Turn Your Passion into a Book

 

Years ago, I read a fun book by author Christna Katz called Get Known Before the Book Deal: Use Your Personal Strengths to Grow an Author Platform. She shared practical tips on simple ways to slowly create a brand and online presence while creating content about something you really love. 

 Phase 1of her blueprint included “Platform Development and Building.” Although I have been writing for years, I spent the first part of my career writing parenting and lifestyle articles, as well as working in magazine publishing. Those markets were oversaturated so I never focused much on building a platform besides establishing an online presence with my writing blog. 

My ideas about platform building changed when I started my podcast, Missing in the Carolinas, almost five years ago. I’ve mentioned here before that it evolved over time—focusing on missing people and then adding in cold cases and crimes that have already been solved. My listeners have grown organically, they e-mail their ideas, I conduct interviews with local true crime authors, and I’ve become fascinated by finding crimes in old newspaper archives. Although I don’t have a large following on Instagram, Facebook, or YouTube, I did establish separate pages for the podcast and try to update those a few times a week. The small group of followers I have there are curious, encouraging, and often engaged. Where I’ve seen the most organic growth is in my podcast feed—between Apple and Spotify podcasts I have close to 10,000 followers. 

As Katz suggested in her book, I’ve established my niche, regional true crime in North and South Carolina. I created a separate website specifically for the podcast. Because I write most of my own scripts, I’ve amassed a stack of research and true crime stories in the past several years. I try and repurpose my content wherever I can, either sharing it or my blog or creating short videos for my YouTube channel, but there is still so much more I can do. Most podcasters I know have either created a Patreon channel with bonus content, published books, or created merchandise to sell to their followers. I’ve done none of that. 

Last week I made a decision and texted it to my whole family. “This is what I’ve decided to do,” I said. “I’m finally going to self-publish a book with crimes that have been featured on the podcast. My target date is fall.” I’m trying not to tell myself that this is an unrealistic deadline, when I’m still working on revising and pitching my suspense novel to agents and trying to start a new work of women’s fiction. Most of the writing and research of the true crime book has already been completed—I need to organize it into chapters, rewrite a bit, conduct some new interviews, and hire an editor and cover designer. I have a focus for the book, crimes from the Carolinas that aren’t as well known to the public. After almost five years of working on this podcast, I’d like to create a product to sell and am hoping the podcast audience will help with book sales. We'll see how it goes!

 Have you used a passion of yours to write a book, create a blog or podcast or any other products? I’d love to know more!

Renee Roberson is an award-winning writer who also produces the true crime podcast, Missing in the Carolinas. She's currently seeking representation for a novel about, what else? A podcaster trying to solve a mystery. Learn more at www.FinishedPages.com and www.MissingintheCarolinas.com.

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