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Should You Self Publish Your Book

Authors often wonder should you self publish your book or seek out a traditional publisher. There are pros and cons to both avenues of publishing, so it’s important to understand them before making such an important decision.

You may think you need the know-how of a publishing house behind you or want the prestige that comes along with a big name publisher, but you’re a savvy woman and with the accessibility of self- publishing you need to consider it seriously as an option.

My top 5 answers to the question: Should you self-publish your book

1. Speed to market
When you self-publish your book, you eliminate the time you would have had to spend to find a book agent and then pitch a publisher. Instead, you can use the time to write, publish and promote your book. As a self-published author, you also can typically move through the publishing process faster, than a publishing house does.

In a few months, you can write and publish your book, whereas the search for an agent and publisher can take as long as two years, not including the writing and packaging of your book, which would be additional.

2. Total artistic control
While working with a publishing house, you get the benefit of their valuable insights and know-how, your book is your baby and having total creative decision making over it ensures that you will come out with a book that totally reflects you, your brand and your personality.

Should an opportunity arise around your book, whether it’s interest from a foreign market, or Hollywood has come calling, you get to decide if it’s right for you without having to consult with anyone.

3. you keep 100% of the profits
By publishing it on your own there is no one you need to share profits except the book store or online book retailer.

Most authors don’t make a lot of money from the sale of books, so being able to keep all of your share of the profit is beneficial. Additionally, when you work with a traditional publisher they give you an advance. That means that once you make book sales, you have to pay back the advance or draw out of the retail book sales. Once you finish paying back your advance, you have to share the remaining profits with the publisher, which means less in your pocket.

4. Book promotion and marketing
One of the big frustrations I hear from those who work with a traditional publisher, is that they don’t do much in the way of book promotion and marketing, until you become successful. Even with a publishing deal, as a first or second time author, you’ll have to do your own book marketing and promotion. You might as well self-publish and do your own marketing and promotion and know that you’re reaping all the benefits of those efforts, instead of having to share the rewards with your publishing company, who left you do the heavy lifting.

5. Equal access to distribution channels
Today, as a smart self-published author, you can get the same distribution and same visibility as traditionally published authors. You no longer need a publisher to get you into every bookstore, library, and online retailer. You can also maintain control of distribution, as well as the ability to offer discount pricing as needed.

The advantages to self-publishing are many, though there is a learning curve. Self-publishing doesn’t mean you have to do it all yourself, there are programs, coaches, and companies to help you publish your book like a pro. Done right, it can be hard to tell a self-published book from a traditionally published one.

This post first appeared on She Owns It

How to Build a List of Book Buyers Before You Even Publish

Why You Need Stories In Your NonFiction Book

Our brains are wired for stories. They can create an emotional connection and are easier to remember than text or facts.

Your nonfiction book will be much richer if you include stories in it. You may have a compelling methodology, philosophy or message; the reader will benefit more and remember it longer if you include stories. A rich, textured, multisensory experience with a beginning, middle and an end, is much more enjoyable and memorable than straight theory.

I don’t remember a lot of what I learned in history class, but the stories my teacher shared with us about a historical figure, have stuck with me long beyond any textbook learning. The same will be true for stories you include in your book.

It’s important to carefully select the story or stories you include in your book; choose a story that your ideal reader will identify with, as well as one that showcases your best client work and results.

[clickToTweet tweet=”She Who Tells Stories Rules The World – Why You Need Stories in Your Nonfiction Book” quote=”She Who Tells Stories Rules the World – Native American Proverb”]

Here is how a story can enhance your book:

Demonstrates how the rubber meets the road; your book outlines a message, concept or theory that you are telling the reader about it. Showing is more compelling than telling! Your story shows the reader your concept in a real-life situation, making it easier for them to relate to it.

Allows readers to see themselves in your story; a well-chosen story is relatable to the reader as it helps them walk in the shoes of your client/hero and see themselves working with you.

Provides social proof. Your story shows how you helped a client go from problem to solution easily and quickly, providing proof that serves as a testimonial. It shows that you have done it successfully for the client in your story, and your reader will now know you’re capable of doing it for them.

Demonstrates to the reader you can help them go from where they are, to where they want to be, as evidenced by your well-selected case study. A well-written story will be so real that the reader can taste the result. They will see you as the one who can help them get the same result for themselves.

A well-chosen story is relatable. It confirms for the reader that you understand them and their problem. It shows that you know the solution, and have helped others working with you, overcome their challenges and obstacles.

Remember, as the native American proverb says, ‘She who tells the best stories rules the world.’

This first appeared on She Owns It

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How to Run a Bestseller Campaign on Amazon

The reason why you want to know how to run a bestseller campaign on Amazon goes beyond bragging rights. When done right, it will provide a significant boost to your book’s visibility and sales, as well as help garner book reviews. I am speaking here about Amazon Kindle Bestseller Campaigns.

Before jumping into the hows of a bestseller campaign… at the risk of stating the obvious, you want to start by writing a great book.

Visibility

When set up right, your book will show up high in the categories your potential readers are browsing in… this way it can be discovered. Amazon is a giant search engine, and like Google, people don’t go beyond the first page to search for results, so ranking high matters. In the case of Amazon, it is the opposite – a low number ranks higher with #1 being at the top. It is key to getting found by new prospective buyers.

Your book can also show up in the Hot New Releases section and potentially other sections that will give it additional visibility in front of your target audience.

Categories and Keywords

Your category and keyword research, when done right, along with optimizing your An optimized listing, will help your book continue to rank well long beyond the bestseller campaign.

When I refer to optimizing your listing – I mean carefully selecting your categories and keywords to help your book get discovered, and taking advantage and using all of the 2 categories and 7 keywords Amazon allows a book.

The optimization of a book listing is a combination of art and science. Sometimes authors see their book as belonging in a certain category, which may not be the ideal one, nor the one or the only one their ideal reader will search in. There are probably a number of ways your reader will browse for books like yours… so remain open. Research can help you identify the optimal categories and keywords. You can conduct your research by polling your target audience, researching similar books on Amazon, using a keyword tool, or hiring an expert.

You can always tweak or change your categories, however, if you aren’t sure why your book isn’t ranking the way you would like, changing the categories and keywords without getting professional input, is a bit like playing the lottery, and leaving the result to chance.

The momentum of a bestseller campaign is valuable on Amazon as it gives you a number of sales. It also boosts your book’s ranking and visibility. Keeping your promotion going beyond the initial campaign can really solidify your book rankings for an extended period. We continue to run a promotional campaign for a few days after the Bestseller campaign. Keeping the price at .99, we see steady sales, increased reviews, and long-term rankings boost. The books that have used this strategy continue to rank and bring in sales month after month with no additional promotion.

What Not To Do – Credibility Busters

Beg or hound friends and family to buy your book. Instead, join a number of book groups that allow you to post your promotion, or hire a service or professional to run your campaign.

Claim bestseller status when your book has no reviews listed. Think about it, is it credible that a book would become a bestseller and no one would have reviewed it? Instead, get a few reviews before running your bestseller campaign.

Post your book online with the bestseller seal on it, before its even published [if it somehow happens to pass Amazon scrutiny this way] before you even start your campaign or reach bestseller status. Instead, hire a graphic designer [a Fiverr for $5] to add the graphic, and upload a new cover once you have actually achieved bestseller status.

No Author page. Amazon gives you this great free marketing tool with Author Central, so why not take advantage and set it up before promoting your book.

Find out about our done for you bestseller campaigns here

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How to Profit From Your Book – The $7,000 Message

Ever get a $7000 message? My client did, and this is just one example of how to profit from your book.

I was at a training with my client Mai. The same workshop where I ate fire! Mai, called me over and was clearly so excited she couldn’t contain herself.

I couldn’t wait to see what the excitement was about.

“Look at this message I just got from a prospect. It’s all because of the book. Oh my gosh! Thank you” Jane.

Note: Mai worked with me to write and publish her book The Divorced Mom’s Guide to Dating. We got the book written and published [to bestseller status] in about 90 days.

The message, which you can see in the image to the left, was from a reader, who was so excited and ready to sign up for coaching with Mai after reading her book that she emailed her and then sent her this message on Facebook to make sure Mai saw it as soon as possible.

**How Mai’s book created a ready to buy $7000 coaching client**

People buy from those that they know, like and trust. People can get a sense of you and your work from your book, if it’s written and set up correctly. What we did in Mai’s case was:

Tell her story, so readers connected with her instantly
Share client stories – so readers could relate to ‘people just like them’, who were in ‘situations just like them’ and who got ‘the outcomes they are seeking’
Give people a taste of her methodology/coaching program in the book
Include worksheets so that readers could start to do the work/ begin to experience results from Mai’s work
Included a beautiful invite to Mai’s bi-annual live event.

Have you ever tried to learn something from a book or program on your own?

What was the outcome?

As is often the case, people find that they are only able to get so far via a book or self-paced coaching or learning program, and then realize they need additional, more personalize support to reach their goals. That was the case with Mai’s reader. She’d gone as far as she could on her own, and she already saw Mai as the answer to a problem she was desperate to solve. So she signed up for a $7000 coaching program with Mai.

Imagine getting a text like this! If you are like me, and selling is not something you like to do….having clients lined up excited to sign up with you is pretty attractive. As a salesperson friend of mine joked, when I showed them the message Mai received, the only thing left to ask is ‘Visa or Mastercard?’

Ready to package your expertise and method into a book, and attract ready to buy readers? Let’s talk.

5 Ways You Should Be Using Your Nonfiction Book to Make Money

How a Business Coach Landed Clients With His Book

4 Ways Writing a Book Can Grow Your Business

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Feel the Fear… Write the Book Anyway

Feel the fear do the ________ anyway!

As many of you know, in my world the fill-in-the-blank would be Feel the fear write the book anyway, but really this is a metaphor for anything in life.

Whether books are on your short list, yours is in works or way out in the distant future or not at all, there’s a lesson in this for everyone.

We all have things that we fear doing. Some of you may not want to fess up publicly. Your choice.

I know I always fear public speaking until I get going on stage and then I usually start enjoying it. I’m actively seeking to do more public speaking. You may think, why the heck would she do that?

There are two reasons:

You may have heard me say that my favorite quote is “life begins at the edge of your comfort zone” so I’m trying to push myself to do things that are uncomfortable but that I know are going to help me grow as a person and a professional.
I know that doing public speaking will help me get in front of more people who I can help by providing some of my knowledge and expertise and hopefully inspiring them to take action.

I was at a literary conference recently that my city hosted for the first time. I sat in on a panel of successful fiction writers, most of whom I’d never heard of. I was really struck by what Garth Risk Hallberg, one of the panelists told us, when he said that he worked on his book for six years. During the first four, he didn’t even let anyone know he was working on it – not even his closest friends.

Why? Because he was afraid. Afraid that it would just end up in his top-drawer, unread. Afraid no publishing house would pick him up. Afraid no one would read it. Afraid if they read it, that they wouldn’t like it.

Sound familiar? It did to me- like he was broadcasting the little gremlin voice in my head, as well as a thoughts /fears many of my clients expressed to me at one point in their journey to becoming published authors.
[clickToTweet tweet=”“I’ve had a lot of worries in my life, most of which never happened.” Mark Twain” quote=”“I’ve had a lot of worries in my life, most of which never happened.” Mark Twain “]

So in this case author Hallberg’s fears were unfounded. His book was a big success and each and every one of his fears didn’t come to pass.

Now your outcomes and my outcomes may not be as spectacular, but you won’t have any wins if you don’t take any chances. If you don’t allow yourself to either ignore those fears, or set them aside to do that thing that you’ve been fearing, nothing great can happen. Period.

Sometimes removing fear can be done by improving your skills in the area where you have fears, practicing to build your confidence, hiring a mentor or sometimes moving past the fear means starting by taking tiny baby steps.

How can I support you in moving past a fear to achieve a dream? Please let me know. You can do so by commenting below or by submitting a request on Facebook

Here’s another fear- doing live video. I publicly committed to doing a FB Live every day in May to help me push past that fear!! I’d love your support on it, so stop by and join me, please!

To your success!

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How to Get Celebrity Endorsements For Your Book

Having celebrities endorse your book will lend credibility, prestige and authority. It will also help you sell more books.

Big brands have been using celebrities to sell products for ages. Think Michael Phelps on the corn flakes box to Ellen Degeneres in Cover Girl makeup commercials. They pay big fees to the celebrities because these endorsements help sell more products.

The good news is, with a little bit of effort on your part, you can get industry influencers and busy celebrities to endorse your books- and you won’t have to pay a fee.

To understand why celebrities will give you an endorsement, even if they don’t know you, see Part 1 of this series Why you should ask Barbara Corcoran for an endorsement

I reached out to a top industry expert who was also a multiple New York Times bestselling author to get an endorsement for a client’s book. They agreed. We were thrilled! An endorsement from them would add incredible cache and authority to my client’s book. Weeks went by. We heard nothing. After more than a month, I reached out and asked if it would help if I sent some sample endorsements.

The expert’s assistant wrote back with a one word response: “Absolutely”.
We got their endorsement the next week!

The key to having celebrities endorse your book is to put in time up front, and to make it as easy as possible for them to say yes.

Here is how to get celebrity endorsements for your book

Create a simple, ‘package’ with all your information and materials to send via email.

Start by sending a very short, detailed note about your book along with your request and why you think they are the perfect person to endorse it. [Genuine flattery goes a long way!]

Offer a copy of the book as well as a representative sample

Many celebrities and experts will not want to read your entire book; however, you should offer them a copy of it as well as a representative sample [intro, table of contents and a chapter]. Rather than send the sample as an attachment, host your sample chapter in the cloud [drop box, google doc…] and offer a link to the files in your email.

Offer Sample Endorsements [3 -5 samples]

Let them know you recognize that they are busy, so you have drafted a few sample endorsements that they are welcome to use as is, or edit. This can make it easier for them. They can simply select one of your samples and email you back which one to put their name next to, or they can customize a sample endorsement to make it more ‘in their own voice’.

This last step of offering ‘sample endorsements’ can make all the difference between getting an endorsement or not, as you can see from my client example.

Sending sample endorsement works for two reasons. People are intimidated by a blank page. They aren’t sure where to start. By offering them some samples, you are helping to give them some suggestions and direction. They don’t have to think hard about this, and can comply with your request, by customizing one of your samples in a minute or two.

Remember, you are asking a busy people to take an action on your behalf. You want to have celebrities endorse your book. They get a lot of requests. The easier you make it for them, the greater likelihood you have of success.

Fast Track Your Results & Get More Celebrity Endorsements

Related Content :

Part 1: Why you should ask Barbara Corcoran for an endorsement

Part 3: How to Contact A Celebrity for a Book Endorsement

Listen to our podcast: The Self-Publishing Blueprint

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Why you should ask Barbara Corcoran for an endorsement

To add credibility and social proof to your book, there is no better way than to have a celebrity or recognized expert endorse your book. In this post I’m going to cover Why you should ask Barbara Corcoran for an endorsement.

You may be thinking, ” but I don’t know any celebrities or recognized experts, or they don’t know me, so why would they endorse me”?

Here are 3 reasons why a celebrity will endorse books or products, even if they don’t know you personally:

They want to remain visible
They want to give back and help someone who is up and coming
They believe in the product

And yet….Barbara Corcoran turned me down.

When I published my first book, Success Secrets of the Real Estate Super Stars – Remarkable Women in Real Estate, the obvious choice to ask for an endorsement from Barbara Corcoran.

I did a search online and found her press contact. I drafted my endorsement letter and sent it off. I got a prompt response from her press person saying that unfortunately Barbara was slammed with travel and wouldn’t be able to endorse the book. I was a little bit disappointed but went on to publish the book.

Fast forward two years. A colleague was publishing a book on real estate and wanted to get an endorsement from Barbara Corcoran. She reached out and Barbara said yes. Why? The timing was better. She had the time to look at the book and endorse it.

So if you’re looking for endorsements from anyone famous, a celebrity or industry expert, the first rule of thumb is simply – you have to ask.

Be prepared to get turned down. It’s not personal, necessarily. It’s probably just that they’re too busy and not able to comply.

Want to sell more books? – get endorsements from recognized experts or celebrities.

Fast Track Your Results & Get Celebrity Now

Part 3, I show you how to find a press contact for any celebrity.

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Does an Author Need Both PR and Social Media

I was recently asked by a fellow publisher “whether an author with limited time and resources should put them into social media strategies rather than trying to include publicity or even going exclusively the publicity route.” Does an author need PR and Social Media to succeed?

Here is my response:

Good question. The first thing I always want to know is where does your audience live, as it should inform a lot of where to put your efforts. If you target an audience that is rarely on social media, then that would not be a great use of all your efforts.

I consider social media as part of ‘the media’ nowadays

Earned media [others writing about you, talking about you…] is the most valuable type of content you can have [no one cares or believes what you say about you to some extent, especially on social media]. Others talking about you is social proof, third party credibility, perceived as an endorsement…

In our review economy [also called trust economy], people trust:

recommendations from friends and family
online reviews & recommendations and
the media [source: Nielson]

You have probably heard it said that people buy from those they know, like and trust… so media coverage/mentions are in the top 3 factors that influence buying decisions

The media are respected, and as it is they who decide what they write about; being the ‘selected one’ has additional value – i.e. they featured you over all the other experts out there.

When you are featured in the media, you get the halo effect of being associated with their respected brands…. that is why we say, as seen in the NY Times or cite a NY Times book review, and we don’t say “as seen on Facebook” or cite a Facebook book review, no matter how glowing.

As you can probably tell by now, I think that authors need PR and Social Media to succeed; I recommend authors use a combination of PR and social media… yes, even when time and resources are challenged [when aren’t they?]… all the more reason to learn how each medium works and learn how to maximize your efforts.

Want to learn more about how to do your own publicity? Please check out our Magnify Your Message program

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4 Ways That Writing A Book Can Help Grow Your Business

Have you ever thought about writing a book?

Maybe you have, but you dismissed the idea because you don’t think of yourself as a writer.

Or maybe you’ve even gone so far as to walk up to a shelf in a bookstore and clear out space where your book would go, if you ever got around to writing it.

Even if neither scenario applies to you, the bottom line is this…

Writing a book can help grow your business; in fact, it can be the biggest leverage point in that yields the fastest results.

In fact, 63% of business owners who wrote a book reported that it had a “very strong” or “strong” influence on their ability to attract new customers.

How Writing a Book Can Grow Your Business

Let’s look at some of the surprising ways that writing a book can help kick your business growth into high gear.

WRITING A BOOK GIVES YOU INSTANT CREDIBILITY

The first benefit of writing a book that’s related to your business is that it gives you instant credibility – in the same way that an experienced PR person can help you by getting you access to opportunities you might not otherwise have.

How?

• While self-publishing is very common today, that wasn’t always the case. It used to be fairly difficult to get a book published. Potential clients will be impressed when they see that you’re a published author.

• A well-written book about a topic that’s relevant to your target audience demonstrates that you are someone knowledgeable – someone they can trust.

Today’s consumers tend to search for companies and people before they do business with them. When a potential customer sees your book on Amazon when they Google you, they’ll know that you are an authority in your industry.

WRITING A BOOK GETS YOU FREE EXPOSURE

When you’re trying to grow a business, it can be a struggle to get people to notice you – particularly if you’re in a competitive industry. That barrier is greatly reduced when you write a book. It’s standard practice for newspapers, industry publications, and even television shows to review books and interview their authors.
Instead of trying to cajole influencers to talk about you, your book can convince them to approach you – or at least help you open the door when you approach them.
WRITING A BOOK RAISES YOUR ONLINE PROFILE

If you know anything at all about online marketing, you know that regardless of your industry, you’re in competition with many other companies and websites for the attention of your target audience.

How can you stand out from the crowd?

When you’re the author of a book that speaks to the needs and problems of your target audience, it’s like standing on a stage while your competitors are milling around in the theater. Your book puts you in a position to command attention and respect, and will also come up in search results for your topic.

Just as a PR person can make sure that people know your name, a published book can help raise your profile and increase your visibility online.

When you list your book for sale, whether it’s on your own website, on Amazon, or even on social media sites like Facebook, you automatically increase the chances that people in your target audience will notice your online footprint instead of your competitor’s. This can even improve your SEO as various sites and publications link back to your company’s website.
WRITING A BOOK ALLOWS YOU TO CHARGE MORE

The final benefit – and one that business owners love – is that the cache of having written a book allows them to raise their prices.

Why?

Think of it this way. Every commodity that sells, whether it’s a product or a service, is subject to the law of supply and demand. The higher the demand is, the lower the supply tends to be…
And the more you can charge for whatever you’re selling.
The author of an authoritative book is likely to be in demand. As you gain visibility and credibility, the number of people who want to work with you will inevitably increase. And when that happens, you can raise your prices. You might even decide to offer high-end consulting services as a way of capitalizing on your notoriety as an author.

When Should You Start Writing?

If you had the money to hire a PR person, you’d want to do it as soon as possible, right?
The same goes for writing your book. Even if you don’t think of yourself as a writer, you know that you have specialized knowledge just by virtue of being a business owner. Your experience and expertise can be working for you 24 hours a day in a published book.

The average non-fiction book that sells on Amazon is only about 10,000 words long. If you wrote only 500 words a day, you could have a completed first draft in less than a month.
You have the expertise. All you need is to carve out a little bit of time and write it.

And as soon as your book is published, it can start working for you – bringing you the credibility, publicity, and success you deserve.

This post was first published on She Owns It

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How to Grow Your Business as a Speaker or Author

I am just back from an amazing 4 days at the Speaker Empire event learning how to grow your business as a speaker or author. I picked up lots of tips and inspiration and it got me to thinking…

In the United States, a favorite food staple is peanut butter and jelly. You rarely see one without the other. They just make each other better then they are on their own.

[clickToTweet tweet=”Books are to speaking, as peanut butter is to jelly” quote=”Books are to speaking, as peanut butter is to jelly”]

One of the best ways to grow your business is as a speaker or author, and best when you are both, as they are the peanut butter to each other’s jelly, they can give you exposure and expert positioning. Together, as both a speaker and an author, you make a bigger, better impression.

As an author, you are more attractive to conference and event planners, so it’s easier to get speaking opportunities. As a speaker, you can get in front of new audiences, wow them with your message, and sell your books and services with your speech. As a speaker without a book, you are leaving money on the table.

Nowadays it can take 5-12 touches before someone becomes a client. When you present to an audience, you immediately have expert positioning and authority, however they may not be ready to buy a big-ticket service from you. Your book is a great way to get them to buy something from you that at a price point that doesn’t require approval from corporate or their partner. Your book continues to give them an experience of you and your philosophy and methodology, and can move them closer to becoming a client.

One of the amazing things I discovered, is that once you commit to writing a book, you can start getting speaking opportunities. I have been interviewed on podcasts and been invited to speak at events based solely on announcing my forthcoming book. So your book can make getting visibility and attracting ideal clients much easier, even before its completely written!

I’ll be sharing some of the tips I picked up at Speaking Empire, as well as tips on how you can build buzz, write and promote your book… via Facebook Live. Please like my page so that you will get notified when I am broadcasting.

If you have any questions or topics you’d like to see my cover, please comment below.

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