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March 2, 2024 17 mins
Julia acted as president of the Los Angeles Chapter of the Women’s National Book Association and mentored at the Los Angeles based non-profit organization WriteGirl. She has appeared as a speaker on literary industry panels, including the Independent Writers of Southern California (IWOSC), the UCLA Alumni Association, the Lambda Literary Foundation, The Publishers Association of Los Angeles (PALA), Publishers & Writers of San Diego (WPSD), The California Writer’s Club, The West Coast Writer’s Conference, and Literary Orange.

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Episode Transcript

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(00:02):
Hello everyone, and welcome from mycar and not even the cool car,
like the average car. I feelaverage, did it? This is why
I have like makeup on and lookcute because I feel very average, you
know. And the narcissism. Iain't gonna stand for that. And if
I'm gonna keep doing wooz, I'mgonna need some water, which I can't

(00:24):
seem to find in my car.That's what I get for taking the average
car. It doesn't have as muchwater. But anyway, I won't know.
No, I just remember to introducemyself. I'm like high five to
me. Send my profession on thisas I do this dance. I have
an actual professional online and so Ishould be like temper it down and be

(00:46):
serious. And I wrote books withother people, but like I still wrote
books this end. I thought divorcewas bad and I thought being crazy if
only I were me a memoir inverse, Foreign Coffee, Widdles, Web
and widles, debt and if you'recounting, that is six and this is
sign language six six books. ActuallyI'm making it sixteen, but that's not
important. It's six books. Ifyou want to see the rest of the

(01:11):
books that we've written, because wenow have twenty and we just finished number
twenty one and we're working on numbertwenty. But if you want to see
the rest, you can go towww. Dot and I thought ladies dot
com. Oh, just to honorJades and non presence here, let me
say these books are literary life guideswith pop poetry, except for Life Foreign

(01:33):
Coffee in the Wido that series,because well we need a romance and a
mystery. Who doesn't need those things? Right? But yah not, you
gotta hear about me. You're hereto hear about our wonderful guests. Wonderful
guests. Would you like to introduceyourself? Yes, it's absolutely. My
name is Julia Drake. I'm theco founder and director of wild Bound PR

(01:55):
and wild Abound Live. We area are and marketing firm specifically for books
authors. We also work with publishersand storytellers, but books is definitely that's
our sweet spot. And we workwith clients all over the world, from
debut authors to New York Times Bestsellerand New York Times best Selling authors.

(02:20):
And we love what we do andwe are wild I love that, and
I love that you're wild bound.Okay, first talk moron, because how
is something wild and bound. Andthen secondly, it sounds like your book
is going to do like amazing thingsnow like you you put it with Julia
and your book goes wild. That'sthe idea. That's the idea. Like

(02:43):
on your beout page it says thatyou're one of the twenty first century pr
agencies. How has pr changed fromI don't know if you were alive for
the twentieth century, you know,the whole nineteen hundred thing. For the
twenty first century, how has itchange? Yeah, totally. I would
say. You know, our ourlandscape, the entertainment landscape as well as

(03:04):
the literary landscape, is very fragmentedat this point. So you know,
what used to work where you know, you would get a review in the
New York Times or something and thatwould just, you know, really move
the needle. It just doesn't worklike that anymore. Everybody sort of has
your own little circle of information thatwhere they draw from, and everybody's is
different. And so really, youknow, we try to have all the

(03:27):
tools in our quiver to make surethat that you know, we can do
the most well rounded book campaign.And so we just don't believe that it's
enough to say Oh, it's allabout the media outreach, or you know,
it's all about the social media marketing, or it's all about doing events.
You know, it's it's all ofthat. You know, it's video,
it's it's really all you can thinkof, and you know, and

(03:49):
out of the box and then someand that's really what we're trying to do
it well bound, Okay, Iwould be specific and then you don't have
to answer this question in any way, shape or form, but I want
to know still work. Yes,yes, I mean, I think it's
all about the platform and you know, and obviously you know, if you

(04:09):
pick ten blogs and they have nofollowers, then you know, it's probably
not going to go very far.But if you have you know, I
think you know, we have somecompanies that we work with that you know,
that have bloggers that have a prettygood platform, and then they will
also post on their Instagram, soyou also kind of get that social media
amplification. Then that can be prettyeffective. Again, you know, that's

(04:31):
one part of the puzzle. Sookay, So I was supposed to not
be that like specific a niche down, but I just had to ask because
someone recently was like block door andI went, I haven't heard block for
ages. Yeah, no, it'sit's around, It's around. Yeah,
it's still first second and I wash ask An expert. You, madam,

(05:01):
have had such an amazing career andwriting. I have to like ask
about like the cool cool one whereyou were like and the Los Angeles I
don't know, don't let the RightGirl or nonprofit organization, Yes, that's

(05:24):
wonderful, the Publisher Associations of LosAngeles. I'm gonna ask about Right Girl
first. First, I'm going todo the pompous one first, you know,
the moment a cloud. I mean, Right Girl has been around for
a long time, and you know, and they really I was a mentor,
you know, working with Right Girland just the the young girls I

(05:45):
met there and I worked with,you know, they were they were so
inspiring and I thought it was amazingthat you know, they were you know,
seventeen, uh, you know,sixteen seventeen, and they just they
were so grounded, you know,they were so grounded and who they were
and who they wanted to become,and their writing was inspiring and I just
loved working with them and that wasa really rewarding experience. So I missed

(06:08):
them as being one of not oneof those girls, but being a teenager
that for a writing that birthed awriting career for herself that actually made money.
I'm gonna just say writing really helpsground everything because you have to think
about it, analyze it, fitit into a story, and then write
it down in the organization, inthe organized manner that keeps people fascinated.

(06:31):
Yeah, you got to break yourwhole life down. Okay, that's enough
of me talking about me, Isaid, I'm a narcissist. After all,
you also formed a feature film productioncompany. How does one go and
do that from like being in theliterary world, because I need to do
that. Well, we actually itwas kind of backwards actually because I started

(06:55):
out at UCLA Film School. That'sactually where I then my husband. We're
partners in Wild Bound now, butbut I started out making films and so
so that's I come from the filmworld. And then we you know,
we were in LA for over fifteenyears and then at some point we just
got very frustrated with being in LAand we wanted a different life for us

(07:17):
and our kids, and so that'show we moved and we transitioned. We
had a lot of author friends andwe kind of transitioned more into the book
industry. But but that's you know, but we started off in the film
industry and we're still have one footin the film industry, and so it's
you know, we're still doing thatseemed to not be able to get out
of it. I think that's agreat creative outlet to have both. I

(07:43):
mean, I'm the authors out hereare like, I want to see it
on the screen, and you haveknowledge of both worlds, and it's hard
to find someone with knowledge of bothworlds. Yeah, yeah, no,
it is, it is. Imean that's definitely something that our clients appreciate
when they're when they're working with us. And obviously, you know, if
we see books that are that looklike you know, they might be a
potential for an adaptation, then youknow, we will definitely see if you

(08:05):
know, we have connections, youknow, we will see if we can
you know, open some doors.I mean it's it's very hard, but
but you know, then again,you know, there's a ton of movies
that come out every day that arebased on books. So yeah, if
you have any doors you want toopen for this for this host over here,

(08:26):
just let me. Know, soI'm assuming. So when you move
from Los Angeles, I saw youwant to east to a place a little
pooler. Was it because you werea homesick for Germany? I was not.
I mean, I I love Germanyand I love growing up there.
Definitely informed I think a lot ofwho I am and my imagination, you

(08:50):
know, growing up in you know, the Black Forest, the creator of
Grim's fairy Tales, you know,which basically forms the basis of any every
Disney movie out there. So soyes, I love going back. We
go back, you know, oncea year, but I really love We
live in Tahoe now, and Ilove Tahoe. It's sort of the best
of both worlds. And so yeah, so I you know, I kind

(09:15):
of, you know, it feelslike I have I can have my cake
and eat it too, living inTahoe, so it's nice. Well you
get both. Yes, that isawesome. And mountains. Wait did I
say that right? It is mountains, right, that's the mountains. Yeah,
that's the mountains. I love themountains. I love skiing. So
I'm second guessing myself today, y'all. Here's a small North narciss His story

(09:35):
went to the doctor's doctors like,oh, this is what's wrong with you?
And I said, okay, that'sfine. So y'all know, like
I'm studying to become a posician assistant. And he was like, this is
what's wrong with you? And I'mlike, oh, okay, wait how
And then he explained it and hewas like, it's a central nerve and
I'm like, oh my god,how did I forget where it is?
Like so when you're saying tahoe andI'm like, oh, okay, oh

(09:58):
wait, how did I forgive aboutnot a good day for the memory?
This is why I'm not writing today. I'm interviewing someone where I have to
remember information and then talk to them. Right anyway, back from my narcissists
rants and back to miss strike.My next question was going to be like,
I this is really for like theauthors out there who want to know,

(10:22):
because everyone wants to know and Ilove pr so I'm always down to
the cause to know more information.What are the three tips that you feel
that authors need to know when they'relooking to publicize their book Besides hire you,
I mean obviously that's the number one. Hire wow wow, yes,
number one? Right. No,I feel like before you even you know,

(10:45):
come to us. I think thereare a lot of things that you
can do to put yourself in agood position, you know, to be
uh, you know, to beconsidered brass. I mean because frankly,
like we have, you know,there's just just a lot of inquiries that
we have and unfortunately we are aboutique company, so we can't really take
on that many people. So whatyou can do for yourself. One is,

(11:05):
you know, platform is really important. I know this word is such
a you know, it's a corporatejargon word and I don't think any writer
wants to hear it, but itis just true. That's what publishers are
looking at. That's what, youknow, It's it's that what that's what
build credibility, you know. Soit's you have to have a professional author
website, you have to have socialmedia channels. You know, you don't

(11:28):
have to go overboard, but it'sjust everything has to look professional and and
so that's just you know, that'sjust really helps. That just really helps.
I think number two I would say, you know, is you know
you yes, of course, youknow, it would be nice if you
wrote a book that everybody likes toread. But I think it's more important

(11:50):
to be realistic and really think aboutyour target audience and figure out where they
are at and how you can findthem. I think that is super important
too. And you know, three, I feel like, you know,
it's a tough road, you know, getting your book published and getting it
out there, and I feel likeit's important in these moments where where you

(12:11):
know, everything just seems to crumbleand book sales are not where they're at,
and you know, social media isnot where it's at, and you
just feel really down on yourself toalways come back to why you had to
write this book and and and thatreally needs to be you know, it
shouldn't be connected to making a bunchof money or you know, or being
celebrated or whatever. It should reallycome from deep inside where you feel like

(12:35):
I just had to write this bookand I don't care if you know,
anybody ever appreciates it or sees it. And I feel like you need to
come back to that, like whyyou had to do that. I think
that's really important. So yeah,that's that's what I would say. Three
points. Okay, first of all, I love that, like, you
know, come back into why you'vegrounded yourself in the creative career in the
first place. I feel like increativity or why becomes everythingbody else is gonna

(13:00):
push you like that, you haveto do yourself and that's hard. Yes,
it's very hard. So of courseI have to follow up with the
question for me, is Good MorningAmerica still a possibility for authors in the
authors? Yes, yes, yes, it's it's you have to have.

(13:24):
I think your best chance probably isif if you've written a memoir or nonfiction,
just because if there's something that's reallycompelling, that that is sort of
has a newsy angle, then thenyes, then there's definitely a chance.
I think fiction is very hard.Yeah, yeah, I've written poetry,

(13:45):
so okay, okay, yeah yeahyeah. So uh. The other thing
that I had heard recently, andthen I swear we're going to stop discussing
mediums and and stuff like that.The other thing that I had heard recently
is that the best media platform rightnow is podcast. Like I mean,

(14:09):
it's not a recent thing, buteveryone's like it's got to be like long
form interviews really moves books. Whatdo you think on this? I think
podcasts are an important addition now toto you know your sort of your your
strategy. You know, in termsof getting coverage, I think they are

(14:31):
very important. You know, alot of people listen to them. I
do think they can move books.But I again, you know, I'm
not a believer in saying this isthe new thing now and everybody has to
jump on the bandwagon. And allI'm going to do is reach out to
podcasts. You know, I justdon't think that works either, especially because
I don't think everybody listens to podcasts. I think it's a certain segment,

(14:54):
you know, I think and soand so I depending on what kind of
books you write, you need tothink about whether podcasts or you know,
they probably should be part of yourstrategy, but I don't know if they
should be. You know, shouldtake whatever sixty seventy percent you know of
your strategy. So that sounds becausethat is my strategy. Oh, I

(15:18):
should say yes to the blood tourslike something. Yeah, just my strategy.
I have a balanced approach. Ithink that's kind of what I'm seeing,
you know, works. But butthen again, you know, it's
the wild West out there a littlebit, right, so you can sort
of it, you know, it'syou know, don't don't take everything I

(15:41):
say for at face value. Thisis just by experience. Hello s.
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