How to publish a children's book with Counsellor Sue Steer

Welcome to today's episode of the Business of Psychology. I'm joined by Sue Steer, who is a counsellor, but also a children's author. I'm really excited to talk to Sue about her journey into private practice and the process of adding a children's book to her already successful business.

Full show notes and a transcript of this episode are available at The Business of Psychology

Links & References:

Start & Grow: The Complete Course for Psychologists and Therapists - Psychology Business School

Links for Sue:

Website: www.steerintocounselling.co.uk

Instagram: @steer_into_counselling

Facebook: Steer into Counselling

Bea's Busy Brain (amazon.co.uk)

Rosie on Instagram:

@rosiegilderthorp

@thepregnancypsychologist

The highlights

• I introduce Sue and she tells us about who she is and what she does 00:00
• Sue tells us how long it took her to go from being a solo practitioner to bringing associates on board? 05:35
• I ask Sue what she found tricky in setting up her private practice process 08:43
• Sue tells us what prompted her to start thinking about adding a children's book to her business 11:23
• Sue tells us about the main character, Bea 17:12
• Sue explains the process of writing and publishing a book 22:52
• I ask Sue about marketing strategy and what her thoughts were about how to get her book out into the world 32:41
• Sue tells her where we can find her 38:00

Thank you so much for listening to the Business of Psychology podcast. I'd really appreciate it if you could take the time to subscribe, rate and review the show. It helps more mental health professionals just like you to find us, and it also means a lot to me personally when I read the reviews. Thank you in advance and we'll see you next week for another episode of practical strategy and inspiration to move your independent practice forward.

Mentioned in this episode:

Start and Grow

Before you go, did you know that I have a course for professionals just like you who are starting out in independent practice? In fact, my Start and Grow course has already supported hundreds of psychologists and therapists to build impactful, financially rewarding, and professionally fulfilling practices. When you sign up to the course, you get clear step-by-step support to build a practice that supports your values and rewards your hard work through our comprehensive online learning modules. You get peace of mind, thanks to our complete suite of legal documents from Clare Veal at Aubergine Legal, you get 12 months of membership to our supportive student community, access to our private students' podcast, so you can learn in your own time and in your own way. You, yes, I see you learning while you're doing the washing up! And you get access to regular group coaching sessions with me and the rest of our lovely students. If that sounds like exactly what you need to get out of private practice paralysis, then sign up today at https://psychologybusinessschool.com/psychology-business-school/

TRANSCRIPT

SPEAKERS

Rosie Gilderthorp, Sue Steer

Hello and welcome to today's episode of the Business of Psychology. I'm here today with Sue Steer, and Sue's a counsellor, but also a children's author. And I'm really excited to talk to Sue today about her journey. So, Hi Sue, welcome to the podcast.

Hi Rosanna, thank you for having me.

So can you tell the listeners a little bit about who you are and what you do?

Yeah, so I'm Sue Steer, I'm a counsellor in Stockton on Tees in the north east of England. I run a private practice here, so there's me and I have three other affiliate counsellors who work alongside me as well. We work with adults and children. So we work across the board, we work with anxiety, depression, relationships. We work with pretty much everything. We're person centred counsellors and we're also CBT counsellors too. So we pull from a few different modalities. That said my, my background is community safety and youth offending. So originally I set up a counselling service in the community safety team here at Stockton for the local authority. And then I moved on to set one up for the youth offending team. And after setting two up for different services, I decided to take the leap and set my own up, really. And that's how I land here.

Oh, wow. So I didn't realise that your background was in youth offending. That's really interesting. And it, was it quite different when you stepped into the private practice world?

Yeah, different in the, I guess there's differences and similarities, I suppose. Different in the sense of, I probably work with more adults here than I did there, and the client issues can be different, but then in the same breath, people are people and so usually in therapy we get a referral for one thing and there's a whole host of other things. And I think that was across the board in community safety, youth offending, and here. It's different in the sense that my background has always been local authority, and so not having the political side of that, of the meetings that the, attending meetings for the sake of meetings sometimes, and all of that other stuff sort of is removed in private practice. And so I feel like I'm more able to do the stuff that's makes a difference and I'm miss difference and I'm more passionate about, I guess.

Yeah, that's really interesting. I think I hear that echoed a lot on this podcast, but I think a lot of people who are new to private practice might be surprised at how similar the clinical issues are that we work with. I know I was surprised, I imagined it was all going to be, you know, very straightforward, lots of, you know, basically well people who just wanted a bit of a mental health top up. And of course that's, that's not what we find at all. Sometimes what's written on the referral form might look different, but when you get down to it, the issues are often very similar.

Absolutely. It's just human beings, isn't it? We all have lives and we all have different things going on in our lives and quite often you get the headline, don't you? You get the, this is the straw that broke the camel's back, that's why I'm coming. But when we get further into it, there's usually more. So yeah, it's different but similar, I guess.

Yeah, absolutely. And for you, it sounds like you were stepping into private practice already having had a lot of managerial experience behind you. Did, did that help when you were starting out?

So I had run the practice, but I was the only counsellor when I worked for local authority. So I literally set the services up. So community safety, there was only me to start with, and then another counsellor came along, but there was a manager who wasn't a counsellor running it, which usually happens in local authority. And then, youth offending, I stepped across and set up the service again, and then left as they, that's grown and there's a few counsellors in there now and I clinically supervise a few of them. So not really manager, managerial experience when I stepped into this. I've had to, I've had to learn fast, as things have changed and grown. I think when you go into private practice, being a counsellor, that's only one part of the job isn't that there are, you've got to do your books, you need to promote yourself. You, if you've got affiliates, which I have, you want to grow them, you want to support them. You, you know, there's, there's all sorts of things that I go, we'd like to put some training on and, and so it goes. So, learning all the time.

Yes, and it, it, it strikes me that you're somebody that embraced that and really got stuck into the learning aspect of it.

Yeah, I'm one of those people who has a million tabs open in her head, lots of ideas. And so I jump from one to the next. I'm always excited about something. I love to learn. And so for me, it felt, It felt like freedom. It was 20 years in local authority, so stepping out of local authority was, oh, I can breathe, and I, I could, nobody's pulling me back and saying, no, you can't do that, you should try this. I can just be me and do what I want to do.

Oh, that's amazing. That's really refreshing. So thinking about, you know, your, your practice as it stands now, how long did it take you to go from being a solo practitioner to bringing in the associates on board?

So I grew this on the side for a little while before I left local authority, before I took the jump, so I knew it was a bit of a calculated risk rather than a jump into the abyss. And then maybe, it's maybe about a year, maybe? And then, there's been a few swaps and changes, how I've done that is I work quite closely with the college, local college, so Riverside College here in Stockton, and Teesside University run counselling courses, and so I link up and provide personal therapy while counsellors are training and clinical supervision, and so by doing that, I've been able to take newly qualified counsellors and help them step into this part, so my affiliates, I think they’re three years qualified now, but they weren't at the start. And so being able to do that and help them feel brave, I guess, of that background of not just stepping into nothing. You've got somebody who's with a bit of experience behind them. And so that's sort of how it is. So maybe about a year.

Wow. I mean, that, that's quite fast. You know, having supported a lot of people through that transition, it's, it's quite a rapid one. But I can totally see how that would work. And I think often people get really stuck. How do I find the right associates? How do I make it worthwhile for an associate to come into my practice? And actually, I think connecting up with training courses is a really nice way of doing that.

Yeah, it's been, it's been really nice 'cause it's meant that we've probably all known each other first, generally, a few of us have, a few of us haven't. But once you, you land in that world, I guess, and, and, and of training, you get to meet new people and different, and you know who's interested in maybe going into a private practice who isn't, how, what maybe support they would like around that, and well, I'm all about, let's all just go and do it, but I'm happy to support anybody and if I can, I will.

And I think people often underestimate how, if you've got that energy and that enthusiasm, how attractive that is for people to work for. You know, of course, if I'm newly qualified, I'm going to want to work alongside you because you're giving me that, you know, confidence boost and that enthusiasm that you need right at the beginning.

Yeah. And it's really nice to give that, you know, that's a two way street, isn't it? I think if you are supporting people and helping them and helping them grow, you're also getting the best out of people too, aren't you? And so they are going to give my clients the best experience too. And that's at the end of the day, what it's about, isn't it? It's my name, it's my practice. And I want my clients to feel they're getting the best and I like to think they are.

So was there anything that was tricky in that setting up process? Because I know a lot of people listening to this are right in the thick of it in those early stages.

Yeah, I think having the guts in the first place was really scary. I remember walking out of my job after 19 and a half years, being really confident, and the first step out of the door, my head said, Who do you think you are? And that was the first thought I had, and I thought, oh, you know, you've walked away from a good pension, you've walked away from this, that, the other, a decent wage, and so it did take, it did take some guts. What was tricky? I think what was tricky was, figuring out the, the paperwork side of things, the books, the doing, you know, log, it's all the background stuff that I find, the boring stuff, I guess, to me, that making sure you have your receipts, making, for me, it's about, I log everything immediately, so every week I have one afternoon where I update my ins and outs into my database, so I know my books are up to date every single week. My client database, so I know who's coming for the following week is all up to date on a Sunday, ready for the Monday. It was, it was figuring out what worked for me, which was really hard. I think at first it was just scattered.

Yeah, I think I can relate to that. I think a lot of people can too. I think a really good tip is to work out what you hate because you're going to avoid that and force yourself to diarise when you're going to do it. And I think frequently is, is the answer, especially if, you know, like both of us, it's a bookkeeping thing. I used to put that off and then it would become overwhelming. But like you say, it's just, it's weekly, daily, but frequently where you get it up to date, so you never have that feeling of, I can't even look at it.

Yeah, it is the worst thing. I think for me, if it's only 20 minutes a week, I can cope with 20 minutes week. And actually the receipt part, I do that on a daily basis. I have a special bit in my purse, as soon as I get in, I take the receipts out and I put them straight on. And they go in an envelope with that date on in a box that's next to my desk and they're gone. It's really easy. But the other bit, it's probably half an hour and I can cope with that. If it was... a full day, once every month. Oh my God, that would just, that's a nightmare.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely awful. So I guess, what prompted you to start thinking about adding a children's book into this already successful business, which is probably quite time consuming, I'm guessing.

Yeah, I guess partly it's because, like I said, I have a really, Bea's Busy Brain could be Sue's busy brain. I have a busy brain. And so I am, I am that person who relaxes by doing rather than laying doing nothing. And so I've always, so I've made vintage shower caps for years. I sew, I've always been a bit of a creator. I'll paint furniture. That's just me. So over the years I have made notes for Books. I work really creatively in therapy so I use a lot of stones and sand trays and metaphor. So often my notes are a drawing, which I'll then get out for the next session and share with the client. It scratched a creative itch, I guess. When I work with young people, it is a story that I have told forever. So partly it was something that I could use myself. It was something that I thought, do you know, that would be really great if I could get this book out and show the pictures and tell the story. I use other books that way. So partly for myself, partly because it, it gave me that creative pleasure that I enjoy. Partly because actually I realised I couldn't find a book that introduced therapy to young people. And so it was partly a way of having that, so if a young person is going into therapy where there's a book you can give them, that tells you what therapy looks like and what a counsellor might so in a session, and that should be really nice, and these are the things you're going to look at, and it's fun, and I think was also a bit of a motive. I think it's something that teachers can use, social workers, counsellors, parents, it's quite easy to use by anyone, I guess, and the colours that, so for me, getting Alice Strange, who’s the illustrator, to come on board and do that, I mean, at first I thought I might do it myself, but I'm really rubbish! I'm really bad, stick men, I really tried and it was really bad. And so, yeah, it was an investment. However, the end result is so colourful and beautiful. I'm, you know, I'm really proud of it and I do think it fits the gap that we don't, we maybe don't have anything that fits at the moment, that introduces counselling, that has a bit of a CBT approach to it.

Yeah, I really like that idea. I think we often underestimate. Because we've been immersed in our professions for so long, I think we often underestimate how little the public know about what a therapy session or a counselling session might be like. And so You've often got parents, teachers, sencos trying to reassure a child about something they don't know anything about.

Absolutely, I completely agree. I think to have a book you can pick up and tell a story that is, leans towards questions too, so it would allow a lovely conversation to run alongside it, is exactly what's missing. I completely agree. I think Bea in the story is worried about going to see a counsellor. She thinks the counsellor might think she's mad. You know, and how many young people will relate to that, who've been told you're going to go and see a counsellor next week, and this is a complete stranger and. Well, what does that look like?

Yeah, I think that's brilliant. And, you know, thinking about young people in my life, often they think counselling happens if a parent dies. Or maybe you get counselling if your parents are separating. They've got quite a concrete idea of what kind of traumatic events deserve counselling, and so anything that opens up that conversation about actually, you know, you might just feel like you need it around something, which isn't a big life event.

Yeah, absolutely. And I agree with you. I think there's lots of books on certain life events. You're right. Is there, you know, there's not so many around worries and muddles, which is what Bea's going to counselling in the book about. And so that is more, I guess it's, I guess the book normalises some of this stuff too, you know, worries and muddles around my friends might not like me, you know, I'm not fast enough at that or I'm not good enough at that. They're the norms, aren't they, that young people do worry about. And so, to go to a counsellor with those things and somebody to help you recognise that they're emotional thoughts and challenge them and work towards thinking rationally, which in the book is Brain Bully and Brain Bestie, is, is really helpful for young people. But you're right, if nobody knows counselling can help that, and so therefore these children don't get referred in, it isn't great, and so maybe this is a... a step towards therapy. It might be just a book that fills the gap and you never end up wanting to go to therapy and that's fine, it's just a nice story, but it can be a stepping stone towards too, I think.

That sounds so valuable. So can you, can you say a little bit more about the main character Bea? Because I'm really fascinated about this.

Yeah, so Bea is a little girl who catches some worries and muddles. She's always been happy and then she suddenly starts worrying about. I can't keep up at that, I'm not very good at that, my friends don't, maybe don't like me, and they're all emotional thoughts, if you like. In the book, Bea's mum makes her an appointment to see the school counsellor and then Bea catches more worries and muddles. So then she starts worrying about seeing the counsellor and she might think she's mad. And so what happens is Bea meets the counsellor and tells her what's going on and they make a list of how she's going to support her. And Bea feels better already the next day and she thinks maybe the counsellor's got a magic wand because talking to her, she already started to feel okay. And the book then goes into the sessions, the sessions where Bea is introduced to a brain, having a brain bully and a brain bestie, which we would know as our emotional mind and our rational mind. And so Bea names her brain Bully Madge, and she writes down the things that Madge says to her, and then she's introduced to her brain Bestie, and she calls her Edith, and Edith has a very quiet voice, and Madge has a really loud voice, and so the counsellor teaches Bea how, when you're doing things that make you happy, so self care, they make big lists of those, when she does those, they help her brain bestie have a louder voice, and when a brain bestie has a louder voice, her brain bully listens. And so what happens is Bea realises that her brain bully isn't a bully after all. She's just a scared part of her and they make friends and they all go out skipping together and they all, you know, get along. And Bea learns that having good self care keeps her brain bully quiet, and it also means that her brain bestie can answer and reassure her brain bully if you like, Madge.

That’s so nice, I love it. What a great way of explaining it.

Thank you. I think it just lends to lots of worksheets and questions, you know, can you draw your brain bully? Can you draw your buddy? Can you name them? You know, the book Bea is doing these things throughout the book, which means that in therapy, you could easily copy these things in therapy with a young person. You know, what does your brain buddy say? What does your brain bestie say about that? Let's do a list of self care to keep your brain bestie having a laugh. I think it also, it gives a language to it. What I've, what I've learned over telling the story over a million years is that young people then start using that language. So I'll hear parents say, or she's been telling me about a brain bully and a brain bestie. And she'll say, my brain bully's been saying this today on my brain bestie. And they, they come into therapy using that language after hearing the story, which, it's great because I think sometimes young people don't have the language and making it separate.

And actually adults don't either. I think as a parent, but also just as an adult, it's really difficult to, to name that bit of yourself, and, and to do it in a friendly way. I think where Adults often get to is they recognise that there is a part of themselves that they call like the anxious part, and but they don't like it, and they get angry with it. And often that makes everything worse. Whereas what I really love about this is the friendliness of it, imagining that, you know, the three of you can be mates. I really like that. And I think that's really healthy, and I think it would give parents a lovely way of talking about their own experiences and modelling that for their children as well.

Thank you. Yeah, hopefully. Imagine the book has a crystal ball and she invites, you know, she thinks she can see that into the future, but obviously she can't, which, which we know in CBT is, you know, our unhelpful thinking stars. We think we can fortune tell, we think we can read people's minds. And so imagine the book does that, you know, she thinks she can read minds, she thinks she can tell the future. So it introduces those unhelpful thinking stars too. So in a conversation, you know, a young Child who's read that book could easily recognise that. Oh, well, my brain bully's been guessing the future, or fortune telling, or reading minds, or... So, I, I completely agree. I think it gives parents, or whoever, the person who might be reading the book, it gives them some answers as well. It's not reading the book and then thinking, right, what am I going to do with that information then? I don't know what to do now. So she's told me I'm, she's worried, but now what do I do? Solutions too.

Yeah, I love that because there's been all these campaigns about, you know, get young people talking, or get people talking in general. But there's nothing about the answer. What am I supposed to say when people open up to me? And I think that's a huge anxiety for a lot of people that work alongside young people particularly, what do I actually do if they come to me and say, I'm really struggling with anxiety? And this is a lovely tool. So yeah, I, I think I'll be getting a copy for me and my kids, but yeah, thank you so much for talking to us about it. Would you mind telling me a little bit about the process? Like, how did you actually get this out of your head and onto paper?

With great difficulty! I have to, so getting it onto paper to start with wasn't so bad because it was a story I've told so many times. But then. Oh God, writing a book is so different to what I thought it was and writing a picture book with so few words you would think was really easy and it really wasn't. So I, I have been on a massive learning curve. I have read everything. I have watched a million YouTube things. I have linked with other authors and tried to learn how to do that the best I can, and so what I actually did was I linked with another lady who, Lou Treleaven she's called, and what she does is she's, she's a children's book writer, but she also offers a service where you can send her your script if you like, and she will read it and then she will give you feedback on the author's voice, the protagonist's voice, that sort of thing. And so she was, oh God, she was a saving grace, actually, so she, I sent her the book, she gave me some feedback, I made tweaks, sent it back, then she was like, yeah, that's right, and that's how it should, and she has lots of information on how to do certain things on her website, so I, she was great, that's where I learned. From, from then, once you've got your, your words, your, your script, right, and you have to write them in spreads. So you write them in two page spreads. So all of this was learning to me, and then it was a case of trying to find an illustrator. Like I said, I thought I might do that myself, which was really rubbish because I couldn't do the same drawing twice! So that was never going to work, and so what I did there was I was on Instagram and started searching illustrators, and following a few, and just looking. And Alice Strange, who I used, her, her images just stood out to me as really warm, and she uses beautiful colours, and her pictures are, like, the flowers are bigger than they should be, if you like, and things are a bit exaggerated, and they're a bit really quirky. And so I contacted Alice, asked if she would be interested, it was the first book she's done. So we went on a little bit of a book adventure, really, together. So we learnt as we went along. We were probably slow. And we kept swapping and changing things. But because we both understood we were learning, that worked really well for us, and so we, we put the transporter bridge on the front page, which is behind Bea on the front page, which is a local landmark here in, well in Middlesbrough. So we, we landed it locally, if you like, and she's, the pictures are just amazing. So once she'd done that, we then had, well I then had to find somebody to typeset it. So I thought that was just something I could do myself. And again, it wasn't. So I sent it to a local, in Billingham, company to have a read through and put it into a nice little file so I could upload it on Amazon. And he came back and said, your words are all over. So, then it was a bit more money to get that all typeset, but once he pointed out what was wrong, I could see it. I just didn't know what I was looking for because I've never done it before. So he set it, the words all nice, and everything was lovely. He put it in a file for me so I could upload it to Amazon, and they were printers too, so I printed a hundred copies so I can take them out and about with me. And then I, I uploaded it onto Amazon ready, and that's sort of the process, in a nutshell, with a lot of worries and wobbles and learning along the way, I guess.

So how does it work with Amazon now? So if somebody makes an order, do they just print a copy and send it to them?

Yes. So, how I've done that, I've done print on demand, which is KDP. So, yes, if you went on Amazon today, you could type in Bea’s Busy Brain, you could buy it, and they would print that one copy, so it doesn't cost you to print a million copies and send them to Amazon or they take an order and then they let you know and you have to post it, but it's all done. They take a big chunk of what you make for that but yeah that's how it's done. Which is why I've also had, so what I did was I got some 100 books printed from the local printers and they had their nicer paper, actuals, brighter colours, so that you have a bit more control with a local printer, if you like, over Amazon. It's just printed that way. So the local printers, what then I did was I've got that in Drake's Bookshop, which is a local shop here and I'll try, I've put it in the local library and I'll try and do some events where I can take them along with me. So I've got two streams of income through it, if you like, that's how I've done it.

That's really interesting. Thank you so much for sharing the nuts and bolts of that because, you know, I, I think I've, I've dived a little bit into the self publishing route and yes, oh my goodness, there are so many things that we don't know about. Typesetting being one of them, but also things like cover design. I mean, obviously you had your illustrator, so I imagine she knew a bit about that, but it's a whole science, isn’t it?

Oh huge, just the fact that once it was all set to go on Amazon, then it wouldn't work because the margins are wrong. The bleed was wrong and all of those things. It really has been a learning experience. However, that said, I think once you've done it and you've learned, book two is now being illustrated. There's going to be three. And so this, touch wood, the second and third will be much easier because I now have the right contacts, I know what that looks like. I'm not going to try and do everything myself because that was a mad thought in the first place, and so I know what to expect the next, next twice, hopefully.

I think you say it's mad, but actually I think it's a mistake that most of us make. Whenever we’re starting anything new in our business, whatever new project it is, we always think we can do everything. And actually sometimes making that investment in bringing other people in is the difference between success and failure. You know, when I... I hear people trying to do everything on an absolute shoestring. They won't invest in any software. They won't get any help. They won't get any admin support, because I can't afford it right now. Well, you'll always not be able to afford it because you won't ever have the headspace to get to the next level. But I think, you know, you learn that don't you from running your business for a while.

I absolutely agree. It is really scary, isn't it sort of outsourcing those things because they are investments and it is money that you think, Oh God, can I do it? What if? And is there any way around it? But the truth is, you're right, if I had drawn that book, it would have been rubbish. If I had a typeset that book, it was rubbish, because I didn't have things central. I had a word falling off the bottom of that, which I thought looked fine. Obviously it doesn't. And so I have, to be honest, I have to say, once I looked at, when he changed the words and put them straight, I could, it was the difference between an alright job and a perfect, like it's a proper book and it looks right. And if that's what you're looking for, then you have to, of course, you have to have the right people to do the right jobs and you can't do everything. You just can't. And it's, yeah, it would've been some sort of weird booklet if I've done on my own, because there's just no way, there's no way… I keep looking at it thinking, I can't even believe that belongs to me because it's, it's lovely. I really like it.

And that, that pride that you feel in it is what makes it easier to market it. You know, there's no sense when I speak to you about it, I don't feel like you're trying to persuade me that it's good, your enthusiasm for it just kind of bubbles out of you. And that's, that's when marketing magic happens because you don't need to persuade anybody. You just tell them about how great the book is, and if they want it, they want it. So there's no kind of, you know, I, to me, it doesn't feel difficult to talk about.

Thank you. Yeah, I guess so, because yeah, I believe in it. I do believe in it. And I, and I, I agree. I'm, I'm no, I'm not a salesperson. I have no idea how to do that, which is, is the next bit that I'm learning. I'm reading loads of books on marketing, because I don't know how to do the next book. You're right. The bit I'm certain about is (I sound cocky and I'm not cocky at all) but the bit I'm happy with or the bit I feel comfortable with is that I believe if somebody has that book in their hands, they'll like it. I just don't, don't know, haven't learned the bit of how to get that in as many people's hands as I need to. That's the bit I'm learning now. But yeah.

Yeah, so I was going to ask you, I was going to ask you about marketing strategy and what your thoughts were about how to get this out into the world.

It's a, it, this is my new thing. So what I did do, luckily at the beginning I started reading about marketing. So at the back of the book, what I did was that, new word for me, but I put in a lead magnet, which was something I hadn't heard of before. So another thing I learned. So the back of the book asks if you'd like to join the website and the mailing list for more updates. But what we did was we offered a free colouring in page for joining that, which is one of the pages from the book. So that was one way of being able to then, especially when you're selling through Amazon, they're Amazon customers. So to be able to make those customers my customers by joining my waiting list, sorry, my mailing list meant that the next book I could then email that out to these customers who've already bought one book. So that was one way, which was my future thinking of how to do it. But the present thinking, yeah, I'm not sure. I'm all over social media. So I'm not very good with TikTok. That's my new learning for the next few weeks that I'm going to figure that out, but I'm, I'm on Instagram and Facebook all over that. I do have clients or that, you know, it's advertised in here. It's in a local bookshop. In September, I'd like to try and get around some schools and do that. I'm in the park, Brockton Park, tomorrow. There is a children's yoga session and I've linked up with them. So I'm going to go and do a book signing and see if we can sell some books there. I've linked in the local authority, I've got a meeting with a local councillor next week. I've linked with some counselling services that are local here, but the truth is I'm quite local, I've stayed local. I need to think bigger, but I don't know how I'm going to think bigger. Is the truth. That's my next learning.

Yeah. So, I mean, I think obviously not a marketing session, but, but I think you're doing the right thing by focusing on relationships first, because you do speak so well about it. You've got so much credibility and it's such an engaging premise, but I could see you going and giving little talks places and, and spreading the word of mouth that way. I think that's a really valuable tool. To take that bigger, think about taking those talks to a bigger audience. So, things like you're doing right now, guesting on podcasts, thinking about where the professionals that might need this might, might be listening to. So, you know, what podcast do Sencos listen to, for example, that's something I'd be thinking about. And maybe trying to get into the kind of media that influences them as well. Then obviously you've got the big hitters, the big parenting podcasts, not as far away as you might think! So you might think, Oh, I could never get on there. They only have celebrities or whatever. Now, obviously if they do only have celebrities, then don't worry. But have a look at the ones that do interview authors, that do talk about mental health. You're more credible than you realise. I mean, that's true, true for everybody listening to this if you've got a decent track record in your profession, the media sees you as credible, never forget that. And the way that you talk about your book is so engaging that if you can record a bit of you talking, so you could send them this podcast episode, and that demonstrates to them, this woman can talk. Not only is she credible, she's got a good product, but she can actually talk about it and that's what they need to know. So don't be afraid to reach out at all to those sort of bigger podcasts, YouTube channels, that kind of thing.

That's good advice. That's yeah, that's, that's my next challenge, definitely. And it is good advice. And yeah, I'll let you know.

And probably more valuable than social media. I have heard of social media advertising doing well for book sales. Do have a look at that. But in terms of building your authority, getting known as an author with authority in this field, it's easier to do that if you're targeting the parents who are likely to buy it and the professionals who are likely to buy it, that's always going to be easier through mainstream media than it is through social media. Not to say that's a bad channel, but it can suck all of your time, and actually because you're so good at talking, let's do more of that.

That's great advice. Thank you. I'll be honest. I wasn't sure I'd be able to talk. So this has been a good test for me.

Yes, and now you know you can do it. So there's no excuse, you've got to do loads of it!

Yeah, I'll be sick of the sound of my own voice in a few weeks.

So I see really exciting things in the future for Bea. So can you tell me a little bit about, you know, where people can go to follow your story? What are your social media channels?

Yeah, so I have Steer into Counselling, which is my company name. So I have a Facebook page of Steer into Counseling, which is STEER, which is my surname, and I have a Instagram page for that. And we have a website too, which is www.steerintocounselling.co.uk, and if you go onto there, you can join the mailing list, which will, we will then send out what's happening around here, and we're going to send some stuff about… We? I don't know who we are! I, I'm going to very soon, which is How to Feel Like Sunshine, which is going to be very exciting.

Yeah, this sounds incredible. I'll definitely be coming and checking out your second book after I've bought your first one! So yeah, congratulations on getting the book out there and we'll all be watching to see what happens next. Thank you so much for your time, Sue.

Thank you very much. Thank you for having me.