Podcasts about wordslinger podcast

Host Patricia McLinn talks with Kevin Tumlinson, director of marketing for the ebook creation and distribution service Draft2Digital, supporting both indie and traditionally published authors. Books2Read, D2D's author services resource, is a fast-growing tool for the industry, with services such as Universal Book Links offering authors increased discoverability with readers, and offering readers a simple, one-click method of finding new authors and new books online.  In his words: "Books2Read has always been built around the idea that eventually we want readers to be able to discover there new favorite author on that site. ... Discover new books, new authors that they love and follow, and then interact with them and support them by sharing things." [21:45]  Kevin also is an award-winning and bestselling thriller author, and host of the Wordslinger Podcast. His archaeological thriller series featuring protagonist Dan Kolter has won awards and reached top rankings on Amazon and iBooks. You can find Kevin on:   *His website, *Facebook and  *Twitter Thank you so much for listening. We hope you enjoyed the podcast enough to want to support us for future episodes. You can do that with as little as $1 a month by pledging at Patreon. It’s vital to Authors Love Readers to have your support. Thank you! Please also consider rating/reviewing the podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks to DialogMusik for the instrumentals that accompany this podcast.

Six years of Wordslinger Podcast! Kevin reflects on the things that he’s learned from more than half a decade of doing the show, and shares the perspective and inspiration he’s taken from interviews and audience interactions.TRANSCRIPT AVAILABLESTART AN ACORNS ACCOUNT AND GET FREE MONEY!VISIT KEVINTUMLINSON.COM/ACORNSDID I MENTION?Cover your nakedness and your shame with a Written World Tee, now with 100% more Kevin words! http://bit.ly/writtenworld-teesNew to Wordslinger Press, pick up Writing a Better Book DescriptionPick up a copy of Kevin Tumlinson's newest Dan Kotler archaeological thriller at https://kevintumlinson.com/books--THIS EPISODE OF THE WORDSLINGER PODCAST IS SPONSORED BY:Draft2Digital—Convert, publish, and distribute your book worldwide, with support the whole way. https://draft2digital.com/wordslingerWordslinger Press—This is your chance to start your indie author career right. Pick up books and other products to help you build and grow a successful writing career. Start growing at http://wordslingerpodcast.comSupport this show: Subscribe and share!Support us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/wordslingerpodcastPick something up to read that will be tough to put down—Archeological Thrillers, Science Fiction, YA Fantasy and more, at https://kevintumlinson.com/books

Surely you can’t just ask for what you want? Kevin begs to differ. If you’ve been struggling to find a way to market your books on a shoestring or no-string budget, you’ll want to tune in to this episode for some first-step author marketing advice.TRANSCRIPT AVAILABLE BELOWTHIS WEEK'S NEWS:Introducing Scribd Snapshots: A New Way to Discover The Best Nonfiction Books — Scribd Blog - https://blog.scribd.com/home/introducing-scribd-snapshots-a-new-way-to-discover-the-best-nonfiction-booksAAP calls for closer regulation of Amazon and Google - https://www.thebookseller.com/news/aap-calls-closer-regulation-amazon-and-google-1027576START AN ACORNS ACCOUNT AND GET FREE MONEY!VISIT KEVINTUMLINSON.COM/ACORNSDID I MENTION?Cover your nakedness and your shame with a Written World Tee, now with 100% more Kevin words! http://bit.ly/writtenworld-teesNew to Wordslinger Press, pick up Writing a Better Book DescriptionPick up a copy of Kevin Tumlinson's newest Dan Kotler archaeological thriller at https://kevintumlinson.com/books--THIS EPISODE OF THE WORDSLINGER PODCAST IS SPONSORED BY:Draft2Digital—Convert, publish, and distribute your book worldwide, with support the whole way. https://draft2digital.com/wordslingerWordslinger Press—This is your chance to start your indie author career right. Pick up books and other products to help you build and grow a successful writing career. Start growing at http://wordslingerpodcast.comSupport this show: Subscribe and share!Support us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/wordslingerpodcastPick something up to read that will be tough to put down—Archeological Thrillers, Science Fiction, YA Fantasy and more, at https://kevintumlinson.com/booksTRANSCRIPTWANT TO HELP IMPROVE THESE TRANSCRIPTS? REACH OUTKevin Tumlinson: 00:00 Hey slingers, this is another week of the Wordslinger Podcast. And one you're not gonna want to miss. Stick around and find I, you can get what you want just by asking for it. Hey, you looking for a jump on your own India author career. Yeah.Kevin Tumlinson: 00:14 Kind of confused about where to start. I got the place for you. Check out draft two digital. That's where you're going to be able to convert your manuscript, distributed worldwide, online, and get help. The hallway from the best author support there is. Trust me on this one. So go check out drafted digital@drafteddigital.com slash word slinger.Announcer: 00:37 It's the Wordslinger Podcast where story matters. Build your brand, write your book, redefine who you are. It's all about the story here. What's yours? Now here's the guy who invented pants, optional Kevin Tumlinson, the Wordslinger.Kevin Tumlinson: 01:02 Well, I am Kevin Tumlinson, the Wordsligner. Uh, youKevin Tumlinson: 01:05 are whoever you are the person listening to this broadcast. Uh, so I'm, uh, I'm in the middle, so you may have noticed I didn't, uh, do an episode last week. Um, and I gotta tell Ya, it's, it's probably going to be tough to get episodes out over the next couple of months. I got, I got conferences coming up August. I, I, I literally have a conference every week of August. Um, and, uh, lots, a lot of travel. It's a lot of trying to work everything out. I'm gonna do my best. I'm gonna do my absolute best to, uh, to get you at least one episode a week in there. It might just be a bunch of Solo slinger episodes. Um, and I'm sorry to the folks who I have interviewed that I'm trying to, I'm trying to get through that bad catalog as fast as possible, and I got more interviews coming up.Kevin Tumlinson: 01:57 So, uh, but you know, this is crunch time, uh, for me in this, in this business with, um, basically it's conference season. So, um, I'm gonna do my best though, and I'm looking out for you. Uh, and speaking of that, uh, you know, we've done a couple of webinars now or while we've done one webinar so far for a draft to digital, the d to do d to d a You a as we call it, ask us anything. Uh, the first one went really well and we set up a bunch of, uh, author consultations. Now, unfortunately, I didn't check a box, uh, that needed to be checked in order to evenly distribute the consultations. So for two weeks, two, three weeks now I have, um, I've basically had back to back consultations with authors with no gap between, uh, and no lunch breaks and none of that.Kevin Tumlinson: 02:49 So it's been a very rough couple of weeks. Uh, plus we've had some other, I've had some other things going on here, like a whole family thing happened. Um, so it's been challenging to get everything done and that includes getting the Wordslinger Podcast recorded. Um, but I'm here, I'm back at least today. Um, but one of the things that's come up in the author consultations that I thought would make a great topic, uh, it's a very basic marketing technique or marketing, um, strategy that I think gets overlooked all the time. Now, everyone I talked to, uh, asks marketing questions, they're always very focused on, you know, Facebook ads, uh, Amazon Ams ads, that sort of thing. You know, how do I handle I up my game and get people to buy my book wide or, you know, uh, just discover me and get on my mailing list. And the one thing that I've discovered that, that hardly anyone does is just ask for what they want.Kevin Tumlinson: 03:53 So if you have a mailing list, now, a lot of the VA, a lot of the authors I've talked to at all, you know, they only have like maybe a hundred people, some only have like 20 people on their list. Uh, some have 1500. It is, it's, it doesn't really matter what the size of the list is. But one of the things you should be doing regularly is engaging that readership with personable emails, which we've talked about in the past. When you want to become a human being to these people, you don't have to share personal, private details of your life, but you want to, uh, frame yourself as someone that they can, that they might enjoy knowing. You know, as someone you're having a conversation with. Um, and in these emails you should periodically ask them to share the, the links to get your free book or short story or whatever you're using to get people on your mailing list.Kevin Tumlinson: 04:47 Um, if you're not offering something, some top of funnel offer or incentive for authors to get on your mailing list, you need to come up with something. Um, I just talked to an author just now. I won't, I won't reveal who she was. I, she's, she's a little shy, but uh, she has a free novella. I have no a prequel. It wasn't an Avella cause it was like 75,000 words. So it was a full on book. She'll give that book away for free. She sells it, but she also gives it away for free. If you get on her mailing list a, but she created this a bonus content that was a, uh, sort of a like almost like, uh, an espionage case study kind of thing. Um, and uh, she offered that as a sort of, I'm sorry to her list for not having emailed him for a bit.Kevin Tumlinson: 05:35 And I, I told her to, to package that and offer that as an incentive for people to just get on the list in the first place. That's a great resource. So if you, if you could pull together a little things like that, just content people can't get anywhere else. Exclusive content for being on your mailing list that is attractive to a lot of readers. And, uh, it's also going to pull in the kind of readers that you want, the readers who are interested in this, this topic that you cover. You know, whatever your genre happens to be, um, who are willing to take an action, uh, which makes them much more likely to take the action of buying a book when you have one to promote to them. Now, um, email your list regularly, once a month at least. Um, and tell them it's perfectly okay with you if they share the links to get the free downloads.Kevin Tumlinson: 06:33 Say, ah, look, I am trying to reach as many readers as possible. You know, this is my dream. You can help me achieve my dream. If you share this link with everyone you know, everyone you think would be interested in reading, um, my kind of books and uh, and just do that every now and then. This is a, this should become a, a regular part of your author diet. Uh, you are going to go out and ask your readership and your platform to share, um, ways to get on your mailing list. The mailing list is where the money's at. It always will be. I'm convinced of this. It always has been for sure. So you want to nurture the mailing list before you try anything else. If you're, if you want to advertise and you're not making a lot of sales, I would advise you to advertise Facebook ads or otherwise.Kevin Tumlinson: 07:30 Um, well the focus on growing your mailing list rather than focusing on sales. Now Amazon's a little different. Uh, ams, the, you know, it's all internal. Um, I have my own opinions about Amazon ads, um, and uh, sort of the toll to play an idea. But um, you can do the same thing on Amazon ads. You can have a book that is, uh, geared towards, you know, for example, this author is pretty cool. This book is actually geared towards enticing people to get interested in the rest of her series. Um, I would heavily laden that with, um, you know, calls to action to get on her mailing list. Definitely a CTA to read through in the next book in the series. Definitely want that. But I would make sure that the call to action to get on the mailing list is front and center and then the Freebie that they get at that point should be like that bonus material or something that they can't get anywhere else.Kevin Tumlinson: 08:30 Cause what you don't want is for the author or for the readers to feel cheated to find out that they could have gotten this book. They just spent, you know, a couple of bucks on for free if they had gotten on your mailing list. So instead you're advertising this prequel or the first book in your series or whatever. Uh, definitely trying to promote, read through, but also trying, pushing, uh, to get people on your mailing list. Once they're on your mailing list, you get a whole lot of other options. Uh, you nurture that list in, you'll go far. So, um, so that is part of this ask. Um, you should also ask, asking is always this to me, it's a magical tool. Ask your readers how things are going, how are the, how, how are you liking the books? Take that feedback and learn from it.Kevin Tumlinson: 09:28 So if someone says to you, you know, I like the books, but there's a lot of typos. All right, well there's an area to focus on. You got to get better at editing. I like your books with the covers stink or I like your books. I really love the covers. You might get some positive feedback out of this, which is always good and always motivational. Um, and then, uh, ask you can ask them what you know for ideas. You can say, I'm trying to get more people to uh, to check out my books at the library. Right? Does anyone know any librarians I can talk to? Does anyone know any programs I can be involved in? Um, and you may be able to find this stuff with a Google search, but if you find this stuff through the people you're engaging with it, there's a bond that happens.Kevin Tumlinson: 10:17 So don't be afraid to ask your platform, um, to help you out and frame it that way. You can say, now you're, you should always focus on trying to give more than you get when it comes to your platform. And I'm using platform to encompass emails, social media conferences, you attend, whatever. But uh, you want to try to give more than you receive, right? So give out some free bonus stuff. Give out, you know, make sure you are engaging your, your email list with, uh, tales from wherever. If you're not personally comfortable sharing personal information, then share things about what you're reading, share trips that you're taking chair or not. You don't have to give people insight information about you're going to be out of town during such and such date. But you can come back and share photos, share history that you've learned. If you're a romance writer, share a, you know, funny romantic comedies that you've watched.Kevin Tumlinson: 11:17 Um, you want to share, share, share. You want to get these people to start thinking of you as a friend that they are willing to help. And then you periodically a, asked them to share with as many people as they can. Your link to get a download or whatever. Or, um, you're linked to by a renew, a preorder or buy a new release or something along those lines. And, and be, um, you asked them to buy this, softens that ask, ah, it's not a hard sell if you spent three months prepping to make it right or to even ask for it. Um, so there's an underlying philosophy here. It's something that it's part of, it's one of my sort of principles, right? That, um, you never get anything you'd [inaudible] you're going to, everything you get you have to ask for in one way or another, right?Kevin Tumlinson: 12:16 Even if you didn't intend to ask for it. So the phrase my grandfather used to use is, I never got to think, I didn't ask for, even if it was a punch in the mouth, which I always took to mean, you know, you, you get, you ask for everything you get out of life in one way or another, your reap what you sell, right? If you got punched in the mouth, you probably set that up somehow, even if you didn't sing or do anything to deserve it. You put yourself in these scenario somehow. Right? Um, and maybe that's not true. Maybe someone just randomly ran up and clocked you in the jaw. It, it's been known to happen. Uh, this is not victim blaming. This is personal responsibility, right? This is you deciding you're empowered rather than deciding everything has to happen to you. You, you are deciding, I am make things happen. When you think like that and you're willing to ask for what you want, you increase the odds of getting it.Speaker 4: 13:15 Yeah.Kevin Tumlinson: 13:15 So you may not get it every time, right? You may not actually get what you asked for. You may ask for something and you don't get exactly what you asked for. Uh, but maybe it comes close or maybe it goes off in a different direction and you decide you didn't want that anyway. You know, maybe you could change your mind, but getting used to and getting comfortable with asking, uh, will carry you much further. This is part of a whole bootstrapping idea by the way, that you can use this to promote yourself without having spend money. So that right there should make your ears perk up. So, uh,Speaker 4: 13:56 okay.Kevin Tumlinson: 13:56 There's a couple of concepts at play here and we talk about this often, but your first priority should be to build up your platform as much as possible. Your platform can be defined as, as your reach to a willing audience that that has a higher, that has higher odds of actually going out and purchasing your books. That's going to be your platform. Your mailing list is the biggest component of that platform. The more people you can get on your mailing list, who are sympathetic to you, who are vetted, uh, the better. So your goal there is you want to build a mailing list of people who, uh, who like the type of thing you write and are willing to part with money for it.Speaker 4: 14:38 Yeah.Kevin Tumlinson: 14:38 Which, you know, seems pretty basic and no brainer. And yet nobody, nobody, I'm not going to say that. A lot of authors don't think about it and they don't do what it takes to make happen. Um, so this is all kind of a mindset thing. I'll be honest, it's, it's all, it's all kind of go out and own your author career, right. Be empowered and empowered. People ask for what they want. The idea is to ask, ask, ask and play the numbers game increase your odds every time you ask your odds go up. Right? So that's what marketing is. Marketing is all about increasing the odds that the right person will find your book at the right time and make a purchase. That's what marketing is. Some people spend money to increase those odds. Some people don't. Some people do a mix of both. Um, I do a mix of both.Kevin Tumlinson: 15:37 Uh, but for the largest portion of my career I had, I only did free promotion stuff cause I only had $0 million to spin. So it's not impossible to market your work without money. It's not impossible at all. You, you don't need a budget to market. Uh, but money is uh, in a nice, interesting little reciprocal relationship with time. You are either going to spend time or you are going to spend money. Money is a shortcut. Money means you don't have to spend as much time and you can actually amplify your time with money. But that doesn't make it the end all be all of my marketing resources. That would be, um, your creativity. You know, because even if you have a budget, let's say that you've got $1,000 extra a month, you know, you sell cans or you or blood or, or you have a book income of thousand dollars or you, um, mow lawns on top of your regular job or something, right?Kevin Tumlinson: 16:40 You've just, somehow each month you've cobbled together an extra thousand a month that you can throw into an advertising or rather a PR I, um, marketing budget, I don't want to call it an advertising budget, cause advertising isn't always the right answer. Advertising can be the right answer, but it comes down to how are you going to spend that thousand dollars? What, how do you, how can you most efficiently spend that thousand dollars? And let's just say it's not $1,000. So let's say the best you're able to do each month is an extra hundred dollars. How do you spend it? Well, you know, you can't go do, um, in an elaborate Facebook ad campaign for 100 bucks a month. You can run Facebook ads for 100 bucks a month and you might even see some traction, but it, it, you need to assess, um, how best to apply those funds. If Facebook advertising is going to be the way to go, chances are you're going to need to figure out, um, the best way to funnel traffic from those ads into something that you can use.Kevin Tumlinson: 17:44 I would argue that at that point, the lower your budget, uh, the important it is to focus entirely on your mailing list. And I think that's just, that's just marketing life right there. In fact, with us, we, let's just engrave that in stone. The lower your budget, the more important it is to focus entirely on growing your mailing list rather than on direct sales. Because you can sell to that list over time. Once you have those people captured, you don't have to spend any more money to, to engage with them necessarily. I mean there are, there is some overhead in, you know, the email management systems, lots of tools out there to explore, to help keep the cost down. But in general, if you have a mailing list, you're not going to spend a ton of money, uh, to be able to remain in contact with them.Kevin Tumlinson: 18:38 Um, but you control that list, you control that group. I mean, if it came down to it, I don't advise this, but you could export that list and import it into a special Gmail account and email those people on blind. See, you know, blind copy, right? There's always going to be a way, I'm not always an advisable way, but at least there is a way, right? So, um, that's the, that's our new one of our new commandments. Well, maybe one day, I should write all these down actually, but that's one of our new commandments. This is lower your budget. The more your focus should be on building your mailing list, uh, and asking that list to help promote you to others is how you grow that list beyond having you spend money, right? So if you can only spend 100 bucks a month and you're focusing all, all of it on getting a couple of people on your mailing list here and there, then I'm asking them to go off and be advocates on your behalf.Kevin Tumlinson: 19:39 It's, that's the fastest way to grow without a bunch of overhead. It's a little bit like network marketing that I don't know if anybody in the audience has ever had this experience. I got approached by tons of people who did network marketing, Amway and things like that. I'm not saying I'm not going to pass any judgments on this. Uh, this practice. There are a lot of millionaires out there who built their millions through network marketing. So Kudos to you. Um, it was never quite my bag. However, the principle of it is pretty sound from a marketing perspective. Uh, I just think we take a different, more heartfelt approach than going out and blind recruiting, you know, hundreds of people to do our bidding and be in our, our downline or whatever they call it. Um, and here's how that would work. So you get, you get your readers to download your Freebie, you get on your mailing list and, and maybe they've even gone off and bought a book or two from you.Kevin Tumlinson: 20:43 And if you only have one book, you know, maybe they've bought your book, now you've, uh, you've enticed them to get on your mailing list, you've somewhat vetted them. And if you asked them to go off and share with just, you know, could you just go share with, say, I would always say everyone, you know, but even if it's just two people, if you could just get two people to sign up and get this Freebie, think of two people you like who might like it and enjoy this book or this bonus content or this short story and tell them, give them this link. You can share this email with them. And that's really when you want your emails to be on point, by the way. You want your emails to be, um, focused on, uh, being personable, engaging, asking questions, open loops. We call it, you want people to respond, right?Kevin Tumlinson: 21:36 Uh, but if you, I'm telling you, as you get people on your mailing list, people are, are really kind of wonderful if you ask for help and you frame it that way. Hey, I need your help. Okay, I need a favor. If that favor doesn't cost them any money, then there's a bigger chance that they're going to go ahead and do it. Uh, there's a book and I'm gonna pop over into a web browser real quick and try to remember what the, I know that the title is influence. Um, but I can't remember the author's name right now, so let me look that up. But you want to, you want to get your hands on this book, uh, influence science and practice. Is that it? No, the psychology of persuasion influence the psychology of persuasion. Uh, this is a written by Robert B and I think it's chill, chill, chill.Kevin Tumlinson: 22:31 Deany CIA, l. D. I. N I, um, pick up this book. Read this book, get it on any book. Get it on audible. Uh, wherever you like to, uh, consume your books. Uh, this is a, this is a good one. This is this, there are a lot of ideas in here that are very applicable to authors. One of the ideas was, um, people respond to and ask if you give them a reason, if you say, because, right? So, uh, I think, and I'm, I'm, I may butcher this, this example. So if you read the book and I'm completely off base, forgive me, it's been a bit, um, but they did a test with, um, people in line to use a copier and someone comes along and says, do you mind? Could I get, could I cut in front of you and use the, the copier because I have 10,000 copies to make or I have 10 copies to make.Kevin Tumlinson: 23:30 That's probably closer to what they actually said. Um, so what they found was when people did this and they gave a reason, no matter what that reason was, it, it increased the odds that the person would let them cut. So when you say to someone, um, would you mind sharing this email with everyone? You know, because I'm trying to build up my readership and it would really help me out. Okay. So now they get to be a hero. You're asking them to help you fulfill your dreams. I would even frame it that way if you wanted. I have a dream of being an author. This is the only thing I really want to do with my life. I love writing. I love, I'm so happy that you enjoy my books. Would you help me find new readers by sharing this with as many people as you can think of?Kevin Tumlinson: 24:24 Thank you so much. I'm so very grateful. And so now you're, you're coming to them hat in hand asking them to help you. You've got to get past the ego. But on this, by the way, don't think of this as begging or, or, or anything like that. Asking for charity. Uh, these people agreed to get on your mailing list because they were interested in what you had to say. They're interested in your book. They were interested in your Freebie. They voluntarily got on this list. You asking them to help grow. That list is not charity. It's just to, you know, two people interacting. We do this. The social contract allows us to do this all the time in our personal relationships. Stop thinking of your list as being a bunch of customers and start thinking of them as a bunch of friends of yours and your life is going to change for the better. I promise you start treating everybody on that list like, like you are so thrilled that they're there because you should be everyone on that list. They're more than just numbers. They're more than just the dollars. They represent their living, breathing human beings who care about you and showed it by getting on your list. Nelson, are there deadbeats on lists? Yes. Are there people who aren't going to respond positively no matter what you say or do? Yes. They're not your audience.Kevin Tumlinson: 25:49 They're welcome to leave that list. You have a special club that, uh, that this group belongs to and you want to treat them like that and remind them of it all the time. You are a, you are in and the exclusive, a company of, of wonderful human beings. And, uh, I am so happy you're here. I am your guide in this, in this, uh, community. Uh, but I, you know, I am a also a servant and if you could help me by spreading this around, you would make my dreams come true. People will respond very positively. Um, and the same thing can happen outside of your mailing list. It can happen on your social media, social media circles. But an interesting thing happens on social media. Uh, there's a kind of, uh, it's a little bit like high school. Like if you to say to your friends in high school, I could really use help in math.Kevin Tumlinson: 26:48 Uh, if you went to your friends individually and said that they, they would help you. But if you said that to your group of friends who are all equally trying to impress each other and build their own audiences and, or cliques, uh, you know, and promote themselves at the same time, chances are instead of being helpful and kind, they're going to be cruel and, and hurtful. They're going to make jokes, they're going to make light of it. Or even if they don't go to that extreme [inaudible] sorry about that. Hold on and to clear my throat. Um, even if they don't go to that extreme, they may just rib you and make fun of you a little out of kindness, you know, out of love, quote unquote. Um, just because a, they don't want to openly commit to anything cause they may get approached by others to do it or whatever. So it's the fact that they can be seen when you ask them. I think so you want to ask them more privately in, in an email newsletter is private. It feels like they're getting an email directly from you. So, uh, you can still ask for this stuff with social media and you'll oftentimes you will, you will get some help. But in my experience, it's much better to, uh, to approach your list. One second.Kevin Tumlinson: 28:11 I absolutely hate putting little gaps in there, but when my throat dries out and what can I do, I could edit, not going to do it. Um, anyway, we're coming up on time. Uh, just a couple minutes left. I, uh, I hope that this has been useful to you. Um, this is how I approach everything. And honestly, it's, it's worked so well for me. I, I don't spend much in advertising. Now. I have some promotions coming up that I do. I have spent money on. I have a $2,500 promotion coming up. Um, you know, August. Uh, I spend money on ads, you know, from time to time, not, not a lot, but then, you know, I spend money on BookBub's and I spend money on, uh, the various different, uh, uh, promotion tools. Um, and I, but I do it sort of sparingly and I do it experimentally.Kevin Tumlinson: 29:09 And, uh, I think I can say without a doubt that I get more traction out of, uh, out of this, this type of thing out of asking the more organic way of doing this. And it's more stable. It grows better over time. It does take more time. So don't, don't think this is an overnight kind of thing. Uh, but you can spend tons of money on ads and never see the needle move for sales. I would spend that money. I'd focus. If I were you and I did this, I would focus entirely on a, I'd focus a hundred percent of my efforts on building my list up and then only promoting to my list. Cause if you can get 50,000 people on your list, you know, and they all buy a book, that's great.Kevin Tumlinson: 30:00 So anyway, uh, that's going to do it for this week. I hope you got something out of it. I hope I'm able to give you an episode Friday, but just in case I'm not a, just be aware I'm doing conference stuff. So, uh, reach out if you want to. God bless and I'll see you next time. Hey, how are you doing on money? I know it's a touchy subject, but, uh, I got some that may help you out. See, I'm using an app called acorns and it helps me manage some investing. Uh, put some money back, get a little interest. It's Kinda nice to watch my money grow. So I want to share that with you. Go to kevintumlinson.com/acorns and you'll get some free money. See you there.

In this episode Chrissy interviews award-winning and bestselling author, Kevin Tumlinson. Kevin talks to us about overcoming the stigma of self-publishing and how marketing sophistication and budgets have increased over the last ten years. He gives listeners his top tips for aspiring and established authors. Kevin also chats to us about his own podcast the Wordslinger Podcast and how he started working with Draft2Digital.

Kevin Tumlinson is an award-winning and bestselling thriller author, and host of the Wordslinger Podcast. His thriller series, featuring protagonist Dan Kolter, has won awards and reached top rankings on Amazon and iBooks. Host Patricia McLinn talks with Kevin about not responding to negative comments, engaging with readers, and learning to write for yourself. You can find Kevin on:   *His website, *Facebook and  *Twitter Thanks to DialogMusik for the instrumentals that accompany this podcast.  

Award-winning and best-selling thriller, sci-fi & fantasy author, Kevin Tumlinson stops by the show today! Known as both, "The voice of indie publishing" and "The Wordslinger", I had an absolute blast getting to discuss his multiple book series, podcasting and writing in general. You don't want to miss it! Follow Kevin via his website and don't forget to listen to his show, The Wordslinger Podcast, while you're there! On Amazon: 

With over 15 years in online marketing experience Jonny Andrews has been in digital publishing before Amazon released the Kindle.MENTIONS:Jonny last appeared on the Wordslinger Podcast in Episode 75Pick up a copy of Kevin Tumlinson's newest Dan Kotler archaeological thriller The Girl in the Mayan Tomb - https://books2read.com/mayan-tombCONNECT ONLINE:Website: authorplatformrocket.com Twitter: @Jonny_AndrewsTHIS WEEK’S INDIE PUBLISHING NEWS:Draft2Digital Announces Author Pages and Book Tabs — D2D started 2018 by announcing we were going to focus on beefing up our offering at Books2Read.com, and by paying particular attention to tools that will help with author discoverability. To that end, we just announced our new discoverability tools: D2D Author Pages and D2D Book Tabs. These two new resources will showcase both the author and the author’s work (books that is) to new and existing readers. Think of Author Pages as either your author-themed web presence, if you don’t have an author website, or as your book store for your existing site. Book Tabs are product pages that give readers everything they need to make their book buying decision, including a link that sends them to everywhere your book is sold online. These tools are incredible, and you can learn more about them on the official blog post, now with more video walk-thrus! — http://bit.ly/WPC145-D2DAuthorPagesDigital Manga Overtakes Print — Manga, which no one ever seems to be able to pronounce correctly, is hugely popular worldwide, but particularly in Japan. And for the first time, digital sales of manga have outpaced print sales. Digital sales were up 17.2% from the previous year, versus print sales falling 14.4% over last year’s numbers. What makes this interesting is that manga is currently underserved in digital markets. As the rise in popularity starts to indicate a shift in interest from consumers, this could lead to opportunities for some willing and able digital publishers out there. Notably, Amazon’s Comixology acquisition could lead to its dominance in yet another digital publishing field. — http://bit.ly/WPC145-Digital-MangaNo room for pirates in Switzerland — When you think of Switzerland, you think of pirates. No? You probably should, because internet piracy is huge in Switzerland, and impacts a lot of authors. The Swiss Federal Supreme Court is considering dialing back on its previous 2010 decision, which barred anti-piracy agencies from having access to the IP addresses of file servers used by internet pirates. The original ruling made Switzerland something of a safe harbor for pirates, but it also landed Switzerland on the US government’s watchlist, which is sometimes used to limit commerce with Swiss businesses online. Changes to the Swiss policy, which I’ll admit has some holes (heh), could help crack down on one of the biggest thorns in the sides of authors. — http://bit.ly/WPC145-Switzerland-PiracyTHIS EPISODE OF THE WORDSLINGER PODCAST IS SPONSORED BY:Draft2Digital—Convert, publish, and distribute your book worldwide, with support the whole way. https://draft2digital.com/wordslingerWordslinger Press—This is your chance to start your indie author career right. Pick up books and other products to help you build and grow a successful writing career. Start growing at http://wordslingerpodcast.comSupport this show: Subscribe and share!Support us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/wordslingerpodcastPick something up to read that will be tough to put down—Archeological Thrillers, Science Fiction, YA Fantasy and more, at https://kevintumlinson.com/books ___GOT A QUESTION FOR KEVIN AND HIS GUESTS?CALL 281-809-WORD (9673)

Bryan Cohen is a two-time USA Today bestselling author with over 40 books and 100,000 copies sold. He's also the head copywriter at Best Page Forward, a book description service, and he's the co-host of The Sell More Books Show, a weekly publishing industry news show.MENTIONS:Bryan last appeared on the Wordslinger Podcast in WPC-055 - Ninja Book Descriptions with Bryan CohenPick up a copy of Kevin Tumlinson's newest Dan Kotler archaeological thriller The Girl in the Mayan Tomb - https://books2read.com/mayan-tombCONNECT ONLINE:Website(s):http://www.sellmorebooksshow.comhttp://www.bestpageforward.net/blurbs Twitter handle(s): @bryancohenbooksAmazon Author page: https://www.amazon.com/Bryan-Cohen/e/B004I9WJTY/THIS WEEK’S INDIE PUBLISHING NEWS:No Love Between Audible and Romance Authors — Is Audible ripping off romance authors? Yes. But that’s my opinion. It is, of course, based on the latest information coming to us about Audible’s new subscription package for romance titles. It was hailed as being similar to Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited program, which pays authors for pages read. But where KU pays authors something comparable to the royalty they would have gotten for a sale, Audible’s program is paying only pennies per listen. Compounding that is the fact that the program only pays the author once they’ve reached a $50 threshold, so for many authors it could be YEARS before they see a very meager return on thousands and thousands of listeners downloading their books. So I’m standing firm on this one—Audible is ripping off romance authors. You may feel free to disagree in comments. It’s a free country. Especially if you’re listening to someone’s romance book. https://goodereader.com/blog/indie-author-news/is-audible-romance-ripping-off-authors Uppity author thinks authors should be paid for their work — According to author Philip Pullman, there’s something a bit unbalanced about the fact that profits and margins are increasing in the publishing industry while the share given to the author is diminishing. In a quote from The Guardian, Pullman said, “To allow corporate profits to be so high at a time when author earnings are markedly falling is, apart from anything else, shockingly bad husbandry. It’s perfectly possible to make a good profit and pay a fair return to all of those on whose work, after all, everything else depends. But that’s not happening at the moment.” This would seem a good time to point out that indie authors keep a much bigger share of their royalties. True, they work for it, in terms of marketing and platform building. The disparity between what authors make versus what shareholders and stakeholders make is astounding: About three times what the authors makes for his or her work. My take: The industry has to make a profit, and that’s why this disparity exists. The solution, then, is to excise your career from the meat grinder of traditional publishing as much as you possibly can. If the trad industry can embrace a hybrid model, where the idea is to assist the author in increasing their reach and growing their platform, everyone can win. Agree? Disagree? Answer in the comments. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/mar/05/philip-pullman-calls-for-authors-to-get-fairer-share-of-publisher-profitsBarnes & Noble’s comeback will be a slow burn — BN hasn’t been feeling so well, and the road to recovery is going to be long. Following a lackluster holiday season and a series of unexpected layoffs in February, Barnes & Noble has released details of its “long-term strategic plan.” The idea is to improve customer satisfaction and profitability by going back to book sales as the focus. It looks like they’re finally waking up to the fact that no one buys music or DVDs from Barnes & Noble (or anywhere, really), so those will likely fall out of the offering. They’re putting their money on gifts and stationary. Because that’ll work. This feels an awful lot like “same thing, new name” to me, but I’m hopeful that BN will see the kind of growth it needs. If they do, in fact, start focusing on the customer more and on defunct product offerings less, it could … well, do nothing, honestly. Truthfully, I don’t see any way that will help. But the new prototype stores, which have been rumored to have offerings such as wine bars and restaurants … ok, no, I just don’t see that working either. Maybe it’s time for Barnes & Noble to sell out to Amazon and get it over with. Comment with your take. https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/bookselling/article/76213-no-quick-fix-for-b-n.htmlTHIS EPISODE OF THE WORDSLINGER PODCAST IS SPONSORED BY:Draft2Digital—Convert, publish, and distribute your book worldwide, with support the whole way. https://draft2digital.com/wordslingerWordslinger Press—This is your chance to start your indie author career right. Pick up books and other products to help you build and grow a successful writing career. Start growing at http://wordslingerpodcast.comSupport this show: Subscribe and share!Support us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/wordslingerpodcastPick something up to read that will be tough to put down—Archeological Thrillers, Science Fiction, YA Fantasy and more, at https://kevintumlinson.com/books ___GOT A QUESTION FOR KEVIN AND HIS GUESTS?CALL 281-809-WORD (9673)

Kevin Tumlinson, the self-proclaimed Wordslinger, is at the core of the independent publishing revolution. He is a best-selling and award-winning fiction author writing Sci-Fi and Thrillers, including the Dan Kotler Thrillers. He is a well-known blogger and podcaster. As the host of his own “Wordslinger Podcast” and co-host of three other podcasts, he gets to interview and interact with some of the biggest names in the publishing world.  He is also the director of marketing for a company called Draft 2 Digital, whose goal is to make it as easy as possibly for authors to self publish and distribute their work. D2D offers free services like e-book and print book formatting. You can even use D2D to distribute your books to Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple iBooks, and other stores. Today, Kevin and I talk about why Christians should write and publish. We also discuss living simply, changing genres, and overcoming the imposter syndrome.  You can connect with Kevin and download one his books for free on his website - www.kevintumlinson.com You can find Kevin's podcast at www.wordslingerpodcast.com  You can also find out about the free services that his company, Draft 2 Digital, offers here - www.draft2digital.com

Kevin Tumlinson, the self-proclaimed Wordslinger, is at the core of the independent publishing revolution. He is a best-selling and award-winning fiction author writing Sci-Fi and Thrillers, including the Dan Kotler Thrillers. He is a well-known blogger and podcaster. As the host of his own “Wordslinger Podcast” and co-host of three other podcasts, he gets to interview and interact with some of the biggest names in the publishing world.  He is also the director of marketing for a company called Draft 2 Digital, whose goal is to make it as easy as possibly for authors to self publish and distribute their work. D2D offers free services like e-book and print book formatting. You can even use D2D to distribute your books to Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple iBooks, and other stores. Today, Kevin and I talk about why Christians should write and publish. We also discuss living simply, changing genres, and overcoming the imposter syndrome.  You can connect with Kevin and download one his books for free on his website - www.kevintumlinson.com You can find Kevin’s podcast at www.wordslingerpodcast.com  You can also find out about the free services that his company, Draft 2 Digital, offers here - www.draft2digital.com

In this interview with Kevin Tumlinson, we are talking about what will help you increase your sales rank on Amazon. In other words, sell more ebooks on Kindle. If you are interested in self publishing your books, this is a MUST listen (or read) to see how you can boost your Amazon sales! See the show notes on Create if Writing for images and more! Why isn't my book selling? I've spent the time to write it. I got a great cover. I told my launch team. And...barely a blip on the radar. This is all too common! You're not alone if you have experience this! Today author and podcaster Kevin Tumlinson joined me to give feedback on three of my community members' books on Amazon. We talk about what they're doing right and what they could improve to better their sales rank on Amazon. Connect with Kevin Tumlinson on his site, listen to the Wordslinger Podcast, or check out Draft2Digital! (

Kevin Tumlinson is a bestselling and award-winning thriller author, Host of the Wordslinger Podcast, and Director of Marketing for Draft2Digital. He is known as "the Voice of Indie Publishing," appearing on hundreds of podcasts and YouTube channels, and at conferences worldwide, speaking about independent self publishing as a career and a community. CONNECT ONLINE: Website(s): https://kevintumlinson.com  Facebook: kevin.tumlinson Twitter: @kevintumlinson Amazon Author page: https://www.amazon.com/Kevin-Tumlinson/e/B007POXGEG/ MENTIONS: Indie Bookfest: http://indiebookconvention.com/ NINC: https://ninc.com/conferences/ninc-conference-2017/ Indie Palooza: http://www.houstonwritersguild.org/indiepalooza_2017/ ___ GOT A QUESTION FOR KEVIN AND HIS GUESTS? CALL 281-809-WORD (9673)

Committing to one genre as a writer may work for some, but not for all writers. In fact, sometimes exploring other genres can give you the opportunity to test your limits and tap into the market in a new way. Today’s guest of Author Platform Rocket, Kevin Tumlinson, took the the creative leap when he pivoted from writing sci-fi to thriller. Kevin Tumlinson is a bestselling author, blogger, and host of the Wordslinger Podcast. Tune-in as Kevin breaks down the reasons for his creative pivot and how his “failure” to perform in one genre resulted in success in another. Last episode was about knowing when to quit; today you’ll hear how quitting (a genre) resulted in a WIN for Kevin Tumlinson. Today’s guest is Kevin Tumlinson Jonny and Kevin will talk about the concept of quitting, failure, and pivoting Kevin had a massive pivot with 40 books out in the market Kevin started as a sci-fi writer His first series, Citadel, launched in 2008 He had a nice following, but he couldn’t crack the income code Kevin was doing a podcast with Nick Thacker when Nick challenged him to write a thriller Kevin took the dare, wrote a thriller, and it was a big hit! It earned bestseller status on Amazon The weirdest thing is that out of the 40+ books Kevin’s written, his thrillers got the most attention and success Kevin invested a lot of time into writing sci-fi, but he knew he had to make a compromise Writing these thrillers opened his eyes to the many, creative different ideas he had put aside “It changed my perspective in my career” He turned down Jonny’s offer to ghostwrite for romance – because he wanted to focus on his sci-fi writing He did not leap into a ‘selling-trend’ just because It’s important for authors to make sure their writing is IN LINE with who they are Writing romance didn’t feel right for Kevin Kevin’s criteria for switching genres: Write something people will read Make sure the story fits the readers Look to see if authors made money in that genre Assess whether or not you can keep up writing that particular genre Can you scale? Kevin went to The Nebula Awards in Pittsburgh and came to the realization that he just didn’t like it there He realized he had outgrown science fiction If you’re questioning the genre you’re in, think about pivoting Kevin shares how in Neil Gaiman’s speech, he describes his career as a mountain “You have to do the things that are going to move you closer to your actual goals as an author” Connect with Kevin on his personal website and on Draft2Digital End of today’s podcast 3 Key Points: It’s not easy to pivot away from a genre you’ve already invested in; at the same time, don’t hesitate to make that move when you know it’s time to move forward. Be open to the possibilities that are out there.  Do the things that will move you closer to your goals. Resources Mentioned:     Wordslinger Podcast – Kevin’s podcast     Citadel – Kevin’s first sci-fi series     Nick Thacker – Person who dared Kevin to write thriller     The Nebula Awards – Where Kevin realized he really didn’t want to be in sci-fi     Neil Gaiman’s speech – An impactful speech that Kevin heard     Draft2Digital – Kevin’s website

In this episode Arm Cast: Dead Sexy Podcast host Armand Rosamilia chats with Kevin Tumlinson. He's an Award-winning and bestselling author, host of the Wordslinger Podcast, and Director of Marketing for Draft2Digital. Also, hater of pants. This week's episode is sponsored by Subculture Corsets & Clothing

Butterflies of Wisdom is a podcast where we want to share your story. We want to share your knowledge if you have a small business if you are an author or a Doctor, or whatever you are. With a disability or not, we want to share your story to inspire others. To learn more about Butterflies of Wisdom visit http://butterfliesofwisdom.weebly.com/ Be sure to FOLLOW this program https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/wins-women-of-wisdom/id1060801905. To find out more about Challenge Aspen go to https://challengeaspen.org. To see how Win walk and about Ekso go to http://www.bridgingbionics.org/, or email Amanda Boxtel at amanda@bridgingbionics.org.   On Butterflies of Wisdom today, Best-Selling Author, Win C welcomes Kevin Tumlinson. Kevin is a bestselling and award-winning writer of fiction, host of the popular Wordslinger Podcast, and Director of Marketing for Draft2Digital. He has written professionally since he was 12 years old, and has a variety of associated careers, including working in film and television. Find more about Kevin on his website at http://kevintumlinson.com/. To learn more about Win Kelly Charles visit https://wincharles.wix.com/win-charles. To follow Win on Twitter go to @winkellycharles. To support Win on Instagram go to winkcharles. To support Win on Snapchat go to Wcharles422. "Books for Books," you buy Win's books so she can purchase books for school. "Getting through school is a 'win' for her fans and a 'win' for her."Please send feedback to Win by email her at winwwow@gmail.com, or go tohttp://survey.libsyn.com/winwisdom and http://survey.libsyn.com/thebutterfly. To be on the show, please fill out the intake at http://bit.ly/bow2017. Butterflies of Wisdom sponsored by Kittr a new social media tool that is bringing about new ways of posting on Twitter. It's fun, full of free content you can use, helps you schedule at the best times, is easy to use, and it will help you get more followers. Visit Kittr at gokittr.com. This is a 20% off code forwww.gracedbygrit.com. The code will be XOBUTTERFLIES. If you would like to support Butterflies of Wisdom go to https://www.patreon.com/wcharles. If you want to check out what Win’s friend, Dannidoll, is doing (a.k.a. Dannielle) go to https://www.facebook.com/dannidolltheragdollclown/?notif_t=page_invite_accepted¬if_id=1492366163404241. To learn more about Danielle visit http://www.dancanshred.com. To learn about the magic of Siri go to https://www.udemy.com/writing-a-book-using-siri/?utm_campaign=email&utm_source=sendgrid.com&utm_medium=email. If you want to donate Butterflies of Wisdom, please send a PayPal donation to aspenrosearts@gmail.com oraspenwin@gmail.com. Please donate to Challenge Aspen or the Bridging Bionics Foundation. Please send a check in the mail so 100% goes to Bridging Bionics Foundation.    In the Memo section have people write: In honor of Win Charles. Please donate to the charity of your choice thank you in advance, Win.   Send to:   Challenge Aspen PO Box 6639 Snowmass Village, CO 81615 Or donate online at https://challengeaspen.org.   Bridging Bionics Foundation  PO Box 3767 Basalt, CO 81621   Thank you Win