Michelle Buck's Blog

I was researching Substack SEO which was something I thought I already understood. And it turns out, I’ve been confusing two completely different things when it comes to Substack and SEO.

If you’ve ever wondered whether you should cross-post your content to both Substack and your own blog, or if you’ve heard people throw around terms like “canonical links” and thought you could just change that in Substack’s settings, we need to talk.

There’s a tremendous difference between customizing your URL ...

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the pressure of social media–having to show up everywhere online, then this post is for you. Today I’m sharing how I finally found my social media sweet spot–and how you can too without the burnout.

Prefer to watch the video? Here you go!

Let’s be honest: trying to maintain a presence on every social platform is exhausting. I see this all the time with authors I talk to. We all want to grow our audience, build our email lists, and connect wi...

I love hearing from authors like Dale L Roberts that have left their mark on the self-publishing ecosystem. I recently began interviewing authors. You can see my interviews on YouTube, Substack, or read about them on my website.

When I sat down with  for our latest author interview, I wasn’t sure what to expect. This is a guy with two massive YouTube channels (over 125,000 combined subscribers!), 50+ published books, and 40 book awards. Not intimidating at all.

But within minutes, ...

I love hearing from authors writing a memoir, learning about self-publishing, and figuring out how to promote their work. I recently began interviewing authors. You can see my interviews on YouTube, Substack, or read about them on my website.

If you’ve been told “you should write a book” more times than you can count but haven’t actually done it yet, this interview is for you.

I sat down with Melissa Thomas, who describes herself as a “reluctant author” who finally caved after years of people te...

If you’ve been telling yourself you’re too old, too late, or too inexperienced to write a book, this conversation will shut down those excuses fast.

I sat down with Lis McDermott, a novelist who wrote her first book at the young age of 70! She now mentors other writers. Her approach to writing is refreshingly unconventional – she writes the exciting scenes first and fills in the boring bits later. When she gets stuck, she just jumps to a different part of the story.

“It’s your story. So if you...

It is possible to get traction for your books without spending a lot of money, however creating a book marketing plan without money means you’ll sacrifice your time to get there.

Even $50 a month can help promote your book and bring it into view faster than organic efforts (non-paid). With Amazon Ads, you can set a daily budget based on keywords which can help your book show up in the search on Amazon.

If you would rather dedicate the time instead of money, this post is for you.

The main reason ...

Accessibility is becoming the standard. It’s no longer a background feature. I have written about this in other posts, but today I want to look at Amazon KDP. They’ve updated their help pages and best practices to include accessibility. Not only that, but if you don’t “get in line”, your book sales could really suffer.

It’s now affecting sales in the EU and it’s coming to a city near you. Whatever gets adapted in the EU usually gets adapted everywhere else.

Check out my other blog posts about th...

Ready to turn that beautifully formatted, accessible Word document into an actual ebook using Calibre? This is where the magic happens!

If you’ve been following along with this series, you should already have a Word document that’s properly structured with heading styles, alt text, and good contrast (if you missed that step, check out part 1 here before continuing). Now we’re going to use Calibre to transform all that hard work into a professional EPUB file.

Accessibility isn’t just nice to have; in fact, it’s now more important than ever.

In 2025, over 1.3 billion people worldwide live with some form of disability, and many use e-readers or screen readers to access digital content. Yet most self-published authors continue to create ebooks that unintentionally exclude these readers.

Microsoft Word, a tool most of us already know, has all the features needed to create truly accessible ebooks. You don’t need expensive software or coding knowledge. The...

After my post about the European Accessibility Act, I got some fantastic questions from you that made me realize we need to have a more practical conversation especially regarding digital products. My original post focused on what’s been published — either written by lawyers for lawyers or aimed at big publishers with compliance departments.

But what about the rest of us? The indie authors, template creators, course builders, and digital product sellers who are wondering: “Does this actually app...