What's the Best Strategy to Launch a Best Selling Book? Mastering Book Marketing

WEBVTT

00:00:00.359 --> 00:00:01.862
Welcome to today's episode.

00:00:01.862 --> 00:00:04.325
Our guest today is Paul.

00:00:04.325 --> 00:00:10.034
He helps authors get their story out there with book marketing.

00:00:10.034 --> 00:00:11.115
Welcome to the show.

00:00:12.541 --> 00:00:13.163
Thanks for having me.

00:00:13.163 --> 00:00:13.987
Eric Great to be here.

00:00:15.781 --> 00:00:22.893
Why don't we start off by you sharing just a minute or two, a little bit about who you are and what you do?

00:00:24.948 --> 00:00:26.271
who you are and what you do.

00:00:26.312 --> 00:00:45.213
Sure, yeah, I'm the co-founder and the CEO of a company called Emissary Publishing, and we're a boutique independent publisher, and we like to say that we help faith-based founders, executives and entrepreneurs tell the stories that matter, and we were created in part to fill what we saw as a gap in the publishing industry.

00:00:45.877 --> 00:01:12.046
Whether you're going through a traditional or hybrid model, we found the fusion of a solid marketing strategy and literary talent was absolutely essential to fulfill the expectations authors had when they started out writing books, as well as to tell a lot of aspiring authors this is not quite the right time for you to do this before you go off spending a ton of money on it, so that's a big part of why we were created.

00:01:12.046 --> 00:01:21.102
But even more, we help people whose message is burning them up on the inside and they know they can help other people if they go out there and spread that message.

00:01:21.102 --> 00:01:38.253
And we help shepherd them through the journey of making themselves, of going from unknown to known right and taking that message beyond their immediate circle, where they're much more likely to be judged very quickly, and making it persuasive and compelling nonetheless.

00:01:39.560 --> 00:01:39.980
That's great.

00:01:39.980 --> 00:01:55.126
I'm curious because some people have brought this up to me that on one hand so easy to self-publish a book on Amazon.

00:01:55.126 --> 00:02:05.210
People have said it's easy, but it seems like there might be landmines everywhere and people might need some help doing it.

00:02:05.210 --> 00:02:05.992
Is that the case?

00:02:06.780 --> 00:02:07.361
It depends.

00:02:07.361 --> 00:02:10.489
My business partner is the layout and uploading.

00:02:10.489 --> 00:02:12.372
For him it's not complicated at all.

00:02:12.372 --> 00:02:19.981
In fact, that's one of the reasons that we started asking the question what is it that's missing in publishing?

00:02:19.981 --> 00:02:36.145
Because, yes, it is a little bit more advanced than, I don't know, flipping burgers or picking up garbage, obviously, but it's not so advanced that you can't find a perfectly good freelancer to do it for very inexpensively.

00:02:36.205 --> 00:02:43.689
That portion of promoting and marketing a book is actually the easy part, and writing is not much, far behind that.

00:02:43.689 --> 00:02:45.522
A lot of people think it's the writing that's the hard part.

00:02:45.522 --> 00:02:49.442
No, it's not the writing and it's not the publishing and the design and the uploading.

00:02:49.442 --> 00:02:52.592
Those are actually the easier parts 80%.

00:02:52.592 --> 00:02:58.568
The hard part that most authors never do is the marketing, because they don't go into it with a strategy.

00:02:58.568 --> 00:03:00.782
They don't market the book before they publish it.

00:03:00.782 --> 00:03:09.731
They expect to be able to market it after they publish it, without having done any research or upfront thinking as to whether or not the market even wants to hear the message.

00:03:10.961 --> 00:03:13.728
So we reverse that process and we say no.

00:03:13.728 --> 00:03:25.186
We begin with strategy and then we move to writing and editing, while doing marketing, testing things, checking out is this message resonating?

00:03:25.186 --> 00:03:27.769
Are we doing enough research on the target reader?

00:03:27.769 --> 00:03:33.492
Are target readers responding to offers to read excerpts that we put out there online ahead of time?

00:03:33.492 --> 00:03:37.550
If they are, okay, we got a signal and we're going to keep moving forward.

00:03:37.550 --> 00:03:40.770
If they're not, maybe we need to go back to the drawing board.

00:03:40.770 --> 00:04:00.752
But by the time that book actually hits its launch date and it's available everywhere on Amazon, barnes and Noble, on its own website, in some bookstores, we've done a lot of homework and we've tested it out and we've had a positive signal and we know this message is going to resonate as long as it's put in front of its target client.

00:04:00.752 --> 00:04:10.067
So the simple answer to your question is yes, it's harder than some very rote mechanical tasks, but it's not.

00:04:10.067 --> 00:04:11.411
It's nowhere near the hardest part.

00:04:13.159 --> 00:04:18.175
Marketing strategy is the main thing that people really need to prioritize.

00:04:18.175 --> 00:04:27.935
That's pretty interesting, so why don't you, why don't you tell us a story about some of the best marketing that you've done, that you're the most proud of?

00:04:29.680 --> 00:04:53.766
Yeah, we are just weeks at the time of recording from launching this book right here, the Hope of War, and it's a memoir slash, personal, professional, spiritual development message written by a career chaplain who fought in Vietnam and then went on to serve in every major US conflict, up to and including Iraq and Afghanistan.

00:04:53.766 --> 00:05:02.744
And early on, and he brought us a manuscript it's probably I've lost count of the pages it was.

00:05:02.744 --> 00:05:11.259
He had a lot to say and part of the problem of writing a book is you have to know what is just for me in this and then what can I give to the audience?

00:05:11.259 --> 00:05:11.802
That's helpful.

00:05:11.802 --> 00:05:14.290
So we had a process of going through that.

00:05:14.290 --> 00:05:33.975
But in the early on in the interviews, jason, my business partner, came up with the title the Hope of War, because what kept coming up for the author was he was in these Vietnamese jungles full of mosquitoes and napalm and sweat and bombs going off and people screaming and all of that and he had to find hope.

00:05:33.975 --> 00:05:42.478
And later on, when he served with naval, with marine units serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, same thing.

00:05:42.478 --> 00:05:59.783
And when he was busy serving the wounded and tending to the people who had survived the 9-11 attack on the Pentagon, he needed hope and all along he found it and now he wants to offer it to veterans and active duty military and military families and all that.

00:06:00.603 --> 00:06:10.567
So there was a process we had to go through, from a jumbled collection of memoirs that didn't really have a coherent message to a very coherent one we're now offering.

00:06:10.567 --> 00:06:16.228
And then, of course, there was the process of putting that in front of people who would be the target audience.

00:06:16.228 --> 00:06:20.665
So we started fanning out to complete strangers.

00:06:20.665 --> 00:06:27.177
Because the truth is, if you write a book, everyone in your family and your friends, most people who love you and care about you, will be kind enough to buy one.

00:06:27.177 --> 00:06:30.992
But the real test is when people who have no idea who you are going to buy them.

00:06:30.992 --> 00:06:49.297
So we started testing and seeing what was did we get a signal and sure enough we did, and so I'm pleased to say first, results are in because we're still in pre-order, but he's got nearly four dozen pre-orders just from organic network and from people we've reached out to on LinkedIn.

00:06:49.798 --> 00:06:51.382
Now that might not sound like a lot.

00:06:51.382 --> 00:07:06.079
You have to remember, 99% of books that are ever published anywhere sell fewer than a hundred copies in their lifetime, and the reason for that is there's no marketing strategy attached to them, so the only people who buy them are people who know the author.

00:07:06.079 --> 00:07:26.002
So this is going to be we are well on track already to have our second consecutive author who far exceeds that national average just by getting out there and spreading the word and by reaching out to people who are not necessarily within his network.

00:07:26.002 --> 00:07:27.456
So we're pretty proud of that.

00:07:27.456 --> 00:07:28.755
It's genuine success.

00:07:28.755 --> 00:07:38.821
It's not manufactured, it's not from knowing all the right levers to pull and buttons to push on Amazon to cause it to be a bestseller on the first day and insert it into categories it has no business being in.

00:07:38.821 --> 00:07:40.173
And that's what we're after.

00:07:41.295 --> 00:07:51.238
So it's very interesting that there's 3 million nonfiction books put out every year in the US.

00:07:51.238 --> 00:07:59.661
So from a marketing strategy perspective attention for competition there's a lot of books that people can read.

00:07:59.661 --> 00:08:02.151
So I think that's one of the aspects of it.

00:08:02.151 --> 00:08:09.713
And I'm curious, when you do your testing of the concept and you get a signal, what kind of signal is that?

00:08:09.713 --> 00:08:15.961
Is that people that are unknown to the author say that's a great idea, I would read that book, or I buy that book, or both of those things.

00:08:15.961 --> 00:08:18.738
I'm just curious, what does the signals look like?

00:08:25.629 --> 00:08:25.810
Correct.

00:08:25.810 --> 00:08:26.612
Yeah, and that's exactly what they say.

00:08:26.612 --> 00:08:34.461
So for us it's as simple as doing an outreach over LinkedIn, and one of the great things about LinkedIn is that you can search for people based on occupation and past employers.

00:08:34.461 --> 00:08:40.278
Most people who are veterans mention in their resume is that they're veterans, and so we found it pretty easy to find people.

00:08:40.278 --> 00:08:52.778
But we also found it pretty easy to find people because our author's a chaplain and therefore it's a somewhat faith-based message, and so we could include people who are currently were once veterans and are now pastors or chaplains or priests.

00:08:53.038 --> 00:08:56.553
And we sent it to them and we said gut reaction, what do you say?

00:08:56.553 --> 00:09:02.014
And the overwhelming response was I would read that book, I would love to read that book.

00:09:02.014 --> 00:09:02.798
That's intriguing.

00:09:02.798 --> 00:09:10.721
We sent him an excerpt, we sent him a social media post where we'd written some copy from it, and they said that's what veterans need to hear.

00:09:10.721 --> 00:09:15.077
So then we were not, we didn't go into it blind.

00:09:15.077 --> 00:09:28.647
We're like we know that the target audience is at least interested enough, and this is not asking them to spend $10,000, right, we're like we know that the target audience is at least interested enough, and this is not asking them to spend $10,000, right, we're asking them to spend 25 bucks with anything that you're doing.

00:09:28.647 --> 00:09:34.854
Testing it out and seeing how strongly the audience responds to it is essential, and in this day and age, it's just a lot simpler than it sounds probably.

00:09:37.436 --> 00:09:56.871
Yeah, I think this concept is really important though, because I would say 80% of the guests that I have on the podcast have a book and their marketing and business leaders who took that step to build their personal brand and to get their message out there.

00:09:56.871 --> 00:10:18.298
Out there and I myself have always been a big reader and I think about when people take the time and effort to spend anywhere from six months to three years to write a book but they don't do the marketing strategy piece first.

00:10:18.298 --> 00:10:37.660
How heartbreaking it must be after all that effort to not get any traction if you haven't done the marketing strategy first and if you haven't gotten some signals validating that, hey, this is going to be something that people are going to want to read and buy.

00:10:37.660 --> 00:10:41.347
Why do you think it is that more people don't?

00:10:41.955 --> 00:10:48.625
Well, there's a couple of stages we recommend people go through, and so my short answer to your question is I think most people haven't gone through.

00:10:48.625 --> 00:11:00.260
They've gone through one of these stages, but not both, or they haven't gone through either of them, right, and so in the book we're going to be sharing with your audience the book that we recently co-authored.

00:11:00.421 --> 00:11:01.244
I See you Everywhere.

00:11:01.244 --> 00:11:02.736
That's it right there.

00:11:02.736 --> 00:11:03.337
I'm pointing to it.

00:11:03.337 --> 00:11:12.303
If you're watching this on video, that's the primer, that if you've ever painted a house or painted a car, you do a primer on there first.

00:11:12.303 --> 00:11:15.317
So this is the primer right.

00:11:15.336 --> 00:11:25.884
This is about building that network, because you are going to need friends, family and anybody else who's willing to get behind you as a baseline for launching a book.

00:11:25.884 --> 00:11:30.581
And so in that book we call them champions, supporters, resistors and bystanders.

00:11:30.581 --> 00:11:32.025
Everybody's got them in their network.

00:11:32.025 --> 00:11:45.403
But you got to build that network, you got to build that account of relational capital and reciprocity so that when you say, hey, I'm thinking about writing a book, you've got people who cheerleaders, who get in your corner unconditionally.

00:11:45.403 --> 00:11:46.326
That's the champions.

00:11:46.326 --> 00:11:48.301
And then you get supporters.

00:11:48.301 --> 00:11:52.174
Now, these people are also you're, they also want to see you succeed.

00:11:52.174 --> 00:12:01.326
But they also have a lot of professional and objective professional experience, maybe an objectivity to lend, to tell you, hey, this is a good idea or it isn't.

00:12:01.326 --> 00:12:04.982
So coaches and consultants are a great category for supporters.

00:12:05.705 --> 00:12:16.596
And then you have resistors and bystanders, and this just represents most of the 8 billion people on the planet who have no idea who you are and they're either going to say nope, not interested, or they're just going to sit there and watch.

00:12:16.596 --> 00:12:39.904
But they are watching and they're important too, because if you can get them to tell you why they're not interested in your book or why they're not interested in your concept before you publish it, then you can go back and make changes before you make that huge investment of time, energy and resources into putting this project out that ultimately, nobody buys.

00:12:39.904 --> 00:12:48.657
So that's one of the things that we teach in the book, and the other thing, of course, is just tactical ways, particularly for business owners.

00:12:48.657 --> 00:12:52.576
It makes the most sense for them based on how we operate, but it can work for anybody.

00:12:52.576 --> 00:13:03.543
Tactical, practical ways to build that network around you so that when you start saying I'm thinking about writing a book, you're not just sitting in a room by yourself tapping away.

00:13:03.543 --> 00:13:08.923
You've got people you can turn to say, hey, I'm thinking about writing a book, and see what their reaction is.

00:13:10.285 --> 00:13:16.152
And so I had that, like when I wrote my very first book back in 2018, I had done all this stuff.

00:13:16.152 --> 00:13:24.087
I had this huge network of people, and a bunch of people came and turned out to this launch I planned and, and, frankly, for the first one being the worst one.

00:13:24.087 --> 00:13:41.860
It turned out pretty well, and so I just I took that experience and I said before people come to us saying I heard you guys help people write and publish books yeah, we do, but if you haven't been through this process, you're just going to have a real hard time getting it off the ground or even figuring out.

00:13:41.860 --> 00:13:44.404
What message do I even have?

00:13:44.404 --> 00:13:47.610
What is it that people see in me?

00:13:47.610 --> 00:13:47.870
What?

00:13:47.870 --> 00:13:49.197
What do they respond to?

00:13:49.197 --> 00:13:52.225
Why did, why am I successful in this particular area?

00:13:52.225 --> 00:13:53.135
What is it that I can?

00:13:53.135 --> 00:14:01.288
It's going to be a very difficult lens through which to view yourself and to understand the message that you really want to share.

00:14:10.315 --> 00:14:11.759
The last question I have is around marketing strategy itself.

00:14:11.759 --> 00:14:13.123
People can have different strategies for their book, right?

00:14:13.123 --> 00:14:16.212
One strategy could be to maximize sales of the book.

00:14:16.212 --> 00:14:22.268
Another strategy, for example, could be the book helps people build up their company.

00:14:22.268 --> 00:14:27.826
I assume there's different models and strategies that people can have, right.

00:14:28.768 --> 00:14:33.091
Yeah, we usually aim for sales, culture or legacy, right.

00:14:33.091 --> 00:14:38.888
So you're either on the up and up, climbing through startup mode, and you're trying to.

00:14:38.888 --> 00:14:55.076
You're trying to multiply your footprint and your market share and the revenue that comes from that, or you might be in the middle stage of business and that's where culture becomes really important, because you're trying to build a culture within your company that keeps it going for the long haul.

00:14:55.076 --> 00:14:57.381
Or many of the clients we've talked to.

00:14:57.381 --> 00:15:01.625
They are in the later stages, they're preparing to exit and for them they've built that company.

00:15:01.625 --> 00:15:05.104
They are in the later stages, they're preparing to exit, and for them they've built that company.

00:15:05.104 --> 00:15:20.664
They've poured their heart and soul into it and now they're just concerned for the legacy that they're leaving behind, that their successors and the teams that they've built and the people who've come to be part of the company get to continue to benefit from the leadership that they've invested in it.

00:15:20.664 --> 00:15:28.736
There's probably other strategies, but those are like the three core ones for us, that's great, I like that.

00:15:29.557 --> 00:15:34.322
So I think you have an offer for one of your books, like you mentioned for the listeners.

00:15:34.322 --> 00:15:35.183
Can you share what that is?

00:15:36.264 --> 00:15:39.707
Yes, we'll get a nice little close-up for everybody watching.

00:15:39.707 --> 00:15:41.370
This is our newest book.

00:15:41.370 --> 00:15:43.471
My business partner and I co-authored it.

00:15:43.471 --> 00:15:50.538
It's called I See you Everywhere 42 No-Fluff Principles to Stand Out and Sell More, and this is available.

00:15:50.538 --> 00:15:55.869
We've got links that I provided you, eric, in the show notes, and you can, of course, get it on Amazon if you prefer.

00:15:55.869 --> 00:16:02.495
We have it available through our website, which is publishwithemissarycom, and it's a quick read.

00:16:02.615 --> 00:16:16.301
You could probably get through it in a one to two hour plane ride, probably maybe even get through it twice on a one to two hour plane ride, but we just wanted to give people a real simple primer, not get too specific and give them a whole bunch of details that they can't.

00:16:16.301 --> 00:16:31.980
There's just some core principles and some core strategic moves you can make when you're trying to build that nucleus around you of champions, supporters, resistors and bystanders the people who are going to help you get that message.

00:16:31.980 --> 00:16:37.950
First get that message flowing and finished and then, hopefully, help you spread it out into the marketplace as well.

00:16:37.950 --> 00:16:39.894
So, as I said, that's available on Amazon.

00:16:39.894 --> 00:16:42.341
You can also get it on our website and if you want to reach out to, as I said, that's available on Amazon, you can also get it on our website.

00:16:42.341 --> 00:16:47.037
And if you want to reach out to me personally, I'm pretty active on LinkedIn, so feel free.

00:16:48.860 --> 00:16:49.181
Awesome.

00:16:49.181 --> 00:16:55.159
Thank you so much for being with us today, sharing your story and your insights about book marketing.

00:16:55.159 --> 00:16:57.905
This has been super interesting and helpful.

00:16:57.905 --> 00:17:03.565
I encourage everyone to share this episode with your friends as well, and we really appreciate you being with us today.

00:17:03.565 --> 00:17:04.626
Thank you for your time.

00:17:05.328 --> 00:17:05.769
Thanks, Eric.