215 From Entrepreneur to Author: How to Write Your First Book
Say hello to this weeks guest, Scott A. MacMillan.
Toronto-based publisher, entrepreneur, and advisor to start-ups.
Tune into this weeks episode…
Today on the show I am sitting down with Scott MacMillan who is a Toronto-based publisher, entrepreneur, and advisor to start-ups - with a passion for helping entrepreneurs grow their business by extracting, productizing, and publishing their knowledge and expertise.
If you have a dream of writing a book one day (even if that day is far away!) then this is the episode for you.
Scott wrote a book called Entrepreneur to Author: the 5 steps to writing and publishing a nonfiction book that builds authority and grows your business. The book is right in front of me and I have very much enjoyed diving into it and scribbling out notes about my future book.
Like many of you, I would love to write a book one day! It’s a long term goal.
I mean, how cool would it be to finally put all of your intellectual property and ideas into words, and have a published book in the hands of millions of readers. Or even 1000’s.
Have you ever thought about writing a book?
What would you say if you were given the chance to put pen to paper?
Do you know how to start the writing process?
Well visionaries, I think this podcast with Scott will answer a lot of those questions and even just open your eyes to what’s possible!
Let’s get into it…
Connect with Scott and with Grammar Factory
Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcast, or YouTube
Let’s connect on Instagram or find out more about Private Business & Marketing Coaching on my Website
Click the image below to tune in to this weeks episode 🎙️
You’re going to LOVE this episode with Scott - especially if you’ve got ‘Future Author’ on your resume!
Here’s a sneak peak at my prep notes for the show…
Key Questions:
There’s a quote right at the beginning of your book from Margaraet Atwood “a word after a word after a word is power” - when did you first realize this in your own life?
What was your entry into the world of entrepreneurship?
When did the lightbulb moment hit to start the Grammar Factory?
70% of entrepreneurs want to write a book but only a small fraction actually do - tell us how Grammar Factory helps entrepreneurs to take action on this vision!
Why authorship (publishing goals and winning strategies for entrepreneurs
Benefits of publishing?
Some of the expected outcomes?
The 5 steps for writing and publishing a nonfiction book - STEPS Method
Go through 5 steps….
IP development, writing, and content creation (tips for getting ideas out of your head and onto the page and beyond)
Does every thought leader or entrepreneur need to codify or productize their IP?
At what point in one's journey should they consider doing this?
What are some red flags that someone is NOT ready to write a book?
Demystifying the publishing black box (editing, publishing, distribution and more – tips from a publishing insider)
Break down some of the common misconceptions and fears around publishing?
Or watch us on YouTube! 👇
🎙️ Other ways to listen…
Episode Transcript:
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You're listening to the visionary life podcast. I'm your host, Kelsey. Rydall, we're hanging out here today because one day, while hiking in Peru, after just having been let go from my dream job, it hit me. There's so much more to life and there's no excuse for not embracing uncertain. And trying new things to really explore our full potential in this lifetime.
On this weekly podcast, you'll hear from successful entrepreneurs, creative thinkers, and visionaries, just like you, so that you feel less alone as you pursue everything you want and deserve in this lifetime. This is a space where big sky thinking is welcomed and conversations about daily. Betterment are essential.
So if. Stop living an ordinary life and start living a visionary life than welcome home.
Welcome back to the show visionaries. Before we dive in, I want to thank this. Week's sponsor healthy planet. Look, I'm not going to make this ad long or drawn out because if you're listening to this show, I have a feeling you're already someone who understands the link between. And performance, you know, that what you drink can affect how you think, you know, that, how you nourish yourself, whether it's with high quality foods or low quality foods is going to affect your performance.
You know that when you practice daily movement and you fuel your recovery properly, you're happier, you're more focused, you're more productive. And all of these things are essential for you in running a successful business. So be sure to pack your cupboards, your desk drawers. And your refrigerator with health goodies from the store healthy planet, healthy planet is your one stop shop for all your supplements, your natural beauty products, your health foods, your sports, nutrition, and your gluten-free dairy-free sugar-free whatever.
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So. Go shop healthy planet and enjoy. Now let's get onto. This week, I am sitting down with Scott, a McMillan. Scott McMillan is a Toronto based publisher, an entrepreneur and an advisor to startups with a passion for helping entrepreneurs grow their business by extracting productizing and publishing their knowledge and expertise.
I have a copy of his book. It's called entrepreneur to author, the five steps to writing and publishing a non-fiction book that builds authority and grows your business. Say that 10 times fast, but I have a copy of it right in front of me. And I have so enjoyed diving into it and scribbling out my own future book.
And like many of you, I would love to write a book one day. It's certainly a long-term goal of mine. 'cause I think it would be really great to get to a point where your intellectual property is put into words and it's published and it can reach millions of people or thousands of people, or even just hundreds of people.
Um, we've talked to many authors on the show. You guys probably remember my episode with dune Roshen she wrote your hyper. Uh, and I know a lot of you reached out saying you really wanted to write a book after hearing her journey. Well, if, so this is the episode for you because Scott is going to talk all about, who wants to write a book, what that process looks like, and some of the first steps you need to take, if that is on your vision board.
So if you'd like to connect with Scott, his website is either entrepreneur to author.com. Or you can find out what his business does. Grammar factory.com. I'll leave all the links in the show notes, but hope you really enjoyed this episode. Be sure to snap a screenshot and tag me on Instagram. I'm at Kelsey Reidel.
And other than that, let's just jump right on him.
Scott welcome to the visionary life podcast. We were connected by actually one of my visionary method, clients, Anya. So thank you to her for that connection. And as soon as I heard your name, I was like, well, I got to learn more about what he does and got my hands on a copy of your book. Was so excited to read through your methodology of how you help entrepreneurs to become published authors.
So we're going to crack into all of that today, but first I'd love to know, uh, how did you get into entrepreneurship? Have you always been an entrepreneur or did you start in some other industry kind of fill us up to speed on kind of what you've been up to the last 20 or so years? Yeah,
very, very, very happy to, and thanks so much for having me calcium.
Um, you know, I've been a listener and have enjoyed the show from that perspective. So it's a real honor to be joining you, but yeah, in terms of my entrepreneurship journey, so I got a taste of it. I would say early on when I was studying graphic design, I was originally trained as a graphic designer and, um, you know, a couple of classmates and I started a design agency.
Sort of gave us our summer employment between school years, designing interactive products. And, um, you know, this was 19 96 97 or so, so we're talking. You know, web 1.0 sites, multimedia CD-ROMs, you know, really cutting edge stuff. Um, but you know, when we all graduated, we took real jobs, right. That's uh, that was kind of the end game at that time.
And so I spent the next decade working in animals. First as a technical director and then a video game producer, and then more into sales and marketing, like a licensing role, licensing out our, um, character brands to publishers. And, you know, at that point I felt I was missing a big chunk of knowledge on the business side.
Cause I had kind of trained up. Yeah. And so I went back to school at the age of 30, um, doing business school. Part-time at the university of Toronto and coming out of business school, I was fortunate to land a management consulting job with Boston consulting group. And so I spent the next five years, uh, you know, traveling the world, working on projects.
Uh, Australia, Asia, U S. And of course, here in Canada, before taking a roll back here in Toronto is head of strategy for Rogers media. And that turned into a couple of other executive roles at Rogers. And then in 2017, my wife and I were blessed with our son Matthew, and pretty quickly it became clear that I wanted two things that I wasn't getting from corporate life.
Um, you know, I wanted flexibility around where, and when I worked. Not uncommon. I think that's a lot of the reasons why people go the entrepreneur route. And I also wanted the ability to build something for our family that was beyond just, you know, saving cash in the bank. Um, so, you know, I, I had a product idea.
I found a good exit point. I worked with the product it's product designer and some manufacturers in China and India, and launched a Kickstarter for a small leather notepad wallet called Kenzie pad. And you know, that, that was great. But I soon realized that Kendra pad was a product. It wasn't a business.
And, um, so you know, it, I, I wasn't, I wasn't sure how that was going to work, but that was really my true jumping off point for entrepreneurship. And when I decided to really put it all on.
Well, I have to ask, does that product still exist or did you just say like, you know what? I can't deal with the product anymore.
Yeah, yeah, no, it still does exist. It's um, it's sold exclusively on Amazon now and, uh, you know, I use Amazon FBA, so basically once a quarter, I'll just package up a bunch of inventory and ship it in and then I don't have to think about it again for another. Yeah.
Oh, very cool. Um, we'll have to do a whole other podcast on how you've done that, but I want to, double-tap on a couple of things of what you just mentioned.
I love that like your journey, uh, very much like a lot of our listeners journey. It's not linear, right? Like not often anymore. Do you jump into one career path and then you're just going. On that pathway for the next 20, 30, 40 years. So thank you for sharing that you have had many pivots and the fact that you went back to school at 30, a lot of our listeners are in that transition from their twenties to their thirties, maybe young thirties to late thirties, and they're unhappy in their career, but they think it's too late.
For them to make any sort of change. Did you have like, uh, any hesitation about going back to school or did you know that, like, that was just what you needed to do and you were willing to do whatever it took to make that pivot or that change?
Yeah. You know, um, I never had that hesitation and, you know, I, I think just thinking for myself often that type of hesitation comes from a place of, um, You know, you, you've got what you've got and that's safe and you don't want to lose that.
And you know, that that's a very real fear and I succumb to it. Um, and, and, you know, I don't want to tell people to ignore that because you can't ignore that. Right. That's the reality of, uh, living a life and supporting a family and, you know, whatever your situation. Um, the way that I mitigated that was I went back to school part-time so I was able to keep my job, um, keep earning the salary that I was making at the time.
Um, and you know, it took longer, it was, it was more work for a period of time. You know, it, it was, um, three years instead of two years to, to finish business school. But for me, that worked and I think that's the key for people is to just really understand what are the, what are the decision factors? What are the things that are negotiable?
What are the things that are. And how can you, um, pursue that dream that you have? Uh, well, balancing those as best you can, and they're gonna be true.
Yeah, absolutely. So let's go back to kind of where you left off with your intro. So you said you launched your product, you started selling this little journal leather-bound journal, um, but then realized you had a product, not a company.
So after that, is that when you got the idea for grammar factory, like what, what happened when you decided, okay, this product is not the be-all end-all I'm ready for that next chapter. How did that all
unfold? Yeah. Yeah. It's a good question. And the answer is maybe not what you'd think. So, like I mentioned, and like you reiterated I'd come to the realization that Ken's UPAD was a product.
It wasn't a business. So I was faced with a decision, you know, do I expand the product line? Right. I was looking at, I was thinking of companies like, like mole skin, right. Where the core product is a notebook, but they've got a whole, um, ecosystem of products surrounding that brand. Um, or do I start something else?
And, you know, I wasn't loving the e-commerce space. I felt that it didn't really, it wasn't really where I could best deploy my experience from media and strategy. Um, so in 2019, we were traveling in, uh, Southern France for a friend's wedding. And I had the spark of an idea, um, that may be the right path here.
Wasn't to start a new business, but maybe I should be looking at buying an existing. And so, you know, I started doing a little bit of digging. Um, the, the virtual classifies, right. There are a few sites online where people can list businesses for sale. And, you know, a lot of them are internet businesses, um, you know, websites that somebody started or an app.
I wasn't really interested in that. I wanted something that was a little bit more tangible. And I came across this company, this listing for grammar, factory and grammar factory is a service publisher that works with entrepreneurs to write and publish books. And what I loved about it was, you know, I love books myself.
I've always loved books. Um, I love entrepreneurship. I had experienced in media and I, I really felt that my strategy background was something that could be layered on top of all of that to add value. Because when you're, when you're acquiring a business, it's, it's more, you know, you've got to assume that the value of the business as it stands is already baked in.
Right. So you're going to. You're going to pay the value, the market value. If you want to, if you want that to be a profitable acquisition, then there's gotta be something more that you're bringing the tape to the table that somebody else can't. And so I felt that my design background and my strategy experience was something that I could layer on top.
What was already a really strong editorial foundation. Um, and so I went back and forth with, uh, the founder, a woman named Jackie Pretti. She built a, an incredible business with some, you know, an amazing team of editors. Um, and, um, you know, in, in the fall of 2019, I agreed to acquire the business and we closed on that.
And, um, you know, the business was originally started in Australia. So, uh, about half of our business is still based in Australia. We've got about. Maybe 35, 40% of the businesses now in Canada and the U S and then the rest is in, um, you know, Europe and Asia, but, uh, but that's kind of the origin story. It wasn't a start from scratch it.
Wasn't. I
think that's so cool because I actually haven't interviewed a lot of people on the podcast who went through that journey of purchasing an existing business. And, uh, I just think it's a, just a fascinating way to become an entrepreneur. Right. And I would assume you do call yourself an entrepreneur.
It's not that just because you bought the business that you can't use that terminology
that's right. Yeah. Because really the reason. It's not that I couldn't have started the same business, but what acquiring the business did, was it just, it brought, um, it probably leapfrog three years. If not more right.
So there, you know, we had 150 blog articles and videos and content. Um, we had search search rankings. We had an existing customer base. We had email lists, we had social media followers, you know, all of that takes time to build, as you would know. Um, and so all of that was ready to deploy. And so then when I came in, um, you know, the main things that I did was a rebrand, uh, change, the, kept the name, but changed the brand.
Um, and then, then I was able to start, uh, adapting the product. So I was talking with customers, talking with prospective customers, understanding, you know, what's missing from the current offering and from what you're seeing from, uh, other publishers that we can layer on. And a lot of what I was hearing was it was around that strategic link between the book and the authors business.
Yeah, right there, there are a lot of publishers that can deliver a fantastic book, a high quality book, but helping the author through that journey. How do I make sure that the book is connected strategically to my business and that I have a plan in place to then monetize it on the. Right. Um, that, that piece is something that, uh, in talking to people I learned was missing from the current
landscape.
Yeah. And I'm really excited to dive into kind of what the grammar factory method is. But before we get there, I'd love to know how did you come to the decision that this is the company I want to buy? This is the path I want to take because. Again, for a lot of the listeners, they are searching for opportunities.
They're looking at franchises, they're weighing the pros and cons of starting their own service-based business. They're thinking about, you know, like switching jobs, but they never quite get that feeling of like, yes, I'm going to do it. How did you know that this was a hell? Yes.
Yeah. That's a great question.
And you know, I'm, I'm always torn on, you know, broadening, broadening the question a little bit, you know, there's often talk about, you know, finding, finding your. Your passion or finding your, what you were meant to do. And I've always been a little bit uncomfortable with that. Not that that doesn't happen, but for me, it's, it's often about choosing your passion and, and choosing, um, what you want to own, what you want to make your own.
Um, and the reason that I think that's important is you can spend a lot of time. Trying to find the right fit. It's like, it's like searching for an apartment right back in the days. When, when, um, you know, I was moving every, every couple years, you know, you'd go out. It's not like you would wait until you found what you knew a hundred percent was the absolute best apartment that you could ever find.
Right. Cause you can never reach that instead. You've got to figure out what are the criteria that are important to me in a business or in an apartment. And what do I bring to the table? And where's the overlap. And so for me, you know, I, I knew I wanted something that was, um, was service-based I knew I wanted something that was in the entertainment and media industry in some fashion.
Yeah. I knew that I wanted it, or it had to leverage my experience and my abilities in some fashion. And so, um, so, so then I just use that as a bit of a filter. So as. Finding different listings of businesses that were available. Um, I then make the decision, uh, is this something that was interesting to me and then also consider, is this something that I could start from scratch and then that's how you kind of weigh the difference between the cost of acquisition versus, um, versus starting something on your own.
And so it was a really that Venn diagram of, um, the, the business itself, um, me as a, as an owner and, uh, And then the, the cost of acquisition.
Hmm. Yeah. I love that visual too, of the Venn diagram. And then right at the middle is like a hell yes. If at all, has her sex, right? Yeah. That's right.
And there might be more than one business there.
Right. If you're lucky you've got, you've got a few businesses that fit right in the middle of that Venn diagram that you can then choose from. Um, for me, I, I found grammar factory and it, it felt right. So I went to.
Yeah. Okay. So now I'd love to hear, um, because I pulled a stat or a quote from your book and it says 70% of entrepreneurs want to write a book and I can kind of validate this cause I'm in a couple masterminds of business owners and that is like always on the vision board, but you say only a small fraction actually do.
So can you tell us. How grammar factory can actually help entrepreneurs to make their vision a reality. Like what do you guys do that helps to hopefully get more of these entrepreneurs actually saying yes to publishing their first book?
Yeah. Yeah. It is a bit of, um, in some ways it's a stark fact. Yeah. A statistic, but, but like you say, it's also understandable.
Cause it's not something you can just say I want to do and, you know, plan it out for the next month and then you're done. We do have some authors that have done that. Uh, but it's rare. Um, so first I would say, let me clarify what we do. We're a professional service book publisher. And what that means is that we help authors write and publish books that are effectively indistinguishable in terms of quality from the books that are published by the big traditional publishers.
So what's different. Well, first we work exclusively with entrepreneurs. We don't do fiction. We don't do kids books or poetry. Only expertise based non-fiction books. And so our aim is to be the absolute best in that niche. Now, not to say that there aren't traditional publishers that choose that niche as well.
Um, but for us, it's important that we kind of stick to our stick to our knitting in that area. But the second thing is rather than acquiring the authors IP through a traditional book deal and then paying them, you know, a 10 to 12% royalty, we work for the author on a service basis. And the reason that this is important is that for entrepreneurs in particular, Um, their business model may not fit well with the traditional publishing model.
Right. Um, first of all, it can take 18 to 24 months for a traditionally published book to get to market. And if your book is part of your marketing plans, um, you probably can't wait for two years for that to come to fruition. And so, um, you know, and then also the, the, uh, The publisher is acquiring the rights to your book, and they're going to want you out on the promo circuit selling books so that they can get paid.
And, um, because of our model, we're happy for authors to give the book out like candy to their business prospects, for example. Um, so anyway, that's what we do. And we handle everything from editing straight through to publication and distribution. Um, so, but why do so many people say that they want to write a book, but never do well?
No, there are, there are a few. One, I don't know if anybody wants to read what I have to write. I hear that all the time. Um, two is, I don't know how to write a book and then I don't know how to get it published. And three is, I just want a time to read it, right? Those would probably be the three big ones.
So let's deal with those one by one. If you don't know, if anybody wants to read what you have to write, you know, I can guarantee you that if you have a viable business, Or you've got an existing audience that you're already engaging with, then you're already doing or sharing something that is of interest to them.
And so your, your book is just another way of packaging, that knowledge and experience and, and the journey that you help people through. It's just another, uh, another way of manifesting that on the second point, right. I don't know how to write a book or how to get it. Well, we help here in a few ways. So ranging from ghost writing, right?
Just because you're the author, it doesn't mean you necessarily have to write the book. Um, all the way through to connecting people with book coaches, we've got a number of book coaches that are really high quality. Um, help people structure their book and get to that point where they have a first draft.
Cool. And then many people are surprised that that transfer at the transformation that happens as their manuscript goes through the editing and publishing process. So in short, the key here is having a supportive team that can guide you and take as much as possible off your plate. And then the last one was I don't have time.
Right. And so again, ghost writing might be a solution for some, uh, but that's not the only solution. It's usually more about how. A clear plan and kind of detailed points that you're writing to, and then committing to a small but consistent effort, right? Like, uh, an hour a day probably gets your book written within two months,
an hour, a day could get our book written within two months.
Wow. That really breaks it down into like something I can wrap my head around generally.
It's just about the. That makes a huge difference
when somebody says yes, to working with you guys and publishing what are some of the benefits or the outcomes that they can expect? Like they go through this whole journey, but like what will be the main outcomes that they would be celebrating at the end of this process?
What can we expect
from that? Yeah. Yeah. Really good question. Um, and it's an important one because it's going to be different for every author. Um, yeah, I. Eight eight different goals that you might have as an author. Um, particularly as an entrepreneur, right? If you're writing fiction, there might be some other ones.
Um, but for the entrepreneur, um, there, there are a few that you can realistically accomplish through writing and publishing and a book can move the needle on more than one, but you'll really need to narrow your focus, right? Strategy is all about trade-offs otherwise, you know, your efforts can be diluted.
So the first one is. The most common and that's to build authority, right? To, to get yourself well known, to get in front of media, to open doors of opportunity. Um, the, the second goal that you might have is, uh, really around sales, right? And it's to generate leads, support the sales effort of your business's core product or service.
So that's another very common one. Um, expanding. After all, a lot of us are solo preneurs, or we have small teams and we can only be in one place at a time. Um, the nice thing about a book is that it doesn't have that same constraint. And so it can almost be like your, your little mini clone, right? Sharing your message, uh, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
And it can do that with a hundred percent consistency because you've plotted out the message, you know exactly what you're saying. And so it lets you reach far more people than you otherwise could. Um, the, the fourth one that, that a lot of people have is to launch a new business. And that if you already have a business, it could be a new product line, a new brand, but it's a business that's based around the intellectual property in the book.
And what a book does, it's not nearly as capital intensive as acquiring other forms of business assets. So a lot of, uh, particularly, uh, nine to fivers who are looking to, uh, escape the corporate world, uh, will often look at writing a book to create that IP that they then use to launch the. Um, influencing opinion is a big one, right?
If you can use your book to change the thinking about a topic within your industry, um, that can be very powerful, particularly in industries that, um, where regular regulatory control is high, um, or public relations or consumer affairs, or particularly in. Uh, you can, uh, the sixth one is codifying knowledge, right?
Uh, when we're, when we're building a business, often we're developing processes and approaches, uh, on an ad hoc basis. And so oftentimes when you're writing a book, that's the first time that you really sit down to think through your intellectual property and, and, um, structure it in a way that you can communicate it effectively.
Um, so that's a real benefit. Uh, another one that's similar is number seven and that's around building new capabilities. And there are a lot of, you know, there are constantly new topics that are coming out, right? Whether it's AI or augmented reality or, uh, you know, big data NFTs, whatever it is. Um, it can be a great way to dive into a new topic in your industry and to establish a bit of a knowledge base and ultimately.
Perhaps become the go-to expert. And it's great in these new areas because often they're desperate for. Um, because the topics are so, so new. So nascent, and then of course the last one is selling books, right? Um, some people go into writing because their goal is to become a serial author, right. They want to write multiple titles.
They want to establish a following of, um, of readers that will buy their book every time a new one comes out. Um, so sometimes that's the, um, that's the goal and, and that's, uh, has a, a bit of a different strata.
Yeah. And one of the reasons too, why a lot of our listeners and, uh, just friends of mine have written books.
I think this kind of ties into the first point you wrote, um, about authority, like is because. They want to speak on stages. They want to speak at conferences, right? And generally the thought around getting a gig, speaking on a stage at a, you know, a business conference is that you kind of need a book in order to then get the big speaking gig.
Is that something you often see as well? Like people who want to become speakers, they write the book to command.
Yeah. Yeah. It, that very much ties into that. That first one you're writing. The interesting thing about authority is those things feed on themselves, right? So you have a book that opens the doors to speaking engagements to media appearances, and then those things to build your authority further, you know, the speaking engagement, you might be selling books at the back of the room.
Um, you know, we we've got one of our publisher or one of our authors rather. Um, interestingly, his business is a physical product business. Um, bunkies. Um, so they're their physical products. He's got to ship them out on a flatbed trailer to, um, you know, uh, to a cottage. It gets built there. Um, we published his book in 2020 and, um, you know, it's a beautiful coffee table style book, right?
Very visual, uh, pictures, beautiful pictures of the monkeys. Um, and you know, at the, in 2021. So the end of last year, he was on Dragon's den and. And, uh, got a five, five dragon offer, a million dollar offer, which was incredible. And, and the reason I share that is, um, the, the re the, the book establishes authority, but of course, that media appearance even skyrockets his authority even further.
So he's really a leader in his space. You know, there are a lot of other companies that are trying to do what he does. Um, but even for a physical products business, uh, he just has a presence that, um, you know, is unparalleled, right? The others can't can't even compete with that.
So interesting. So my next question for you, because the name of this podcast is visionary life, and generally visionaries are always living in the future.
They're always getting new ideas. A lot of the listeners are multi-passionate they're coaches, consultants, freelancers. They're probably gifted at many, many, many things. And on that big vision board is I want to write a book one day. So what happens when someone knows they want to write a book they're probably gifted in many areas of their industry.
But they don't know what the topic is. They come to you and they're like, okay, I want to get this process rolling, but I have so many things that I could write about. I just don't know what I should write about how do you help them in that messy, early stage?
Yeah, really, really good question. Cause it's so important, um, to, to know a few things right.
Going in. Th the first thing is about the goals that we do that we just talked about. Right? You got to know why you're doing it, and that is going to lead you to a few follow on decisions. It's going to lead to the decision about who your ideal reader. Right. And you can think of this as your, your persona, right?
It's the same thing as when we're establishing a new product or a new business, you've got to know who your customer is. So the same idea with the book, you have to know who your reader is, and you got to get crystal clear on it. You've got to understand them, um, to the point where you have a single individual in mind that you can name, you know, his or her family situation, nor he or she works, you know, everything about them and you know, the problems that they have and, you know, Which problem you're going to help them solve through your book.
And what I, what I suggest is once you've identified that problem, I like to turn that around into a question, right? I call that the central question that your book is going to answer. And the reason that I recommend that is it's far easier to use that as a writing prompt than to use a general topic, right.
From my book entrepreneurial. I could've said, okay. My, my topic is, uh, writing right. Or my topic is authorship. That's a massive topic. Instead, you want to frame that as a question. So for mine it was, how can I write and publish a book that builds your authority and grows your business? Right. It makes it very clear because then what you want to do is you want to then sketch out the journey to answering that question.
And what are the, what are the topics. That you need to cover to bring your reader from the point where they are right now, where they have this problem that they want to want to solve to that future state, where their problem is now solved. And you've answered that central question. And those are those, um, those topics or the steps, depending on, on what your solution is.
Um, those probably become your chapters of your book, and then you can dive into each of those chapters and answer, okay, what is this chapter about? Why is it. And how am I going to answer, how am I going to explain this, this topic? So that really gives you then the structure of your book. You can do that same exercise with subtopics within, right?
You can, within a particular chapter, you can say, okay, what are the, what are the topics that I need to cover within this chapter? And then answer, what is the sub topic? Why is it important and how can I take action on it? And once you've done that for every chapter in the book, you now have enough. Hmm, a detailed outline that you can write to.
And then a lot of the, one of the fear goes away, right? You, you don't have that writer's block where you sit down and you don't know what you're going to write because you've already done all that, all that thinking. And so you can wake up at 5:00 AM on a Wednesday morning, open your laptop and, you know, tap out 750 words.
You've done that for the day. You can do the same thing again tomorrow, and you don't have to spend, you know, half an hour, 45 minutes thinking, okay, what am I going to write about today?
Yeah. I love the idea of like getting the outline done first. I'm sure that is in the process when we work with you and then having that framework to be like, now, all I have to do is build it out.
Right. But this is the bones of the book that I'm going to launch. And it's so funny because listening to you talk, I'm realizing that most freelancers consultants, coaches. They get on calls with clients and they're explaining the same things over and over, and they may not have codafide to use your word.
They may not have codified their process, but if they really sit down and think about it, people come to them with a similar challenge, they spend two months, four months, six months working with this client, probably explaining the same topics as they're explaining to client, to client for client 567. And then the end result is whatever dream come, true outcome that client came to you for.
And it's now just saying, okay, I need to spend the time to actually think what are those key milestones or key learnings that I'm saying pretty much to every client across the board and how can I neatly package that up? And I feel like even for me as a marketing consultant, it would be a really good practice to write a book with you guys, because it would be.
Me to write out exactly what those steps are in the journey to find more clients using a really good strategic marketing plan, but I've never actually done it. So, um, I feel like, yeah, you could feel like you're ready to write the book and then hire you. Or it could be like, I know I need this in order to reach my next level of business.
So even though I'm not ready to write the book, I should write the book because it's going to be a growth opportunity for my business. Cause then you've productized it. Right? You've productized your methodology and maybe somebody else could teach it. I could leave my business in 10 years and someone can teach, you know, the Kelsey method of marketing.
Absolutely. And you make a really good point. You know, these days we all have so much content. Right. And we may just, we may not know it. Right. But you talked about, um, zoom meetings, right? If, if you record your zoom meetings, you've got all these videos or audios saved on your, on your drive somewhere, right?
You, you and I have podcast transcripts, but even emails, right. That just the volume of emails that we get, where we're answering questions, um, to the extent that you can. Uh, you can at least save all of that content. And then once you've gone to the trouble of creating that book outline, then you know, where you need to pull stuff from, and you may very easily be able to, um, you know, submit a, uh, pod using podcast transcript, or just send a zoom video to rev and get, get the transcript automated, um, pull out some emails to just drop into those, uh, bullet points to really fill out the.
And then it becomes so much easier to just, you've got something to work from and you can do some self editing go through and tighten it up. And then the real magic happens when it goes to professional editing and, you know, it gets a full structural edit, copy, edit, proofread, and then you'd be amazed at what comes out the other end.
Now I know you've kind of touched on this already, but I'm definitely curious because we have a lot of listeners in their first year of year or two of business. Is it ever too early to write a book? Is there anyone who writing a book is not appropriate for at this point in their journey?
Yeah. It's a good question.
So what I would say is, um, you know, from day one, I would suggest, starting to think in terms of intellectual property. Yeah. Right. Start thinking about, uh, what problem you're solving and how do you do that and, and do your best to document that. Um, having said that it's not a once and done thing. I mean, I'm, I'm constant.
Uh, adapting our processes and adapting our thinking on certain topics. Um, but, uh, so, so the first point is I would, I would start thinking about that right away. Um, but to your point, not, everybody's ready to write a book, um, just yet. And, and the things that I would say to think about, um, you need to make sure that your business itself is viable.
By that. I mean, you need to have a clear sense of who your ideal client is, but it's the same things that I was talking about with respect to a reader. And that's intentional because, um, the two need to be need to be linked. So you need to be clear on who your ideal client is. You need to be clear about the problem that you solve for your ideal client.
And then you need to be clear about your unique solution for solving it. And if, if your business, if you haven't figured that out in your business, A book isn't going to help because a book isn't the silver bullet, it's an amplifier. So it's only as strong as the business that it's linked to. Um, and then the last thing I would say is you still have to, you have to be prepared to use it, to use the book.
Um, you can't just publish the book, uh, have it up on Amazon and hope that it's. The leads are gonna come in, right? You've gotta be out there using it to get media opportunities, using it, to get speaking engagements. Um, if it will work for you, if you work. Yeah.
And kind of on that topic, what are some of the best promotional methods?
When say we go through this process with you, we write the book, we have it in our hands and we're excited to get it into the hands of people who can benefit from it. What are some of the best promotional strategies you've seen or the best ways to like actually get the book out there and to get it visible, maybe just sharing some successes from your clients or what you know, to be true about getting more eyes on the book.
Yeah. Um, it's really about getting in front of the people that you want reading it. Right. And so it, it, um, like everything it's going to depend on, on your goals, but, um, you know, media appearances and I use media broadly, um, using your book to get on, uh, TV spots. We had one of our authors, um, was, you know, recently on breakfast television.
Personal trainer, a fitness trainer. And so he got on a morning spot to do a, just kind of a three to five minute, uh, just showing people how to do exercises with common things that you have around your home. Um, he had his book up in the background and at the end of it, he said, anybody who's interested just email me.
I'll send you a copy of my book for free. And, you know, he got hundreds of people reaching out and incredible, right? So it's the power even of traditional media. A lot of people think that traditional media is. It's just not the case. Um, so traditional media being on podcasts, right? Uh, guest blogging, um, you know, vlogs, all sorts of, it's really just about finding, um, who's already speaking to your ideal clients and getting in front of them.
That's the first thing, the second thing is, and this is really important for people that are using their book as a lead generator, um, is just getting it into the hands. Of your ideal clients, your ideal prospects and, um, you know, we've got one client. I, I share this story a lot, cause it's so powerful.
He's probably sold, you know, he, he published his book I think in 2018 and uh, he's, you know, maybe sold a hundred books right at retail. Okay. Doesn't sound very impressive. But he's given out almost 5,000 calls. To clients and prospective clients. And he always gives them two copies, two signed copies, one for them.
And one for somebody that they know and his business is, um, is a nonprofit and a public sector consulting. And so the, the engagements that he gets on the back of, uh, distributing his book, th they net, you know, five, six figure consulting engagements. So he's very happy. Hand his book out to anybody that fits that ideal client profile.
And it's been an absolute game changer for him, him and his business.
That's so smart to gift them to so that they can keep one and give one. So like already, you've just amplified the amount of people you reach and likely if you give someone two bucks, they're going to think, okay, who's the one person I know.
Who could really benefit from this book and there's like a prime candidate, right? That's
right. Yes. Traditional viral, viral distribution.
Yeah. Yeah, it is. And I love the idea and I actually took a really great quiz on your website. I think. It's to help you determine, are you at the, is it, are you at the right stage or a self-assessment of whether you're ready to publish?
Right. And one of the questions is along the lines of is the service that you sell above like four or 5,000 or something of that nature. So I can see that people who answer yes. Writing a book and then giving it away for free or gifting it to a hundred people every month. It's wildly beneficial because you know, whatever it costs you 10 $20 to gift the book.
If somebody then books in for a 5,000, 10,000, $20,000 gig with. That's a pretty good return on investment. And the book was at the kind of the heart of actually signing that client,
right? Yeah. You nailed it. Exactly. That's exactly how to
think about it. So exciting. So, as I mentioned, you do have some resources on your website.
One of them. That self-assessment to see if you're kind of ready to write a book. And I really enjoyed that. So I'll link it in the show notes. Another one is that you have a nonfiction book, strategy planner, like you're gifting a lot of stuff, uh, to people who are interested, but for somebody who is kind of ready to get started, they want to get in conversation with you.
Where should they go to learn about grammar factory? How can they connect with you? Uh, just tell us all the places where we can dive in.
Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So, you know, if you're interested in more on some of the topics that we discussed, I would suggest heading over to entrepreneur, to author.com. Um, there, you can download a sample of the book.
Um, we've got a link to the steps assessment there, and you can, you can also listen to the entrepreneur and author podcast. Um, if you're further down the line and are keen to learn more about actually getting your book written and public. You can head over to grammar, factory.com and book a call with me.
I'll send you a free copy of my book. Like we just talked about. I'm very happy to, um, to ship that to you, free of charge. And then finally I'm pretty active on LinkedIn. So feel free to reach out and connect with me there. I'd be very, very happy to be.
And what I love about this book that you've written entrepreneur to author is it's literally a book that you would use.
Like you have a pen in hand while you are reading it, and you also have, um, a package that people can go download that's associated with the book. So as I was going through it, I was like, wow, like I better get to work here. I'm not just going to read this passively. I'm actually going to plan for the book that I'm going to write.
So it's really fun. Um, I'm certainly going to be diving into it just consistently over the next few months and see what comes together. So I love that you're using this as a lead generator. For grammar factory. It definitely reiterate that you use your own process, which is great. Um, and yeah, I'm really excited to be sharing this episode because I just know that so many of us on our vision boards, as entrepreneurs have writing a book, speaking on stages and you guys are really that secret weapon to actually making it happen one day.
So very, very cool. So thank you so much for being on the show. I would encourage everyone. Yeah. To go check out those links that you mentioned, click through the links in the show notes, pick up a copy of the book. It is truly an amazing, amazing product. And thank you again for sharing your story and for joining us on the visionary life podcast.
Oh, thanks so much, Kelsey. This has been a lot of fun.
Thanks for tuning in to this episode. Visionary life. I love bringing you these conversations on a weekly basis. So it would mean so much to me. If you could help me out by rating and reviewing the show in your iTunes app, you can also support the show by taking a quick screenshot of the episode and sharing it on your Instagram stories.
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