SPA Girls Podcast

This week we’re dealing out the “truthslaps” – in a loving way, of course. Wendy, Cher and Shar discuss ten truths for self-publishers that will help you navigate the choppy waters of a new indie author career. We want to be positive, but also realistic, so we are holding nothing back here. This is a rewarding (but tough) business and it requires patience and persistence. When you’re starting out you’re more than just a writer, you’re launching a small business with a pretty steep learning curve. Fortunately there’s a ton of help out there and here in the SPA is the best place to start!

This week we delved deep into our writing habits from the last ten years, and brainstormed all the ways that we've managed to squeeze an extra 30 minutes of writing out of our days. We're all busy - work, family, other commitments take our time. But even adding just an extra half hour of writing every day can make a big difference to our monthly totals.

It's a trap writers often fall into - the belief that you need several hours of uninterrupted writing time to be able to produce anything worthwhile. It's just not true - even just a half hour can move you significantly forward in your manuscript. Here in the SPA we know that it's about regular, sustained writing over time. 

This show is about being mindful, thinking about where you're spending your time every day, and looking for the loopholes where you're losing precious time you could be using for writing. :)

This week we delved deep into our writing habits from the last ten years, and brainstormed all the ways that we've managed to squeeze an extra 30 minutes of writing out of our days. We're all busy - work, family, other commitments take our time. But even adding just an extra half hour of writing every day can make a big difference to our monthly totals.

It's a trap writers often fall into - the belief that you need several hours of uninterrupted writing time to be able to produce anything worthwhile. It's just not true - even just a half hour can move you significantly forward in your manuscript. Here in the SPA we know that it's about regular, sustained writing over time. 

This show is about being mindful, thinking about where you're spending your time every day, and looking for the loopholes where you're losing precious time you could be using for writing. :)

This week we tackle Christmas. Not literally. I mean we're not going after Santa or anything.

No knocking him to the ground, and sitting on him til he gives us presents.

That would be weird, right? 

No, this week we're talking about what self-published authors should be doing over the Christmas period to promote their books to the hoards of eager Yuletide book buyers. It's a prime book buying time of year, and no one wants to miss out, right? In order to do the best research for our eager listeners, we talked to several other authors (in forums and people we know) for their advice on this topic, as well as using our own experiences. We even discovered a few tips that we didn't know about and are planning to use this year for ourselves! 

If you've been wondering what you should do to promote your books this Christmas, you need to listen to this episode!

This week we tackle Christmas. Not literally. I mean we're not going after Santa or anything.

No knocking him to the ground, and sitting on him til he gives us presents.

That would be weird, right? 

No, this week we're talking about what self-published authors should be doing over the Christmas period to promote their books to the hoards of eager Yuletide book buyers. It's a prime book buying time of year, and no one wants to miss out, right? In order to do the best research for our eager listeners, we talked to several other authors (in forums and people we know) for their advice on this topic, as well as using our own experiences. We even discovered a few tips that we didn't know about and are planning to use this year for ourselves! 

If you've been wondering what you should do to promote your books this Christmas, you need to listen to this episode!

This week we talk to fantasy and young adult author Katie Cross about being a military wife, learning to be a nap-time authorpreneur, and making every moment count. She also gives us some amazing productivity tips for authors who are trying to squeeze their writing career into already busy lives. Katie impressed us right from the start of the interview when she talked about having done some writing before we got on the call. My paraphrasing summary of her words: "It was a choice between going on Facebook for ten minutes, or doing some writing. I decided to do some writing, and managed to get almost a thousand words done in that time."

It's always good to be reminded of the things that we can achieve if we pay a little more attention to what we're doing, and how we choose to spend our time! 

It's a great interview, Katie is hilarious, and we loved chatting to her. (And we're totally impressed by everything she's able to achieve in her day!)

This week we talk to fantasy and young adult author Katie Cross about being a military wife, learning to be a nap-time authorpreneur, and making every moment count. She also gives us some amazing productivity tips for authors who are trying to squeeze their writing career into already busy lives. Katie impressed us right from the start of the interview when she talked about having done some writing before we got on the call. My paraphrasing summary of her words: "It was a choice between going on Facebook for ten minutes, or doing some writing. I decided to do some writing, and managed to get almost a thousand words done in that time."

It's always good to be reminded of the things that we can achieve if we pay a little more attention to what we're doing, and how we choose to spend our time! 

It's a great interview, Katie is hilarious, and we loved chatting to her. (And we're totally impressed by everything she's able to achieve in her day!)

This is a very special episode of the SPA Girls Podcast - our 100th episode! Who'd have thought when we nervously started our first episode that we'd make it this far?? We talk through everything we've learned about self publishing and writing over the last couple of years, give some of the top self publishing tips that we've gleaned, the advice we've been given by our guests, and what's in store for the future of the SPA Girls... Listen in for some laugh-out-loud moments as we celebrate the last 100 episodes of the SPA Girls Podcast. :)

This is a very special episode of the SPA Girls Podcast - our 100th episode! Who'd have thought when we nervously started our first episode that we'd make it this far?? We talk through everything we've learned about self publishing and writing over the last couple of years, give some of the top self publishing tips that we've gleaned, the advice we've been given by our guests, and what's in store for the future of the SPA Girls... Listen in for some laugh-out-loud moments as we celebrate the last 100 episodes of the SPA Girls Podcast. :)

This week we have authorpreneur and automation expert Arianna Golden. She's great at helping authors set up systems in their business, to amp up their productivity, and enhance their ability to write. She talked to us about some basic automations that are simple for authors to put in place, and gave us some fantastic tips on how to save time. 

Automation doesn't have to be a scary word. As Arianna says, think of it as a tool, like a cheese grater. Used correctly, a grater can get you yummy grated cheese to go on top of a baked potato. It's only if you don't use it correctly that you might get into trouble... (I'm scared of graters, but not of automation, so I'm not sure where that leaves me...) It's another fascinating interview, and hopefully a good introduction to automation for people who don't know much about automation. Enjoy!