As paid subscribers already know, January was kind of a bleak month around here. I experienced a lot of anxiety in the first half of the month, after a busy December and some work that failed to materialise, leaving me with a big financial deficit.
I *could* have gone all guns blazing into getting new work, but honestly I was exhausted. I decided to take some money from savings and have a break.
From the outside, I’m not sure it looked like I was resting. I was still posting on social media and writing posts for Substack. But my days slowed way down for the last two weeks, and that has been an absolute pleasure.
Some things I loved this month:
Gosh, The Traitors is great TV, isn’t it???? I was completely and totally sucked in by it, and Traitors Claudia Winkleman (as opposed to Strictly CW) is my style icon.
Watercolour painting. I got the kids some sets for Christmas / birthday, and my dad got me a watercolour paper book, so we’ve been watching a few evening YouTube tutorials and painting together as a family. It’s not always been very relaxing (turns out, 9 years olds get quite annoyed that they can’t paint *exactly* like the professional artists on screen) but it has been really lovely, and I’ve tried to do a little bit in my own time, too.
I’m reading Babel* which I’m enjoying, although it seems to be taking me a long time to read it.
I’m also reading More Sales Please*, by
, which is great for anyone who sells stuff online (and I can spot a *lot* of stuff I tell people to do which I don’t do for myself, which is always fun)And finally, because my son said it was “the best book I’ve ever read in my life”, I read Holes*. Maybe not the best book I’ve read in my life, but I absolutely whipped through this in an evening, and it was a thoroughly enjoyable read. We’re now looking forward to watching the movie.
Interesting links you might like
- (who wrote this post for my website about marketing without social media) has launched a course all around that same topic, if you want to spend less time on the socials this year.
- - as someone whose first fail was also their driving test, this resonated with me
- - this month has been a bit of a low period, work wise, but when I finally gave myself permission to pay myself from my savings (there for exactly this purpose), the whole month lightened up
January behind-the-scenes - January has definitely been a quieter month than expected, work-wise, and I’ve written a little bit about how that affected me and what I did about it
Rose for a fart? - lessons from a failed TikTok live
Author marketing lessons: Charlotte Duckworth - marketing lessons from Charlotte’s 6 books in 5 years
Let’s get visible - tips on bringing more people to your author platform and books, along with a 7 day visibility challenge (paid)
Goal getting - how I set and occasionally hit my goals
Back to life - on starting back at my desk in January
Ways you can work with me this month:
Sign up to my Substack as a paid subscriber and access member benefits including posts that address your specific needs and questions, behind-the-scenes posts and 20% off working with me.
*NEW* Get started with Canva: Sam and I have been working on some video tutorials to help authors learn how to create great looking assets for their book promotion. If you’ve opened Canva and thought - I don’t even know where to start - there’s a introduction to the platform, and 8 step-by-step tutorials showing you how to create 3D covers, bespoke graphics, videos and more. Pre-order yours here.
*NEW* Let me create your content plan: I will read your book and the content you have on your website and come up with 5 clear content categories for you to use to help you connect and engage with your readers, along with 30 totally unique social media captions for you. If you’re interested, you can find out more here.
Get an overall plan to work from: I will review all of the channels in your author platform (including your social media, website, Amazon page and newsletter) and create a plan for you to massively level up your marketing efforts. Find out about that here.
If you’d like to work together, but aren’t sure any of these are the right fit, or you’re a publisher looking for support on a campaign, drop me a note about what you are looking for and I’ll see if I can help.
How has your month been? What are you working on? What books / telly / articles have you enjoyed? Share your links in the comments or hit ‘reply’ on email!
Big hugs from me, Katie - glad you found things in Jan to enjoy and here's to a better February xxx
Thank you for the shout-out Katie and glad to read you're feeling better :) x