Hi, everyone. We're glad you're here. This is the Three Lesbians and a Pen podcast. Get ready to have your world rocked. As we dive into the wild and sometimes wacky world of self publishing. We are three fabulous bestselling authors. I'm your host, Kimberly Todd with my best friends.

K. C. Luck

and Jamey Moody. 

Join us as we discuss the joys of writing, challenges of self publishing, and anything else that tickles our fancy. 

Hey there. Welcome to episode 13 of the Three Lesbians and a Pen podcast. I'm Kimberly Todd and I'm here with my fabulous friends, KC Luck and Jamey Moody. Today we're talking about advertising, but before we start, how was everyone's week? KC?

It was a good week actually, I am working on the super secret project and it's going very well. I don't want to give you too much about it, but this one takes a lot more preparation in advance. Although I'm definitely a planner and I like to write out everything I want to do in the book at some degree, this one, you have to really be ready and otherwise there's going to be a lot of rewriting.

So I don't want to tip it off too much, but if you haven't figured out from that clue, then, you'll have to find out when it comes out in May. But yeah, that's what I worked on. I'm on chapter five. I'm very excited.

We're supposed to figure it out from that clue.

Yes. The word clue should help.

Okay. Readers.

Oh. 

Well, I had a fab week because, it was my birthday this weekend. Thank you, and let me tell you, when you get to a certain age, presents don't mean anything. It's a really nice to get cards, texts. And I even got a few phone calls from friends that I hadn't talked to in a long time.

It was just so nice. And then, my siblings did a little, birthday party for me, just the three of us. And that was really fun because, my sister had, a bunch of birthday cards from the little kids, from her little grandkids, which were really cute. And then she made me one of my favorite cakes. So it was nice to be special.

You are special.

Oh, thank you. How about you, Kimberly?

Yeah, I had a good weekend. I cooked dinner and we had friends over, which we haven't seen in almost a year. So that was so much fun. And then, I am trying to organize my many stickies and continue to streamline my writing process for my newest book. So I've been talking to myself a lot.

I know, I wonder how many sticky pads you go through for, let's, I

Sticky notes.

one novel. Yeah. A whole pad or two of sticky notes. 

Many, many, many.

See, I do everything online. Everything is in a document somewhere. Keeping track of the documents can be hard sometimes, but I definitely write it there.

I've got a little notebook that I have a few notes in, but I'm like you, mine are online, usually in the document that I'm writing. 

Do we have any feedback from anyone this week? Any emails or...

We did, Julie emailed us and, the question was about ads. If you noticed them on Amazon, Facebook or wherever, and she said she wasn't exactly sure what an ad looked like. But she finds out about new books. She's on a bunch of author mailing lists, Facebook groups, things like that.

But she shot us a question this week. She said, what's your favorite underappreciated novel? This can be one of your own or someone else's. And I thought about this for a little bit, and I don't know that, necessarily, I have an underappreciated novel. Here's what happens when you write a series. The first book usually is going to do well and it's going to sell more and get more reviews than the books that follow it.

So in my series, the first books will have, several reviews, and then the second one won't have as much. And then the third one won't have as much. So I guess generally speaking, I would say the third books in my series. Then I have one series that has four books. Those might be underappreciated just because they haven't had the read through. Does that happen with y'all?

Definitely happens.

Definitely.

I would have to agree. I think my billionaire series, although it's sold really well. Maybe what I would consider my unappreciated books because yes, they're erotica. A lot of people don't want to read erotica. I get that, but there's intrigue in there too. There's actually a secondary plot aside from them trying to jump in the sack together where they're actually trying to solve mysteries.

So, it's underappreciated. I think people should give it more of a chance instead of just going, well, it's porn. We're not going to read it, you know? So it's like,

Yeah, the thing about mine is the third and that fourth book in that one series, they wrap everything up. And so to me, they're really great because I bring all the other characters back and you get this one big, huge, happy ending and what they're doing now. The third and that fourth book usually have great epilogues in them.

So that's just a clue. Did you get any texts this week, KC?

I did get a text, from Memphis, Tennessee, actually got a couple of texts, but the one I'm gonna talk about is from Memphis, Tennessee, where, she says, I do look at the ads, but not all the time. that makes sense.

Today we're talking about advertising. KC, did you want to start us off?

Yeah. So, we did a marketing episode and you may be thinking, wow, what is the difference between marketing and advertising? And let's clear that up. So when you're marketing, you're basically marketing yourself. You're marketing your brand, who you are as an author, why people should read you. It has something to do with your books, but mostly it's about you, the author.

Whereas advertising is actually about a product. You're advertising a product and we focus therefore on our books. For example, there are lots of different places where you can send in your book and have them send out in a huge email blast. Just focusing on your book has nothing to do with you, the author whatsoever.

That's not what the people see when they read the newsletter. They only see your book cover. So that's an example of how you would focus on advertising.

My advertising, that I do is, mostly the money I spend on it. I'll put it that way. There's some forms of advertising that you don't have to spend money on. I spend most of my money on Amazon. I have not tried Facebook ads yet, but they have become popular I'd say in the last six to 12 months.

I think they went through, a time there when they weren't, doing as well. And so authors kind of went away from them. And then I think maybe they have, adjusted them somewhat and some authors are doing better on Facebook ads than they were before. But I, pay for ads on Amazon.

Okay. Well, I can tell you for Facebook ads real quick here that Facebook ads are difficult. If you're a sapphic author, because when you do Facebook ads, you have to put in targeting and you can put in targeting for a lot of things, but you can't put any targeting in for romance, sapphic authors. So...

Really? Oh, they won't let you be that specific.

There's nothing that specific for people that read that exact genre.

So what you have to do is you have to tell it, you want people that like Kindles and then people who might be LGBTQ, but you can't get right down to lesbian. And that's one of the obstacles for Facebook ads.

And see you can on Amazon.

Yes. Amazon is much more focused, but you think about it. Facebook's not necessarily focusing on books. It's a social media site, whereas Amazon ads are specifically for selling products.

 I have a lot of, success with Amazon ads. And I do spend money each month that I think is well worth spending. And also one of the things about Amazon is when people are there, they're looking to buy books, like you said. So you don't know necessarily with Facebook, if they're going to click the ad and then go all the way over to Amazon to buy. Whereas you want to be where the people are going to buy in my mind, at least.

Yes, that's true. It's a two step process. If you're on Facebook, it's two clicks where it's on Amazon. It's one. You want to keep that in mind when you're doing anything when it comes to advertising, you want to keep those clicks down. Get them right to the product. Another place you can advertise like that and what is the one that I do use when I do use an ad is BookBub and BookBub actually puts your ad at the bottom of newsletters.

So if you are subscribed to a certain author and you get a newsletter from BookBub recommending books, it'll give the list of recommendations and at the very bottom is a tiny little place where you'll see an ad. And if your bid is high enough. Then you can get your name and book there. And when I say bid is high enough, that leads us into something else entirely. Does anyone want to explain how bidding works on Amazon? 

One thing we can say, we're not affiliated at all, but, Bryan Cohen, does a whole course, which he has three times a year. It's Author Ad School and Best Page Forward and again, this is just me saying something that I like. We're not affiliated with him, but, I suggest you look into that because that's how I learned. And I think it's a really good course.

Yeah. He gives you tips on how much to bid on, certain books and things like that. Yeah. I use BookBub, more for, my audio books. I don't advertise much on it as far as my eBooks go, but I do advertise my audiobooks there. Because that's about the only place you can advertise your audio books. You can't advertise them on Amazon. I don't really know why, but, anyway, you can on BookBub. And so that's what I use them for. 

Other ways you can advertise, let's see, you can post about your books in multiple groups on social media. So like Facebook for one has a lot of really good groups with a lot of readers in them. If you post on let's say I Heart SapphFic's reader group is a good one. If you post in there about your book, that's a good way to advertise that product.

And readers have told us that they do join those groups and they find a lot of new authors. 

 So it's a good place to be.

And that's free. That's, one of the free ways that you can advertise.

And there's several groups, on Facebook. Yeah. That you can, 

mention your books then, and your readers will do the same. They'll mention 'em in those groups for you or, or share them.

 I try every once in a while to Google and try to find, websites to try to buy ads on and I definitely do, The Lesbian Review. 

So I do ads on The Lesbian Review. I also do ads. I tried, She Reads Romance. It's not specifically, targeted only for the, LGBTQ community. But they do have an LGBTQ thing that you can, do ads on so you can put an ad on their homepage and then also be part of their newsletter. 

So that was cool. And a couple other ones. Each, launch. I try to pick one new website or place that I've seen. And see how it does, if I can.

Written Word Media is another place. They have, all kinds of promotions that you could buy. If you've heard of, Free Booksy is one of 'em. They email out a big old list of free books every day, and, you could buy a spot there, the Fussy Librarian, Red Feather Romance. I do those occasionally, but you could just go to Written Word Media and just look at all the different promos they have.

And they're, various priced, so you can go, cheap or however big you want your budget to go. They have, all kinds of different options.

One I'm just thinking of now is doing live readings. 

We used to do those a lot, right? Rita Potter's doing it pretty regularly now. 

Oh, she is 

On Facebook or?

Everyone other than Kimberly, who does not read, 

No, never, never, ever.

I remember reading live for you one.

You did. Thank you, friend.

But, anyway, so yeah, if you want to go onto your own Facebook page or Facebook profile and do a live reading, that's a good way to promote that book. People can really get a good idea of what it's about when you actually do that. So very effective way to promote that product.

Mm hmm.

And then the other one that you have talked about in the past, was having authors include your book in their newsletter.

Mm hmm. Mm hmm.

And you guys were gracious to do that for V.A.M.P. Book 4, so thank 

you. 

hmm. 

Another thing you can do is join different readers challenges like Uh, I Heart SapphFic does as well as Jae. If you get in one of those and your book is one of them that they select, let's say I Heart SapphFic will do one, they'll have two different categories a week.

And, if they choose your book in a certain category, then what I do is I go in their Facebook group, and I do a giveaway for that book for that week. And I'll just ask some funny little question for example, last week, enemies to lovers was one of the, categories and my book, 

Corey Sloan is Swearing because they're the enemies in that series. Anyway, they are alcohol salesmen. That's one thing they do is they sell spirits. And so I just asked a simple little question. I said if you're taking someone out for the first time, because that's what Corey does in the book, she makes a virgin cocktail for Violet. And I said, what would you make for a woman that you're interested in? And so that got all kinds of responses. It was great. And so then you just, randomly choose one of them and you give your book away. So 

that's fun for the readers and that's fun for me too, because I don't mind giving books away. I love giving books away. I know y'all have done that too, haven't you? 

Oh, yeah. I've given away so many books. Yeah, for sure. 

Yeah, it's a good way to, and it's, you know,

People like it.

Oh yeah. People love it. 

And it doesn't cost you anything. But Jae, same way, you join Jae's, Book Bingo. That's what Jae runs all year long. And if your book gets, chosen for that, I think she does 15 a week. And so that's free advertising.

Yeah. Those are free.

As Leo sings to us in the background,

Hi Leo!

I'm sorry, y'all. He's such a sweetheart, but he just,

He misses his mommy.

You can also put your book in an ad, in the Golden Crown Literary Society's program. So they have their conference every year. They have a program every year. You can put your book in there for a price. Of course, it's not super cheap.

If you go in with some other authors, such as my pod pals, we could always put an ad in there with all three books in the same space and save a little money that way. But that is a place where you can also advertise and get a lot of exposure to readers.

In the same way for marketing, I, give away swag to be, for example, in GCLS, they do a bag that they, they give you goodies from authors, and so that would be marketing, but I do the swag. GCLS. And then, KC and I are gonna attend a, reader's conference in, Portland, called Queers and Quills in May.

I guess it is.

And I am gonna send, stickers and things like that, or bookmarks, things like that, that are swag. It costs you, but then, but that's a way to market yourself. And then hopefully somebody will read your book.

Yeah, I made coasters and I dropped them all around where my mom lives.

There you go. That is sort of advertising. Yeah.

Nice thing about all this advertising we're talking about is the fact that if you end up paying for it, such as Fussy Librarian email blast, or an ad in GCLS's Program, any of that stuff is tax deductible.

So keep that in mind when you're setting up your advertising, you run those ads, Amazon ads. I hope you guys are deducting all that from your taxes. it 

Yeah. Oh yeah. 

Because yeah, it definitely cuts into that profit margin a little bit. So you want to make sure you get the biggest bang you can out of it.

I've been seeing a lot of people and I want to do it eventually. Kickstarter's. Where people are creating, special editions of their book, with unique collectible versions. They might have like custom artwork or the edges are sprayed and things like that.

And then they group them with other things in different tiers to try to promote their book. 

It takes a lot of time to put the packages together and you really need to take time to do it. But that's another thing you can do to market your book and get excitement around it.

Definitely a good one.

Oh, I have one more thing about advertising. You know, what they don't do anymore is launch parties. Launch parties were a great way to kick off if you had a new book coming out and they used to be on Facebook and Instagram and they were kind of fun readers could dial in and you'd have this block of time where you were taking calls or taking texts or taking comments and talking about your book and I don't see it anymore.

You know what? 

I used to see him on Instagram a lot.

Bring it back. Bring it back KC.

I think I will. I think I have a book coming out. Holiday Layover is coming out here at the end of November. Maybe I'll just have a little launch party and we'll just kick back and have a cocktail and talk about what it would be like to be stuck in an airport and fall in love. 

Where do you have your launch parties? Do you do a Facebook 

live?

I would do Facebook Live, I guess. Yeah, I don't know. I'll have to figure it out. Now I've promised, but I'd do it.

You heard, she committed it here. Everyone feel free to write it and ask her when it is.

Yeah,

Yeah

It'll be the day before Thanksgiving. Okay.

It will be on Thanksgiving at 2 PM. So see you there.

Nice. Okay. That's it for me tonight

Okay. So, I think that's it for today. for next week's topic, we're going to be dealing with reviews and other feedback. 

And do we have a question of the week? 

Yeah, so readers, do you write reviews and give feedback? We'd really like to know how many of you out there do that. We see some, but most of the time we just see ratings, so reviews are even more important. Where you actually write in a little bit about why you gave us that five star. And authors, do you read them?

That's the big question. Dun, dun, dun, dun. Do you read your reviews? Yeah. No, I don't recommend it, but we'll talk about it next week.

If you have any questions about advertising, please hit us up, on our social medias or email us or text us.

Thanks everyone for listening, have a good week. 

Yeah, we hope you have a great week. 

Thank you. 

Thanks. Bye 

Thanks for listening. If you'd like to reach out to us, you can contact us by email at contact@threelesbiansandapen.com with the number three spelled out or on Instagram, Facebook and X at Three Lesbians and a Pen using the number three. And finally on our website, at threelesbiansandapen.com, we look forward to hearing from you, see you next week.