Novel Marketing

Many authors say reader magnets don’t work anymore. But when done right, a good reader magnet can grow your email list from zero to thousands of subscribers before your first book even launches. In this episode , you’ll hear from author, podcaster, and producer of the Novel Marketing podcast, Laurie Christine, who built an email list of thousands using various reader magnet strategies, all while w...

Do you ever wish you had a team of writing, publishing, or marketing professionals to consult? Do you wish you had an assistant to help with the business and marketing side of writing? What if you could have both for less than the cost of a couple of lattes? In this week’s episode , you’ll hear about the newest additions to the Novel Marketing Patron Toolbox, a growing suite of practical tools des...

Is your writing a hobby or a profession? The answer to that question changes everything. Many authors claim to be professionals but act like hobbyists. They write what they want instead of what readers will pay for. They try to fit a finished book into a genre instead of studying the genre first. They publish without a marketing plan or budget and are shocked by low sales and few reviews. They exp...

If your book isn’t selling, it may not be your writing. It may be your metadata. In this week’s episode of the Novel Marketing Podcast, you’ll hear from Dave Chesson, creator of Publisher Rocket, and learn about the hidden engine behind book sales on Amazon. Even if your book is well-written and professionally edited, Amazon doesn’t read your book. It reads your metadata. And if your metadata is u...

Many authors assume book formatting is complicated, expensive, or something only professionals can handle. In ​this week’s episode​ , I talk with Bryan Canter about why that assumption is outdated, and how tools like Vellum have changed what authors can do. If you’ve ever wondered whether you need to pay a pro or learn to format your book’s interior yourself, this conversation will give you clarit...

American Taxes, pay too little and you go to jail. Pay too much and you lose the money you need to reach more readers with advertising and promotion.  If your records feel like a mess of Amazon deposits, Ingram payments, Kickstarter funds, affiliate income, coaching fees and dozens of random expenses you’re not alone.  In this week’s episode , you’ll hear from a CPA who works specifically with aut...

Do you ever feel like your book is taking forever to write? Maybe you’ve been working on the same manuscript for years, and then you look up and see other authors publishing a book a year, or more. How do they do it? In this week’s episode , I ask Jerry B. Jenkins that very question. He has sold more than 73 million books, including his mega-bestselling Left Behind series, and he breaks down the h...

Most authors begin writing as a solitary pursuit and soon realize they don’t know other writers or industry professionals who can help them grow. So how do you go from a solitary outsider to a connected insider who knows designers, editors, marketers, and more? In this week’s episode , we talk with Dale L. Roberts, an award-winning indie author and host of Self-Publishing with Dale , about how gen...

If you ask a bestselling novelist how long it took to go from aspiring writer to published success, the answer is usually about ten years. One reason it takes so long is that most authors learn about writing in a haphazard way. They read a blog post here, listen to a podcast there, attend a conference where they receive a firehose of information, and then watch YouTube videos hoping to fill in the...

ChatGPT used to be the go-to AI for authors, but it's no longer the best choice for every task. New models like Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, and Grok are outperforming it in specific areas, from creative writing to research to automation. In this week’s episode , you’ll hear from The Nerdy Novelist, Jason Hamilton. We discuss which AI tools work best for your writing, your budget, and your gen...

I am not a big fan of Substack for novelists. Most novelists are better off using the free version of Kit and WordPress. However, Substack is a completely different story for nonfiction authors. If you’re a nonfiction author who wants to grow your platform without juggling five different tech tools, this week’s Novel Marketing episode is for you. In this week’s episode , I talk with screenwriter a...

Hardcover books are back. Beautiful, premium, collector-quality editions are gaining momentum with readers who want books that look and feel special. But how do you know if you should create a premium hardcover edition of your book? In this week’s episode , you’ll hear from author Paul Millerd, who created a luxury edition of his bestselling book. We dig into the strategy, psychology, risks, and r...

Authors talk about “the algorithm” the way the little aliens in Toy Story talk about “the claw.” Does the algorithm randomly choose your book, or is someone else controlling the claw? In this week’s episode , you’ll discover what we know about how Amazon decides which books to show, and how to get your book in front of the readers most likely to love it. In this episode, you’ll learn: How Amazon “...

Lately, I’ve been getting swamped with emails from authors asking about Shopify. Many are losing money and wondering what went wrong and how to fix it. Here’s the truth most authors don’t want to hear: Shopify is usually a bad deal for most authors. In  this week’s episode , you’ll learn ✅ Why Shopify sounds so good but often backfires ✅ The math behind why most authors lose money by using it ✅...

Are you wasting money, time, and paper by using the wrong printer? Before you buy your next printer, make sure it has the features every author needs. The wrong setup can cost you hundreds of dollars a year or, worse, stop working altogether when your Wi-Fi service fails. In this week’s episode , you’ll learn: The critical printer features authors need How to cut your paper use (and clutter) in ha...

Audiobooks have been the fastest-growing segment in publishing for a decade, and for many readers, an audiobook signals a real, human-written book. In fact, audiobook sales have recently outpaced ebook sales! Now is the time to get your book on audio. But where do you even begin? In this week’s episode , audiobook consultant Bryan Canter gives us an overview of the entire process of how ACX (Audio...

Many authors make the mistake of writing a book first and then trying to find readers. This is backwards and rarely works. However, if you follow these three steps, your book will be set up for success. Step #1 : Identify your target reader. Step #2 : Start growing an audience of readers like that person. Step #3 : Launch your book. But how do you find your Timothy? How do you grow your audience?...

The faster you write, the more books you can publish and the more money you can make from your writing. We all type slower than we speak, and if you’re typing and creating a story at the same time, you type even slower. But what if you could regularly produce 50 words or more per minute? You’d be able to write a 120,000-word book in a 40-hour work week! Authors who can write that fast all use dict...

Giving away your hard work for free doesn’t seem to make good business sense. So why do authors give away ebooks for free? What if “free” didn’t kill your revenue, but primed it? In this week’s episode , we’ll dig into the permafree strategy with Dale Roberts, author of Secrets of the Permafree Book . You’ll learn: Where permafree works (and where it flops) How to make Amazon price-match a free bo...

So you wrote a good book, but you can’t seem to get reviews. Do you just throw up your hands? Why do reviews and ratings even matter? Well, the more reviews a book has, the better it will sell and the more reviews it will get. Without the social proof of reviews, readers scroll past your book listing, algorithms ignore you, and sales flatline. So, how do you get more book reviews? In this week’s e...

Most authors either avoid AI or use it badly. Let’s fix that. Authors who learn to use AI find that they have more time to write better books. In this week’s episode , Joanna Penn and I break down where to start, which tools are actually worth using, and how to get useful output instead of bland tasteless, voiceless, AI slop. You’ll learn How to prompt ChatGPT like a coworker The best tools for im...

Every author needs editorial feedback. But not all feedback is good. If you accept every edit, you risk losing your voice and writing something bland. If you ignore all edits, you risk writing something sloppy that readers won’t buy. So how do you know which edits to take and which to toss? In this week’s episode , you’ll learn: 7 “Bewares” to help you sort out good and bad editorial suggestions W...

Most writing conferences teach you how to write a better book or how to pursue a literary agent. But what if you have already written a great book and you need help selling it? Is there a conference for you? Yes! Announcing the 2026 Novel Marketing Conference , a live, in-person event focused on helping you market and sell more books. The 2026 conference is packed with innovations you won’t find a...

If you write picture books, chapter books, or middle-grade fiction, you know the challenge: kids read your books, but adults buy them. So how can you let young readers know about your books? Where can you connect with your readers? By meeting them in person in school classrooms! In this week's episode, award-winning author Becca Wierwille shares how school visits became her best book marketin...

What’s up with ruthless heroes and romantasy? And what if the real reason your book isn’t selling has nothing to do with your writing and everything to do with the zeitgeist ? In this week’s Novel Marketing episode, we’re ​featuring an episode of Author Update​ . We unpack the massive cultural shift that's changing what readers crave. From romantasy's domination to the hunger for noble d...