Anna David's Blog, page 12
July 20, 2022
The 7 Biggest Mistakes First-Time Authors Make
This solo episode is focused on the seven biggest mistakes first-time authors make. They are:
Skimping on cover design
Not optimizing book descriptions
Not have a reason why/CTA
Slacking on editing
Not gathering reader reviews
Not getting that it's not about them
Listening to people who give bad advice once the book is written
Listen to get all the deets!
RELATED EPISODES:
What Makes a Great Book Cover?
The Debut of Launch Pad with Dave Chesson
What's the Difference Between a Ghostwriter, Editor & Coach?
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
July 13, 2022
How to Save Yourself From a Disastrous Book Launch with Scott Duffy
Scott Duffy is an entrepreneur and business strategist who's listed as a “Top 10 Speaker” by Entrepreneur and has been named one of the “Top Influential People To Follow” by Yahoo! Finance.
But that's not why I brought him on the pod. I brought him on because he's also the author of three different business books on three different topics, from three different publishers and launched in three entirely different ways. When I was at his mastermind a few weeks ago, he articulated why entrepreneurs should launch books in a way that was clearer than I'd ever heard. That's why I wanted him on the show but what I actually got out of our talk was so much more.
In this episode, we got into the importance of subtitles, why authors should be featured on their book covers and how his most recent book launch was a disaster.
RELEVANT LINKS:
RELATED EPISODES:
What I Learned From the Party Girl Re-Launch
What Book Would Help Build This Entrepreneur's Business?
Approaching Your Book Like It's a Business with Bonnie Habyan
TRANSCRIPT:
Anna David: Thanks for being here, Scott.
Scott Duffy: Hi. Great to be here.
Anna David: So you are a genius, and a genius and author. And also, as I was just telling you, someone who articulated what I have been trying to articulate for many years, and you just did it off the cuff. Well, let's talk about what you said that I loved so much.
Scott Duffy: So what happened was we were talking about, you and I were having this conversation in Park City. So, I was throwing an event we had, say, 50 entrepreneurs, small business owners there, and a whole bunch of them wanted to write books. But the challenge that I saw, which is a challenge I've seen, since the last, you know, 30 plus years they've been around this industry, is that most people don't know why they're writing a book. So, when we start a business, we write a plan, I always like to say start with the end in mind, right? Think about where it is that you want to be, what you're doing this for, and then back out a strategy. So what we were talking about was this, you know, I always ask people, are you writing a book, because you want to be a New York Times number one best seller, and you're willing to invest the time and the money in this project, because you believe it'll bring you a tremendous amount of business, whether that's in speaking fees, or in other ways that help you and your company to grow? Are you writing a book number two, because you want to have a business card, that you're able to hand out to everybody?
And this is like your introduction to them. And the strategy for doing that is much different, it costs a lot less to do, you're gonna have to your cost per book is going to have to be super low. So, you're going to be able to give away a lot of these books, right? Are you writing a book number three, because you want to, for example, build a list. So what you want to do is you want to have a book online, people enter an email address, or they enter a phone number, and then they're able to download your book in exchange for you being able to send them marketing messages. So, it's like, what is your strategy? What is the reason that you that you're doing this? And what you and I were talking about is like your client, that you primarily is writing because they want to hit? You know, they want to be that New York Times bestseller.
Anna David: Well, so these are, this is actually the way I remembered what you said, it's slightly different. When entrepreneurs write books for three reasons. One is the free plus shipping, or give away for free, basically, they want your email address is that it's my business card, but I kind of hope you don't read it. Like it's there. And you know that I did it, but there's probably tons of typos and stuff like that. And then the third is the legacy book. And I don't look at that as like the number one New York Times bestseller. You know, I don't believe in shooting for things that .00001% of the population can get the don't make a difference. Take it from someone who is a New York Times bestselling author and was borrowing money to pay my rent after I hit that list, is not a thing. So, to me, a legacy book is it does those things, those other two ideas do, but it's something you're proud of. It's I think the way you feel about your book for entrepreneur, maybe you feel that way about all three of your books. I don't I don't know, you tell me. Are they legacy books?
Scott Duffy: No, they're one of them is one of them. Maybe two. So, the first book that I wrote was called How to Invest in Self Storage. And the reason I wrote that book is I, I had come from I've been in the tech industry, I'd had a series of kind of wins financial wins in the tech industry. And I wanted to, I decided I wanted to invest in real estate, and create passive income. And this is, this is a long time ago. And it's back before there was a self storage, you know, like a Public Self Storage where you put your stuff and you keep it. Like before those were on every corner. And before I'm a real data driven person. And so before I invested anything, I wanted information, I wanted to learn about what I was going to potentially invest in. And the challenges the self storage industry didn't have a lot of that. So in the just for perspective, in the self storage industry, there's like 50,000 self storage facilities in the United States. And the biggest owner of self storage facilities only owns 3% of the market.
So, the majority of the industry is people that just own a one or two, so it's a lot of mom-and-pop businesses, meaning you don't have big companies that are aggregating public data in order to share it, they don't have to do. So what I did is I went out there to talk to everybody, I could assemble all of my notes. And I'm like, if I want this, I'll bet there's somebody else that wants it, too. So, I went to the biggest publisher in the industry called Mini Co. And I said, What do you think? And so they said, We think that's a great job that doesn't exist out there. And so they helped me to hire an editor. And we put the notes together, we launched it. And I think to this day, it's the best selling book about self storage in the industry, which is kind of ironic. So I wrote that. I wrote that entirely, because I was trying to aggregate research. So, I could decide if this is a good decision to invest it in, like crazy. My second book was called Launch. Yeah. And that was a whole different process.
So, I wanted Launch to be a legacy book. And my goal was to make that a number one New York Times bestseller. And so I ended up getting an agent, she was amazing. We ended up selling that, that book to portfolio, which is a division of Penguin Publishing, working with the exact time and we were scheduled to be the number one like the big release for Thanksgiving weekend for the holidays that year, in business books. So here's the thing, I had never written a book like this. And I wanted the book to be written about how to scale a company. That was the goal. Okay, and this will come back, it'll be important. So I, because it was the first book I'd ever done for a publisher like that. They required that I have an editor. And they were very hands on in helping me determine who that editor was. And the editor was, he was that head of entrepreneurship, and those kinds of articles for one of the two biggest business publications in the world. So, we're thinking to ourselves, this is going to be a home run.
Well, here's what happened, we had one year to write this book. So we started to work on it. And number one, he started to get all of these covers for that magazine. He had three while we were working together, so he would disappear. So, it just never really worked. It never really gelled. I kept going back to the publisher saying, I need more time, or I need different help. And they kept saying no, no, no, just every entrepreneur goes to this. Every writer goes through this. Just put your head down. It didn't work. Until one day, the book, it just was so bad. It was so bad. And nobody would listen. Yeah, I wrote a text actually was a I wrote an email to the head of Penguin portfolio. And the subject was in all caps. This book fucking sucks. Okay, I wrote this book fucking sucks. Because I had to get somebody's attention. Yeah, he was on vacation in Mexico. He called me right away. He said, this book does suck. You're right, we need to make a change.
And he said, the change starts with you. And it's really important for authors for writers, that change starts with you. He said, We'll do our part, we're going to help find you another editor. But what do you really know about what you're writing about? You see, my core competency had always been launching companies taking ideas from idea to market. And he said, What would naturally just kind of pour out of you. And it would be those stories versus the stories about growth and scale. So, what it is I sat down, I was so by the way, depressed after that call, I'm like, shit, now I got to change the book. I got to change the title. I got to figure this out. We don't have much time. And what happened in a is I went home that night, and I was talking to my ex wife was looking at my kids. And she said, Well, what if the book wasn't about like, you weren't doing it for yourself? Who would you do it for? And they said, You know what, I would use this book to tell my kids who their dad was. That's what I would do. That became the purpose.
And then over the next six weeks, I started from scratch. And I wrote every word of the book from front to back.
Wow, in the book was called Launch and it was all about doing what I really knew. And so for me, that was a big lesson. And I think that, you know, when you're writing a book, it's really important not to focus on what you think is going to make money or what you think is going to do something you've got to focus on what it is that you know, it naturally comes to you. Because those are the stories. And those are the lessons that will truly connect with an audience. And so, I think, you know, that's kind of what kind of what happened.
Anna David: But don't you think it's where what you know, meets what you know your audience wants? Don't you think?
Scott Duffy: I think that if you're writing about seeing this is the mistake I made, I was trying to write. See? Okay, I have to answer your question. I have share the story. The day the book was published, and I got my first copy, got my first hardcopy, I drove up to one of my mentors, houses. And he was gonna be the person first person I gave it to. He was like ADA, an iconic venture capitalist. And I walked up to him, he said, I got the book I've been telling you about, you get the first copy. He said, would you sign it? And I signed it. And he looked at the cover. And he said, your book is called Launch? And I said, Yes. He said, “You're gonna he broke.” That's what he said to me. And they said, Why would you say that? He said, “Scott, you have to make a decision. Before you do anything in business? Do you want to have a rich customer or a poor customer?” And he said, “if you're talking to people that are launching companies, they're probably broke, or at least they don't have a lot of free cash, because they're investing everything they can into this business.”
He said, “So you can be the very best in the world writing this book or doing what you do. But if you're going to have a poor customer, you'll be broken because they can't afford to pay you.” He said, “Where would you rather have a rich customer?” And I said, “Well, these are the stories I know how to tell.” He said, “If you told them just a little bit differently, what you know, they would appeal to that person too.” So that was a really big shift. I wouldn't I wouldn't try and in invent. First of all, I would get really clear on who my target is. And can they afford to pay me what I want them to pay me? Number one. And number two, I would focus on the content that they really know and understand. And if I have to tweak that a little bit, to make it relevant for a different market, I would do that. But I wouldn't start from scratch. I wouldn't try and lie, or not stretch the truth about what I was really good at.
Anna David: Did you rewrite it after he said that? Or you just said, fine. You leave it?
Scott Duffy: I said, Fuck. Are you serious? I'm like, are you serious? And by the way, it was it was it was really awful. For me, my stomach, like his I love I love this man. And so to my feet, and I was so embarrassed, you know, but it was the right lesson for me at the right time. I actually, it was the right lesson for me. It would have been great if the timing was a little different.
Anna David: It was the right lesson at the wrong time. But also, the Jeff Walker book Launch was already out or?
Scott Duffy: No, so Jeff and I were talking so Jeff. So, Jeff was working on lunch while I was working on launch and a mutual friend Travis Euston put us together because Travis was in the product launcher world. And so Jeff and I talked by the way, in our books came out like the same month. In there's two things I learned from that experience. Number one, you can't trademark the title of a book. So a lot of people will seek see that they can stay claim to a title, you can't trademark that right. What I learned is the most valuable part of selling a book is the subtitle. And that was just what Jeff and I talked about. He said, We can both have the same title. It can look the same way it can be identical. But your subtitle has to talk to your market. And my subtitle has to talk to my market. And that was a really big lesson for me.
Anna David: That's so interesting. I think yes, I don't want to interrupt you. But I do think it depends on the book. I think there are subtitles where you don't the reader doesn't even notice what the subtitle is. A short title, absolutely. And especially like your subtitle is no pun intended, critical. But I don't think that's always the case. I think it is true in this case. Okay, so keep going.
Scott Duffy: I think that the subtitle really has, because if you're in a bookstore, I mean, I don't know how many people but when Launch came out, people are still going to bookstores, if you're in a bookstore, and then your target customer is looking at a shelf and they're skimming. You only have a few seconds for them to know if that's the book, right? So what attracts the verse, it's going to be the color and the font, the positioning on the shelf, who you're around or who you next to. By the way, when I wanted to sell more. I went into every bookstore I could wherever I was, I moved my book next to Gary Anarchic. I moved in next to whoever was hot at that time. You got to do that. You got to have a little bit of Sara Blakely from Spanx in you.
Anna David: And nobody stopped you. Right. That's gonna stop you. You're like an affable big dude. Nobody's going to be like, ah, that guy stopped the guy moving the books. You just did it, right?
Scott Duffy: No, I did. And here's the thing, the people in the bookstore couldn't care less, because they just want to sell books. Right? So, I did, I would take pictures. Yeah. So I learned about the importance of a subtitle learn about the importance of the impact that your cover, and that needs to have in a very short period of time. Yeah. So that if two people are looking at books like and so and when, when the subtitle for Launch was the critical 90 days from idea to market. And the reason was, our publisher had research showing that in the next year, having a number in the subtitle was going to be like the thing. So they actually did that.
Anna David: I mean, the publisher research...you don't even want to hear my rants about traditional publishing. So it sounds like that was a great learning experience, but not necessarily a wonderful publishing experience.
Scott Duffy: It was a terrible publishing experience. It was awful. It was incredibly stressful. The book fizzled, because by the time, by the time it came out, I was so burned out from the project. I just I had no energy or desire to go out into to promote it the way the way that you should do, you know.
Anna David: Me too. And so, the next one, you said, "This is going to be different." Right? Is that what you said for your most recent book?
Scott Duffy: Well, I actually said, "I'm never going to do this again," first. That's what I said, I'll never do this again. And then what happened was, I had a video series called Business and Burgers. And we would go, I would travel across the country, Alan Taylor, and I, and we would go the awesome burger places. And we would interview entrepreneurs like Daymond John, and people like that, over burgers and sides, and it was a blast. And we ran about 45 episodes of that show. And while that show was airing, I was contacted by Entrepreneur Magazine, and they said, you know, the publishing group, Entrepreneur Books, really enjoyed the first book and didn't understand why it didn't get bigger pickup. And they said, "What if we went in and we updated the book, and we updated the stories, and we added some more connective tissue, would you be open to that?" And so that's what we did. Now, the problem that I ran into in this circumstance was a disagreement about the title and the subtitle.
So, here's the thing. If you read the breakthrough book, the title and subtitle don't tell you what's in it. So you don't know what you're buying. And so that was a big disconnect. And that hurt. And I'm just sharing I mean, yeah, I'm committed to sharing the good and bad of everything, you know. And so what I learned is I was much happier with the book itself, but I think that the title and subtitle got in the way of it, and so we're actually in the process of redoing that with new stories. And I can't show the title yet, but it's very descriptive to come out next year.
Anna David: Okay, wait, stop. Breakthrough is your brand. So I would think that that's the perfect title for you. Well, so
Scott Duffy: Here's what I learned. Breakthrough is a brand. But if you are a personal brand, your name has got to be your brand. And that was a lesson for me. It was a lesson for me because my brand was Launch. Oh, no, no, no, it's not. My brand is Breakthrough. Oh, no, no, it's not. I'm in education, technology. I'm working on a book right now. Right education, right, is that Lybrand? No, my brand is Scott Duffy. And so, for me, that was a that was a that was a real big. That was a real big lesson. And I think it's interesting, because if I used to be back in the day, you're too young for this, but it used to be when I was starting in the industry. The way you got to know somebody and see who they were, was there was a one inch by one inch picture on the back cover of the book. Yeah. So like when I worked for Tony Robbins back in 1990, right. The way anyone got to see him before the infomercial was he had a book and on the back there was the picture. That was it. I think that as it relates to books, and today when personal branding is so important, I am an advocate of putting your picture on it somewhere, you know, on the cover. Yeah, because you are the brand. And I'd be curious to see to hear what you have to say about that.
Anna David: You know, it's very interesting that you say that I'm a narcissist, and I'm very vain. So, I think I should not just be on the cover of all my books, but on every book, and yet I've never done it.
Scott Duffy: Why not?
Anna David: Out of fear of being judged as vain. And all also I really vacillate between, is it my experience? Or do you? You know, it's sort of like that idea about marketing, change all your eyes to use, make your stories. Imagine yourself that, you know, I don't I don't know the answers. I do this. Because every book, I learned more, I mean, I think I approach it a lot like you do, it's like, but I also have to, so that I can stay on the cutting edge for my clients. So I mean, I'm kind of excited. I'm like feeling something inside, like, ooh, could I go on the cover my next book, but I don't know. So you didn't do that. So, this is how you feel now, you didn't do it before?
Scott Duffy: That's how I feel now. And like in terms of change, you know, a change in approach, one thing that I did really learn what was the Breakthrough that I really loved. versus the way I wrote Launch the way we're Launch, is I literally sat behind a computer all day, and just wrote, and then what I would do is I would write a chapter, I would send it to an editor. The next day, the editor would send it back, I make corrections. And then we move to the next. Now, I'd like to say that I wrote a chapter every day that in practice, it doesn't work that way, you know, some take longer than others. But that was kind of like what the flow was, with Breakthrough the flow changed. So, with Breakthrough, what I started to do is I love to move and I love to be active. So I downloaded an app called Rev. And I actually wrote a lot in the book while I was walking. So I would be walking, or I would be in the gym or whatever. And I'd record on Rev. And then what we would do is I hit play, and then when I was done, I would I would I would have that translated, right? And then or whatever the word is, yeah, yeah, you transcribe, it would go. By the time I was back from the gym, or my walk, or my run, or whatever it was, it would be in my inbox, I would send that to an editor. And the editor would then organize it and compile the thoughts in there was my chapter. What was really cool about that also is, once that was done, I can take that I could turn that into a blog, quote boards, a million other things. So I highly recommend if you're not the kind of person that wants to sit behind a computer all day, leverage a tool like Rev. If you're a blogger, and you're in the car, just talk about what you're thinking, and boom, you're done.
Anna David: Here's what I want to say about that. Yeah, and I'm this is not like, this is not sucking up, you speak the way a lot of people try to write you just are naturally like that, I do not think that works for everybody. And I say that because we've had clients who have said, oh, I'm just gonna send over my like brain dumps. And it is very hard for us to make that into written material, it is far more effective for us to interview them, I think somebody interviewing you is going to be more effective. However, if you're like Scott, and you've got the gift of the gab, then I do think that can work more effectively. But sometimes you are making an editor's job hard if you do it like that.
Scott Duffy: Okay, so a couple thoughts on that, because you're right. I think an interview is like the gold standard. If you can get interviewed, I mean, like that's freakin awesome. I think, if you're a speaker, a professional speaker, it can really be a challenge. And you got to learn to get better when you're dictating. And the reason is, speaker can just talk forever, and say nothing. They're really awesome at it. Right? So, it's almost like you got to get that inner Tik Tok voice working in you where you got like, eight seconds to a minute, or whatever it is. Yeah, you got to learn how to talk in shorter in shorter sound bites. And so, I think I've seen that with speakers. When I wrote Launch, the way I would tell a lot of the stories because the way I teach is story based; the way I would tell a lot of the stories was almost like dictating a speech. And this is really important for right for people who want to be authors. The way you speak at people, right when you're onstage, is different than the way people read. It's really important.
If you just gave them a speech, they're not going to get through if you give them something like should be written about. Totally different. The other thing is if you're hiring an editor, this is a lesson I learned in Launch. The person that we used was a magazine editor. Okay. So think about this. They were exceptional at writing things that were really short, and it stood on their own So if you're writing a book, and you need an editor for a book, you need somebody that understands basically how to craft a story that builds as it goes, right? And where there's connective tissue from one thing to the next. So, when I wrote Launch, and I was dealing with that first editor, the reason the book didn't work is everything was totally disjointed, like a bunch of articles. So, it's really important to know, you know, you got to have like, the perfect target avatar of who your writer or your editor is, in order to have a book be as successful as you want it to be.
Anna David: The good news is that most magazines have gone under. So most magazine editors have transitioned into being book editors, I came up as a magazine editor. And then I learned to edit books, because you know, necessity is the mother of invention, you just learn, right? But that's great. That's a great tip. So let me ask you what have and we got to get close to wrapping up? Tell me what these books have done for your career?
Scott Duffy: Well, I mean, they done a number of things, I think that the one thing they did is they helped me to, actually, I'll tell you what the most important thing is, the most important thing that they've done is they've helped me to develop a business philosophy that became like, I was successful doing things. And I didn't necessarily know how I was doing them. I thought I did. But what I did is I was able to, like codify my superhero power, right. And I think that that's incredibly powerful. And if you want to be a great speaker, you want to be great at growing an audience on social media, you want to be great at building a personal brand, I think you really unmeet to understand who you are, what you stand for, and how you get to the results that you get to. And so, this really helped me to learn that, and it helped me to find where there were holes in what I did, where I really needed to, like grow myself.
And I really worked on those areas when writing the book. In fact, on the book breakthrough, I added a section on growth and scale. But instead of doing it myself, I went to a friend of mine named Rolan Frasier, who is exceptional at scaling a company, and almost made those chapters more like interviews, where we talk back and forth. And the way we positioned it is here's how we work with this company. Here's how we work with that company. So the content was organic, it was authentic, but I couldn't have done it on my own. But when I was done with it, I'm like, I understand that now I can really help a company in that area now. So, in addition to a branding tool, it was like a growth hack for me as well.
Anna David: I love that. I love that. Because it's kind of like I think a lot of successful people. They can't teach what they do. Because they don't know how they did it. It was so organic. It was when I started teaching that I'm like, oh, I got to figure out how did I write a book? I don't know, I just did it. So, I think that I've never heard someone say that, the book is the opportunity for you to drill down and articulate. How did you do this? How can your reader do this? And so, and in terms of business, in terms of speaking, I mean, you were already killing it on the speaking circuit, but what difference has it made in your business?
Scott Duffy: You know, I think the book, it enabled me to market myself in the bigger companies was one of those things. So it's one thing to have a personal brand, it's one thing to have success with companies that you're a part of. And for me, many of those were big media companies, big media brands, but having your codified philosophy, bad how you did it. I think, you know, that really helped me to open to open more doors. You know, I feel today that the book is like it's a learning tool for us as authors. But I think that as a door opener, it's incredible. It's just you need to get clear as to which doors you want to open. Do you want to open the door of somebody hiring a speaker in a fortune 500 company? Or do you want to open the door of an entrepreneur that wants to learn how to create sales funnels?
So, if I were to share with anybody, like if somebody said to me, where do I start? And so, we'll start by getting clear on what you want the end result to be and my second step would be create the perfect avatar of who it is that you want to speak to. And the more narrow you go, the more successful you're going to be. Because if you try to talk to everybody, you're not going to connect with anybody. The riches are really in the niches and when it comes to writing and when it comes to author when it comes to putting out a book, if you nail who your target audience is, I mean from the beginning. You're gonna be on fire.
Anna David: Yeah. Yeah. You are fantastic Mr. Duffy; how can people find you?
Scott Duffy: Go to Scottduffy.com. There, or you can you can find me on social media at Scott Duffy media across all the platforms.
Anna David: I love it. Thank you, Scott. Thanks, you guys for listening. I'll talk to you next week.
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
July 6, 2022
How to Get Over Yourself and Just Promote Your Book with Jerry Stahl
Jerry Stahl is the iconic author of Permanent Midnight (made into a movie starring Ben Stiller), among nine other books (among them, OG Dad, Pain Killers, I, Fatty, Perv, Plainclothes Naked, Happy Mutant Baby Pills, Bad Sex on Speed and his latest, Nien Nien: One Man's Tale of Depression, Psychic Torment, and a Bus Tour of the Holocaust).
A Pushcart Prize–winning author, Stahl’s work has appeared in Esquire, Vice, The Believer, Tin House, Los Angeles Review of Books and the New York Times, among other places.
He also wrote the HBO movie Hemingway & Gellhorn (which earned a Writers Guild Award nomination), Bad Boys II and the cult classic Dr. Caligari and has written on the TV shows Maron, CSI and Escape at Dannemora (for which he received an Emmy nomination).
So you get it; he's done a lot. So why does he hate promoting his work so much? And how does he promote his work in spite of that? Find out in our spirited, sarcastic and deeply salacious (no, it's not salacious, I was just in the mood to be alliterative) interview.
RELEVANT LINKS:
Jerry's interview with the Village Voice
RELATED EPISODES:
10 Free Ways to Promote a Book
How to Get on Podcasts to Promote Your Book with John Corcoran
CLICK ON ANY OF THE LINKS BELOW TO HEAR THIS EPISODE OR CLICK HERE TO GET THE POD ON ANY PLATFORM
June 29, 2022
The Business of Being a Writer with Jane Friedman
Jane Friedman is an icon in the publishing space. With over two decades of experience in the business, she is truly considered the world's leading expert on traditional publishing, self publishing and where the twain shall meet. She's the curator of The Hot Sheet, a biweekly paid newsletter, oversees a wildly popular blog and is also the author of The Business of Being a Writer.
In this episode, we discussed how important it is to know what you want your book to do for you, how to get bookstores interested in hosting you, the biggest changes in the publishing industry over the past year and so much more.
RELEVANT LINKS:
The Business of Being a Writer site
RELATED EPISODES:
What Your Non-Fiction Book Needs with Elizabeth Lyons
How Do I Arrange Readings for my Book?
Talking About Your Book on TV and Podcasts with Media Coach Susan Harrow
TRANSCRIPT:
Anna David: Well, thank you so much for being here, Jane, I really appreciate it.
Jane Friedman: My pleasure.
Anna David: One thing, I have actually spoken about you on this show before and one of the conversations I recently had about you was with Elizabeth Lyons, and we were talking about how much we both love that you, you don't pick a side. You are really right there, you can't go well, Jane is very true. She's all for tradition but no, no, no, she's all for self publishing. So would you say that's accurate that you haven't picked aside?
Jane Friedman: Absolutely. And I am glad you have noticed that. I hope everybody notices that I like the 360 degree view. And I've experienced stories or met with enough authors that I know that there isn't like a right side to publishing paths. Everyone's position and needs are unique.
Anna David: Yeah, I love it. This is the quote from your said, I love it. “I've been working in book publishing since the 1990s, but my views are not from the 1990s.” So what would you say because it's changing so quickly? How would you say traditional publishing has changed the most in the past year? So right now we're recording this in June of 2022. What would you say is the most significant change in the past year?
Jane Friedman: The supply chain issues have gotten worse. I mean, they were bad a year ago. But I know it seems insane. But it's getting worse. And I think that a lot of publishers are struggling to get their printing time to get their paper and to do the things to have a normal publishing schedule. And I think it's just creating a lot of stress. So that's one piece. Another piece is labor issues. So there are a lot of people as we're coming out of the pandemic, knock on wood, that are reevaluating their priorities. And the pandemic has resulted in a wake up call for a lot of people about work life balance. And so we're seeing a lot of discussion about how to treat publishings workers. I have no idea where that's going to fall out. But we'll see what happens.
Anna David: And in terms of the supply chain issues, it almost feels like being in traditional publishing, it's more of a concern, because, you know, Amazon and print on demand those that, you know, they are just printing every night, right?
Jane Friedman: Right. So print on demand is a bit of a different animal, traditional publishers are using print on demand to fill in the gaps. But because of all of these supply chain crunches, prices are going up, it's probably going to result in higher book prices for everybody. Some people listening may have already noticed higher prices on books, and POD prices are going up too. So even self publishing authors are affected by this.
Anna David: But it's not really affecting the speed a little bit. I am noticing right now that Amazon KDP has had just kind of exquisite customer support for years. And now it's like Sorry, there's a delay in there. There are no explanations. There's just excuses, which is unusual for such amazing tech support.
Jane Friedman: Yes, I see and hear a lot of varied experiences with Amazon, it's really hard to understand what's going on behind the scenes, because one person will have a smooth problem free experience and others are just banging their head against the wall. So yeah, it's hard to comment on Amazon's customer service given the variety of diversity of the experience.
Anna David: So one of the things that I have always felt very aligned with you on is this idea about writers and making a living there are these ideas like oh, I just, you know, we all think it's gonna be different for us. We all think it Yeah, yeah, no one can make a living, whatever, it's gonna be different for me. What do you think is the best way for a writer to make a living?
Jane Friedman: If it's your first book, The Living isn't likely to come from book sales alone. Now, you may have received a really ginormous advance, which might keep you afloat for a while. But I would say that most authors if they're making a living, it's through ancillary activities related to that book. So for nonfiction authors that could be speaking and consulting. Things that grow their business footprint. If it's fiction, it gets a little bit tougher. So usually, then you're getting into services where you're helping people with less experience. Come up the ladder, so you're providing editing services or marketing services, things that maybe you've become an expert for children's authors, classroom visits and speaking engagements can be very important and provide additional revenue. Some writers are great freelance writers, although some of those opportunities have been drying up just because of the state of the media and magazine industry.
Anna David: I'm interested in, so you really would say your main business is the Hot Sheet? And if so when did it become clear, this is my main business, everything else is adjunct?
Jane Friedman: It's probably about a third of my business. The bulk of my business is online education. So running one time webinars is where I earn most of my income. And then book sales would probably be less than 5%. At this point. Yeah. As far as where I recognized the hot sheet would become the size it is today. I mean, I think I knew all along, just because of my experience in the industry, that it could be basically the entirety of my business if I chose to focus on it to the exclusion of all else, but I like variety. I don't want to do just one thing. Yeah.
Anna David: Yeah. It's interesting, because it was my first introduction, it was, you know, before Substack existed, I was like, wait, you charge for a newsletter. And now it's become so commonplace. But I'm very intrigued by it. So it's, you know, anybody? Because it is everyone I know who reads it, it's if you open it right away, it's all these? How do you do it? How is it you and your husband work on it, you have a team that works on it, I know you have original reporting in it. So you have freelancers and all of that.
Jane Friedman: Most of the writing gets done by myself. So it's my writing, reporting and research, then I have a freelance copy editor who goes through all of the content, does the fact checking and style and you know, fixing grammatical errors. And then my husband who does work for me in the business, he does what I consider the production, which is you know, loading it all into the MailChimp system and then doing customer service. So you know, when people have deliverability issues, or we need to invoice someone, or people aren't, you know, whatever the issue is, for the reader, he's there to take care of it.
Anna David: And how are you finding all of those stories? Is it just your voraciousness in terms of researching them? You have Google Alerts, you're going to events? How are you doing it?
Jane Friedman: Well, it's somewhat incestuous, because I read a ton of newsletters to make my own newsletter, right? And, but, you know, I've been studying industry publications, you know, since the early 2000s. So I obviously subscribed to all of the main industry outlets like Publishers Weekly, the Bookseller's Shelf Awareness, Publishers Lunch, I could go on. But there are lots of others like publishing adjacent newsletters that are super helpful, and that I'm always scanning for bigger picture trends, like related to Substack, or to advertising, or serial reading and writing apps. So the publishing world is very multifaceted. Some people call it, you know, two dozen industries and one and so that always gives me a lot of fuel for the fire.
Anna David: So I'm curious, what would you call it? How would you define success for a book? I know it depends on the author, but what would you consider a, quote, successful book?
Jane Friedman: If it's my personal definition, what would success mean, for me publishing a book, it's going to raise my profile and more strongly identify me with a specific message or a specific audience that I want to be known by. So in my last book, The Business of Being a Writer, my goal was to strongly associate myself with writers interested in the business. And I would say by that measure, it's been a success. It's also been for the publisher of financial success. So there will be a second edition, which I happen to be working on now. Another one of my goals was to get to writers early in their journey. So I really wanted to see the book adopted by professors in MFA programs or undergraduate writing programs. And that's one of the reasons that I worked with the University of Chicago Press on that book, because they have the clout and the ability to get books into classrooms. So again, I would say check mark on that, because it is being used by those programs.
Anna David: Do you think a writer should go into a book knowing this is what success would look like for me?
Jane Friedman: Oh, yes. It just affects the writing and the development of the book to know why are you spending time doing this thing that is basically going to pay you pennies on the hour? Or maybe even like a percentage of a penny on the hour. So you have to really be clear and honest with yourself about what you would like to see happen. That's hopefully not related to sales, which you have no control over. To some extent, you have no control over it.
Anna David: And how could someone know if their idea is good or not?
Jane Friedman: I think it really goes back to your understanding of who you're writing for a lot of people are writing, not in a bad way for themselves, and they haven't really thought about, okay, who is the ideal reader for this? Whose life am I trying to change? Who am I speaking to, that really needs to hear this message or story or benefit from this information? And by either planning the book or writing the book with that person in mind, it helps avoid going too broad trying to include everyone or serve all audiences, which is a classic mistake. And just dig into the people that you think will be most likely to read it and the easiest for you to reach.
Anna David: It's so interesting, because I come from traditional publishing. Why did they ever say that? Why did that never come up in all those meanings? No one ever said that, six books. Do you know what I mean?
Jane Friedman: I do know what you mean. I mean, I think this is a problem primarily with the more literary and publishing or, especially in New York publishing, where there's a lot of respect for personalities and people's gut instinct. And there's this overriding myth, neither good nor bad, that no one knows what books are gonna sell. And they were just going to throw it all at the wall and see what sticks. And if you are making decisions by gut instinct, then yeah, that sort of thinking makes sense. But I actually started working at a publishing company that did market research. And it was my first responsibility, in my first year on the job to do that market research into certain segments. And we had book clubs where we could survey our members and say, which of these books do you want to buy next? And so that really disciplined me early that you can find out the answers to what people want, and you can develop books that have a waiting audience, but that is not normal for most of big publishing.
Anna David: Why do you think that they are so anti research?
Jane Friedman: I don't think typically, there haven't been departments devoted to it, you would have to actually hire and market research people. And again, there's this art commerce tension, you know, although I think that's changed a lot more in the last 10 to 20 years, especially with the advent of Amazon, which showed, oh, look, if you pay attention to some data and analytics, and you measure the audience, it has results. So I do think there are more people in marketing departments at big publishers today that are involved in marketing analytics, but still, that it's hard to change that culture.
Anna David: Yeah, I mean, and I think it's sort of like will they know those big hits, they're going to hit so big, if it's a JK Rowling or Brene Brown, or whatever it is, that they don't need to bother, because we're gonna, you know what I mean, we're going to be okay, in the end, like, even though we're going to lose money on on 99% of these. I mean, that's how it feels to me.
Jane Friedman: It can feel that way. And, it's really sad for the authors, you know, of those books, who aren't, you know, inevitably they're disappointed by performance. And they think their publisher could have done more, and maybe the publisher could have.
Anna David: Yeah, it's interesting now that I'm on this side of it. And I remember speaking to a publicist, and she told me what I always suspected, she had been an in-house published publicist at a big five publishing company. And she's like, you just kind of had to avoid those authors that you weren't doing anything for. Because what are you going to tell them? Like, you don't matter? But the author feels it. It's almost I don't know, I guess it's good. If someone had sent that to me, I would have been really upset. But since it really is, you know, each author is really in it for his or herself. What do you think? What do you think is the most crucial thing to do all authors need to have Newsletter Lists?
Jane Friedman: Well, it is like the number one most powerful sales and marketing tool hands down. There is nothing in my mind. That's a better asset to have that protects you from the changes happening. If your publisher drops you if your agent dies, if you know, whatever happens, you've still got that direct connection to your readers. I always hesitate to say, you know, you must and there is no other way, but it is one of the best insurance policies against change in the industry. And certainly we're seeing now with the growing privacy protections through social media or Apple. They're coming on Google too, that It makes those channels less effective, it makes the advertising less effective. And if you hear people inside publishing talking today, even at traditional publishers, they're trying to beef up what they call their first party data, which is their direct experience of selling to readers and that often through email, and not through their own website. And of course, Amazon's not sharing any data. So that's really incumbent on whether it's the author or publisher to figure out who those readers are, and reach them without depending on a third party.
Anna David: Even when people go, Well, emails dead, who opens email anymore? It's just simply not true?
Jane Friedman: It's not true.
Anna David: In terms of social media, you know, one of the most fascinating things and I know you definitely covered it, but was that New York Times story about a year ago that said, like, “Okay, here we go, if publishers had been, you know, really prioritizing social media, but Billie Eilish has millions of subscribers.” And she sold, I think it was under 60,000 copies, and Justin Timberlake, you know, over five years under 100,000 copies. So what is it with social media? Will you explain how it matters and how it doesn't matter?
Jane Friedman: Well, it is really like, big stories that you see in the New York Times that look at this issue, the one that you mentioned, is a particularly fascinating one, because I don't see any evidence that the publishers were actively collaborating with those celebrity authors to use their social media platform to help sell books. So if the author themselves haven't kind of brought people in, and you know, taking them along on the journey, and themselves being excited about the book and talking about it, of course, there's not going to be any sales of it. So the publisher just can't sit back and wait for the social media numbers to do their job. There has to be an actual engagement, surprise. The other thing that I think people miss about this distinction is that, for example, on Tik Tok, we have the book talk phenomenon, which is indeed selling tons of books. It's responsible for the bulk of fiction sales growth this year, and last year. But is it the author's themselves doing that? Not really, it's the influencers and other people who are just excited to talk about and recommend books. So social media, in that instance, does sell books, but it's because of community engagement and enthusiasm. It's not because the author amassed some enormous Tik Tok following, although I will say, there are some authors like Colleen Hoover, who are wonderful at using Tik Tok. And, you know, using it for engagement in order to boost visibility and boost sales, but you can't tell someone who's a debut author? Yeah, go get on Tik Tok. And that will ensure sales? It does not.
Anna David: I mean, that's the thing. I'll talk to people and they go, Well, I really need to focus on that. And it's true, but Oh, my God, is it a? It’s a day in day out slog, I do think it works. I think anyone who's listening, you know, you don't have to go like I had Tik Tok up. Find your path, find your thing. Try to make it fun. That thing that makes you creative. When everything in you says this is sick, this is social media? Well, you're a creative find a way to make it fun is sort of where I stand with that. But you don't think writers have to be on social media?
Jane Friedman: I think you make your life increasingly difficult as an author if you don't use anything whatsoever. It's possible. I've seen authors do it. Yeah. But you're, I think you're making your life harder. And so it's not a path I recommend, unless you just feel like for whatever reason that it's just going to drain you and take away and the negatives are going to really outweigh the positives.
Anna David: How important do you think media attention is for an author?
Jane Friedman: It's increasingly hard to get because the number of media outlets covering books has diminished over time. And it's one of the number one things you're going to hear a publishing industry say is that media outlets don't cover books like they used to. Part of this has to do with the socio-political environment. Certain presidents who have been in office, climate change, gun violence, like there are a lot of things competing for people's attention, particularly right now when we feel like the world is on fire. And it also raises questions for writers themselves about why am I producing art or talking about my book, when there are these apparently very serious issues in the world today. But that doesn't directly answer your question. I'm just talking about how hard it is. But I think any marketer or publicist would tell you that right now, part of the game is just keeping visibility consistent over a long period of time. So to the extent that you can get some media hits, even if there's from a smaller outlet That's to keep the ball rolling. The larger the number of impressions, the more likely you're going to get sales over time. It usually doesn't happen with the first impression unless we're talking about someone who already knows you. And has been waiting for your book to come out.
Anna David: But also seeing how your book relates to the news. And obviously, that's not always the case with fiction. It's not easy. But but with nonfiction, you know, there again, it's using your creativity to find a way like, well, how does the business of being a writer fit into what's what? That's what we figure out, we’re creative people?
Jane Friedman: Yes, you have to find those links between what people are talking about, what's in the Zeitgeist, and what's in your book.
Anna David: Do you think there's particular media hits that really moved the needle? Obviously, Terry Gross. But are there others? I mean, I know from personal experience, like being on Good Morning America, Today show that doesn't necessarily result in book sales.
Jane Friedman: That's correct. The big favorite right now is CBS Sunday Morning, because they actually give the author a good seven or 10 minutes to talk about the book. And so people like to have an opportunity to really kind of sink into who this author is and what they're concerned about. Whereas the other morning shows, I don't know how long those segments are, but they're really short. Other things, any sort of celebrity book club or influencer book club. So this includes Reese Witherspoon, Jenna Bush, retailer book clubs, the Barnes and Noble, they all have these pics, and those are all super helpful.
Anna David: Do you have any tips for getting attention from those celebrity book clubs?
Jane Friedman: I mean, unless you already have an existing connection, I don't know that I would recommend trying to knock on those doors. It's really something that's facilitated through your publisher.
Anna David: Yeah, yeah. Do you recommend book tours?
Jane Friedman: I think they can still be super useful, but you have to be strategic about it. And there's probably going to be some sort of hybrid tour from now on out. So you'll do some things online, because it's just not going to be worth the return on investment to fly out to the other end of the country. But I do think it's still super useful, especially in your region, to get media going to have that library or bookstore winery launch event because that allows the media to report on something interesting, and it's happening. So this goes back many years, often it was the bookstore event, it was used to get the local and regional media, it wasn't necessarily that the sales in the store was the point, it was the bigger impression that you were making in that media market. So those reasons to do events still exist. I think that I would encourage people to think about collaborating on these events, rather than being a solo author. Can you be in conversation with another author? Can there be a theme surrounding the event? So it's not just about you reading from a book, instead, you're analyzing a pertinent current events issue that your book ties into, as you mentioned earlier? That just makes the events more appealing and dynamic.
Anna David: And so in the two, would you recommend that somebody, because this is a conversation I have with people all the time, I just want to try traditional publishing first, do you think everybody who wants to be published traditionally should try first? And have NBP be a second option?
Jane Friedman: Yeah, if that's what you want, I would suggest trying it like the only thing you have to lose is your time and maybe a bit of your ego. Right? So you can set up a submissions process that you kind of knock out I would say in three months, I wouldn't like to wait forever and ever to get responses. I'd like to test the waters, see what responses you can get and give yourself a deadline to finish that process and then move on. I think it's really important not to get caught up in like this hamster wheel of submission where you kind of stopped for a while because you're feeling dejected. You think well, maybe I'd get this edited or there's a lot of hemming and hawing and doubt, which is totally normal. But I would say do not linger in that process, move through it, and then move on.
Anna David: So that's three months for an agent, and then maybe another three months, like if you don't get an agent in three months, move on and then give your agent three months to try to sell the book. If you get an agent?
Jane Friedman: The agent will offer realistic expectations there. So what I'm hearing right now is that it's taking editors longer to look at manuscripts and read them. So it could be that it takes longer than three months. It might be six months, but I would say you know, take your agents' guidance on that one, but if they can't sell it in a year, that's definitely what I would cut loose and consider another avenue.
Anna David: What do you see as today the advantages of having a traditional publisher?
Jane Friedman: Oh, boy, it depends so much on the publisher we're talking about. So for instance, Amazon publishing, which many people confuse with self publishing, it's not their traditional publishing operation that does 1000 titles a year, they're enormous, they have about two dozen imprints covering every category and genre. If you get a deal with Amazon publishing, you're probably going to have a small advance relative to like a big New York house, but you're gonna get the power of Amazon, putting your book in front of the people, it's pretty sure it's going people that they think are going to buy the book. They're probably going to put it in Amazon Prime, or it's going to be in Kindle Unlimited, and you're going to get huge exposure, that it would be very hard for like a big five publisher to get you. But you're in the Amazon ecosystem, you know, you're not in the bookstore ecosystem.
Now, if you're the sort of author who feels like Oh, my God, this is the independent bookstore book, I think it's going to the bookstore, people are going to love this thing. And you can sometimes see exactly what titles are like that, because they're actually about bookstores. And those are just you can tell these are dead ringers for bookstore promotion. Anyway, if that's what you want, you kind of need a big five to help you do that, or at least a really strong, independent house like Grove Atlantic. So it really goes back to what you're looking for. Not that you have the choice of publisher there. But publishers are great at getting your book stocked and bricks and mortar. They can be really powerful at online marketing and promotion, if they have that direct to consumer list, which some do. So if they have an active publishing program in your genre, or category, you then also have the benefit of the relationships, I hope, of other authors in that imprint. And it helps build your network as well.
Anna David: Yeah, that's a very rosy look at it. I have a much easier time getting my books I published myself in bookstores than the traditionally published ones, because if you are publishing independently, you can make your book returnable, and my publisher didn't. So they don't want to or, anyway. Oh, Jane, you don't want to hear me? Just trust me. Oh, so what I was going to ask you is for somebody who doesn't have a book publisher behind them, how would you recommend making yourself attractive to a bookstore or a winery or wherever? Is it saying, you know, I loved your idea about making it a themed event? Is there anything else like that? Or how would you recommend people go around trying to secure those?
Jane Friedman: Well, it's gonna depend a little bit on the venue. So like bookstores, if they're going to order the book, for the event, it needs to, it needs to be available on certain terms from certain places. So like, we're not going to order your book from Amazon, if you've self published it strictly on Amazon. You have to have it available through Ingram and you need to choose the appropriate discount, which is 55%. So there are those like little technical logistical pieces, if you're dealing with book oriented venues that have certain expectations, aside from that, any venue is going to be looking at your ability to get turnout. And so you need to look for evidence that you can generate an audience for this venue, unless they're charging you and that's how they make their money. Right. So you have to show that oh, well, you know, at my last event, it's such a venue, we had so many people turnout, and we sold so many books. And so if you're totally new, though, and don't have that track record, then you could mention maybe that you have an email list of a certain size, or you're active on social media, or you're partnering with this person who does have a presence and is going to be marketing and promoting it. So essentially, what I'm saying is you have to give them an idea of how you're going to market and promote the event and show that you're not relying on the venue itself to gin up interest.
Anna David: And I didn't actually know that there were bookstores that you could possibly pay to have an event. That's a great idea. If you're brand new.
Jane Friedman: Yeah, there are some venues where you can just pay them outright. All right.
Anna David: Well, this has been fantastic. Is there any final piece of advice you have for somebody who is sort of I know I want to write a book, but I'm not sure what to do. What final advice would you have for them?
Jane Friedman: Have patience with yourself in the process. I find that a lot of people are either if they're not paralyzed by self doubt, they're rushing or they expect things to happen more quickly than they actually do, especially in the publishing industry, which is notoriously slow, but writing itself is a slow process. So just give it the respect and attention it deserves and take some joy, I hope and the act of writing and revising because that's what it all boils down to is taking joy in the work.
Anna David: Okay, great. So Jane, if people want to find you what's the best way?
Jane Friedman: My website is Janefriedman.com. That points to everything that I do, whether it's the paid newsletter or the classes and events.
Anna David: Fantastic. Thank you so much, Jane. And thank you guys for listening
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June 22, 2022
How to Make Your Book Into a TEDx Talk with Bridget Sampson
Bridget Sampson is a Professor Emeritus of Communication Studies, the author of Communication Secrets for Success and the co-author of Communication Training and Development. She's also a TEDx speaker who helps other people write and deliver their TEDx talks.
All of this made her the perfect person to talk to about how to convert your book into a TEDx talk, whether or not you should outline or write the talk out completely, how to book a TEDx slot, how many times to practice, what to wear and what to do if you bomb, among many other topics.
She also shared that people never seem to care that she was a professor for decades but they all care that she has a book and a TEDx talk. So get on it! It's easier than you think.
RELEVANT LINKS:
Bridget's Growth & Gratitude podcast
RELATED EPISODES:
How Authors Can Get Booked to Speak with Topher Morrison
David Nihill on Selling a Book to a Publisher After Self-Publishing
Talking About Your Book on TV and Podcasts with Media Coach Susan Harrow
TRANSCRIPT:
Anna David: Thank you for being here Bridget.
Bridget: Thank you for having me. So excited to talk with you.
Anna David: I love how we were just talking about how I'm casual verging on unprofessional. And then I'm like, that is the name of a book. That should be the name of my podcast.
Bridget: Yes. Oh my gosh, absolutely. I love it.
Anna David: It's not what we're here to talk about is that
Bridget: No. It could be related, because I think that that might be the way we want to be in any of our talks, especially a TED talk.
Anna David: Absolutely Okay, so, so many people come to me, and they say, I want to do a TEDx talk. And, and I say, you can make your book into a TEDx talk. So you are the perfect person. You've been a professor for 20 years in public speaking. Is that right?
Bridget: Yes.
Anna David: Did I get the number right?
Bridget: It's more, but let's leave it at that because people will think I'm younger.
Anna David: Well, you look 20. So you did a TEDx talk. And then you coach people to do TEDx talks. So let's talk a little bit about Well, first, let's talk about your journey. So how did you become a professor of public speaking?
Bridget: When I was an undergrad in communication studies. And I didn't know what I wanted to do after I graduated. So some professor said, why don't you do the master's program in communication, and you can teach. You can teach the basic public speaking course, I started teaching that course at 22, which is insane. They just threw me in, you know. I was teaching public speaking. And we got lots of great training on how to teach and public speaking skills. So I started really early. But the truth Anna was when I took my public speaking course, I waited until the last minute to take it. I was terrified. I completely fell apart. During my first speech, I was one of those super anxious, terrified nervous speakers, which is why I think I was so passionate about helping other people overcome that fear because it was so paralyzing for me. So that's how it all started. And that's how I love teaching public speaking. I love teaching communication, all of the communication courses. And I continued to do that for many years, as I also started my consulting business coaching people on their communication skills.
Anna David: Okay, wait, so you were terrified when you were an undergrad? And you were taking this class? And so what advice do you have for people who are terrified of public speaking?
Bridget: Yes. Well, that's my first thing is, I can serve as an example, because I was terrified that I fell apart during my speeches and was teaching that same exact course two years later. How insane is that? Right? So I have tons of advice. But the truth is, while I love what you said about um, casual verging on unprofessional, the best speakers are people who realize they can just be themselves. Yeah, just be you, for God's sakes, be real, whatever your personality is, are you funny? Are you sarcastic? Are you serious? Just know that you can just be yourself when you're speaking to an audience. Yes, you should prepare your thoughts and have some valuable content. Of course, the people just stress about the delivery way more than we need to, in my opinion.
Anna David: I know and I think but I think TEDx is one where it has an even greater stress value, because it's so it's the it also let's talk about how most people don't know the difference between a TED Talk and a TEDx talk, which is true.
Bridget:I agree. And I love that, that works for us. Right?
Anna David: Absolutely. And to clarify, a TED talk is, you know, the thing where it's like Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates give TEDx TEDx is something where any community can, as far as I know, get sort of getting a license and put on a TEDx event. It is not easy to do. But um, so I don't even think TEDx knows how many TEDx events there are to you? What do you know about this?
Bridget: Yeah, I think at one point, I heard there's at least one TEDx event happening every single day. And I think it's even more. I think it's way more than that if you go global, right? So yes, I agree with you. Sometimes I say I gave a TEDx talk. Sometimes I just say TED Talk. Absolutely. You are affiliated with the TED brand. Even if it's a TEDx talk, it is a TED talk, because it's the TED brand. They own it. Right? They have somebody thankfully, not me, not us. But the coordinator of the TEDx event that you're at, went through a lot of trouble, as you said, to get to be able to have a TED, you know, sponsored conference and have TEDx speakers. So yes, use it by all means. It is not as hard as people think to get a TEDx talk to apply. Just make the case that you got something important to say, it's only 18 minutes if you've written a whole book. My goodness, you have got enough gems in that Look for sure to give a 10 or 15 minute talk that is going to wow people. I am just so passionate. I believe that wholeheartedly.
Anna David: I mean, it doesn't have to be that long. I mean, I read somewhere like there's like a three minute talk that's really successful. Yes. Do you have a favorite TED Talk?
Bridget: Probably Brene Brown's talk on vulnerability. I just love her so much. I love all her work. I gosh, I have so many favorites. I love Shaun Akers' work. I don't know if you've heard about him. But he talks about happiness. Oh, my gosh, his talk called the happy secret to something that happy secret to better work? I think it is. And it's all about how we generate happiness in our lives internally. We're looking for it in these external circumstances. And that's not where it comes from. And we all know this, but he shares it. And I think his talk is only 12 minutes. I've shown that at countless trainings, and shared it with countless coaching clients and everybody loves it and says it was really a mindset shift for them as far as how to feel good in our lives. So you're absolutely right. I think a 10 a 12 minute talk can be life changing for us. That's why I love Ted so much.
Anna David: One of my previous podcast guests, Chris Voss told me and he's a big media star. Now he prepared for the media by watching Angela Duckworth, grit talk. Oh, I love it. Yeah. He said, Yeah. What is powerful about this, and he analyzed the tone of voice and all of these things. I think my favorite is Derek Severs. Have you ever seenHow to start a revolution?
Bridget: No, I have to watch it.
Anna David: He barely talks. It's mostly showing a video. So it's like, you can get so creative.. So what do you know about the process of finding and applying? What can you share?
Bridget: Yeah, I think it's a matter of I think you have to have grit and you and persistence. And you have to do a thorough search. And you have to talk to everybody you know, and tell them you have a TED talk, and you're looking for a venue. And for me, it was just through the avenues of people I knew and I gave it at the university where I was teaching. But I've talked to lots of people who just were really aggressive, assertive about going out into communities, googling where TED talks are happening, talking to everyone in their networking community. A lot of people say it came through someone they knew or some connection they had, but that they didn't initially necessarily know that that person had a connection to a TEDx conference, right? And so you gotta be a big mouth. You gotta tell everybody.
Anna David: So do recommend deciding this is my TEDx talk and writing it out and memorizing it before applying?
Bridget: Yeah, I do and have a catchy title, have a timely topic, I don't think you have to, I think it's great. If you can do that. I don't think you have to have it. 100% fleshed out. In fact, a lot of what I do as a coach when I coach TEDx speakers is give me kind of a rough outline of their talk. And I can really, really help them flesh it out. We talked about this before Anna, but you know that I'm big on stories. And people, they come with an outline of all this, these are the things I want to teach people, these are the points I want to make. And then I help them say, no, no, you're gonna do that through storytelling, because the most popular TED Talks have lots of stories and your TED talk has been testing stories and your story about the homeless man, and all your experiences, you got to have your stories. So I actually maybe want to take back what I said and say, have definitely have your title, your topic, let be ready to let people know that is your area of expertise, but have it outlined and be ready to work with a coach or to even if it's just working with the people, you know, on fleshing out those powerful stories, because that's what people remember.
Anna David: Yeah. And by the way, one of the places where I got in, they were like, I've got my talk, and here we go. And they go, “no, no, no, no, no, we want to help you come up with the talk”, right? That was the only TEDx place where they actually had coaches where it was like free coaching. Yeah. But most aren't going to have that right?
Bridget: Some do. I mean, mine did, but I was the coach. Not only the responsibility of giving my talk and being ready and being the first speaker of the day, but to actually coach all of the other speakers. So in some TEDx conferences, do they bring in someone as a volunteer coach, or they have the funding, they'll pay for a coach, but many don't, from what I understand. Yeah.
Anna David: Okay, let's say you have a book and you go, I want to make this into a TEDx talk. How do you start and we can take some of my clients as examples. And I've had a few clients that have done it, but like, Okay, I'm thinking of a client, who wrote a memoir about growing up Mormon in this crazy family and unraveling different aspects of it. How do you take a story like that and go, Okay, I'm gonna make this into a 10 or an 18 minute talk. What do you do?
Bridget: I think You pull out what you think the beauty of having such a short time is you get to pull out your most powerful material. So I'm a big fan. Maybe it's because I taught public speaking for so long, though, right? But of having like your two or three key points like what are they real? Remember that people forget 25% of what you say two days later, I'm sorry, forget 75% of what you say. So people will forget 75% of what you say two days later, this is based on the communication academic literature. So what they'll remember is the key points, like, that person helped me understand that happiness comes from within, it doesn't come from external circumstances, right? They'll take away a key point. So you want to be clear from the get go from your 200 or 300 page book, whatever it is, like, what are their two or three core points that people will take away that will be most meaningful and most memorable? That's where you have to start?
Anna David: So my key point, you know, is that like, you know, you never really know your family or something like that. Do you cry? So you decide what the two or three key points are? And then you find the best story to illustrate?
Bridget: Yes, exactly. That would be my order, I would truly recommend it. And I think the title, like, really makes sure your title is catchy, intriguing, but also a really good indication of what people are going to get out of it. I don't think people like when the title has nothing to do with what the talk is actually about. It can be, you know, I know like your title, how were your labels. I love it, because it is what you talk about. But there's a little surprise about where you're going with it. So I like that. But I also think it's important for people to have some inkling of what they're gonna get out of it. It's like a teaser, right?
Anna David: Well, I'll tell you the absolute truth about my talk, and listeners I'm telling you to, I hired somebody to write that talk, which is shocking to us inside. This is all I've ever done is right. But I couldn't figure it out. I wasn't taking a book and making it into a talk. I wish I had, it would have been much easier. And I hated what they wrote. But they came up with that title. And I liked the title. In retrospect, now that this is years later, I know so much more about titles, and mostly from learning about book titles, that no, no, no, you have to give more of an indication in it. Because the competition is so fierce. So would you recommend, I don't know, key words, or just like how do you know what to put in the title?
Bridget: Yeah, so my title is How Public Speaking Will Change Your Life. And I'm actually happy with it. Yeah. Because I think it's why I have no paid advertising whatsoever, you know, 300,000 views, like people just found their way to it if they were searching for a TED talk about. Yeah, so I did nothing to do that. So and I'm not I'm not I'm not bragging because there are people with millions of views. But I'm saying with no paid adverts with nothing, I like literally just did it and wanted to have it and didn't do anything with it really. So people found their way to and I'm really happy with that, because it is about public speaking. It is about how to overcome the fear of public speaking and embrace public speaking in your life and your career and to feel good about it. And to see that it's a gift to the world that you have some kind of gift to give the world so I'm really happy with the title. The only thing I would say for you and I right, you probably agree is I would have had addiction in the title somehow. But the thing is that I do like that kind of peeking people's interest. I weighed myself because I know you and I know your story. When I saw the title, I was like, Oh, I can't wait to listen to that. Because I know what it's really going to be about what kind of labels she's talking about. So it can work for you, really you have to play with it, I think but I do. I do agree with you, Anna, that like, make sure your title gives people a clear indication of what it's really going to be about what they're going to get from it. So I had to have public speaking in my title.
Anna David: Yeah. And you know, to be clear, my mind doesn't have nearly doesn't have anywhere near 300,000 views. So it's like, it's wonderful if the people who know you are going to be interested, but it's not much more wonderful if people interested in your topic are going too.
Bridget: And I am telling you that that's because of my title. Yeah, I don't have nearly that many views or listens on, I have three podcasts and I have all this other stuff out there. And I really think it's because, one, it's the TED brand. And two, it's about public speaking. So people are searching for a TED talk on public speaking because it's in the name, remember that keyword, the SEO, the search, you know, all that all that really comes into play here. So back to you know, my recommendations have a really catchy title but a title that has the key words of what your talk is about. Have your two or three key core points and then anchor them in the most powerful stories that you can think of from your personal life. Anna, when you said to me that you had someone else write that really blew me away because it's so personal. And it's so you and it's so authentic and you're so vulnerable and open and real. I just love your talks so much. And because it's so us, it speaks to how you can get so much as you can even now to someone, right, and you probably didn't use what they wrote, but it was a starting point for you. If you can afford to get someone to write your speech, you can afford a coach, go for it, because you're still going to end up with your authentic piece of work. Yeah, why not get that help to give you something to start with? And to give you something to work from?
Anna David: Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't recommend, well, now it's so different. Like this was a place where they were like, we've done talks for everybody, but nobody wants to admit that they have their talks written. So we can't tell you who and so I don't even think it was like that legitimate right dinner party told me about it. But what was helpful is they had a questionnaire and the questionnaire had a lot of personal questions. And you know, and so it got me thinking about it. In the end, I would say to anybody, don't do what I did, hire a professional. Write the talk yourself, right.
Bridget: And you can write it in collaboration, much like you do with books. Anna, you know, I say the same. I tell people about you all the time, like recommending you. If you want to have a book out there. You don't have to do it all yourself. Yeah, to do. You don't have to do a lot of it. If you want to get full service work with someone like Anna's company. But same thing with a TED Talk. I've had many people come to me and say, Can you write it for me? And I say no, absolutely not. But let's sign up for 10 coaching sessions. And we'll write it together. And it'll be amazing. Because you're gonna tell me and what I've done. It's the most fun coaching because I'm like, Okay, tell me your stories. Tell me what you most want people to know. And we write it together. And they're so happy at the end.
Anna David: So how does that work? So they show up? Does it have to be 10 Sessions?
Bridget: No, but this is what I typically recommend when someone is starting with nothing.
Anna David: Yeah. You're starting with a book, maybe five sessions?
Bridget: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I would say at least two or three, you know, but I've also had people come to me. I've actually had people come to me, when they have the whole thing written, practiced. They have their TED Talk, they've practiced it with a million people, and they just want to do one session to get my take on it. My feedback, and that's great, too. So anything? Yeah, absolutely any level of service, which you offer as well, many different options there.
Anna David: So you know, talking it out with somebody, and then how much of it is written and how much is bullet points?
Bridget: You know, it's interesting, because I am a fan of writing the whole thing out nearly for a TED talk only for a TED Talk. When I taught public speaking for 28 years, I'll say, it was always bullet points. It was like Do not write out your talk because you're giving it in front of this live audience for just this one time and it's a small intimate group and you can just be yourself. Just have your bullet points and speak naturally, speak extemporaneously or conversationally, right. That's always my recommendation for most talks, but with a TEDx talk, given the stakes, the gravity I have to say honestly, you know, going in knowing Ted now owns this, you have no rights to it. You 're gonna put it online forever for you know, in perpetuity. So you want to have it be as close to perfect as you possibly can. So yes, write it out word for word. But the challenge with writing out word for word is you really have to practice and rehearse so that it sounds natural and conversational. Nobody wants to hear you read your speech.
Anna David: Yeah. Yeah. So okay, so you write it out word for word. And then do you recommend I mean, one thing I do is I will tape record myself and then play it back, do recommend doing that?
Bridget: I do exactly the same thing. Yep. record myself or just I have a PDF reader. So I can just have the words written now you can whatever technology works. We also recommend videoing yourself, recording yourself and looking at your body language and your movements. Is there anything awkward going on there? It's really important to have an awareness of how you're carrying yourself, your voice, your pacing, eliminating those vocalized pauses, hums and ahhs. All of that is work that I do with people and then I had to do myself as well.
Anna David: So let's talk about your talk. How many times do you estimate you’ve practiced it?
Bridget: Oh my gosh, practiced? Oh my gosh, I don't know. Maybe 100. I mean, maybe 50. I don't even know. I mean, I just listened. I definitely listened to it over and over hundreds of times, because why not? You're driving in the car, running, exercising. You're cleaning your dishes, washing your dishes, doing your laundry, you could be listening to it over and over. Right? Well, maybe 25 Maybe 50. It's really hard to say Yeah, and I did. I practiced it over and over.
Anna David: Until you're so sick of it.
Bridget: Yeah. Do you know how many times you did?
Anna David: No. I have no idea but like How do you keep it fresh? You know, when you're like, I'm so sick of hearing myself say this sort of thing, you know, how do you do that?
Bridget: You don't think you can keep it fresh for yourself. I think when you're in front of the live audience now I know a lot of people are doing type two TED talks, virtually now, I was lucky mine was before COVID. So it was with when you're in front of that live audience, and you look at them, and you see that they're hearing it, they're there and excited to hear it for the first time. That energy naturally is sparked in the moment.
Anna David: Yeah, yeah. So you just resign yourself to being bored with it and being like, well, and maybe you can pretend you're someone new, almost like an exercise? Or an audience member? So the order is, look at your book, you know, find the key points, find the stories that match it, write an outline, either work with someone or write it out yourself. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that. And then start searching, you know, it is not yes, they do not make it easy to find TEDx talks, because there's no unified center. So it really is a lot of Googling and spreadsheets and going, Oh, okay. Some TEDx events make it really clear, submit, hear most do not? Most do not. And I say if this is your goal, say, you know, I know people who've gone to Amsterdam to give. But yeah, for me, I said, I'm willing to go anywhere in the state of California. And so I just applied to every one I could find in California, they each have different themes. They're very general themes. So you can kind of make your topic fit a theme.
Bridget: 100%. I believe any topic can fit any theme. Yes.
Anna David: And each place is going to be different in each place, tech is going to be different. I did a TEDx talk in an auditorium where you couldn't even hear me. It was like a, it was like an I mean, a frickin school auditorium. And then I did one that was really great. So understand that you cannot control how high tech or low tech an event is. Yeah, you could do some Googling to figure out if this is, you know, some of the TEDx stages are a much bigger deal than others. Do you know anything about that?
Bridget: I don't know that much about it. But I think you can research you know, thankfully, you can research. You can look at the TED talks from that conference. And you look at what their website looks like? What does it say just you really, it's where the grit and the persistence come in. If you're serious about it, and you have a book, you will get it, you will get a TED talk. And you will, if you're willing to put in the work and the time and research, you'll find a 10x conference that matches what you're looking for. But you've got to be willing to dig deep and do the research. And you can even reach out to someone like yourself, so many people reached out to me, through my TEDx talk, they thought you know, you can Google anybody and you'll find an email for them somewhere or a contact page on their website. people reach out to me all the time. Hey, I found your TED talk, I'd love to talk to you about it, you know how I can do one. So you can find someone's TED talk at that conference, try to find them, reach out and be like, Hey, can I get five minutes of your time to ask you about what it was like speaking at this conference? Keep persistent, be assertive, find out from all the people who you can potentially tap into to learn and pick. Yeah, maybe you're going to be in the lucky position of picking which one you would most prefer to speak at.
Anna David: Yeah, I mean, you can do what I did, which is I just did the same talk and a bunch of them which one of them yanked me out you know, said you can't do that but most don't care and if you were to decide. If you're going to the trouble of applying for all these and you get in, why not? Why not have this experience? Yeah, what about the actual talk? What do you recommend? Like you know, it's down to don't wear red or don't drink too much water?
Bridget: I would say just wear something that's comfortable that you feel great in whatever you feel you look your best in but that's comfortable for you to move around in. I regret wearing a tight skirt. You know, I would want something a little more comfortable but I love blue and I feel good and blue. So I knew from the get go that I was going to be wearing a blue tarp. So I don't wouldn't say don't wear red but I would say wear what you know you feel good and look good in Yeah, and get a good night's sleep if you can. That's so ironic because I didn't sleep the whole night before my TED Talk. So get a good night's sleep but if you don't then just Just be careful of your trash talk in your mind. Right so I didn't sleep all night. So I didn't couldn't change that. It was like you know what you can do. You can teach and you lead all day training programs with unknown sleep, you can do this, you can do this talk on no sleep, you'll be fine. You can get through it, you know. So make sure that your self talk I think is really affirming and positive, no matter how much everyone else tells you. Yeah, you're gonna do great. You have to be able to speak to yourself that way. And just take good care of yourself. Yeah, don't drink too much water, so that you're gonna have to pee right in the middle of it. Take care of your physical needs, make sure you're in good shape physically, emotionally, mentally, as much as you can. And really just tell yourself, you've got this, you can do it.
Anna David: Do you recommend going early and mingling with the audience? And do you do? Yeah,
Bridget: I do. I mean, if you can, depending on what's going on with your TEDx conference, I was lucky enough to be among many friends, because it was at the University where I had been teaching for many years. So I felt really good to get there early, and get hugs and talk with people and have people say, I'm so excited to hear your talk. But then I'm a big meditator. I meditate every day, sometimes multiple times a day. So I definitely needed to be able to pull away and find a quiet hallway and just sit and center myself and get quiet and do some breathing. Breathing. So if that works for you, if you know that works in your day to day life, to calm yourself and center and ground yourself and find a way to find that space for yourself.
Anna David: And did you have to apply? Was that awkward?
Bridget: Yeah, no, they didn’t, I was worried that I wouldn't get picked because they didn't want to be incestuous. And say, no, we want to have community leaders, they had student speakers as well at my conference. So I thought, well, they might not pick me because I'm a professor at the University and they figure I can get a TED Talk anywhere. But it ended up working in my favor. And I knew the curator of the TEDx talk. And I talk about that in my talk that, you know, net, we always say like, networking is everything. And it's who you know, and you know, you and I are people, people, people anyway, and I like, sincere, and we love connecting with people. But I got that TED talk because of connections, that I was always very conscientious about making real and deep and genuine connections with people in all of my circles. And I would not have gotten that TED talk if it weren't for that. And I didn't do it because of the TED Talk. Because I didn't know that this person was the curator of the TED conference when I got to know her. But it happened to work in my favor.
Anna David: No, what do you do if you're bombing? What the hell do you do? Can you reel it back in?
Bridget: Yes, you can always reel it back in. And I've always taught this in my public speaking training programs and courses, you've got to be able to read the room, you got to be able to read the audience. If energy is low, when you're looking out there, or you feel it, like pick up your energy, pull yourself together, manage your mind, so much of it is going to be the talk in your mind is like if you're bombing and don't tell yourself, you're bombing, just saying I'm feeling a little low energy, you know what, I'm gonna raise my volume, I'm gonna, like, do that inner work of talking louder and talking a little faster, maybe and telling that story with a little bit more oomph and passion and enthusiasm. You can absolutely turn it around in the moment. I have done that many times.
Anna David: I love it. Now, would you say that as an author, you're that much more likely to be able to book a TEDx talk?
Bridget: Yes, absolutely. You're applying like you're applying for a job? Yeah, they want people who have credentials, who are going to bring a bigger audience who are going to capture people's attention more, having a book is a huge advantage for you.
Anna David: And you told me this thing that you're like, nobody cares, did we? I can't remember if I said this on tape. Nobody cares that I was a professor for 26 years. But everyone cares that I have a book and a TEDx talk. And that's true.
Bridget: Absolutely. Absolutely. Whenever I'm introduced, it's the book and the TEDx talk that come first and I self published my book, I'll say that proudly, nobody knows. Nobody cares. I went through that process and got lots of support, like the kind of support that you provide, and, you know, books and the TEDx talk.
Anna David: And well how has having both of those changed your life and your career?
Bridget: Well in that way, I mean, I just want to elaborate and say they give you credibility that you simply cannot find through any other activity you might do. You can be on a board of directors, you can be on the you know, in the leadership of your organization, which is great. I love doing those things. You know, I volunteer for a bit I'm involved in a million different things but you're gonna have credibility and that those that brand, like nothing else you can possibly do, but honestly, I'm not like and I didn't realize the extent of how much I would get this from it, but the the feeling of truly helped and people, like your TEDx talk was so meaningful and so powerful. And I know it's helped so many people, right? Who, who also identifies with being an addict and the empowerment that you brought to that talk, and I don't I have, we all have lots of labels. You know, It's so funny how your talk can be so meaningful and so deeply helpful and transformative for people who you wouldn't even think of, like your talk was so meaningful for me for a million reasons.
But because as you know, I have a transgender daughter. And that's a label that we have in our family, right? That is very scary to share with people, I have a transgender daughter, I've embraced it over the years, we, you know, we are out there in the world, educating people. But in the beginning, it was really, really scary to say that, you wouldn't necessarily think that in my TED Talk, where I openly talk about the label of being an addict. It's going to empower and inspire and transform all these people's lives who are going to hear this, who have totally different labels that I can't even imagine, right. So that's where I think it's going to be something of value in people's lives that they can't even imagine. That you're going to be giving a gift to the world that's going to feel so rewarding and meaningful and just profoundly deeply important to you in ways that you can't possibly feel before you ever have the experience of giving a TEDx talk.
Anna David: I love it. What a note to end on. So, Bridget, what's the best way? And so you guys are podcast listeners. So you have two or 3 podcasts?
Bridget: Three. Okay, so the most important, well, they're all important to me, my daughter and I the most popular for sure is my daughter and I have a podcast called Transgender School. And she identifies with three of the letters of the acronym LGBTQ plus. So we talk about sexual orientation and identity, we talk about gender identity.
Anna David: You talk about dog identity.
Bridget: My dogs are barking. So yes, we do talk about our dogs, talking about our dogs. It's very supportive. They want to be heard. And so please listen to that to be an ally, to be educated. It's not just for people in the LGBTQ plus community, it's for all of us, for everyone. It's so important for people to learn, and we're learning. And then my personal podcast is just me, my coaching podcast is called Growth and Gratitude. And I just started it. I'm just about to release my second episode, and I talk all about coaching, life coaching, executive coaching, we all have it and how to just live a meaningful and happy and rewarding life. And it's okay if it's not happy, and how to process emotion and feel sad, and just everything around living our lives fully and wholeheartedly as Brene Brown talks about. And the third podcast, which is on Hiatus, but we have 30 episodes, and I am so proud of is called The Right Questions, which is with my partner Todd, who's a fellow coach in my company, and we talk all about how asking ourselves the right questions in life leads us to the answers and where we want to go in life. And it's all about powerful questions, the power of questions. So those are my three podcasts, find them. They're free. They're out there, all of them. Also, we have the video of every single episode on YouTube. So you can watch us you can hear us there on all the podcast apps and I would love for people to find us and learn from us
Anna David: Also hire Bridget, you know, if somebody's interested in working with you on their talk, what's the best way for them to find you?
Bridget: Yeah, find me, go search for me. I have my coaching and consulting website called Sampsoncoachingandconsulting.com. We have transgenderschool.org. So find my website, you're welcome to email me. Both of those have contact pages, they go directly to my email, find me just google me, you'll find me I'm out there in a million different places. Bridget Sampson, Find me I would love to work with you and I do a free 20 minute consultation for anybody who wants to talk with me. Absolutely. I have time in my schedule for anything, any kind of coaching, any kind of training or I leave retreats, group experiences, whatever you need, we can chat.
Anna David: I love it. I will have links to all of that in the show notes. So Bridget, thank you so much. And you guys, thank you so much for listening. Go get your TEDx talks.
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June 15, 2022
How to Get a Journalist's Attention with HARO Creator Peter Shankman
Peter Shankman is many things, among them a five-time best selling author, entrepreneur and corporate in-person and virtual keynote speaker who focuses on customer service. But in this episode I got him speaking about something so many of you ask me about: HARO, or Help a Reporter Out...the website he started (and sold to Cision many years ago) that helps so many authors get featured in mainstream media.
In this conversation, which happened in rapid fire while he was in the throws of salmonella, Peter shared with me how he started HARO accidentally, the best way to get a journalist's attention and why someone stealing a Yoo Hoo truck ended up being the best PR Yoo Hoo could get, among many other topics.
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TRANSCRIPT:
Anna David: Hi, Peter, thank you so much for being here.
Peter Shankman: Glad to be here.
Anna David: So in addition to being an author, you many times over, I consider you someone who has helped authors get coverage more than anyone else out there because the first thing I do, as anyone who listens to this podcast knows, is I say go to HARO when you're writing your book, because you are writing a book on this topic, therefore, you are an expert on this topic. So I say thank you on behalf of all authors, Peter.
Peter Shankman: You're welcome. It's nice to see something I created almost 15 years ago now. It's still very popular. So that's makes me happy every time I hear it.
Anna David: More popular than ever, it seems like.
Peter Shankman: Yeah, people tend to keep using it. There's always a part of me that wants to buy it back. But they can't go back again.
Anna David: Well, and also there are these poor imitations that I have tried, and I'm just saying, they just they suck in comparison. I'm not naming names. So tell me about the inspiration to start HARO. How did that happen?
Peter Shankman: So I talked to everyone I have massive ADHD. And when you imagine ADHD, you talk to everyone and if I'm on a plane, and you're next to me, unless you fake your death, I'm gonna know everything about you by the time we land. And so over time, you know, just growing up and living in New York City and Boston and California, I created this massive Rolodex. If anyone listening to you is under 30, a Rolodex like Outlook that has cards, and you turn it. And I came with this massive Rolodex of 1000s and 1000s of people and journalists. I ran a PR firm at one point in my life and journalists knew me and they knew. Peter, you know, I'm doing a story on whatever, who do you know, who does? I tell them, ya call this guy or call that guy.
And over time, more and more journalists are calling me asking me hey, I'm doing this or whatever. And the straw that broke the camel's back was I'm calling for the Wall Street Journal, a friend of mine at the Times said that, you know, a lot of you I'm doing a story on African farming. And my friend said, you have a lot of friends that are subsaharan soil experts. And 12 hours later, I found a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend at USC who knew someone, right? So it's alright, this is getting a little ridiculous, maybe if I, what if I put all the queries together and send them out automatically. And you know, that led to what is now Help A Reporter Out.
Anna David: That is amazing. So my personal experience with harrow is the very first time I used it, I wrote a two line thing. And suddenly, next, I'm quoted in Fortune magazine, I ended up being quoted millions, you know, dozens of times by that writer, then I have written elaborate, amazing things like blogs that are super random, and I never hear back. So what is the secret? Is it just a numbers game?
Peter Shankman: I think it partially is a numbers game. But more and more across the field. I think it's about an early response game, you know, think about this when the Herald was at 545. In the morning, by six o'clock, there are at least 100 people that have sent in a response to every single query. And so if you're smart enough to know your answer, you need to do a couple of things, you need to make sure that your response is quick and to the point, and is easy. You need to make sure that you can write in such a way that the reporters are willing to use the answers to all the questions they have without wasting their time. Most importantly, that you haven't done it quickly. So I mean, the best recommendation I can give, create a mock write up of what you would send with some key parts left blank. And those key parts are usually with reporters going to ask. And so you know, my name is Peter, I recently found a company called blah, we do blah, based on your query about blank. I think I'd be the perfect person to answer the question of what is blank, because our company, blank, and you know, that gives you that much more to work with and you can really read the Harrow, fill it out and send it within three minutes. The speed game, a lot of the speed,
Anna David: It goes up at 5:45 East Coast time, right.
Peter Shankman: 5:45 am East Coast, 12:45 pm East Coast and then 5:45 pm East Coast. Yeah, I have a friend of mine on the West Coast who paid me a compliment when she goes, I know I've been awake too long on the West Coast when I get Peter's morning HARO before I go to bed.
Anna David: I know that's my recommendation to you in California. It's just staying up all night. You'll be the first.
Peter Shankman: Well there are people who set their mailing program on their phone to have the Harrow act as an alarm. And so they wake up at 5:45 when it comes out so they can review it and answer it. Yeah, there are some junkies out there.
Anna David: What I think is really genius about it is, you know, I started in journalism back when we would never have conceived of taking emailed answers as a quote and tie and it just changed. Did you understand that that was changing? Or was that just a lucky break?
Peter Shankman: I started my career. I mean, I was a journalism major in the early 90s. And then when I'm starting my career, my first job in a school was I helped found the Newsroom in America Online. And I watched digital news be born. And I watched the birth of digital news between the US and MSNBC. People don't realize that MSNBC actually served from Microsoft NBC, and it was a Microsoft NBC joint venture. And we launched a newsroom in the height of the dot com boom, well, not the height of the dot com boom, but back when the dot com boom was first gaining its legs in the mid 19, early mid 90s. And some of the time the.com boom came around. I mean, do you remember something called Point cast? When cast? Was this this screensaver that would turn on and bring you information? Right? bring you news to your screen while your screen is off, right?
While your screensaver was on. So you know, all I saw was where it was going. And I saw more importantly, that for every new bit of technology that was impacting journalists negatively, journalists are consistently having to do 10 times more with five times less or bite or scratch that reverse. And so for me, I'm like, Well, what can I do? I always had my job as a PR person back when I did PR isn't to make a client happy to make a reporter happy, they make the reporter happy, the clients I'm having by default. So what can I do to make that client happy? And for me, that was always offering them information, I didn't necessarily need to pitch them. And that was really the foundation of HARO. So the concept of being able to help a journalist do more with less, is really what sort of blew it up.
Anna David: And you also have a book about how to, one of your earlier books was really about how to, you know, kind of awesome PR sort of stunts, would you say?
Peter Shankman: Yeah, my first one was called, Can We Do That? It was all about outrageous PR stunts and how they can benefit your company.
Anna David: So how has it changed now? Do you have to be more outrageous today than when you wrote the book?
Peter Shankman: You know, it's funny. I'm talking about on CNN and MSNBC, and a lot of what they call me for back eight, nine years ago, they used to call me when when companies or people did stupid shit, when they took a PR stunt too far, when a celebrity said something stupid. With the invention of Twitter, and the dumbing down of America, and you know, our previous president, things like that, the bar for what stupid things actually are, has dropped, or has raised I guess, depending on how you look at it. And I don't get caught about that anymore, I get called about other things. But you know, a company making a stupid statement might gather two seconds of screen time when 10 years ago gather 10 minutes worth. So you have to ask yourself, you know, where is the bar? You know, it's the same thing with customer experience, the customer service bar is so damn low, that I don't need you to be awesome anymore.
I need you to suck slightly less than everyone else. And the same thing sort of applies from a PR standpoint, there are so many bad pitches going out every single day in the media, that I don't need you to be awesome. I need you to just get the facts right, get them to the right journalist and get their name right. I will, you know, my two favorite stories, one which happened a couple days ago. And quickly is my new favorite story, as I was in the Omni Hotel in Florida two days ago about to give a keynote. Yesterday actually, I was about to give a keynote. Ming you, I was doing this with salmonella, so I wasn't happy to begin with. And I couldn't get online and I called the front desk. I'm like, “Yeah, my like, well did you enter your last name, and your room number in the bottom. I'm like, “yeah.” “Are you sure you are spelling your last name right?” “Well, it's been my last name for almost 50 years. So I'm pretty sure I got that part down, thanks.”
You know, and then the other one my favorite is, you know, last Mother's Day, I got a pitch. I still get tons of pitches all the time from the media. And I got one last Mother's Day. Dear Peter, we know that working moms like you have it tough. So you know that if that's where the bar is, I don't need you to be awesome. I need your walk crossfire. That shifts hard. I don't need to do any of that. I just need you to [inaudible].
Anna David: I mean, you're preaching to the choir, this thing with hotels, like basically the companies that used COVID as an excuse to suck and never come back from sucking. Because they're just like, oh, no, we don't clean rooms anymore because of COVID. Sorry, sorry, what does that even mean?
Peter Shankman:: Yeah, I got the same thing. Yeah.
Anna David: So but in terms of a stunt that would work, you know, what kinds of things would you recommend? I mean, I'm looking at some of the things you talked about in that book. A small yarn shop that got people to eat their sweaters?
Peter Shankman: No, no, the small yarns shop, the best one for that. Well, yeah, that was made with a handsome Martha Stewart sweater, but the best one for the yarn shop was that we created. You know, the problem with the yarn store, they were just outside New York City, and when you’re just outside New York City, no one wants to visit you because you're outside of New York City, you might as well be in Wisconsin. And so what we did was we created a bus and we put two giant needles on the two giant needles and two giant balls of yarn made out of like, you know, plastic on the roof of the bus and drove around New York City picking people up taking them to the yarn store and bringing them Back called the Yarn Bus. And it was everywhere saying the show it was on Martha Stewart was all over the world. And they made a fortune. Because you know, they were the average spend, I think for every customer is like 200 bucks. And they're bringing like, you know, 300 customers a day, it was crazy.
Anna David: And so, so these PR stunts that you wrote about in the book, were they all once you engineered?
Peter Shankman: Yes.
Anna David: Okay, another one. You got CEOs to jump out of a plane in the name of brand visibility? Who is that for?
Peter Shankman: So that was actually for my PR firm. During the dotcom boom, everyone had a PR firm and it was trying to do better. And I'm like, Well, how can we get press that you know, what can we do to invite reporters and potential clients to do? Oh, a softball game, boring, picnic, boring, dance party, boring. Let's go skydiving, someone said. I don’t remember who. One of them. I mean, so 150 of us jumped on a plane. We called it a web dive 2000. We got a front page, tons and tons of press. My lawyer had a heart attack. When I told him what we're doing. It was incredible. And the best part about it was that the 150 people, 149 of them you know, jumped and had a great time. And I left it at that. Now I've wound up getting my skydiving license and I have over 500 jumps now. I've jumped over the Pyramids of Giza and all over the world. So yeah, it's pretty crazy.
Anna David: That was your first time though?
Peter Shankman: Yeah.
Anna David: And okay, another one: a stolen Yoo Hoo truck became a financial and media relations. Can you tell me about that one?
Peter Shankman: Yeah, we had a client. I was repping Yoo Hoo at the time. And we had a garbage truck that traveled around the country to go to the Warped Tour concerts in summer 2002. And they were followed by a truck with all the supplies, all the Yoo Hoo and everything like that. And that truck was stolen. And so we put in an APB offering a free lifetime supply of Yoo Hoo if someone found the truck, it was found in like 45 minutes.
Anna David: Oh, my God. So your brain, which as you've discussed many times, works really fast, just automatically thinks of these things. What do you think of something like that, that's going to be a stunt?
Peter Shankman: A lot of times, it's just understanding that, hey, this could be worth you know, I asked myself what I want to read about this, right? And that's really doing you should ask yourself, Is this something, if I didn't know, this company, if I wasn't attached to this brand, would I want to read this, but I want to take a look at what's going on with this interest me? And if the answer is yes, you know, why not give it a shot and see what happens?
Anna David: I mean, I think that that is the major problem. And I used to come at it this way. Like we think of our books as news. Our books are not news to anyone, no one cares about your book.
Peter Shankman: There is very little stuff that we do that could be considered news, very little. A lot of it is going to be the question of what is interesting enough to be worth the time of the journalist, because so few things are. So the question is, what can you find that becomes interesting to the journalist? What can you take a story that would otherwise be boring as shit? Repainting your conference room is not a story. Right? So what can you find that you can then take to the journalist? It's okay, this has some interest because it's not just about me.
Anna David: Right. So how have you used this for your books? Did you do stunts? So how did you promote your books?
Peter Shankman: Well, I mean, faster than normal. My most recent book, which is about ADHD, is the premise that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. And every media outlet I talked to, you know, thought of what they've been told, which is that ADHD is obviously a curse, it's a terrible thing to have. It's the worst thing in the world. But I cannot have a lot to say, actually, no, there's some benefit here. If you understand how to use your brain, and a better way, you can actually do pretty well. And you know, saying that, Oh, wow. Okay, never thought of it that way. Give me some examples at four or five examples ready to go at any given time, that changes things. So it really, it's a way of, can you make people think, a little different.
Anna David: And so it's not like you wrote that book with the concept like, Oh, this is gonna be really needed for journalists, this is what you know for books.
Peter Shankman: I wrote the book based on how I can help people channel their iterative gene and how they can use it to their advantage, but I understood how to pitch it because of what I do for a living.
Anna David: So somebody who doesn't have your contacts and doesn't, you know, but has a very creative brain and can think of saying, what would you recommend? Let's say they're like, I want to be on the mainstream media, and they've got a book about, you know, let's try to think of some kind of boring, I have no idea. Nothing is boring, adopting a kid. And they're like, this is my memoir. It's a really heartwarming story. How did they get media attention?
Peter Shankman: Well it's the human interest angle, right? You talk about, you know, I wasn't able to have children. And this was my journey towards eventually finding the child of my life, finding that child who changed my life is my journey of saving a child from abuse in Russia, whatever it is. You know, it's not just about her duplicate, where's the better part of that story? Where's the part that would make you go oh, wow, I want to read that. Where's that? You know, we have a very short attention span of 2.77 second attention span this country. So what can you do to make the reporter or the person or the reader stop and say, Okay, I'll give you more time?
Anna David: Yeah, yeah. And do you, I had a previous guest who said, "Oh, you've got to call journalists" because others never call a journalist.
Peter Shankman: No, you never do not. If someone called me right now and I wasn't expecting the call, I'd have them killed. No. There is nothing good about making a phone call. I mean, I can't believe I used to answer those things without knowing who was calling. I grew up in the 80s. The phone rang. Hello? No, no, do not email, text anything with the report. First of all, find out who the reporter likes to get their information. The best way to do that is to ask them how they like to get their information, they'll tell you and you use that way.
Anna David: So how do you ask them how you look on Twitter? What do you say?
Peter Shankman: Hey, curious, I got your email from the station or from wherever I'll have an idea for a story. What's the best way to pitch? They will respond and they will say "Oh, thanks for asking. Do it this way."
Anna David: Okay, so it's better to do that than just to go in for the pitch.
Peter Shankman: Oh, god. Yeah, make that first connection. Or follow them online. Hey, I saw this piece you wrote on XYZ. I loved it. I'd love to pitch you something similar. What's the best way to do that? Read their bios, a lot of time they'll write out what their bios are.
Anna David: Right. Right. And so you do occasionally, like you have a webinar coming up by the time this takes place, it's passed, on how to pitch journalists newspaper, TV, online, all of that. How often do you do these webinars? Can people just go to them?
Peter Shankman: Yeah, and actually, you know what you can actually even though it's, it'll be past when you run this, people can still buy the audio recording. So I'm happy to give you the link. So Shank.com/press.
Anna David: Yeah, I mean, even though the hotel doesn't know that Peter knows how to spell his last name. He does. He just proved it. So I'm just, I'm just looking at some of the things you're covering in that. What guarantees you'll never get a response from a journalist.
Peter Shankman: Pitching them the wrong way, pitching them off topic or complaining that they wrote a piece and you weren't in it, they're obviously mistaken.
Anna David: But you could write and say, I've actually done this effectively before, you can write and say I absolutely loved your piece. I'm going to not so humbly say, Hey, I also have a podcast about this topic or whatever.
Peter Shankman: Yeah, next time, if you ever do this again, once again, feel free to file this. If you ever do this again next time. Yeah.
Anna David: How To piggyback back off a great media hit. What's the secret?
Peter Shankman: Yeah, the secret is to grab that great media hit, figure out why it went, why it was a success and alternate it, and pitch it in different ways. There are different brands out there, if you got a great TV hit, how can you turn that into press, how do you turn it into written word, you know, blog format, maybe some want to follow that up with a podcast, whatever it is.
Anna David: I remember I had a publicist on this podcast who said to me, you could never get on a mainstream show first time out, you got to work your way up through local TV.
Peter Shankman: You have really stupid guests.
Anna David: I mean, that's weird, because my first TV thing was CNN. And so is that just someone who doesn't get how to play the game?
Peter Shankman: Yeah, first of all, anyone who says anything like, you'll never. I had a great teacher in school who told me that on a true or false test, if there's not a multiple choice test if the answer if one of the choices are at are usually never or always those usually wrong. Great piece of advice. So yeah, there are tons of ways to do better than that.
Anna David: Yeah, you can absolutely get on CNN or Today Show your first time out, if you want the right thing. I'm related to that, something I used to say, to like, you know, when your thought is always or never, it's not a true thought. A no, it's gonna be like, whatever it is. So that can be applied in many, many places. What are the best email subject lines to get responses?
Peter Shankman: It varies, but you know, for me, and I'm not giving away everything for the webinar, but I would say that I've had a lot of success with just being straight up a pitch on XYZ. You get, you should follow the NY Times pitch bot, it's pretty funny. They come up with some of the worst pitches possible to be sent in here at times. But you know, anything that you can do that's out there, you know, just figure it out. Again, don't waste a journalist's time.
Anna David: Yeah. I'll tell you in pitching you because I was just looking at the email. And this is how I pitch people I really want on the podcasts, I'll go podcast requests 950,000 Plus downloads, not a bad thing. You said yes, quickly.
Peter Shankman: I think at the end of the day, for me I don't mind doing things like this because it's good karma and [inaudible]. Yeah, I’m happy to help where I can, I think more people in the world should help.
Anna David: Great. Well, thank you so much for doing this while you don't feel well. If you could leave authors with one piece of advice, your final advice for them when they want to get media attention for their book or for themselves, what would you recommend?
Peter Shankman: One piece of advice. Don't focus so much on crafting a story about you, focus on what crafting a story that other people would find interesting that includes yourself.
Anna David: Great. I love it. Well, Peter, thank you so much, the best place for people to find you.
Peter Shankman: Yeah, my entire world is Petershankman.com. My social name everywhere is @PeterShankman, including Peloton. And yeah, reach out. I'm Peter Shankman. When it comes to my email, I'm always happy to chat.
Anna David: Okay, I'm going to find you on Peloton later today. Thank you so much. Thanks guys for listening.
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June 8, 2022
Approaching Your Book Like It's a Business with Bonnie Habyan
Bonnie Habyan is a communications marketing professional with an MBA in banking and finance. She's been a news reporter, a wedding DJ and even a Miss Baltimore Oriole.
But now she's taken on a whole new role: as an author. Her book, The World According to Bess, is a true love letter to her 90-year-old mother—a woman who can definitely give the Sh*t My Dad guy's dad a run for his money.
What surprised Bonnie the most about the book process is that, despite her history in marketing, launching a book is a whole new animal—an animal that requires as much of a plan as any other business...complete with KPIs, plans for how the book plays into ultimate business goals and much more.
So what has she figured out about a book business plan and what are her KPI's and plans? It's all in this episode.
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How Can I Use Social Media to Promote My Book?
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June 1, 2022
What Your Non-Fiction Book Needs with Elizabeth Lyons
Elizabeth Lyons is the creator of the Book Writing Accelerator and a five-time author whose first book, which she wrote because she couldn't find another book on the topic and really needed it, sold over 20,000 copies.
As someone who helps aspiring authors write and publish books, she's become a bit of my comrade-in-arms the past few years, where we regularly text each other questions, concerns and the occasional (or not so occasional) gripe.
We have so many feelings and thoughts about publishing, in fact, that in this episode we delve into beginners luck, navigating self-publishing and much more before we get to the meat of it: what to include in your non-fiction book. She breaks down how to start (you write a letter to your reader [genius!]), how to approach your Table of Contents and how to see it through to the end.
Did I mention she's a mom of five and super funny?
You'll like this one, I promise. (Who are we kidding, you like love all of 'em!)
USEFUL LINKS:
RELATED EPISODES:
The Debut of Launch Pad with Dave Chesson
Writing a Book in Public with Jesse J. Anderson
How to Write a Book Everyone Recommends with Rob Fitzpatrick
TRANSCRIPT:
Anna David: This is so long overdue. Would you not agree?
Liz Lyons: I would totally agree. It's so funny because right when you messaged me, I had been thinking the exact same thing, that I need to get you on mine.
Anna David: You came and spoke to my class. And I get that confused sometimes with oh, this person has already been a guest. But so we quote unquote, met early pandemic I would say. Where I noted your existence, and I did what I will sometimes do and I say, “I need to know this person.” So I reached out and I said, “Should we know each other?” And you basically said, “Yes.” Is that how you remember it?
Liz Lyons: I mean, who remembers anything from two days ago? Like I barely remember, did I eat breakfast today? I don't even know. But yes, that rings true?
Anna David: Yeah, it doesn't ring false.
Liz Lyons: It does not ring false.
Anna David: So, and I thought, Oh, my God, we do such similar things that we need to take over the world together or do whatever. And it's, and it's been glorious, on several levels, A, that we refer to each other, clients, because we kind of offer different ish yet similar things. And B, just to have someone to go to text and go, whoa, do you deal with this? Right? Yes, right. Yes, yes. Yes, I do.
Liz Lyons: And you know, what I love about it, too, is that we do similar things. And as you said, we do them slightly differently. And sometimes it's really reassuring, I think, in any space to recognize that at every there's a devil at every level, so to speak.
Anna David: Oh, tell me more.
Liz Lyons: Well, just meaning that it doesn't matter if you're offering a free course, a $47 course, a $1,000 course, a $25,000 package, $100,000 package, when it comes to just managing expectations, setting expectations, getting really clear about what a client is looking to do and whether or not you're the right person to help with that. It doesn't matter. Right? So you have packages at levels that I don't have packages at, and we still talk about some of the same things.
Anna David: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's, sometimes I just, I feel like I've sort of given you this talk, it's like, my, the, the people who pay the least are the most demanding, and the people who pay the most or the least demanding. And I don't know if it's part of some, you know, 8020 principle, or just that having clients is the most fascinating experience in expectations. What it's taught me is when I haven't been a good client doesn't actually do that to you, because I just had a surgery. And I try to think of it the way that my clients think of our service when they come in, they don't know anything about it. What I know, I forget they don't know. And so it's constantly knowing that what you're dealing with is people's fear around the fact that they don't understand. And they shouldn't because.
Liz Lyons: And that's what I say all the time. Because you and I both deal with incredibly, you know, successful, confident, and I don't just mean success in terms of their bank account. I mean, they know of what they speak, they are confident and who they are. They walk with a certainness to the whole thing. And yet, sometimes they feel like there's something wrong with them, because they can't figure out this book writing and publishing thing. And that's what I say all the time is why would you know this? Like, why would you know what the surgeon is going to do with your intestines? It's not something that you have an interest necessarily in spending time researching.
Anna David: Right. That's why you've hired us. So let's talk about your journey. Totally different from mine. Let's also talk about how you have five children and I really don’t understand, but go on. Okay, so it starts with you looking at, I want to publish a book, let me look into this traditional thing. What happened?
Liz Lyons: Kind of right. So it started with, you know, finding out I was having twins and always having wanted to write something, not being sure what was I actually capable or qualified to write. Because I didn't have a degree in writing and all the things that people back then this was 2002 said you had to have. So I find out I'm expecting twins and I want a book that basically doesn't exist. And so I think maybe I can write that. And the first thing I thought to do was go traditional because back then that was the only thing I mean, that was the only thing to do really. So I tried and I queried and I queried and I queried some more and everybody was like nope, your market's not big enough. That's all I heard and this was before Amazon, social media. It was just all based on the market. Like, how big is your readership? And the feeling was that because my readership wasn't in the potentially millions, that I didn't have a viable product? So I thought well, I don't like the word no, I've never liked the word no.
So I thought, well, how hard can it be? Right, famous last words. So I did go initially with I guess what you would call a vanity publisher, you know, and it didn't go great. Because as we were just saying, I didn't know what questions to ask. So when I was told things, like, we're going to do this for you. And we're going to do that for you. I was like, Oh, my god, that's amazing. Not really realizing what that meant. And didn't mean. And so it became clear very quickly that I was on the losing end of this deal. In this particular case, because I was, I was fronting all the money, which is a fine business model, in my opinion, for book publishing, or really anything else. But they were keeping still, like 70% of the profit. I couldn't figure that out. So, it just didn't make any sense. So I quickly cut ties with them, and then started all over on my own. And that's where I figured out step by step by Google and then it did well.
Anna David: It's interesting, I was just reading Jane Friedman's hot sheet. And there's been this huge exploration of what they call hybrid publishing, which hybrid publishing means two things. It's what we do, where people pay us in order to do the work for them. And it's also when you pay somebody, and they take a percentage, and nobody in this report has any judgment about what we're doing. But there's great judgment about that model.
LIz Lyons: And I agree, I'm not gonna lie, I have great judgment about that model. And that's exactly why I don't run my publishing house that way.
Anna David: It seems like a terrible idea, even from a business standpoint for them, since most books sell 300 copies, because they’re setting themselves up for people to be upset.
Liz Lyons: Not only that, the accounting end of it, the administrative end of it for the publishing house, I have to imagine is insane. Because I know what it is just for my books, yeah, I'm just checking my own personal books, the books I've written and published and what they're earning on all the different platforms each month, and some pay 90 days and some pay at 30 days. And then there can be returns, if you're with, you know, IngramSpark, and you therefore are distributed to bookstores or whatever. And so all of those things come into play, and to figure out what you owe an author number one, and number two, for the author to look at that report and have confidence that it's correct. And I'm not suggesting that it's not correct. I'm just saying that I know, having worked with a wonderful distributor way, way, way, way back in the day before Amazon, to get my books in bookstores, I would get their report at the end of the month, and we could not figure out if it was even right.
Anna David: Right. I'm very challenged with reports and numbers anyway, so I don't even try. I've never looked at my book sales ever, ever, ever. I just take a check if it comes. So okay, you get everything back from this company, and you figure out all the things which back then must have been extremely challenging.
Liz Lyons: Extremely. Yes. I mean, that's an understatement. Because it was really, I don't even know if I was just a masochist or extremely determined. Because when I think back now, there's so many resources, they're almost too many resources, which is an opposite end of the spectrum problem for people. Because you can google deep dive all day long and never really know which approach you quote unquote, should choose. And so but that's what I did is I just kept diving and figuring it out. What's an ISBN? Do I need an ISBN? These people are saying, I don't need an ISBN. Does that feel valid, you know? And really just finding out to be honest, who my mentors in the space were, like, who, who's who was I listening to? And then if I trusted them, and I did, I took their advice, and I went from there and if it worked, it worked. And if it didn't, I pivoted again.
Anna David: Then was Jane Friedman, the only voice or she wasn't even there doing it.
Liz Lyons: Yeah. Back then I didn't know of Jane Friedman. And it's funny. I am so excited to see the hot sheet in my inbox this morning. So I learned about Jane Friedman, probably six years ago because I think Jane and I don't want to speak for her. But I feel like she's pivoted a little bit. She was very much more in the traditional space, puzzles and things like that. And that's not the space I've ever been in. Because ever since going indie in 2005 I suppose. I don't follow some agents now because I'm still interested in what's going on in the traditional space. I follow Jane, Jane is an absolute unbelievable wealth of information.
Anna David: Future podcast guest, just secured her.
Liz Lyons: Oh, good for you. She's, she's remarkable, remarkable. And, one of the things I really like about Jane...this is going to become the Jane fan show...is that she sits fairly squarely in the middle, like, she doesn't tell people you should do this, or you should do that. She just presents information as it becomes available to her. And I really respect that.
Anna David: It's funny, because when I first stumbled across her, you know, my big, my big heartbreak and publishing was when Judith Regan was fired, you know, she acquired my book for a lot of money. It's all exciting. And then she's fired by a woman named Jane Friedman, who was right under Rupert Murdoch at Fox. And who now I think does audiobooks. And like, she was the focus of my ire. Because it's like, I'm not gonna focus on Murdoch. And so it was like, and then I discovered Jane Friedman's an expert on publishing. I mean, literally for five years. That's who I thought it was.
Liz Lyons: That's funny. That's a great story.
Anna David: Oh, I wrote a piece that she published on her site. And when I pitched her I was like, by the way, I thought this was you for a long time. So who were the following back then? There were those dudes, there's that JT something like there was a guy that really made a lot of headway. He made a lot of money as an indie author. And he was one of the first I can't remember his name, people I discovered. Sorry, what his name was Barry, something.
Liz Lyons: Oh, that rings a bell, though. So Admittedly, I had blinders on. So I don't even remember, because to call them my mentors actually is probably a little bit of a misstatement, because it's not like I was following. Nobody had newsletters back then, we didn't have social media. I wasn't following anybody. It's just per se, when you did a Google search on, how do I know if I need an ISBN, for example, there were certain websites and resources that would always come up at the top of the Google search. And so I became uber familiar with those. And one of the first people that I started following very seriously, although this was probably after I had done at least two books, and maybe three of my own was Dave Chesson. Because he too, is just an absolute wealth of not just information, but tactical, like, here's how you do this.
Anna David: Yeah. I love him. You know, he writes his books under another name, because he told me he was the first guest I had when we switched this podcast to being about books. Because he's like, Well, I don't want to exploit the fact that I have a name in publishing. Bow down to him, it was Barry Eisler. I just Googled.
Liz Lyons: That name is very familiar.
Anna David: Yeah. And it's saying he turned down half a million in publishing contract for two books, and then went and did self publishing. And it's, you know, been terribly successful. So you figure it out, and you publish your book, and what happens, your first book?
Liz Lyons: So I published my book, and in my opinion, really, nothing happened, to be honest, because we didn't have Amazon. We didn't have anything. I didn't have an agent or a publisher telling me oh, these are your required sales. I was just getting a check every month and it wasn't earth shattering. It wasn't tens of 1000s of dollars, but it was, I mean, I was at that time, a mom of, I don't know, a four year old, two year old twins, and I think I was pregnant with the next one. Like, I was happy for anything, but it was more than anything. Right? I mean, you know, it was like, Okay that’s interesting. I mean, it was four figures. It was in the low four figures every month. And it was like, wait a minute, like, I'm not promoting this. I'm not, I don't understand. And so I didn't really have a handle at all on what the sales numbers were until several, probably years later, I had hired a publicist who was helping me get on radio and local TV and mostly radio. We didn't have podcasts yet.
And she mentioned a girl to me by the name of Jenna McCarthy, who is well, now she's in Texas, but at the time she was in California. And somehow she connected the two of us because Jenna had just written a book called The Parent Trip that was released by one of the big five traditional publishers, and she said, you know, you guys are so similar, you should connect. So Jenna and I connected. And then Jenna was mentioning my book to her agent at the time. And her agent went into Bookscan, out of curiosity, and said, “Oh, my God, she has sold more books than most of my clients who are traditionally published.” And at the time, the number was like 25,000 copies or something like that. And I was like, really? I was like, okay, and what's interesting about that, though, Anna, is that if that had been one and done, if I had only done that book, I would be sitting here telling you a very different story, because I'd be sitting here going, it's easy, right? Write a book with a niche market, and you just put it out there and it just goes.
Anna David: Don't you think the universe just doles these out usually in the beginning of our careers? Oh, it's like, I wonder if I'd never thought about this. Just the gateway drug. The universe is like, we're gonna give you this and you don't realize this is your blessing. You're like, I've always kind of deserved this. So here we go with my career. Right?
Liz Lyons: Right. I am raising all these children. Come on, I deserve something. Yeah. That's an interesting perspective. Because, you know, when I did Book Two, it was the sequel to book one. Book one was Newborn Twins, First Year with Twins. Book Two was Toddler Years with Twins. And so that was a natural, it didn't sell as well as the first but it sold well. Then I did three, total flops. Now, in my opinion, here's why. Same market, same demographic, but the demographic wasn't just moms of twins or multiples. It was all moms. So now I was competing with Stephanie. I can't remember her last name right now.
Anna David: Yeah, Baby on Board. Stephanie. She's a friend of mine. Taylor, Stephanie. Or something?
Liz Lyons: Yes, Sippy Cups are Not for Chardonnay. Yeah, it was the book that came out right around the, plus Jenny McCarthy, she had her books, every but all the celebrities and the people had their books coming out. And they were on the Today Show and what was mine? Right? Am I alright, no press. I had no not so and I had no email list.
Anna David: That's interesting. You know, we always talked about the riches are in the niches. I always thought of it like, you know, what I really learned from Ryan Holiday, which is you drill down on a niche, and then that those people feel that there's a book that's written precisely for them. So they start recommending it, but I actually hadn't thought of it that your competition grows to the most popular authors that exist if you're not niching down.
Liz Lyons: Well, and to be fair, because I'm kind of comparing apples and oranges. If I had known how to communicate with the 30,000 people, you know, who had purchased the first and or the second book, I could have sold a lot more books. I mean, Ryan Holiday, who I think is magnificent, has always been more, back then and sometimes even now. But back then I didn't have a business mind about being an author. I wanted it to sell. And I liked the check that came in and I felt creative. But again, I was raising four very young children. So I wasn't thinking about what I have loved to get on the Today Show or do something with it. And did I try to do it absolutely. But I wasn't. I wasn't as knee deep in it, as I am now. And even now, to be honest, my knee deepness is not about promoting my own books. It's about helping other people write theirs.
Anna David: Exactly I mean, I don't know about you, but I basically write books in order to stay on top of the latest and try techniques out that I can try on clients. Do you think that's an interest?
Liz Lyons: That's very interesting. Yeah. I mean, when I wrote my last book, The fifth one, it was really something I wanted to say because it was something that I was experiencing as an entrepreneur. And it was a bunch of stuff that had been on my mind for a while that I had figured out how to think about differently and have a different perspective on and and I wanted to say, but I do think a lot now that I'm book coaching, I think a lot now about how did I write all those books? You know, what was my process for doing that? And I incorporate that.
Anna David: What I think that you said that's really interesting is that, you know, it has to be something you're interested in exploring when I was on the traditional publishing, like God do a book a year path. I was writing about stuff I didn't really care about, which is crazy to me. And I released this podcast episode today with Paul Angone and he was just talking about, you have to be so passionate about this, that you're willing to talk about it for years and focus for years. And I have written books where I don't feel like that at all.
Liz Lyons: Well, because, and here's the thing is that from, admittedly, I've not been traditionally published, but from what I understand it, because I know a lot of people who have, it's more of a business over there. You know, it's like, what cover will sell what content will sell what voice will sell what topic will sell what controversy will sell. And so that's why sometimes people, not all authors, but some authors get quote unquote roped in to writing a book that they're not super passionate about, or they write a book that they were passionate about. But then once the editor gets a hold of it, and makes it into what they think is marketable, all of a sudden, this isn’t even my book anymore, it doesn't feel like my book anymore. And therefore it's hard to talk about it and promote it. But that's something I stand very, very firmly on. And this is something you and I have talked about, and I believe I'm gonna let you correct me if I'm wrong, of course, but I'm pretty sure we share this opinion. If you're gonna write about, please let it be something that you're super passionate about talking about for as long as you're passionate about talking about it. If you decide in six months, or three years or 10 years that you don't want to talk about it anymore, totally fine. That's when your sales are going to drop off because somebody else is talking about it.
Anna David: And it's ironic. Well, I mean, when you said this thing about traditional publishing, it's more like a business. But I've never really thought about it like that. But the business is for the traditional publisher, because they don't think about it at all, as a business for the author, which is why they're capturing the email address. I mean, they're not really capturing email addresses with Amazon anyway. But the idea is, you know, when a book is finished, they don't want you to know, the number one thing that people want to do when they finish a book, if they finish it, is connect with the author, not connect with a publisher. Why would they care?
Liz Lyons: And that's what I say all the time. People don't buy books from publishers, so people will come to me and they'll say, Well, Elizabeth, I really want a traditional publisher. And the main reasons why people want a traditional publisher, in my experience, are they think there's a huge advance. Yeah, they think that there's huge marketing and connecting. And also they don't understand the timeline, they don't understand that it's going to be three years, if not more, depending on how long it takes to get the agent etc. But when they talk about marketing, I'm like, this is such a huge misconception, because people don't buy books from publishers, they buy books from authors, especially in the day of social media. Yeah, when you can actually connect with those authors. Nobody's out there connecting with Penguin on social media.
Anna David: I know. And it's interesting, Jennifer Armstrong, who I had on the podcast, who has a New York Times bestseller, she's like, I think you've got to just think of them as a printing service, you're just going to be disappointed if you think of them as more than that. So how did you start getting in touch with your readers and getting your newsletter subscribers and all of that?
Liz Lyons: Really, that started when social media started. And when there just became a way I mean, I went through all the like, rigmarole that we all hear about, you know, have a lead magnet and have the word funnel, I have a visceral reaction. And it's not good, because it makes me think of funneling cattle into a pen. But I understand what people are saying when they say it. And the idea is go out and find them, which is easier now than it's ever been, and then offer them a reason to stay connected to you, which is not in my experience. Like it depends on your genre to be clear. Yeah. So I don't work with fiction writers and their opportunities for connecting with readers are very different from nonfiction or memoir, because it's more character based. And it's more story based, whereas especially with nonfiction, it's more self development based.
Anna David: And it does seem like a massive generalization. It's far easier for certain genres of fiction writers to churn it out and to really have their business model be backlist and giving a perma free one book so that they get the series and all of that. And I do think it's much harder to churn it out, if you're doing nonfiction.
Liz Lyons: It's a completely different approach. Like you can almost look at it, I think of it. Most people don't realize that on Amazon, the paperback store and the Kindle store are two different stores. Even though they merged together, they are two different databases on Amazon. I think of this in the same way. When you're a fiction writer versus a nonfiction or a memoir writer, it's two completely different you're all writing books. But the approach to marketing and the like you said the perma free on the first one and then building up a backlist and getting people involved in the next character and doing pre orders and all those sorts of things, which is what people do very successfully in the fiction realm is wildly different from the nonfiction and the memoir realm. And especially in the nonfiction realm. So many of my clients, at least, are looking to build their business, which revolves around it's either based on their book or their book is an extension of something where they're already coaching, teaching, guiding whatever verb you want to use, to other people.
Anna David: Absolutely. And that's the same with ours. But wait, okay, I do want to go back to one thing. What do you think it was with your first book, just straight up beginner's luck?
Liz Lyons: You know what? The truth is, I don't know for sure. What I suspect. I don't think it was beginner's luck. I think that I hit without realizing it. I like that whole preparation meets opportunity thing. And it's like I hit the opportunity. Because there were no, there were, there were only a few books on the market about expecting twins to begin with. And they were all at the time quite like, your life is over. They weren't you know, and this was when Vicki I vine was really big with her Girlfriends Guide stuff, and honestly Anna, that's what I wanted. I was like Vicki, why couldn't you have had twins and written the girlfriends guide to twins, because that's the book I need right now. But she didn't. And so I just, I, I saw that as an opportunity. And I think that there happened to be a lot of people who wanted that. And the other thing was, it wasn't just book orders. Unbeknownst to me for a while there were hospitals ordering in bulk. Because they were running what was called Marvelous Multiples, which was a program that had been put together by a nurse who was also a mom of twins that was being offered by different hospitals. And the hospitals were ordering volume and giving the book to all of the participants in those classes.
Anna David: Don't you think that was your big thing? I mean, do you know how many sales there are?
Liz Lyons: I don't, I don't because the only way to get that information is through Bookscan. And even Bookscan is unreliable when it comes to off market stuff. Like it was all through the distributor I was working with. And I just if you had seen, I mean, my reports from a distributor every month, we're 15 pages long.
Anna David: Wow, So have you tried to reverse engineer that and be like, I'm gonna write a book that I know, institutions can bulk order?
Liz Lyons: I haven't because and it's an interesting question. And I guess the answer is because right now the answer is because that feels formulaic to me and I don't write in a formulaic, you know, I'm not.
So there are certain modalities that say, here's how you can figure out what kind of a book will sell, you can go out on Amazon and you can see what people are searching for. And if you know a lot of people are searching for this certain thing, then you know that if you write a book about it, it will probably sell well. But that is just an approach that has never felt good to me. I write, stuff just comes through me and. That's how I write.
Anna David: Interesting. I know I've read those things. I've read those and it literally be like, lots of people are searching for kids playing tennis. I've never played tennis, but I'm gonna write a book about that. That was really effective for a while. I will say I use it and I teach it which is you know your book and I mean, I got this from Dave Chesson. So start looking on Amazon to see how it auto populates because you're already reading the book. So include sections that people are already searching for. I do find that really helpful.
Liz Lyons: I find that really helpful too. And another thing that I find very helpful is recognizing what the keywords are that people are searching for and making sure that those are in not only your book description, but if possible, your reviews.
Anna David: Yes. By the way, your author bio, the whole thing, the whole thing? Yeah. So by the way, remember we said, Of course you remember it was yesterday, we're going back and forth about gotta find an exact angle for this episode. And of course, because we have so much to talk about, we really haven't gotten into the angle. Well, we're kind of verging on it now. Which is, what do you put in your book? That was the angle we decided, how do you basically come up with it? I don't know, your table of contents?
Liz Lyons: Yeah, I mean, you know, one of the things that I find, and I hear all the time holds people back from actually writing their book, because, you know, my clients are doing the writing themselves. So they are like, I have a story, I have something to share, I either have a story, like my life, or I have a process if we're talking about business. And sometimes there's a little bit of crossover. But where they get stuck most of the time is it's like, I'm so overwhelmed. So they do what's normally suggested or often suggested, which they do this big brain dump, and one of two things happens, either it's 75 pages long. And they can't figure out how to make it all come together with a nice bow. Or it's like four things. Because they're overthinking it. And they're trying to think through like, should I talk about that? Or should I talk about that?
Well, I don't know, have I been working on that long enough to actually position myself as an expert air quotes on it. And so that's where they get stuck in figuring out what do we should include? And what do we not include? And when you're ghostwriting, which you're intimately familiar with? Obviously, you guide them through that process of figuring out well, what is the you know, what is the table of contents, and I'm working on a ghost writing project right now. And that's something that had to happen was, you know, what are those, but that's where people get really stuck, and they don't progress from there. Because they come up with some story pun intended about clearly I shouldn't be doing this, because I can't figure it out.
Anna David: So how do you guide them? What's the process?
Liz Lyons: Well, it's different for nonfiction versus memoir. So nonfiction in my world is much more tactical. What do you want to say? First of all, what is the thing that your book is guiding people through? Because it's not a whole mess of things. It's not everything you've ever done? It's like, what do you want this book to help a reader overcome? And then what are the steps that you take people through? And more often than not, with that sort of a book? If the author is operating in integrity? They have gone through, that's the process they created for themselves? So it's like, take yourself back three years, five years, whatever it was, and identify what were the steps that really worked for you? What were the things that you needed to hear and know, back then? And then that's kind of where we start to get clear on that.
Anna David: I loves it. It was always interesting to me, when people differentiate between nonfiction and memoir, I was like, it is nonfiction. But you know, it's interesting. Rob Fitzpatrick, who I recently had on the show, was talking about how to book. How to versus memoir. Because really, that's what, that's what we're talking about. And so is there anything else about like, okay, take it back six months, five years, however long it is that you developed this process, and you're now explaining to other people, what do you do next? You go, okay, so for instance, I'm doing a book right now about how to plan and promote a book. So this is different, because I'm taking podcast interviews, and I'm doing it but like, how would we do that? How would you guide someone through that? You go, okay, so what was your starting point?
Liz Lyons: Exactly. You know, one of the things that I find very effective is for authors to write a letter to their reader first. And more often than not the reader is them, who they were three or five years ago. So essentially what you're doing is you're getting outside of yourself and outside of your I have to be you're getting outside of your perfectionist tendencies in order to say dear whomever name them if you want, here's what I know to be true about you. Here's where I know you are right now, here's what your fears are. Here's what's keeping you from moving forward. Here's what you're really really good at. But here's where you're stuck. And I have great news. Like again now we're going into like the typical copy editing stuff, but right or marketing, stuff like that. Good news is there's a path. And one of the things that's really important is that authors not hold themselves as the savior to the reader.
So all you're saying is here is a path, you're not saying here is the one and only path that takes the pressure off everyone. But here's the thing I want to share with you, my process that I use to get through this and/or, that I utilize, when I'm helping my clients, or however you do, whatever, get through this. And here's what we're going to talk about. And you start to get really clear, and you don't have to get into the nitty gritty of it at that point. But what you're doing when you do that, is you're creating the bubble. Okay. And then it just comes down to what goes into the bubble. Like you're creating the hub of the wheel, and what's in what's encapsulated in that hub.
Anna David: Do you have a certain set number of chapters that you recommend?
Liz Lyons: I don't, I think most nonfiction ends up between like 12 and 18 chapters, and it just depends on you know, I don't subscribe to a word count. I think anything under 40,000 words, or under 35,000 words is a pamphlet not a book, I’m kind of a stickler about that. Maybe 35,000. But I don't believe in adding words, just to add words. I think that when you're really connected to helping, that's what a book really is about, is serving. So when people come to me, and this doesn't happen much anymore, but and they say, Look, I just want to hit the bestseller list for five minutes, so that I can say I'm a best selling author, and that's going to sell me tons of books and make me millions of dollars and make me the sought after expert on every stage. That's not the right person for me, you know? Yeah, I know. You know, I know we share this. So when you're really looking to serve another person through telling your stories, it's not hard to get 40,000 words, 50,000 words or even 60,000 words. It's just not.
Anna David: But I know, on a personal level, I like reading shorter books now. I hate to say it, but I do.
And studies are showing because it just means you can read more, and some authors are just going on and on and on. I find self help has never been my thing. And it's like, I always feel like the first chapter says it and then the next 10 are repeating it. But that's me.
Liz Lyons: You know, I think that often is the case that often is the case. And if you don't have enough to get yourself to, you know, something solid, I mean, 80,000 words is such an old, old paradigm, because it's what was the average back in the day for traditional books, mostly fiction based. Yeah, or mostly, you know, fiction, but I think there's always an exception. So there are a lot of people who say, “well, I don't like to read long books.” And you have to kind of dive into why that is. Because when those people find a book, that's 250 pages long, that is just chock full of amazing information and stories. They read it. So it may not be that they don't like reading long books, it may be that they don't like reading repetitive nonsense, number one. And number two, if there's someone who wants to be like, well, I read a book a week. But in order to accomplish that goal, they know the book has to only be 97 pages. Well, then there's their motivation.
Anna David: Right. Well, okay, so we have to get to wrapping up. Do you have any final advice for somebody who, I guess who wants to write how to book, what they should do?
Liz Lyons: I mean, whether you want to write how to or memoir. And to be clear, the distinction between the two for me is that when you're writing what I call transformative nonfiction, or how to call it, whatever, you want to, you want the reader to take an action; there is a very specific action that you are giving to the reader with the hope that they may take it; when you're writing memoir, you are not attached to what they take from the story. Yeah, that's to me, is the difference. But I think it's really important, and I've always said this, to just understand why you really want to do it. And then what's the why under that? And you do the six layers or whatever deep of why? Because as with anything, once you really uncover why you want to do it and what you want to get out of it, you can execute it more efficiently. Whether that's write it yourself, hire someone to write it for you, write a 30 page ebook, do a novel, like whatever it is.
Anna David: I love it. So if people want to reach you what's the best way? And let's just also quickly say all your offers because you have courses you have coaching. Go.
Liz Lyons: So, I've minimized, I've simplified.
Anna David: So you still have courses?
Liz Lyons: I have one. Yeah.
Anna David: I think I've told you I'm so frustrated by trying to sell courses. It's just, you know, when the beginning of the conversation you were like, is this masochism or is this determination. That's how I feel about trying to sound like you guys, my Courses are so good. And you don't find them?
Liz Lyons: Yeah. And I feel exactly the same. And I know your courses. And you know mine, I get it, I think for me, so I have the book writing accelerator, which is my 12 week intimate group program. And it's a coaching program through writing nonfiction, or memoir, writing nonfiction, and memoir is an experience period. It's not something that in my world, we sit down and do on a weekend, it is a full on experience. And you're learning about yourself as you're as you're writing the book period. And then I have my course, the only course I have now, which is how to publish a book, how to self publish a book that can be sitting next to any New York Times bestseller and be indistinguishable and quality. So those are my two things.
Anna David: Well, so people can take those courses they can sign up for your coaching. You know, you just launch a few times a year?
Liz Lyons: I do the next one which launches in July. We start in July, and it goes for 12 weeks. And I usually do two or three containers a year of that. And then the publishing course IS evergreen.
Anna David: And then of course they can get your books?
Liz Lyons: Of course.
Anna David: And so where can they find you online?
Liz Lyons: The best place is Elizabethlyons.com. And that'll take people out to the course sites and the coaching site, wherever they want to go, but the hub is Elizabethlyons.com.
Anna David: Well, this has been such a delight. I'm so glad we finally did this. And you guys, thank you as ever for listening. Go find her. So good.
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What to Include In Your Non-Fiction Book with Elizabeth Lyons
Elizabeth Lyons is the creator of the Book Writing Accelerator and a five-time author whose first book, which she wrote because she couldn't find another book on the topic and really needed it, sold over 20,000 copies.
As someone who helps aspiring authors write and publish books, she's become a bit of my comrade-in-arms the past few years, where we regularly text each other questions, concerns and the occasional (or not so occasional) gripe.
We have so many feelings and thoughts about publishing, in fact, that in this episode we delve into beginners luck, navigating self-publishing and much more before we get to the meat of it: what to include in your non-fiction book. She breaks down how to start (you write a letter to your reader [genius!]), how to approach your Table of Contents and how to see it through to the end.
Did I mention she's a mom of five and super funny?
You'll like this one, I promise. (Who are we kidding, you like love all of 'em!)
USEFUL LINKS:
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The Debut of Launch Pad with Dave Chesson
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TRANSCRIPT:
Anna David: This is so long overdue. Would you not agree?
Liz Lyons: I would totally agree. It's so funny because right when you messaged me, I had been thinking the exact same thing, that I need to get you on mine.
Anna David: You came and spoke to my class. And I get that confused sometimes with oh, this person has already been a guest. But so we quote unquote, met early pandemic I would say. Where I noted your existence, and I did what I will sometimes do and I say, “I need to know this person.” So I reached out and I said, “Should we know each other?” And you basically said, “Yes.” Is that how you remember it?
Liz Lyons: I mean, who remembers anything from two days ago? Like I barely remember, did I eat breakfast today? I don't even know. But yes, that rings true?
Anna David: Yeah, it doesn't ring false.
Liz Lyons: It does not ring false.
Anna David: So, and I thought, Oh, my God, we do such similar things that we need to take over the world together or do whatever. And it's, and it's been glorious, on several levels, A, that we refer to each other, clients, because we kind of offer different ish yet similar things. And B, just to have someone to go to text and go, whoa, do you deal with this? Right? Yes, right. Yes, yes. Yes, I do.
Liz Lyons: And you know, what I love about it, too, is that we do similar things. And as you said, we do them slightly differently. And sometimes it's really reassuring, I think, in any space to recognize that at every there's a devil at every level, so to speak.
Anna David: Oh, tell me more.
Liz Lyons: Well, just meaning that it doesn't matter if you're offering a free course, a $47 course, a $1,000 course, a $25,000 package, $100,000 package, when it comes to just managing expectations, setting expectations, getting really clear about what a client is looking to do and whether or not you're the right person to help with that. It doesn't matter. Right? So you have packages at levels that I don't have packages at, and we still talk about some of the same things.
Anna David: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's, sometimes I just, I feel like I've sort of given you this talk, it's like, my, the, the people who pay the least are the most demanding, and the people who pay the most or the least demanding. And I don't know if it's part of some, you know, 8020 principle, or just that having clients is the most fascinating experience in expectations. What it's taught me is when I haven't been a good client doesn't actually do that to you, because I just had a surgery. And I try to think of it the way that my clients think of our service when they come in, they don't know anything about it. What I know, I forget they don't know. And so it's constantly knowing that what you're dealing with is people's fear around the fact that they don't understand. And they shouldn't because.
Liz Lyons: And that's what I say all the time. Because you and I both deal with incredibly, you know, successful, confident, and I don't just mean success in terms of their bank account. I mean, they know of what they speak, they are confident and who they are. They walk with a certainness to the whole thing. And yet, sometimes they feel like there's something wrong with them, because they can't figure out this book writing and publishing thing. And that's what I say all the time is why would you know this? Like, why would you know what the surgeon is going to do with your intestines? It's not something that you have an interest necessarily in spending time researching.
Anna David: Right. That's why you've hired us. So let's talk about your journey. Totally different from mine. Let's also talk about how you have five children and I really don’t understand, but go on. Okay, so it starts with you looking at, I want to publish a book, let me look into this traditional thing. What happened?
Liz Lyons: Kind of right. So it started with, you know, finding out I was having twins and always having wanted to write something, not being sure what was I actually capable or qualified to write. Because I didn't have a degree in writing and all the things that people back then this was 2002 said you had to have. So I find out I'm expecting twins and I want a book that basically doesn't exist. And so I think maybe I can write that. And the first thing I thought to do was go traditional because back then that was the only thing I mean, that was the only thing to do really. So I tried and I queried and I queried and I queried some more and everybody was like nope, your market's not big enough. That's all I heard and this was before Amazon, social media. It was just all based on the market. Like, how big is your readership? And the feeling was that because my readership wasn't in the potentially millions, that I didn't have a viable product? So I thought well, I don't like the word no, I've never liked the word no.
So I thought, well, how hard can it be? Right, famous last words. So I did go initially with I guess what you would call a vanity publisher, you know, and it didn't go great. Because as we were just saying, I didn't know what questions to ask. So when I was told things, like, we're going to do this for you. And we're going to do that for you. I was like, Oh, my god, that's amazing. Not really realizing what that meant. And didn't mean. And so it became clear very quickly that I was on the losing end of this deal. In this particular case, because I was, I was fronting all the money, which is a fine business model, in my opinion, for book publishing, or really anything else. But they were keeping still, like 70% of the profit. I couldn't figure that out. So, it just didn't make any sense. So I quickly cut ties with them, and then started all over on my own. And that's where I figured out step by step by Google and then it did well.
Anna David: It's interesting, I was just reading Jane Friedman's hot sheet. And there's been this huge exploration of what they call hybrid publishing, which hybrid publishing means two things. It's what we do, where people pay us in order to do the work for them. And it's also when you pay somebody, and they take a percentage, and nobody in this report has any judgment about what we're doing. But there's great judgment about that model.
LIz Lyons: And I agree, I'm not gonna lie, I have great judgment about that model. And that's exactly why I don't run my publishing house that way.
Anna David: It seems like a terrible idea, even from a business standpoint for them, since most books sell 300 copies, because they’re setting themselves up for people to be upset.
Liz Lyons: Not only that, the accounting end of it, the administrative end of it for the publishing house, I have to imagine is insane. Because I know what it is just for my books, yeah, I'm just checking my own personal books, the books I've written and published and what they're earning on all the different platforms each month, and some pay 90 days and some pay at 30 days. And then there can be returns, if you're with, you know, IngramSpark, and you therefore are distributed to bookstores or whatever. And so all of those things come into play, and to figure out what you owe an author number one, and number two, for the author to look at that report and have confidence that it's correct. And I'm not suggesting that it's not correct. I'm just saying that I know, having worked with a wonderful distributor way, way, way, way back in the day before Amazon, to get my books in bookstores, I would get their report at the end of the month, and we could not figure out if it was even right.
Anna David: Right. I'm very challenged with reports and numbers anyway, so I don't even try. I've never looked at my book sales ever, ever, ever. I just take a check if it comes. So okay, you get everything back from this company, and you figure out all the things which back then must have been extremely challenging.
Liz Lyons: Extremely. Yes. I mean, that's an understatement. Because it was really, I don't even know if I was just a masochist or extremely determined. Because when I think back now, there's so many resources, they're almost too many resources, which is an opposite end of the spectrum problem for people. Because you can google deep dive all day long and never really know which approach you quote unquote, should choose. And so but that's what I did is I just kept diving and figuring it out. What's an ISBN? Do I need an ISBN? These people are saying, I don't need an ISBN. Does that feel valid, you know? And really just finding out to be honest, who my mentors in the space were, like, who, who's who was I listening to? And then if I trusted them, and I did, I took their advice, and I went from there and if it worked, it worked. And if it didn't, I pivoted again.
Anna David: Then was Jane Friedman, the only voice or she wasn't even there doing it.
Liz Lyons: Yeah. Back then I didn't know of Jane Friedman. And it's funny. I am so excited to see the hot sheet in my inbox this morning. So I learned about Jane Friedman, probably six years ago because I think Jane and I don't want to speak for her. But I feel like she's pivoted a little bit. She was very much more in the traditional space, puzzles and things like that. And that's not the space I've ever been in. Because ever since going indie in 2005 I suppose. I don't follow some agents now because I'm still interested in what's going on in the traditional space. I follow Jane, Jane is an absolute unbelievable wealth of information.
Anna David: Future podcast guest, just secured her.
Liz Lyons: Oh, good for you. She's, she's remarkable, remarkable. And, one of the things I really like about Jane...this is going to become the Jane fan show...is that she sits fairly squarely in the middle, like, she doesn't tell people you should do this, or you should do that. She just presents information as it becomes available to her. And I really respect that.
Anna David: It's funny, because when I first stumbled across her, you know, my big, my big heartbreak and publishing was when Judith Regan was fired, you know, she acquired my book for a lot of money. It's all exciting. And then she's fired by a woman named Jane Friedman, who was right under Rupert Murdoch at Fox. And who now I think does audiobooks. And like, she was the focus of my ire. Because it's like, I'm not gonna focus on Murdoch. And so it was like, and then I discovered Jane Friedman's an expert on publishing. I mean, literally for five years. That's who I thought it was.
Liz Lyons: That's funny. That's a great story.
Anna David: Oh, I wrote a piece that she published on her site. And when I pitched her I was like, by the way, I thought this was you for a long time. So who were the following back then? There were those dudes, there's that JT something like there was a guy that really made a lot of headway. He made a lot of money as an indie author. And he was one of the first I can't remember his name, people I discovered. Sorry, what his name was Barry, something.
Liz Lyons: Oh, that rings a bell, though. So Admittedly, I had blinders on. So I don't even remember, because to call them my mentors actually is probably a little bit of a misstatement, because it's not like I was following. Nobody had newsletters back then, we didn't have social media. I wasn't following anybody. It's just per se, when you did a Google search on, how do I know if I need an ISBN, for example, there were certain websites and resources that would always come up at the top of the Google search. And so I became uber familiar with those. And one of the first people that I started following very seriously, although this was probably after I had done at least two books, and maybe three of my own was Dave Chesson. Because he too, is just an absolute wealth of not just information, but tactical, like, here's how you do this.
Anna David: Yeah. I love him. You know, he writes his books under another name, because he told me he was the first guest I had when we switched this podcast to being about books. Because he's like, Well, I don't want to exploit the fact that I have a name in publishing. Bow down to him, it was Barry Eisler. I just Googled.
Liz Lyons: That name is very familiar.
Anna David: Yeah. And it's saying he turned down half a million in publishing contract for two books, and then went and did self publishing. And it's, you know, been terribly successful. So you figure it out, and you publish your book, and what happens, your first book?
Liz Lyons: So I published my book, and in my opinion, really, nothing happened, to be honest, because we didn't have Amazon. We didn't have anything. I didn't have an agent or a publisher telling me oh, these are your required sales. I was just getting a check every month and it wasn't earth shattering. It wasn't tens of 1000s of dollars, but it was, I mean, I was at that time, a mom of, I don't know, a four year old, two year old twins, and I think I was pregnant with the next one. Like, I was happy for anything, but it was more than anything. Right? I mean, you know, it was like, Okay that’s interesting. I mean, it was four figures. It was in the low four figures every month. And it was like, wait a minute, like, I'm not promoting this. I'm not, I don't understand. And so I didn't really have a handle at all on what the sales numbers were until several, probably years later, I had hired a publicist who was helping me get on radio and local TV and mostly radio. We didn't have podcasts yet.
And she mentioned a girl to me by the name of Jenna McCarthy, who is well, now she's in Texas, but at the time she was in California. And somehow she connected the two of us because Jenna had just written a book called The Parent Trip that was released by one of the big five traditional publishers, and she said, you know, you guys are so similar, you should connect. So Jenna and I connected. And then Jenna was mentioning my book to her agent at the time. And her agent went into Bookscan, out of curiosity, and said, “Oh, my God, she has sold more books than most of my clients who are traditionally published.” And at the time, the number was like 25,000 copies or something like that. And I was like, really? I was like, okay, and what's interesting about that, though, Anna, is that if that had been one and done, if I had only done that book, I would be sitting here telling you a very different story, because I'd be sitting here going, it's easy, right? Write a book with a niche market, and you just put it out there and it just goes.
Anna David: Don't you think the universe just doles these out usually in the beginning of our careers? Oh, it's like, I wonder if I'd never thought about this. Just the gateway drug. The universe is like, we're gonna give you this and you don't realize this is your blessing. You're like, I've always kind of deserved this. So here we go with my career. Right?
Liz Lyons: Right. I am raising all these children. Come on, I deserve something. Yeah. That's an interesting perspective. Because, you know, when I did Book Two, it was the sequel to book one. Book one was Newborn Twins, First Year with Twins. Book Two was Toddler Years with Twins. And so that was a natural, it didn't sell as well as the first but it sold well. Then I did three, total flops. Now, in my opinion, here's why. Same market, same demographic, but the demographic wasn't just moms of twins or multiples. It was all moms. So now I was competing with Stephanie. I can't remember her last name right now.
Anna David: Yeah, Baby on Board. Stephanie. She's a friend of mine. Taylor, Stephanie. Or something?
Liz Lyons: Yes, Sippy Cups are Not for Chardonnay. Yeah, it was the book that came out right around the, plus Jenny McCarthy, she had her books, every but all the celebrities and the people had their books coming out. And they were on the Today Show and what was mine? Right? Am I alright, no press. I had no not so and I had no email list.
Anna David: That's interesting. You know, we always talked about the riches are in the niches. I always thought of it like, you know, what I really learned from Ryan Holiday, which is you drill down on a niche, and then that those people feel that there's a book that's written precisely for them. So they start recommending it, but I actually hadn't thought of it that your competition grows to the most popular authors that exist if you're not niching down.
Liz Lyons: Well, and to be fair, because I'm kind of comparing apples and oranges. If I had known how to communicate with the 30,000 people, you know, who had purchased the first and or the second book, I could have sold a lot more books. I mean, Ryan Holiday, who I think is magnificent, has always been more, back then and sometimes even now. But back then I didn't have a business mind about being an author. I wanted it to sell. And I liked the check that came in and I felt creative. But again, I was raising four very young children. So I wasn't thinking about what I have loved to get on the Today Show or do something with it. And did I try to do it absolutely. But I wasn't. I wasn't as knee deep in it, as I am now. And even now, to be honest, my knee deepness is not about promoting my own books. It's about helping other people write theirs.
Anna David: Exactly I mean, I don't know about you, but I basically write books in order to stay on top of the latest and try techniques out that I can try on clients. Do you think that's an interest?
Liz Lyons: That's very interesting. Yeah. I mean, when I wrote my last book, The fifth one, it was really something I wanted to say because it was something that I was experiencing as an entrepreneur. And it was a bunch of stuff that had been on my mind for a while that I had figured out how to think about differently and have a different perspective on and and I wanted to say, but I do think a lot now that I'm book coaching, I think a lot now about how did I write all those books? You know, what was my process for doing that? And I incorporate that.
Anna David: What I think that you said that's really interesting is that, you know, it has to be something you're interested in exploring when I was on the traditional publishing, like God do a book a year path. I was writing about stuff I didn't really care about, which is crazy to me. And I released this podcast episode today with Paul Angone and he was just talking about, you have to be so passionate about this, that you're willing to talk about it for years and focus for years. And I have written books where I don't feel like that at all.
Liz Lyons: Well, because, and here's the thing is that from, admittedly, I've not been traditionally published, but from what I understand it, because I know a lot of people who have, it's more of a business over there. You know, it's like, what cover will sell what content will sell what voice will sell what topic will sell what controversy will sell. And so that's why sometimes people, not all authors, but some authors get quote unquote roped in to writing a book that they're not super passionate about, or they write a book that they were passionate about. But then once the editor gets a hold of it, and makes it into what they think is marketable, all of a sudden, this isn’t even my book anymore, it doesn't feel like my book anymore. And therefore it's hard to talk about it and promote it. But that's something I stand very, very firmly on. And this is something you and I have talked about, and I believe I'm gonna let you correct me if I'm wrong, of course, but I'm pretty sure we share this opinion. If you're gonna write about, please let it be something that you're super passionate about talking about for as long as you're passionate about talking about it. If you decide in six months, or three years or 10 years that you don't want to talk about it anymore, totally fine. That's when your sales are going to drop off because somebody else is talking about it.
Anna David: And it's ironic. Well, I mean, when you said this thing about traditional publishing, it's more like a business. But I've never really thought about it like that. But the business is for the traditional publisher, because they don't think about it at all, as a business for the author, which is why they're capturing the email address. I mean, they're not really capturing email addresses with Amazon anyway. But the idea is, you know, when a book is finished, they don't want you to know, the number one thing that people want to do when they finish a book, if they finish it, is connect with the author, not connect with a publisher. Why would they care?
Liz Lyons: And that's what I say all the time. People don't buy books from publishers, so people will come to me and they'll say, Well, Elizabeth, I really want a traditional publisher. And the main reasons why people want a traditional publisher, in my experience, are they think there's a huge advance. Yeah, they think that there's huge marketing and connecting. And also they don't understand the timeline, they don't understand that it's going to be three years, if not more, depending on how long it takes to get the agent etc. But when they talk about marketing, I'm like, this is such a huge misconception, because people don't buy books from publishers, they buy books from authors, especially in the day of social media. Yeah, when you can actually connect with those authors. Nobody's out there connecting with Penguin on social media.
Anna David: I know. And it's interesting, Jennifer Armstrong, who I had on the podcast, who has a New York Times bestseller, she's like, I think you've got to just think of them as a printing service, you're just going to be disappointed if you think of them as more than that. So how did you start getting in touch with your readers and getting your newsletter subscribers and all of that?
Liz Lyons: Really, that started when social media started. And when there just became a way I mean, I went through all the like, rigmarole that we all hear about, you know, have a lead magnet and have the word funnel, I have a visceral reaction. And it's not good, because it makes me think of funneling cattle into a pen. But I understand what people are saying when they say it. And the idea is go out and find them, which is easier now than it's ever been, and then offer them a reason to stay connected to you, which is not in my experience. Like it depends on your genre to be clear. Yeah. So I don't work with fiction writers and their opportunities for connecting with readers are very different from nonfiction or memoir, because it's more character based. And it's more story based, whereas especially with nonfiction, it's more self development based.
Anna David: And it does seem like a massive generalization. It's far easier for certain genres of fiction writers to churn it out and to really have their business model be backlist and giving a perma free one book so that they get the series and all of that. And I do think it's much harder to churn it out, if you're doing nonfiction.
Liz Lyons: It's a completely different approach. Like you can almost look at it, I think of it. Most people don't realize that on Amazon, the paperback store and the Kindle store are two different stores. Even though they merged together, they are two different databases on Amazon. I think of this in the same way. When you're a fiction writer versus a nonfiction or a memoir writer, it's two completely different you're all writing books. But the approach to marketing and the like you said the perma free on the first one and then building up a backlist and getting people involved in the next character and doing pre orders and all those sorts of things, which is what people do very successfully in the fiction realm is wildly different from the nonfiction and the memoir realm. And especially in the nonfiction realm. So many of my clients, at least, are looking to build their business, which revolves around it's either based on their book or their book is an extension of something where they're already coaching, teaching, guiding whatever verb you want to use, to other people.
Anna David: Absolutely. And that's the same with ours. But wait, okay, I do want to go back to one thing. What do you think it was with your first book, just straight up beginner's luck?
Liz Lyons: You know what? The truth is, I don't know for sure. What I suspect. I don't think it was beginner's luck. I think that I hit without realizing it. I like that whole preparation meets opportunity thing. And it's like I hit the opportunity. Because there were no, there were, there were only a few books on the market about expecting twins to begin with. And they were all at the time quite like, your life is over. They weren't you know, and this was when Vicki I vine was really big with her Girlfriends Guide stuff, and honestly Anna, that's what I wanted. I was like Vicki, why couldn't you have had twins and written the girlfriends guide to twins, because that's the book I need right now. But she didn't. And so I just, I, I saw that as an opportunity. And I think that there happened to be a lot of people who wanted that. And the other thing was, it wasn't just book orders. Unbeknownst to me for a while there were hospitals ordering in bulk. Because they were running what was called Marvelous Multiples, which was a program that had been put together by a nurse who was also a mom of twins that was being offered by different hospitals. And the hospitals were ordering volume and giving the book to all of the participants in those classes.
Anna David: Don't you think that was your big thing? I mean, do you know how many sales there are?
Liz Lyons: I don't, I don't because the only way to get that information is through Bookscan. And even Bookscan is unreliable when it comes to off market stuff. Like it was all through the distributor I was working with. And I just if you had seen, I mean, my reports from a distributor every month, we're 15 pages long.
Anna David: Wow, So have you tried to reverse engineer that and be like, I'm gonna write a book that I know, institutions can bulk order?
Liz Lyons: I haven't because and it's an interesting question. And I guess the answer is because right now the answer is because that feels formulaic to me and I don't write in a formulaic, you know, I'm not.
So there are certain modalities that say, here's how you can figure out what kind of a book will sell, you can go out on Amazon and you can see what people are searching for. And if you know a lot of people are searching for this certain thing, then you know that if you write a book about it, it will probably sell well. But that is just an approach that has never felt good to me. I write, stuff just comes through me and. That's how I write.
Anna David: Interesting. I know I've read those things. I've read those and it literally be like, lots of people are searching for kids playing tennis. I've never played tennis, but I'm gonna write a book about that. That was really effective for a while. I will say I use it and I teach it which is you know your book and I mean, I got this from Dave Chesson. So start looking on Amazon to see how it auto populates because you're already reading the book. So include sections that people are already searching for. I do find that really helpful.
Liz Lyons: I find that really helpful too. And another thing that I find very helpful is recognizing what the keywords are that people are searching for and making sure that those are in not only your book description, but if possible, your reviews.
Anna David: Yes. By the way, your author bio, the whole thing, the whole thing? Yeah. So by the way, remember we said, Of course you remember it was yesterday, we're going back and forth about gotta find an exact angle for this episode. And of course, because we have so much to talk about, we really haven't gotten into the angle. Well, we're kind of verging on it now. Which is, what do you put in your book? That was the angle we decided, how do you basically come up with it? I don't know, your table of contents?
Liz Lyons: Yeah, I mean, you know, one of the things that I find, and I hear all the time holds people back from actually writing their book, because, you know, my clients are doing the writing themselves. So they are like, I have a story, I have something to share, I either have a story, like my life, or I have a process if we're talking about business. And sometimes there's a little bit of crossover. But where they get stuck most of the time is it's like, I'm so overwhelmed. So they do what's normally suggested or often suggested, which they do this big brain dump, and one of two things happens, either it's 75 pages long. And they can't figure out how to make it all come together with a nice bow. Or it's like four things. Because they're overthinking it. And they're trying to think through like, should I talk about that? Or should I talk about that?
Well, I don't know, have I been working on that long enough to actually position myself as an expert air quotes on it. And so that's where they get stuck in figuring out what do we should include? And what do we not include? And when you're ghostwriting, which you're intimately familiar with? Obviously, you guide them through that process of figuring out well, what is the you know, what is the table of contents, and I'm working on a ghost writing project right now. And that's something that had to happen was, you know, what are those, but that's where people get really stuck, and they don't progress from there. Because they come up with some story pun intended about clearly I shouldn't be doing this, because I can't figure it out.
Anna David: So how do you guide them? What's the process?
Liz Lyons: Well, it's different for nonfiction versus memoir. So nonfiction in my world is much more tactical. What do you want to say? First of all, what is the thing that your book is guiding people through? Because it's not a whole mess of things. It's not everything you've ever done? It's like, what do you want this book to help a reader overcome? And then what are the steps that you take people through? And more often than not, with that sort of a book? If the author is operating in integrity? They have gone through, that's the process they created for themselves? So it's like, take yourself back three years, five years, whatever it was, and identify what were the steps that really worked for you? What were the things that you needed to hear and know, back then? And then that's kind of where we start to get clear on that.
Anna David: I loves it. It was always interesting to me, when people differentiate between nonfiction and memoir, I was like, it is nonfiction. But you know, it's interesting. Rob Fitzpatrick, who I recently had on the show, was talking about how to book. How to versus memoir. Because really, that's what, that's what we're talking about. And so is there anything else about like, okay, take it back six months, five years, however long it is that you developed this process, and you're now explaining to other people, what do you do next? You go, okay, so for instance, I'm doing a book right now about how to plan and promote a book. So this is different, because I'm taking podcast interviews, and I'm doing it but like, how would we do that? How would you guide someone through that? You go, okay, so what was your starting point?
Liz Lyons: Exactly. You know, one of the things that I find very effective is for authors to write a letter to their reader first. And more often than not the reader is them, who they were three or five years ago. So essentially what you're doing is you're getting outside of yourself and outside of your I have to be you're getting outside of your perfectionist tendencies in order to say dear whomever name them if you want, here's what I know to be true about you. Here's where I know you are right now, here's what your fears are. Here's what's keeping you from moving forward. Here's what you're really really good at. But here's where you're stuck. And I have great news. Like again now we're going into like the typical copy editing stuff, but right or marketing, stuff like that. Good news is there's a path. And one of the things that's really important is that authors not hold themselves as the savior to the reader.
So all you're saying is here is a path, you're not saying here is the one and only path that takes the pressure off everyone. But here's the thing I want to share with you, my process that I use to get through this and/or, that I utilize, when I'm helping my clients, or however you do, whatever, get through this. And here's what we're going to talk about. And you start to get really clear, and you don't have to get into the nitty gritty of it at that point. But what you're doing when you do that, is you're creating the bubble. Okay. And then it just comes down to what goes into the bubble. Like you're creating the hub of the wheel, and what's in what's encapsulated in that hub.
Anna David: Do you have a certain set number of chapters that you recommend?
Liz Lyons: I don't, I think most nonfiction ends up between like 12 and 18 chapters, and it just depends on you know, I don't subscribe to a word count. I think anything under 40,000 words, or under 35,000 words is a pamphlet not a book, I’m kind of a stickler about that. Maybe 35,000. But I don't believe in adding words, just to add words. I think that when you're really connected to helping, that's what a book really is about, is serving. So when people come to me, and this doesn't happen much anymore, but and they say, Look, I just want to hit the bestseller list for five minutes, so that I can say I'm a best selling author, and that's going to sell me tons of books and make me millions of dollars and make me the sought after expert on every stage. That's not the right person for me, you know? Yeah, I know. You know, I know we share this. So when you're really looking to serve another person through telling your stories, it's not hard to get 40,000 words, 50,000 words or even 60,000 words. It's just not.
Anna David: But I know, on a personal level, I like reading shorter books now. I hate to say it, but I do.
And studies are showing because it just means you can read more, and some authors are just going on and on and on. I find self help has never been my thing. And it's like, I always feel like the first chapter says it and then the next 10 are repeating it. But that's me.
Liz Lyons: You know, I think that often is the case that often is the case. And if you don't have enough to get yourself to, you know, something solid, I mean, 80,000 words is such an old, old paradigm, because it's what was the average back in the day for traditional books, mostly fiction based. Yeah, or mostly, you know, fiction, but I think there's always an exception. So there are a lot of people who say, “well, I don't like to read long books.” And you have to kind of dive into why that is. Because when those people find a book, that's 250 pages long, that is just chock full of amazing information and stories. They read it. So it may not be that they don't like reading long books, it may be that they don't like reading repetitive nonsense, number one. And number two, if there's someone who wants to be like, well, I read a book a week. But in order to accomplish that goal, they know the book has to only be 97 pages. Well, then there's their motivation.
Anna David: Right. Well, okay, so we have to get to wrapping up. Do you have any final advice for somebody who, I guess who wants to write how to book, what they should do?
Liz Lyons: I mean, whether you want to write how to or memoir. And to be clear, the distinction between the two for me is that when you're writing what I call transformative nonfiction, or how to call it, whatever, you want to, you want the reader to take an action; there is a very specific action that you are giving to the reader with the hope that they may take it; when you're writing memoir, you are not attached to what they take from the story. Yeah, that's to me, is the difference. But I think it's really important, and I've always said this, to just understand why you really want to do it. And then what's the why under that? And you do the six layers or whatever deep of why? Because as with anything, once you really uncover why you want to do it and what you want to get out of it, you can execute it more efficiently. Whether that's write it yourself, hire someone to write it for you, write a 30 page ebook, do a novel, like whatever it is.
Anna David: I love it. So if people want to reach you what's the best way? And let's just also quickly say all your offers because you have courses you have coaching. Go.
Liz Lyons: So, I've minimized, I've simplified.
Anna David: So you still have courses?
Liz Lyons: I have one. Yeah.
Anna David: I think I've told you I'm so frustrated by trying to sell courses. It's just, you know, when the beginning of the conversation you were like, is this masochism or is this determination. That's how I feel about trying to sound like you guys, my Courses are so good. And you don't find them?
Liz Lyons: Yeah. And I feel exactly the same. And I know your courses. And you know mine, I get it, I think for me, so I have the book writing accelerator, which is my 12 week intimate group program. And it's a coaching program through writing nonfiction, or memoir, writing nonfiction, and memoir is an experience period. It's not something that in my world, we sit down and do on a weekend, it is a full on experience. And you're learning about yourself as you're as you're writing the book period. And then I have my course, the only course I have now, which is how to publish a book, how to self publish a book that can be sitting next to any New York Times bestseller and be indistinguishable and quality. So those are my two things.
Anna David: Well, so people can take those courses they can sign up for your coaching. You know, you just launch a few times a year?
Liz Lyons: I do the next one which launches in July. We start in July, and it goes for 12 weeks. And I usually do two or three containers a year of that. And then the publishing course IS evergreen.
Anna David: And then of course they can get your books?
Liz Lyons: Of course.
Anna David: And so where can they find you online?
Liz Lyons: The best place is Elizabethlyons.com. And that'll take people out to the course sites and the coaching site, wherever they want to go, but the hub is Elizabethlyons.com.
Anna David: Well, this has been such a delight. I'm so glad we finally did this. And you guys, thank you as ever for listening. Go find her. So good.
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May 25, 2022
Hollywood Special: Turning Your Books Into Movies with Ben Mezrich
Ben Mezrich has sold over 10 million copies of his books.
And, by the way, that’s not even the impressive part. The impressive part is that he sells EVERY SINGLE ONE OF HIS BOOKS as a movie or TV show; in fact, if Hollywood isn’t interested in the treatment, he doesn’t even write the book.
Mezrich has gotten into this position because of a chance encounter with some MIT students, which led to his writing Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story of Six M.I.T. Students Who Took Vegas for Millions, which led to Kevin Spacey snapping up the film rights before the book was even out, which led to the book spending over 60 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list.
Then there was his book, The Accidental Billionaires, which David Fincher and Aaron Sorkin jumped on as Mezrich was writing the book and which, of course turned into the multi award-nominated movie The Social Network. (Mezrich is the only non-fiction author to have two adaptations open at #1 at the box office.)
He’s written numerous other books, including Bitcoin Billionaires and The Antisocial Network and is also a consulting producer on Billions. Oh, and his most recent book, The Midnight Ride, has an NFT component that already has over 3500 owners.
So how does this happen? How does a former struggling novelist become Hollywood’s go to guy pursued by designers who want to dress him for his book tours? And what is the secret to finding the sort of story that makes Hollywood salivate? It’s all in this episode.
TRANSCRIPT:
Anna David: Okay, well so basically you have the career that we all want, is what it comes down to. And yet you're not hateable.
Ben Mezrich: Thank you. I try not to be hateful. No, everything has happened in my career by accident and luck and timing. And there's been just a lot of really crazy moments. So I'm just happy and lucky and fortunate all along, and it's just been a blast. So I'm happy to tell you any stories you want to hear.
Anna David: I was reading, you know, you've been getting press for so many years. And I was reading this old story, I think in the Boston Globe about how Maybach flies him out to parties, and different people send him clothes and all of that. Is your life still like that? Was that true?
Ben Mezrich: And yeah, that's all it got crazy for a while. And, you know, I still get flown around. Like this weekend, I have two separate sorts of parties. I'm supposed to be flown to, although COVID Put a big crimp and all of that sort of thing. But yeah, when you do a book tour, there are definitely clothing sponsors that want me to wear their clothes and suits. But all a lot of that has to do with my wife, my wife is very, very good at cultivating these relationships and throwing these book parties and sort of a lot of authors come to me like, “How did you do this?” And I'm always like, Tanya did all that I didn't, I just sat in my room and wrote. And she's, you know, she had a TV show in Boston for a little while, she had a fashion line in Boston, she's done a lot of amazing things. So she's kind of cultivated this, this really great network of people. I mean, the other thing is I write books, for gambling type personalities, a lot of hedge funders like my stuff. So there's a lot of people in the finance world who read my stuff. And so, in that world, when there's an intersection between the finance world and the Hollywood world, where all of that craziness comes about, so yeah, it's been, Gosh, 15 years of crazy parties and stuff like that.
Anna David: Mostly, the writers who are on the outside be like, “Hey, could you let me in?”
Ben Mezrich: So I've been through that as well. I've had my battles with certain Hollywood types trying to get into the premiere of my own movie, there've been incidents like that, too. There was an incident with Scott Rudin, way back when, with The Social Network with Scott Rudin is a character, you know, himself. And then, and I'm sure there's lots and lots of stories about him. But in general, I've been very fortunate, I've worked with really amazing people. And I think that's the key is that the only real power a writer has is who they sell their project to. And once you sell your project, you have to assume that you have no power. So you want to sell it to people who are going to treat you like a partner, or treat you like you know, part of the team are going to take you on the ride with them. And so when I'm making my deals, it's not just the dollars, you're looking at who is buying this project and, and what do they want to do with it? And are they people you want to hang out with and are they people you want to work with? And I don't think I would sell a project today, to people I didn't want to hang out with. And that's different in the beginning of your career. At the beginning of a career you sell to anybody who offers but you know, you reach a point in your career where, you know, you know that it's really important, these relationships are more important than anything else. So you're always looking for that kind of special thing. Anna David: You know what's interesting. So Molly Bloom, who I've known for years, I heard her say that when she was going in, pitching Molly's Game, she had this epiphany: "Everyone's passing. I'm reaching too low. I need to reach higher." And that's how she got to Aaron Sorkin. And I think that's so interesting.
Ben Mezrich: I mean, I think that's really smart. Molly's story is as great as the movies. I've always, I always get asked, you know, what books do you wish you would have written? And that was one of those books that I would have loved to have written?
Anna David: Would you want to live the story that she lives?
Ben Mezrich: Oh, no, I just want to write it from the outside. I don't want to actually get involved with dangerous Russian monsters. I think that yeah, it's just a great movie and a great story. But yeah, I think there's something to that. If you can get to an Aaron Sorkin obviously, that's the dream. And the reality of Hollywood is it takes an Aaron Sorkin to get a movie made. It's extremely hard to start at the bottom in Hollywood and get something made. It happens but it's like a lottery ticket. 99% of the things you sell are never going to get made. And that's because it needs an A list writer and a list director and a list actor and anything less than that. And it's just a struggle. It's a continuous struggle.
Anna David: Oh, yes, talking to somebody whose book was optioned 15 years ago. And I'm like, “Oh, this is so awesome. I've got it made." They even hired a big writer to do the script. And then you get the email "Congratulations, your rights have reverted back to you" and you realize, that means "We're never talking to you again." So okay, so let's talk about your journey. So you started off as just a novelist in the same sort of, you know, terrible situation most writers are in. And then what happened?
Ben Mezrich: Yeah, so my story is, I knew I wanted to be a writer since I was 12 years old. So that's all I ever wanted to do. And when I graduated from college, you know, my parents were not thrilled with that choice. And so I basically locked myself in an apartment for a year, my dad said, “I'm not going to let you starve. But if you don't have any proof by the end of this year that you're going to make it as a writer, you gotta go to law school.” That was pretty much the conversation. So I wrote nine novels that year, I locked myself in a room and I wrote a novel a month, basically 400 Page novels, I wrote round the clock, I was writing 40 pages a day, just craziness. And they were all rejected, rejected, rejected, 190 rejection slips, had them taped to the walls, like a serial killer. It was just crazy writing. And eventually, an editor took pity on me, a guy named John Karp, who's a very famous, powerful editor. Now, he didn't buy anything I'd written, he said, “I'm not going to buy any of the crap you've been writing. But go read John Grisham and Michael Crichton and try to do what they do.” So then I started writing thrillers. And I wrote one book that was slightly better than the rest, and I got a literary agent.
So at the end of my first year, pretty much out of college, I had a literary agent, and I sold my first book and nobody read it. So I wrote about six medical thrillers, they were sci fi, medical pop thrillers. And they never, they didn't go anywhere. One of them was made into a TV movie. So I did have sort of that level of success in my early 20s, or mid 20s.
But my books were not selling, nobody was buying. And then I ran into this group of MIT kids in a bar. And they were going to Vegas every weekend. And it was just this crazy story that started going to Vegas with them. I convinced the main character to sort of tell me his story. And that became Bringing Down the House, which was my first nonfiction book. And it was going to be this little book, you know, tiny first printing. I had been paid less for it than I'd ever been paid for anything. It was a nothing of a book, because it was about Vegas. It was about cards. And this was before Vegas, and cards were interesting again, and I wrote an article for Wired Magazine, and I got a call in the middle of the night, phone rings. And it's a guy saying, “I have Kevin Spacey on the line.” And so back then that was a better call than it would be today. Let's just put that out there. Kevin Spacey back then was the biggest star in the world. And I get on the phone with him. It really was Kevin Spacey. And he said, I love this story. I want you to come out to LA. So I flew out to LA pretty much the next day. And I met Kevin and his producer, Dana Brunetti, Dana, right. And Dana was at the time Kevin's assistant.
This was that far back. And they're like, “we want to make a movie out of this.” And I was like, great. Seems like a great idea. And I asked him, “Well, how much are you gonna pay me?” And they said, “nothing, zero.” And I was like, “zero?” And at the time I was massively in debt. Because I had had all these books published, they all kind of failed. I had spent every penny I'd ever made. I owed a million $2 million. At 28 years old. I was vastly in debt. And, so basically, I went to my agent, I had an agent through the TV movie who had gotten me an agent. And I said, ''They want to make a movie, they want to pay me zero.” And he's like, “Well, let's see what we can do.” And the next day, he called me and said, I have an offer from someone else for $750,000. So I go back to Kevin and Dana. And I say, “I've got this competing offer now for $750,000. And what are you guys going to pay?” Dana's like, “Nothing, zero, still zero.”
I said, "So how can you offer me zero against $750,000?" And they said, "Well, if we gave you $300,000, right now, what would you do with it?" And so I was at a crazy period of my life, and I was massively in debt, and they knew all my stories. And I said, “I'd probably spend all of it.” And they said, “We're gonna do something better. We're gonna actually make this movie. And you can talk about Kevin and publicity, he's going to talk about you, this is gonna be great for your career.”
So we ended up taking that deal, turning down three quarters of a million dollars and freaking my agent out, and it worked. The book came out and I went on the Today show. And the book was a huge bestseller for a couple of years, and the movie, although it took a number of years to get made, put me on the map in an enormous way. And from that moment on, I actually have sold every book I've written as a movie off of the treatment before I've written a page of the book. So I've sold something like 25 movies, at this point, right off of a 10 page treatment. And one of them happened to be the social network project, which comes along a little bit later, we can get into that. But that's what started me off. It was really a phone call from Kevin Spacey in Milan, right, because of an article in Wired magazine, and it was my first time it became a feature film that actually got made, because there was an actor with an A-list actor attached, you know?
Anna David: So two questions. So the Today show was interested because Kevin Spacey is involved.
Ben Mezrich: No, I had actually booked the Today show. Randomly, this publicist at the publisher had gotten me it was, you know, the only real publicity I'd ever gotten, and then having to be a really big show. But I was able to talk about Kevin during it. And I think that was helpful. Who knows? Then I went on CNBC. And at the time, CNBC Power Lunch was a really big deal. And this was a book about gambling, and everybody who watched CNBC was a gambler. And so I think that the Today show, and CNBC together is what really made that book just go crazy. I remember it went to number one on Amazon. And it sold out in the first three hours. And it was one of those situations where they were just always trying to print books, because they were always selling and it just happens, you know, I think what was great about that story was it was the perfect one sentence. It was six MIT kids who took Vegas for millions. And it was an easy sentence for every news show, to throw at the end of a news report. So it was on every single channel all the time. And there's this group of MIT kids who took Vegas for millions. It's like the perfect sentence. And I think that easy sentences, what just turn that into some moment, basically. But on the Hollywood side, that movie really opened enormous doors for me, because I decided right there, and then that I wanted to have a Hollywood career. On top of that every book I would write had to be a movie. And so I basically became very close to my Hollywood agent at the time. And I said to him, “every project I'm going to do, we're going to come out here, we're going to pitch it all over town. And we're gonna develop these relationships with lots of producers and lots of studios. And that's the way I want to do books.” And that became the model for me. And so, even today, if someone tells me a story idea, I think it's great. I'll interview the people, I'll write 10 pages, and I will take it out to Hollywood. And if I can't get a studio deal, then I won't write the book. I won't, I won't even look at it. That's it, I'm done. So that's the way I do my projects now and have for 20 years.
Anna David: And knowing, as you said, how impossible it is to get things made. I don't mean to be woo woo. But it's like you made this decision. And it happened. And obviously you've got a serious feel for what people are going to respond to. But so questions, rumor is that like, so everybody wanted the social network. And so like they're like, oh, people went, the producer went to the 21 party and that wound up being Dana, is that true?
Meznich: So Dana, and I became very close. There's so many stories about Dana. Do you know Dana at all?
Anna David: I met him through Mike years ago. I think when he was Kevin Spacey’s assistant, or just became.
Mezrich: Yeah, Dana is one of those people that it's almost like he's a mythical creature. I love Dana. Dana is a genius. He's also terrifying. He can be completely insane. And I think if you talk to enough people, you'll hear so many crazy stories about Dana. But Dana and I were like brothers from the very beginning. There's no question about that. When I went out to LA that first time and Dana and Kevin picked me up at the airport, it was like Kevin's little Mercedes. And the first place they took me, we're driving along and I'm a kid from Boston. I mean, I've never been to Hollywood a few times, but I was not, you know, in that scene, and we're driving along and we pull up to this huge mansion. And I recognized it and it was a Playboy mansion. And it was literally the first place. They drove me. And we sat down and it was like movie night. And it was these moments where I think Dana really, really, we got along extremely well. And we definitely worked as partners together, selling I think, Gosh, eight or nine movies in a row we sold together.
But the social network was a really interesting situation. Because what happened with The Social Network was, again, a random moment. I had become known for writing these true stories. So I would get pitched a lot of stories. Every time some young college kid pulled off a scheme or somebody did a crime, I would get a call, they would either reach me on the phone or an email or something like that. And it was the middle of the night and I got an email from a Harvard senior. And it said, “my best friend founded Facebook and no one's ever heard of him.” This is in Boston, and I went out for a drink in a bar. And in walked Eduardo Savarin, the real Eduardo, and he sits down he goes, “Mark Zuckerberg fucked me!” Started the conversation like that, and told me this completely insane story. So I think this is awesome. I went and I actually found the Winklevoss twins on the internet. I just found him on Facebook. I started meeting with them. I started meeting with Sean Parker, and I wrote a 14 page book proposal, which I called Face Off was a horrible title. And I sent it to my agent. And he sent it out to I think 11 or 12 publishers, and it leaked onto the internet. So it leaked onto Gawker. Gawker printed my entire book proposals, something I'd never seen before. I don't know if they'd ever printed a full book proposal before. And everything went crazy. Facebook freaked out and was like, What are you writing? And they came after me. And I had sent it to Dana.
Because Dana and I were like brothers, I would send him every single thing. And we had sold eight or eight movies. By that point, we had sold all these books that I had written. That never got made, but we had sold, you know, a number of books together. And Dana thought it was cool. I do think Dana, I don't remember for sure. But I think its first response was similar to my mom's which is like, I'm not sure anybody will watch a movie about Facebook, but he definitely thought it was cool. But that day when it leaked on Gawker, Aaron Sorkin saw it.
And David Fincher saw it. And Aaron Sorkin called and said he wanted to write it. And David Fincher called and said he wanted to direct it. And so then you had Dana and Kevin, because Dana and Kevin, Ricky have already sent the proposal. So they came from their angle, they met with Scott Rudin, who came with the Aaron Sorkin situation. And Mike DeLuca, who was at Sony, MGM, and Amy Pascal. And that became the team. And so it was this incredible moment as a writer, like that's the dream team at that point in time. There was no better team of people. And to be frank, nobody else could have made that movie, because you were dealing with Facebook, you know, a billion dollar corporation.
You were dealing with huge egos, you know, people, people who are incredibly known for taking over a movie set, right. It was one of those just magnificent kinds of situations to get into. And, it was wild. And I was there for the whole thing. And it was great. And yeah, Dana. Dana was a big part of it. And, and, and DeLuca Mike, who is just awesome. I love Mike, I think he's one of the best people in Hollywood. And he had done 21 as well. So basically, you know, Dana and Mike were involved again this time. Yeah.
Anna David: Actually, I went to The Social Network premiere. I was living in New York at the time, and the New York Post assigned me the junk. And I interviewed Jesse, and did the whole junket thing. And that was some premiere, I still remember being like, Oh, they've spent some money.
Ben Mezrich: Yeah, I mean, they went all out. And I will say it was just one of those situations where they really knew that they had something special, like a kind of movie that's going to last decades. And it was a cultural moment. I mean, I don't think there was a single newspaper in the world that didn't cover it, or magazine or anything like that. It was just one of those things. And I think what's really interesting to look back on now is Facebook wasn't that big a deal before that movie, it was just this company. But what I saw, and I think what a number of people who made the movie saw was that this was a moment that was going to change all of our lives. And we were documenting it, we were creating the mythology of this world changing technology, which sitting here today, it's clear that we were correct, that Facebook has led to everything that's happening in the world, good and bad. And so it's just a spectacular moment. But for me personally, it was obviously life changing, and just such a ride. And accidentally, the book was Accidental Billionaires. But I think that most of my career has been things like that, where I fall or stumble into a story, and it just becomes something immense. So yeah, it's been wild, for sure.
Anna David: So finding the stories, you know, obviously you said, you know, people come to you, they're pitching you stories, but I'm assuming a lot of these you're finding on your own. How are you doing that? And what is the thing that you know makes it?
Ben Mezrich: Yeah, so the majority of my stories have been pitched to me. I will say only a few of them have ones that I've gone out and found. I basically sift through pitches now on Twitter, but whatever. I mean, something like the Gamestop Story, which I just wrote that book, I mean that everybody saw. So you could say I look for it, but I was getting tons of people writing to me saying you should be ready to be writing it. But in general, I'm looking for something that you can sum up in one sentence that the whole world will be interested in, that can make a great movie. So that's to have great visuals, it has to have incredible Shakespearean type themes, do it exotic locales, or that sort of drama, you know, conflict. I mean, it's the magic is it has to be a story that not everyone already knows. And yet everyone would want to know or be interested in it. And that's the tricky thing, usually something that we've all heard of, I mean, every day people will email me about things. I'm like, yeah, but there's probably 100 writers writing that story. Right now, I don't want to be one of a dozen Wall Street Journal writers trying to get this story. I want to have the main character come to me and say, Look at this crazy thing I did, and I realize, oh, man, everyone's gonna want to hear about that.
And that's what I'm really looking for. But it's got to be simple. It's got to have a big theme. And it's got to be the origin of something life changing. So the things that I've written about to me that have worked have been stories about big, big events are moments or technologies or shifts in the cultural moment, that even though my book was written 10 years ago, people will find a reason to read it 10 years from now. So that's hard. It's not easy. So when I look back on the books that I've written, I think Vegas and Bringing on the House is one, I think, you know, Social Network is certainly one. I think Bitcoin Billionaires is going to be one of those stories that people are going to, and the entire crypto world is built a lot on that story, which is really interesting. And as we make that movie, I think there'll be a big moment, I do think the Gamestop Story is going to be a big moment of a story. I wrote a book called Wooly about the wooly mammoth, coming back to life, and the scientist at Harvard is making one. And although I haven't found that story yet, I think that's going to be a big story in the future. So that's really what I'm looking for all the time is this big, kind of, but again, it has to be able to sell as a movie.
So I have to be able to write a 10 page treatment, that when I take it out to studios, there's going to be a dozen of them bidding on it. And, and I feel like to me, that justifies me writing the book, if I can't get and there's been moments where I've sent out a pitch that I just thought was awesome. And I haven't gotten the movie deal. And I put it aside and they say, you know what, I'm not going to write it. I'm not going to, I can't get excited about it. Because in my opinion, a book is a platform. The book is a story. And many writers feel differently. And I think that's cool, too. But for me, the book is a platform for this story that hopefully has a much bigger life than that. Because books are one component of it. I want to see a movie in a television show and I want to see all the magazines writing about it. I wanted to become something that the whole world talks about and you don't. It doesn't always happen, you know, it's happened two out of 25 books so far, but that's what I'm trying to do every time.
Anna David: That ratio for what you're talking about, which doesn't happen in most people's lifetime ever. Thinking about it, it also requires a certain not psychic skill but back when you know with the Winklevoss in Bitcoin was like, who cares about Bitcoin today? I'm like, what? So I mean, you are on to these things early.
Ben Mezrich: Yeah, I mean, and this goes back to Michael Crichton, my worship of Michael Crichton, I used to keep all of Michael Crichton's books on my desk. And I think what he was a genius of was picking something that two years from now we would all be talking about. And that's what I'm always trying to do, and it's hard, you can't really do it. But I think I get that feeling. You know, I get that tingle. That sense that something is really important. And with Bitcoin, you know, listen, people have been pitching me Bitcoin stories for years, and I've been turning it down. I'm like, I'm not interested. This is math. This is geeky. There's a bunch of weirdos sitting in their rooms. But then when I heard the Winklevoss, we were at the center of this story. It blew my mind because I was like, Nah, those guys, I can wrap the movie around. And as I started meeting with them, I spent six months just hanging out with them. I was like, Yeah, this is huge. It's a big moment in history. Sadly, I didn't go by a bunch of Bitcoin, because I'd be really rich right now. But I definitely saw that I knew crypto was gonna change all our lives. And so yeah, I mean, I think I do have sort of a spidey sense about it. And yeah, it's hard to sort of know what you can put your finger on and say okay, that's the next big thing. But it is something I'm always looking for.
Anna David: In crypto, the web 3 spaces. So you did an NFT thing with this latest book?
Ben Mezrich: Yeah. So now I have this. This is actually new and it's sort of separate from meeting the Winklevoss twins and becoming friends with them. They started telling me you got to look into NFTs is really cool so then I ended up launching an NFT project. That's going to be a movie I'm writing the script for it. And I dropped an NFT line which sold out and we're doing three lines of NFTs and anybody who owns the NFTs gets to own a piece of the screenplay I’m writing about the NFT space. And I'm hoping that becomes a platform for other writers to come on and drop NF T's and build their careers that way. I think the NF T is going to give writers and artists and musicians another way of taking a community, building a community and having the community support them. So this is the first time I've kind of stepped into something rather than just writing about it. And it's been really wonderful. And it's been incredible and fun. But it did evolve from the sort of Bitcoin story. Yeah.
Anna David: Well, what does that mean owning part of a screenplay?
Ben Mezrich: Yeah, it means that the people who own one of each of my three NFT drops, who dropped two so far, and the third one is coming, are going to get 50% of the screenplay. So I'm going to write a screenplay and partner with the community. We're going to try and make the movie. I'm going to sell it to a studio or I'm going to make it on our own. And the money that comes in is going to go back into the community.
Anna David: And so they don't own the rights to the movie in any way?
Ben Mezrich: No, they own the rights to the movie, they own an NFT that gives them partial, you know, ownership of the project, essentially. So it's not like they can say, you know, we want this star to be in or this star to be that kind of thing. But it does mean that if I sell it for a million dollars, half a million dollars goes back into [inaudible]. So it's an interesting model, and we'll see if it works. It's kind of brand new. You know, this is the Wild West, the NFT world. There's no real rules yet about how this works. And there's Neil Strauss, who's doing something Gary Vee, there's some other people trying to do something in its space. But this is the model that we think will work going forward. So we'll see what happens as I write the screenplay and see how it works.
Anna David: Yeah, this is actually I've been doing a couple of episodes on NF Ts and writers and really exploring that world. I didn't even know we were gonna get into it till I started doing my research. But in terms of the screenplay, you don't normally write the screenplays though.
Ben Mezrich: So I've written a few screenplays, I just wrote one, I had a book called The Midnight Ride that came out a few months ago, which actually sold to Spielberg and Amblin. And they let me write the first draft. So actually they gave a screenplay to Steven Spielberg just a month ago, which is a little terrifying and intimidating. I wrote a draft that I wrote for the show, Billions. So I was a producer and writer on that. So I wrote episode three of last season, season five of billions. And I've written independently, I've probably written about five screenplays at this point. So it's not the main thing that I do. But I've definitely written a few of them.
Anna David: And do you still lock yourself away when you've got the story. And you're like, bye, bye, Tanya. Bye, kids see in two months, like, how does that work?
Ben Mezrich: I mean, I listen, it's definitely gotten harder. So actually, in the beginning of the pandemic, I mean, I wrote two books in the first six months. I mean, I was really writing, you know, at a really great clip. Now, definitely, you know, I have a sequel to The Midnight Ride, due next month, which is going to be challenging. I think that yes, I, my process is, I spend a large amount of my time researching and doing the outline. So that's kind of the biggest time commitment for me is actually researching and talking to everybody I need to, to get all the information I need. And then writing a very stiff outline to kind of outline that. I know every chapter, I know what happens in every chapter, I know the page numbers of every chapter, and I never even missed a page. So I put together a really tight skeleton, then is when I start writing, and it starts off, you know, a few hours a day, but I don't write by time I write by pages. I'm one of those writers that believes, you know, you say I'm gonna write five pages today. And if I'm done in an hour, I'm done an hour and five hours, and five hours. So I start off with like six pages a day.
And then as I get into the heat of it, I'm up to like, 12 to 14 pages a day. And towards the end of that process, yeah, I lock myself up for a couple of weeks, and finish up the book. But it's always a struggle, as you know, writing every book is a struggle. And even though I've written 20, some five of them, it never gets that much easier. I know what works and what doesn't, I know how to write. There's very little editing for me at this point, pretty much. I write the book, I hand it in, it's pretty much done. The editor will come back. I mean, I do edit it. But the work is really the writing of the book. I'm not one of those people who edits, edits, and edits. I don't edit. I hand in the book that I finished. I don't edit my own books at all. So I write a draft. It's done. I send it to the publisher, then they'll come back with stuff, you know, and they'll be like this chapter, add something. Can you put a little bit more in there and I'll make those additions. But when I write to the end of my manuscript, I don't even look at it. I don't read it. I literally put it in the mail, I hit send. Which is crazy, right? But honestly, that started a long time ago with Bringing Down the House. I didn't edit, bring down the house once. It went to the publisher, and then the publisher had some changes to make, but I don't self edit myself. And it's weird. I can't, I can't, I can't edit myself. I'm a happy writer. So it's funny. I have my friend from college, this guy named Scott Stossel, who was my roommate in college. He's one of the people who runs the Atlantic Monthly. He wrote about My Age of Anxiety. Brilliant book. Yeah. And Scott is one of those writers who's miserable, who sits there. He's a genius, but he'll write and edit and write and edit. And it's just these years and years of misery. And, and that's, I'm the opposite of that. I'd like to do it. Yeah. Good. It's great. It's perfect. And I sent it out.
I think for me, the key is I'm not a perfectionist. I don't believe in being perfect. I don't want to be perfect. Good is good. And so I never try to perfect what I'm doing. I just want to get it written. So when I go on a story, I write it to the end. And then I send it in.
Anna David: Here's my question, well you’re writing a very clean copy, clearly. I mean, a lot of people's first drafts are like, Wait, what is that word?
Ben Mezrich: Yeah. I mean, if I went back to sort of 20 years ago, I'm sure it would have been worse. Now, at this point, I think I know what I'm doing. So yeah.
Anna David: My big question. And you've been so generous with your time we have to wrap up. But in terms of this outline, you are getting new sources as you're working on it, right? So the outline does evolve and change or...
Ben Mezrich: The other thing is I write very quickly, right. So, you know, eight weeks is a book, not a year. Yeah. So I do all of my research. Before I start writing, I've interviewed everybody I can get all the legal documents I can get. I've got all the information I can get. I will write the outline of that information. And then I start writing. So once I start writing, there shouldn't be any new information. If you know if it's a developing situation, like the Gamestop Story was a little different, in that I was writing it while it was happening. So yeah, in that respect that one, you sort of had to go back and not go back and change anything but it certainly evolved that there was writing it. But no, something like The Accidental Billionaires, for instance, I had written this proposal, I had done the research. And then Aaron Sorkin, David Fincher stepped in, but I hadn't written the book yet. So suddenly, I had this massive movie developing. So I locked myself in a hotel, I went over to the Westin Hotel in Boston, and Aaron Sorkin came into Boston. And I literally wrote 11 weeks, I wrote that book. Never really left the hotel. And I would hand him chapters as I went, so no, all the information was done before I start writing. The research stage is usually complete before I start the actual writing, because to me, the writing is like this, frenzied, furious, crazed, you know, six pages, 10 pages, 14 pages, 20 pages a day. Music blaring, the room is pitch black, it's like a rock concert to me that I'm performing.
It's like that moment where you could be godlike. I think that one brief moment in your life when you're not captured by all your anxieties. And then you know, whatever it is that doesn't work in your life. You just sit and you write in your creating. And for me, it's almost trance-like, so I don't want to have to stop for anything. Once I start writing, I do not stop until I get to the last page. Because I'm a big believer in that's where you go wrong. Right. So if there's research I haven't done yet, I just whizzed through it. And in the end, then we'll find a way to fix it in post right. I will not stop once they start writing the scene.
Anna David: You already absorbed everything. It's not like you're like, oh, Eduardo said bullet like it's in there.
Ben Mezrich: Yeah, I know, every chapter I know, every character I know. You know, I know everything that I need to know. I've got photos of every room that is in the story. I've got, you know, either blueprints from the internet or I've been there myself with a video camera. Like I do real crazy levels of research. And so yeah, there's no sort of saying, oh, shoot, I don't know what this is or what happened here.
Anna David: Yeah. So for anybody who's listening and dreams of having their book made into a movie or TV show or whatever it is. First of all, in terms of rights when you're doing it like this, how many rights do you need? Whose rights?
Ben Mezrich: That's a good question. So that's usually the way I look at it. That's the movie studios problem. So, if it's a public figure, you don't need any rights. You know, if you're writing about Mark Zuckerberg, or you're writing about the Gamestop story, you're not really going to need anybody's rights to do that. Certainly not for the book, when the studio wants to make a movie, they're going to need certain rights. If there aren't a lot of news articles about those characters. So for instance, for the MIT story, these are a bunch of unknown kids who played blackjack, a movie studio would need those rights. An author of a book wouldn't necessarily need rights. But I certainly didn't want anybody pissed off and unhappy with the story. So I sat down with everybody who I was going to write about and said, I'm going to write about is this cool. And I think for the main character, I did end up making a deal with him for his rights, to make it easier to sell the movie and that kind of thing. But usually, I don't think so much about that. But the other thing is, don't forget, I've sold the movie.
So the studio comes in pretty early, and starts talking to the main characters and figuring that out. I've also had situations where a producer will come to me with a story, and they've already locked up rights. That's what my book 37 Parallel about this crazy UFO hunter, Beau Flynn, who does all the rocks, movies, who did go notice bows wonderful bow came to me, he's like, I've got this great story, you've got to take a look at this. And I flew out to Colorado, and was out in the mountains hunting UFOs with this guy, and it was just an incredible experience. And that became, I thought, a really cool book. And so I didn't really think about, you know, the rights. I don't think about it. Because for the most part, I'm not writing about unknowns. But less of someone emailed me and was like, I have this incredible story. If I wanted to tell it, it would have to be a situation where they're on board, it wouldn't be the kind of thing where I go to them and say I want to tell your story. That's not the kind of writer I am. So for the people you're talking about who are like, “Oh, I saw this news, that looks like a great story. I need to go get that guy's rights.” I would never do that. That person would have to come to me and say, I've got this great story, I want you to tell it. And I would say I'd love to tell it.
That's all there is to it. I'll tell you. I'm not going to buy anything from you. I'll tell it, it'll become a big movie, you'll become incredibly famous. And we'll all win, that's the deal I'm looking for. But yes, the studio does often have to come in and figure out rights, but they don't actually need rights for a true story. They only need rights if it's not a true story about somebody. So yeah, it's complicated. I definitely would suggest that a starting out writer doesn't try to do that. I think there are so many great stories to tell, that don't necessarily involve buying somebody's rights. Why would you choose that? Unless you had a certain reason why you were going to write that story. But there are a million journalists out there trying to do those stories, right? And it's not like they're getting anybody's rights. If you open the Wall Street Journal tomorrow, there'll be a dozen stories in there. Nobody's been paid for any rights. If a studio decides to make that story, the studio will come in and buy the rights. But none of those writers got anybody's rights.
Anna David: Same with podcasters now.
Ben Mezrich: Right. Yeah, I mean, in terms of you don't need people's rights.
Anna David: They're telling all kinds of stories.
Ben Mezrich: Yeah. But eventually, if a studio wants to make a movie off something, they'll figure that out. But that's not really my role. So, yeah, I don't really think about it that much.
Anna David: And so well, this has been fantastic. I usually end with you know, how do you want people to reach you? But really, you only want people to reach you if they've got an incredible story. And they want you to tell it right?
Ben Mezrich: Yeah. I mean, I love people. I'm on Twitter. You know, I think that's the easiest place to find me. I have a Discord for the NFT stuff. So if people are interested in that, there's Benmezrich.com, or Ben MezrichNFT.com. But really, I think Twitter has become sort of the go to place for people to pitch me stories. And that's what people do. And I love young writers coming and talking about writing and stuff like that. So I'm happy to answer any questions anybody has. But I think it's a great moment. For writers. I think this is probably in my entire career. This is the moment where there are the most places to sell something. This is probably the golden age for people starting out and writing to me because there's more places to sell it than there ever were in history, and more places to tell a story than there ever were before. So, you know, there's streaming, there's podcasts, there's just a million different ways to do it. Self publishing and Kindle and Substack. And it's an infinite number compared to when I started out. You sent query letters to agents. That was much the only ballgame right, and by mail, you go to the post office every day with your stack. Right. So, you know, I think there's just a lot of opportunity now.
Anna David: Yeah, as my previous guests said, because of the NFT revolution. The writers haven't been celebrated like this since the Renaissance. That's what she said.
Ben Mezrich: That's a good way to put it. I like that. Yeah.
Anna David: Well, Ben, thank you so much for your time. Listeners, thank you for listening. And this has just been delightful.
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