The Publishing Performance Show

Shelby Leigh - The Power of TikTok: Turning Views Into Book Sales

• Teddy Smith • Episode 42

Share episode

Shelby Leigh is a mental health poetry author who has built a significant social media presence, with over 103,000 Instagram followers and viral TikTok success. Her journey from self-publishing to traditional publishing demonstrates the power of social media marketing for book sales.

In this episode:

  • Mental health poetry publishing success
  • TikTok marketing strategies
  • Content creation best practices
  • Social media platform building
  • Converting views to sales
  • Book marketing analytics


Resources mentioned:


Book Recommendations for Poetry:


Traditional Poetry Influences:


Modern Poetry Recommendations:


Connect with Shelby Leigh:


Connect with Teddy Smith:


Join our Facebook Community - https://www.facebook.com/groups/publishingperformance/

Support the show

[00:00:00] Teddy: TikTok is one of those things that I don't really know too much about myself. It's not something I use too much in my book business, which is why I was so happy to get Shelby Lee to come on to the show because she is the expert. Now you might have seen on Instagram, she's got tons and tons of followers, both for her poetry books and for her Book marketing tips.

[00:00:25] Teddy: And today we're going to be talking all about how you can use Tik Tok for your books. And it's a really great show because we go through some beginner tactics, like how you can just get started with, you've got no experience at all and some more advanced things, how to read the data, how to create great Tik Toks, Toks you should be doing, all that sort of thing.

[00:00:41] Teddy: So I think you're gonna have a great show and I'll see you in there. Hi everyone. And welcome to the publishing performance show. I'm really happy to be here with Shelby Lee, who is an author, uh, a marketing coach, and she's also the founder of Marketing by Shelby, which is an Instagram account that I'm sure a lot of you have seen before.

[00:00:57] Teddy: So thank you for joining me, Shelby. 

[00:00:58] Shelby: Thanks for having me. I'm excited to chat today. 

[00:01:01] Teddy: Great. So why don't you tell me a bit about your background in authoring and about how many books you've written and what sort of books you've done? 

[00:01:08] Shelby: Sure. So I actually write poetry. I write a mental health poetry books.

[00:01:14] Shelby: And I like being a success story in poetry because a lot of people don't believe me when I tell them that I thousands of books and poetry. It's, amazing because I never thought that I would be down that path. I always wanted to write fiction novels. Still do, but took a detour. So I published, self published my first book in 2016 after I had started sharing some poems online and kind of growing an audience actually on Tumblr which was more popular back then not so much now.

[00:01:41] Shelby: Then ended up self publishing a second book in 2019 as I was really focused on growing my own author brand and my own audience on social media over those few years. And then I got into TikTok, which we'll be talking about today and Instagram and that really helped to increase my sales.

[00:02:00] Shelby: quite substantially. And I ended up getting an offer to republish that second book in 2022. So a few years after it had come out and then have been with traditional publishers, the last couple of books, my fourth book just came out October 1st. So pretty recent, that one's called From Sand to Stars.

[00:02:16] Shelby: And so I've just continued writing my poetry books. So four books now still marketing them primarily through social media and it's been quite an awesome journey. So. 

[00:02:25] Teddy: Yeah. I mean, your Instagram account is quite remarkable. It's got, I can't, I don't know exactly how many thousands of followers it is, but it's a lot.

[00:02:31] Teddy: And, um, I know how, well, how many is it? 

[00:02:34] Shelby: My author page has around 103 or 4k. 

[00:02:39] Teddy: Yeah. Amazing. And you've used that specifically to sell your books, grow your audience, get a load of fans around your poems and that's what's really well. 

[00:02:47] Shelby: Yes, definitely. Yeah. I started that one I think in 2017. So it's definitely not like a.

[00:02:53] Shelby: Get rich quick tomorrow or you're going to have thousands of followers quickly. Like it takes, you know, time and consistency for sure. But it's such a great way to build trust with your audience and grow your email list and get readers on board. So yeah, I'd be a huge advocate for it. 

[00:03:08] Teddy: Yeah. But brilliant.

[00:03:09] Teddy: Yeah. I mean, it's absolutely amazing story. And as you've just touched on before, one of the main things I want to talk to you today is some is TikTok because it's not something that I really know anything about, you know, I've never used it particularly for my own personal social media, or even for my books.

[00:03:24] Teddy: And I, I've heard a lot of people talk about things like BookTok or TikTok for books and all these things. And it's, it's kind of a bit of a buzzword at the moment in marketing, I think. And I don't know anything about it. So could you, I think we need to start a bit with the basics. So if there's authors who are brand new to TikTok, could you explain what it is and why it is so powerful for marketing, especially for 

[00:03:44] Shelby: books?

[00:03:45] Shelby: Yes. We'll start with the basics for sure. So TikTok is a social media platform. The main. Content type is video, which a lot of us might shy away from as writers, but it's a really powerful tool in building that no like trust factor that we talk about in marketing. You know, with our, with our readers and there's a huge book community on tick tock.

[00:04:07] Shelby: And so that's kind of referred to as book talk. It's not like a separate place in tick tock. It's a hashtag. It's just, you'll hear people talking about the book side of tick tock. And so there's a lot of readers. And creators who are talking about the books that they love and reviewing books and sharing their favorite recommendations and making like fun trends about books.

[00:04:27] Shelby: And then there's also authors who share about their own books or other book recommendations in their genre as well. So it's a really great place to promote your content and people are fast buyers over there faster than any other platform that I've seen or used. It's really interesting. Like I'll have a video do really well on Instagram and it will, it will push some sales, but on Tik TOK, it's like way, way more.

[00:04:51] Shelby: And I don't know exactly why that is, but the reader audience on Tik TOK is just ready to buy books. And so it's, it's interesting because the way that the algorithm works, the way that the platform works is it's really based on what you like to watch. And so there's what's called the For You page.

[00:05:10] Shelby: Which is just tailored to you. And at the beginning, when you first download the app and create an account, it won't be, it'll be, they're trying to figure out what you like. But once you engage in content about books or the topics that you like, it really starts to be more tailored to you. And so that's how content gets pushed out.

[00:05:26] Shelby: It's how Unlike other platforms, although other platforms are starting to adapt to this model where you can have zero followers and post your first video and get thousands of views potentially because it's being shown to a group of people that don't follow you first. So that's what makes it really, really great for growth and reaching new readers on a regular basis.

[00:05:48] Teddy: It works slightly differently to something like Instagram or even Twitter, for example, where your stuff doesn't just get shown to your own audience. Cause I know on Instagram, your posts and your reels reels more than posts, but they can get shown to a wider audience, but generally it's your own audience that, that sees your stuff.

[00:06:07] Teddy: And you can actually see that in the data at the back end of Instagram. It's like, at least with my stuff, it's like 80%, 90 percent of my own followers who see my stuff. But with TikTok actually stuff gets. Or posts, sorry, get posted to a much wider audience of maybe people who are interested in a similar topic.

[00:06:24] Teddy: Is that kind of right? Yeah, that's right. So it'll start by showing it to a small group of people who they think will like your content based on what they can tell by that video, what words you've used in it, what the topic is, what hashtags you've used. Depending on how much they watch it and engage with it.

[00:06:42] Shelby: It will get shown to more people from there. So it kind of just keeps widening that circle. And so once you have followers, it'll show it to a small segment of your followers and some non followers first and then continue to expand. So that's kind of how it differs compared to other platforms. 

[00:06:59] Teddy: Right.

[00:06:59] Teddy: Okay. So is having followers on TikTok important or not that really important? 

[00:07:04] Shelby: You know, it's helpful, but the more that I've grown, the less that I think that it matters. And also I think that there's a trend of people following less. And I'm kind of seeing this on multiple platforms too, because the for you page is so tailored to what you like that.

[00:07:18] Shelby: I don't even think people realize they're not following someone because their videos can keep popping up as long as you like them and engage with them. But You don't really even have to follow that person. So I'm kind of seeing that trend but you can absolutely go viral or you can just get a good amount of views consistently, even without a lot of followers.

[00:07:35] Shelby: So I don't think follower count matters as much on TikTok as other platforms. 

[00:07:41] Teddy: That's very interesting. So have you had some posts that have gone viral and have done really well? And what do those numbers look like? 

[00:07:48] Shelby: I think my top video was like 10 million views. Wow. Yeah, which is wild. I think that one was probably my biggest, like, sales driver for that one.

[00:07:58] Shelby: But did that post 

[00:07:59] Teddy: itself drive traffic, drive sales as well? 

[00:08:02] Shelby: Yeah. So my like top sales was like 4, 000 or 5, 000 in like a week from, um, TikTok videos. So, yeah, it definitely can drive a lot of traffic. If the video is related to your books, because a lot of people will go viral for something completely unrelated and then be like, why didn't it drive sales?

[00:08:21] Shelby: But it was a video of my book, a poem from my book that just happened to really go viral and really resonate with people. But I've had other videos get 2 million, 3 million, 4 million over the years of using it. And those consistently will kind of improve my rankings and all of that in sales.

[00:08:36] Teddy: That's so interesting. The poem that you did that went for 10 million. Did you ever use the same poem again in a different post and it didn't get as many views? 

[00:08:45] Shelby: Yes, absolutely. So that's the thing too, is like it's strategy. It's a lot of strategy, but it's also timing. And sometimes it's just like it doesn't resonate or it doesn't hit the right group of people.

[00:08:57] Shelby: So it really is like. Once you post something, if it doesn't work, try it again, because you never really know, and that particular poem, I have shared probably 10 or 15 times, and sometimes it goes, it does really well, and sometimes it doesn't, but if I had only done it once and then been like, okay, I can't repeat, you know, content, or I can't share this one again, because 10 million people have already seen it, then I would have missed those other opportunities where I did post it.

[00:09:20] Shelby: So I think it's important to kind of repurpose and figure out what works and then you can kind of repeat the same format or structure that's working well for you. Yeah, amazing. When you create content for TikTok, is it quite in the moment? It doesn't last for a long time. Like something like Pinterest does where, you know, you could create a pin and, you know, years later, you're still getting people clicking on it and going to your website.

[00:09:43] Teddy: Is TikTok a bit more, you've got to create it and that that's when it exists. Yeah, that's a good question. That's a good question. It depends. It depends on the content because I have content from years ago that's still getting views, but it's more search optimized. Like you were saying with Pinterest, I have some videos whenever I first started out just trying to figure out what was working, where I was posting like some writing prompts and things like that.

[00:10:05] Shelby: And those are things that people will go on to TikTok and search for writing prompts. So I have videos from 2020 still getting likes and comments on a regular basis that are more educational or more um, value based versus my poems that have gone viral have been very much in the moment, like a week or two, they'll get traffic.

[00:10:23] Shelby: Now that being said, there have been times where I'll post and it won't take off for a few weeks and then it will. I don't know if TikTok started showing it to more people and then they realized, okay, people are engaging with this and they continue showing it. But that is, The case sometimes as well, where it takes some time to get traffic.

[00:10:39] Shelby: So it's not as long term SEO as like Pinterest or YouTube, but I think they are focusing on that a lot and using keywords in your content. So it kind of just depends on if you're sharing that valuable educational content that people are searching for. Years down the line. 

[00:10:54] Teddy: That's really interesting.

[00:10:56] Teddy: This is fascinating because I have done a lot of YouTube and Pinterest and I, you know, you can see this stuff lasting for a long time. So it's great, but it does take a lot of work to get those videos to get shown for that long amount of time, whereas TikTok, it feels like you can get that more immediacy and get it, get stuff happening quite quickly.

[00:11:13] Shelby: Mm hmm. 

[00:11:14] Teddy: Definitely. Yeah. Amazing. So when your content strategy, have you noticed any particular types of posts that you would recommend people thinking about making? 

[00:11:25] Shelby: Yeah. So the nice thing about tick tock is there's a lot of different formats that work. However, I think it really is up to the author and that particular book to kind of test the different formats, because things work differently for fiction versus nonfiction.

[00:11:39] Shelby: I'm a poet. I'm able to share like a page of my book, and it can make sense to the reader, whereas like the average fiction author can't just open up a page of their book and You can share quotes and scenes and all of that, but it's a lot to read and all of that. So there's different formats that work for me.

[00:11:54] Shelby: And for any video, I should say, the one thing that always works is having a strong hook at the beginning of your video. And that can be text on the screen. It should speak directly to your target audience. It can be the visual itself is very engaging and captures attention. And It can be the sound that you add to the video.

[00:12:13] Shelby: Are you talking? So that very first second is where you really want to capture attention because that's what the algorithm relies on is people watching the video all the way through is what they want because they want to keep people on the platform, keep them watching ads. That's how they make money.

[00:12:27] Shelby: And so if you can really grab attention from the very beginning that's how you get people watching. And for me, That looks like I write mental health poetry, so I want to reach an audience of people who are going through mental health challenges. I write a lot about anxiety, self love, so people who are going through that journey.

[00:12:44] Shelby: And so for me, a hook could look like, If you are feeling anxious today, Read this poem or listen to this. And then I read the poem or I share the poem. And that format has been my format for the past four years. So once you find something, you can stick with it. I change up the hook. Of course, I share different poems.

[00:13:01] Shelby: I've tried other things, but that's what's worked for me. But it could be totally different for a nonfiction author who is very much an expert in a certain area, who it's going to be way more valuable for them to go on camera and talk to their audience. And show their knowledge and show their voice on this topic.

[00:13:19] Shelby: A fiction author might take the very popular tropes that are in their book, or summarize a scene in their book and leave us on a cliffhanger, and really focus on that plot, that conflict. So it really is going to vary by, your genre and by your book, but experiment, make sure you're focusing on those hooks that first second and be analytical with yourself.

[00:13:41] Shelby: Like what I stop and watch this video if it was someone else and not my own. And that can be kind of hard to do, but as you test, you can see those analytics on tech talk and see how long are people watching for. And you'll probably be a little sad because you'll see like. A big drop off after one second or two seconds, but then you can keep improving that and work on it and, and get better at making those hooks.

[00:14:04] Teddy: Yeah. So TikTok's good at giving you all those analytics so you can work out exactly what it is that keeps you watching your videos. 

[00:14:10] Shelby: Yes. Yeah. If you have a business account, they should be turned on automatically on a personal account. You have to go in and turn them on. So make sure you do that right away.

[00:14:18] Shelby: If you, if you don't, you won't have the data from all the videos you've already posted. But you can see. When people drop off, you can see the average watch time and then my favorite to look at is the percentage of people that watched the full video because I always see a pretty clear correlation between if people are only watching 5 percent of the video, there's not going to be that many views, whereas if people are watching, you know, 30 percent of people watched all the way to the end, that's a pretty good indication that tick tock will start pushing it out more and more because they can see that you've gotten people engaged throughout the video.

[00:14:51] Shelby: Um, 

[00:14:52] Teddy: Yeah. Okay. Now with your TikToks that you create, you mentioned they sometimes watch to the end of the video. What's the length that these TikToks usually need to be? 

[00:15:02] Shelby: So I recommend starting lower and then moving up as you're able to Make longer content and get people engaged. And there's been some studies that have shown like people with larger audiences are able to make longer videos and keep people engaged because they've built that kind of community and people know what to expect from them.

[00:15:22] Shelby: So I do recommend starting shorter and like seven to 10 seconds is a good place to start. Now, if you're doing like a talk, yeah, if you're doing a talking or educational video, that's going to be hard to fit that into. Seven, 10 seconds. You can go a little bit longer, but a style that works really well.

[00:15:39] Shelby: You've probably, if you use Instagram, Instagram reels is common is like B roll or just some kind of video footage of you or something related to what you're talking about and then text over top to get people to read the text or then read the caption and get the value from there. So that's a pretty popular format that is short and allows you to kind of see, am I able with what I'm putting on the screen to keep people engaged?

[00:16:05] Shelby: And then you can increase from there. The other format that TikTok has that I've been doing a lot too, that you can experiment with is carousels, which is photos. And you can add. your text hook on the photo, you can add background music to it, and then people can swipe through. And if they make it to the end, that's the same thing as watching a full video, even though it's not a video, it's they're kind of swiping through and engaging with it that way.

[00:16:28] Shelby: And so I've been posting that type of content a lot. And usually for me, it's just two or three slides, but fiction authors in particular are seeing a lot of success with a lot of slides, like 10 slides or more. Where they'll put like a quote from the book on each slide, and people can just kind of swipe through almost as if they're reading a scene from the book, and then that kind of engages them and has been pretty successful for some fiction authors as well.

[00:16:51] Shelby: So that's another format if you don't love the idea of video, I still do recommend it, but the carousel option is on TikTok as well. 

[00:17:00] Teddy: Yeah, a lot of people are a bit scared about creating videos, uh, not necessarily even just being on camera. I think it's just quite a scary prospect if you haven't done anything like this before.

[00:17:08] Teddy: Um, can you realistically, is it possible to outsource creating TikToks do you think? Or do you think you need to really be in, in front of the camera? 

[00:17:18] Shelby: What I've seen works best is doing it yourself and figuring out what works. And then once you have some hooks and you have an idea of what your audience is resonating with, then you can outsource some of it.

[00:17:30] Shelby: And I think it also depends on the content because for a fiction author who, you know, could hand somebody a book and say, like, can you pull out some strong stuff. Seeing some strong quotes, like realistically, absolutely other people can do that for you. In the nonfiction world, especially if it is more of a, you're an authority on the topic and people want to see you.

[00:17:49] Shelby: You could have someone help you write the scripts or write a strong hook, but I still think that you definitely need to be a part of the content creation itself. So yes and no I still, I do all my content myself. I find that I, I just know my audience really well, but that takes time to learn. So you can get feedback from someone, you can hire, you know, a tick tock consultation or something just to get you started if you're really, you know, unsure.

[00:18:11] Shelby: But I do think that being able to know what your audience resonates with can help you. In a lot of ways. So I think it's worth trying on your own. 

[00:18:21] Teddy: Could you outsource, for example, the editing of the videos into a TikTok? So if you were just going to create the film yourself doing the hook, film yourself speaking there.

[00:18:30] Teddy: Whatever it is you're doing, but then could you give that someone else? Is that something that's done? 

[00:18:35] Shelby: You could, yeah, you could. What I do. So I make my own author videos and there's also, I should add in the TikTok platform itself, a pretty easy editor, like if you've never edited before. You can learn it.

[00:18:49] Shelby: It's going to take a little bit of time, but you can learn it. And it's really easy to just clip the beginning and end of you, maybe pausing or messing up and all of that can be done inside of tech talk. But I do like weekly YouTube videos on marketing and my video editor will take that and edit it into reels that I post and tech talks that I post as well.

[00:19:07] Shelby: And that definitely saves time for some of those longer form talking videos where there might be more. Editing involved. But the nice thing about TikTok too is that it's very like low key. It's very authentic in terms of you don't need the fancy editing and the sound effects and the really engaging kind of cuts that you would see in like a YouTube video.

[00:19:26] Shelby: Typically there are some people that have built success off of doing that, but the vast majority is pretty, I'm just talking to camera. Yes. You want to clip out, you know, mess ups or pauses. You want to make sure you're getting to the point right away, but we don't need a lot of fancy stuff, which is really nice.

[00:19:43] Teddy: Yeah, because a lot of TikToks I think I've seen around have been literally just people with their phones just talking into it. So it is quite straightforward and maybe it doesn't need too much and I guess that builds a bit more authenticity with the audience rather than having these cuts because my YouTube videos take quite a lot of editing, you know, I have to do like B roll as you mentioned and all these different cuts.

[00:20:00] Teddy: It does take quite a 10 minute video together. 

[00:20:03] Shelby: Exactly. Yeah. 

[00:20:05] Teddy: Have you found different content types have worked well, particularly for non fiction because a lot of people listening to this do, Have nonfiction books. Are there any particular types of video or types of content that you have worked particularly well that you've noticed?

[00:20:18] Shelby: Yeah, definitely. So I think a mix and trying out a mix of the like short B roll text over top. And whenever I say text over top, we don't want to like load up the screen with like paragraphs, but typically a few sentences enough to hook someone's attention and get them reading and that. And then you can give value in the caption, or you could give, you know, maybe three tips in the video itself over the course of 10, 15 seconds.

[00:20:46] Shelby: Just as text. That's a really popular one just because it. Encourages people to stop because they want to see what they're missing if they don't read it. So that first line really needs to be gripping speaking right to your audience. And if you can show value, it doesn't always have to be educational or show like the transformation of your book.

[00:21:06] Shelby: If it's that type of book or memoir, there's memoir authors who will share just like a really gripping part of their story. And people want to know what happens next. It's also popular with both fiction and nonfiction to just tell part of your story. And with fiction, it's kind of like funny because people don't realize that it's a fiction story.

[00:21:25] Shelby: So they'll be telling the stories of what happened to them, but it's actually like a character in their book. But with nonfiction, typically it happened to the author or someone that they know, so they can tell the story. Leave us off on a cliffhanger, obviously don't give it all away. And then people want to go and read the story.

[00:21:42] Shelby: So that's a couple. And then, of course, there's kind of your standard, like talking videos, telling your story, educational you know, showing the transformation that's going to occur in your book if that's the case. So that's kind of what I recommend. And Take talk, you know, with how many videos are posted all the time.

[00:21:58] Shelby: There's just a drove of research that you can find on tech talk. If you search for either your genre or just keywords, like, I don't know if you wrote a book about like divorce, for example, and just searching that or divorce, I don't know, healing, like things like that. You'll be able to find videos that people have made on this topic and see what's working for them.

[00:22:20] Shelby: Because the difference between like nonfiction and fiction is with BookTok, it's pretty much fiction driven, but that doesn't mean that there aren't lots of people reading nonfiction on TikTok. And you can still find people talking about nonfiction, but we also want to target people who are specifically looking for the topics in your book.

[00:22:39] Shelby: So for me with poetry, yes, there's people who buy my books who love poetry, but there's also a lot of people who don't know that they liked poetry. And I'm telling them about how. These poems can help with their anxiety and things like that. And then they want it. So I'm more targeting, not necessarily book talk, but people who are interested in the themes of my book specifically, if that makes sense.

[00:22:59] Teddy: Yeah, no, that makes perfect sense. Yeah. That's absolutely fascinating. Do you even touch briefly on the research part? Do you usually recommend people doing keyword research to find the right videos to do, or is it a case of just starting and working out what works? 

[00:23:15] Shelby: A mix of both. I do think it's helpful if you haven't seen TikToks before or haven't really used the platform that you do spend some time being an engaged user for research purposes before you start posting, because I do think that you learn a lot just from seeing how the platform works, what is it showing you, what videos make you stop and actually watch it to the end.

[00:23:36] Shelby: And then also if you search a keyword or you search for your genre, you'll see other readers talking about What books they're enjoying and the words that they're using, the hashtags they're using, the hooks that they're using. And that's a really good insight directly into your target audience and what they're already talking about and saying.

[00:23:55] Shelby: And you can emulate that in your own content. So I think that it is valuable, but don't put off your own creation for the sake of continuing to research. I do think that you have to, at one point jump in and try it and know that your first few videos. Might be rough. They might not be your best work, but you're going to improve over time.

[00:24:14] Teddy: Yeah, that's great advice. Don't you don't get analysis paralysis. You're it's better to learn by doing sometimes than it is to. You know, you can't learn everything just by researching, you know? Absolutely. 

[00:24:24] Shelby: Yeah. 

[00:24:25] Teddy: So obviously you've got a program all about helping people with TikTok. I think it's called the TikTok solution and it helps people with the end to end with their TikTok process.

[00:24:35] Teddy: Could you tell us a bit about what that program entails and also how it links to people who are just getting started on TikTok and what they can expect from the program? 

[00:24:44] Shelby: Yeah, definitely. It's perfect for people who are just getting started. Because it's really just a step by step guide from like step one, download the app.

[00:24:52] Shelby: Like it really goes step by step. So it is perfect for the, the new user of TikTok who is curious about how you can use it to sell books. So yeah, it's on my website, marketingbyshelby. com and it will just take you through the step by step. It's a written guide. So it's good if you Do learn the kind of like reading instructions, but there are video tutorials embedded within it.

[00:25:12] Shelby: There's a whole master class video on writing hooks for your social media. And like we talked about how important that first second is with examples. So it's pretty thorough in that case. And then there's. Video ideas and examples that I've pulled from successful tick tocks. There's even some sounds that I've divided by genre that are available in the tick tock app that you can add to your video some evergreen ones and trends and things like that.

[00:25:36] Shelby: So, it's pretty thorough. People who are new to tick tock tend to really like it just because it is very step by step and it is a lot to learn because it's a new platform, but kind of having it step by step can really make it a lot easier. 

[00:25:49] Teddy: Yeah, definitely. I mean, it sounds great. Do you think tick tock?

[00:25:52] Teddy: Say you're just starting out with social media for your book. Do you think tick tock is a platform you should really be focusing on as one of your first platforms to go on? 

[00:26:00] Shelby: I honestly do think so, because the algorithm is like Facebook, you know, I don't even know how many years ago now, 10 plus years ago before ads were such a big part of it, you know, and tick tock ads are a thing.

[00:26:14] Shelby: But tick tock is Allows you to reach non followers. New people easier than other platforms that I'm seeing and more quickly as well. And they also have, which we didn't really touch on, but tick tock shop. If you want to kind of ship out your books directly to your audience that people can purchase directly in the app on tick tock and tick tock shop is quite popular.

[00:26:36] Shelby: I'm not available in every single country, but a lot of Big countries that is available. I know the UK and the U S and all of that. So that's also an option that authors are seeing success with which is another benefit to tick tock that I think really differs from other platforms as well. 

[00:26:51] Teddy: Can you link it up to your Amazon store as well?

[00:26:53] Teddy: If you are selling books through KDP, for example. 

[00:26:56] Shelby: So a tick tock shop, you cannot it, unfortunately there's no integration with Amazon at this point. I would love to see that happen. So people are ordering like author copies and shipping them out. Themselves which obviously is extra work and more manual, but you can chart a higher price for sign books.

[00:27:13] Shelby: You can include like other stickers and bookmarks and things in it if you wanted to do that. However, for the past four years, I have been selling through Amazon and directing people to Amazon, so you don't have to use TikTok shop to see success. A lot of readers know that. Their favorite books are going to be on Amazon and they'll go and search for the book there.

[00:27:30] Shelby: So it's no problem. 

[00:27:32] Teddy: Great. That's what I was going to say. Could you direct people to your Amazon listing instead? But you've just answered that. So that's great. Just one final question about the TikTok. So I've got a bit of a prejudice about it in that it's just 15 year olds posting pictures themselves dancing.

[00:27:45] Teddy: So what is the target audience? You know, a lot of people listen to this, they might be, you know, maybe quite a bit older than 15, they might be, you know, 40s, 50s, even older, and they're writing their first book, they might think, okay, my target audience isn't going to be on TikTok. Is that the wrong thing to think, do you think?

[00:28:04] Shelby: I don't think it's the wrong thing to think, because it started off quite young. But over time, so many people have got onto this app. It has over a billion users. So you're going to find people of your age group, your target audience on this app. It does get fewer as we get older. And Instagram is the same, but we've also seen Instagram change with that.

[00:28:25] Shelby: And. I'm going to be talking about the Tic Tac app. as a person who has become an older, like average median age as time has gone on as well. So you can research Tic Tac demographics for your country or your target audience. But I do think that it's worth it to just try, because even if, you know, 10 percent of your age group is on the app, that's still potentially millions of people that you could reach.

[00:28:46] Shelby: So I think it's worth it. But totally, you know, of course, up to you to kind of research those demographics and see if you are trying to reach a very specific age group. You can check that first before you. You know, start spending all your time making videos. 

[00:29:00] Teddy: Yeah. Brilliant. That's really good advice.

[00:29:02] Teddy: I mean, yeah, this has been such a good episode. You've given so many good insights that people can just go in and learn so much from you. Well, if people want to get in contact with you, what's the best way to do that? Cause we'll put the link to your website in the show notes, but where's the best place for people to follow you or to find out more about the course.

[00:29:17] Shelby: Yeah, sure. So yeah, the course is on my website, marketingbyshelby. com. I post pretty regularly on Instagram as well as weekly marketing videos on YouTube also at marketingbyshelby so you can find me and follow me there as well. 

[00:29:31] Teddy: Brilliant. Yeah. I highly recommend her Instagram accounts. There's really good tips on there just for every day.

[00:29:36] Teddy: So really good, really good Instagram accounts follow. Thank you. Well, thank you very much, Shelby. I really appreciated this conversation. I think you've given some great insights there. Just one final question. What's one book you recommends that everyone should be reading at the moment? 

[00:29:48] Shelby: Okay. I have to stick with my poetry genre.

[00:29:52] Shelby: I read a lot of poetry. I love a lot of self published. indie poets. So one of my favorites right now is a book on grief. It's called, I look to the morning sky by Liz Newman. 

[00:30:03] Teddy: Oh, great. And who's your favorite poets? 

[00:30:06] Shelby: Oh, I don't know if I could pick. I grew up reading Emily Dickinson, so I love her, but there's a lot of modern poets that I adore.

[00:30:14] Shelby: Tristan Mateo. I made a lovely Snakita Gill to name a few. 

[00:30:17] Teddy: Oh, lovely. Quite traditional things. 

[00:30:21] Shelby: Yes. 

[00:30:23] Teddy: Great. Well, it's been lovely to speak to you. Thank you so much for joining me and we'll speak again soon. 

[00:30:27] Shelby: Okay. Thank you so much for having me. 

[00:30:29] Teddy: Thank you so much for tuning into the publishing performance podcast.

[00:30:32] Teddy: I really hope you found today's episode inspiring. I love chatting to authors, writers, and people in the publishing world. Now, just before we wrap up, let me tell you about some Publishingformance, the number one platform for authors who want to increase Amazon book sales, but I'm not really sure where to start.

[00:30:48] Teddy: Now, this show is all about helping you to sell more books. And if you're looking to boost your publishing game and to maximize your book's potential on Amazon, then Publishingformance is designed to help authors just like you to grow your readership and to reach a much wider audience. Now, I know that Amazon ads can be slightly complicated, which is why Publishingformance is like having a personalized ad account manager to create your ad campaigns, to choose your best keywords, and to make adjustments in real time.

[00:31:17] Teddy: Now, if you're investing in ads, you really want to make sure that your investment is being used effectively, and Publishing Performance does just that. It aims to make your budget go further, improve your organic rank, and target keywords more effectively. Just go to publishingperformance. com to get started with Amazon Ads for just 1.