199. Newsletters, Virtual Assistants, and RWA Workshops: An Interview with Mel Jolly

[music]

Sarah Wendell:  Hello, and welcome to episode number 199 of Smart Podcast, Trashy Books.  I’m Sarah Wendell with Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, and with me today is Mel Jolly.  Mel and I are presenting two workshops at RWA, and we wanted to do a little podcast and talk about them.  We talk about organization and newsletters, what pens we really like, time management, and building efficient habits.  Our two workshops are on newsletters and on hiring a virtual assistant, and we talk about both of those topics as well.  Then we talk about what books are rocking Mel’s world.  Please note there’s a little bit of TMI in the beginning; if you’re listening on speakers you might want to put your headphones on.  It’s not drastic, just, just a little bit.

This podcast is brought to you by you.  How ‘bout that?  If you’re a regular listener or you’ve just found the podcast, welcome and thank you.  I really appreciate that you tune in each week, and if you’d like to support the show, may I invite you to have a look at our Patreon campaign at Patreon.com/SmartBitches.  For pledges starting at $1 a month, you can help me improve the show, keep it going, and give me a hand in commissioning transcripts for the episodes that don’t have one yet.  Thank you for listening.  Thank you for tuning in each week.  I really appreciate it, you’re awesome, and if you have happen to be working out right now, keep going, you have totally got this.

The podcast transcript this month is sponsored by Kensington, publishers of Once a Soldier by New York Times bestselling author Mary Jo Putney, the first book in a brand-new series about a dashing group of soldiers and spies, Rogues Redeemed.  It has all the best of Mary Jo Putney’s talents on display:  captivating characters, daring adventures, gripping intrigue, and exceptional historical detail, all rolled up into a thoroughly passionate and complex love story.  It’s THE historical romance of the summer.  Don’t forget to pick up your copy, on sale June 28th.

The music you’re listening to is provided by Sassy Outwater, and I will have information at the end of the podcast as to who this is.  And of course I will have links to all of the books and topics we talk about, including some tools that Mel uses, pens we both really like, and links to learn more about her newsletters and also mine.

And now, on with the podcast.

[music]

Sarah:  Talk a little bit about what you do and about the workshops we’re doing at RWA.

Mel Jolly:  Okay.  So I –

Sarah:  No pressure.

Mel:  No pressure.  Just, you know –

Sarah:  Just your whole life story.

Mel:  – sum yourself up in one paragraph and go.  At least –

Sarah:  Yes, Twitter length, please.

Mel:  Yeah – [laughs] – so at least –

Sarah:  Your whole life –

Mel:  – in 140 characters.

Sarah:  – 140 characters.

Mel:  Yeah, when everybody had to get used to Twitter –

Sarah:  Heh-heh-heh-heh.

Mel:  – but especially writers, they’re like, no, I, I, I can’t do 140 characters, I’m sorry.  I do eighty thousand words?

Sarah:  Yeah.

Mel:  I can’t bio myself in 140.

Sarah:  I can do 140 subordinate clauses, how ‘bout that?

Mel:  [Laughs] Exactly!

Sarah:  I like commas.  Ooh!

Mel:  So I am Mel Jolly.  I am an author’s assistant, and I’ve been doing this since 2009, which, when I first started saying it sounded kind of silly, but now it, it sounds a lot more awesome, now that it’s finally 2016.  I do this full-time, and that’s pretty cool.

Sarah:  That is very, very cool.

Mel:  Every time I get pajamas as a Christmas present I hold them up and I shout, work pants!

Sarah:  [Laughs] You know –

[Laughter]

Sarah:  You know, I, I, I remember telling people that I ran a book blog back in 2005, and people were like, a, a what-what?

Mel:  [Laughs] Right.

Sarah:  Forget book.  Like, book they got, but book blog?  Like, what do those words have to do with each other?  And I, I share your affinity for pajamas.

Mel:  Mm-hmm.  Yeah, although I have discovered that stretchy pants equal weight gain.

Sarah:  Oh, yes, they do.

Mel:  Sometimes I have to make myself put on pants with a zipper?

Sarah:  Ugh.

Mel:  You know, like, especially as we prepare for RWA, and not only that, like, when I did go to, like, my real, grownup job in the grownup world and I had to dress up and all that, I was never a makeup person.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  Ever.  And so now, to get ready for RWA, I will literally practice for, like, a week.

Sarah:  [Laughs] Not only will I practice –

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  – I will buy new stuff, ‘cause I’m like, well, that’s, that’s, like, over a year old.  I haven’t used that, so, oh, yeah, I’ve got to get new eye makeup –

Mel:  Yeah.

Sarah:  – and then by, like, the fourth day of RWA or RT, my skin is, like, are you for real?  Who are you?  What are you doing?

Mel:  Yeah.  Should really –

Sarah:  Do you want acne?  ‘Cause that’s what’s next.

Mel:  Yeah.  Well, thank God the conferences are, like, four or five days long, so by the time the acne really starts showing up I’m already back at home.

Sarah:  Oh, when you’re on the plane, who cares?

Mel:  Exactly.  I’m back at home, I’m back in my pajama pants, I’m back in my cone of silence.

Sarah:  [Laughs] Back into the introvert cave we go.  

Mel:  Yes!  Yes.  Like, I love conference, but this year, okay, so this year I am going to try to respect this about myself.  I am trying to schedule, like, a two-hour block of naptime/silent time every day?

Sarah:  Very smart.

Mel:  It’ll be smart if I can, like –

Sarah:  Guard that time.

Mel:  Yeah!  If I can say, no, I’m sorry, I am booked at that time and just not tell them what it is?

Sarah:  It helps if you, for me, if I use language that is non-negotiable.  Like, one year for a conference between 3:30 and 5:30 on my calendar it said diarrhea.

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  And it was just sort of like, oh, oh!  Yeah, I’ve got to go to my room; I’m sorry.  And it was not an accurate statement.  I wasn’t, like, psychically predicting some sort of gastrointestinal distress.  Like, that was a non-negotiable – this was all inspired by Elyse saying, just, nobody questions diarrhea.  Just say you have diarrhea when there’s a new book out?  No one argues with that.

Mel:  That, that’s exactly right.  And you know what, though?  If, if this were not a primarily female conference, you could use anything uterus-related?

Sarah:  [Laughs] Yes!

Mel:  And it would, it would scare people into not talking.  Now they –

Sarah:  Not at RWA.  It would be like, do you have the right maxi pad?  I’ve got three.  Do you need one?

Mel:  [Laughs] Yeah, right.  Let me tell you about this amazing maxi pad that I found?

Sarah:  Oh, wait, I bet I know which one it is, ‘cause it has changed my life too.

Mel:  What did you call it?  The, like, ShamWow!?

Sarah:  [Laughs] That’s Elyse’s term.  The ShamWow! of maxi pads.

Mel:  Yeah.  You know, that is one good thing.  If you forget, ‘cause, like –

Sarah:  Oh, someone’s got you.

Mel:  I totally went to Spring Fling and forgot that that was going to happen, so then me and my roommate – [laughs] – she had a car, and I’m like, you have to take me to Target.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  You have to take me to Target right now.  I mean, thank God we’re good friends, but –

Sarah:  Yeah, at a wom-, at, at a conference full of women, though, like, I travel, not only do I always have, like, a maxi pad and tampons, but I have, like, blister-stick, Band-Aids –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – ‘cause I’m just used to being prepared for some kind of blood loss?

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Somebody needs a Band-Aid.  Somebody’s going to need a thing.  Like, it’s going to happen.  All right, we have achieved pet duality.  I have a cat on the desk and a dog underneath the desk.

Mel:  Okay.

Sarah:  It’s going to get noisy; this is going to be great.  I actually have to shut my laptop ‘cause he likes to lie down on it.

Mel:  Did you hear my dogs barking a second ago?

Sarah:  I did!  I was really excited!

Mel:  Okay.  Well, good.  That’s the appropriate loudness for the podcast –

Sarah:  Yeah.

Mel:  – which means they’re in a totally different room with the door shut.  Probably barking at nothing.

Sarah:  It should be.

Mel:  Oh, remember when I was saying my bio?

Sarah:  Yeah.

Mel:  At the thing.

Sarah:  Yeah.

Mel:  I forgot what I was saying.

Sarah:  That’s fine; that’s how this works.

Mel:  So I, I help authors.

Sarah:  You help authors do things.

Mel:  I help authors do all the things.

Sarah:  You do all the things.

Mel:  I do all the things.  At this point I have, I have about fifteen-ish clients, and that’s about where I’ve stayed for the last three, three or so years, and there, there are some come and go and turnover, but that’s generally about the appropriate number for me?

Sarah:  That works.

Mel:  And I have people that only utilize me for maybe two to four hours a month and then people that utilize me for, like, 30 hours a month, so –

Sarah:  What are the top, like, ten things that you do for authors?

Mel:  Top ten things would be – I have kind of a split between romance authors and YA authors?  So for my YA authors I set up a lot of school visits –

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  – and speaking events, because there is a shocking amount of back and forth setting those things up.

Sarah:  Oh, you don’t say.

Mel:  [Laughs] And I think people don’t realize how much time they spend emailing.

Sarah:  Ohhh, yes.

Mel:  Right?  It, it’s just, like, a complete and total time suck, and I’ve done it so many times that, like, I either have the answers memorized, or I have this amazing thing that is Apple only, but they are in beta for non-Apple.  What’s non-Apple called again?

Sarah:  PC?

Mel:  Yes, okay, for PC.  Sorry.

Sarah:  It’s like, what, Linux?  [Laughs]

Mel:  I’ve been an Apple – [laughs] – God, I hope not.

Sarah:  DOS?  Like, what are you talking about?  [Laughs]

Mel:  So it’s called TextExpander?

Sarah:  Oh, it’s lovely!

Mel:  It’s so good.  And you, you create your own shortcuts for things, so, like, I will create a shortcut that is a response to a really common question that I get about setting up a school visit, and I’ll make it specific to that client, so it’ll be like, semicolon, you know, EL school visit, and then it’ll expand into, like, four paragraphs.  And so speaking events are, are a big one, and then I help with a lot of social media, which probably explains why I am terrible at my own social media.

Sarah:  Oh, yes.

Mel:  Because by the time I’m done checking everybody else’s social media, I don’t want to look at my own.  Like, I have a Facebook that I’m friends with, like, my friends from high school on?  I have probably posted once in 2016.

Sarah:  I have a friend from college who was giving me a hard time over the weekend because my mother-in-law is better than me at posting pictures of my kids, and she’s just going to go friend my mother-in-law instead of me because that’s how she keeps up with her friends, and she hasn’t seen a picture of my kids in, like, a year, and, like, my private, my personal Facebook, like, who I actually am if you’ve been to my house and I’ve fed you and, you know, like –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – you’ve met the dogs, like, that’s where I connect with people who are personally friends versus my professional, which is a separate profile.  Sorry, Facebook!

Mel:  Yeah.

Sarah:  And she’s threatening to friend my mother-in-law because I’m so bad at it.

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  And I was like, yeah, yeah, I am; I suck.  Sorry.

Mel:  They should friend my mother-in-law because she posts things.

Sarah:  That’s totally – she’s very Facebook-y.  She loves the Facebook.

Mel:  It’s funny because my, my babcia, which is Polish for grandma, she is –

Sarah:  Please tell me she’s on Facebook and that I can friend her.

Mel:  Yes, she is on Facebook!

Sarah:  Yes!

Mel:  She probably – I don’t know if she will friend you.

[Laughter]

Mel:  But she’s – I have no idea how, how old she is.  I just, all grandparents are eighty.

Sarah:  Okay.

Mel:  I really, I don’t know.  But she is great at Facebook!  And I’ll try to call her, you know, because she lives in Missouri, and I live in North Carolina, and I’ll start telling her things, and she’ll be like, I know, I already saw it on Facebook.

Sarah:  [Laughs] Oh, God!

Mel:  What are we going to talk about?

Sarah:  I know that already.

Mel:  So maybe this is my strategy in not posting anything.  If I don’t –

Sarah:  That you have better conversations with people?

Mel:  Yes, I can, I can call my babcia and talk about things.

Sarah:  Well, then you have the strategy of, oh, I saw that on Facebook!  And then you can talk about it again, which is what we do.

Mel:  True.

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  True.  She also texts, which is great.  So, like, I can take a picture of my purple hair and text it to her.

Sarah:  And she says?

Mel:  I don’t think she actually responded to that one.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  She thought it was a great idea, though.

Sarah:  That’s fabulous!

Mel:  My sister’s going to do purple hair as well.

Sarah:  One of my favorite trends of late is the number of women I see who have gone gray –

Mel:  Mm.

Sarah:  – and because gray takes dye so well, it’s like –

Mel:  Hmm?

Sarah:  – screw gray.  I’m going green.  And purple.

Mel:  Exactly.

Sarah:  I’m going fucking blue.  Like, the plumage of women who are just sort of, like, embracing gray as a base for a really awesome dye job is giving me so much joy.

Mel:  Mm-hmm.  I had actually, like, this had been my plan.  Like, soon as I went gray, I was just going to go blue or I was going to go purple, and then one day I was like, you know what?  I work for myself.

Sarah:  Yeah.

Mel:  I don’t have to wait to go gray.  Like –

Sarah:  Go ahead!

Mel:   – I’ll go purple now!

Sarah:  Good plan.

Mel:  And I’m sort of fortunate, like, knock on wood, that I really don’t have gray hair yet?

Sarah:  It’ll come.

Mel:  I know!  But –

Sarah:  I have matching gray hairs in my sideburns, and I’m stupidly proud of them.

Mel:  [Laughs] I went to pull a gray hair out the other day and then realized it wasn’t attached, because it was a dog hair.  Thanks, white dog!

Sarah:  [Laughs] I usually only get those on my pants.  So let’s talk about our panels!  We have two panels –

Mel:  Yes!

Sarah:  – at RWA this year!

[Cheers]

Mel:  So excited.  Yes!  So one is about assistant-ing.

Sarah:  Yes!  And, and I, I always feel like I should start, every time I talk about virtual assistant-ing, with the explanation to anyone who’s asking, why are you talking about this, Sarah? that before I was a full-time blogger and wore lots of elastic-waist pants, I was the second assistant to a Fortune 100 CEO, so I was a very high-level executive assistant, and before that I was a camp registrar, I managed a bunch of overnight camps, I’ve done, I worked in a graduate admissions office, so if there were people who wanted things organized –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – and there were file folders, possibly computers, data entry, and managing a whole lot of shit simultaneously, I was usually in that job.

Mel:  Mm-hmm, and –

Sarah:  And I didn’t realize that’s a very specific skill set.  To be organized across multiple projects with multiple things coming at you?  That’s not an easy job to manage, especially when it’s, you know, like, eight or nine different people or major things going on at the same time.

Mel:  Exactly, and I think the other thing that, as far as your career is concerned, is, in case people don’t realize it, Smart Bitches has a, a lot of moving parts.

Sarah:  Oh, just, like, a few?  Hundred?

Mel:  You know, but, I mean, that –

[Laughter]

Mel:  Yes!

Sarah:  It has many.

Mel:  It has a podcast and the books on sale –

Sarah:  Yep!

Mel:  – and reviews and the Help a Bitch Out and –

Sarah:  Yep!

Mel:  – you know, that’s, that’s a hell of a lot of things to keep up with and organize and schedule and, you know, keep the whole site from –

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  – crashing and burning.

Sarah:  And I have a, I have very simple goals.  I like sleep.

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  I am generally healthier and happier when I get at least eight hours?  So –

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  – I tend to try to be organized, because if I’m organized I have time to go to sleep.  And I like sleep!  Sleep’s awesome.  But I also know that generally speaking, women, even if you’re not an author, even if you’re not a secretary or an organizational professional or an administrative professional, even if you’re not doing anything where organization or creativity is a part of your job, most women, if not all of them, have multiple balls in the air at the same time.

Mel:  Absolutely.

Sarah:  So –

Mel:  Just, if you have, like, just trying to keep up with your personal calendar and then any other thing, and then as soon as you have additional people in your life, whether it’s –

Sarah:  Young people, old people.

Mel:  – a spouse or kids or parents –

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  – oh, my gosh.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  Like, my calendar right now, I don’t know what I would do without color coding?

[Laughter]

Mel:  Because I –

Sarah:  It’s so helpful.

Mel:  And the thing is, I pulled up the week of RWA, and I share calendars with several of my clients as well, and so, you know what, another major thing I do in conjunction with speaking events, even with my non-YA clients, is I do itineraries, and that’s another thing that I did not realize is kind of a specific skill?

Sarah:  Yes.  ‘Cause you have to organize time, space, distance, travel –

Mel:  Exactly.

Sarah:  – and then you have to make sure that there’re arrangements, that arrangements can be confirmed, that that, that if something goes wrong there’s an alternative.

Mel:  These are the things that you need to know.

Sarah:  Oh, yeah.

Mel:  When we were in, when I was in fourth grade, we had –

Sarah:  Are you, are you dealing with private jets?  ‘Cause that sucks, let me tell you.

Mel:  No.

Sarah:  Okay, good –

Mel:  No!

Sarah:  – ‘cause don’t ever –

Mel:  No.

Sarah:  – don’t ever deal with anything having to do with private aviation.  Just trust me.

Mel:  As soon as I get a client that’s like, I have a jet, I’m going to be like –

Sarah:  No!

Mel:  – I’m sorry –

Sarah:  You can FBO right out of here.  No.

[Laughter]

Mel:  – we cannot work together anymore.  And –

Sarah:  Thou shalt not work with private jets.

Mel: [Laughs]

Sarah:  Just trust me.  [Laughs]

Mel:  Right.  So, when I was in fourth grade, we had to do this, like, technical writing assignment where you were supposed to describe, I don’t know, let’s say a table or something like that, and everybody else’s was a, like, a paragraph.  You know, and it’s handwriting, cursive, everybody else’s is a paragraph, and mine’s, like, two pages long, ‘cause I’ve described every inch.  That is probably what I think of most often when I think of, like, walking through an itinerary.  Like, I just put myself in that person’s shoes –

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  – and I walk through every step, and I think, if this goes wrong, this is what you, you know, this is what I would need to know, and, like, here’s a picture of the person that’s going to pick you up, and here’s their phone number, and here’s a second phone number, and, you know, this is their name, but this is their nickname, and –

Sarah:  Oh, yeah.

Mel:  – here’s an interesting fact about them that you should know, because they love your books –

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  – and they’ve been talking my ear off about them.

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  So I pulled up the calendar for RWA, and I have so many different colors on here, because I have my schedule, I have three client schedules, and then I still have, like, my personal family schedule for my husband to keep –

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  – while I’m gone.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  And so I think I told you that I started using my – [laughs] – I started using a shared calendar to remind my husband of things?

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  So that I –

Sarah:  This is very useful.

Mel:  – yeah, so that I don’t, I don’t get, you know, like, I’m not nagging.

Sarah:  Oh, nonono, if the, if Google is nagging, it’s not nagging.

Mel:  No!  No, it’s just –

Sarah:  Google is a reminder.  You are nagging.

Mel:  Ding!

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  Renew your driver’s license!

Sarah:  Ding!  Time to go to the pharmacy for a refill.

Mel:  Exactly.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  Exactly.  Yeah, it’s a very specific skill set, to be organized, and then I think you have to – I used to be very good at keeping everything in my brain.  Like, when I have one job, in my history I have been a, I was assistant to the president of a fabric factory?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  And then I got promoted into production planning manager?

Sarah:  Whoa.

Mel:  It was an extremely difficult job.  It was an extremely difficult job.  There were so many moving parts.  I was planning every aspect.  Like, we would order yarn?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  Which is not yarn like knitting yarn; we would call it thread.  But I was ordering yarn, and we were going from, like, bringing everything in to fabric going back out the door, and I had to organize every department and then talk to our sales reps in New York, and then lie to our sales reps in New York, ‘cause I knew that whatever deadline I gave them, they were going to tell the client two weeks sooner than that?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  So, like, I had to add two weeks on, and it was just an extremely difficult job, and that was probably the first time that I had to learn to not keep everything in my head?

Sarah:  My head is not a place to keep things.

Mel:  [Laughs] They fall right out.

Sarah:  My head is, my head is not for keeping; my head is for thinking and probably zoning out.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  So I’ve had to be organized externally, but it also helps me because the higher up I got into organizational jobs, like for example when I was working for the CEO, there were other people who did pieces of my job for other people –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – so I had to be able to hand off my information at a moment’s notice in a way that –

Mel:  Right.

Sarah:  – someone would be like, okay, I see where you are; I’m taking over now.  And that could happen at any time in many different ways –

Mel:  Mm-hmm?

Sarah:  – and so I not only had to be organized externally, but it had to be clear.  It couldn’t be in, like, Sarah-language?

Mel:  Right!

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  I made a training manual –

Sarah:  ‘Cause I make perfect sense to myself!  Oh, training manuals are the shit!

Mel:  Yeah.  I made – and this is something we’re going to talk about in our workshop is how authors and their assistants can communicate?

Sarah:  Yes.  This, this is going to be awesome!

Mel:  Because that can be a major barrier for people, I think.

Sarah:  Yes.  So for, one of our sessions is Virtual Assistants and the Organized Author, and we are going to talk about how to identify whether or not you need a virtual assistant, or if you would like one, what you would like to have them do.

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  And that comes about as a result of the fact that as more and more authors are embarking on hybrid careers, they’re taking on more and more responsibilities, and there’s an incredible amount of empowerment and freedom in being told as a creative professional, you can do all of this yourself!  You can do everything!  You don’t have to depend –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – on someone else to do it for you.  You can do it!  But it’s also an enormous time suck to be told, you can do all of it yourself, because there are things you can choose not to do yourself!

Mel:  I think that –

Sarah:  That will free up more time for the writing thing!

Mel:  Exactly.  And I think that the people that are capable of learning new things and doing everything themselves are actually the ones that have the most difficult time hiring somebody, and generally –

Sarah:  It’s hard to let go.

Mel:  Yeah, and generally, they’re the ones that need to hire somebody, because they’re running a very professional business, but they’re like, no, no, no!  I’m not going to pay somebody to do graphics because I can do them.  Or I’m not going to pay somebody to update my website because I can do it myself.  Well, it, I mean, it’s awesome that you can do it yourself, but if you have a book that released six months ago and it’s not on your website yet?

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  You know –

Sarah:  That never happens.  I would also like to point out that on my calendar I have a quarterly reminder to check my bio to make sure that it’s up to date.

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Because, like I said, my head is not a keeping-things place?

Mel:  Right.

Sarah:  And the date or the time also are not kept in my brain.

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  I have no idea what year it is; I have to look.  So I have to make sure that my bio is updated, but that is, like I said, that is a system that can be taught.  That’s the other thing –

Mel:  Exactly.

Sarah:  – it’s important to realize, that being organized is a skill set.  It, and, and not anybody can just walk into a secretarial or administrative job and be like, oh, yeah, I’ve got this, which is why I always got really irritated with people who are rude to secretaries.  Never be rude to secretaries –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – they actually run the company?

Mel:  Exactly.

Sarah:  But anyway.  It, it, being organized is a skill set, but you can learn ways to help yourself be better organized, and that’s part of what the ses-, the, the session of this workshop is about.

Mel:  Yes, absolutely.  I think it’s one of those things that for some of us it, it’s a, for me, organization is almost like an obsession.

Sarah:  Ohhh.

Mel:  If I am getting, if I get to –

Sarah:  Efficiency is a rush, yo.

Mel:  It is, and see, the problem I have is squirrel brain, right?

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  But it’s like squirrel brain for organization.  Like, I will go get a snack, and next thing I know I’m organizing the refrigerator.

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  That’s bad!

Sarah:  This pantry is not in alphabetical order.  Everybody get out of my way.

Mel:  Why aren’t all these labels turned the correct direction?  I can’t read what the stuff is!  You know?

Sarah:  Laces out.  Laces out!

Mel:  Yeah, so –

[Laughter]

Mel:  – I, I will get distracted by organizing things, so I think for some of us it is, it’s a rush, and it’s like, almost like a nervous tic to organize things, and if I’m part of a group that’s not organizing things, like almost twitchy to the point where I have to be like, Mel, Mel, you must not volunteer to organize this.  You must not do it!  You do not have time.

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  But, but it is a sill that can be taught to people, and I think that’s, that’s one of the things I think about pretty often as well.  Like, I do my weekly newsletter about organization.

Sarah:  Why, wait, hold, you have a weekly newsletter?

Mel:  I, I do!

Sarah:  I legit knew this already.  Not only ‘cause Mel and I are friends, but also I subscribe, and it’s awesome!  That, okay, there’s one newsletter that Mel did about taking a shoe organizer, like that big plastic thing you hang on the back of your door?  Putting all your cords in there, so now we have a charge cable center in our kitchen.  Every single charger, every single cord has a labeled pocket, and my kids think this is the most amazing thing.

Mel:  Yay!

Sarah:  It has rocked our world.

Mel:  I am totally not, like, sure where that came out of my brain.  Like, most of my ideas come when I’m in the shower.  Ooh!  That would be a great way to organize your cables!  Or whatever.

[Laughter]

Mel:  But, so I do this weekly newsletter, and I think, honestly, I think it has helped me, because I’m more aware of the things that I’m doing?  Because my goal is to teach other people to do the same things.

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  Like, things that might come naturally to me, I now look.  Like, I take a step back from the way I do things and think, Mel, why do you do it this way, and why does it work this way?  And there’s certainly more than one way to do things?  Like, I know you and I have talked about the different ways that we organize –

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  – our computer files?

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  You know, and so, like, you have them sort one way, and I have them sort the other way, and both of them work well with our brains.

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  Like, you don’t do numbers and dates.

Sarah:  No, ‘cause those are the last things that are going to stick in my brain.  You know how people who have dyslexia talk about how the, the words sort of dissolve, or the words disappear, or they just, they don’t, the words, the letters don’t stay put?  For me, that’s numbers.  Numbers might as well be written in sand in my brain.  They do not stick.

Mel:  I think that my previous jobs must have made this a thing for me, or it could be because I’m really good at math, but I start almost every file, like, if, if you and I were talking or a client and I were talking, I would start a Word document that was labeled, like, 20160606 and then –

Sarah:  I have no idea what that refers to.

Mel:  – phone call from Sarah’s cell.

Sarah:  Yeah, whereas I would be, for example, the notes file for the podcast as I compile notes from our conversation is called Notes, and it’s in a folder called Mel Jolly, and that is –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – dated today because I created it today, so I can sort by date because Mac knows that I can’t do numbers.  It lets me sort by date.

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  But the other thing about organization is that because we figured out systems for how to do different things, we can explain some cost-effective and efficient ways to help other people identify things that they either don’t want to do or don’t have time to do –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – or shouldn’t do because they’re not an efficient use of their time.  ‘Cause there’s, not only is there, okay, yes, you can do that yourself, but there’re too many things on your to-do list, you’re never going to get to it.  There’s also which is a more cost-effective solution?  Spending a couple of hours figuring out this software to make graphics or hiring a designer on Fiverr or asking your virtual assistant to do three graphics for social media and try to do it within half an hour.

Mel:  Right.  Because the, the thing that I try to explain to my clients, and, and the thing that I’ve learned as an assistant is I, I have a very wide variety of personalities when it comes to my clients, and so one of the things that I feel I excel at is knowing how to specifically communicate with that client –

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  – and what they do need help with and what they don’t need help with?  So that’s part of the learning curve when I start with somebody new.  Like, I know that I have a client that I can only email her not one email but one thing per email.  Like, I can’t send her an email that has a long list of things to do.  Like, for me, if I receive that email that would work, because it would just be a checklist.

Sarah:  Totally!

Mel:  And I would go through the checklist, and I would check everything off, and it would be done.  I know with her, if she opens an email from me and sees five things to do, she’s just going to pretend like that email never happened.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  Like, she, she will get overwhelmed, and she will walk away.

Sarah:  Whereas, I have the same thing.  I love when publishers send me almost like a newsletter of upcoming titles.  Like, here are all of the July titles, here are all of the August titles, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, and then that works wonderfully for me.  And then I know there are some people for whom that would be like, oh, my God, wall of words, no, too much information.  Yeah.

Mel:  Right, right, right.  Overwhelmed, shut down.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  I think we all wake up every day with a certain amount of brain energy.  Just –

Sarah:  Yes!  I’m holding a lighter up.

Mel:  Yeah.  [Laughs] I can make a certain number of –

Sarah:  A certain number of words, certain amount of brain energy.

Mel:  Yes.  Certain number of decisions.

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  So, like, I set up my morning so that I don’t have to make a decision until, like, 9 a.m.  Like, I my get up at 5:30, but no decisions are made until 9 a.m.  I do everything in the exact same order.  Like, I just, I move through the morning, and I know that if I do something that is not part of my routine, my brain is like [screeching noise].  Oh, too early –

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  – no decisions to make.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  So if, and that client is capable of writing things on a calendar but, like you said, does better creatively if she just forwards me emails and says, remind me, remind me, remind me.  And it also keeps her from reading these long, long emails written by people that don’t know how to use bullet points, and she can just say, can you remind me and also tell me what they want?  Because I have found that some people go on and on and on, when really they could just say, can you send me these three things?

Sarah:  Oh, no.  There, there are many people for whom email is a great outlet of much words.

Mel:  Ugh.  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Wall of words, why?  Why wall of words?

Mel:  Why is this a – that’s why – [laughs] – and I am not, I mean, that takes a lot of my brain energy to read that.

Sarah:  Oh –

Mel:  You know, I do it if it’s part of my job, but that’s why my newsletter is like, here are these three bullet points, and if you only want to read these three headlines, you’ll get the basic gist.

Sarah:  Yep!  So our workshop on newsletters –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – is on Friday, and it is at 9:45 in the morning.

Mel:  I think that’s our assistant workshop.

Sarah:  Excuse me!  Virtual assistant.  I beg your pardon.

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  Virtual assistant.  I’m actually looking at the words virtual assistant and said the wrong thing.

Mel:  [Laughs] 

Sarah:  This is, this is so great.  This is why my brain is not a keeping-place place.

Mel:  I, I said newsletter, and it, it triggered your brain.

Sarah:  Yeah, so, Virtual Assistants is Friday at 9:45, and we’re going to talk about identifying the things that a virtual assistant can do, finding a virtual assistant, hiring a virtual assistant, budgeting money to pay a virtual assistant.

Mel:  Math.  There will be math, but easy-to-understand math.

Sarah:  Yes, easy math.

Mel:  No one be afraid.  I’m going to do the math, and you just listen.

Sarah:  Yeah, I don’t do any of the math.  It is my understanding that there is no math for Sarah.

Mel:  There’s no math for Sarah, and if you are not a math person you just, like, space out for thirty seconds and then come back.

Sarah:  Yeah.  But at the same time, we will be talking also about organizing yourself, because one of the most important things to do if you’re considering hiring a virtual assistant, or even if you’re not, is to figure out what you do and to organize your time, which is something we both also pay a lot of attention to.

Mel:  Yes, and I would say as far as – I really think that a wide variety of people could benefit from this –

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  – simply because of all of the organizational stuff we’re going to talk about, and even if someone’s not quite ready to hire an assistant, you can really save yourself a lot of time in the future by being organized now.  I mean, you can be your own best virtual assistant –

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  – if you will just keep up with things.

Sarah:  If you read my Google calendar series then you know that my, my philosophy is that Present Sarah and Past Sarah have to work together to help –

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  – Future Sarah, because Future Sarah’s going to be tired and busy.

Mel:  Yes.  This is one of my favorite things.  [Laughs] Over the weekend I was asking Past Mel where she had put the pickles because Present Mel could not find them.

Sarah:  Yeah, they’re somewhere.  Past Mel is keeping them hidden.

Mel:  Oh, dang you, Past Mel!

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  I’m sure it made sense at the time, but it doesn’t make sense now!

Sarah:  And then there’re the times when Past Sarah has put something in a very logical place so that when I’m like, where’s the Sharpie? and I open the drawer, the Sharpie is where the Sharpie goes?  [Breathes in] Past Sarah is the best.

Mel:  Yes.  Or like when I’m looking for a computer file I, I think, before I file it I think, where am I going to look for this?

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  You know what I mean?  If I were to look for this, whatever my gut instinct is now, that is the place that it should be filed in –

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  – so that it – that’s why my naming convention, you know, so, like, I know how to look up things –

Sarah:  Helps a lot.

Mel:  – like, when I use the Search feature.  Yes.  So I think our, our session on assistants would help a lot of people, and our goal is for someone who is looking to hire, either in the immediate future or the distant future, or who is already working with someone, to feel like they will be better able to find an assistant and will know what they should delegate, because I know that can be really overwhelming.  I have a –

Sarah:  And what to expect when you do.

Mel:  Exactly.  What to expect when you do, what to look for, and then how to communicate well, because you and I are both big fans of all the things where you can do it online, like Google Drive.  Like, we are working on our presentation in Google Drive, and –

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  – and you could type, and I could see what we were talking about.

Sarah:  Yep!

Mel:  And I’m a huge fan of Basecamp –

Sarah:  Yeah?

Mel:  – which is a project management system that can be shared, but there are also a ton of those, so we’re going to talk about those as well.

Sarah:  Yes.  And we have another presentation, too.  We have two!

Mel:  Yes, we do!

Sarah:  Two!  That’s crazy business, two!

Mel:  Whoo!

Sarah:  We have one on newsletters.  And newsletters –

Mel:  I’ve already talked about my newsletter.

Sarah:  Oh –

Mel:  You have a newsletter too.

Sarah:  I have two newsletters!  I have two.  One of them is the daily RSS feed for the site, so if you don’t want to go to the website or if you can’t go to the website because your office blocks things like the word bitches – God, what a terrible work site –

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  – you can have all of the content of the website mailed to you, and it goes out at noon Eastern, and it is basically a feed of the blog content sent directly to you, and to my knowledge, unless your email feed is a little wonky, you’ll get everything going back twenty-four hours in your inbox every day.  And then we have the Books on Sale newsletter, which goes out Friday, 10:30 in the morning Eastern time, and that’s all of the sales that are still valid from the past week, so if you miss a Books on Sale post you get them all on Friday.  And this is fun because I have learned a great deal about building a good email list, but also building an email list of people who really want to be on that list who open the email, who click on what’s inside, who are interested in whatever it is that I’m sharing, because that relationship is more valuable than any other social media relationship you have.  Like, I’ve got a bunch of followers on Twitter.  That’s awesome.  I have no idea how many of those people are bots or eggs or both?

Mel:  Right.

Sarah:  But the newsletter, the people who are on the newsletter have asked for me to be in their inbox.  That is enormous!

Mel:  Which is the coolest feeling!

Sarah:  Yes!  It’s an enormous privilege, and they have invited me into all of the things that they look at in a day, which is substantial?

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  So that is a tremendously valuable asset in terms of reaching people who want to hear from you.  So we’re going to talk about newsletters, because they are super valuable and underused and underappreciated.

Mel:  Absolutely, and as far as authors are concerned –

Sarah:  Ohhh –

Mel:   – I would say it’s got to be, you know, what do you say?  It’s in your top three selling tools?

Sarah:  Yes, my –

Mel:  I was almost going to say top two.

Sarah:  My, my analogy is to envision yourself – unless you’re driving right now –

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  – or if, if you’re –

Mel:  On the treadmill?

Sarah:  If you’re on the treadmill just hold on, but just close your eyes if you can safely close your eyes.  If you’re walking the –

Mel:  [Laughs] I don’t think I could close my eyes and hold on.

Sarah:  If you’re walking the dog, don’t close your eyes; you might step in poop.  If you’re driving, definitely not.  If you’re on the treadmill, just hold on.  But just close your eyes and imagine you are the center of the universe, and the entire universe revolves around you, which is really pretty fly.  The closest three planets, so Mercury, Venus, and Earth, the things that orbit closest to you, are your personal appearances, your newsletter, and your website, and they can be in any of those three orders.  Some people cannot do a lot of personal appearances.  Some people do a lot of personal appearances.  But if you think about the impact of an author visiting a middle school for a number of sessions –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – versus an author sending a tweet at four o’clock in the afternoon on a Thursday, that visit has a lot more impact.  So your in-person stuff and your newsletter and your website are the three most important pieces.  So anything that is in person is very important, but suppose you don’t want to do in-person stuff.

Mel:  Exactly.

Sarah:  That’s okay!  Your newsletter and your website are what speak for you when you can’t speak for yourself, and the key thing is, the key differential is your website is your real estate –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – and your newsletter is your list.  You own those pieces of property.  Those pieces of intellectual property and those email addresses that have voluntarily subscribed themselves?  Those are yours.  Anything that you post on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, all of these other networks, belongs to them when you post it.  Your stuff is yours.

Mel:  Yes, and if you, if your, like, newsletter carrier is MailChimp and MailChimp crashes tomorrow, as long as you’re backing up your list, which, by the way, you should be backing up your list – Sarah, you back up your list, right?

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  Okay.  So, you should be backing up your list, which just means that you’re downloading a spreadsheet of the email addresses –

Sarah:  I do it quarterly.  That way I know that I’ve done it, and I’ve caught –

Mel:  Do you have Calendar Reminder?

Sarah:  How did you guess?

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  ‘Cause I don’t know what day it is.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  My brain is not a keeping place.

Mel:  I do that for my clients, too, like, I have a recurring monthly reminder that says, like, go, go back up this person’s list –

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  – on VerticalResponse or MailChimp

Sarah:  But the thing is, with those major email carriers, like MailChimp, VerticalResponse, AWeber, ConvertKit – what’s the other one I’m missing?

Mel:  Mad Mimi?

Sarah:  Mad Mimi, Return Path, all of them are serious business?

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  They are also backing themselves up, so, like, don’t –

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  – if this has just made you panic, don’t panic.  They are also backing themselves up.

Mel:  [Laughs] But also, too –

Sarah:  It’s good to have a copy.

Mel:  – back up, back up –

Together:  Yeah.

Mel:  So, but, but where I was going with that was, if one of those things crashes tomorrow?  You still have your list, and you can take it somewhere else.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  Whereas if Facebook or any of those places crash –

Sarah:  Like, or changes, because Facebook changes every other week.

Mel:  This is why social media is not my favorite thing to do?  It is, it is an important part of my job?

Sarah:  And it’s valuable.

Mel:  It’s valuable, and as one of my clients says, I do the things that no one else wants to do.

Sarah:  Yep.  Well –

Mel:  And, and social –

Sarah:  – like you said –

Mel:  – Facebook is one of them.

Sarah:  Well, it’s, it’s like you said.  If you wake up with a certain number of decisions and a certain amount of brain energy and, for me, I think, a certain number of words – like, there are points in the late afternoon when my kids are home from school where I’m like, guys?  I’m out of words.  No more wording.  Mom needs to recharge.  No more words.  Okay!  No problem.  Like, they understand, like, I’m done.  I need a break.  If you work, if you’ll, if you are using the words and the energy and the brain power figuring out what Facebook has done now to be different, then that’s energy that you can’t place elsewhere, whereas an assistant has to figure that out once and then apply it to all of their clients, which is a much more –

Mel:  Yes!

Sarah:  – efficient use of brain energy.

Mel:  Yes!

Sarah:  Also, Facebook is annoying.

Mel:  And also, like, when I log into MailChimp from these eight different accounts that I have access to?  I don’t need the tour every time!

Sarah:  Oh, no!

Mel:  MailChimp, I get the change, and I took the tour one time.  Please stop showing me.

Sarah:  Oh, I have Wufoo for forms –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – and data collection, and Wufoo is forever trying to tell me everything that’s new since you left.  I’m like, I was just here yesterday, so it’s cool; no worries.  It’s good.  I don’t need to know.

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Okay, but since you logged in last time we’ve up- – Okay, thanks, that’s really great, and I’m glad I’m paying for a service that is constantly being attended to.  That’s rad, but seriously, I just need three clicks and I’m done.  But with newsletters what we’re going to talk about is why a newsletter is awesome, and we’re going to talk about building a list, things you do and do not want to do, and then creating a newsletter and using your newsletter.  So much of, I think, what happens is, I need a newsletter!  I need to build a list.  Build a list, have a newsletter, okay, I have a newsletter.  I don’t know what to say.  What do I do?

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  What do I put in this newsletter?  And I’m very fortunate, because mine is, mine is a set amount of content, one that is automatically generated, and one that is a very specific thing.  If I had to come up with something original every week for the newsletter, okay, (a) I’m already doing that on the website.  Like I said, a limited amount of words.

Mel:  Right.

Sarah:  But coming up with what to say on your newsletter can be very difficult, so we’ll give you a plan of efficient attack in predicting what you should and should not be putting in your newsletter.

Mel:  Yes!  And if you are an author then the number one thing that fans want to know is, when is your next book out?

Sarah:  [Gasps] No!

Mel:  Exactly!  Like, we are a notification society at this point.

Sarah:  Oh, and we are a custom, or as marketers like to say, bespoke notification system.

Mel:  [Laughs] I’ve never heard that!

Sarah:  Bespoke means, basically, it means custom tailored.  So, like, everything that is delivered to you right now is tailored to your specifications and your preferences.

Mel:  So if somebody says, hey, Sarah, tell me when your next book is out, you need to hold up your end of the bargain and not feel bad about it, because that is what people –

Sarah:  Oh, yes.  People are asking – yes!

Mel:  – ask for.

Sarah:  Yes.  People are asking to hear from you.

Mel:  Hey, Sarah, tell me when books are on sale so that I can buy all the books, but I –

Sarah:  Oh, dude, I am so there for you.

Mel:  Books on sale!  Click, click, click, click, click!  Like, how many books do I own that I haven’t read yet, Sarah?

Sarah:  Oh –

Mel:  So many –

Sarah:  – I don’t know.  Join me.

Mel:  So many!

Sarah:  So our newsletter is on the 14th at 3:15 p.m. Pacific time.

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  It’s an afternoon one.  So in the morning one, bring –

Mel:  Oh, my God, it’s my nap time!

Sarah:  Sorry, dude.  You could have diarrhea if you need to.

Mel:  No!  No, no, I’m super excited about this workshop.

Sarah:  So in the, on the Friday morning one, bring your coffee.  For the Thursday afternoon one –

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  – bring some snacks.

Mel:  Yeah.

Sarah:  You can totally eat and drink in our sessions, but we’re going to talk about organization and making things less stressful, ‘cause that’s what we do!

Mel:  Yes, and you know what, our newsletter workshop is going to be about organizing yourself as well.

Sarah:  Yep!

Mel:  Because we are both very big in plan of attack kind of people?

Sarah:  Yes!

Mel:  Because I find that the unknown is the, the most difficult part to, to overcome –

Sarah:  Oh, of course!

Mel:  – and so I think for a lot of people, it’s just fear of the unknown is why they haven’t done a newsletter yet.  It’s not that difficult; it’s just that there are too many steps, and they get overwhelmed, so we’re going to break it down.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  Like, these are the steps.  These are the things to think about.  If it overwhelms you, you know, like –

Sarah:  Do one.

Mel:  – say you want to do a newsletter in a month?  Let’s break it down.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  Work on it a little bit every week, and then in a month you have a newsletter.

Sarah:  Yep.  So I have an important question for you.

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  What are you reading?

Mel:  I made a list!

Sarah:  I know, ‘cause you’re prepared, ‘cause, you know, Past You and Present You have to work together for Future You.

Mel:  Yes, and, like, every – I’m, I am sure I’m not the only podcast listener that does this, but I find if I listen to too many of your podcasts in a row I start interviewing myself?

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  In my head.  So, Mel, tell me what books you’ve been listening to, or what books you’ve been reading – [laughs] – and then I think about the people that are surprised by the question.  I’m like, oh, no, I’m not going to be surprised!  I’ve been working on this list for years!

Sarah:  [Laughs] That’s awesome!  So go ahead!  Tell me the things.

Mel:  Okay.  So, I already mentioned The Power of Habit.  That book was so good, and for the longest time I thought that I did not like nonfiction.  I think it just depends on the nonfiction, like, what the topic is.

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  I love reading about brains.

Sarah:  Oh –

Mel:  Like, I, I know you love brains.  Brains are weird.

Sarah:  You read Spark, right?

Mel:  I haven’t read that one yet!  It’s on the list.

Sarah:  Oh, my God, it’s – okay, Spark is the, I think it’s curious effect of exercise on the brain [The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain].  It will blow your mind.

Mel:  Mm.  I made exercise – so I did the Jerry Seinfeld don’t break the chain thing.  Like, I bought a giant year calendar, and for every day you do the thing that’s trying to, that’s, like, what you’re going to X off for the year?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  I don’t know if I’m explaining this well.  You get an X for every day you do the thing that you have predetermined is the thing you’re going to do.

Sarah:  Right.  I think for Seinfeld it was write a joke every day.

Mel:  Yes!  You know, and for a lot of authors it’s, you know, if they want to write every day.  I’m going for –

Sarah:  Morning pages, whatever.

Mel:  Yes.  So I picked exercise, because I decided that exercise would have a trickle-down effect for me?

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  And would improve all the areas of my life, so when I was reading The Power of Habit and they talked about keystone habits and they mentioned exercise, I’m like, I’m so smart!

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  It’s a keystone habit!  I’m doing it!  So I do – I really need to read Spark, and the same guy that wrote The Power of Habit has another one.  It’s like, Smarter Faster Better – I don’t know; it’s all words I like!  Be more awesome!  You’re going to –

Sarah:  Be more gooder.

Mel:  Yeah, be – I keep looking for the book called How to Be Awesome at Everything, but I’ve yet to find it.

Sarah:  Well, it’s, the trick is there that everyone’s definition of awesome is different.

Mel:  And everyone’s definition of everything.  It’s called Smarter Faster Better: The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business.  That is on my to-read list.  As far as other books that I’ve read, The Four Agreements – have you read that one yet?

Sarah:  I think I have read several summaries of it.

Mel:  Okay.  It is one of those books that, it would be, it’s not very long, and it would be really easy to devour, like, really quickly?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  But I’ve read it twice now, and so I just would read a little bit in the morning, like after I do my stretching and my meditation and my journaling time.  I would read, like, a few pages and reflect on those pages, and it has been, I would say that’s been one of the more life-changing books for me.

Sarah:  I think my favorite thing in that book is the idea that other people’s actions a lot of the time have absolutely nothing to do with you.

Mel:  Oh, yes.  Yes.

Sarah:  That’s incredibly liberating, especially if you have, like, social anxiety or anxiety in general?

Mel:  Yeah.

Sarah:  The idea that someone else’s behavior may have exactly zero to do with you is incredibly comforting sometimes.

Mel:  Yes.  And the other thing that stood out to me in that book was that you should always do your best, that’s one of the four agreements, but the part that was news to me is that you should not do better than your best.  And I was like, what?

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  Better than your best is a thing?  I just thought that –

Sarah:  Someone is a type A overachiever.

Mel:  [Laughs] I just thought –

Sarah:  And also me.  [Laughs]

Mel:  – if I’m not exhausted, then I’m not doing my best!  But it, it talks about how if you’re constantly doing better than your best, then you are going to exhaust yourself, and you won’t be able to consistently do your best.  And your best is not the same on every day.

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  Like, on a day you’re sick, your best is different than your best on a day that you’re healthy.  I mean, it was so liberating, and I would say as far as an, an overall life attitude change for me, that book has been so key for me, because I, I decided at the beginning of 2015 that I was going to focus on my attitude, and I was going to focus on being positive, and I was going to focus on the things that I could control.  You know, hello, type A, over-controlling –

Sarah:  Uh-huh.

Mel:  – wanting to organize everybody’s everything?

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  Yeah.  That, that can be a little exhausting –

Sarah:  Just a little.

Mel:  – thinking about all those things.  Yes.  And I know you’ve talked about this book before, but I really enjoyed 2k to 10k, which is Rachel Aaron’s writing book?

Sarah:  Oh, that’s also about organizing yourself in a lot of ways.

Mel:  It is!

Sarah:  It’s about analyzing when you work best –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – and the conditions under which you write the most productively.

Mel:  Mm-hmm.  Yeah, and I loved how she talked about giving yourself a game plan.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  You know, and that’s true, you know, in my, in my work life, in my assistant life, I keep a little clipboard here with just a piece of paper, and it’s got one of those plastic sheet protectors on it?  And I just use it as a little dry erase board, and I’ll write next to a client name.  So even though I have the online stuff, handwriting something helps put it in my brain and, and tell me where I’m going and what I’m doing next.

Sarah:  Oh, absolutely.  I, I do almost everything digitally, but I always have a notebook to write things down –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – because – okay, this is a very strange thing with my brain, and maybe I’m not the only who has this experience, but when I am writing something down by hand, especially if it’s in pencil, and especially if I take my glasses off, I am not editing what I say while I write.

Mel:  Hmm!

Sarah:  If I type, I am editing, because it sticks –

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  – and I can read it very clearly, and it’s on a screen, which is where I do all the editing things anyway –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – so if I want to write something down very quickly or very, very roughly sketch out an idea or write notes for a review, it’s much easier for me to do that quickly with pencil on paper than it is –

Mel:  Yeah.

Sarah:  – even though I am a very, very fast typist.  Handwriting is very important if that’s a part of your brain that is engaged uniquely.

Mel:  It is, and for me, I’ve even found, like, I’ve experimented with the difference between writing in cursive and writing in print?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  Because there’s something, like, all my journal entries are in cursive at this point, ‘cause there’s just something very soothing for me about writing in cursive, and one of my former coworkers when I was a library assistant, she brought this up recently and it’s been, like, ten – I don’t know how many years it’s been – eight years since I worked at the library?  She was like, you were always kind of a pen snob.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  You were always writing – [laughs] – you were always writing these very specific pens on the list, because we, we got, you know, office supplies, and there was somebody whose job it was to buy our pens.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  I was always like, I specifically need the Bic 5-mm rollerball.

Sarah:  Yep.  Are you a lefty?

Mel:  No, I’m a righty.

Sarah:  [Laughs] I have gotten my husband, who is a lefty, like, a hard lefty, like, there is only writing with his left hand, and there’s –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – no flexibility on this.  I got him hooked on the Jetstream, which is an, a rollerball pen that is great for lefties because it dries instantly.

Mel:  Ohhh!

Sarah:  And I need you to help me find those pens.  I need to order them for myself.  I need more.

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Like, he was like, wait, I need, I need them.  I, I need these pens.  Like, I need them now.   [Laughs]

Mel:  I, I actually got my new favorite pens as swag?  And –

Sarah:  Oh, what’s your new favorite?

Mel:  It is the Bic rollerball, I think it’s 5 mm.  Wait, here, I have one right here.  See, I’m using the one that’s swag, which was so difficult, because it doesn’t say on there exactly what it is?

Sarah:  Yeah.

Mel:  Because it’s imprinted.  So it’s the Bic grip roller fine point.

Sarah:  Oohhh.

Mel:  It’s just so smooth!  I just love it!

Sarah:  I use the – what is this?  Come here, pen.  What are you?  It is the FriXion, Pilot FriXion erasable pen –

Mel:  Ooh!

Sarah:  – and, and the erasable part?  Legit erases.  It doesn’t –

Mel:  Really!

Sarah:  – it does not scour the surface of the paper to remove the visible ink –

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  – it actually erases.  Now, this means that if it gets wet it’s just, it’s everywhere.  It’s not a very, very strong ink.  It is not indelible.  It is super lightweight, but when it comes to writing very quickly, smoothly, and then being able to erase, awesomeness!

Mel:  Ooh, I might have to check that out.

Sarah:  Yeah.  What is it with pens?

Mel:  I don’t know!  But like you said, you know, like, it connects to your brain, and that’s part of what I liked about Rachel Aaron’s book was one of her big discoveries was that if she took five minutes and just sketched out briefly what she was going to write –

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  – it massively increased her word count.

Sarah:  ‘Cause she had a road map of where go –

Mel:  Yes, I love road maps.

Sarah:  – and could connect those points.  Oh, absolutely!  If that, that helps –

Mel:  I do not –

Sarah:  – that’s how I write reviews.  I write a list of things that I want to make sure I mention?

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  And then I sit down, and sometimes I set a timer to see how fast I can do it, and then, like, two thousand words later I’m like, oh!  Well, that was a lot of things to say.  Darn.

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  And sometimes I know the grade, and sometimes I read the review, and then I know the grade.

Mel:  Oh!  That’s interesting.

Sarah:  Yep.  The grade, the grade is often disconnected from the text.  The grade has to match the text –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – but sometimes I know the grade and then the text explains the grade, and sometimes –

Mel:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – I write the text and go, okay, now I know where this fits in my rubric.

Mel:  Right.  That makes sense.

Sarah:  Writing is weird.

Mel:  It is.  And it, it takes – because of my job being such a wide variety, I sometimes order my tasks based on which part of my brain I’m going to use?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  You know, and I, I’m constantly re-adjusting my schedule to figure out what works best for me.  Like, is it best to start with, like, a visually creative task first thing in the morning, like graphics?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  Which is something I really enjoy.  Or – honestly, you’re going to hate this – sometimes it is easiest for me to start with accounting, because it’s math, and it’s got a right answer –

Sarah:  Perfectly adequate!

Mel:  – and it’s a wrong answer, and it, it actually doesn’t take as much of my brain as some other things, whereas if I have to ghost write something?  Ugh!  That is so hard.  And when I say ghost write, what I mean is I might draft out something for a client and then pass it along to them.  Like, I do the grunt work of the first draft, and then they, they might do it –

Sarah:  Polish.

Mel:  – and – they might polish.  And this is totally not books.  This would be like, hey, Mel, can you sketch out some ideas about, you know, like, in response to these interview questions?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.  Or authors that have FAQs on their website –

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  – or content that is going to be reused or, or present in more than one place –

Mel:  Yes.

Sarah:  – that kind of content, absolutely.

Mel:  And especially with the FAQs.  If I am managing their email, which is another thing that I do often, maybe not somebody’s primary inbox but their public inbox?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  Like, I might sort and tag things.  I will have a better idea of what their Frequently Asked Questions are.

Sarah:  Oh, of course.

Mel:  You know, because I know how many times I’ve heard, are you books going to be made into a movie?  You know?

Sarah:  Oh, if only we were in control of such things.

Mel:  Like, I’ll, I’ll know – if only.  If only.  So another book that I really enjoyed was it’s called As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride, and it is read by Cary Elwes.

Sarah:  Oh, mercy!

Mel:  Oh, my God!  When I figured this out, that this book even existed – I don’t know how I missed it; I think it came out a couple years ago – immediately, Audible!  Immediately, get into my earbuds!  Now!

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  And it was every bit as good as I thought it was going to be.  I love The Princess Bride, the book and the movie, and I love those, and I like backstage-y books.

Sarah:  Oh, behind the scenes is some of my favorite stuff.

Mel:  And I can’t figure out if it’s just because I have a theater degree that it’s interesting, or if that’s just – I mean, there are a lot of celebrity autobiographies now, so it must be a fairly popular genre.  I also read Amy, or listened to Amy Poehler’s book.

Sarah:  Oh, uh –

Mel:  Which is –

Sarah:  – Yes Please?

Mel:  Mm-hmm.  And the only part I was disappointed about with that book is she really did not talk about the making of Wet Hot American Summer.

[Laughter]

Mel:  Which, which I really wanted to hear about!  There is something on Netflix about that, though.  Like, it’s a behind-the-scenes thing.

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  I know that you and I have talked about this, but I have recently discovered the crack that is the Maiden Lane series by Elizabeth Hoyt.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  Oh, dear God.  I never want them to end.  Ever.  And it’s a good thing I’m sort of a slow reader, so I can make a, you know, it’s, let’s see, book ten just came out, and I’m on, like, book six?  I’m on book six right now.  Book – it’ll probably take me the rest of the summer to get to book ten.  Mm, I don’t know, I have a vacation, so maybe not, but oh, my God, those books are so crack-errific.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  You just can’t stop reading them!  And then I like to go and read Elyse’s reviews, because she’s so, like, spot on.

Sarah:  Oh, she’s, she loves that series, and she’s hilarious.

Mel:  Oh, when she was talking about Wicked Intentions and about how, she’s like, are you all thinking what I’m thinking?  Lucius Malfoy, right?

Sarah:  Yep.  [Laughs]

Mel:  That, that’s who this is, yes?

Sarah:  Yeah, probably.

Mel:  Exactly.  So, yes, Elizabeth Hoyt is actually a client, and I don’t know, I think I got intimidated by her backlist because –

Sarah:  [Laughs] ‘Cause it’s a substantial backlist!

Mel:  Well, and we’ve been working together for two years, just over two years at this point, and so when she came to me, she already had, like, her twentieth book.  Let’s see, this was her twentieth book.  Duke of Sin was her twentieth book, right?  So she came to me, and she already had something like sixteen or seventeen in her backlist, and I generally do try to read at least a couple of books by my clients, but she comes to me with this enormous backlist, and I’m like, oh, forget it!

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  I’ll never be able to read all those!  Plus, and I know this makes me an unusual romance reader?  I thought I hated historicals.  Honestly.  I think I just –

Sarah:  Ah, you’re not the first person I’ve heard say that.

Mel:  I just, I thought I did, and I think it’s just, I picked up a couple that were not right for me, and they were also – you know, I know you’ve talked about worldbuilding in historicals –

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Mel:  – and I know it’s got to be tricky for historical authors, because they have to explain enough that a new reader will know what was going on, but not so much that people that read historicals all the time will be like, dude, I do not need this explanation.  Please continue.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  But I picked a coup-, a, a couple that mentioned, like, the Ton, and I’m like, I don’t know what any of this is.  This is stupid.

Sarah:  I’m out of here.

Mel:  I don’t care about dresses.  Please quit describing this.  But the thing about Hoyt and about Courtney Milan, who is also a client, so I, I did read her books as they were coming out because she was a client, and then I, I did really enjoy them as well, but both of them write about not the upper class?

Sarah:  Yes, they write about multiple class levels.

Mel:  Right.  And so that, I think, is key for me in historicals, because if it’s just about balls and some of the conflicts that can arise out of being part of the upper class, I’m like, this is boring.  I don’t like reading about contemporary billionaires either.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  All your first-world, private jet problems.  Not my life.

Sarah:  Private jet problems, stay away from them.  Stay away! Do you, have you ever read Rose Lerner?

Mel:  No, I haven’t yet!

Sarah:  You would like that.

Mel:  I, I need to check her out.  Now that, now that my eyes are opened and I don’t hate historicals, I can do that.  But I did always like contemporaries, and so when I discovered Julie James, I binge-read the crap out of Julie James.

Sarah:  Oh, yes.

Mel:  Just everything.  And I know that you have interviewed, and you guys have talked about how she writes alpha females?

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  And alpha males?

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  The other thing I think that she’s really good at, and this, this kind of goes along with your competence porn?  I have always been really intrigued by different jobs.

Sarah:  Oh, yes.

Mel:  You know, and she’s so good at describing not just that someone is competent at their job but, like, what that entails?  Like, I love that one of her books ends with the main character getting a promotion, and that was, like, almost as satisfying as the romantic ending as well.

Sarah:  Yep.  I completely agree.

Mel:  She’s just, she’s really good.  So, and she’s another one of those that, like, she’s got, I think we have another year before her next book comes out.  Soon as it’s up for preorder I’m going to be like grabby hands, click, click, how many times can I click this?  Does it make it come faster?  No?  Okay.

Sarah:  [Laughs] So I hope people come to our sessions.

Mel:  I hope so too!  I think they’re going to be really great.  And I know I’m really excited about them.

Sarah:  Yeah?

Mel:  I love teaching things.  Like I said, since I can’t volunteer to, to organize everybody’s everything, at least maybe I can teach people to organize their everything.

Sarah:  Yep!  And you can teach people that being disorganized and feeling overwhelmed does not have to be a constant state.

Mel:  No!  No, they –

Sarah:   No, I am developing a, an online course to address that very idea, that you do not have to feel overwhelmed.  You can make your time under control.

Mel:  Yes, and, and the more that you have a system, the easier it is to deal with things.  And the –

Sarah:  Yes.  Systems are good.

Mel:  Systems are good, and they keep things from falling by the wayside.

Sarah:  Yep!

Mel:  You know, that horrible feeling when you realize that you forgot to do a thing, like –

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  – pay your mortgage?

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  Or pick up your kid at school?  Oops.  You don’t want to do that.

Sarah:  Nope.

Mel:  There’s no shame in needing a calendar reminder, that’s all I’m saying.

Sarah:  Oh, I need a calendar reminder to remind me what time the bus comes to the corner, because I don’t know what time it is.

Mel:  Exactly!  And you know what –

Sarah:  And I accept this about myself.  I can’t change this about my brain; my brain is this way.  It is just the way it is.  I don’t remember numbers, and I don’t have any concept of time, and that’s okay, because I’ve worked out a system that works with my brain to keep me on a schedule, so then I’m not letting anyone down who’s depending on me.

Mel:  Exactly!  And you know what?  I think that it’s important to own those sorts of things about yourself.

Sarah:  Yes.

Mel:  Like, my newsletter from Sunday was about how I am super messy, and even if I’m not eating, I will get food on my clothes –

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  – and so when I dyed my hair purple, I taped garbage bags all over my bathroom.

Sarah:  Yep!

Mel:  Because I know that I am messy, and it is much easier for me to just own that about myself –

Sarah:  Yep!

Mel:  – and, and learn to live with it.

Sarah:  Yep.

Mel:  But you can, you can develop skills, you know, if you’re not naturally organized.  You can tape garbage bags to your life.

Sarah:  Yep.  Might be a little sweaty.

Mel:  Sarah can teach you the organizational ways – [laughs] – yeah, that might be a little sweaty.

[Laughter]

Mel:  That, that analogy might go to a really, just, like, a weird place.  I don’t know.

Sarah:  Be a lot of slip and slide.  Your life can be as easy as a Slip’N Slide.

Mel:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Whee!  Thunk.

Mel:  I don’t know; I hurt myself the last time on a Slip’N Slide.

Sarah:  Yeah, me too.  I’m not so good at slipping and sliding.

Mel:  I was like, I’m not old!  I can slip and slide!  Oh, God, I think I pulled something important in –

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Mel:  – abdominal.  I couldn’t, I couldn’t fully sit up.

Sarah:  Oh, dear.

[music]

Sarah:  And that is all for this week’s episode.  Thank you to Mel Jolly for hanging out with me and talking about all the things.  If you’re going to RWA I hope you will think about attending our sessions, and if you’ve got questions about them or you can’t attend or you want to know more, you can always email me at [email protected], and I can connect all of us together and answer all your questions, ‘cause email is what we do.  Lots of it.  Do you have too much email?  I have too much email.  It’s kind of alarming, but yet I like it when people email me about books and questions and stuff.  That’s awesome.  It’s the, hey, I want to pitch you guest entries and guest content about frying pans and hubcaps.  That’s the things that drive me nuts.  And seriously, you would not believe how much guest content pitching is going on right now.  It’s just goofy.  Like, I can’t explain it.

This podcast was brought to you by you, because you are awesome, and you tune in each week and listen, and if you’re new or you’ve been listening for a long time, I appreciate that so much.  Thank you.

The podcast transcript this week is brought to you by Kensington, publishers of Once a Soldier by New York Times bestselling author Mary Jo Putney, the first book in a brand-new series about a dashing group of soldiers and spies, Rogues Redeemed.  Once a Soldier has all the best of Mary Jo Putney’s talents on display:  captivating characters, daring adventures, gripping intrigue, and exceptional historical detail, all rolled up into a thoroughly passionate and complex love story.  It is the historical romance of the summer, so don’t forget to pick up your copy, on sale June 28th.

If you are a listener or a fan or a brand-new person, welcome!  I’ve wanted to invite you to check out our Patreon campaign at Patreon.com/SmartBitches.  For monthly pledges starting at $1 a month, you can help support the show, keep it going, and help me make sure that we have transcripts for every episode.  There are rewards and different levels of pledging and lots of fun things involved, and if you’ve checked it out already, thank you very, very much.

And now it’s time for some compliments!  Are you ready?  This is fun.  This is so fun.  Okay, here we go:  

Brandi, you’ve got courage that never quits, even when you really need a nap.

Leslie, you are better than bacon, and if you don’t like bacon, you’re better than your favorite thing.

Elizabeth, folks wish they had all of your superpowers.

Laura B., your dance moves are the best in every known galaxy.

Mary B., when you wake up, you are the finest achievement of every day.

And Emily, poems will be written about the food you make for the people you love.

Now if you’re wondering what is going on and what is happening, you can check out Patreon.com/SmartBitches and have a look.  Different pledge levels come with different rewards, and some of them are completely goofy but deeply meant compliments from yours truly.  Thank you to everyone who has helped support the show.  I am so grateful for your support.  That is just amazing, and I, every time I look at that I’m just floored.  It is so great.  Thank you.

Our music is brought to you by Sassy Outwater.  You can find her on Twitter @SassyOutwater.  This is Treacherous Orchestra.  Is that not, like, a really great band name?  [Laughs] Treacherous Orchestra.  This is their album Grind.  This track is called “The Sly One,” and you can find it at Amazon or iTunes or wherever you like to buy your music.  And big thanks to Sassy for sending me original, cool music every week.

I will have links to all of the books and shortcuts and tools that we, we listed during the podcast, the pens that we talked about, our workshops – it’s going to be awesome.

And if you have questions or suggestions or you have ideas, you can email me at [email protected].  If you’d like information about sponsoring the podcast or sponsoring an episode, you can totally email me there as well.  And if you have a question or you want some book recommendations and you’d like to leave a message, you can call 1-201-371-3272, that’s 201-371-3272, and leave a message there, and I will use that file in an upcoming podcast, if I can hear it clearly, and make sure that I answer your question.  It’s awesome to hear from you, whether by email or by voicemail or just, you know, reviews that you leave on iTunes.  Y’all are an amazing group of people.  Thank you for hanging out with me each Friday.

And on behalf of Mel and myself and everyone here, we wish you the very best of reading.  Have a great weekend.

[sly music]