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Book Brush with Kathleen Sweeney · The Two Authors’ Podcast

• 0:00
  Are you guys using the brand kit in book brush?
• 0:03
  Who's using the brand kit?
• 0:05
  By internet seems to be dipping in the map.
• 0:06
  I didn't hear that.
• 0:12
  Welcome to the two authors podcast, an entertaining chat show
• 0:16
  hosted by bestselling mystery and thriller authors, Douglas Pratt
• 0:20
  and Nicholas Harvey in lively, humorous and informative conversation
• 0:24
  with distinguished guests who share their thoughts and experience
• 0:28
  about forging a successful author career.
• 0:34
  Welcome to this week's show brought to you as always by vellum,
• 0:37
  the most fantabulous, absolute best formatting solution in the galaxy.
• 0:44
  Fantabulous.
• 0:46
  Is there something bigger than the galaxy?
• 0:47
  Because I bet they're better than that, too.
• 0:50
  Infinity and beyond.
• 0:51
  In the infinite, infinite.
• 0:53
  In the infinite.
• 0:54
  You fell down a hole there, didn't you?
• 0:55
  I fell down a hole, yeah.
• 0:58
  [laughter]
• 1:02
  You've been using villain playing with a few things, don't you?
• 1:06
  So here's the deal.
• 1:07
  Why did you deal?
• 1:08
  Sure.
• 1:08
  Here's the deal.
• 1:08
  Let me tell you.
• 1:09
  Let's hear all about it, sir.
• 1:13
  So through some Facebook ads and what have you, there have been a struggle lately as
• 1:17
  everybody knows, but I've got some stuff to work.
• 1:20
  I became concerned that my Norah Summer Series, I did a recover with some mega cool covers
• 1:27
  my cover designer and I came up with the concept for and he knocked it out of the park on and
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  I love them and I did them at the end of last year.
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  But marketing that series has not gone as well as it has in the past and I started getting
• 1:43
  this itch that maybe the covers weren't jiving.
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  I mean, we did a lot of research, spent a lot of time on it before we'd breezed these
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  covers and we thought we'd nailed it.
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  So anyway, I had him make a test cover going in a slightly different vein and he came up
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  with another freaking mega cover for it, right?
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  Just a different kind of vibe and feel.
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  And I tested it for a week and it sounds like, oh my God, testing a cover for a week.
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  So I tested the ebook only.
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  I jump in Vellum, make a copy of my Vellum file for that book so I don't ruin the old
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  one.
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  And I dropped the cover in there.
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  I go into KDP, change the cover on KDP, upload the new Valum so it's in the file as well.
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  And boom, that's it. I tested a cover for a week. And I've just switched it back because
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  the test was basically neutral. It didn't make any difference. So I don't think the cover is the
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  problem. So now I'm moving on and doing some blurb testing. But it was just so easy with Valum,
• 2:36
  man. I just go in there, switch out the cover, upload the file, go on KDP, switch it over.
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  And then to just reverse that, I mean literally on both ends, it was like a less than five
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  minute process.
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  Well, I just put a run released out this last week and I did the same thing.
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  I just updated new landing pages for all my series and so I went through and plop them
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  in.
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  Plop, plop, plop.
• 3:00
  It's so easy.
• 3:02
  Like I just, they make it, honestly, we say it's the best formatting solution in the universe.
• 3:07
  We probably should say it's the easiest formatting solution in the universe.
• 3:09
  Yeah, it certainly is that.
• 3:10
  I mean, it does make it the best, but I think that that is
• 3:14
  That's the really the thing that is so easy to use. It is the bestest
• 3:19
  It is the easiest and it has the best shade of purple
• 3:23
  That's shade of purple and and they're such delightful the best brads to they are the best brads if you're looking for brads
• 3:30
  They're pretty good on the Bradford. Yeah, they're the pretty pretty solid
• 3:33
  So also big thank you of course to all of our patreon subscribers
• 3:36
  And if you guys feel like you're on a joy art show at all or just want to support us,
• 3:41
  we appreciate you just jumping over to patreon.com/thetwoofficepodcast.
• 3:45
  We have tons of extra free stuff.
• 3:48
  We ask every single guest a new question that just doesn't make it on there.
• 3:52
  Some of them can get long and detailed and you're getting some really good bonus stuff
• 3:57
  over there.
• 3:57
  So make sure you check us out.
• 3:59
  Good content.
• 4:00
  Good content.
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  And we have a really cool show today.
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  I'm looking forward to that.
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  I guess today is Kathleen Sweeney of Book Brush.
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  I think everybody knows a book.
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  - Another great product you have been using for years.
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  - Yeah, and we're gonna chat with her shortly,
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  but first we have a listener question
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  from our recent guest, another Kathleen,
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  Kathleen Antrim from--
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  - It's a Kathleen Fest.
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  - It's a Kathleen Fest.
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  Let's listen to Kathleen Antrim.
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  - Kathy Antrim, thank you so much
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  for being on the show recently
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  and being a glutton to serve us up with the question.
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  You're turning the tables as a fellow podcaster
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  who does a far more professional polish job than us.
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  I'm expecting something good from us.
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  - I don't know about that.
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  You guys do a great job.
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  (laughing)
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  - All right, what you got for a question?
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  - Okay, so because I'm nosy,
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  I'd like to know if you feel,
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  sending this out to both of you,
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  that your childhood impacted your decision
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  to become a writer.
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  I wanna know if you were an introvert or an extroverted child.
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  Did you read a lot?
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  Did you have imaginary friends?
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  If you did, I wanna know their names.
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  All right. Yes, I did have an imaginary friend. His name was Sam. He was from Texas.
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  Sam from Texas. Did you live in Texas?
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  Yeah. Nope, I did not. I just figured he needed boots.
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  Sam with boots.
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  Well, it was, I mean, that was seven. I don't know what to tell you. So I didn't have a lot of experience with Texans.
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  Now, yes, I did. I was very imaginative. I wanted to be a writer. That's all I ever wanted to be since I, you know, kind of like you, I was, you said you started at seven.
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  I was probably the same age.
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  I remember writing my first book when I was in fifth grade.
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  I wrote it with a friend of mine and it was terrible.
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  And it was very tropey and full of like cliches.
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  And you talk about some hyperbole,
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  I can really go hyperbolic.
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  So yeah, it's very much a part of me.
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  I was a big reader.
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  I remember sitting and my great-grandmother
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  and my grandfather were big about telling stories.
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  So we'd sit around and just ask them to tell us stories.
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  And so that, you know, stories were always important to me.
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  So Nicholas, I've been a reader on and off like in phases.
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  So as a kid, I did read quite a bit.
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  I've always been very visual.
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  Like life is a movie in my head.
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  Like everything, my thoughts are always movies.
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  There's a lot of visual to it.
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  So I've always played situations out and scenarios out like an
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  imagined situation, have a pretty vivid and strong imagination.
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  So things would play out that way a lot more than I would write them down.
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  I was pretty introverted. I've always been fairly introverted, which I make up for by
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  being quite extrovert in spurts and small doses.
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  Extrovert? I don't know. That's a stress.
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  A little bit. Yeah. I'm happy to curl up in a corner and be alone with my... It's just
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  Cheryl and me as long as we can go scuba diving.
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  Did you have imaginary friends?
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  Yeah, I'd say I did. I didn't have one that I particularly had one companion that was
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  with me at all the times. It was always these people in these scenarios and movies I'd play
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  in my head. So I'd watch something on TV or a movie and I'd put myself in that scenario
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  amongst those characters and then invent some new characters and things like that. That's
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  how my imagination played out.
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  What movies did you put yourself in? I need to know.
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  Probably ones I shouldn't have been watching.
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  Well, I did the same thing. I was just curious. I want to know if yours was as weird as mine.
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  was just night writer. I was like always wanted to have night writer so I was like, yeah.
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  It wasn't Little House on the Prairie for me. All right, Kathy, what have you got?
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  So yeah, I had imaginary friends, Snarky and Hyacin. Snarky would, when my mom would yell at
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  me, Snarky would tell mom off and then I'd get in trouble because we both, I guess, knew that it
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  wasn't really Snarky telling mom off. Yeah, that was great. And I use every night. Like, that's
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  That's how I would put myself to sleep is I would tell myself a story and I'd like you
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  be in the story and I mean a lot of times my bed was a pirate ship or whatever it was
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  and if it was a great story that was juicy then it would become multiple nights and if
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  it was not so great then it was like a one night stand.
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  That was it.
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  Brilliant.
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  Alright.
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  That's awesome.
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  Great question.
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  Thank you so much, Kathleen.
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  Now Doug is going to go talk to Ashley
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  and have Sam give her a good telling all.
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  (laughing)
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  I'm more likely to know how that goes.
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  - Yeah, Mark needs to say Maureen.
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  - Maureen.
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  - Maureen.
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  - Would you please shut up?
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  (laughing)
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  Oh, I really get the trouble.
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  - I bet you would.
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  - I think if Starkey's not nice to talk to mommy that way.
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  (laughing)
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  - All right, great question.
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  Thank you so much, Kathy.
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  - Thank you.
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  Welcome to the show, Kathleen. It's great to have you with us today.
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  Hey, I'm excited to be here.
• 8:59
  Give us a real quick for any of our listeners who don't know quite what Book Brush is,
• 9:03
  kind of what it is, you know, your TLDR kind of thing.
• 9:07
  Sure thing. So we are built as an online platform for authors to use to create their own marketing graphics.
• 9:13
  That's a little short version.
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  The long version is we started in 2019 with a really simple platform and we've added tons
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  of different features and things.
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  So now not just the simple little marketing graphics, but folks can design covers and book
• 9:26
  trailers and all kinds of cool things.
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  And then as we've gone along, we've added some services.
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  So we also do custom covers, a la carte items like we create a lot of Amazon a plus content
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  for authors.
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  They don't want to tackle that and some full service things where we handle some authors
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  entire social media for them.
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  So we kind of run the gamut.
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  We want to be everywhere authors want us to be in that space.
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  It's grown a lot.
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  Yeah, it has.
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  I remember when it came out in 2019 that, yeah, it was kind of a big deal then and now
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  it's just like huge compared to where y'all were.
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  Well, I just chuckled at how simple that was and everybody thought it was cool.
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  And now that's there.
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  That's cool.
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  We'll be that cool.
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  Yeah, we hit 100,000 users in 2024.
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  So that was super exciting.
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  We celebrated over here.
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  That's a big number.
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  That's a big number for a niche software or supplier like you are in the niche market.
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  That's a really large number.
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  That's great.
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  So you do have, obviously, 100,000 authors across probably every genre, I assume, I'm
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  sure.
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  I once helped somebody make a video about a potato cookbook.
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  So I'm telling you, we can do just about anything.
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  How to cook potatoes or a potato cookbook?
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  No, no, no.
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  So I'm doing a live webinar.
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  I do a lot of webinars for author groups.
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  I'm like, well, tell me your book. Lo and behold, it's the potato cookbook, like how
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  to cook potatoes. And so this is now what we're making our simple book trailer about.
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  And luckily I found some photogenic potatoes in Pixabay came to the rescue and we made
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  this book trailer about the potato cookbook. So it wasn't potatoes cooking, it was cooking
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  the potatoes.
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  Were they an Irish author?
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  Idahoan. Idahoan?
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  Oh, that's more American centric would be Idaho.
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  Idahoan, yeah. Irish, yeah. They had a fam in the whole thing. Idahoans always had potatoes
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  is no problem. So I just like the idea that you had to find photogenic potatoes.
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  Well, we don't want to be homely looking. We are trying to find the best looking potatoes
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  we could. What makes a good looking potato? Well, it's in the eyes of the beholder, I think,
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  but I tried to find some that were up for the task. There was a pun in there somewhere because
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  of the eyes that grow in potatoes. All right, we're digressing. Let's go.
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  You also have this backup. You've got 100,000 authors across all these genres, including
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  potatoes. Is there a measurable correlation that you guys are seeing between the quality
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  of an author's marketing visuals and their actual sales performance? And what does that
• 11:51
  tell you?
• 11:52
  We don't see the specific numbers, you know, where the platform that authors are using.
• 11:57
  But a lot of people tell us about if they're not visual or appearing in social media, and
• 12:02
  They keep coming back for more, so there's a need for them.
• 12:05
  And as things are progressing now, we're seeing what the changes in the search is.
• 12:09
  So a lot of people, I don't want to necessarily commit to a percentage, but a certain percentage
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  of people are using AI to search.
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  And if AI doesn't know about you and you're not recognizable, it's harder for AI to recommend
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  you.
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  So even more so.
• 12:21
  Now make sure authors are posting to social media.
• 12:23
  Every post is a signal.
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  So our tools can make that easy.
• 12:26
  You could spend your Sunday afternoon and move on with your life and get all those ready.
• 12:30
  doesn't have to be that full-time job that it feels like.
• 12:33
  Oh, yeah.
• 12:34
  Cause it can be a challenge getting all those posts together and just kind of going
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  to the part that authors don't like.
• 12:41
  No, no, yeah.
• 12:42
  Yeah, a lot.
• 12:43
  Don't a lot.
• 12:44
  Don't it's, uh, you know, it's interesting.
• 12:45
  I've been a subscriber since 2020, I think.
• 12:48
  And so 2019.
• 12:51
  No, I didn't.
• 12:51
  You were slow to the game.
• 12:52
  Yeah.
• 12:53
  Well, I was only just actually starting right in 2019.
• 12:56
  But I use it for the 3D book and ebook stuff and cover reveals and all those templates that
• 13:01
  you have in there because I like to build my own graphics.
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  So you provide this brilliant tool to go in there and get a piece of a key piece that's
• 13:09
  hard for me to make on my own and I get to bring in and it's super.
• 13:14
  But people can go there and do the whole thing.
• 13:16
  I take just a 3D book.
• 13:18
  You can take that same thing and put it in our background.
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  You've got a ton of different backgrounds to choose from.
• 13:23
  Talk about all of that a little bit.
• 13:25
  hit the nail on the head, those 3D book mock-ups are like our most popular thing because that's
• 13:29
  something that's hard to do on your own and it just takes that flat front cover and makes it look
• 13:33
  like magic. As far as the 3D versions, we have over 300 3D versions, so we're talking all different
• 13:39
  kinds of ebooks, phones, physical books, facing all different directions and cool stuff like you
• 13:44
  could put your book in a picture frame and do things like that. But that part's pretty easy to do.
• 13:48
  We have tons of templates. You just bring in that cover. You can edit those, so you personalize them
• 13:53
  if you want. But those are the things here that are built for speed. I think you need
• 13:57
  lots of graphics quickly. We can be your go-to tool. A lot of people call us Canva for authors.
• 14:03
  So Canva's great, but because it's not built specifically for authors, it doesn't have as
• 14:06
  much authory stuff. So when people are looking for all those goodies in their marketing toolbox,
• 14:11
  that's where we can come in.
• 14:13
  Yes. That's all. And so we talk a little bit about what the difference is. What are some
• 14:18
  of the things that you do have? You have always the books. And Canva's kind of grown a little
• 14:21
  bit too. So, but you, as we just discussed, you guys have kind of exploded with all the
• 14:26
  stuff that you all have done because certainly Canva is not running social media for anybody.
• 14:30
  So, no, definitely not. So, the services have branched out because we have a lot of people
• 14:35
  who come into the help desk with questions about the tools and they end up saying,
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  "Can you just do this for me?" You know, what they came here to do was write books and they're
• 14:41
  trying to dabble with those extra things, but some of them they find fun and some of them
• 14:46
  they're like, "No, just handle that." So, we have that cover design tool, but we have lots of people
• 14:50
  who say, "Hey, we'll just hire you for custom covers." And then for the full service social
• 14:55
  media, that's a really fun option, not necessarily for everybody because, you know, it is priced
• 14:59
  a little more because of the full service, but we are posting six days a week. It's a
• 15:03
  mixture of static graphics and reels on Facebook and Instagram and a really great way for authors
• 15:10
  to help stay discoverable, visible out there without having to do it yourself. So you can
• 15:15
  focus on what you want to do, the writing, family, take a nap, whatever.
• 15:19
  Oh, now, that's a good idea.
• 15:21
  I can stuff you all that for a nap.
• 15:23
  Let's jump back to coverage for a little bit,
• 15:25
  because I think that's one of the things
• 15:26
  that we have seen a lot of people make a mistake.
• 15:30
  You may have a great book and you have a terrible cover.
• 15:34
  And genre tropes and cover designs
• 15:36
  are pretty specific.
• 15:39
  So--
• 15:40
  And moving, right?
• 15:41
  And moving, yeah.
• 15:42
  That's a good point.
• 15:43
  So how does an author know when they're following
• 15:45
  the genre formula it formula is smart marketing versus making
• 15:49
  invisible in a crowded shelf full of, you know, if you're looking at domestic
• 15:53
  thrillers and they're all one house, you know, is this the same thing?
• 15:55
  This is always the question.
• 15:57
  You know, you want to stand out enough that you stand out, but you still want to
• 16:01
  fit in, you know, how do you make it so that you fit in, but you still stand out,
• 16:04
  but not so much so you don't fit in, you know, those kind of things.
• 16:07
  It's like the others, but be unique.
• 16:08
  Yes.
• 16:09
  That's exactly what I meant.
• 16:11
  See when you asked earlier, that's how those words don't always work.
• 16:14
  Shoot, I forgot how to talk, but I luckily, I can still write.
• 16:17
  So that's the real truth.
• 16:19
  If you forget out of right, then we're in trouble.
• 16:21
  It's a moving target.
• 16:22
  And so you have to try things.
• 16:23
  The thing to remember too is you could always
• 16:25
  recover the book.
• 16:26
  You can do the first cover.
• 16:28
  And if that misses the marker, I work with a lot of people
• 16:30
  who a few years down the road, because different things
• 16:32
  have changed with the way people are looking at covers.
• 16:34
  They're like, time to rebrand.
• 16:36
  And so they're doing a new cover.
• 16:37
  So don't feel like you can't do that.
• 16:39
  That's also a possibility.
• 16:40
  Based on what you've seen, is there
• 16:42
  something that authors should be doing more or be more focused
• 16:46
  on when they're coming up with their covers right now, I guess is a better question.
• 16:49
  Like I see a lot of really terrible covers.
• 16:53
  I see them brilliant covers that people have done, obviously, but then there's some that
• 16:56
  people are always, "Whoa, what's wrong with my book?"
• 16:57
  And I look at the cover, I'm like, "You made it in paint."
• 17:00
  So...
• 17:01
  Yeah.
• 17:01
  I would definitely suggest look at the top selling books in your genre, take a step back
• 17:05
  and see visually what do they have, you know, the similar kind of text, the similar kind
• 17:09
  of placement, the colors, and make sure that what you're doing is at least somewhat aligned
• 17:13
  to those things.
• 17:14
  you want your own spin on it. And I will say, if it's in your budget to hire a designer,
• 17:19
  you'll probably be happier with the results. That said, we do have a really great tool
• 17:23
  to create your own. And if that's the way a budget-friendly option, that's the way that
• 17:26
  you can get your book into the world, then do that. We have lots of templates and things
• 17:31
  and just kind of a shout out about how to use it. It's formatted to do Amazon KDP and
• 17:36
  Ingram Spark, both paperback and hardcover. So lots of options for folks to design those.
• 17:41
  And we're not hanging you out to dry lots of templates.
• 17:43
  So you can start with a template and think about, okay, what goes where?
• 17:46
  You're not looking at this blank rectangle.
• 17:48
  So choose a template in your genre and then, you know,
• 17:51
  personalize it as much as possible there.
• 17:53
  And a good part is you can save lots of iterations and ask other groups,
• 17:57
  other authors, readers to even vote before you finalize.
• 18:00
  So that might be another option.
• 18:02
  And now a word from this episode sponsor.
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• 18:28
  Now we'll get back to the show. That's a great resource. So go to BookBrush, use the templates
• 18:34
  and what have you, make your own cover, export it.
• 18:37
  One thing I always do is the wall of covers.
• 18:39
  So when I'm working with my cover designer, I get all my comps and as just literally,
• 18:46
  I do a wall of them and I do a row of them because a row on Amazon is how people are
• 18:50
  going to see it, right?
• 18:51
  When they're scrolling, they're going to see it out.
• 18:52
  If they're looking at it advertised on the by-page, it's going to be in a row of other
• 18:56
  book covers.
• 18:57
  So put your book cover in there.
• 18:59
  What does it look like?
• 18:59
  Does it stand out like a sore thumb because it's got the wrong thing on it or the right
• 19:03
  thing on it?
• 19:04
  I think that's a really good acid test.
• 19:06
  So for people that can go to book brush,
• 19:08
  use template system, make your own cover,
• 19:09
  see how it looks against the others.
• 19:11
  - Also, make sure you shrink it down.
• 19:14
  Shrink it down to that thumbnail size.
• 19:16
  Because man, yeah, I've had a book cover before
• 19:18
  that looked beautiful.
• 19:20
  When you went to a thumbnail,
• 19:21
  you couldn't read the title on it.
• 19:22
  And it was like, yeah, it's terrible.
• 19:24
  - That's one of my top tips.
• 19:25
  I'm like, zoom out.
• 19:26
  Here's where the zoom out buttons are.
• 19:28
  And just give yourself a little sanity check.
• 19:31
  That's great for graphics too,
• 19:32
  because a lot of people are looking at them
• 19:33
  on their phone. So zoom out and just double check. It looks like the things you want people
• 19:38
  to see, people are seeing.
• 19:40
  So again about covers. A lot of people have started out, they've had their ebook cover
• 19:44
  for a while, wherever they happen to get it. Now they want to make it into a paperback.
• 19:47
  Can I take my ebook cover into book brush and create my paperback cover from that? Because
• 19:52
  that's a little more complicated once you get to that point.
• 19:55
  It is and it isn't. So it's totally doable and we have a lot of folks who knows where
• 19:59
  they came across their ebook cover. They made it themselves, they got it somewhere. Now
• 20:03
  You're making it in book brush and you're starting from scratch.
• 20:05
  My tip is start with that print wrap.
• 20:08
  If you think you're ever going to want to print wrap, make the print wrap because then
• 20:11
  it flows really nicely.
• 20:12
  You think how you open that book and it makes it like a butterfly look, it will flow.
• 20:17
  Now if you didn't do that, that's okay.
• 20:18
  You're today old, you know that now.
• 20:20
  But you can go back and take that front cover and you'll just put in your trim size and
• 20:25
  so forth and there's a little option, upload front cover.
• 20:28
  Great.
• 20:29
  Bring that in and then you can use the rest of the design tools to design the spine.
• 20:33
  in the back cover and get your blurb.
• 20:35
  And you guys know the color picker,
• 20:37
  the little color picker, color matching thing.
• 20:39
  So that's a great little tool to match your colors.
• 20:41
  - Oh, it's an awesome tool, yes.
• 20:42
  It's amazing. - Yeah.
• 20:44
  I would call it a hidden gem, but we didn't hide it.
• 20:46
  It's right there.
• 20:48
  - People don't realize you can use it though.
• 20:50
  I've been playing with that thing forever.
• 20:51
  Like, oh, it's so much fun.
• 20:52
  - It's just a gem.
• 20:54
  - It's just a gem. - Yeah, yeah.
• 20:55
  It's just a gem. - It's a visible gem.
• 20:56
  That's gonna be my new word.
• 20:57
  This is not a hidden gem.
• 20:59
  - Visible, it's just a gem. - It's a visible gem, cool.
• 21:01
  Let's jump over to talk about the social media
• 21:03
  services that you've started doing a couple of years ago. How does that work? What can
• 21:08
  an author expect? They come to you and say, "I think I need help with my social media.
• 21:13
  What are the levels of options that you have available?"
• 21:16
  So the full service one will be Facebook and Instagram, and you'll just simply make me,
• 21:20
  actually an admin or a manager on your Facebook and Instagram. So we handle everything from
• 21:25
  the design, the caption writing, and then we go in and schedule a post for you. It's
• 21:33
  What kind of things you want on your social media?
• 21:36
  So if you like cats, we will be dropping cats in there if you don't want cats
• 21:39
  You know, so it's got to be an experience on your page. It cannot say buy my book every day
• 21:44
  That's a steal most of our authors have a number of books
• 21:48
  So they'll pick each month we we can meet in person
• 21:50
  But who does that mostly it's email just because we want to fit into your life. Also, you said you're in central
• 21:55
  Central Illinois where he's in Grand Cayman when he's like I come up and see you
• 22:00
  We're welcome to come and see me.
• 22:02
  Yeah, yeah, I'm on the way.
• 22:04
  So, but you know, we'll just do it over Zoom if we need to,
• 22:07
  but most of it's email and they'll pick between
• 22:09
  one and four books for the month.
• 22:11
  And then we come up with all these other kinds of things
• 22:13
  that feature the books.
• 22:14
  So, trope graphics, reader reviews,
• 22:16
  other kinds of engagement posts and stuff.
• 22:18
  And we'll search, this is a great idea for anybody,
• 22:21
  even if you're doing your own.
• 22:22
  Look up that fun like calendar for all the weird days,
• 22:25
  like grilled cheese day,
• 22:27
  just so you know, National Book Lover Day is August 9th.
• 22:30
  So those are great posts that you can use that are bookish or maybe your character is
• 22:34
  always eating pretzels and you want to feature on National Pretzel Day, something about that.
• 22:38
  We've also done the opposite where like a cute little cupcake day and then maybe you write
• 22:42
  thrillers and your character says so-and-so doesn't trust anything that looks this innocent
• 22:47
  and they're eyeballing this little cupcake, you know, so you can do the opposite play
• 22:51
  on those things.
• 22:51
  But those are ways that people who already like your characters or hate your characters,
• 22:56
  or the other can be immersed in that world without just saying, "Buy my book."
• 23:00
  So we kind of create all those different posts and get them rolling.
• 23:03
  So author has a lot more input that first month.
• 23:06
  They review everything.
• 23:07
  Most of the time from there, because this is meant to be not a time suck.
• 23:10
  So we want to take it off your plate.
• 23:12
  So you'll tell us the books and we just rock and roll.
• 23:14
  I had one author email and say she was scrolling social media.
• 23:17
  She saw this cute post and it was one that we did for her and it was her.
• 23:21
  She was so excited like I saw it.
• 23:22
  I loved it and it was mine.
• 23:24
  That's our goal.
• 23:25
  That's very cool.
• 23:27
  That's very cool.
• 23:27
  By the way, on the day of recording this, it is National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day.
• 23:31
  I gotta tell you, Nick, by the way, the other day was National Lasagna Day.
• 23:36
  Yeah, Lasagna Day.
• 23:37
  You got a lot of comments on my Lasagna Day.
• 23:39
  You posted on it.
• 23:39
  Yes.
• 23:40
  And I happened to use that as we were going to my mother's house and she was asking if
• 23:44
  we wanted a lasagna or this other dish.
• 23:46
  And I was like, "Well, it's National Lasagna Day."
• 23:48
  You have to have, you know, I'd like only because, you know, I shared that post with
• 23:51
  her.
• 23:51
  I was like, "Look, it's important."
• 23:53
  So you kind of help you help save me from having whatever the other thing was.
• 23:56
  Yeah, yeah.
• 23:57
  My wife, my wife, my wife, Cheryl and
• 24:02
  our helper, Lee, come up with most of my social media posts stuff.
• 24:06
  And we do a national day.
• 24:07
  We don't do it every day, but we try and pick the fun ones.
• 24:10
  Chocolate chips, pretty good one.
• 24:11
  Lasagna is a good one.
• 24:12
  Chocolate chip, lasagna is a good one.
• 24:14
  Yeah. So yeah, that's a good idea.
• 24:15
  Like shoot, I hate talking to you.
• 24:17
  And it makes it you, you know, your personality.
• 24:19
  So I like it.
• 24:20
  Yeah, that's the key, right?
• 24:21
  is understanding the vibe that the author wants what they're trying to portray. And
• 24:26
  you know, there's a lot of thriller authors that like to put a lot of comedy on there
• 24:30
  on show. Dianne Capri, our friend Diane, she's all about coffee. Anything amusing coffee.
• 24:34
  And there's coffee, yeah.
• 24:35
  Yeah, she's all over it.
• 24:36
  And I think that's, it's also important and you can kind of back this up that, I mean,
• 24:41
  you want to put out who you are, because that's who your readers want to, they want to follow
• 24:45
  that. They want to follow you and they want to know who you're with.
• 24:48
  Your brand, yeah.
• 24:49
  to follow somebody you're pretending to be. So, you know, that's kind of the big kicker
• 24:54
  there. So can we talk a little bit about the reader hub? I think that's an interesting
• 24:57
  concept you guys have got going right now.
• 24:59
  Yes.
• 24:59
  Given this little rundown on kind of what it is and how authors can use it.
• 25:05
  Possibly another hidden gem that's not meant to be hidden.
• 25:09
  So.
• 25:10
  You need a little spot at the top of your page that says hidden gems, not like a big, big
• 25:15
  board.
• 25:16
  Yeah.
• 25:17
  I don't know if you've seen our YouTube channel.
• 25:19
  I have like 700 videos of things I'm trying to mention
• 25:21
  to people, hey, these are not hidden gems.
• 25:23
  I'm just highlighting, here's how to use it,
• 25:25
  those kind of things.
• 25:25
  So, Reader Hub is one of those things
• 25:28
  where you can create graphics,
• 25:30
  just like you would in Book Rush,
• 25:31
  but the flip of the switch is these are
• 25:33
  from a reader perspective.
• 25:34
  And so you're not telling readers
• 25:36
  what you want them to hear or see.
• 25:39
  You're giving, putting words in the mouths of readers
• 25:42
  like this book was five stars.
• 25:43
  I couldn't put this book down.
• 25:45
  So what would a reader say about your book?
• 25:46
  make those graphics, and then you get to create
• 25:49
  your own unique URL in Book Rush.
• 25:51
  So it's like Book Rush, Backslash,
• 25:53
  Reader Hub, Backslash, Amazing Author,
• 25:55
  or whatever your handle is, and then you can share
• 25:57
  that URL with your readers, and all of those graphics
• 26:00
  are there.
• 26:01
  So the idea is then they can easily download those,
• 26:05
  it's words they would say like, "I love this book.
• 26:07
  This book is on my TBR list," whatever,
• 26:09
  and then they're posting them on social media.
• 26:11
  So if you've been thinking about,
• 26:13
  how do I get word of mouth marketing going?
• 26:15
  because you want your readers talking about your books,
• 26:17
  but you can't just ask them to talk about your books.
• 26:19
  Well, you could, but maybe they wouldn't.
• 26:21
  If you give them graphics, how easy is that?
• 26:23
  - They are. - They can go post them.
• 26:24
  And they're the kind of graphics you want
• 26:26
  to showcase your books because you made them.
• 26:29
  So you're kind of in the driver's seat there.
• 26:30
  So I love this idea.
• 26:31
  And it's included on all the paid plans
• 26:33
  you can set up these reader hubs.
• 26:35
  So yeah, I'm glad you asked about that.
• 26:37
  - That's really cool.
• 26:37
  I didn't know about it until we did the prep for the show.
• 26:40
  It's really cool.
• 26:40
  I'm gonna be the first one over there
• 26:43
  after the show looking at it.
• 26:44
  It's a living and breathing thing.
• 26:46
  So when you have new releases in the series,
• 26:48
  you can update those graphics with coming soon
• 26:50
  or can't wait or things like that.
• 26:52
  So we, I don't even know how we came up with that,
• 26:54
  but it exploded.
• 26:55
  I remember chatting about it at one of the 20 books
• 26:58
  with a few authors,
• 26:58
  'cause it was like coming later that November,
• 27:00
  and people were super excited about it.
• 27:03
  - So Kathleen, what do you see with people,
• 27:07
  you're running social media for a lot of people.
• 27:09
  So when they probably arrive as customers,
• 27:11
  you get to see what they have been doing.
• 27:13
  What's one of the biggest mistakes that you see in what people are trying to do with their
• 27:17
  social media content?
• 27:19
  For the most part, it's just inconsistency and not that many posts.
• 27:24
  So they only post when they have a sale or a new release.
• 27:28
  So they're just not showing up.
• 27:30
  The posts they have maybe aren't bad, but they're too infrequent and they're just a
• 27:34
  call to action, a buy my book kind of thing.
• 27:36
  Right.
• 27:37
  So consistency is key.
• 27:39
  Yeah.
• 27:39
  And then a lot of people don't put much about themselves.
• 27:42
  I'm not saying you need to tell them what time you will get groceries and where you'll
• 27:46
  be, but sharing some fun facts about yourself, you know, here and there.
• 27:51
  People like it can still be within the author's space.
• 27:53
  It can be about your writing process or how you start your day or things like that, but
• 27:57
  make it a little more personal because then people feel like they know you and get more
• 28:01
  interested.
• 28:01
  That's what readers want is to know you.
• 28:03
  That's what I tell people all the time, like get their newsletters and everything else.
• 28:06
  What do I talk about?
• 28:07
  Well, just talk about yourself to some extent.
• 28:09
  I mean, like you said, not the details, but Nick does a lot of diving stuff.
• 28:13
  You probably get a lot of feedback from that.
• 28:14
  I do some sailing stuff and those kind of things kind of pop up as interesting.
• 28:19
  Yeah, that's perfect.
• 28:20
  That's not saying I have season tickets to the Dallas Cowboys in row 12.
• 28:24
  And I'll be right there.
• 28:25
  You know, like they can just generally know this is what you like to do.
• 28:28
  I, okay.
• 28:29
  So I have a story and it could have been a scary story, but it actually was a lovely story.
• 28:34
  So I posted on Facebook flying to, we were flying from Miami.
• 28:38
  I think it was to Bon Air and when we were nomadic and I posted on the plane to Bon Air
• 28:44
  for four months looking forward to it.
• 28:45
  We were working down there and then a comment popped.
• 28:50
  I'm on the same plane.
• 28:52
  I'm right behind you.
• 28:54
  Yeah, so not just a reader, but a reader having to be on Facebook at the same time and saw
• 29:00
  the post and said, "And literally Doug, they were in the seat behind you."
• 29:04
  Right behind you.
• 29:05
  That's creepy.
• 29:07
  Yeah.
• 29:07
  This is not thriller music.
• 29:09
  It's coming in and who knows what happens next.
• 29:12
  - Actually, absolutely lovely lady and a husband
• 29:14
  and we've become good friends with them
• 29:16
  'cause they get on Bonnet and we went diving
• 29:18
  with them in all kinds, but it was potentially
• 29:20
  a scary story, yeah.
• 29:21
  - Make a good domestic thriller right there.
• 29:23
  It's a cool, like, you know, we take--
• 29:25
  - Yeah, you can't make this stuff up.
• 29:27
  - Eat up Kirsten Magland's little section of vacations
• 29:31
  that you can ruin.
• 29:31
  - Yeah, yeah, that'd be a Kirsten plot right there.
• 29:34
  So back on the point though, the key is planned, right?
• 29:37
  you know, if you find something like we talked about Diane has her coffee thing, you know,
• 29:41
  and we have different features, finding something that's uniquely you, I think is key. And for
• 29:48
  a lot of authors, they go, "I don't know. I'm not that interesting. I'm writing all the time."
• 29:53
  Everybody's interesting in some way, shape, or form, right? So, and how do you help authors
• 29:58
  find that when you're running their social? So, we meet with them at first and just, you know,
• 30:04
  kind of talk through how much they're comfortable with, what we can share, what's completely
• 30:10
  off limits. Some people will give us a nice little portfolio of candid shots. I love those,
• 30:16
  because then we can even put quotes on top of that. Their face is in the background. It really
• 30:19
  personalizes that. Nothing's cookie cutter here. Everything is on an individual basis. You're working
• 30:25
  directly with me and we have two project managers. So small company with big dreams, there's like six
• 30:30
  and a half of us here. So we all are working together as a team. We don't have billions of...
• 30:35
  Who's the half? We want to know that.
• 30:37
  I know. That was my first thought. And you know what? There's seven people that work while
• 30:43
  there's six because you're the one of them. But the other six people are all going,
• 30:47
  "Wait, am I the half?"
• 30:47
  No, no. They probably all, all, six of those seven know which one's the half.
• 30:53
  They don't get on camera. I'll tell you that.
• 30:57
  Well, you know, it ends and flows, but you know, we don't have a huge huge
• 31:02
  a gamut of staff that you're lost in the cracks at all.
• 31:05
  I think that's great.
• 31:06
  I think that let's let's kind of talk a little bit.
• 31:07
  Yeah, you guys keep doing more and more stuff for authors, which kind of blows me away.
• 31:11
  But you also ran a bookmark on the, how are you going to say it?
• 31:15
  Bookmark on bookmark.
• 31:17
  Yeah.
• 31:18
  Yeah.
• 31:19
  So it was like a virtual conference for book rush members.
• 31:22
  I got some emails about it.
• 31:23
  I didn't get a chance to go to it, but you also had an agent his
• 31:26
  sessions alongside some of the marketing sessions.
• 31:28
  This year we didn't.
• 31:30
  We did try that the first time, but so this was our fourth annual book mark on and it's
• 31:35
  a three day conference.
• 31:36
  So the cool thing is that it's a private conference for our book brush members.
• 31:40
  So no tickets to buy, no nothing, it's just an extra perk that we want to focus on, you
• 31:44
  know, author education for members.
• 31:47
  And I love that we didn't have to track down selling tickets and things like that.
• 31:50
  The first year we did do pitch sessions and people were hopping in and out and missing
• 31:54
  things and it was kind of a bummer. So for our sanity and for the happiness of everyone
• 31:59
  we decided not to offer that. But the first one in 23 we did do that.
• 32:04
  So when you, I guess my question was really going to be like, how does that, having dealt
• 32:09
  with the pitch side of it and everything else, how did you think that that told you where
• 32:13
  indie publishing is going simultaneously? Well, I just doubled all my words like that.
• 32:20
  like I couldn't even talk.
• 32:21
  We talked about this, you cursed me already Kathleen.
• 32:24
  So, okay, she's off the show.
• 32:28
  - Rewind a little bit and let's try that again.
• 32:29
  What does it tell you about where indie author,
• 32:31
  indie publishing is heading that authors are simultaneously
• 32:34
  wanting to pitch agents and learn to market themselves
• 32:37
  independently?
• 32:38
  - I guess what it told us it was too much on your plate
• 32:40
  for one conference.
• 32:41
  So that's why we didn't do that.
• 32:43
  You know, we, and you know, as a company,
• 32:45
  we go to conferences sometimes,
• 32:47
  but we try to not go to the ones where authors are also
• 32:49
  meeting readers because it's hard for authors to switch gears between an educational setting
• 32:54
  and also meeting their readers.
• 32:55
  So we only go to the ones that are just on the business side of being an author.
• 33:00
  So that's what we had bookmark on focus, like on the marketing, not the writing side, but
• 33:06
  more of all the other things and keep that in one space.
• 33:08
  And it's not all just tools about using book brush.
• 33:11
  There was a speaker about audiobooks and somebody that was curating these really cool
• 33:14
  book boxes and things like that. But even if somebody came away with just one or two
• 33:20
  ideas that they were going to implement, that's awesome. You know, I know it's probably information
• 33:24
  overload, 15 sessions in three days, but it is all recorded and people can watch those
• 33:29
  later too. But so I guess I don't know for sure where that's headed, but just lots of
• 33:32
  different things that we want to offer for authors.
• 33:34
  It's a great benefit for others. A lot of authors who aren't to a point where they feel
• 33:38
  like they can go to conferences. So a virtual conference like this and included in the package
• 33:45
  deal basically is a quite a deal that you could really keep learning. I think that's
• 33:50
  the biggest thing we often forget to do is keep learning what we're doing.
• 33:54
  And it's super comfortable. You don't have to worry about who to sit by and the travel
• 33:59
  expenses were pet friendly. All those things work out really well.
• 34:03
  I don't have to wear pants.
• 34:05
  I was going to say clothing optional.
• 34:07
  Yeah.
• 34:08
  Which is found upon a nink Doug discovered.
• 34:11
  Well, it depends on who you are.
• 34:12
  Let's be honest.
• 34:13
  Nobody wants to see this.
• 34:18
  And now a word from this episode sponsor.
• 34:21
  Hello, I'm Jamie Davis, show manager for author nation.
• 34:24
  The conference that's coming up in just over a month.
• 34:27
  We're prepping some amazing events and education for you there.
• 34:30
  So you don't want to miss out.
• 34:32
  If you're not going yet, you probably should get your ticket soon.
• 34:35
  Speaking of missing out, what's the Avid Reader's favorite dessert?
• 34:40
  It's a chocolate chip bookie.
• 34:42
  And now let's get back to the show.
• 34:45
  Well, another thing I was just thinking about, sorry to jump around, but
• 34:48
  thinking about branding is also, I think one thing people often overlook is
• 34:54
  individual branding is matching that across all the places.
• 34:58
  And that's something you can really accomplish in BookBrush, whether using your services
• 35:03
  or doing it yourself.
• 35:04
  And it's, you know, your banner in your newsletter, your website look, your social media posts.
• 35:11
  Well, your Amazon ads, your BookBubs, all those have different sizes and looks too, right?
• 35:16
  Different sizes, but you can also make them cohesive with your author brand.
• 35:20
  Now I'm going to put you both on the spot.
• 35:22
  Are you guys using the brand kit in BookBrush?
• 35:25
  Who's using the brand kit?
• 35:27
  By internet seems to be dipping in the map. I didn't hear that.
• 35:30
  (laughing)
• 35:32
  Son of a biscuit. Okay, well good thing I'm here to explain this.
• 35:35
  What? What? What? What?
• 35:36
  (laughing)
• 35:38
  But for those who don't use it, Kathleen, perhaps you could explain.
• 35:41
  (laughing)
• 35:42
  All right, so this afternoon, what y'all can go do?
• 35:45
  There is a brand kit that you can fill out, and it's on the home page in the upper left corner.
• 35:50
  You go in and you put in your brand kit colors and your preferred fonts.
• 35:54
  you can make three different ones in case you have different pen names or different,
• 35:57
  even same pen name, but books with different kind of color codes and things like that.
• 36:01
  But here's the cool thing. When you fill out brand kit one and put in your preferred font,
• 36:05
  guess what? That's your default font on every text box you add forevermore until you change
• 36:10
  it again. No more of that Fahala one. So we made the default font Fahala one, which is
• 36:16
  fine. It works for everybody. It's the most boring font because it works for everybody.
• 36:20
  So I really want you to have some genre specific font
• 36:23
  that gives off the right vibe.
• 36:25
  - Doug's a big on comic sans, yeah.
• 36:27
  (laughing)
• 36:27
  He's a comic sans kind of guy.
• 36:29
  - No, papyrus, I like papyrus.
• 36:31
  'Cause I mean, if it works for avatar,
• 36:34
  it should work for everybody, right?
• 36:35
  (laughing)
• 36:36
  - Well, if that's your go-to,
• 36:37
  set that as your preferred font,
• 36:39
  but then it's there every time.
• 36:41
  So that should save you time setting those up.
• 36:43
  And then instead of color picker,
• 36:45
  right next to the color,
• 36:47
  there's a little box with two circles.
• 36:49
  When you click that, all of your brand kit colors are right there.
• 36:51
  So there's three brand kits and you can have three colors.
• 36:54
  So we're talking nine colors.
• 36:55
  This is a lock and you just click right there and it changes it.
• 36:58
  So let's see you've got red.
• 36:59
  The chances of you just clicking randomly and getting the right red are very slim.
• 37:03
  This will always give you the right red in all of anywhere you're adding color.
• 37:07
  So you know, text, background, borders, anything in there.
• 37:11
  So I guess, you know, we kind of got on a tangent with branding, but we want you to
• 37:14
  make sure that you're giving things a polished look.
• 37:16
  So we put in this little brand kit to make that easier.
• 37:19
  So once you take a few minutes to fill it out,
• 37:21
  then it's in there for you to access,
• 37:23
  and then those preferred fonts pop up
• 37:25
  and just makes your life easier.
• 37:27
  - I'm getting a list of things I gotta do
• 37:28
  when we get out there. - I'm gonna say,
• 37:29
  I'm gonna be like, all right, well,
• 37:30
  I gotta go back and do all this stuff.
• 37:33
  - Kathleen's giving me homework.
• 37:35
  (laughing)
• 37:36
  - We do tend to say do what we say,
• 37:38
  not what we do kind of a thing.
• 37:39
  So, 'cause we're bad at, all right,
• 37:41
  let's talk about something that is such a hot topic right now,
• 37:44
  but like AI image generation
• 37:46
  really better, really fast. So how is that changing what book brush is offering? And
• 37:52
  are you seeing authors use AI generated elements in ways that actually help them or hurt them?
• 37:57
  All right, I'm so glad you asked about this. So first off, there's a lot of questions about
• 38:01
  AI and our background search sources from Pixabay. And so we can't control what Pixabay
• 38:07
  has out there. But we are able to at least note, so Pixabay has something identified as
• 38:11
  AI, there will be a little AI note when you do the background search. For example, if
• 38:16
  you want to test this out, search sci-fi. You'll see a lot more pop up than you would
• 38:19
  if you were searching flowers. And then like one is that I see a lot is like a
• 38:23
  Morgan Freeman AI. He's clearly not real alien dude. So that will be a clear
• 38:28
  indicator. But if you're conscious about AI, you can see those kind of things in
• 38:32
  there and then do as in what you want. The second thing I want to mention is in
• 38:35
  August we recently launched a brand new tool. I don't even know the last time we
• 38:39
  launched a brand new tool. So we have been working hard at this. It is called the
• 38:43
  character and scene creator. And this is a tool built specifically for authors to
• 38:49
  create all those authory scenes in your book. So you can take bits from your
• 38:53
  manuscript, put it in, and it creates the scenes you need, those key scenes to make
• 38:58
  your marketing graphics. And then you just click edit in the custom creator
• 39:02
  and add the text, the extra things, the book cover. It'll also do character
• 39:06
  portraits, character cards, so you can create all those characters in your book
• 39:10
  and objects and artifacts depending, you know, what kind of things you have in
• 39:14
  there. So super cool new tool that we have in Book Brush Land. Totally optional
• 39:20
  for folks but you can do it as an add-on. So am I right in understanding? You can
• 39:24
  take like a page out of your manuscript where it describes the scene and you
• 39:29
  just paste that in and it'll go okay you want this character in this scene. Yep and
• 39:33
  you can put in so it has a lot of extra things to click like the mood, the time of
• 39:37
  day, all those extra things to see. And then there's ways you can pick the type of image.
• 39:42
  If you wanted to be, I would say like painterly or photo realistic or whatever anime. I can't
• 39:48
  remember all the categories, but there are probably like nine different ways the photo
• 39:52
  comes out the graphic. It's so interesting. We've had some beta tester groups and I love
• 39:57
  the sharing part of the beta testing because the things that we get are so wide variety
• 40:02
  from like horse and buggy stuff to futuristic kinds of things.
• 40:06
  So seeing what everybody has been creating,
• 40:08
  just as beta testers, it really gets me excited
• 40:11
  to see what our folks will create with that.
• 40:13
  - And more homework from Kathleen.
• 40:15
  That's the third thing now I have to go.
• 40:18
  (laughing)
• 40:19
  Go check out over a book.
• 40:20
  - I'm gonna keep 'em coming.
• 40:21
  - Yeah, this is brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant.
• 40:24
  That's some really cool tools.
• 40:25
  So when's that actually launching?
• 40:27
  - August 18th is our launch date.
• 40:29
  - Okay, so coming up, good.
• 40:30
  I gotta...
• 40:31
  I'll send you guys the email to register.
• 40:34
  We'll have an email coming out about it too.
• 40:37
  We talked about it a lot at Bookmarcon.
• 40:38
  So that was kind of our first,
• 40:40
  other than the beta testers who have been,
• 40:42
  we have two small beta groups.
• 40:44
  We just brought it forth for the Bookmarcon folks.
• 40:47
  - Yeah, getting consistent characters,
• 40:50
  it's getting better and better.
• 40:51
  And I've kind of found a way, some of it now,
• 40:55
  to produce more consistent character stuff
• 40:58
  with, Chair GPT actually has ended up
• 41:00
  being reasonably good at it.
• 41:02
  It wasn't, but it is better now.
• 41:04
  And then Leonardo is pretty strong
• 41:06
  if you can get a base character thing.
• 41:08
  But it's always tricky.
• 41:10
  It's always tricky.
• 41:11
  So, Kathleen, this has been brilliant.
• 41:13
  Thank you so much for cluing our listeners in
• 41:15
  on all the things that Book Brush do.
• 41:18
  I have a subscription that I use Book Brush all the time,
• 41:20
  and I didn't know about some of this stuff.
• 41:22
  So this has been brilliant. - Oh, so handy, yeah.
• 41:24
  - So we're gonna throw one more question at you.
• 41:26
  We have a wheel of questions.
• 41:27
  We normally save this for the authors,
• 41:29
  But the, and you've been here as an industry guest,
• 41:32
  but we're gonna give you one anyway.
• 41:34
  So give it a spin, Doug.
• 41:36
  - They're fun.
• 41:36
  - Mainly 'cause we like making noise with it.
• 41:39
  - We like to make the noise.
• 41:41
  - That's hard to resist, yeah.
• 41:42
  - It is hard to resist.
• 41:43
  14.99 on Amazon folks, you too can have a wheel you can scan.
• 41:47
  - I use this spinner, the Wheel of Names website,
• 41:49
  and it cheers for you when it lands on the thing.
• 41:53
  I don't have you ever seen that one.
• 41:54
  - No!
• 41:56
  - No, that'd be kind of--
• 41:56
  - You guys, okay, I like your physical spinner,
• 41:58
  But it's wheelofnames.com.
• 42:00
  You get to put in however many things you want.
• 42:02
  So you write in your things and then you hit spin
• 42:05
  and it spins and da da da da da.
• 42:07
  And then when it lands on that, it goes whoo!
• 42:09
  And it cheers for you.
• 42:10
  It's my favorite part.
• 42:11
  - Oh my God.
• 42:13
  Why did you have to tell Doug about that?
• 42:15
  He winches all the time about carrying this rat.
• 42:18
  And I make him carry it everywhere he goes
• 42:20
  whenever we're recording this show.
• 42:22
  And now he's got an excuse to use something else.
• 42:24
  - I'm gonna get me something else
• 42:26
  that doesn't make the sound of it.
• 42:28
  even does a woo.
• 42:28
  Woo.
• 42:29
  That's pretty good.
• 42:30
  There's confetti.
• 42:32
  I don't have confetti.
• 42:33
  And confetti.
• 42:33
  But I can do the woo at the end of the spin, Doug.
• 42:36
  From...
• 42:36
  All right, we're doing it again with the woo.
• 42:38
  Ready?
• 42:39
  This is exciting.
• 42:40
  This is what brings people back, folks.
• 42:42
  This is the riveting kind of shit that we do on the show.
• 42:44
  This is riveting stuff.
• 42:46
  Yeah.
• 42:46
  You could go listen to the creative pin or something like that.
• 42:48
  Talk about industry stuff and the latest news.
• 42:51
  Woo!
• 42:52
  Sorry.
• 42:53
  Don't wait until you've got the news.
• 42:56
  - Right, what did you have for breakfast
• 42:59
  and the question that we got?
• 43:01
  (laughing)
• 43:01
  - Oh, this is the most boring thing.
• 43:03
  I'm usually more fun.
• 43:04
  I'm eating egg whites and turkey bacon
• 43:07
  for the last few weeks
• 43:08
  and I'm telling you, turkey bacon gets a bad rap.
• 43:10
  I thought I wouldn't like it.
• 43:11
  It's delicious.
• 43:12
  I don't know why more people don't eat it.
• 43:14
  - Yes, 'cause you've forgotten what baking tastes like.
• 43:15
  - That's awesome.
• 43:17
  (laughing)
• 43:19
  - At this point, your choice is egg whites
• 43:21
  and turkey bacon.
• 43:21
  You're like, "I guess it's not that bad."
• 43:23
  - I'm gonna keep this up.
• 43:24
  By the time you guys ever see me in person,
• 43:25
  a toothpick from this diet so you just wait. You're already a toothpick. My gosh. Doug,
• 43:30
  what did you have for breakfast? I actually had a cup of coffee and I didn't have any
• 43:33
  bread. So far today I've had eight grapes that I had between the two.
• 43:36
  Coffee and grape.
• 43:39
  Not the grape for lunch. I haven't had lunch yet either so I'm really kind of pushing it today.
• 43:43
  I'm going to be railfan. You see this? This figure is going to look like...
• 43:47
  He's on the eight grape diet. You heard it here first.
• 43:51
  Every time he loses weight I have to buy him a new podcast shirt.
• 43:54
  Yeah, well, I'm plateaued between like this, just like I keep bouncing back and forth now.
• 44:01
  More grapes, Doug. More grapes. All right, Kathleen, thank you so much for joining us.
• 44:07
  And people can find the link to Book Brush in the show notes. When's your bookmark on happening
• 44:15
  next year? It's usually the last weekend of July. This year, we moved it to July 24th through the
• 44:21
  to 26 for the only reason is because the weekend was over July and August and I thought that
• 44:25
  would be a real pain for the marketing because it was going to be July.
• 44:28
  And so depending on how the calendar falls probably that last full weekend in July.
• 44:32
  That's usually when we do it.
• 44:33
  Great.
• 44:33
  So it comes with your subscription to Book Rush.
• 44:35
  All right, Kathleen.
• 44:37
  Thank you so much for joining us.
• 44:38
  Thanks.
• 44:45
  Thank you so much, Kathleen.
• 44:46
  That was a wide education.
• 44:48
  I learned a little bit about Book Rush that I didn't know.
• 44:50
  I've used them.
• 44:52
  I know.
• 44:53
  I'm a subscriber and this is how much of a dumbass I am.
• 44:57
  I didn't realize all these extra, I knew about that they'll do the social media and
• 45:02
  stuff like that.
• 45:02
  I knew about some of the other tools, but there is an expansion of stuff I didn't know
• 45:06
  about the branding thing for one and different stuff like that.
• 45:10
  So it is a tool in the toolbox that I kind of, the subscriptions are really reasonable
• 45:16
  and it's just a go-to.
• 45:18
  they do these videos. Like I know she's like she said she had less tons of videos for so
• 45:24
  if you're if you're a subscriber and you're watching these you're just it's more education
• 45:28
  and if you're just starting out the more you can learn it's gonna be information overload
• 45:32
  but the more you can learn the better you're gonna be in the long run and this this is
• 45:36
  just another tool like you said I mean so I mean I think it's pretty great yeah I'm
• 45:40
  so glad you get to come on and kind of share a little bit about what they're doing and
• 45:43
  gonna remind me to go in there and look at a little bit more so.
• 45:46
  Yep. And we had a great chat with her for the bonus for our Patreon subscribers too.
• 45:51
  Oh yeah. Nice little couple of questions. We kept asking more because she'd answer something on the, oh wait a minute.
• 45:58
  I know.
• 45:59
  Yeah.
• 45:59
  So thank you guys so much. And of course, make sure you big thank you as always to our good friends over at vellum. So if you'll find the vellum link in the show notes or go to try vellum.com/tuauthers to find out more. And you can also find links to book rush.
• 46:16
  in the show notes as well. And also big thanks to you guys on Patreon. And remember, if you
• 46:22
  guys get any benefit out of listening to us or just want to like, you feel sorry for us,
• 46:28
  then you can just jump on over to Patreon. We'll take the sympathy. We will take pity money.
• 46:33
  You want to do it? Pity money. Pity money. So yeah, just jump over at Patreon.com/D2Authers
• 46:40
  podcast. Your kindness helps us cover the cost of bringing the show to you. So until next time,
• 46:45
  be cool to each other.
• 46:47
  Fair wins and follow-ins.
• 46:49
  You've been listening to the Two Authors podcast with Nicholas Harvey and Douglas Pratt. Subscribe
• 46:56
  on your favourite platform for new shows coming every week.
• 46:59
  (upbeat music)