SPEAKER_01 0:00

You know, just like with Google reviews, I mean five stars are great, but people want to know why, right? I mean, they they want to know what the experience is. And so if you can get people to leave reviews, and um, you know, I will always advise my authors to put in the back of their book, you know, if you enjoyed this book, please go and leave a review, right?

SPEAKER_02 0:24

All right, everybody, welcome to another episode of Connections That Matter. We have great conversations with Northern Colorado's best networkers and find out the tips that have led to their success. Today we have a special guest, Liz Morofka from What If Publishing, uh, who helps you publish your own book. I'm super excited for this, Liz. Welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

Thank you. I'm so glad to be here. Any day that I can talk about books is a good day.

SPEAKER_02 0:49

Well, you got a table for them, and uh, there's definitely some ones I want to dive into. But if if um somebody hasn't met you out networking or been across your website, tell a little bit more about what you do.

SPEAKER_01 1:00

Um, so I'm an award-winning graphic designer. I've been in publishing for 30 years. Uh I started out right out of school um at a craft publishing company called Interweave, and that's where I learned my love of publishing. And when uh the company got bought out by a larger corporation, as most do, um it was about the time that print on demand started with Amazon and Ingram Spark, and it allowed a way for authors to get their voice heard and get published and be able to compete with some of the big boys without having to print, you know, 3,000 books and have them ship from China to get a good price. And that's the beauty of print on demand is you know, Amazon prints them and ships them, and you get a royalty in the bank. So I thought it was a really great business model, so you don't have to have books sitting in your garage hoping that they sell.

SPEAKER_02 1:55

Sure. So have you have you always been um have a knack for design? Um I mean, uh you know, thinking of me, Liz, like art class was not my best subject in school. Like if you're putting something there, like I know we have tools now, like uh with different things, but it was never my skill set. So, how did you get into graphic design where you became an award-winning graphic artist?

SPEAKER_01 2:19

You know, I was I you know, art was my thing in high school, you know. I was in the in the art um the art group, and you know, we won all the best floats every year. And um it was always my love being creative and making things, and um, and so I naturally when I went to design design school, um, I loved that. But then I I just got lucky and my first job, you know, right out of school was in publishing. And it just it just stuck, you know, and I just really loved it. I mean, I've I've I can't even it'd be millions of pages that I've designed in magazines and books. Um and it's it's just fun.

SPEAKER_02 3:05

Yeah, it's one thing to have a book, it's another thing when you pick it up and read it, does it flow and all the the stuff that maybe you take for granted as a reader that you're coming through? And but there's a lot more to a book than just the cover, right? Liz, talk to me about what goes into the design of a book.

SPEAKER_01 3:23

Yeah. Yeah, I um I got really good training. I got really lucky. Um, the um my boss when I when I worked at Interweave was uh, you know, back in when typesetting was you know very meticulous, you know, he taught me good typesetting and good line breaks and and good kerning, which is the spacing between letters and and all the things that a reader doesn't realize is happening when they're reading a book. You know, if you're if you're uh writing a novel and I'm typesetting a novel, you know, that should be in a serif font because all the little doohickeys help your eye go from word to word to read. And um, you know, a lot of fonts have this is this is how anal I am the FL, the FI, and the FF. If they touch, it's like you know, fingernails on a on a chalkboard for me, you know, because your eye it it's it's just wrong.

SPEAKER_02 4:22

Um so there's no comic sands in your uh No comic sands, no.

SPEAKER_01 4:28

Um Yeah, so I'm I'm pretty meticulous about how books look and are typeset. And um when I'm working with an author, of course, you know, everybody has an idea of what they want, right? You know, I you you don't really want a butterfly on your you know your novel unless it's you know silence of the lambs and it's gonna be you know something that doesn't make sense, you know. I mean, because you know, I mean you have to I I do a lot of research um on the competition in your category to make sure that your book looks like it belongs but stands out, right? So, and then there's the whole um part about I think I think every every book, almost every book that I've published has been at least in the top 50 hotner release and best-selling categories, just because I know how to I don't want to say manipulate the system, but I know how to, you know, put them in the right categories, do all the right keywords, do all the right things to make sure that your book stands out and um and gets that because it's it's marketing gold, right? I mean, if you're saying you're a number one hot in a release on Amazon, that's good social media, right?

SPEAKER_02 5:47

It's good social proof, you know, like people who are speaking at conferences, most of them have books uh that they've published, people can buy it. Um, I think it adds a level of credibility and authority to if you have uh something to say. Um, but beyond like the book in a traditional sense, like what you help people design for their business goes well beyond just you know a couple of chapters or a business book or something like that. Guys, share a little bit about the scope of stuff that you can help create for us.

SPEAKER_01 6:18

There's so many different different, I mean, obviously, you know, from our my spread here of different books that I've done, I get to work with so many different people. So um I had you know an author who is a um a pet grief counselor, and so she decided to write a book about pet grief, and it's a story about a dog who goes to heaven and writes a letter to his boy to let him know that everything's okay. And so um, you know, Leanne Girk is her name, the book is Dear Brayfriend, and so she, you know, came to me and and said that she wanted to to write this book, and um she, you know, we did it, and I don't want to say it was an instant bestseller, but she did really well. And she also teaches a lot of um classes on pet grief. She gets interviewed by, you know, I think it was Simple Magazine and uh the Washington Post and all these different, you know, high-end publications that are doing stories on pet grief because it's it's a thing. And you know, for us here in Colorado, when we had the Marshall Fire, so many people couldn't get home. And so they they their houses burned down and they lost their pets. And so the town of I think it was Louisville hired her to be on call, you know, for pet grief counseling for for people that that needed that. Um and even though it was written as a children's book, there's so many adults that you know have gotten comfort from reading it too. Uh so there's yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:13

Well, take us through, I mean, and it's beautiful the way the the pictures that are in that. Um, but take us through people come with you with the idea, and then it turns into stuff like we have on the table. So what is that process like and how does it get from point A to point B?

SPEAKER_01 8:30

Um, you know, some people are very specific about what they want and they know, right? And so then I work with them to help that vision come to life. And then there are others who haven't a clue, and you know, so we work together to um make sure that we get the best product. And sometimes um, you know, what they have in mind isn't necessarily what it should be. It shouldn't, you know, it should maybe be in a different genre, it should maybe be designed in a different way. Um like with with some books, um so like with uh um uh Michael Lamb, he was um a gentleman who came to us. He was born in Russia without any legs or from the knee down and a partial arm. And he wanted to be a motivational speaker. I mean, he wanted to tell a story. He was interestingly, and I'd never heard about this, but he was um set to be euthanized. Now I didn't even know they could do that in Russia, but his parents um came from the US and adopted him and brought him home and you know gave him the care that he needed. And he's uh he's uh um a bodybuilder and competes and he wanted to be a speaker, so he went to the Colorado Speakers Association, got his certification, and we said, Well, you gotta, you know, you gotta write a book, right? So we did a book with his story. So now he's got that extra revenue. It establishes himself as a motivational speaker. Now he's a published author, and when you're trying to decide between him and someone else that you want to um hire, who are you gonna hire? You're gonna hire the published author, right? Gives you that street cred.

SPEAKER_02 10:06

Absolutely. Well, you know, if especially in the realm of PR, um a lot of business owners are trying to like get the word out, and if if you're just trying to get the word out, you're paying for ad space or something. But if you're an authority because you've written a book or people can find you, they will come and ask you questions. So you're getting interviewed by the news or you're getting featured uh at different talks for different areas, but it definitely helps you be found. How would you advise somebody who wants to write a book to leverage the tool of it to either create awareness, open doors, um, you know, is it just get a bunch of copies or uh how do I work to get up on stages and and highlight that I am an author or published author?

SPEAKER_01 10:52

Um yeah, so depending, you know, it kind of depends on your on your genre, you know, and and things that um that you wanna that you want to do with your book. It's you know, I always say that you know, people will throw away a business card, but they won't throw away a book. And so I think there are lots of different ways that you can utilize a book for your business. It can be something that is just used as a um giveaway, you know, kind of like I don't want to say a gorified pamphlet, but um, you know, you're creating something that people can can use. I mean, they can read depending on the book, but I think um what I've advised people is if you put in a either a note-taking or a journaling or a checklist or something in with your content, now you're you're creating a interactive piece, and so now they've got information in there that they need, right? You know, so say you're a heating and air guy, right? And so now I'm writing down when I change my filters, and I'm writing down, you know, when I do this or that, or like a car mechanic, or I mean I can come up with an idea for any business, you know, to use a book, but now it's something you're keeping and holding, and now you've got your branding in front of them all the time. It's not something they throw away.

unknown 12:15

Right.

SPEAKER_02 12:15

If you give me your maintenance log on in your glove box and it's got branded by the shop that you're going to, like you're probably gonna keep going to the same shop. It's it's a great mechanism for loyalty. Right. Um Well, there's a book on this table that's caught my eye, Liz. So uh Cats being dicks. So tell me about this and uh um a funny adult coloring book for cat lovers. So how did you hear about this idea? How did you make it to life, and how fun was this one to uh to put together?

SPEAKER_01 12:47

Yeah, this this was great friends. So um Julie Kitz is an illustrator, and she was also a vet tech. So she worked with animals a lot, plus she has cats, sure, right? Um, and so she really wanted to break into book illustrations. And you know, for any artist, that's you know, that's not an easy gig, right? I mean, to get in front of the right people and get known for your illustration work, and you gotta start somewhere. And I happened to be doing some research on different coloring books, and the ones that sell the most, you know, use bad words, you know. And so we thought, how about cats being decks? And so she did a really great job of being able to illustrate all the all the crazy things that that cats do, you know, and I think anyone who's who's had a cat, you know, can uh can attest to um trying to fight a you know, I mean, right? The toilet paper. Um, you know, so there are things that um are just are just natural for the book. So she um because she was an illustrator and she's very tech savvy, um, I work in InDesign and she um was familiar with with that, and so I, you know, created a template for her. You know, I trained her on how to be able to import her images so that she could um create her own books. And she we launched this one, I think it was in the fall, you know, and by Christmas, I mean I think she I don't know how many thousands of books she had sold, but she killed it. And it was it was it was really exciting to see. And and she wrote me, gosh, I think it was this past February and said that she's already up to a thousand reviews. Oh wow, you know, and that's gold if you have a book on Amazon to have the reviews because that's how we make decisions, right? You know, if somebody says it's awesome, people buy it.

SPEAKER_02 14:45

Well, talk to me about that because the the business owners getting that Google review, it's a big part. But for a for a book, a book review, um, how do you advise people to like get more reviews or um is it showing appreciation by just as simply as hitting five stars?

SPEAKER_01 15:01

Or should um Yeah, I mean, you know, just like with Google reviews, I mean five stars are great, but people want to know why, right? I mean, they they want to know what the experience is. And so if you can get people to leave reviews, and um, you know, I will always advise my authors to put in the back of their book, you know, if you enjoyed this book, please go and leave a review, right? Um, and then I think in the you know, in the Kindle versions, they automatically do that where you can go and click and you know go do that. Um another way, I mean, of course, you know, you can get your family and friends, but that's you know, that's kind of against the you know, Amazon doesn't doesn't like that. Um because they, you know, of course they want to have real reviews. Sure. Um so there are different ads that you can do, different companies like Bargain Booksy and stuff that you can subscribe to, and then it you have deals, right? You can get a book for 99 cents. So I have had authors that will do that just for the fact that, you know, if they sell hundreds of copies for 99 cents, then people will go and leave reviews. So it's kind of a good way to, you know, it's a good um spend, you know, to get people to um buy your book and then it helps when you're ranking on Amazon so it gets you higher up and so people see it more naturally. And then um, you know, most of them will leave reviews, and so that helps a lot. I mean, even though you're you know taking the hit and your royalty, you know, it's still a good marketing spend.

SPEAKER_02 16:30

Do you see people become serial authors like they do one and now they want to do their next one?

SPEAKER_01 16:36

I do. I've got quite a few quite a few repeat um clients, um, mostly with children's books. You know, they they really you know like to like to do children's books. I've got um Yeah, I've got a couple of those in the works. I'm trying to think of who else. Yeah, you know, when people are creative and like to write and they're good at it, you know, I you know, once they go through the whole process with me and see how much fun it is, they just keep doing it, you know.

SPEAKER_02 17:10

And do you uh you know, if you if you read a book and then you check out the author, does that help the whole holistic uh sales of all your books? Do people get hooked on different authors?

SPEAKER_01 17:23

Yeah, you know, I mean you can if you're scrolling on, you know, on a um a listing for your book, you'll see about the author, right? And you can click on it and you know read their bio and learn more about them. But the other really good thing about that is if anybody googles you, that's one of the number one things that'll come up is your Amazon um author page. So it's really good for SEO.

SPEAKER_02 17:43

So Liz, let's say I got this idea, and uh it the the book has been in my brain for uh months or even years, but uh maybe I just haven't had the time to put a pen to paper, or I don't the the barrier of knowing how to get published is a barrier. What what would be the steps to get started so that we actually get one published?

SPEAKER_01 18:08

Um so I I always advise, you know, the best way to start is to write your table contents. You know, because I think if you can narrow down all the different things that you want to talk about, it makes it a lot easier for your brain to say, oh, okay, now I'm just talking about that for a while, you know, and then the next thing. And then we can always rearrange those different chapters to what makes the most sense and what a good ebb and flow of the content is. Um I work with a lot of really talented editors. So if there's um someone that you want to, you know, writing coach, um I have worked with authors where um they'll work with a coach for like a year, you know, on their whole novel and they'll read it and make sure that they've got a good um ebb and flow in their content. And then um, or if you just need just regular, you know, proofreading and editing, you know, I've got different people for that. So um yeah, there's lots of lots of different ways that we can, you know, figure all that out.

SPEAKER_02 19:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:05

I mean, even uh you could even find a ghostwriter if you if you needed one.

SPEAKER_02 19:09

Interesting. What um so let's talk networking for a little bit. Yeah, so uh well, you know, I've seen you around Loveland and you're involved in my community as a way to build relationships, but who who do you try to network with and and uh what has been successful for your networking efforts?

SPEAKER_01 19:28

You know, it's really it's a fascinating thing, networking. I um a lot of the clients that I have gotten, authors, have been through writing groups. Um I work a lot with Writing Heights, which is a local um writers' group, and so I've I've spoken about marketing books, I've you know been to their conference and spoke about different things. Um and it seems like again, once people work with me, you know, they you know, they just continue to write books or or they hire me to do their marketing, you know, um advertise um Amazon ads or Facebook ads. And um, but you know, without sounding too woo-woo, you know, I'm um networking is a very um intentional and personal thing. And you know, before I ever go into any group, you know, I I try to set the tone in my brain of, you know, how can I make this a really good event? You know, what if I could, again, what if, you know, what if I could meet someone that gave me that, you know, one contact, you know, that changed everything or I could you know make a change for someone else in their business? You know, what if I know the the person that is that one thing you've been missing, you know, that can get you a ton of business? Um and often, you know, I'll just you know talk about books and somebody will say, Oh, my aunt, you know, wrote a book and you know, or I'm thinking about a book, and and that's that's all great, you know, because obviously we're there to get business, but you know, it's just it's more personal, you know, making making connections and relationships with people is you know what life's about, right? I mean just just doing doing good stuff in the world.

SPEAKER_02 21:26

Yeah. Well, as and you you mentioned it earlier, like people might lose the business card, but they're not gonna they're not gonna lose a book if you're using that. So having a book as a networking tool, what kind of strategic advantage do you think it gives people?

SPEAKER_01 21:41

You know, again, it it in people's minds, you know, if you're a published author, I mean, you know, it just raises the bar about who you are, you know, right? It creates it it makes you an expert in your field. If I'm trying to decide between you and somebody else I'm gonna do business with, who am I gonna do business with? You know, the published author, of course. Um so I think that is a is a great is a great differentiator, uh differentiator for you and your business.

SPEAKER_02 22:16

Well, Liz, this has been great. It's cool to see the variety of stuff that you have on the table. Um anyone in particular you want to uh shout out and give a plug to their author of that story and that you've put your name on.

SPEAKER_01 22:32

Oh my goodness. Um boy, that would be that would be a hard that would be a hard choice. Um I would say an interesting read is um Teachings from State U.

SPEAKER_00 22:48

What I Learned in Prison. Wow. I know.

SPEAKER_01 22:51

It's um, you know, Eric Henderson, he um oh it's kind of a sad tale. His um his ex-wife um killed their son and he ended up going to um prison for um being complicit. You know, they they thought that he should and he didn't want the family to go through any more struggle, and so um he went to prison for a few years, and the book is about what he learned there, and he writes with humor and care and about his experiences, and I think it's very meaningful, you know, to to learn the different things that he learned about you know how to how to live your life and and in situations that aren't great.

SPEAKER_02 23:49

It's just uh amazing the stories people can tell, right? The life different life experiences and different perspectives, and um whether it's in stories or actually in a in a book on on paper, how powerful that could be. So Liz, this is great. Uh I know we have people watching, they have that that uh novel in their head, or they would love to talk to you to say, hey, maybe I actually maybe it's a New Year's resolution. They they put it out there, but what is the best way for people to get a hold of you?

SPEAKER_01 24:19

Um the website is what if publishing.com. There's a contact page um there that you can fill out and contact me or just Liz at what if publishing.com.

SPEAKER_02 24:30

Awesome. Well, Liz, thanks for being in my community and for sharing your story and and uh we look forward to seeing you around Northern Colorado.

SPEAKER_01 24:39

Thank you so much. I appreciate your time and interview, and um, yeah, it's been fun. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 24:45

Hey all, thanks for watching. I love networking and building relationships with other Northern Colorado business leaders. So if you want to come meet some of these podcast guests, meet me, or meet some other amazing entrepreneurs in Northern Colorado, I would love to have you attend one of our next events. Uh go in the podcast description. There's the ways that you can see our upcoming schedule. And maybe you could be a future podcast guest as well. Thanks.