© 2026 Urcelia Teixeira. All rights reserved. This episode and its accompanying materials may not be reproduced, republished, distributed, transcribed, or adapted in whole or in substantial part without prior written permission, except as permitted by law.
What if the reason your books aren't selling as well as you hoped isn't because you need more followers, more ads, or more visibility?
What if they are simply being seen by the wrong people?
Because you can be doing all the things we are told authors should be doing.
Showing up online, emailing your list, promoting your books, maybe even spending money on ads, trying to get them noticed and still see disappointing sales.
And when that happens, our natural reaction is usually to spend more and to work harder.
But more promotion to the wrong people is still promotion to the wrong people.
So today I want to help you take a closer look at who you are actually trying to reach.
How you can tell when there's a mismatch between your book and your readers,
and why getting closer to the right readers could save you a whole lot of time,
money, heartache, and frustration.
And if at some point you've been asking whether your readers are simply the people most likely to buy your books or if they're the people God is calling you to serve, I'm hoping to help you answer that question too.
We're also going to unlock a valuable piece of advice straight from the Letters of Paul. And I'm going to share the verse that sits on my inspiration wall right in front of my desk that continually remind me who I'm supposed to be looking for in the first place.
This is the Anointed Scribe Podcast.
If you're a self published Christian author who's ready for real growth in your relationship with God and in your author business, this is your home for growing your faith and building a profitable author business, God's Way.
I'm Urcelia Teixeira, best selling and indie Christian author and I'd love to walk this journey with you. Come on in friend. It's good to have you here.
Hey, it's your author friend, Urcelia and welcome back to the show.
Whether you have been a longtime listener of the show or whether you were just finding this podcast for the first time, and this is the very first time you ever hearing my voice.
Welcome.
I'm so grateful that you are here. You know I think about you all the time.
So many of you have told me that you tune into the show, that this is the show you wait for to drop every week, that you listen as soon as the episodes drop.
And so I think about you and pray for you all the time because you are the reason this show exists and who I created this show for in the first place.
It took me about a year to finally step up to God's call to launch this show and it's been a massive learning curve and journey of faith and courage.
And so it's my hope and pray that the Biblical wisdom, author business strategies, and personal experience I've gained over the nearly 10 years as an indie author will help you grow your relationship with God, but also help you build and grow a profitable author business.
And I can't thank you enough for being here.
So if you need encouragement, author tips and self publishing strategies to sell more books, or if you simply need to know if you're aligned with God's vision and plan for your author business, then friend, I believe you are exactly where you need to be right now and I'm excited to share what God has in store for you today.
And today I want to start with something that is literally sitting in front of me while I work.
I have an inspiration wall above my desk and on it I have Matthew 4:19 where Jesus says to Simon, Peter and Andrew, follow me and I will make you fishers of men.
Some translations say fishers of people.
Now Jesus is calling Peter and Andrew into discipleship. Here he is talking about Gospel mission, not selling books per se.
Although I absolutely believe God can use Christian writers like you and me and the particular work he has called us to do in service of his kingdom and but for the sake of today's discussion, I'm not going to turn this verse into some kind of Christian business formula.
I keep it in front of me because it gives me a really simple heart check in my own author business.
So above this scripture I wrote in big bold letters fish for people, not sales.
That little reminder matters to me because it's very easy in business to start seeing people as numbers.
I can look at an email campaign and wonder whether anyone opened it or clicked through. Or check my KDP sales dashboard and start thinking entirely in terms of performance and money.
And obviously those numbers are hugely important. I mean, we run a business, right?
I need to know whether what I'm doing is working.
One of the first rules they teach you in business is know your numbers. But it's crucial that we, as Christian authors on a mission for Christ remind ourselves that every one of those numbers represent a real person.
And the moment I forget that, I think it becomes much harder to reach readers well,
because if we want people to notice and buy our books, we need to understand the people we're hoping will read them.
We need to know something about why they choose our book and ignore another what they are hoping to experience when they pick it up and what makes them trust an author and enough to give a book a try.
And this is where I think Christian authors can make a very easy mistake.
We can assume that because someone shares our faith, we somehow already understand what they want to read.
But guess what? We don't think about the people sitting in a church on any given Sunday.
One person may love romantic suspense and happily stay up until 2 in the morning finishing a book.
The person sitting beside them may hate anything remotely frightening and only read gentle historical romance, for example.
And someone else may seldom read fiction at all, but devour Bible studies and Christian non fiction instead.
They can all love Jesus.
That tells you something incredibly important about them, but it does not automatically tell you what they want from a book.
Sometimes we create this broad idea of a Christian reader and assume that because our book contains Christian themes or characters,
Christians should naturally want it, right? But that's a bit like saying everyone who enjoys food will want the same meal.
It doesn't work like that. And I think there's another question underneath this for us Christian authors. We're not only asking who is most likely to buy this book,
we are also asking who has God actually equipped us to serve through what we write?
Now, I don't think that always comes with some dramatic revelation where God hands us a perfectly defined reader profile and says, there, that's the person you are writing for.
Sometimes we discern it by paying attention.
Who keeps responding to our work? Who seems genuinely helped, encouraged and entertained, challenged, or drawn closer to God through what we are writing?
Where does there seem to be a natural connection between what God has given us and what somebody else needs?
Because if we believe our writing is something we are stewarding with God, then surely part of that stewardship is learning who the work is actually serving, right?
And this is where I want to take you to 1 Corinthians 9 because Paul gives us such an interesting picture of what it means to pay attention to the people we are trying to reach.
In that passage, Paul talks about becoming like the people he is ministering to.
To the Jews he became like a Jew,
to those under the law, like one under the law, and to those outside the law, he met them where they were too,
while making it clear that he himself remained under the law of Christ.
Then he says, I have become all things to all people,
so that by all possible means I might save some.
Now again, Paul is talking about gospel ministry. This isn't a passage about audience targeting,
but Paul clearly paid attention to the people in front of him. He didn't change the gospel to make it more acceptable.
He understood the context of the people he was speaking to and was willing to adjust the way he approached them so that unnecessary barriers didn't get in the way of the message.
And I think there's a valuable principle in that. For us,
understanding the person you are trying to reach isn't compromise.
Getting to know what your readers enjoy or what they expect from your genre doesn't mean changing who you are or or watering down what God called you to write.
It simply means you care enough about the person on the other side of the book to understand them. And when I think about reaching readers that way, it feels a lot less uncomfortable.
Promoting a book stops feeling like I'm standing on the Internet, waving it in the air, shouting please buy my book. Please buy this.
Instead, it starts feeling much more like a conversation,
and it prompts me to ask the right questions.
Why did the story appeal to this reader?
What made them choose it? What did they enjoy about it? What made them want another one?
And here's what sometimes happens.
We realize that the people paying attention to what we are sharing aren't necessarily the same people who end up buying our books.
You might have a lovely social media following, filled with friends and family, or even other authors who comment on your posts, celebrate your releases, and understand exactly how hard the writing and publishing process is for you, but they may not read your genre.
I've seen this happen so often in author circles, and I've been guilty of it myself.
We naturally connect with other writers because we have publishing in common, right?
Then release day comes around and we're confused when the engagement we got on our posts doesn't translate into book sales.
There's nothing wrong with those relationships. We simply have to be careful not to confuse attention with buying intent.
And that's one of the first clues that there may be a mismatch.
People are paying attention,
perhaps even engaging with what you share,
but very few of them are showing any real interest in the books themselves.
Another clue can be that you are constantly having to work very hard to explain and to persuade them why the book should appeal to the people you are promoting it to.
When the book, the reader, and what that reader actually wants all line up well, there's usually a much more natural connection.
And if we misread that disconnect,
it's very easy to start fixing the wrong problem,
because that mistake can become expensive.
If sales are disappointing, and we assume the problem is that not enough people are seeing the book,
we may start spending money on ads or adding another platform when the better question would be,
who is most likely to want this particular book in the first place?
And for us, I'd add another layer to that question.
Who is this book genuinely suited to serve?
Now that sounds simple, but it changes what we look for.
One place we often go wrong is defining the reader far too broadly.
We say something like, my reader is a Christian woman or My reader likes clean fiction.
Now that may be true,
but the actual reason somebody chooses a book is usually much more specific than that.
Maybe they exhausted at the end of the day and want a story they can disappear into for a few hours.
Maybe they're walking through grief and looking for biblical encouragement that speaks directly into what they are experiencing.
Maybe they love romance but have become tired of explicit content and want something emotionally satisfying with all of that other stuff now, we're getting closer to a real person.
And when we understand the reason underneath the purchase, it becomes much easier to know what to say about the book.
We are no longer relying on something vague like Christian readers will love this.
We are helping the right person recognize why this particular book might matter to them.
And this is also why I don't think getting to know our readers should ever be something we do once and then file away.
People change.
The person who had hours to read every weekend a few years ago may now have young children and squeeze 20 minutes of reading in before bed.
Somebody who once wanted help starting a business may now be trying to grow one.
These circumstances change, their needs change, and sometimes their tastes do too.
So if I genuinely care about the people I'm trying to reach, I need to stay interested in them.
Not just interested in what I can sell them.
Interested in them.
Quite often, readers are already telling us what matters to them most.
Think about the emails or messages you've received after somebody finished your book.
Maybe there's a particular character people keep mentioning,
or a theme that seems to resonate again and again.
Perhaps somebody tells you your nonfiction helped them finally understand something they had been wrestling with for years.
Those little conversations can tell us far more than we sometimes realize.
Reviews can do the same thing if we stop reading them only to see whether somebody liked the book and start paying attention to what they actually valued about the book.
Your email list can be incredibly useful yet, too.
Instead of always sending information out,
every now and then, ask a simple question and invite people to reply.
You could ask what made them pick up your book in the first place,
or what they enjoy most about the type of books you write.
You might be surprised by what comes back,
and yes, for some authors, a Facebook reader group or Patreon or some other kind of community makes those conversations easier.
But please don't finish this episode thinking, I've just given you another job.
I'm absolutely not telling you to go and start five new reader communities.
Use whatever you already have.
The point isn't the platform. The point is to create enough space to listen as well as speak.
Because when you know what your actual readers value, it becomes much easier to know what to say about your books and and where to spend your money and your energy.
It also helps us avoid drawing the wrong conclusion when something doesn't work.
We can run one promotion, see very little happening, and immediately decide that email doesn't work for us, or ads don't work for our genre, or nobody wants the book,
and then give up.
Maybe we even start thinking we are just terrible at selling.
But sometimes the channel isn't the problem.
The right reader may simply not be seeing a message that helps them recognize why the book is for them. And that matters financially.
Because the clearer the fit between the book,
the reader, and the way we present it, the less time and money we waste trying to persuade people who were never particularly interested in the first place.
There's also a heart issue here that I think is worth acknowledging.
Sometimes we don't really want to hear what readers are telling us because we're afraid of what we might discover. We're afraid of the hurt we've poured ourselves into this book.
We love it. We believe in it. We may genuinely believe God called us to write it.
Then readers respond differently than we expected.
And that can hurt deeply.
And if we've been putting our book in front of people who were never really the right readers for it,
that lack of response can make us start questioning the book, our ability, or even our calling, when the real problem may simply be who we've been trying to reach.
But see, listening to readers does not mean you are allowing those readers to dictate your calling.
There may be things you feel strongly called to write. There may be boundaries you will not cross.
There may be stories God has put on your heart that will never appeal to the widest possible audience.
You can't please everyone. And you know what? That's okay.
Knowing your reader isn't about becoming everything to everyone.
It's about communicating clearly with the people your work is genuinely suited to serve.
And I think there's enormous freedom in that.
And here's the truth of it. You don't need everyone.
You need the people your work is truly suited to. Serve. And part of discerning that, I think, is paying attention to where God seems to be creating connections between what you've written and the people receiving it.
Now, we may not always know exactly how God is working behind every reader connection,
but we do know that he is sovereign over our lives and able to use the work he has entrusted to us in ways we may never fully see.
So rather than trying to decide whether every single reader was specifically sent to us,
I think our part is to pay attention,
serve faithfully, and steward the connections God places in front of us.
But I do think we can stop chasing everybody and become much more intentional about serving the people who are actually responding to the work we've been given.
And once you begin seeing readers that way, the whole book marketing game changes.
You are not desperately trying to convince as many people as possible to buy.
You're not begging them. You are trying to make it easier for the right people to recognize that this book may be for them. You are matching your book to the right person.
So here's what I'd love you to do this week.
Pick one of your books. Just choose one. Don't analyze your entire catalogue. Just choose one of your books.
Then go back through whatever genuine reader feedback you already have. Look at your reviews, your email replies, your messages or comments,
and read them as information.
Pay attention to what keeps coming up.
What did readers value?
What words did they use to describe the experience they had with the book?
What seems to have made this particular book a good fit for them?
And as you're looking, ask the Holy Spirit to help you notice what you may have missed.
Not Lord, tell me exactly who my target reader is. No,
perhaps say something more like show me who this work is serving well. Help me pay attention to the people in front of me. Give me wisdom to reach them faithfully.
And if you don't have much reader feedback yet, ask one simple question somewhere you already have access to readers.
Then take one thing you learned and use it. The next time you talk about or promote that book.
Maybe you can change the way you describe it in your next email.
Maybe you emphasize something readers consistently say they love.
Maybe you realize you've been spending most of your promotional energy talking to people who enjoy your author content but don't actually read the books you write.
You don't need to overhaull everything.
Just notice one thing and respond to it.
Because I think we make selling our books much harder than it needs to be when we start with tactics instead of people.
And that brings me back to the verse on my wall Fish for people,
not sales Remember who you are trying to reach.
Remember who God put on your heart in the first place, and let that guide how you talk about your books.
Keep your heart pointed in the right direction. Because when we remember there's a person behind every sale, we naturally become more interested in understanding that person.
And when we understand them better,
we can serve them better.
So before you add another platform,
another promotion, or another ad campaign,
take a closer look at the people you are already trying to reach.
Ask whether they really are the people most likely to want what you've written. And as a Christian author, ask the deeper question too.
Are these the people your work is actually serving?
And if conversations like this are helping you build your author business with greater clarity, please help me out by leaving a review and make sure you follow the show, because next week we are digging into the financial pressures of having an author business.
Thanks for spending this time with me today, friend.
May your pen stay faithful, your roots grow deep, and every word you write bear fruit for his glory.™
