We recently connected with Elina Tarkazikis and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Elina thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

I’m a New Jersey native and moved to South Florida about two and a half years ago. I’ve always had friends and family around me, and after my move I found myself yearning for a sense of community. I joined a book club to make connections and explore new reads.

At the same time, I’ve been in journalism for 10 years, working in newsrooms, for magazines, and even a popular iHeartRadio morning show. I always had such a passion for the industry and love storytelling. Whether it be writing a book, having a column, or some sort of broadcast outlet, I always felt a calling to put my own voice out there in some way.

Through my book club, I found a real sense of community. It was a group of women not just talking about what we’re reading, but sharing our own stories, offering advice, and gossiping about the latest pop culture news and shows. It was so much deeper than just reading a book each month.

Through the book club, my fellow book club member, and now co-host, Amanda and I had the idea to create a virtual book club community. While most “book podcasts” analyze books, ours is something beyond that, in a way I’ve never seen done before. We really wanted to bring that sense of a book club community to life, in all aspects. We talk about life, trending news and pop culture, and things a lot of millennial women like us can relate to. At the same time, listeners read along with us as we discuss a section of chapters in our book each week. We dissect the chapters, make book predictions and give book ratings each time we finish a novel.

The way we describe Book, Please! Podcast is “half girl talk, half book talk.” It brings together that complete sense of community wrapped into a virtual book club, where we’ll talk about what we’re reading, but also laugh about the latest reality show drama or navigate feelings a lot of women like us can relate to. We also interact with listeners on social media and share responses of their perspectives on the pod. We’ve also had on a number of author guests and get to know them for their books and beyond.

Elina, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Book, Please! Podcast is a virtual book club community. We dive into trending reads each week but the podcast goes far beyond that, to bring a real sense of a book club community to life. We’re laughing about pop culture news and trends, but also navigating feelings — about things like self image, relationships, pressures as we age — that many women like us relate to.

We like to say our podcast is “half girl talk, half book talk.” We are laughing, getting deep, but also falling in love with book boyfriends and predicting the next part of the plot after a cliffhanger.

I’m proud that we can offer a space for women like us to feel seen and heard. The most common feedback I get is people telling me they feel like they are in the room with us, hanging with their girlfriends. That’s exactly the type of outcome we had hoped for, and that sense of connection is what moves me the most. And along the way, we’re expanding our reading palates and hearing thoughts from those following along. The first half of the episode is something anyone can listen to, regardless of if they read or not. The second half is where the book analysis comes in. We have a little something for everyone.

Our model definitely puts a spin on a traditional “book podcast” in a way I’ve never seen done before. I feel such a sense of purpose working on the podcast and it has truly become my number one passion.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

Sometimes, no matter how close you are to friends or family, they may not make the best business partners. When Amanda and I first launched Book, Please! Podcast, there was a third co-host on board. And while there are no hard feelings, it became clear that goals were different and we were often held back from steps we wanted to take because we had wanted to grow our podcast into a profitable business but the other described it as more of a hobby. It held us back from making investments and moves we needed to make to propel forward. It also forced us to have hard conversations with someone we cared about and didn’t want to feel isolated or hurt.

I had to learn the hard way that no matter our relationship outside of the business we need to have the hard conversations upfront and be totally aligned on our goals and what we are and aren’t willing to do. Even amongst ourselves as founders, Amanda and I ended up mapping out responsibilities to ensure we have all our duties divied up and expectations in writing.

Any thoughts, advice, or strategies you can share for fostering brand loyalty?

We are really engaged with our audience on social media. We often poll them for perspectives and share their commentary on the podcast. We give them a voice in our book club community by asking for opinions, advice, topics they want us to discuss, and which book they’d like us to read for the pod. We shape our content each week based off their feedback.

We also like to do giveaways every so often to thank our supporters. We always see a spike in engagements and subscribers not just for the giveaway post but across our posts and episodes.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @bookpleasepodcast
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bookpleasepodcast
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@BookPleasePodcast
• Other: Find us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and all major podcast platforms under Book, Please! Podcast.