Chapters To Chats...

This one is for the authors!

Morning Car Rides

The past couple of weeks have felt very long and heavy, at least for me they have. We witnessed yet another school shooting, held our breaths for a Presidential debate and honored those who lost their lives on 9/11.

Our morning car rides to school have much more purposeful singing and dance parties because I worry about what my last interaction with my kids could be when I send them to school. This morning, I found out that a friend’s child was on a shooter list by another child and thankfully it was all intercepted. I hate that these thoughts become more and more realistic.

I know that living in fear is not the thing to do, so I am ensuring fun with my kids every morning. I am researching political candidates from the local level running for school board to the national level. I’m paying attention to who is endorsing them and stalking their social media pages to see what they stand for. I’m talking to friends and other parents about who is running, what we can do and making sure we are all using our voices. I encourage you to do the same.

It’s easy to get distracted and doom scroll with so much going on. My uplifting solution has been to connect virtually with my friends. This week I had zoom calls and phone calls with women whom I admire and love. It’s so uplifting to get to connect with others, so make time on your calendar to reach out to someone you miss. It’ll be good for your soul and chances are, they need it too!

What I’m Working On

Chapters To Chats: An Author’s Book Club on Podcast Guesting

When How To Get On Podcasts came out, I created a course that is a companion to it. I want to help more of you become podcast guests and share your stories, especially authors. This upgraded course is geared towards authors but is applicable to anyone who wants to be a podcast guest. Think of it as a book club where you get to meet with the author after reading every chapter!

The Details

What: An online course with 8 live weekly Zoom calls with me! Each week we will read a chapter of How To Get On Podcasts and not only discuss the content but you’ll have an opportunity to ask questions, get feedback on your topics and media kit and more.

When: We will meet every Tuesday, starting on October 8th through November 26th at 8:30amPST/11:30am EST. The calls will be recorded if you can’t make it and you can submit questions in advance!

To Do: Grab a copy of How To Get On Podcasts and snag your seat!

Film Producing

I have been interested in learning more about what role a producer plays in filmmaking. If you’ve been following me for awhile, then you know I love to jump into things that not only peak my interest but tell a story that others need to hear. I am beyond thrilled to be joining filmmaker and actress Katie Prentiss of Sunshine Soul Films and producer Cara Mitsuko to work on Wake Up Maggie.

Wake Up Maggie is the story of a young woman who is diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia (FTD…what Bruce Willis has) and how her estranged sister steps in to be her caregiver. This isn’t just a story though. Katie’s mother also had FTD and Katie was her caregiver, while being a wife, mother of four and business owner.

I’m honored and humbled to get to work with these two incredible women and to help bring more awareness and education on FTD and caregivers. We are in the pre-production stage which means we are working on funding! If you’d to donate to help bring this film to life, I’d be forever grateful! You’ll get to hear Katie’s story on the podcast in October!

I’m still plugging away on my novel as well and have got a more exciting things in the works, but it’s too soon to share!

Podcast Pitching & AI

I keep getting ads in my feeds for podcast pitching. I guess the algorithms haven’t figured out that I’m always working on the topic because it’s literally what I do.

The newest one promises to save you 13 hours of work every week by sending out “personalized, auto-written emails that match your style”. I visited the website just to check it out and also do some competitive research analysis. I didn’t enter my information anywhere and probably spent less than 3 minutes total. The very next day I had an email from one of their co-founders saying they were glad I was checking them out and wanted to schedule a call. What the what?!?!

I received multiple follow-ups in quick succession. Every email had grammatical errors, didn’t capitalize words and frankly, turned me completely off. I have no intention of utilizing AI to craft my pitches, but seeing the lack of quality that was being sent to me just reinforced why my gut is always right.

I do use ChatGPT on occasion for content I’ve already created, such as helping me jazz up a podcast or presentation title or converting a bio from first person to third person. I’m not utilizing it to do any outreach of any kind!

My Simplified Life

I continue to host the most incredible guests and fall in love more and more with their stories.

Ep 243 with James Rhee will teach you how kindness + math = a great leader,

Ep 244 with Liz Alterman dives into how we connected over our shared stories of being laid off from our corporate jobs,

Ep 245 with Ava Dellaira looks at empathy and how there are multiple sides to every story, just as in her book, Exposure.

Let’s keep going friends!

Michelle