The AmWritingFantasy Podcast: Episode 14 — How to Build Your Author Platform

Internationally bestselling author Angela Ford began publishing in 2015 and grew her platform quickly. Discover how she managed to rocket up the indie book list and the essential things you need to build your author platform. Plus, we may have a bit of fun on the way!

Check out Angela Ford's writing at https://angelajford.com/ and her amazing website design for authors at https://www.angelajfordmarketing.com.

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Read the full transcript below. (Please note that it's automatically generated and while the AI is super cool, it isn't perfect. There may be misspellings or incorrect words on occasion).

Intro (9s):
Yeah.

Autumn (12s):
If you're a fantasy author then you've come to the right place. I'm autumn and together with Jesper we've run amwritingfantasy.com between the two of us, we have more than 20 books and our aim is to help you with your writing and marketing in deafness. We are today with Angela Ford who is an international bestselling author and has an amazing author platform and she's going to give us some tips today to help us out. Welcome, Angela, if you could give us a brief introduction and tell us a little bit about your writing and how you got started.

Angela (43s):
All right, well, thank you for having me on. I, wow. I started writing a long time ago and I guess I never really expected to be here, but one of the things that I've found so far with the writing journey is that it just takes the time that it takes. So I guess that would be my number one tip. Um, I think nowadays is really hard when we go online, especially on social media and people are talking in different writing groups about their income and how much they've made, um, from just this month.

Angela (1m 19s):
And it's something like five figures or six figures and it's hard to like look at that and go like, well, I've been writing for a long time and how come I'm not making that amount yet? But as I found out from just from my writer's journey that it just takes some people, it just takes them, they get there instantly and some people, it just takes a long time. So I'm all about the journey and just making sure that everything is set up the way they look that up in order to help you reach your, your writing goals.

Angela (1m 50s):
And so for that, um, I do a couple of different things and I'll share my story. I started writing when I was 12 years old and that was the first time I started writing fantasy yeah, it was really fun. Like I just loved writing and I was home until I had a lot of time on my hands because school didn't take up as much time as it did. Like if I went to public schools. So instead of being in school for like seven and a half hours a day, I did school work for four hours and I tried to be done by noon, so then I could have the rep for that afternoon until they do whatever I like to do, which ended up being writing other things, but mainly writing.

Angela (2m 31s):
And I really was inspired by, um, token of course CS Lewis. Uh, when growing up my dad used to read the Hobbit out loud to me and my sister. And so it was just a lot of fun, like with the whole Blake, the doom and gloom and just like the different fantasy tropes. Like they have the drawers that show up on the doorstep and Bilbo was just resistant to this adventure in the ring that makes him invisible. Like all of those fun things. I just loved how fantasy takes things that you know, don't happen in the natural world.

Angela (3m 6s):
And just all the, the mystery and the magic and makes it come alive. And that really inspired me to write. I was like, I want to write something that's, that's fun, that they take all the impossibilities and makes them into this ridiculous story that we're reading. And that's really where it started. And it was funny because I remember that I started writing the first draft of the four world series, which is more one of my more popular fantasy series is the first one that I publish.

Angela (3m 38s):
And I remember I wrote the first draft of that. And then, um, I kind of switched and I decided to become a musician and then I decided to go off to college and get a real job as they say. That's something that would pay the bills. And I remember like writing just stuck with me. It just stayed with me. And I remember writing, even during my sophomore year of college, I spent a summer and I just wrote a book because I loved writing and it was a great outlet for me. And then, uh, I recall I just stopped writing.

Angela (4m 10s):
Uh, and it was after my laptop was stolen and it had all my work on it and I saved all my work. Blog the actual hard drive with my laptop. So when it was stolen, like everything was gone. And so I just, I just gotta stop because it was at that moment was like, okay, I need to focus on having a real career and having a really good job and I'm going to do something else now. And it was my sisters that really kind of pulled me back or like, Hey, we really want to hear your stories like usual, right again. And so I actually joined a writers' group.

Angela (4m 44s):
Um, it was something like write to a book and a hundred days and I had that daily motivation just encouraging me to write. And I finished the first draft and they very first novel, uh, the five warriors. I remember when I was getting ready to release, cause I knew I wanted to self publish because my main goal was getting my book into the hands of readers as fast as possible. And I didn't work through the process of querying and agent and stuff because I know that that takes time. Like it, it just takes time. And so I was like, I want to make sure I can get this book out quickly, you know, within a few months to these people instead of waiting like a year, year and a half, however long.

Angela (5m 23s):
I remember when I started working on it and I was like, okay, like the first thing that I need to do is start building my platform. I need to create an email list and start growing that. I need a website where people can go and they can sign up to the email list. I need an attractive offer because I don't really have anything to give them. So I need to make sure I have something that's fun or interesting or just why people want to sign up. And then the other thing that I decided to do, I was like, I also need a reason for, um, Robert Walters to the, my work.

Angela (5m 56s):
And so I'm to do newsletter swaps too. And so this was back in 2015 it was kind of before, like the whole like newsletter swap idea was super popular. Um, it was actually like I had just reached out to authors and I said, Hey, like I will feature your book in my knees letter, um, on this day, you know, just help me spread the word about my book. So it was just kind of an interesting little swap there. And for the actual growing my email list, I really didn't know what to do other than just do a $25 Amazon gift card giveaway.

Angela (6m 27s):
So I did that and people signed up for my email list. I was part of the, the contest. I kind of found out afterwards, those might not be the best subscribers or people that want to win a contest. And so, you know, sign up for anything. That's the ideal. But it just all started there with, um, making sure that I had my, my platforms I'm going to give away and I can focus on growing my email list. So that's kind of the, the background. Let's kind of start career at again.

Autumn (6m 59s):
I love the fact that you knew that you needed a plat for somebody. New authors don't like have that knowledge, that savvy attitude. So where did you, how did you know that this is what you needed to be successful? Because I know I actually started publishing in 2012 and um, I didn't do a website, but I, there was so much I didn't know. And at the time if you Googled it, they were like, no advice out there. I always joke it's the wild West days of publishing because I mean, you could literally do anything and probably be successful, but by the time you hit 2015 when you started, you actually really needed to kind of know what you're doing.

Autumn (7m 36s):
You need to know that you needed a good, good cover, that you needed to edit. These things were so important or you would sink to the bottom. So how did you come into the writing game and actually know that and have that much experience and knowledge?

Angela (7m 50s):
Well, it's, it's funny that you asked that. So, like I said, so back in the day I decided to give up writing because you know, lost my laptop, lost on my work, you know, it started whose practice really hard and so I broke focus. Yeah. I was just, I was just struggling with it and I was like, okay, I'll still write, but maybe I'll blog online and if my work is on blind, then you know, it's not going to be deleted. Or if I'm storing something in the cloud, then it's going to be much easier to do if I don't have my laptop or if I'm on any device is going to be easy to retrieve that work without losing it completely.

Angela (8m 25s):
And so I decided to focus on my career and my career was actually in marketing and yeah, so I worked for a company that did development. They did websites and as I was learning, I started at the bottom when I was working my way up. And one of the things they really encouraged me to do is really learn about, really focused on my own personal growth in where I wanted to go. And the more I worked for them, the more I was like, marketing is really interesting. I'm really curious about content marketing and email marketing and all these different things.

Angela (8m 58s):
Like it's fascinating and I really want to do more with that. And so as I was standing, uh, learning about it, I was like, I need to work with entrepreneurs who are publishing books because I want to know the behind the scenes. And so I worked with um, a couple of different authors, especially one entrepreneur, he had a book coming out and it was nonfiction. So I helped them with the research of it. I looked at what he did for his book lodge and he had like a whole beautiful landing page. He had a place for people to go to like see the book, he has a purchase links on there.

Angela (9m 29s):
He had the reviews from other people, he had a way to sign up for email lists, all these sorts of different things. And I was like, Oh wow, we really has it together. And I noticed the one thing that made his review really stand out because he got like something around 25 to 50 reviews, like within the first week I realized was because he had a platform and he already had people on his side that were willing to like read his work. So, um, that was, that really put him ahead and I was like, I'm starting from scratch. I'm not going to have these people right away, so I need to do what he did.

Angela (10m 2s):
I need to build my platform. That's the one I need to do because he already has a platform and he's way ahead of the game, uh, with his book's coming out. And so it was really from past experience and working in the marketing field that I really saw, like this makes a difference between um, breaking your, your launch. It's the whole marketing, making sure you have a thing set up correctly in from the get go. And the other thing when marketing is that it can be a quick process or it can be a slower one.

Angela (10m 34s):
I realized that it would be a lot harder for me to get going if I didn't set those things up right away. And so that's what really helped. That's how I knew how to do it.

Autumn (10m 43s):
That is fantastic. So you saw the power of having that before you even got started. So that is no wonder you were your on top of it. That's a fantastic way of starting out. And so that was when you published your first book. You already had your website, you had a freebie, you had a mailing list. So when you launched your first book, what happened?

Angela (11m 4s):
Well, so lots of great things happen. So I was able to grow my email list, I think from zero to about, it was either 800 or a thousand and that happened in that two month period. Uh, I was able to the book release and it was actually a full-price launch. Um, I did not do any routes. I really want it to make some money from the books. So I believe I released it at four 99. Wow. Yeah. But the thing was, I have a lot of people that were excited about it.

Angela (11m 36s):
I had a lot of friends and family and so they were the people that bought that book. And I know real market is really don't go after your friends or family because they're not your target audience. But that's what I have at the time. So. And so they bought the books. And then one of the other things that I do, which was really big, uh, was I had an actual book release party at my apartment. And so that, yes, and the reason I did that was because like I said earlier, my big goal with, um, doing the indie publishing route was because I wanted to have the physical book to put it in the hands of people when I wanted it fast.

Angela (12m 15s):
Like I want this now when the, when the book came out, like the ebook released online and that was a good seller, was doing just fine. And then, um, I had the party and I ordered a bunch of books. I think I'll order it like only ordered like 30 books. Cause I was like, Oh, he'll be fine and stuff. And I had the party was great. Everyone came, everyone bought books. Like everybody bought books. It was crazy. I wasn't expecting it. They were like, I pay $15 for the book. It was wonderful. And they sold me out and then people were like, Oh we'll have like later that we could like Oh yeah I need to pick up a book and stuff.

Angela (12m 48s):
And I was like this is working like for itself. This is wonderful. S I really find it cause I went really well and now like selling 30 paperbacks doesn't seem like a big deal. But back then when you're first starting out like every little bit helps. Like it's like success to be like selling. And so after that like book sales were fine. I wasn't making a ton of mining, but I was making around like I believe it's like 50 to a hundred dollars a month off of it because then again it was full price.

Angela (13m 20s):
And so that actually ended up being something that it wasn't getting as many sales because it was full price and I really wasn't doing anything with am. I did not do advertising, uh, very much. I think I did it like the first like launch week I did some Facebook ads and I may have done some Amazon ads later, but I really didn't know what I was doing with ads and I felt like I really need to like sit down and take an ad. Scores are really learning what to do with ads before I could really utilize them.

Angela (13m 51s):
Um, it just felt like throwing money away. Well not really throwing money away if felt more like I was using that money to give my book's visibility, which might or might not convert to a sale. And so I was okay with spending that money, um, for that week that I spent it because I was like, this is all about visibility. And I need visibility. I meet people to see the cover over and over again and hopefully one day they will actually buy it. That's also one of the things that I learned, um, when I was in the workforce was that the rule of marketing is it takes people about seven times, see something or hear about it before they actually make a purchase.

Angela (14m 26s):
And so lasting your email about that one time about your knee release is great, but you also need to do it again, you know, like couple weeks later, tell tone, Hey, like make sure you got this. Yeah, it's crazy. Even now, uh, I will say that I have my best days for cells when I send a message to my email list and I always think, I'm like, Oh, my email is, they're great. They're my super fans. They have all my books is wonderful. But now every time I said, well, now all of a sudden all these smells are coming out of the blue.

Angela (14m 58s):
And I'm like, Oh, you didn't have it really didn't have it. Oh my gosh, why are you here? Well, like this book has been out for forever. Why are you just now buying it? They started later in the series and that's just the way it was. That's probably it. Like you just never know. And so, uh, I know like there, there are different thoughts when it comes to having an email list. But, uh, for myself I found that it's a, it's a powerful thing and I wouldn't have had that if I hadn't thought to like set up my platform make sure I started building it from day one.

Angela (15m 33s):
So it's a really smart way to go. I think that answer your question, I kind of gave some extra. No, no, but that's, to me it's all very good information because it's just amazing how much I think you've done so well and you've grown so quickly. Like I said, you're an international bestseller and you have how many books on now? You have quite a few. I just release number eight actually 2019 number eight is out. That is an amazing accomplishment.

Angela (16m 4s):
And yeah, and you've sold around the world. You've done amazing with your platform. Your website is very top-notch. It looks beautiful and of course it helps to know that you were actually do how to build a newbie. But for those who are starting out, what's some of really good advice for a new author or even an author who is just their sales, aren't there, what could they do? What should they focus on? Number one, to create a platform? What's the first step that they should do? Yeah, so I think number one, it really helps, um, to focus on making sure you have something to give people when they join your email list.

Angela (16m 41s):
So a lot of people call it a welcome gift or the lead magnet or just kind of whatever you want to call it. But when they, when they go through our website to sign up, am is good to have that sign up for my email list, front and center, maybe at the very top. That's like the number one thing, especially if you're brand new and then give them a preview of your work so they can understand, um, your writing and just kind of leave him hanging or just kind of hook them in with your story. And so for that I actually create it.

Angela (17m 12s):
I used to give away, I think like the first, like one to two chapters. Then my first novel, like that was my, my giveaway for readers. And it worked just fine. It was great. Um, now I actually give away a full short story that's like 9,000 words. Uh, but one of the reasons I recommend doing that is because number one, you're growing your email list, so that's great. And then number two, you can give people a preview of your work, encouraged them to buy your actual book that's out on Amazon or just wherever. It's that you can now encourage people to apply it.

Angela (17m 44s):
And then number three, now that you have people on your list, you can talk to them and you've been, you can build them up to the cell. And so what, what I used to do with my email list is once they joined, you know, I give him the preview a little bit later, I come back and say, Oh, we'll have a quiz on my website. If you want to take it, you can find out which character your mill slide and then read the book, you know, and you can kind of be like, Oh yeah, that, that result was right. Or wool, the characters straight. Um, and those two things really help because people do need those reminders.

Angela (18m 16s):
Like they, they might get the book and download it and then for it to read it and then they get an email from you like, Oh, what'd you do think are with character you like? And they're like, Oh yeah, I need to read that is. So it just helps to really jump in memories. And so that's what I recommend starting out. Um, make sure that you're a jog in their memories and actually having that conversation. Uh, and then the other thing that I suggest doing is if you're really want to make more cells, you might want to think about pricing a little bit. Uh, maybe if you have a, a couple of books out already, maybe start the lower the first one off at a lower price point and then kind of raise the prices on the other ones.

Angela (18m 51s):
Just to bring more people in and get that visibility online. And then the third thing that I recommend doing is just connecting with other authors that I just massive because I feel like I wouldn't be where I am today without having, without knowing what other authors are doing, without having their encouragement and support and accountability. And that's huge. And so just talking to someone else about their journey and what worked for them and just kind of the tips and the tricks that you can also apply to your platform will help tune.

Angela (19m 24s):
And so what is your number one place that you like to network with other authors, if you don't mind sharing that tip of release where you think the best places are to go? Yeah, I actually love Facebook groups and I really don't use Facebook that much anymore. Like I was one of those people that signed up back in the day when Facebook was just for college kids and I was a college kid without the place to be obviously. But now with the groups, it's just great to have those communities just have conversations with.

Angela (19m 54s):
And so a couple of the groups that I've been hanging out in and we're actually read the post and interact with them is am 20 bucks to 20 K that's a big one. And they have am the yearly, uh, seminars or conferences in different parts of the world. And so that's a great place to go to like catch up with other people and learn a lot and get encouraged to actually like publish your book, get it out there, start marketing it because the beginning of the journey you're going to learn so much once you're actually doing it. Uh, and then, um, SPF, I'm self publishing formula by Mark Dawson as another great place.

Angela (20m 29s):
Um, I'm actually taking his ads course and must help me just to really become confident with what I'm doing with that. So now it's not just one visibility is about actually making, but yeah, they'll book me in these online and there, there are tons of good ones. So you just really have to find what works well for you. I've been in somewhere, you know, it was great, but I didn't love the advice and I was like, yeah, I'm just going to leave it because this, this isn't exactly for me, but it just, it just really helped to just hear what other people are doing to be able to ask questions and get advice and people are great.

Angela (21m 1s):
They're willing to talk about it. You get all these free of biases. Wonderful.

Autumn (21m 6s):
True. I mean, how often do you, it's, it's one of the things am I found that recently though. Someone else that, one of my favorite things about authors is compared to other professions in groups and even online, they tend to be so helpful. We know that a reader is going to read more than us. We can't produce enough books to fill a readers to be read list in our lifetimes, even if we wrote every single day. So authors are amazingly supportive. I every time I need to be uplifted, I just go and like talk to, you know, go jump on Twitter, jump on Facebook, say hi to somebody, and you end up networking and talking or just blowing off steam where, uh, my husband's a photographer and it's cut throat.

Autumn (21m 47s):
Don't, don't go on photographer. Thor comes, they will kill you.

Angela (21m 51s):
Yes.

Autumn (21m 52s):
Lethal. If you want to be depressed, go on photographers, little rope and you will feel inadequate. But that is fantastic. Is there any last tips that you want to give to wrap up before we move on?

Angela (22m 5s):
Oh, well my other tip would just be, don't be afraid to get started. What you have to get started because you need to learn. You need to make those mistakes and you need to improve so that the next book you bring out can be even better. And then the third one will be even better. And I just feel like it's a journey as kind of like walking up a staircase. Like every, every time you release a book, you get closer to the top. And that's kind of like a snare that you've accomplished, I guess. Uh, so you just keep going because eventually you're going to get to where you want to be. It just takes time and patience.

Angela (22m 36s):
But you absolutely, you've got to get started and you know, there'll be afraid to reach out for help, but like it's, people are ready to cheer you on. And like you said, there really isn't any competition because, you know, I released my fantasy books. I'm really excited. I tell my advanced review team, you know, I worked so hard, I spent months working on this. They're like, great. I read in one sitting, wonderful, what's next? And I'm like, I don't have anything else. I don't like go here. People that I recommend you go read while you're waiting.

Autumn (23m 8s):
And that is true because yes, I mean that's why we support each other because uh, it takes, even if you're a fast writer, you're talking maybe a month, want to be three months, you've got to do the editing and the artwork and you know, many you let it sit for a little bit. You got to do world-building, especially with fantasy and plotting and characters, especially if you switch. I just recently finished up, um, I'd been writing in one fantasy world. I switched to a new one and that first novella was so hard because it's a world Duke your it was so much to figure out and build um, I was so easy to write the same characters, the same world for six bucks.

Autumn (23m 44s):
You're like, I'm dreaming it. I mean, it was like, you know, I, they're my best friends. It's not out the effort and suddenly it's all new again. And it was harder than I remember the first time around. That's okay. And I agree with you. I mean, if you don't start, so many people want to write and you know, they want perfection, they don't want to do anything until it is perfect. What, you don't even know what you need until you put it out there. And so yeah, it should be edited. It should have a good cover. You should do professional level, but you will learn so much more and you will look back five books from now.

Autumn (24m 16s):
It'd be like, Oh, I just didn't know.

Angela (24m 20s):
I still go, wow. I just didn't know. And now I know. So it's a learning process, but it's wonderful.

Autumn (24m 28s):
It is definitely my passion and it took me awhile to figure that out, but I, there's, I will never stop riding. The internet could crash and we ended up at a post apocalyptic world and I'll still be writing somewhere. That's just who I am. It's how I defined myself.

Angela (24m 44s):
That is wonderful because I feel like that's the spirit of writers. We don't, right? Because we know we're going to make X amount of money off our next book launch. We write because we love it. And I mean, what you said was absolutely perfect. I'm just going to say yes. Yes.

Autumn (25m 0s):
Fantastic. Thank you so much for being here today. Angela and I will put links below the episode to your websites so everyone can check you out. And thank you for the tips. Have you writing

Angela (25m 12s):
thank you.