notes can be found at http://beginselfpublishing.com/great-content-andrew-pete-christmas-special
In this show I talk to Olly Richards about how he has built a company selling self-published language books. Starting with self-publishing in the Kindle Gold Rush, he got disillusioned and started a language training company. Then he started using his existing self-publishing experience to help him self-publish short stories to help people learn languages. Now he has been approached by a traditional publisher to take over his series of learning books.
Show notes are available at: http://beginselfpublishing.com/writing-educational-books-olly-richards
In this show I talk to Park Howell who teaches people how to use their stories to improve their marketing and business. It's ironic that many fiction authors don't use story very well in their marketing. This interview should help change that for some.
You can find show notes at
beginselfpublishing.com/story-park-howell
Writing great book descriptions is an art. Something that you can either outsource to a copywriter or do yourself, if you take the time to do it. Don't just write any old rubbish at the last minute. Find out how to write great book descriptions with the host of the Copy That Pops Podcast and expert copywriter, Laura Petersen.
Full Show Notes are available at http://beginselfpublishing.com/book-descriptions-laura-petersen
How can you use Amazon Advertising to promote your books? Find out as I interview Books Ads Supremo Mark Dawson about how to use Amazon and Bookbub advertising for your books.
Find the full show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/amazon-advertising-mark-dawson
Learn how to do video just with your mobile phone in this interview with Social Media Expert Amanda Webb.
My guest on this episode is Amanda Webb, who's somebody I've met at multiple conferences. The purpose of today's episode is to talk about mobile video. I did Amanda's Go Do Video course in London and, to be honest, I was extremely impressed by what you can actually do with videos on a mobile phone, and I thought it would be a great opportunity to get Amanda on the show, to talk about the same topic.
I mean we all think that you need expensive cameras and things to do video but in today's world, with only maybe a small amount of extra equipment, you can actually do very, very good videos on mobile phones, and certainly I think most self-publishers, as they're fairly cost-conscious, would be quite keen to use something they've already got to create decent videos.
Show Notes are available at http://beginselfpublishing.com/mobile-video-amanda-webb
In this episode, I talk to Claire Josa, who is the author of Dare To Dream Bigger, and an expert on overcoming limiting beliefs. The irony is that she actually tells quite often the story about her own failures in feeling like an imposter within the book. Actually, I think a lot of the things that it discusses are quite profound in terms of the whole mental side of writing and doing other things.
I think this actually a very interesting interview for psychological perspective. You might be one of those happy individuals who never suffers from writer's block, never feels like an imposter, and is happily getting on with their life. In which case, you might not find this interview that interesting.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/imposter-syndrome-clare-josa
In this episode I talk to Charles Harris, an experienced Screenplay Writer, Filmmaker and now best-selling novelist about how to write and pitch Screenplays, which as we discover are quite a different beast to novels. His first novel is the Breaking of Liam Glass.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/writing-screenplays-charles-harris
In this show I talk to Louise Harnby, an experienced Fiction editor and proof-reader about how to get the most from an editor for your work of fiction.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/fiction-editing-louise-harnby
In this episode I talk about overcoming the fundamental economic problem - how to prioritise what to spend your money and time doing as an author.
Long term listeners to this show will know that every now and then I do a solo show where I talk about something that's either a mindset issue or just something to do with self publishing that's come up.
I'll be completely honest with you most of the time I do these episodes because I haven't booked a guest or I've run out of guests. But in this particular instance that isn't the case. I've actually got about three shows recorded.
But I don't really want to do an interview show when I'm away. In terms of when the show has been released. So I thought I do one of these shorter shows I need to tide you over until we start getting into the more serious interviews again in September.
But also because I've quite missed having these sort of odd philosophical chats on the podcast every now and then. So you're probably wondering unless you've ever done economics in the subject as to what the Economic Problem is and why we want to overcome it.
See full show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/overcoming-economic-problem
In this episode and I talk to Marcus Sheridan who is the owner of a swimming pool company who suddenly learned in the days when his business was suffering in the recession that by creating an absolutely amazing blog just about the questions people have about swimming pools, he managed to hold his company back from the point of oblivion just by doing blogging and answering questions. He's now known as the Sales Lion and goes around training people internationally on how to do Content Marketing for fiction especially focusing on answering the questions that readers actually have.
You can find full show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/content-marketing-fiction
In this episode I talk again to Alex Newton of K-Lytics about what is happening in the Amazon Kindle Store in terms of what categories are doing well and badly.
You can find full show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/latest-kindle-store
In this episode I talk to Denise Cowle, a non-fiction editor based in Scotland. We talk about what the difference is between copy-editing and proofreading and what you need to look for in an editor.
You can find full show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/non-fiction-editing-denise-cowle
In this episode I talk to acclaimed Finnish author Helena Halme about her experiences of writing and self-publishing in English.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/writing-foreign-language
In this episode I talk to WordPress security expert Chris Varnom about how to make sure your website is secure. Invariably I see on a monthly (and sometimes weekly) basis reports of author websites being hacked, so I thought this was an important topic to cover on the show.
You can find full show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/website-security-chris-varnom
In this episode I talk to veteran Book Publicist, Ben Cameron about using a book publicist to promote your book.
You can find full show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/book-publicist-ben-cameron
To celebrate Episode 100, I'm doing something different, letting myself be interviewed by the lovely Amanda Robinson (@shewakeboards) of http://www.socialsavvysociety.com/ fame.
We talk about me, my plans for the podcast and about my books
You can find full show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/episode-100-she-interviews
This show is about the importance of getting the quality right when you do something, which usually means taking time or spending money.
You can find show notes at: http://beginselfpublishing.com/the-importance-timing-quality
In this show I talk again to Paul Teague, this time about two of the hottest topics in Self-Publishing at the moment, InstaFreebie and Vellum.
You can find show notes at: http://beginselfpublishing.com/instafreebie-vellum-paul-teague
In this show I talk to social media tools expert and regular Facebook Live broadcaster, Ian Anderson Gray. As well as being a tremendously nice guy he's also a talented singer and musician. I talk with him about Facebook Live.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/secrets-facebook-live-ian-anderson-gray
In this show I talk to Tyler Anderson, CEO of the Social Media Marketing Agency Casual Fridays in terms of what to look for if you do want to hire an agency for your social media marketing.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/hiring-smm-agency-tyler-anderson
In this show I talk about what I learned from my recent attendance from the biggest Social Media Marketing conference in the world, Social Media Marketing World.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/lessons-social-media-marketing-world
In this show I interview Catherine Carrigan of the WhatIsSocialMediaToday.com society about the benefits of community for authors and how it can help a starting author have success with marketing their book.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/community-with-catherine-carrigan
Way back in Episode number 28: My Top Ten Podcasts, I did my top ten podcasts and in Episode number 8: Other Self-Publishing Podcasts I also did other self-publishing podcasts. I thought it was time I revisited this area of my favourite podcasts. This is a list of new podcasts I have discovered since I shared my last list of favourite podcasts. Plus a few that missed the cut last time but have grown on me.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/top-podcasts-revisited
As I mentioned in my last show this is a special episode where I replay the audio of my interview with James Scott-Bell for the Alliance of Independent Authors Indie Fringe Event.
You can watch the video of this event and the other Fringe events using this link:
http://selfpublishingadvice.org/what-is-indie-author-fringe/ (E-mail sign-up required)
James Scott Bell is a graduate of USC law school and began his professional writing career in 1995 with a series of legal thrillers. He later started teaching writing workshops and eventually landed as the fiction columnist for Writer’s Digest magazine. Jim has had numerous bestsellers in both the traditional and indie world, and was the first self-publishing author to be nominated for an International Thriller Writers Award.
In this episode, I talk to Facebook expert Andrea Vahl about Facebook advertising. She is the co-author of Facebook Marketing All-in-One for Dummies. In some ways this is too big a topic for just one episode, but I think this interview gives a good overview of what is available in terms of Facebook advertising.
Show notes are available at http://beginselfpublishing.com/fundamentals-facebook-ads-andrea-vah
In this episode I talk to Mark Coker who is the head of Smashwords, the biggest and longest-established of the eBook aggregators. It is the last (for now) of the eBook aggregator interview series. It's been a long ride. I've you've missed the other shows here are the links to them:
PublishDrive with Kinga Jentetics
Discovering Streetlib with Giacomo D’Angelo
Pronoun with Justin Renard (UPDATE NOv 17: THEY ARE NO LONGER TRADING)
How to Use Draft2Digital with Dan Wood
You can find the transcript of this show at:
http://beginselfpublishing.com/smashwords-mark-coker
In this show I talk to Mark Schaefer, international speaker and multiple best-selling author about his efforts to get the rights back to his book, the Tao of Twitter, from McGraw-Hill. As a publisher they weren't keen to do a new edition of the book, which for a social media book, Mark thought was unacceptable. In addition we also talk about the lessons self-publishers can learn from his new book Known.
Show notes and and a full transcript are available at http://beginselfpublishing.com/reclaim-rights-mark-schaefer
In this show I talk to Dan Wood from Draft2Digital, probably the second best known eBook aggregator after Smashwords. I talk to him about their current offerings and some interesting changes they are making in terms of new efforts to help authors with their marketing.
Show notes are available at http://beginselfpublishing.com/draft2digital-dan-wood
This episode was much more opportunistic than most. I saw on Adam Croft's facebook profile that he was number 1 on Amazon in both the UK and US eBook stores, so I thought it would be interesting to interview an author at the "peak of their powers" to find out how he got to number 1 on Amazon. It's an interesting journey from being a self-published author to being picked up by an Amazon imprint to getting to number 1 in the whole Amazon US store.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/number1-adam-croft
*UPDATE (24-Nov 2017): Pronoun are no longer trading, so this show should be considered for historical purposes only.
Continuing my series of interviews with eBook aggregators, in this show I talk to Justin Renard of Pronoun. EBook aggregators are companies that allow you to submit your eBook to multiple eBook stores (like Apple, Kobo and Barnes and Noble) and often provide other features as well. Pronoun have been in the news as they are very competitive compared to the other eBook aggregators, especially in the US and Canadian markets for Amazon. They actually pay better rates for some books than going direct via KDP direct.
Tired of being told that you can't grow a Facebook Page without spending money? Holly Homer has built up her Quirky Momma page to have over 3 million fans in only a few years organically. Learn about Organic Facebook Growth with Holly Homer.
Show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/organic-facebook-holly-homer
Streetlib is an eBook aggregator, publishing services and POD company that's been relatively unknown (being an Italian company) in the US and UK but offers interesting services and is expanding into the US. I interview Giacomo D'Angelo CEO of Streetlib USA to find out more.
Show Notes are available at http://beginselfpublishing.com/streetlib-giacomo-dangelo
Steve Dotto is a TV presenter turned YouTube businessman, and he reveals the secrets of his success in using YouTube in this interview.
You can find show notes here: http://beginselfpublishing.com/youtube-steve-dotto
An eBook aggregator service takes your eBook and submits it to multiple eBook stores, such as Apple, Nook and Kobo. The reason why these services are useful is it means you don't have to manage several different system dashboards and in some cases it allows you to get into stores where there isn't even a direct route for self-publishers into that store (for example Google Play).
I must admit that I thought Smashwords and Draft2Digital were the only major eBook aggregator companies, but after joining the International Indie Authors Facebook group, I heard about a whole host of new and international companies, primarily PublishDrive, Streetlib and Pronoun. I've decided to try and get representatives from these companies on to the show to learn a bit more about them. This week I talk to Kinga Jentetics from PublishDrive.
You can find show notes at http://beginselfpublishing.com/publishdrive-kinga-jentetics
It's a new year and it's time to get that hit book published. I know a lot of people have "publish a book" as a New Year's goal. So I thought I would do a quick summary of the advice I would give someone who has this resolution, from my own humble experience.
Show notes for this episode are available at http://beginselfpublishing.com/publish_hit_book
In this show I talk to Alisa Meredith, who is an expert and speaker on Pinterest and is, to my mind, the world authority on Pinterest's advertising platform, Promoted Pins.
Show notes can be found at http://beginselfpublishing.com/promoted-pins-alisa-meredith
In this show I discuss how I have started using a new technique using tailored audiences to allow me to start making successful use of Twitter Adverts.
The post How to Unlock the Magic of Twitter Adverts appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
While listening back to the audio of the last show I realised that I have gone a bit native in the world of Marketing Buzzwords, happily talking about "Return-On-Investment Rates" with no extra explanation as to what that means. So I'd thought I'd do a quick show on explaining this and some of other business/sales/marketing related terms and what they all mean.
The post What Do All these Marketing Buzzwords Mean? appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this show I talk to the author of "How to Get A Meeting With Anyone", Stu Heinecke, about what he calls Contact Marketing. This is where you focus on a small number of customers/influencers and personalise campaigns towards them. The Return on Investment of this can be amazing.
The post Getting that Meeting with Stu Heinecke appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
Well I've completed NaNoWrimo again! 50,000 words of a first draft written in November. But more significant than that is that it is the final book in my three book Magpies and Magic series. So now I am faced with a common problem : what to work on next. In this show I discuss the options and my thinking as to which to use.
The post Choosing your Next Project appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this show I talk to David Neal, who is someone I met on now defunct #futurechat publishing chat. He has self-published the appBook Alice Winks and has quite a large amount of experience with Richer Media books, that is those books that contain more than just text and pictures. They can contain interactive elements (that is choices), videos and other graphical elements.
The post Rich Media Books with David Neal appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
I'd heard about Dave Chesson and Kindlepreneur quite some time ago, but have always been slightly put off by companies with Kindle in the title, as they have tended to be get-rich-quick schemes. However I heard an interview Dave Chesson gave on the EOFire podcast, and with a recommendation from another friend, decided to have Dave on the show. It turns out Dave knows a lot about SEO, and Amazon SEO in particular!
The post Amazon SEO with Dave Chesson appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this episode I talk to Twitter expert, and host of the #TwitterSmarter twitter chat, Madalyn Sklar. Personally I had great success building up publishing industry specific twitter followers by taking part in the now defunct #futurechat Twitter chat. In this show I talk to Madalyn about what twitter chats are and how to use them.
The post Twitter Chats with Madalyn Sklar appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
Why I do NaNoWrimo. For the uninitiated NaNoWrimo is an event coming out of the US that challenges writers to write 50,000 words in the month of November. I've done it the last two years and in fact the majority of the last two books I've written have been in NaNoWrimo. In this episode I tell you why I do it.
The post Why I Do NaNoWrimo appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
I met Alison Morton in person for the first time at the Triskele Literary Festival. While there, former guest Debbie Young put her forward as a potential guest for the show. At the time I didn't have an idea of a potential show topic, but looking at her website I saw how many speaking events she had done. So then I thought that would be a good topic to talk about, especially as I've done exactly zero speaking events myself.
The post Author Events with Alison Morton appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
Something we often forget to do is to check things that we already think are working. Sadly with Wordpress, Mail Providers and eBook Retailers things outside our control (usually a change somewhere else) can break things without you doing anything. So you need to check things occasionally to ensure they are still working.
The post Check, Check and Check Again appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
Why is Writing a Book Important? There's a reason why you want to write a book...in this episode I examine those reasons. There are good and bad reasons to write a book, but by listening to this podcast you are showing that it is important to you. Understanding why can help you in your writing career.
The post Why is Writing a Book Important? appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this episode I talk again to Alex Newton from the firm K-Lytics about the trends he has recently seen in the Amazon eBook market. His company K-Lytics scans the Amazon charts and looks for the number of books, their prices and how they rank relatively. In this way he can work out what areas are the easiest to chart in and which are the areas with the most potential sales and least competition.
The post What’s New on Amazon with Alex Newton appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this show I talk to Jay Baer about how to handle reviews. Jay Baer is an international speaker and author of multiple books about marketing and customer service. It is a real honour to have him on the show. I saw him speak about the concepts behind his book Hug Your Haters at Social Media Marketing World 2015 and was blown away. It's been a long process to get him on the show, but his contrarian views on how to handle reviews for books, backed up by research, meant that I hope you will agree it was worth the wait!
The post How to Handle Reviews with Jay Baer appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
This week I interview Leslie Samuel about Blogging. Leslie Samuel is a former university professor and the creator of the Become A Blogger - a blog dedicated to the craft of professional blogging. He has a passion for education and has taken on the mission of "Changing The World One Blog At A Time".
The post Blogging with Leslie Samuel appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this show I talk to businessman and author Tony Brown about standard procedures and how they have helped him become much more productive. Tony had a situation where he had a new contract that he could not fulfil on his own without dropping an existing contract. He decided to instead look to write down his procedures so he could get someone else to fulfil the new contract. He developed worksheets, templates and checklists allowing him to employ someone else to do the work he used to do. Going on from that he got to the point where he had his business to the level where he could go on an eight week holiday without any effect on his business.
The post The Benefits of Standard Procedures with Tony Brown appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In my first full-time job I worked for a small financial software company and had to learn this odd computer programming language that only they used. As a new employee I was given the manual but most people just expected me to do what they did and just pick things up as I went along. But for whatever reason I read the manual. What surprised me was that I learnt an awful lot of things that many of the "old hands" didn't know by just reading Chapter 1 of the manual.
The post Always Read the First Chapter of the Manual appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
An often talked about option for marketing books (especially fiction books) is eBook discovery services like Bookbub, where readers sign up to regular e-mails of discounted books and authors pay to have their books listed. But how good value are these services? What do you need to get listed with one? Which are the best for which genres? I talk today to Alli's watchdog John Doppler who has done a comparison of these services about what he found out.
The post EBook Discovery Services with John Doppler appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
Joanna Penn is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of thrillers under the name J.F.Penn. She also writes non-fiction for authors and is an award-winning creative entrepreneur and international professional speaker. Her site, TheCreativePenn.com is regularly voted one of the top 10 sites for writers and self-publishing and in this episode I talk to her about self-publishing audiobooks. We discuss how to use Amazon's ACX platform to find a narrator and arrange a royalty split, the issues of narrating the book yourself and the issue with Audible having the audiobook market sewn up.
The post Audiobooks with Joanna Penn appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
Calvin Wayman has recently written the book Fish Out of Water. One of the central themes of the book is the benefits of having mentors on your progression into the entrepreneurial world. I talk to him about these concepts and the interesting way he promoted the launch of his book.
The post The Benefits of Mentors with Calvin Wayman appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this interview I talk with the host of the MyKitaab Podcast and self-published Indian Author Amar Vyas about self-publishing in India.
The post Self-Publishing in India with Amar Vyas appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
Despite having a desire to test out the latest marketing techniques all the time I've recently discovered that often simpler techniques help provide the greatest results. This has mainly been in the area of marketing this podcast rather than my books.
In the previous episode How do you revive sales in a book that doesn't sell? (Episode 37) I mentioned that I was going to try and do a marketing push for my book Magpies and Magic. It was as much of an opportunity to try out some new marketing avenues as anything else. As is often the case with new things I wasn't expecting success, which was good because I didn't have much. Some the things I tried showed real promise, while others I will probably not repeat.
The post In Marketing, Simple Is Often Better appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In my first solo show for a while I use the information I learnt from my interview with Emmanuel Nataf about how much self-publishing costs to create a spreadsheet to work out exactly how many eBooks you'll need to sell to cover these costs, get these costs plus a minimum wage and to a comfortable "average" income from an individual book.
The post Author Income : How Many Books Do You Need to Sell to Make Money? appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
I have seen Phil speak at both New Media Europe 2015 and New Media Europe 2016 and he's always been an amazing speaker. He's a globe-trotting brand expert who has worked with a host of celebrities and small business people. I ask him to talk about author branding in this interview.
The post Author Branding with Phil Pallen appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this episode I am blessed to have on one half of the duo who make up the core of the EOFire organisation, Kate Erickson. Together with her partner John Lee Dumas they released the Freedom Journal at the start of this year to great success after running one of the best ever book Kickstarter launches (7,063 backers pledged $453,803) and have continued their success after the launch.
The post Organising a Mega-Book Launch with Kate Erickson appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this episode I talk to Orna Ross, Director of the Alliance of Independent Authors about selling publishing rights. She has recently co-authored the book How Authors Sell Publishing Rights (ALLi How-to for Authors Guidebook Book 4) with previous guest Helen Sedwick on this topic.
The post Selling Publishing Rights with Orna Ross appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
Paul Teague is a successful non-fiction author and host of the Self-Publishing Journeys Podcast. He is now attempting to move solely into writing in fiction, which is where his passion lies.
The post Moving from Non-Fiction to Fiction with Paul Teague appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this show I talk to Martin Shervington, who is an author, speaker and marketing consultant at PlusYourBusiness.com. He coaches on marketing, specialising in things to do with Google.
The post Using Google for Business with Martin Shervington appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.
In this show I talk again to Emmanuel Nataf from Reedsy about a blog post he wrote about how much self-publishing costs, in terms of editing, cover design and interior layout.
The post How Much Does Self-Publishing Cost with Emmanuel Nataf appeared first on Begin Self-Publishing.