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Mark interviews Orna Ross, an award-winning novelist, poet, creative catalyst, and founder of the Alliance of Independent Authors about her recent move towards focusing all her social media energy on Substack.
Prior to the interview, Mark shares comments from recent episode, a personal update, and a word from this episode’s sponsor.
This episode is sponsored by Author Nation, being held in Las Vegas Nov 13 through 14, 2026
Learn more about Author Nation and register at AuthorNation.live.
In the interview, Mark and Orna talk about:
- That one time in London at a Kobo device launch event when Mark and Orna were hanging out together
- Orna’s background as a writer, a poet, and a freelance journalist
- Her experience in both self-publishing and traditional publishing
- The origin of wanting to create something to help support authors who were self-publishing, and the 2012 launch of ALLI (Alliance of Independent Authors) at London Book Fair
- The connection one of Orna’s multi-book writing projects has to do with Irish poet W.B. Yeats
- Orna’s experience with deciding to go “all in” with Substack
- One of the best things about Substack, which is how “everything” can be there (blog, socials, “patrons,” serialization of a novel, poetry, self-development for creativists)
- How on Substack you can segment what goes out to different people
- Orna’s recommendation for authors considering not doing it the way she did it, but instead picking a single lane and staying in it
- The main mistake Orna sees a lot of authors making on Substack
- How Substack is completely different than everyplace else on social media
- The difference between notes and posts on Substack
- The visibility of analytics of what’s working, who is interacting with what, etc
- Advice Orna would give to writers related to “meaning and purpose” as well as understanding our value
- And more…
After the interview Mark reflects on the idea of simplicity in execution, creating things that are “unmistakeable human” and how Orna describes herself as a “Creative Catalyst.”
Links of Interest:
- Orna Ross’s Website
- Orna Ross on Substack
- Manuscript Report (Mark’s affiliate link – use MARK10 to save 10%)
- Buy Mark a Coffee
- Patreon for Stark Reflections
- Mark’s YouTube channel
- ElevenLabs (AI Voice Generation – Affiliate link)
- Mark’s Stark Reflections on Writing & Publishing Newsletter (Signup)
- An Author’s Guide to Working With Bookstores and Libraries
- The Relaxed Author
- Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
- An Author’s Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
- Wide for the Win
- Mark’s Canadian Werewolf Books
- The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
- Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard
- Merry Christmas! Shitter Was Full!: A Trivia Guide to National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation
- I Think It’s A Sign That The Pun Also Rises
Orna Ross is an award-winning novelist, poet, creative catalyst, and founder of the Alliance of Independent Authors
The introductory, end, and bumper music for this podcast (“Laser Groove”) was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
I admit to having a mental hiccup on first hearing the news about D2Ds new fee structure, but it didn’t take me long to realise the value I get from using the various D2D tools far outstrips the new maintenance fee. The fact that D2D has recognized the problem and been willing to make an effort to combat it is itself heartening.
Now, the thing I got out of this episode is where you talk about how all our marketing efforts are really about telling a story that will make our readers sit up and take notice rather than keep yelling Buy My Books into the void. Our stories still need to be seen by the right people, but when they are, the upside is so much stronger than the other methods out there. It’s a talent I’m still struggling to get right. Not perfect, just moving in the right direction.
One more thing I do have to mention. I have participated in multiple Smashwords and Kobo promos, but so far my best efforts have failed to get my books out of the page 20(ish) dungeon and high enough in the rankings to actually be found by potential readers. You have addressed this issue when talking about these promos in the past, but there is a point where it begins to feel like the effort is being wasted I don’t know how to deal with.