It takes someone equally passionate with her creative side and work to understand the struggle of writers when faced with the pressure of marketing: especially when we’re told to build a platform to find and grow our audience.

This chat with Julia reassures us that there are ways for us to use digital marketing to show up in a way that makes sense for us, and thankfully, the most impactful results are marketing strategies independent of social media.

There were so many good tips and insights, and I’ll share a few of them here and give a rundown of the lively discussion:

• You need an author platform: no one will do your promotions for you, not even when you get that book deal (unless you’re Beyonce or Prince Harry)

• How important is a website? Why “owning” your platform apart from social media is important: cautionary tale of author Neil Parischa's experience with Facebook/Meta.

• Julia breaks down digital marketing (involves organic or direct to market contact) and why it shouldn’t be focused on social media

• SEO and how to reach "real people" (organic marketing) - Julia shows how people typically do searches using an example of an author’s book. She also showed a sample audit of an author website and how it can be improved

• Online presence and reputation: showing up predictably (not necessarily frequently) so you become searchable for your potential readers/audience.

• Why paid ads are a bad idea as a first marketing strategy

• Wrap-up question: How might multi-passionate, multi-hyphenate authors best show up online — do we have to just pick one part of our interests or background? Julia answers

Why I chose Julia out of all the digital marketing professionals:

• Her agency is focused on organic marketing that fits into the style of most creatives, especially writers!

• She has dedicated digital marketing services for authors (AND 10% off any of these services if booked by April 27 — mention “otherwordy” so you get the special pricing)

• Connect and consult with Julia through this link