Ep. 24: Build a Healthy PR Mindset Before You Market Your Book with Lilian Sue

Welcome to the Pub Date Podcast, the show where two book broads discuss what should happen before, during, and after your book publication date. Brought to you by Broad Book Group with your host Vanessa Campos and Jen Dorsey.

Hi everyone, thanks for joining us on another episode of the Pub Date podcast. Today we are actually playing a little bit of musical chairs. Instead of Jen, who is out on a quick little vacation, we're going to have Paul join us in the conversation because I think it's super appropriate. We are talking publicity, PR, and storytelling, and that's something that is near and dear to Paul's heart.

That's exactly why it is near and dear, because for the first 20 years of my life, between my original stint in radio and my rebirth in internet radio, I was an entertainment publicist and then a corporate publicist for years. So yes, I have a lot of, a lot of ideas and background in this. Back in the day when it was— you weren't a publicist, you were a press agent.

Press agent.

Yes.

I haven't heard that in a while.

Yeah.

So let's introduce our guest. Our guest today is Lillian Su. She is a longtime PR coach and publicist who focuses on helping authors fulfill their potential to become global industry leaders by focusing on how to build a healthy PR mindset above any strategy. She's given workshop presentations and developed journals and other resources to help authors bust down that mindset, which really creates roadblocks. I'm telling you from experience, uh, gain clarity on their thoughts, feelings, um, and the myths they believe about PR while providing them with the right tools, resources, and knowledge to learn how to build their own successful PR campaigns. Welcome, Lillian.

Hi, Vanessa. Hi, Paul. Thanks for having me.

Thanks for joining us. So tell us a little bit about how you came into the world of PR and your experience with book publishing, because as we know, book publishing people don't come straight out of— well, for the most part, don't come straight out of college into publicity and, and book marketing.

Sure. Yeah. I actually started my business on the copywriting and social media side. And the reason why I added publicity as one of my services is because I had a lot of entrepreneurs coming up to me and saying, hey, can you put out a press release for me? Can you get me interviews? And I got tired of telling them no. So it was more of like, okay, let's add this service. Let's see, let's see how I do with it and let's see who I can help. And I actually got my start off with indie film publicity, as you mentioned, Paul, being in entertainment yourself, before moving into book publicity because I saw a lot of authors who were struggling quite a bit with, with marketing. They had built their own platforms through social media and email, but they were still struggling to kind of find traction and feeling like so much of it was, how do I get my audience to respond? How do I get my audience to engage with me that isn't always about me promoting my books? It isn't just me sitting there and going, buy my books, buy my books, buy my books. And one of the reasons why I incorporated PR coaching and the educational component into my services— I also have a course, actually— is because a lot of authors and a lot of entrepreneurs were coming up to me and going, I would love to work with you on a campaign, but I can't afford it. So I took a step back and I went, okay, there's got to be a way, a better way for me to show up for my clients and continue to add value, but to also give them that education component to empower them, to teach them how to learn how to do this themselves in a way that makes it affordable for them, but also gives them that knowledge and those resources that they can carry with them long term. The motto for my business is, you know, you give a man a fish, he will eat a day, for a day. You teach a man to fish, he will eat for a lifetime. And that's what I tell authors all the time. When you know how to use this, when you have the confidence to go out there and do this, nobody can take that away from you. It'll stay with you for the rest of your life. The question is, are you ready to get started with it? And if you're not, what are some of the things that we need to talk about in regards to where are you at? What are you stuck on? What are your fears surrounding all of this and how can we get past that to figure out what your goals are and how you want to use PR to make those goals?

Can I ask one just sort of establishing question here that I always used to ask? From your perspective, what is PR? What is public relations and what is it not? Because it is earned media, it's not paid media, and people sometimes blur the lines. I know, but they— I think they go into it with unrealistic expectations as to what it is or what it isn't.

That's exactly part of the reason why mindset is so key, Paul, because a lot of the entrepreneurs and the authors that I deal with have those kind of unrealistic expectations of like, oh, it's advertising or oh, it's social media. But what PR is to me is that it is the most cost-effective way to establish your reputation, build that brand recognition, and build third-party credibility with audiences and media all over the world. The power in that, of course, as I, as I've told a lot of authors, is the media has no bias or vested interest to support you, right? You're not paying them. They're not related to you. You know, they don't have to support your book or interview you. The reason why they want to do that is because they've bought into what your book is about. They've bought into your story. They think it's compelling and they think their audiences will get a lot of value from hearing about you. And your books. That's why they want to support you. Right. And I think where people, one of the humps they have to get across is that when you build, when you spend so much time building a platform on social media, through email, some authors have websites and that, I hear all the time that they get burnt out on those platforms because they're like, it's not my job. I'm tired. I'd rather be focusing on writing and everything. The challenge with building your own platform is you can only go so far beyond your own audience. Even if you're— you have an avid reviewer who promotes it to their audience, it helps. Absolutely. But the media doing any kind of PR will help elevate you to the next level to reach international audiences. And that's where I think there is a piece that's missing for a lot of people because they'll build their own platforms and build their own audiences and go, I'm doing what it is that I want to be doing with this. This is all that I can manage. But what they don't realize is that if you want to go to the next level, do more author signings, run those workshops, be called as a panelist for different industry conferences. They're going to want to see that foundation, that track record, that experience that you have moving in the media arena. So if that's what you want and you don't have that experience, they're not going to pick somebody super green who doesn't know what they're doing. Right? That, that's where I find the disconnect. I mean, if all you want to do is sell 10 books a month, you could probably do that with your own, you know, social media platform. I'm never going to sit there and tell authors that you can't. But if you want to move to the next level, you have to be willing to take a bigger picture look at what your goals are and really get introspective, nail down what is it that I want to do, because selling more books, that's not enough. That's surface level. That's not specific enough, and it's not going to get you where you want to go.

So the question I have, I guess, to go one step further, and I'll let Vanessa Campos jump in here, is when I did PR, you were trying to go to some media outlet on behalf of your client and convince them to write about them, to have them on a TV show, to review their book, to do something. And so you had to tell them a story. You can't just say, well, it's a big successful book. Okay, so what? I got to write about the human story, their struggle doing this, their backstory, how this fits into the times. Boy, this is the perfect spotlight on what we're going through today. I had to frame it in some bigger narrative. I couldn't just say, here's a book. Here's what it's about. Write about it.

I—

and because that's an ad. And then when I did get stuff in publication, when I got somebody to write about it, that my client would often come back and say, well, they didn't talk about this. They didn't talk about this. I'm like, they're not there to give all the talking points of your book. They're not there to give all the products and features of benefits of your product here. They're there to tell the story. And the story will hopefully attract people to go and learn more. So that was what we were trying to do. It was earned media. We had to earn it from them. We didn't buy it from them. So we didn't have total control over it. And I used to frustrate the hell out of the clients. Well, I wanted more. I wanted bigger. I wanted these extra 5 points included. Like I'm just supposed to call them up and say, hey, make sure you add these 5 things in there. Or what? Or we won't run it. Uh, it, it, it's an unex— un— unrealistic expectation about what PR was, number one. And number two, I think that it's changed today. And that's what I'd like to talk about because I haven't done PR in a long time. Now you got social media and I don't know, is that earned media? Are you still trying to convince an influencer to do something? But in some cases you're giving them copies or you're doing other things. In some cases you're writing the press, the public, the releases for your client. You're running their social media. So are you just a social media editor now? You're not convincing somebody to write it. You're coming up with stories and creating your own publicity. Talk about how— first of all, what PR is, and then more specifically, how it works today. What do you do for these people?

Whether they come to me for coaching, whether they take my course, whether they come to me for campaign services where I actually work alongside them to launch a campaign. Earned media is still that in the sense that we're not paying to have an article featured. We're not paying to have an ad featured, nothing like that. But it has expanded in the sense that in the old days, um, when you were pitching, you would get on the phone or send an email or whatever. Email's still big. Email's still big.

It was all about the pitch. You had 10 seconds in front of them and I pitched them and they either took the bait and decided, oh, I'll look, I'll learn more about it. Or they said, no, next. What else you got?

Mm-hmm. And, you know, or we use social media as a, as a way to bridge the gap because there are a lot of indie publications, podcasts and stuff. People aren't as open with their email addresses anymore unless they work for a major mainstream publication, right? You know, what I counsel clients to do and what I do for them is when it comes to pitching, we're not just talking about like what your book is about. You have to tell them why it matters. That's it. That's what, what is it about your book that makes it compelling enough that their audience is going to want to read it? What is it about your story that will make it unique enough that people are going to go, wow, I really need to talk to this guy, or I really need to interview her. And one of those big things that I don't think authors think about a ton is positioning, because they look at it and they're like, oh, you know, I'm just going to focus on building my own audience and that's it. People sit straight up when I say to them, what you do is not unique. Some of them even get a little bit offended when I say that, but I'm like, it's not about what you do because there are thousands of authors who write in the genres that you write in. That's the honest truth. What makes it unique is how you do it and why you do it. What's the story? It's time for you to sit down and get introspective on what inspired you to do this, what inspired you to create this particular story. What do you want people to get out of it?

Yeah, you bring up a very valid point in you saying people sit straight up when you tell them you're not unique or you're not— your story is not, you know, there's nothing new under the sun. It's really a matter of who you are, what you bring to the table, and how people can connect with you. And I think for me on the book production and book marketing side, it's like, okay, I'm going to create a content calendar for you to not worry about sharing your insights But now I need you to take that step in front of the camera and start talking about you. And I think that that's really what stops people short of making something, you know, into leveling up into taking that book and creating a little bit of a broader audience. What are a few different habits that you recommend for authors that are very shy or even entrepreneurs that are very shy to get them out of that and start thinking, yes, I earned this. Yes, I've done this. What do you recommend habit-wise?

I think what it comes down to is imposter syndrome, which is really, really big with the creative community and with authors in particular. And I tell them, I said, hey, you know what? I was in the same boat as you are right now. The same way you just want your book to speak for you. And to do all that work and, you know, you asked the question, why would people care about my story when it should be about my book or my project? I said I was the same way. I always said, why can't my work speak for me? But the thing is, is that people want to learn the story behind who created the project. They can't just buy into the project. They also have to buy into who you are. What you stand for. And when I say to them, when it comes to imposter syndrome, really look at what is at the root of that fear. What I do is I meditate. I use mantras where, you know, if I'm feeling scared about something or there's a ton of anxiety or I'm stressed out, I take a deep breath and I tell myself, You are here because people believe in you. You know, people believe in you because you've spent this time building your audience. You know that no matter what, they're going to be behind you. And you know that there's already a market there for your book. Do not let anybody tell you that it is not marketable. Sidebar, that is my biggest pet peeve with my author friends who are getting rejected by publishers and agents. When they tell them it's not marketable, I say, according to who? According to who?

The gatekeeper, whoever the gatekeeper is in their experience. Let me ask Vanessa Campos a question though, and I'm just marveled as I listened to both of you talking about this. Why can't you get authors who are storytellers to tell their own story? Why do they have to be hidden behind the book?

I think it's a matter of the product and saying like, well, this was the solution that I used and then that I've sold to other people and that's why people want to eventually hire me. And I think it's usually like, well, this— there's this tiny little nugget that I have that no one else has, but it's so cool. Let's just let the nugget speak for itself. But in reality it's like, I don't know, I mean, I read a lot of business books. I think the part that I, I get really excited and I'm, you know, if I'm reading something about franchising, I get really excited and then I wake up in the middle of the book when somebody's giving me their behind the scenes stories. Those case studies are what makes, you know, colors that illustration in your head. That's what you get excited about. And it's not always just about the thing, because the thing tends to be pretty easy to duplicate. I mean, we're talking about publishing, we're talking about PR, and these are all things that, you know, there's the standard way of doing it and then there's your way of doing it. And what's your way of doing it is the, that nugget that's gonna make you look different than everybody else who's writing a book about marketing or publicity for authors.

But I would think they're ready to be celebrities. That's why they've stepped out of the shadow. They want some attention. They think they got I've got something cool to say and then everybody will buy this and read this and maybe it'll bring in more business or more attention. They're ready for that celebrity. And yet, is it because they're authors? They spent months, years writing this thing by themselves and now they just want to sort of throw it out there. Movie makers have the same problem. Movie makers spend forever coming up with a movie and I don't want to publicize it. I don't want to promote it. That's cheapening it. That's— it should be just so great enough. Everybody should just want to go see But in truth, we all want to know who makes this stuff. I came out of the celebrity business, so it came very natural to me to talk about— if you're going to make a movie or star in a movie or write a book, then you're a celebrity. You're somebody special. I want to understand why you did this and how you did this and how long it took and your struggle and your story. Then if I like that, then I'll read your book. I'll watch your movie.

Speaking from my perspective in terms of working with authors that are entrepreneurs, they're usually solution-based, right? So they see the solution as being the star versus them carrying the solution and being the creator of this specific way of doing it, right? Or this, you know, this extra twist of doing it. Lillian, what do you see on your end?

I think that a lot of it comes down to some of the— still a lot of the fear, the imposter syndrome, the anxiety around, yes, I've put parts of myself into this product, I've put parts of myself into this book. However, there is a difference between them reading it versus me coming out and actually talking about it. There's still that huge fear of rejection. There's still that huge fear, especially of judgment. And sometimes it does come. It comes in the form of negative reviews, right? For no, no good or apparent reason. It's not constructive criticism. It's just negativity for the sake of being negative. And a lot of what I do in working with my clients is to try and help them get past that by giving them those mantras and reminding them to celebrate how far they've come whenever they get on a stumbling block and go, oh, you know, PR is too much for me. I can't, I can't send this email and go pitch somebody. I can't. And it's like, why can't you? Let's get to the root of what's blocking you. Where is that fear coming from? And how do we address building upon that based on this is how far you've come. Not everybody can write a book and that deserves to be celebrated. And your story, as we keep going back to is unique. There's people that will want to hear about why you did this, and honestly, they deserve to hear it. Yes, they want to learn from you. Your insights, your knowledge, your experiences are so valuable that it deserves to be shared. I almost feel like appealing to the educational component that they, that they could come out and educate someone else to give them that knowledge so that future generations of authors, whether they're self-published or not, are not stumbling around in the dark, right? When I say, when you want to sell more books, here's the other thing. It means more coming from an unbiased third party in the media who is endorsing your book than it is always coming from the horse's mouth. Why? Because you're inherently biased. Everybody knows you want to sell your books, but the media, they don't have a stake in it. They can support whoever they want to, and yet they've chosen you. That means something. So you should leverage that content, continue to build that relationship, and see where it goes, because the, the world is essentially your oyster when it comes to that. Even going beyond, authors understand the importance of reviews. Of course. What about going beyond that and building relationships with, let's say your book has mental health issues in it, or you're focused on what it's like to parent a child who is neurodivergent. There you have a lot of industry associations you can tap into too to build relationships with them that will help further the business development and help grow your profile, build name recognition and brand awareness that, you know, you have this book and that it is important to all these different communities as well. That's something else that gets overlooked quite often where people just go, oh, I have to end up on the Graham Norton Show. I have to end up on the talk show circuit and do Jimmy Fallon. That's not that's all there is to it. And I think that when people go into PR with those unrealistic expectations of I need the New York Times bestseller list, they think that's the top of the mountain. They're just going to aim for that top of the mountain and that's it. And I tell them, when you have no experience and you are essentially coming into this as a greenhorn, they will not it is very, very rare for something to go viral and they will take a chance on you.

I do have to say that Vanessa's been on all three of those shows: Jimmy Fallon, Graham Norton in England, and the New York Times bestseller list. So it can happen. I know. Well, we're out of time. So Vanessa, take us, uh, give us— wrap this up somehow. What are we— what are we talking about?

I want people to start following Lillian. I want people to start following her because this has been incredibly insightful. Lillian, I know that you drop all of this education for free just to kind of help build people up. Where can people find you?

I'm probably the most active on Instagram at Lily and Sue Copywriter PR, and I'm on there, you know, 5 days a week posting mindset tips, posting tips on how to use different tools and focus on different parts of PR strategy. And my DMs are always open. For anybody who has questions.

Yes. And let's just make sure that everyone follows her. I'll be putting that in the show notes. Thank you so much for being here today, Lillian. I really appreciate it. I love picking people's brains like we did today. And a big thank you to our producer, Paul Roberts of OC Talk Radio, and our executive producer, Emily Carpenter-Pulskamp of Little Red Communications. Until next time.

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