Quill feedback after week 1
After using Thomas’s quills for a week, I figured some feedback on them might be helpful. Overall, these quills have been amazing! I’ve had a blast learning how to use them. I’ve been giving them test tasks then doing other stuff and returning later to find the work done, although I have been periodically checking on them and providing small adjustments if needed.
So far, I’ve mostly used Quill Command, Metadata Quill, and KDP Quill. (Plus, the quills I created.) I’ve also set up the Efficiency Quill. I haven’t had time to dig into the other quills yet.
Here are some of the things I’ve noticed:
As Thomas mentioned, asking the quill if it can do something is very useful for setting up things. I’ve also found asking for lists of tasks they can perform or what else needs to be done for setup to be helpful.
Currently, few of the publishing site connections I’ve established use MCP/API, so you need to login through Grok Bot’s computer. But I imagine that will change.
The quills perform their tasks well with few errors. But they occasionally need a better way pointed out to them, like using a duplicate button instead of manually copying all text from one edition to another.
When using Quill Command, it will sometimes run tasks itself rather than handing them off. But you just tell it to hand those tasks off, and it does.
In Grok Bot, there currently isn’t a way to pin/bookmark answers to easily refer to them later. As a workaround, I’ve been pasting those into the Grok Bot chat since I’m not really using Grok Bot outside of Quill Command.
Here are the tasks I’ve done:
Installed the quills I thought I’d use soon, linked up the Patron Toolbox, then created publishing quills for all the sites I publish on based off the KDP Quill. (I also created custom avatars for those new quills.)
Set up Efficiency Quill’s weekly audit.
Created abbreviations for my books.
In addition to the default connections, I connected the Metadata Quill to all the sites I publish on, Bookbub, and BookFunnel. I also completed and customized the master catalog.
Connected the Webmaster Quill to my website and the Newsletter Quill to MailerLite, but haven't done more yet.
Started creating hardcover editions for my books. (This a project I wanted to do but hadn’t gotten around to yet.) First, I cloned the ISBNs on Bowker. Then I created the listings on Ingram and KDP (drafts only.) For KDP, I hit the title limit as expected, so I set up a routine to create those two at a time until all titles are done.
Gave the quill instructions about the file structure for my book folders so it knows later how to pull book files, covers, A+ content, etc. (It will need to be connected to my Mac when it does that so it gets the latest file versions.)
Pulled all my reviews from various sites. (Giving the quill rules about duplicates.) Then I created custom reports that calculate totals across all sites for written reviews and all reviews. I also asked it to summarize common themes in the reviews.
Added to Efficiency Quill’s weekly audit a price check of Amazon’s live pages in all regions for my free ebook. (Apparently, Amazon is removing $0.00 price matching for some wide authors.) Then I created a price matching report containing Google Play’s links by region for Metadata Quill to run whenever I need to submit price matching requests to Amazon.
Here are the tasks I plan to do (in order):
Work with the other quills I haven’t played with yet to figure out what they can do.
Upload my hardcover files once I have the covers back from my cover designer. (I will still probably click the final publish button myself because I want to review the listings for errors first.)
Have the publishing quills upload updated files to all the sites. (Which I do with every release to update the book list in the back matter, but the more books I have the longer it takes…)
Have the KDP Quill update my metadata and A+ content when I need that.
Have the publishing quills create listings for my next book when I need that.
Anyway, hope all this helps someone. 🙃