#162: Dr. Tim Riordan learned how to grow his author platform and the basics of book marketing from the academy

Hey, this is Shelly Hitz.

And I'm CJ Hitz.

And today we are here with Christian book Academy member Dr. Tim Riordan. Welcome.

Thank you, Shelly. It's great to be here.

Yes. And we were just reminiscing that it was back in maybe 2013 that you first found my website and the resources. But just we've known you for many, many years. You invited me to come speak at a conference in your church and so on, on self publishing. And so we've met in person and just watched your. Your ministry. And you now have 13 published books, both in fiction under a pen name and as well as, you know, your nonfiction books and just wanted to feature you and share some of your story and how God has been working through your writing ministry.

Well, thank you, Shelly. I can tell you when I first came across you, I was struggling because I wanted to publish. I felt like it was important. It was God's call in my life to do this, but I had no clue how to do it. And so I started googling things, trying to learn. Is there some help out there that would help me be able to self publish my book? I'd heard about Amazon. I'd heard about then CreateSpace and KDP and some of those things, but I didn't know what to do with it. And that's how I came across you. Shelley is through that kind of Google search. And. And I started out being mentored by your website and the resources you had there. And then I eventually got connected to your academy group, your mentoring group. And you poured in me through that, through your videos, through your training, and really helped me along the way. It taught me some really important lessons about partnering with people and learning and gleaning that I don't have to just stand on my own feet. I can stand on someone else's shoulders. And I really believe that God's helped me to stand on your shoulders and, and bless my ministry because of you. And so I know back in the early days and now, actually just last week, I went back in and looked at some previous things that I'd watched before, just trying to pull some things out that maybe I had missed. We can always be learning. We can always be growing. And it's been such a blessing to my life and to my ministry as a writer.

Yeah. And you know, we were talking about how just. Just marketing is not necessarily your favorite thing.

I have a hard time with it. And it's because I would rather write than market. And I just tell you, in the early days, I used to Think marketing means I'm out there on social media asking people to buy my book. And actually, Shelly, you helped me see it's not that at all. It's not asking people to buy my book. It's really building relationship with people and connecting to people, dealing with felt needs in their life and just trying to journey together. And then every now and then we have opportunity to be able to present our books. And so that was a big, a big part. One thing that you helped me with so much in some of the modules in the Christian Book Academy is on email marketing. Because when I first started, I didn't know what I was doing at all about much of anything. And you talked about how to use email marketing. You connected me to the service that you used at the time. And I still use that one. I keep saying I'm gonna switch over to something else, but I still use it. And people say, so why do you use that? I said, well, because Shelly Hits told me to use this, but it's a fine resource and I use it and it's helpful. It's traffic wave is what I'm still doing. But in your resource, you, you gave us practical steps on what to do and how to do this. Because I had no clue about email marketing. And I would say, in fact, you probably said this in that, that training, if you do one thing in marketing, email marketing ought to be one of them. It ought to be the one thing. Obviously you gotta have a website, you gotta have some other things, but email marketing is so really important and, and you not only said we ought to do that, but you gave practical steps on how to do that. So your mentoring, your training has been so instrumental on helping me not only to be able to publish these books, but also on marketing the books. And it's because it's so practical. It's not like I've got to figure out what you really meant. You give the practical steps, do this, follow these things, and then do it. And I'll just tell you it works. What you say works if I'll just do it. I was saying earlier that a lot of times we know what to do, right? But we just don't always do it. And I think that's one thing that I've enjoyed about your training. It reminds me to do those things. Don't just sit around thinking about it, don't just talk about it, don't just plan to do it, but pull the trigger and do it. And so it's been a great resource to help me move down the road. To really being able to impact. And I get to hear from people from time to time. Sometimes they'll respond to my website, maybe to a blog. Sometimes they send me emails and reach out to me. I just was probably about a month ago, I got an email from a woman who. It's just a very sad story about abuse and just on and on. Her father died, her husband left her. On and on and on it went. And she's not a believer. And she read my book on marketing of all things. You know, it's not like she read Psalms or my book on Proverbs or something about, you know, but it was on how to market your book because she's an author and she connected to me with me through that book and shared her story about her life and has given me the opportunity to share the gospel with her by email. We developed an email relationship back and forth. I've shared the gospel. She's an older lady, I'm going to guess in her mid-70s. And she still doesn't know the Lord. But we probably connect once a week about spiritual things. And she's very open to talking about the Lord now, whereas at first she was not. She's had some bad experiences. And so it's just been a thrilling thing to know that somehow God's given me the opportunity, just like he gives every writer. We have the opportunity to write a book in the quiet of our little writing place, wherever that is. And God's going to use it around the world to touch the lives of people who otherwise we would never come in contact with. I just got a note from a lady who read one of my novels. And I market these novels to unbelievers. I intentionally write to a secular audience. I have reasons for that, but I wanted to use this as a backdoor ministry to talk about how to really have relationships that honor the Lord. And she wrote me a note about a week ago about my sixth book that just came out because I pretty strong I use Mexican history to share the gospel. It's kind of a long story, but I use some historical stuff to present the gospel in a creative way so it doesn't feel like I'm hitting you over your head with the Bible. But she wrote me a note and thanked me for my book and told me how much she liked it and said some nice things about it. But then she specifically thanked me for showing her in my story, the love of God. Now, I don't know her story. I don't know anything else about her. But I do know that she Got the message. And that means the world to me because that's one book where I'm very careful. You know, I realize I'm writing to people who don't buy a book to read about Jesus. And I'm. I want to creatively, carefully share the gospel, make them experience the love of God. And I just think it's thrilling. And so I would just say to people who are considering Christian Book Academy, this program can take you to the next level and can help you bear fruit for the kingdom, which is why we write. We write so that we can bear fruit for God's kingdom, that God can use us for eternal purposes. And I'll just tell you, I would still be wandering around in the wilderness, honestly, Shelly, if it had not been for you in those early days, especially helping me get on the path, you know, figure all this stuff out and get on the journey. And I still go back and reference. I'll just tell you, it was about. I held this book up a minute ago and talked about this book that Shelly wrote many years ago. This is 2014, and how it impacted my life back then. It was about two months ago. I was doing something. I can't remember what I was working on. And I pulled this book out and I went back to something I had marked in here just to see what that was. And I am just telling you, Shelly wrote this a long time ago and it is still impacting me today. So I know that, that this program is a great resource that can help people going down the path. I recommend it all the time.

Thank you so much for sharing. And it just gives me chills to hear the stories and how God is using your words to impact people. How can people find out more about you if they want to connect further?

If they want to connect, they can go to my website, TimRiordan.com my last name is R I O R d a n tim riordan.com actually, if you google me, I think I pop up first, so. But I would love to connect anywhere I can help you. I don't have it all down. I'm still on the journey as well, wondering, you know, trying to figure it all out. But we can do it together. And I've learned the value of collaboration and working together. And that's one thing I love about Christian authors. We all want to help each other. So feel free to reach out to me. I'd love to be a part of your journey.

Yes. Thank you so much for taking a few minutes to share some of your story and your journey as a writer. We really appreciate you, Tim.

Thank you. Thanks, Shelly. Thanks, C.J. thanks, Tim.