Tiara Brown: Iron Age Marketing Podcast Episode 019
In today’s episode of Iron Age Marketing, I talk to Tiara Brown author of the fantasy book “The Tales of Alexandria Stecklar: The Locket.”
Let’s Meet Iron Age Creator Tiara Brown
Tiara J Brown is an Ohio native and first time author with her book “The Tales of Alexandria Stecklar: The Locket.” She describes herself as “a nerdy, quirky, and adventurous mid-western girl with a love affair of writing, animations, and musicals! I have been writing stories since I was twelve-years-old.”
Living Your Childhood Dream & Publisher’s Blackspectations
Beginning our conversation, Tiara J Brown tells us how she finally pulled the trigger on her dream of being a writer, after rereading a story she’d written as a child. Tiara felt inspired to revive her story as an adult and began shopping it around to publishers. This turned out to not be the most fruitful path of course for a burgeoning fantasy novelist.
With some prompting Tiara confirms some of my worst suspicions about the publishing industry for Black creators. She describes some notes that she got from some publishers upon discovering it was a Fantasy story and not a book that focused on her race. Tiara says she’s writing the kind of story that she likes. Period.
The Strengths Of YA Fiction & Magic Vs Technology
Tiara Brown gets into what drew her to write in the YA genre. The stories tend to have more innocent relationships and incorporate more of the family dynamic into the world-building. Tiara appreciates being able to explore the relationships between a teen and her family in the midst of a dramatic setting.
Giving us a glimpse of the world she created, Tiana goes in deep about her heroine, Alexandria Stecklar, a teen with telekinetic powers who literally lives underground with her family. The story turns around the interactions with neighboring lands with different views on magic and technology, a dichotomy I always enjoy exploring.
Creative Engagement: Maximizing Your List
Carrying on Tiara shares a bit of her journey from finishing her book to where she starts marketing to people. Tiara researched self-published authors to see what they did to devise her own marketing strategy. Her strategy included using social media to do a cover art reveal, a release countdown, and podcasts to spread the word online. In-person, she spoke to a local high school English class and at her local library.
Talking about book two, Tiara said she would include a link in the book as an easy way for readers to leave reviews. As always I can’t help grilling our guests about their email marketing and thankfully Tiara is no slouch. She has an email list and continues to keep in touch with her readers, making sure her readers are sharing what they like about the story and anticipating the next book. I bring up my idea of contests for marketing as a capstone to this section of the conversation.
Is YA Fantasy For Girls, Are Series Scary, And Can Book Trailers Work
Talking about the YA Fantasy genre in general, Speculates that she believes more of her readers are young women. I tend to like more killing in a book than my wife does for instance so this checks out as far as my own anecdotal research. I remember YA fiction feeling juvenile even when I was of the appropriate. Tiara just thinks it’s to do with the type of story itself. Women are just more drawn to fantasy for whatever reason.
Since Tales of Alexandria Stecklar is an ongoing series, I have to ask Tiara if she thinks buyers will be gun-shy about starting a book series since the GOT debacle. Tiara has been watching the ongoing Nerdrotic coverage of the long-anticipated (but not really expected) end of the GOT book series herself and thinks we might be holding onto false hope.
In one last gasp, we talk about book trailers. Tiara received so many mixed messages about them that she didn’t bother. I wonder if a testimonial-type trailer might not work better than the movie trailer model. I know Storm Young got some traction with mysterious reels of her character ideas. Only time and experimentation will tell.
Hopefully, today’s episode with Tiara J Brown serves as both inspiration and education in your own journey to bring your creation to the world.
Tiara Brown Resources & Extra Media
Shilling In The Iron Age
Need help connecting with or growing your audience for your book, comic, TTRPG, or other creative endeavor? Check out Nicky P @ ironagemarketing.com
ironagemarketing@nickpecone.com
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