Hello ,

First—thanks so much for taking a chance on a new idea. It seems incredible that nobody's created a romance reader coloring challenge before... we are pioneers!

I have stopped accepting new authors to this inaugural coloring challenge. There are 30 of us and that feels like a good, solid number to achieve some list-building and profile-raising goals.

I'd love to have a space where we can chat with each other and share promotional ideas—but if I am forced to join one more Facebook group for author organizing I will have to start seeing a therapist in a higher tax bracket than my current one.

Here's my current promo plan for us and this project. Subject to change, morph, grow another head...

6 challenge books with 5-6 reading/coloring challenges in each

My logic is this:

With one book, we have one chance to get an email and the first person who connects with a reader/colorer will grab it. And to start, that will be someone we already have on our mailing list... so, that's not ideal.

But, if my coloring page is in a book with 4 other pages, and the reader wants more than those 5, she will have to download another set of images in another book from another author... lots more opportunity for each of us to gather names for our mailing lists.

Make sense?

A BookFunnel promotion for our coloring pages

I will create a BF promo page that will only be for our project.

If you'd like your page to appear with the others—and to collect email addresses from people who download it—you'll need to join this promo and use your image as the book cover.

The file you'll upload (as the free download) will be the 5- or 6-page coloring book that your page is included in... making sense so far?

The trope line you've chosen to have on your image, along with the picture itself and the description you've written should help readers find the kinds of books they're interested in reading.

Yes, each mini-coloring book will be uploaded 6 times but I'm not concerned that a reader might download it more than once. In fact, that would be a win since she will have given her email address to 2 authors when only one was actually needed.

I'll send you the link to the BF page and all the files you need by Nov 27th at the latest—it's a huge job and has already broken my brain once!—so you'll have 3 days minimum to join the BF promo and upload details of your new 'book.'

New website for the challenge

Because... building a new website seemed like a good idea...

It's not live yet but it will be by December 1st when all this fun gets real.

RomanceColoringChallenge.com will be a simple site with links to download all the coloring pages. Since I don't want to cannibalize your list-building, my plan is to drive every click back to the BF promo, at least for the first 2 months... then we can reevaluate.

Originally, I'd planned to publish these images as an actual coloring book for sale on Amazon. And I probably still will (with different backgrounds (long story) but still including your book recommendation), but my focus for now is on getting as many people to see these pages as possible to build hype. The website will be the link to share on social media since it's easy to remember and allows me to help push your recommended titles because...

The website will include "This coloring page sponsored by"

• your name,
• your book title recommendation AND
• an image of your book cover with a buy link.

Of course, at 3 AM when I have all my 'brilliant' ideas, I thought, "Oooh, it would be fun to turn every recommended book into a coloring page, too..."

And then I wondered if I should I reduce how much Vitamin B12 I'm taking since more energy is good, but I feel I may be vibrating just a titch too quickly these days. 🤷‍♀️

Social media shares

Phew. So, we get the coloring pages into readers' hands and then we want them to share those images with the world! Mwahahaha!

I'm hoping your own readers and fans will seed the social media campaign by downloading & coloring your page, recommending your book, and uploading their art to their feeds using a special #hashtag so we can easily find all the pages and help push each others books.

#ColorfulRomance

What do you think? #ColorfulRomance is a pretty clean hashtag on Instagram, meaning it's not saturated with lots of other stuff. If you have ideas for a great hashtag for Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, etc, let me know. I'm not wed to this one.

Facebook Coloring Fan Groups

There are dozens of FB groups for people who love to color and share their colored pictures. There are also groups to post free coloring pages. I'll share the links I've found so you can either join a few and drop your page into the feed or perhaps have one of your keen reader-colorers upload their prettied-up version of your coloring page and a link to download the booklet it's in.

Pinterest? TikTok? Whatever else is cool?

I am told these places can be great for promoting image-y things... I have no experience or desire to learn how to use either. But if you have a presence and ideas and the willingness to raise the vibration of this experiment, please share your ideas.

And... that brings us right back to... would we benefit from having a private FB group for discussing how to make the most of this project?

Contest with free ebooks

I know some of you don't have books you give away for free and that's 100% fine. But, for those who do have a free download, I think it would be fun to tie a contest to the #hashtagged uploads and award free books to colored pages that get the most likes or shares... something we can discuss and figure out over the next couple of weeks, if there's interest.

Long-ass message... in short... please answer!

Once we all have our pages and mini-coloring books in-hand and the BookFunnel promo and website are live, I feel like I can (and probably should!) step away from the car and let author's who've had a good night sleep drive... I see no reason why we can't all be drivers.

1—Do you want to strategize and share ideas in a private Facebook group?

Yes ... No, I have a better idea

2—Are you happy with joining a private BookFunnel promo to distribute your color page?

Yes ... No, I have a better idea

3—Do you like the #ColorfulRomance hashtag?

Yes ... No, I have a better idea

4—Would you participate in awarding a free ebook for social love on your colored pages?

Yes ... No, I don't have a free ebook/just not interested

5—If you could get the book you're recommending on your coloring page as a coloring page itself, would you pay $10 for that?

Yes ... Danika, cut back on the vitamins

Planning dates

Dec 1—day the challenge goes live

Nov 27—absolute latest date I'll get you materials to upload for sharing

Nov soon—I'll invite you to a shared Google doc to approve all copy for your page. I need to edit some so there's a bit more consistency between them. You'll get a final revision opportunity on that form so watch for another, less long-ass I promise, email from me with the subject <🖍 Update #2: Reader Coloring Challenge>.

Again, thanks so much for taking a chance on this project. I'm stoked—if that's not clear! I have no idea how well it will work, but with this group of fun-loving risk-takers playing, I'm quite confident we're about to launch something pretty darned exciting!

Stay safe!

Donna aka Danika

PS—Please reply so I know you got this message. I'd hate to find out, after we launch, that you weren't looped in.

You rock! 🥰