Publishing Is a Business:
The Game Plan Most Authors Skip

Test Titles and Optimize for Search

Your book cover only has 7 seconds to convince a browser to pick it up, while your back cover has 20 to 30 seconds to close the sale. Pressure-test your book titles, subject lines, and blog hooks using the AM Institute Headline Analyzer to target emotional marketing values above a 30 to 40 score. Keep metadata descriptions under 160 characters to optimize discoverability on search engines.

Escape the 30-Day Launch Trap

Do not let your book disappear after month one. Treat indie publishing as a series of rolling launches. Host private gatherings, attend seasonal craft fairs, cross-promote evergreen titles, and continually drive readers toward an email list you own via MailerLite or MailChimp.

Timestamps:

0:00 - Introduction & When to Start Book Marketing

0:51 - Treating Publishing as a Business

1:40 - Micro-Content & Quote Posters

4:35 - Building and Owning Your Email List

5:40 - In-Person Bookstore & Event Tactics

10:30 - Overcoming the Fear of Marketing

12:45 - Website Lead Magnets & Email Capture

14:40 - Repurposing Back-Cover Copy for Social Media

17:10 - Graphic Design Tools for Authors

21:00 - Pressure Testing Titles and Headlines with AM Institute

29:30 - Bookmarks and Alternative Sales Funnels

31:40 - The Rolling Launch Strategy

36:50 - Cross-Promoting Without Direct Genre Competition

41:20 - Transitioning from Writer to Authorpreneur

45:30 - The 7-Second Cover Rule & Interior Design

50:45 - The Power of Voice and Impact

55:40 - Where to Find Judith Briles

Meet Dr. Judith Briles

Dr. Judith Briles is an award-winning author of 35 books with over 1,000,000 copies sold worldwide, specializing in financial, workplace, and publishing expertise. A national expert in book publishing and founder of TheBookShepherd.com and AuthorU.org, she is a sought-after speaker and media guest, featured on over 1,000 radio and television shows including CNN, CNBC, and Oprah, and honored by the Girl Scouts as a Woman of Distinction.

OTHER BOOKS MENTIONED

Full Transcript.

Publishing Is a Business: The Game Plan Most Authors Skip with Dr. Judith Briles

[00:00:00] Laura Williams: Today, we're asking the question: when should you start marketing your book — while you're still working on your manuscript, or after you hit publish? I'm lucky to have Judith Briles here to help us figure this out. Judith hosts the popular Author You podcast and is the industry's original book shepherd.

She's the author of 44 books, a publishing veteran, and she's personally guided authors to over 500 book awards. Judith, how are you today?

[00:00:26] Judith Briles: I am fabulous, Laura, and thank you so much for having me with you and your fabulous listeners. So we'll have some fun.

[00:00:34] Laura Williams: I watch your podcast, Author U, and absolutely love it, as I'm sure many of my listeners do.

[00:00:39] Laura Williams: So when do you advise an author to pivot into marketing, and what are the first three assets they need to build before their book is ever finished?

[00:00:51] Judith Briles: Well, there are multiple things. First, they need to understand that publishing, becoming an author, is a business. It is a business, and you need a game plan for it. That's number one. Number two, your words are your product, and that means they have to be protected, and they have to be promoted.

So one of the big questions that always comes up is, "When should I start marketing my book? Do I wait until I have it in hand?" The answer is absolutely not. You start marketing your book in subtle ways sometimes, and really bold ways other times, starting the day you begin writing. If we've missed that mark, then today's the day you start.

The subtle way is influence-building — getting your words out there. I'm a firm believer — I don't know, Laura, if you've seen my little book, The Author's Walk, which I talk about all the time — it has one page about the power of our words and why they matter, and getting them out there.

So whatever you're writing, whether our listeners are fiction or nonfiction authors, your words matter. Start putting little nuggets and one-liners out there, and turn them into little posters, adding your name to them. One quote I always tell my authors, and this applies to your writers too: "Don't do well what you have no business doing," or, "If you never say no, your yeses become worthless." I make my clients, as a book shepherd, actually write those down and put them on a sticky note, so they don't get pulled onto a path that takes them away from the goal — whether that's writing the chapter, or the whole book.

So I'd make it a poster: "Don't do well what you have no business doing," with a little squiggle underneath and my name. And by the way, everyone doing this, make sure you add the copyright symbol and the year, like 2/26, along with your name, and embed it on any posters you put out on social media — Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, wherever. That way your copyright travels with anyone who reshares it. You can very effectively start building followers with these little sage tidbits, these nuggets.

For lines pulled from your books, I'd pull a phrase — something scintillating, something worth chewing on — and then add the title of the book it comes from, and "by Laura Williams," for example. You could even add "available 2/27" or whatever the date is, so people know it's coming. You're waving the flag, saying, "Yoo-hoo, here I come." And you'll start building followers.

The next essential thing everyone should be doing is curating and growing an email list. Laura, I don't know if you or your listeners got caught up in that Facebook, Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, LinkedIn, Amazon algorithm mess back in June, where nothing could be done. I'll go on a bit of a nag here: it's so important to have an email list, because you control it. These are your babies. You don't care if Facebook goes belly-up, because you've already built your own contacts you can communicate with directly.

One thing I'll describe, since our listeners can't see it — I have a banner with all my books on it that I use for bookstore signings. I have a great relationship with Barnes & Noble here in Colorado, and I'm in stores fairly often for a day at a time. A typical bookstore event sells four to six books. I sell forty when I'm there.

[00:06:09] Laura Williams: Oh, that's wonderful.

[00:06:10] Judith Briles: One of the things I do is have a sign-up form, and at the very top it says, "Join Judith Briles' email list for special events and activities." This becomes my cheat sheet in a few different ways, because I have all the books I could possibly bring to the bookstore.

Actually, Laura, I get to announce this to you — I just finished book number 49, and it went to layout yesterday. It's a little cookbook, part of a series. Who thought I'd end up writing cookbooks? But I do — it's called Appetizers with Judith, and it has over 80 really yummy, easy appetizers. I entertain a lot, and I dedicated it to a dear friend of forty years who doesn't cook at all — she's basically allergic to a stove. I'm the cook between us, and I told her, "Hey, Suz, I've got a few recipes in here with only three ingredients and no cooking required, just for you."

So back to the banner — it says, "Join Judith Briles' email list for special events and activities." When I know I'm heading to a bookstore, I notify all my contacts: "Join me at the Barnes & Noble in Southlands, Aurora — I'll be featuring my new book." That's how you start doing this.

On the banner, with all the book covers across it, I put the number of books I know are in the store, or that I'm bringing in myself. Another trick — keep extra books in your car, in the trunk, in case you sell out. Most bookstores, by the way, will immediately set up a consignment arrangement — they'll pay you cash, 50% of retail, and you walk away with it that day.

Underneath the books, I keep old-fashioned tally marks — four vertical lines and a diagonal for five — to track sales. Below that I have three columns: name, email, and mobile. If you start doing this today, everywhere you go, every event you show up at or speak at, gathering names — and I note the date and location — you can later transfer it into a document for a virtual assistant to upload into a database, so you can reach out by email.

If you build this habit now, it will be a godsend, and it puts you far ahead of other authors. The reality is the average independently published author sells about 100 books, mostly through the low-hanging fruit — friends and family. I'm trying to get you beyond that.

[00:09:47] Laura Williams: Not in the writing industry specifically, but throughout my career I've been to countless industry shows, and it never fails to blow my mind how few people bother capturing emails. They're invaluable to any business, writing or otherwise.

[00:10:05] Judith Briles: It boggles my mind too. Even in bookstores, I've asked managers, "Don't you have a list?" People who run restaurants — don't you have a list of your regulars? People who do massage therapy — don't you have the names, phone numbers, and emails of your clients? Because I know these people, and they hop from place to place, and then they're just lost. I don't understand it.

[00:10:30] Laura Williams: Let me ask you something. Some authors are really intimidated by marketing — they don't want to come across as pushy or salesy. What advice would you give them?

[00:10:43] Judith Briles: Here comes another one of my posters, Laura: "Get over it."

You've got me in a quirky mood today, but honestly, you have to get over it if you want to sell books. If you don't care about selling books, fine, no big deal. But if your goal is to sell them — one of the great myths is that publishers handle everything. I come from traditional publishing myself; I was a "kept author" with Simon & Schuster and McGraw-Hill. Eighteen of my books were published in New York, and I went on office tours with escorts getting me from place to place. I didn't have to think about any of it.

That's not how it works today. Even with a well-established publisher, unless you're a celebrity of some sort, you're largely on your own. They might do a press release, maybe some follow-up for a couple of weeks, but that's it.

So you have to claim you're a successful author if you want your book to have legs. That means committing to a movement — asking yourself, "What can I give, 15 or 20 minutes a day, to make that little poster with a quirky saying, a fun quote, or a nugget of advice with my name on it?" You just start doing it, and you build your social media following.

The other essential piece is a website — of course, something about you, but with an offering right on the homepage, always in the upper right corner, because most of our listeners are North American or Northern European based, and read left to right, so that's where you want their eyes to land: "Ooh, this looks like something I want."

On my own website right now, since we're talking about marketing, I offer a free ultimate book marketing plan as a PDF. Go to thebookshepherd.com, upper right corner, bright orange button — click it, submit your name and email, and it downloads instantly. That's how you start collecting emails. You'll need a portal to manage that list — I think two of the best are MailChimp and MailerLite.

[00:14:11] Laura Williams: It's funny, I often hear authors say, "I don't even know what to post." To me, it's just about thinking about your book. If it's historical fiction, maybe you pull some facts from your research. If it's paranormal — werewolves, say — post about myths, or about werewolves themselves. There's always something. Just look at your book and think about what you can use.

[00:14:40] Judith Briles: You just said historical fiction, so let me pull out book three — Laura, you know this one, The Secret Rise. It's a medieval, 11th-century series with a badass female protagonist — that's the word I use when I'm greeting people in bookstores. I'll ask, "Do you like historical fiction?" and if they say yes, I ask permission: "Can I tell you about my book? Do you like a strong female protagonist who has to become a badass to survive and thrive in the 11th century?" And that starts a conversation.

I love writing back covers — I have a marketing mind for it. Looking at this one now, the lead line on the back cover is, "Nicole's power increases while others seek to destroy her." I could turn that into a poster: "Discover how, in book three." If your back cover is written well, you should be able to pull anywhere from five to ten one-line posters straight off it.

[00:16:06] Laura Williams: Smart. Yes, that's smart.

[00:16:09] Judith Briles: I'm all for repurposing, Laura. Why reinvent the wheel every time you turn around? We're writers — masters of words. I know it's hard to write about ourselves, but if you've already got some juicy lines out there, use them. You don't have to think up new material.

[00:16:42] Laura Williams: No, and that's the trick that's easier to follow, because you're just repurposing — slicing and dicing what already exists. It makes dealing with social media so much easier, because the content is faster to create — it's right there. You know as well as anybody, probably better than most, that the time you spend on social media has to be worth something, or it's just noise.

[00:17:11] Judith Briles: Oh, yeah, it does. One tool I don't know if you're aware of — Book Brush — is wonderful for authors.

[00:17:21] Laura Williams: Haven't seen that one.

[00:17:22] Judith Briles: It's designed specifically for authors. Let me give everyone my discount code — they used to have a free version, now I think it's a lower-fee version. I get nothing for this, but the code is just my name, Judith, plus 15 — Judith15. There's so much you can do with it, from making your book look like it's part of an author set, to reveal-style animations of a book cover — scrolls, strips, stripes, reveals.

As I mentioned, Appetizers with Judith is in layout right now. I'll have it back from the designer in about four or five days, and then we do the final proofread. Do I do it myself? Yes. Do I also have other eyes on it? Yes — one of my editors, too — because when you're this deep into your own writing, you go word-blind. Your brain tells you it's perfect, because you already believe it is, and it isn't.

[00:18:52] Laura Williams: I've read books actually written by editors that still have typos in them — probably for exactly that reason. You stop seeing them after a while.

[00:19:03] Judith Briles: You do. You've just been too deep in them. That's why I've reached the point where I have to step away and let someone else go through it. Cookbooks are a little different too — I'm someone who genuinely reads cookbooks, and I end up mentally redoing recipes as I go: "Oh, no, I'd do it this way instead." That's just what I do.

So when it comes to formatting, I don't spell out "tablespoon" — maybe in narrative text I would — but you commonly see "tbsp" abbreviated in cookbooks. Not me — I just use a capital T. If you can't tell the difference between a capital T and a lowercase "tsp," we have a problem. In my author's note to readers, I let them know how I format things, and I also warn them upfront that I'm highly allergic to rosemary and thyme, so they'll never see either in any of my recipes — though if readers love them, by all means, add them in.

[00:20:20] Laura Williams: To me, cookbooks are a starting point — they feed my own creativity. I love to cook, absolutely love it, and that's how I use them. I own so many cookbooks I've read cover to cover, but I don't often actually cook straight out of one.

[00:20:35] Judith Briles: I open mine up constantly for little visual guides. I was making something with fettuccine the other day and wanted to build it into a kind of nest shape

[00:20:48] Laura Williams: Ooh

[00:20:49] Judith Briles: and I needed to see the visual to actually pull it off.

[00:20:54] Laura Williams: Yeah, that makes sense. And I bet it was delicious.

[00:21:01] Judith Briles: It was.

[00:21:03] Laura Williams: I love your approach to evaluating titles and book covers. That's a sticking point in a lot of marketing programs, because a bad title and a bad cover can kill a book's momentum in the market — especially now that we're looking at those tiny thumbnails so often. So how can we pressure-test our covers and titles before committing to print?

[00:21:30] Judith Briles: Ooh, I love that question. I actually just did an episode on my podcast, Author You: Your Guide to Book Publishing, in late June, on fourteen author tools you should be using. You can find that on YouTube, or go to TogiNet — T-O-G-I-N-E-T dot com — and look under their podcasts; it's alphabetical, and Author You will come up. It'll show recent episodes, and you can listen to just the audio there, or catch the visual version on YouTube, since I was demoing tools live on screen.

I'll tell you about one of them right now. One of my all-time favorites — completely free — is a headline analyzer that helps create that emotional pull, at aminstitute.com. That's A-M, like Apple Mary, institute dot com, put together by the American Marketing Institute. Copywriters use it — anyone hunting for the emotional, spiritual, or intellectual hook to pull readers into a headline.

Once you're on the site, click on "Headline Analyzer." You put in your words — up to 20 — and it scores them back. You want a minimum score of around 30; copywriters consider 30 to 40 acceptable. These are the same people who write headlines for newspapers and magazines — think about your own blog titles or article headlines the same way.

I was working with one of my virtual assistants this morning on the subject line for our Wednesday newsletter — we were tying it to the Fourth of July, to the freedom we still have with our words here in America. My first pass scored around 16 — not good. We changed a couple of words, got it up to 30 — okay, acceptable. Then we shifted the word order and added one new word, and it jumped past 40. That became the keeper — that's the subject line going out in today's newsletter.

[00:25:58] Laura Williams: It's also an educational tool. Even if you don't naturally have a marketing mind, you start to understand what the program is telling you, and how to shape your titles closer to where you want them. Because fighting for a place on social media and online really is all about good copywriting — it honestly is.

[00:26:23] Judith Briles: No question. And once something's out there — I have my own rule about this. Some people say six months is enough time before you can reuse or refresh a piece, but I think that's too early. If I wrote something two years ago, that's fair game — totally fair — for a new title, and sometimes a full rewrite. Rarely does it need that much, though, depending on what's changed.

I'm thinking mainly of blogs, since I'm a big believer in blogging — I post twice a week. If I've got a blog from two years back, I'll give it a new title, check it against AM Institute for the right buzz, rewrite the opening paragraph, and rearrange any bullet points. Then I can repurpose it as a whole new post, and keep the Google algorithm happy in the process. One tip: keep your titles under 160 characters, spacing included.

[00:27:45] Laura Williams: Really good advice.

[00:27:46] Judith Briles: Right — that's what drives searchability. Same with your meta description, the opening line that shows up in search results: keep it under 160 characters too, since that's what gets pulled and repeated by search engines.

[00:28:06] Laura Williams: But it also needs to be unique enough. You don't want it to just say "My thoughts on book marketing" — there could be a hundred other blogs out there with that exact title. You need some creative juice, and I love that AM Institute tool — I'm definitely going to check it out, since that would help tremendously.

[00:28:25] Judith Briles: Oh, you'll love it. It becomes your new best friend — you'll bookmark it and live in it.

As a side note, that particular podcast episode actually came together in ten minutes, because my scheduled guest was having unbelievable tech problems. I have a producer and a studio I pay for, and my producer Ben said, "We could just cancel." I said, "No — let me just go solo. Give me a couple minutes to breathe, and I'll put a show together." That's how the fourteen-tools episode happened.

Back to marketing — you have to know how to pivot, because something unusual will happen. When you're out selling books, you want bookmarks — and don't skimp. Someone will tell you, "Just print 50 or 100," but I'd blow through 100 bookmarks in a couple hours at a bookstore event. I print 1,000 at a time, and always on matte finish — never gloss, because glossy bookmarks are slippery as anything and just

[00:29:58] Laura Williams: scatter all over the place.

[00:29:59] Judith Briles: Don't do that, people. Matte finish, and I like a two-and-a-half by seven-inch size — plenty of room. Make sure you list every format your book's available in — paper, e-book, audio, whatever applies. A lot of bookstore browsers only read e-books, so I let them know it's available that way too. Another sales trick: if I'm selling paperbacks in a store like Barnes & Noble, I'll mention that if they're on a Kindle Unlimited-type subscription, they can download up to 20 books a month — so they can grab the next book in the series for no extra cost. It works.

[00:31:17] Laura Williams: Let me ask you something else — it's funny, I was just talking to someone about this out of the blue on a phone call. After the book launch, once you've done everything you can to get it off the ground, you get a great 30 days, and then it tapers off. So what do you do?

[00:31:43] Judith Briles: Well, here's the beauty of being an independent publisher — what's this nonsense about 30 days? You should be thinking in terms of rolling launches. What can you do each month to keep momentum going?

I've got a new book coming out, and I'm a member of the Denver Women's Press Club — we're doing an evening launch event where I'll actually be bringing in appetizers, since, well, food. When you do these private launch events, you should be feeding people, or having drinks — beer, wine, tea — it keeps them around talking longer. I've done private teas, brunches, events at my own house — my neighbors basically expect it at this point. At Christmastime, while I was developing the appetizer book, I had about 50 people over with a whole spread of different appetizers to test out, and a lot of those made it into the book.

You can do this any time of day, keep it light. I've always asked friends, "Who among your friends would love to invite their own friends over to meet me, and would be willing to host?" As the author, you offer to cover the food or supplies, and you're there selling your books the whole time — so this can be an ongoing thing throughout the life of the book.

Right now, in the heart of summer, there are festivals and craft shows everywhere, and it's very common for authors to have a table there. So why not you? If you're going solo, bring a rolling wagon so you're not hauling bags and boxes back and forth from the car. I've got pull-up banners and other accessories, but one of the most effective is just a three-foot runner you drape over a table — something bold like "Best-Selling Author" or "Love Mystery and Suspense?" in bright color, so people notice as they walk by.

I also give out lollipops with my book branding — my website, judithbrilesbooks.com, is right on them. Kids want the lollipops, and guess who they bring along with them?

[00:34:56] Laura Williams: Their parents, who read.

[00:35:02] Judith Briles: Exactly.

[00:35:04] Laura Williams: And the child's occupied, so you get more time to talk to the parent.

[00:35:06] Judith Briles: "How many lollipops do you want, darling? What flavor?" So there are all kinds of little things you can do.

But you're right that a lot of authors treat 30 days as the end. It shouldn't be — not if your book has evergreen potential. I just interviewed Vickie King, who wrote How to Write a Movie in 21 Days — I've known Vickie for about 40 years, and that book is 50 years old now. It's a classic. Most fiction is evergreen, by the way, and plenty of business books are too — The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell, or Tim Ferriss's books — they have a long shelf life.

So the question becomes, what can you do to freshen them back up? Cross-promotion is one option. Does the four-hour workweek even hold up anymore? I don't know anyone who actually works four hours — I think we've all ended up working longer, if anything. That's just my opinion.

[00:36:19] Laura Williams: Yeah, especially with the internet — it's so easy to access work from home, so even if you're technically in an office environment, you finish up later at home and it's just not a big deal anymore.

[00:36:28] Judith Briles: Yeah.

[00:36:29] Laura Williams: So I agree — we do work too much.

[00:36:32] Judith Briles: We really do. Remember, this is a business, and your product is you and your book. So what are you going to do to get it out there?

Back to craft shows, tables, and bookstores — a bookstore might invite me to team up with another author. I've got a couple that'll say, "Hey, do you and Joseph want to come in?" Joseph writes middle-school books; I write how-to-publish, historical fiction, and now cooking. We don't compete with each other, and that's essential for everyone to understand. If your best friend writes romance, and you also write romance, don't share an event table — your buyers are only going to buy one of you.

[00:37:33] Laura Williams: You're giving them the choice instead of both — yeah, I agree.

[00:37:38] Judith Briles: So when Joseph and I do bookstore events together, I have my table, he has his, and when parents come by for his kids' books, he'll say, "Have you ever thought about writing, or do you like historical fiction or cooking? You need to meet Judith." I do the same for him — if someone's buying from me, I'll ask if they have kids or grandkids or a birthday party coming up, and point them to Joseph's table. We cross-support each other instead of cutting into each other's sales.

That matters most for fiction authors specifically. Nonfiction serves a specific topic or pain point — someone has a problem, and you're delivering the wisdom to solve it. Fiction is about someone wanting to drop in and spend hours immersed in a story, so you have to be selective about who you're willing to share a table with at these events. That's my two cents.

[00:38:50] Laura Williams: Sounds like maybe you learned that one the hard way.

[00:38:53] Judith Briles: I have, yes. When I coordinate book fairs with Barnes & Noble — bringing in seven or eight authors to raise money — I'm the founder of the Colorado Authors Hall of Fame, and one of our events funds aspiring-author scholarships. We give away five $17,000 scholarships, and Barnes & Noble has been a wonderful partner — since we're a 501(c)(3), they donate 10% of sales from customers using our vouchers to the scholarship fund.

When I organize the fiction authors for those events, I'm very deliberate — murder mystery, mayhem, suspense, thriller authors don't compete with fantasy authors, so they can share a table. Fantasy readers are their own unique breed. I always bring in children's authors too, and they can share a big eight-foot table — three authors at once — but I make sure to pair picture-book authors for the very young with middle-school authors like Joseph, and then have a separate section for juvenile through YA. Distinct audiences, and it's important to honor that when coordinating these events.

[00:40:44] Laura Williams: That's great — sounds like a really fun event.

[00:40:49] Judith Briles: It is fun, we have a great time, but it's a long day — nine to five.

[00:40:55] Laura Williams: I bet it is. I'd be so peopled out.

[00:40:59] Judith Briles: We do it, though.

[00:41:03] Laura Williams: This has been such an interesting conversation. Let me ask you one more thing — what do you think is the most valuable advice you can give someone trying to make that shift from being a writer to being an author? Trying to internalize, "Okay, this is now a business." So many authors just don't have that business sense, and you've been steeped in this industry for so long. What would you say to them — is it mostly a matter of educating themselves?

[00:41:50] Judith Briles: Let's tackle that. Education is always important. I've told people that if I were starting now, I'd want the last publishing book I wrote in hand — The Author's Walk: Finding Your Voice. It's not about craft at all; it's about your mojo, your momentum, staying focused. I wish I'd had that book years earlier myself.

Another one that'll save you thousands of dollars in mistakes is How to Avoid Book Publishing Blunders, which covers over a hundred common, painful mistakes — I've made plenty of them myself.

So education matters, but here's the bigger picture: we're all writers first. We become authors the moment we step into the published arena, with the goal of putting a book together and getting our act together to do it. Maybe you're a blogger and you suddenly realize there's enough of a common thread to become a book. But then it's about making the commitment — "I need to learn how to promote, find my fans, build a base." That's an investment.

When I think about crossing that bridge into authoring, it starts with passion — passion for your work, your words. Then purpose — who is this for, and why are you the person to deliver it? Understanding that is critical. Passion plus purpose leads to commitment, and commitment has three components: time, energy, and money. What are you willing to put forward?

What pains me is seeing people who genuinely have the passion and see their purpose clearly, but the commitment falters — they start second-guessing, "It's not good enough yet." That's when you bring in an editor — someone with real expertise in your genre, fiction or nonfiction. You need those outside players.

Cover design matters too. One of the most important things I can tell listeners: give yourself an hour, maybe two, and go to a bookstore — one with a little café if you can find it. Explore the section where your genre lives. See what those books look like, what they're all about. Walk the tables — some centered on a single big title, like a fantasy table featuring Sarah J. Maas or Rebecca Yarros, others just a broad mix of new arrivals. Pay close attention to the covers. Study what current covers in your genre look like.

And remember — a cover gets about seven seconds before someone decides to pick it up or pass. Seven seconds, that's it. So the cover isn't for you, the author — it's for the buyer, the person actually looking for that book.

If you're a nonfiction author, your subtitle is essential — it's the promise of what's between the covers. Then the book gets flipped over, and you've got another 20 to 30 seconds on the back cover. One of the most effective covers I wrote for myself was for a book about conflict in the female-dominated healthcare workplace — the title was Sabotage. Short titles are best for the cover design itself, but the subtitle can run longer since you can stack it — mine was How to Deal with the Pit Bulls, Skunks, Snakes, Scorpions, and Slugs in the Healthcare Workplace. Anyone who'd worked in healthcare knew exactly what I meant, and that alone often sold the book.

When you flipped it over, the headline was "Are Saboteurs in Your Midst?" with an image of a pit bull in lipstick wearing scrubs and a stethoscope, and five questions like, "Have you ever felt like you just wanted to quit? Has anyone ever taken credit for your work? Is your workplace the pits?" By the third bullet, the book was already sold.

So the back cover gets 20 to 30 seconds, and then they open the book itself — is it visual, is it attractive? I like using call-outs and sidebars for my nonfiction clients, anything to introduce a little visual variety. Even in interior design, we carry some imagery over from the cover into the chapter openings, so when someone flips through, they see it's not just line after line of black text — there's some customization to it. That's how books get sold today.

So I'd tell everyone: next weekend, wherever you go, wander through a bookstore and actually watch people browsing the tables — some picking books up and putting them back down, some just walking past without a second glance. Figure out what's actually catching people's attention.

[00:49:31] Laura Williams: Another thing worth paying attention to is the spine of the book, since it'll often be sitting on a shelf where you can't see the full cover — so something on the spine needs to draw attention, beyond just the title.

[00:49:46] Judith Briles: Right — as we're talking, I'm looking at my Harmony series, my 11th-century, kick-ass female protagonist series. There's a jeweled dagger on the covers, and if you line all the books up together, you can clearly see they're sisters — there's a band across each one with the book number, 1, 2, or 3, and the cover art is very bold. That cover art really matters, and that's where you want a professional involved. That's my advice.

[00:50:26] Laura Williams: Agreed, very much. This has been such an interesting conversation. I appreciate you taking the time to visit with me — I know you're an incredibly busy woman. This has been really valuable.

[00:50:42] Judith Briles: Thank you, it's been my pleasure. If we have a minute, I'd love to share those words about your voice, if you'd like me to.

[00:50:49] Laura Williams: Absolutely, please do.

[00:50:50] Judith Briles: All right. This is from The Author's Walk — someone read it once and told me, "You need to make this a giant poster and put it on your book table."

The power of words and voice — your words and your voice. Without your words and your voice, history can become silent. Literature is dumbed down and disappears. Science reporting is crippled. Thought and speculation are at a standstill. Without your words and your voice, the development and revealing of civilization would be impossible.

Without your words and your voice, the storytelling, the visuals, and the narratives of the imagination ebb to oblivion. Without your words and your voice, the engines of change will disappear — windows that are the lighthouses erected in the sea of tides recede and vanish. Without your words and your voice, the companions, the teachers, and the bankers of the mind fade away and cease to exist.

Without your words and your voice, innovative ideas and solutions wither to invisibility, and without your words and your voice, everyone is diminished. Your words and your voice are essential. That's what writers and authors do.

[00:52:16] Laura Williams: It's so important to keep in mind how much our words matter — not just in writing, but in communication in general.

[00:52:23] Judith Briles: Oh, very much so. They count, they matter.

[00:52:27] Laura Williams: They do, and they can literally change someone's life. You never know when — something you said could resonate with a person and change their whole trajectory. It's incredibly powerful.

[00:52:38] Judith Briles: They can save a life. As a side note, I was speaking in Washington one May, during a hospital event for Nurses Week — an all-day workshop. There was one woman sitting right up front who I just couldn't connect with, no matter how I tried. She was with me the entire day; the hospital had brought me in and was paying me a nice fee to speak.

At the end of the day, people were coming up to talk to me, and I noticed her fold up a piece of paper and tuck it under the edge of my computer before she left. I packed up, my husband was with me, and we walked out to the car. I put the note in my pocket, and once we sat down, I opened it. It said something like: "Today I had nothing better to do, and I saw you were speaking at the hospital, so I came. Today was going to be my last day, but I've decided to live."

I just said, "Stop, we can't leave — I need to go back right now," and I told the hospital contact, "You need to find out who this woman is, she needs support."

[00:54:11] Laura Williams: Did you find her?

[00:54:12] Judith Briles: No, I didn't — I just gave them her description and asked them to make sure she knew I was sending her every virtual hug I had.

[00:54:23] Laura Williams: That's wonderful. I just love hearing about that kind of impact on somebody's life. That's terrific.

[00:54:30] Judith Briles: We've all had moments like that. When I wrote my memoir — Laura, we could go on forever together on this — it's called When God Says No. People find out I've had two children die, I've died twice myself, had cancer, been paralyzed, had a business partner embezzle a million dollars from me, been homeless — I've had a real roller-coaster of a life.

I was at a Barnes & Noble once, and a woman was standing in front of my display for When God Says No. I walked over and said, "Hi, I'm Judith — do you have any questions?" She turned around and just collapsed into my arms. She said, "I lost my baby too, and I just want you to know, you helped get me through it." That's why we write — that's why we get these things out into the world.

[00:55:20] Laura Williams: Right. You just never know. Even in a fictional book, sometimes something resonates with someone and reframes how they think about their own life. It's so beautiful.

[00:55:34] Judith Briles: You really never know.

[00:55:36] Laura Williams: Well, Judith, it's been such a pleasure. Thank you so much for taking the time.

[00:55:40] Laura Williams: I appreciate it. Go ahead and share with everyone when you think your book will be out, and where they can find you.

[00:55:51] Judith Briles: So the next book, Appetizers with Judith, is for anyone who likes to cook easy, no-fuss recipes — I write like I'm right there beside you, always telling you where an idea came from and why I do things a certain way. It'll be available through Amazon, or a bookstore can order it for you, certainly by August 1st.

[00:56:16] Laura Williams: Oh, wonderful — in time for the holidays. Terrific.

[00:56:18] Judith Briles: Yeah, end of summer, right in time for the holidays. My other books are all available too — just search Judith Briles' books on Amazon and you'll find them quickly, or go to my website, judithbrilesbooks.com, and everything's linked there. The only one not up yet is the appetizer book, since I can't post it until it's actually in hand.

[00:56:46] Laura Williams: Won't be long, then.

[00:56:51] Laura Williams: Well, thank you so much, Judith.

[00:56:52] Laura Williams: To learn more about the podcast and be the first to know when new episodes are up, visit thewritingbiz.com. Don't forget to hit like, share, and subscribe, and until next time, take what you've learned and put it to work in your own writing biz. Judith, enjoy the rest of your day. Thank you so much.

[00:57:10] Judith Briles: You too, thank you.