Years ago, I worked with an author who had a wonderful message. She was smart, thoughtful, credentialed, and full of heart. The kind of person who truly had something meaningful to contribute to public conversations. And we were getting interest. An interview here, a feature […]
Why Readiness Creates Visibility Read More »
Sometimes you do not know which part of a presentation is going to stick. You prepare your slides. You shape your teaching points. You think carefully about what your audience needs to hear, and you hope the right ideas land in the right hearts at
The Red Sheep Gets Remembered Read More »
There is something powerful that happens when a room full of nonfiction writers gathers together. Even if the room is virtual, you can feel it. The ideas, and the questions, and the quiet determination. The “I know I have something important to say, but how
Your Book Is Not Your Hook Read More »
I recently spoke with an author who had finally finished her book. And I mean finally. After years of thinking about it, two years of writing it, rounds of editing, cover design, and formatting, she finally reached the end of the whole glorious, exhausting, emotional
Your Book Publicity Plan Starts While You’re Still Writing Read More »
There was a time when top-tier media was not just the shiny prize. It was the thing that truly worked. A big national TV segment on Oprah, a major newspaper feature in the New York Times, a splashy magazine placement in People, was big. These
Big Media is Impressive. Fit is What Works Read More »
There is a moment I see fairly often in media training. It is subtle, but it can make a smart, credible person sound less confident than they are. An author/expert is asked a good question. They know their material. They are thoughtful, articulate, and genuinely
The Interview Habit That Softens Your Authority Read More »
A few months ago, I clicked on a podcast interview with an author I genuinely wanted to hear. The host asked a friendly, normal question, “What led you to write this book?” And the guest started with a story that felt honest and human. I
Be Personal Without Oversharing Read More »
Remember Marie Kondo? She was everywhere, teaching the world to tidy up and keep only what “sparks joy,” beginning around 2014 in the U.S. At one point, I heard an interview where she said something that stopped me in my tracks. She said, a person
Make It Easy to Say Yes to You Read More »
Back in the day, Oprah was the holy grail of media “gets.” You could meet someone at a networking event, talk to a fiction or nonfiction author, and within 60 seconds they would say her name. Not because they loved daytime TV, but because Oprah
A few years ago, I was standing in a hotel lobby waiting for an elevator with a group that had just left a conference. Someone asked a woman, “So what do you do?” And you could see her brain open twelve tabs at once. She
Can You Say It In 10 Seconds? Read More »