We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Angelica Norton a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Angelica, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

The story behind my mission is simple…I am paving a way for those that will come after me and setting an example for anyone who has ever made it out of poverty.

Angelica, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Greetings, my name is Angelica Norton I am an author, business & writing coach, and owner of Beautiful Books Publishing. I have always loved writing and journaling as a teenager but it wasn’t until I successfully graduated my three children from high school that I began pursuing my dream of attaining a college degree. Being that I was a once high school dropout who became a teen mother I sort of gave up on my dream of one day becoming a professional writer. As a child, my teachers would point out how creative my short stories were, and while growing up in the housing projects, my siblings and I would spend a lot of time participating in extracurricular activities at the Parks & Rec center. It was there that I perfected my love for storytelling. We would have storytelling competitions and the winners would receive trophies, along with the opportunity to compete against others at local recreational centers. It was simple, you read a book, preferably one you enjoyed, and instead of writing a book report, you shared your reading experience in front of an audience. You were judged on your creativity, delivery, and accuracy. Let’s just say I always came home with the trophy. Now as a mother of three young adults, I began reevaluating what I wanted out of life. I was a young, black, uneducated mother of three. And that no longer sat well with me. I knew if I wanted to rewrite my story, I had to hold the pen and begin. So, there I was a 40-year-old freshman in college. Mind you, I had zero college experience, but I had tons of life experience. Needless to say, nothing could have prepared me for the Eckerd College experience. The PEL Program was a program for Experience Learners…It catered to educating adult entrepreneurs like me. It was there that I discovered that academic writing and I would never get along.

For those of you with higher education, I’m sure you’re familiar with APA, MLA & Chicago style collegiate writing. Let’s just say I and APA have a love-hate relationship. Why? Because I sucked at academic writing. My professors would return my papers back to me with endless “red ink” remarks. Thankfully, over time my writing improved but my confidence suffered at the cost of trying. I was ready to throw away my dream. I assumed that if I could not master academic writing then I should give up on writing altogether. Silly me…Today, I am proud of the fact that I was able to differentiate between the facts and the truth. The fact was that academic writing was indeed challenging and I needed to do my best if attaining a degree was my end goal. The truth was that I was a good creative writer. There was a difference. And once I was able to rise about what I was not good at, I then put all my energy and focus on what I was good at.

This is what sets my publishing company apart. The self-publishing industry does not care about your socio-economic background, nor does it care if you have degrees on the wall or letters behind your name. We work with ambitious entrepreneurs, teaching them how to package their knowledge, experiences, and expertise into short books. Beautiful Books Publishing is a premier one-stop shop for authors interested in self-publishing and turning their books into businesses.

Many don’t realize how lucrative the self-publishing industry can really be, and it’s mainly because we have been led to believe that traditional publishing is the only way for authors to gain authority, creditability, and make money. But what you may not know is that with self-publishing the author owns the rights and receives all royalties for their published work. However, if you were to choose traditional publishing the publishing company owns the rights and you may receive an advance payment upfront or a percentage of the royalties.

Either way, I believe self-publishing is a game changer! Especially in the times in which we live. You can literally build a reading community on any social media platform and become a successful author. Yes, Amazon is an option but keep in mind publishing on Amazon is much like traditional publishing. In fact, they take 65% leaving you 35% of every book sold. This is why I advise my clients to focus on developing a personal brand. A personal brand (we all have one) requires developing a unique professional identity. How is it that you want the world to see you? What is it that you want them to know about you and what is it that you do? What did it take for you to arrive where you are today?

Your personal brand is what sets you apart from others. You can also build upon your personal brand by communicating your values, beliefs, goals, and purpose to your target audience. Within the self-publishing industry, effective branding is foundational to you as an author. In addition, our authors do not have to seek out a business coach to help with developing their brand message, image, voice, or story. Everything they need is in-house. Including, ghostwriting, business coaching & writing, branding, marketing, content development, KDP uploading, signature speeches, developing coaching programs, and more. We provide the ultimate author experience for our writers. It is important to us that they get the best ROI -return on their investment.

How did you build your audience on social media?

Social media has been a blessing and a curse when it comes to business in my opinion. However, I will focus more on the positives. When I finally decided to give in to marketing my business on social media I was a little skeptical as to how effective social media really was as it relates to increasing my business visibility. But in order for you to understand how I arrived where I am, you must first have a better understanding of where I began. I am generation X. This means I still remember pay phones, landline phones, and pagers (beepers) as communication channels. I also built my first business by passing out flyers to random people and placing my business cards at the local stores and gas stations. Back then (early 2000) business ads were marketed in newspapers, local cable stations, and popular neighborhood magazines and community publications. But for people like me, a single mother of three who had a “broke” marketing budget that required that I do all the work.

So, imagine the fear I experienced launching my business on a virtual platform that at the time I really did not understand. Once I got over the fear, I came up with a strategy before launching my business online. The first thing on my list; develop a personal brand. What would be my brand message? What would I share as my brand story? I grab a pen and paper and began writing. My brand message was that of hope, inspiration, and motivation. As for my brand message; I would use my story of growing up in poverty, dropping out of school, and becoming a teen mom to promote a message of resilience.

I share this simple strategy with my clients all the time. If your goal is to expand your business and increase your social media presence I would advise you to develop a personal brand. A personal brand gives you the opportunity to purposefully and strategically showcase your authentic self. Once my brand message and story were in place I began focusing on exactly who my audience would be (target audience.)

It’s vitally important for you to identify who it is that your industry/niche serves. The bottom line is; that if you do not know your audience how can you serve them? My goal was to become an expert on my ideal clients. I wanted to know them better than I knew myself. However, If you are uncertain as to who your target audience may be… think about who you were, who you are currently, and who it is that you’re becoming. Simply said, your target audience will identify and relate to pieces of the past you, present you, and future you. I’m sure you may have never heard that from a business coach but trust me, it’s true.

I knew that I wanted to be authentic in my approach, so, I wrote down three things that I overcame and wanted to share with my audience. One was that I was a teen mom. I knew that there were other women out there like me who understood the struggles of raising children alone. Number two; I dropped out of school my senior year to raise my child. And number three; I was born in poverty, and raised in the housing projects.

I can hear you now; “I don’t want people in my business.” But developing a personal brand is not about people being in your business it’s about building an authentic connection with those who relate to your brand story. Why? Because people do business with people they know, like, and trust. If they do not feel a connection to you they will never invest in you. You must be open to gifting pieces of yourself to your audience. I then gave them a front-row seat as I worked to attain my college degree. I shared my struggles with academic writing, the late-night study sessions, and the challenge of running my business full-time while taking classes. This in return, increased my online engagement.

Try and think about one of your favorite brands…why do you love the brand? What stands out about the brand? What does the brand represent? Why do you feel a connection to the brand? Is the brand relatable? Does the brand fulfill your needs?
These are the exact same questions you should consider when starting to build your audience.

Steps To Building A Bankable Audience

1. Be visible
2. Be open and honest
3. Be transparent
4. Be consistent
5. Reply to comments
6. Use your manners (Ex: thank you for sharing my post)
7. Be timely when responding to people inquiring about your services
8. Educate your audience on your business services & products
9. Invest in quality photos and marketing materials
10. Utilize your live stream, stories & reels
11. Develop content based on things your audience may want to know (Ex; How did you get started in the business? What was the hardest thing for you when you began your business & what are some struggles you currently face as an entrepreneur?) Offering insight into how you manage and balance life as an entrepreneur makes for a great online engagement.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

In February of 2019, I was diagnosed with blood cancer, and by May of 2019, I began chemo. By the start of 2020, my immune system was weakened and in March of 2020, I contracted Covid-19. When I arrived at the hospital my ex-rays showed that my lungs were filled with mucus. I could barely breathe or speak. To add to my misery I was told that I had walking phenmonia, upper respiratory infection, and acute bronchitis all associated with Covid-19. Just as I began to recover and regain my strength, 2021 arrived and I contracted a stronger variant of the virus. Mind you, I only went outside for doctor appointments, groceries, and to check my mail.

This variant was way worse than the first one. It landed me in ICU, my kidneys shut down, and I lost my sight as well as physical mobility. This is the short version of my experience but it took the remainder of 2021 for me to fully recover. I returned back to work full-time in January 2022. I experienced three near deaths experiences in the past three years. And although time was stolen from me and I now live a new normal by administering insulin and other unwanted medications.
Each time I was away, my audience held strong, while waiting patiently for my return. Most businesses would have never survived but mine did.

When I share this story I cannot help but point out the power of a personal brand. For instance, I watched close friends who are diehard Cowboys (NFL) fans watched as the Tampa Buccaneers beat the Cowboys in 2021. For those who are not Cowboy fans you would not understand the shame associated with this defeat and if you were a first-year fan of the Cowboys watching them lose to my home team could have caused you to jump ship. But when you are a diehard fan you are committed to the brand. Win or lose that’s your team. This is how I see my audience…Winning seasons or losing seasons they got me. They rock with my brand! They believe in my brand! They support me and my brand.

Contact Info:

• Website: Seedsowingsister.com
• Instagram: @BeautifulBooksPublishing
• Facebook: @AngelicaCole (seedsowingsister)
• Linkedin: @AngelicaNorton

Image Credits
Photographer: Cedric “Hollywood Ced” Washington Running Tampa Group Photo