WEBVTT 1 00:00:37.120 --> 00:00:55.920 This is Loren Weisman in this episode of Wait What Really OK. 2 00:00:55.920 --> 00:01:02.960 Is focusing on those that have decided to write a book while it's turned into a time 3 00:01:02.960 --> 00:01:08.160 where anybody can write a book, it seems. And many of these books that are coming out are 4 00:01:08.160 --> 00:01:14.080 AI generated and AI prompted. And there's a lot of, there's a lot of reasons for 5 00:01:14.080 --> 00:01:17.920 a lot of people not to write a book. If you're really looking to the point of, 6 00:01:17.920 --> 00:01:24.240 oh, I'm trying to appear as an authority, so I'll write a book, or I'll use AI or 7 00:01:24.240 --> 00:01:30.800 I'll use these chat GPT prompt lessons and how to write a book in 20 minutes, you 8 00:01:30.800 --> 00:01:35.120 know, not really a great idea, and I'm not trying to get off that path. 9 00:01:35.120 --> 00:01:41.840 But if you genuinely have an authentic, authoritative, true story and there's 10 00:01:41.840 --> 00:01:45.760 something that you want to get out, and regardless of whether it's to sell some 11 00:01:45.760 --> 00:01:51.440 books to open up speaking opportunities, to move toward, you know, move something to 12 00:01:51.440 --> 00:01:58.560 clients that genuinely has a foundation that is true and that is you, then 13 00:01:58.560 --> 00:02:03.520 hopefully this podcast will be helpful. However, it's really a stop point 14 00:02:03.520 --> 00:02:06.640 and turn it off. If you're just doing the book thing because they 15 00:02:06.640 --> 00:02:10.960 say everybody has a book in them. I don't, I don't believe that. I don't think 16 00:02:10.960 --> 00:02:15.040 everybody has a book in them. And I think it's shown more and more in these 17 00:02:15.040 --> 00:02:20.160 last number of years with so many people trying to push out these double spaced, 18 00:02:20.160 --> 00:02:26.400 large font, all these images, images of other people's quotes, other people's stuff, 19 00:02:26.400 --> 00:02:32.400 that model of chapter openers where it's some famous Zig Ziglar or Dale 20 00:02:32.400 --> 00:02:35.840 Carnegie quote. Where is the authority in that? 21 00:02:35.840 --> 00:02:40.560 It's sort of like those videos that you see on YouTube or Instagram or anywhere else 22 00:02:40.560 --> 00:02:46.240 where it's. Somebody else is commenting on an actual authority, but they're not 23 00:02:46.240 --> 00:02:50.160 really bringing anything to the table. So I guess that would be kind of the 24 00:02:50.160 --> 00:02:53.280 preface of this. Let's say that you are not one of those people and 25 00:02:53.280 --> 00:02:58.240 you have a genuine story and it's a story that you want to get out there. 26 00:02:58.240 --> 00:03:02.400 While many say, okay, well, you've just got to write and you got to join these 27 00:03:02.400 --> 00:03:04.560 writing workshops and you've got. And here's how you write a book, 28 00:03:04.560 --> 00:03:06.480 and here's how you do this, and here's how you do 29 00:03:06.480 --> 00:03:12.000 that, that does work for some, but not necessarily for all. 30 00:03:12.000 --> 00:03:17.360 And many of these people that are pushing the here's how to publish a book, many of 31 00:03:17.360 --> 00:03:20.560 them have, you know, not  really all that successful 32 00:03:20.560 --> 00:03:24.960 books for themselves and they've put together some kind of course or some kind of 33 00:03:24.960 --> 00:03:29.040 model to try to get other people to do it so that they can cash in. 34 00:03:29.040 --> 00:03:33.680 I would be very wary of these courses. And also when you're looking up about 35 00:03:33.680 --> 00:03:40.720 publishing, there are a number of self publishing scams out there. And the thing is, 36 00:03:40.720 --> 00:03:44.800 anybody, oh, we'll hook you up with editors, we'll hook you up 37 00:03:44.800 --> 00:03:47.040 with this, we'll hook you up with distribution, we'll get 38 00:03:47.040 --> 00:03:51.120 this thing to be an Amazon bestseller. I'm going to touch on that before we dig into the 39 00:03:51.120 --> 00:03:57.120 book an Amazon bestseller and look at the expert. You can become many. 40 00:03:57.120 --> 00:04:01.600 There are genuine self publishers out there, but a lot of these are scams where 41 00:04:01.600 --> 00:04:08.800 they're looking for money to basically build a book that has no 42 00:04:08.800 --> 00:04:15.200 solid foundation, no security and no real stability, especially in today's market 43 00:04:15.200 --> 00:04:19.920 with AI, with plagiarism. And as all these things have just increased and gotten 44 00:04:19.920 --> 00:04:26.400 wor. And then that last touch on the whole Amazon bestseller, I don't know what the 45 00:04:26.400 --> 00:04:30.480 price is, I'm sure it's gone down now, but these people claiming to have Amazon 46 00:04:30.480 --> 00:04:34.720 bestsellers, isn't it amazing? Take two seconds to think about it. 47 00:04:34.720 --> 00:04:38.000 Isn't it amazing how many  people have claimed to be 48 00:04:38.000 --> 00:04:42.400 best sellers that you've never heard of? Amazon has thousands 49 00:04:42.400 --> 00:04:48.400 of categories. And just to touch on this and then move on, 50 00:04:48.400 --> 00:04:52.800 what some of these book consultants will tell you to do is to pick a 51 00:04:52.800 --> 00:04:57.920 category that's very, very low and then you attack in there and then 52 00:04:57.920 --> 00:05:01.600 you can buy this little program where it's going to get 53 00:05:01.600 --> 00:05:05.760 a whole bunch of robots to download your book at the same time and it's going to 54 00:05:05.760 --> 00:05:11.600 bump you up to number one in a given category and you'll be there for a minute or 55 00:05:11.600 --> 00:05:16.320 five minutes or ten minutes, who knows? And then they're going to grab a screenshot when 56 00:05:16.320 --> 00:05:19.520 that happens, they'll send it to you and all of a sudden you're an 57 00:05:19.520 --> 00:05:24.240 Amazon bestseller. That's a lie, that's deceptive. 58 00:05:24.240 --> 00:05:31.920 You are a best bought download for a momentary time for seconds, minutes, 59 00:05:31.920 --> 00:05:37.120 maybe a few hours, and then it went away because you didn't see a single sale from 60 00:05:37.120 --> 00:05:40.320 that. You ended up spending money for this hype position. 61 00:05:40.320 --> 00:05:44.960 And more people are getting onto that. Again, if that's something that you want to do and 62 00:05:44.960 --> 00:05:48.880 you want to claim on the Amazon best seller thing, this podcast 63 00:05:48.880 --> 00:05:52.960 might not be for you. I'm not trying to turn people off in a way, but if 64 00:05:52.960 --> 00:05:58.640 you genuinely want to put out a book Consider doing it in the right way, in a 65 00:05:58.640 --> 00:06:02.880 foundational way, in a secure way, and moving away the assumptions 66 00:06:02.880 --> 00:06:06.640 and the connotations of an industry that has become more 67 00:06:06.640 --> 00:06:13.040 and more flawed. I, I, I've published three books. 68 00:06:13.040 --> 00:06:18.480 One was completely self published. It was, it was self published through an agent 69 00:06:19.280 --> 00:06:24.640 and it was a self publishing house of sorts. So a lot of it 70 00:06:24.640 --> 00:06:28.880 was paid for. I was guided through, I was guided 71 00:06:28.880 --> 00:06:33.360 through their process. I had paid out of pocket for that. 72 00:06:33.360 --> 00:06:38.480 And then there was baseline distribution. The second book was a hybrid publish and these are 73 00:06:38.480 --> 00:06:41.280 publishing options that you can have. The second book was a 74 00:06:41.280 --> 00:06:45.760 hybrid publisher. It was a great publisher that took some of the 75 00:06:45.760 --> 00:06:50.880 cost, I took some of the cost. It's a very fair percentage that 76 00:06:50.880 --> 00:06:55.200 comes back. You're going to get paid a little bit more when 77 00:06:55.200 --> 00:07:01.920 you have some skin in the game. And it worked out decently well. 78 00:07:02.480 --> 00:07:08.960 The third book was a major publisher and I ended up brokering a 79 00:07:08.960 --> 00:07:13.600 deal with that major publisher, knowing where the state of the book industry was, 80 00:07:13.600 --> 00:07:20.640 where I really wrote on the front side and gave royalties and extended elements on 81 00:07:20.640 --> 00:07:25.680 the backside back to the publisher. And in that it was an advantage for many years for 82 00:07:25.680 --> 00:07:31.360 me because the level of promotion went up, up that much more because I wasn't 83 00:07:31.360 --> 00:07:35.200 necessarily getting the royalties. Now some jumped on me for that saying, 84 00:07:35.200 --> 00:07:39.760 okay, that's foolish. But even with certain major publishers and with 85 00:07:39.760 --> 00:07:45.440 hybrid, you are paying or money is being spent that you have to pay back, that comes 86 00:07:45.440 --> 00:07:49.920 to the warehousing, comes to the transportation, parts of printing, all of these 87 00:07:49.920 --> 00:07:54.800 different costs that come into line. And what I felt was I'm going to get on the front 88 00:07:54.800 --> 00:07:58.160 side before the bulk of these costs come in, handle some 89 00:07:58.160 --> 00:08:01.200 of these costs, take the advance, take these payments and 90 00:08:01.200 --> 00:08:07.600 I'll be good to go. And in that book that still is marketed and out there today, it 91 00:08:07.600 --> 00:08:13.760 helps to promote me. And I guess as we jump now into the actual foundation, are you 92 00:08:13.760 --> 00:08:20.960 looking for a book where you're trying to make X a quarter and most 93 00:08:20.960 --> 00:08:27.200 of the books, major publishing, they pay quarterly or are you looking at other 94 00:08:27.200 --> 00:08:33.600 elements? Because if you're looking solely to have a living as an author, that's a 95 00:08:33.600 --> 00:08:39.840 very challenging world to be in and more than likely it really is impossible these 96 00:08:39.840 --> 00:08:46.160 days. I would advise that if you have a story, if you're tying that to genuine 97 00:08:46.160 --> 00:08:49.840 speaking, if you're tying  that to services that you 98 00:08:49.840 --> 00:08:54.480 provide, if you're tying that to other elements, it's going to put you in a greater 99 00:08:54.480 --> 00:08:59.680 position than trying to put out this book. Now the Same thing goes. 100 00:08:59.680 --> 00:09:02.160 It even goes a little bit worse for children's books. 101 00:09:02.160 --> 00:09:08.080 Children's books pay even less in some. In some cases. Is it something you want to do 102 00:09:08.080 --> 00:09:15.120 genuinely from the heart and tie it to a company that you're with, a nonprofit 103 00:09:15.120 --> 00:09:21.040 speaking clients product, anything like that, that can be a great connection, 104 00:09:21.040 --> 00:09:26.480 that can be a great bridge. But sitting there solely operating purely 105 00:09:26.480 --> 00:09:33.680 on just book revenue is a dangerous way to go. Now adding the numerous 106 00:09:33.680 --> 00:09:37.440 elements can be a good idea and that can up the. Up the revenue too. 107 00:09:37.440 --> 00:09:43.840 And this is kind of on the front side. Thinking about not just the paperback, but are you 108 00:09:43.840 --> 00:09:48.400 going to do a hardcover, are you going to do an ebook? Are you going to 109 00:09:48.400 --> 00:09:52.560 also do an audio? I really recommend all of those. 110 00:09:52.560 --> 00:09:56.320 Now, my second book, it was a music business book. 111 00:09:56.320 --> 00:09:58.880 One of the things I did  with the audio and I highly 112 00:09:58.880 --> 00:10:01.680 recommend it for people that are putting out something that might be a 113 00:10:01.680 --> 00:10:07.120 little bit more. If you're a strategist, a consultant, coach, you 114 00:10:07.120 --> 00:10:13.200 have a series of different topics run through different chapters and you're able to 115 00:10:13.200 --> 00:10:19.040 have a book that can be read from any space. And I prided myself on my second 116 00:10:19.040 --> 00:10:23.200 book that you could read. You could read the Artist's Guide to 117 00:10:23.200 --> 00:10:26.240 Success in the Music Business. If you just wanted to read chapter nine, you 118 00:10:26.240 --> 00:10:29.360 could read chapter nine. If you wanted to read 10 and go, then go to 119 00:10:29.360 --> 00:10:32.480 two, you could do that. You could read it front to back. 120 00:10:32.480 --> 00:10:37.040 It had a format to it, but it also was a choose your own adventure. 121 00:10:37.040 --> 00:10:41.920 And in that when I released the book with the hybrid publisher, I went to them and 122 00:10:41.920 --> 00:10:47.760 said, as opposed to okay, we're putting out the paperback, the hard copy, the ebook 123 00:10:47.760 --> 00:10:52.240 and the audio all at once. I opted to go a different route. 124 00:10:52.240 --> 00:10:58.080 I said, let's get the ebook out first, get it warmed up, get some press releases 125 00:10:58.080 --> 00:11:01.200 going, then put out the paperback and the hard copy. 126 00:11:01.200 --> 00:11:05.120 Then from there, a month  later, we staggered for 12 127 00:11:05.120 --> 00:11:10.640 months an audiobook coming out once a month. And in that audiobook was 128 00:11:10.640 --> 00:11:13.280 just a single chapter. So chapter one came 129 00:11:13.280 --> 00:11:17.360 out a month later, chapter two, and inside of the promotion that 130 00:11:17.360 --> 00:11:22.560 was online and also in press releases and in major media. 131 00:11:22.560 --> 00:11:27.040 It wasn't the same concept of buy my book, buy my book, buy my book, you got to buy 132 00:11:27.040 --> 00:11:32.800 my book, review my book. There was an element of this is available right now, the 133 00:11:32.800 --> 00:11:37.040 audiobook for chat, you know, the audio chapter for this book is available now. 134 00:11:37.040 --> 00:11:44.720 And it ended up being a cool and almost. It was humble in not saying, okay, buy the book, 135 00:11:44.720 --> 00:11:51.040 but run me for a test drive. Try this 99 cent chapter. I think some sites might 136 00:11:51.040 --> 00:11:56.800 have charged a buck 99, some were up to two 99. But try this chapter, see 137 00:11:56.800 --> 00:11:59.280 what you think of it. Maybe you'll want to wait till next month 138 00:11:59.280 --> 00:12:02.400 and get another chapter. Maybe from there you'll want to get the ebook, or 139 00:12:02.400 --> 00:12:06.080 maybe from there you're going to want to get the paper back. And I found in 140 00:12:06.080 --> 00:12:12.240 looking at sales over time that many people went to a couple audio chapters and 141 00:12:12.240 --> 00:12:15.120 then they buy the ebook. And then even some of them, 142 00:12:15.120 --> 00:12:17.200 when I was out speaking, they said, well, I bought these 143 00:12:17.200 --> 00:12:20.800 four chapters, then I bought the ebook, then I bought the paperback. 144 00:12:20.800 --> 00:12:23.200 I wanted to have the physical copy as well. 145 00:12:23.200 --> 00:12:29.440 So that one customer ended up being an array of purchases which then help with the 146 00:12:29.440 --> 00:12:36.560 profit as a whole. The other points inside a profit are not necessarily courses. 147 00:12:36.560 --> 00:12:38.400 And I know that people say, oh, you need to have 148 00:12:38.400 --> 00:12:39.760 a course, you need to have a course. I don't believe 149 00:12:39.760 --> 00:12:44.000 it. If you're not a genuine teacher, if you don't genuinely 150 00:12:44.000 --> 00:12:49.360 have a course in you, don't use one of these AI things to fake it, because people 151 00:12:49.360 --> 00:12:53.680 are going to know. And right now, more and more these courses are getting slammed 152 00:12:53.680 --> 00:12:57.840 and attacked for people that maybe they did have a book in them and maybe they can 153 00:12:57.840 --> 00:13:03.200 serve well as a coach or a consultant or a strategist, but then inside of a course, 154 00:13:03.200 --> 00:13:09.200 it just looks like crap. So if you don't have a genuine course in you, try to move 155 00:13:09.200 --> 00:13:15.360 away from products like that, please. Getting back to the foundation, though, we've 156 00:13:15.360 --> 00:13:19.280 talked quickly about the different models of what you can put out. 157 00:13:19.280 --> 00:13:23.040 You talk about the speaking element, the consulting element. 158 00:13:23.040 --> 00:13:26.880 These all become part of the foundation even before you write the book. 159 00:13:26.880 --> 00:13:33.120 And as you go to write the book, thinking about ways to protect the property, 160 00:13:33.120 --> 00:13:39.200 the intellectual property, the integrity, and at the same time to look good for. 161 00:13:39.200 --> 00:13:41.680 If you want to go to a  major publisher, if you want 162 00:13:41.680 --> 00:13:46.480 to go to a literary agent, what are ways that you can do that can stand out in a 163 00:13:46.480 --> 00:13:52.400 world where everybody supposedly can be an author, but really are they selecting 164 00:13:53.520 --> 00:13:56.080 you or are they going to look at you? Or do you become worth 165 00:13:56.080 --> 00:14:00.880 the investment? Does your story stand with authority? 166 00:14:00.880 --> 00:14:07.040 And in that, as you begin to outline it and you begin to almost blueprint it, this 167 00:14:07.040 --> 00:14:13.440 may open many more doors, opportunities, and even advances to do the book in 168 00:14:13.440 --> 00:14:18.400 the way that you'd hope to and in a way that can really protect you. 169 00:14:18.400 --> 00:14:25.120 What I mean by that is outlining a blueprint of understanding the shape of the book. 170 00:14:25.120 --> 00:14:28.880 What are you Know, as opposed to the. I'm going to sit down and write the Great 171 00:14:28.880 --> 00:14:31.920 American Book, and I'm going to start writing from the opening point to 172 00:14:31.920 --> 00:14:36.480 the closing point. Consider laying it out, maybe even 173 00:14:36.480 --> 00:14:41.440 using flashcards. I used flashcards for my third book, and 174 00:14:41.440 --> 00:14:44.240 I moved them around. I wrote down. I'm like, okay, is 175 00:14:44.240 --> 00:14:49.840 this a chapter? Is this a section? Is this, you 176 00:14:49.840 --> 00:14:53.040 know, a subheader? I would call them. I did one of the 177 00:14:53.040 --> 00:14:56.800 For Dummies books. So Is this an H1, a header 1, a header 178 00:14:56.800 --> 00:15:01.920 2, or a header 3? And in slowly moving the pieces around and getting 179 00:15:01.920 --> 00:15:06.960 this sound foundation of what this looked like of what was going to be written, 180 00:15:06.960 --> 00:15:12.320 it became much more comfortable. I wrote my third book in just under four 181 00:15:12.320 --> 00:15:17.200 months, and I did that after I put together the blueprint and this 182 00:15:17.200 --> 00:15:20.400 baseline foundation. And in the book I was 183 00:15:20.400 --> 00:15:24.960 talking about, it was another book on music, but I was talking 184 00:15:24.960 --> 00:15:26.960 about different things.  And some of the same things 185 00:15:26.960 --> 00:15:31.200 from the second book, but in a different format. And I really wanted to collect 186 00:15:31.200 --> 00:15:35.280 my thoughts in a way to make it easier to write. I'm not an author. 187 00:15:35.280 --> 00:15:38.640 I dropped out of college to become a drummer. 188 00:15:38.640 --> 00:15:40.960 I was in music and television for many years. 189 00:15:40.960 --> 00:15:47.120 I'm not an author. I was not a writer. There was a bartender in Seattle, 190 00:15:47.120 --> 00:15:54.240 Washington, gosh, what was his name? John Moroney, said, you need 191 00:15:54.240 --> 00:15:56.560 to write a book. And I laughed at 192 00:15:56.560 --> 00:16:01.440 him. And my first response was, as he was serving alcohol, so you 193 00:16:01.440 --> 00:16:07.760 must be drinking. And he kind of ripped me for a while and just kept going, you 194 00:16:07.760 --> 00:16:10.160 should write a book. You should write a book. 195 00:16:10.160 --> 00:16:12.720 And the more I thought about it, I said, okay, I'll try. 196 00:16:12.720 --> 00:16:16.400 And with that first book in kind of looking at, okay, I'm not going to write 197 00:16:16.400 --> 00:16:19.520 something front to back. How am I going to remember all these things? 198 00:16:19.520 --> 00:16:23.280 Let me break it out. I began to design chapter ideas. 199 00:16:23.280 --> 00:16:26.480 They weren't the chapter titles, and we'll get to that in a bit. 200 00:16:26.480 --> 00:16:30.240 And then I began to say, okay, what sections will go where? 201 00:16:30.240 --> 00:16:34.800 And then I began to see a form and inside of this format. 202 00:16:34.800 --> 00:16:39.360 The idea was not to write it front to back or write complete chapters. 203 00:16:39.360 --> 00:16:42.240 It was to write from the standpoint of not being a writer. 204 00:17:13.520 --> 00:17:19.120 I had sections and eventually I made on my computer files for each chapter. 205 00:17:19.120 --> 00:17:23.600 I made file sections of, okay, so this chapter is here, that chapter is here, okay? 206 00:17:23.600 --> 00:17:29.200 And I had a little, you know, notepad, word docs that had notes in them of this will 207 00:17:29.200 --> 00:17:31.520 go into this chapter. Let's cover some stuff on this. 208 00:17:31.520 --> 00:17:36.720 Let's cover some stuff on that. And I was able to, in a much more comfortable 209 00:17:36.720 --> 00:17:42.240 way, write the first book by writing what I felt in any given day. 210 00:17:42.240 --> 00:17:46.640 At that time, I was producing full time. I wasn't really on the road. I was 211 00:17:46.640 --> 00:17:51.360 speaking a little bit. And I would get up in the morning, I'd usually go 212 00:17:51.360 --> 00:17:56.880 for a swim, the, you know, have a little bit of breakfast, and then I just try to 213 00:17:56.880 --> 00:18:02.640 write for, you know, an hour or two. But in that, it wasn't just writing fluff or 214 00:18:02.640 --> 00:18:07.280 writing, who knows where this is going to go. I would think about where I was, where the 215 00:18:07.280 --> 00:18:11.520 inspiration was, and I would see, what chapter is that going into? 216 00:18:11.520 --> 00:18:16.160 And then inside of that file for that chapter was, okay, here's some loose ideas, 217 00:18:16.160 --> 00:18:20.080 but this is what it's going to go, and I know it's going to go in this chapter. 218 00:18:20.080 --> 00:18:23.680 And then eventually inside of those chapters became sections. 219 00:18:23.680 --> 00:18:28.160 Then I could hop around  this model, which made it a 220 00:18:28.160 --> 00:18:30.800 lot easier than people if they were back in the days of typewriting 221 00:18:30.800 --> 00:18:34.960 or writing by hand. I could jump from place to place. 222 00:18:34.960 --> 00:18:40.240 And I never got burnt out in writing because I never felt the restriction or the 223 00:18:40.240 --> 00:18:44.160 constriction of being stuck or like, okay, I've got to fill this in. 224 00:18:44.160 --> 00:18:48.160 I could be sitting here working on this section, you know, some subsection in 225 00:18:48.160 --> 00:18:50.160 chapter three, and all of a sudden I'd have an idea. 226 00:18:50.160 --> 00:18:55.120 And I'd either pop that idea into a notepad to address it later, I pop that idea on 227 00:18:55.120 --> 00:19:01.200 a page in another chapter file, or I take a break and then just go into that other 228 00:19:01.200 --> 00:19:05.920 file and write from there.  In this, it brings almost 229 00:19:05.920 --> 00:19:12.160 a greater creativity, or it did for me, and a greater relief to jump around, to 230 00:19:12.160 --> 00:19:16.560 have the freedom and at the same time to get all the thoughts out. 231 00:19:16.560 --> 00:19:21.200 And then this master notepad that I had that was right on the. 232 00:19:21.200 --> 00:19:23.920 Right on the front of the laptop. I don't know where this is going, 233 00:19:23.920 --> 00:19:27.200 but here's a note. And oftentimes when I was checking emails in the 234 00:19:27.200 --> 00:19:30.960 morning, I would look at those notes. Where does this belong? And I 235 00:19:30.960 --> 00:19:36.160 moved that around myself. And then the foundation grew into 236 00:19:36.160 --> 00:19:40.000 large chapters. And then there was a format, and that's when the 237 00:19:40.000 --> 00:19:45.120 editor came in, and so on and so forth. The other element in this initial phase 238 00:19:45.120 --> 00:19:54.160 can be titling and seeing almost the chapter titles as something more important 239 00:19:54.160 --> 00:19:59.600 at first than the title of the book itself. When we sit here, I need to 240 00:19:59.600 --> 00:20:02.320 have the great name. I need to have a great name. I need to 241 00:20:02.320 --> 00:20:06.960 have a great name. Maybe consider that having a great chapter Title 242 00:20:06.960 --> 00:20:12.400 name something that can stand on its own. So if you do an audio chapter that can 243 00:20:12.400 --> 00:20:17.200 stand out, something where there's a tagline, not just a tagline for the book, but 244 00:20:17.200 --> 00:20:22.240 a tagline for the chapter. I believe in more of the 245 00:20:22.240 --> 00:20:25.280 educational books, and even some of the ones that aren't as 246 00:20:25.280 --> 00:20:31.280 educational, a little bit more story. Having that chapter title, designing that tagline 247 00:20:31.280 --> 00:20:35.840 for the chapter, and having an opening thought and a closing thought to that 248 00:20:35.840 --> 00:20:42.880 chapter can be a great tool to get people to read, and especially get people to read 249 00:20:42.880 --> 00:20:48.240 that might not necessarily want to read. So the concept here, and some of this can 250 00:20:48.240 --> 00:20:52.640 also be, if you choose a different writing mode of saying, okay, I'm going to work on 251 00:20:52.640 --> 00:20:58.240 chapter titles, taglines, opening and closing thoughts, and then I'll fill in and 252 00:20:58.240 --> 00:21:02.480 write the chapters in from there. Or you might end up writing inside 253 00:21:02.480 --> 00:21:06.640 and going backwards. But either way or either direction that you 254 00:21:06.640 --> 00:21:11.520 choose, please consider having the importance of that chapter title. 255 00:21:11.520 --> 00:21:18.480 Almost like a headline, probably under 70 characters, a tagline to it, it brings an 256 00:21:18.480 --> 00:21:22.080 extra piece to that and an opening and closing thought. 257 00:21:22.080 --> 00:21:25.680 Here's one of the leads for the idea of the book as a whole. 258 00:21:25.680 --> 00:21:32.240 Could somebody go into each chapter, read just the opening and closing thoughts, and 259 00:21:32.240 --> 00:21:37.840 get the gist, or from there be drawn in that much more to want to read the rest of 260 00:21:37.840 --> 00:21:43.680 the chapters? I believe this to be a great way to draw people in and at the same 261 00:21:43.680 --> 00:21:47.200 time to draw media in.  There are many people inside 262 00:21:47.200 --> 00:21:53.280 of media where they're handed a number of books on a daily basis. 263 00:21:53.280 --> 00:21:57.280 What's going to draw them to review? What if you sent out with a review packet 264 00:21:57.280 --> 00:22:01.840 saying, okay, here's the book. By the way, there's opening and closing 265 00:22:01.840 --> 00:22:06.240 thoughts for each chapter. So if you just want to skim, you can get 266 00:22:06.240 --> 00:22:10.800 a much better idea. One of my promotion points and promotion docs that 267 00:22:10.800 --> 00:22:17.520 I sent out when I was doing pre reviews and pre release of the second book was a 268 00:22:17.520 --> 00:22:22.560 PDF document that was just the opening and closing thoughts of each chapter, as 269 00:22:22.560 --> 00:22:27.760 well as the opening, the opening of the book and the conclusion of the book. 270 00:22:28.400 --> 00:22:34.480 I got a lot more interest and a lot more return on the investment of the time that 271 00:22:34.480 --> 00:22:39.920 I put in of people asking for the entire book, of people wanting more, of people 272 00:22:39.920 --> 00:22:44.960 wanting to dig in. So consider that opening thought and that closing thought, and 273 00:22:44.960 --> 00:22:48.160 even inside of some of those opening thoughts and closing thoughts, when you get 274 00:22:48.160 --> 00:22:52.640 them honed in and you've now designed a chapter, even before that chapter is 275 00:22:52.640 --> 00:22:56.560 completely done, some of those opening and closing thoughts can Be used in advance 276 00:22:56.560 --> 00:23:03.360 of the book being put out through social media, by audios, by videos, and especially 277 00:23:03.360 --> 00:23:09.760 quotes. And getting to the quote part, jumping over to quotes, please 278 00:23:09.760 --> 00:23:12.800 consider inside of your book. If it's, let it be your book. 279 00:23:12.800 --> 00:23:17.360 Be the author of your book. Don't put other people's quotes all over your book. 280 00:23:17.360 --> 00:23:22.640 Don't let these opening thoughts, like so many choose to do, have somebody else's 281 00:23:22.640 --> 00:23:27.920 authority, somebody else's expertise, make it yours. 282 00:23:27.920 --> 00:23:33.200 If there's a certain quote that you are tying in some kind of knowledge or some part 283 00:23:33.200 --> 00:23:38.720 of the story to, by all means, but don't have these segments and these books with 284 00:23:38.720 --> 00:23:43.120 these people where it's just quote unquote, on quote unquote of other people's 285 00:23:43.120 --> 00:23:50.000 authority. Let it be yours. And as you find a quote that might be important, that 286 00:23:50.000 --> 00:23:51.760 might be something going, okay, this is definitely 287 00:23:51.760 --> 00:23:58.400 in the book, this is definitely here. You can make it as you can have it be 288 00:23:58.400 --> 00:24:04.320 something that's pulled out as a pull quote in certain images as opposed to just 289 00:24:04.320 --> 00:24:07.840 having a chapter and a whole bunch of pages. You could have something enlarged, 290 00:24:07.840 --> 00:24:12.080 something italicized, something bolded, something to stand out, something to break it out 291 00:24:12.080 --> 00:24:17.120 for the eye for someone to read. And if you know, okay, this quote is going in, 292 00:24:17.120 --> 00:24:20.240 this quote is going in here. It's going in the middle of chapter two. 293 00:24:20.240 --> 00:24:24.320 It's on this subject. I really like it. I know it's going to be there. Boom. 294 00:24:24.320 --> 00:24:31.440 That is in chapter two. Feel free and please consider doing this to 295 00:24:31.440 --> 00:24:37.280 add that quote to Goodreads and you can add a quote to Goodreads before your book 296 00:24:37.280 --> 00:24:44.560 is published, to sites like quotes.net to quote fancy and to many of these 297 00:24:44.560 --> 00:24:51.600 other places where you can begin to pre optimize the IP of your 298 00:24:51.600 --> 00:24:57.120 work so that as the book comes out, when people look up some of these quotes, they 299 00:24:57.120 --> 00:24:59.920 find them located in all these other places. 300 00:24:59.920 --> 00:25:06.160 Every so often it can be good to put out that blog of your quotes and add it on a 301 00:25:06.160 --> 00:25:09.600 website inside of an article.  Quotes that you can be 302 00:25:09.600 --> 00:25:14.320 quoted on inside of interviews. Would you quote me on this? That's great. 303 00:25:14.320 --> 00:25:19.680 Let's say it's one of the Kirkus reviews and it goes through a major publisher. 304 00:25:19.680 --> 00:25:24.000 That's a quote that's going to have some high authority and point back to you. 305 00:25:24.000 --> 00:25:29.280 Recently, right now, in just protecting some of my older quotes, I ended up doing a, 306 00:25:29.280 --> 00:25:33.520 you know, I ended, I titled it Top 100 Loren Wiseman Quotes. 307 00:25:33.520 --> 00:25:38.320 Now, this isn't a look at me. These are quotes that I hope people are happy with. 308 00:25:38.320 --> 00:25:44.560 But the main point was to reestablish quotes that were from my book, from my three 309 00:25:44.560 --> 00:25:48.320 books, quotes that I've had on my website, quotes I shared in interviews, quotes 310 00:25:48.320 --> 00:25:52.800 about how I operate, how I like to work with people, what I advise people to do. 311 00:25:52.800 --> 00:25:57.120 And again, it's a re energizing of these are mine. 312 00:25:57.120 --> 00:26:02.000 And so at the same time, you can do that in advance, these are yours. 313 00:26:02.000 --> 00:26:09.360 Creating elements in advance can also help whether you're going to a literary agent, 314 00:26:09.360 --> 00:26:13.360 whether you're going to a hybrid, whether you're going to a major publisher for them 315 00:26:13.360 --> 00:26:18.400 to see the strength of what's being created, to begin to see the buzz of what's 316 00:26:18.400 --> 00:26:22.480 happening, whether you end up with a working title, whether it ends up having the 317 00:26:22.480 --> 00:26:26.880 title ends up having to change somewhat, that can happen too. 318 00:26:26.880 --> 00:26:33.440 But coming back to the blueprint, in really designing chapter titles, in designing a 319 00:26:33.440 --> 00:26:39.440 title for the book, in looking, in doing a brand discovery, and that's something you 320 00:26:39.440 --> 00:26:42.800 can do with someone like me, that's something you can do with other brand 321 00:26:42.800 --> 00:26:49.200 strategists that understand this methodology and this model to work in, to 322 00:26:49.200 --> 00:26:54.320 understand what is the chapter title, what is the title of the book going to be when 323 00:26:54.320 --> 00:26:58.320 that's searched on. Are you buying some of the domain names already? 324 00:26:58.320 --> 00:27:05.680 Are you securing a social media Are you securing a social media set? 325 00:27:05.680 --> 00:27:09.920 Do you have this stuff taken? Maybe you don't know what the COVID of the book is 326 00:27:09.920 --> 00:27:15.680 necessarily going to be and you have just a holder image, but this is where your ex 327 00:27:15.680 --> 00:27:19.920 is going to be or formerly Twitter. This is the Facebook, this is the Instagram, this 328 00:27:19.920 --> 00:27:24.720 is where you'll have your YouTube having these things set up. 329 00:27:24.720 --> 00:27:28.880 Not only does it set up a primary level of security for 330 00:27:28.880 --> 00:27:34.080 you, for your IP and for the book, but it can be a great preliminary marketing 331 00:27:34.080 --> 00:27:40.640 element to go to, to go to a publisher and state, this is what I'm doing. 332 00:28:11.520 --> 00:28:17.440 When I had put out a book proposal, put out a book proposal on a Friday 333 00:28:17.440 --> 00:28:23.280 and it came back on a Monday afternoon saying we want this. 334 00:28:23.280 --> 00:28:28.560 And what I sent in the proposal, it was one chapter done, it was 11 chapters 335 00:28:28.560 --> 00:28:33.360 stated. These are the names, this is what I want to call them. 336 00:28:34.160 --> 00:28:38.080 I understand certain things are going to change, but from an SEO standpoint, from a 337 00:28:38.080 --> 00:28:41.680 competitive standpoint, from a comparative standpoint, from a connotative 338 00:28:41.680 --> 00:28:46.880 standpoint, these may be the strongest. Here's the opening and closing thoughts as they 339 00:28:46.880 --> 00:28:50.640 are at the moment for the rest of the chapters. And by the way, here are 340 00:28:50.640 --> 00:28:54.080 the domains I purchased. Here's the social media sites that are all 341 00:28:54.080 --> 00:28:57.120 up, there's nothing on them. And here's the outline in the direction 342 00:28:57.120 --> 00:29:04.640 of where I'm taking it. I became less of a risk and a safer investment to 343 00:29:04.640 --> 00:29:08.400 be viewed for what I was doing and what I was doing in advance while the 344 00:29:08.400 --> 00:29:13.360 book was still being written. And in that it brought a level of promotion and 345 00:29:13.360 --> 00:29:21.600 it also helped once the book cover came back, I believe that was. 346 00:29:21.600 --> 00:29:30.800 Oh, book came. It came back in. I think it was like December. I don't even 347 00:29:30.800 --> 00:29:34.240 remember the year now. But then I could use the image 348 00:29:34.240 --> 00:29:38.640 of the book. And the book was still five months out 349 00:29:38.640 --> 00:29:42.640 from being released. And I was able to get the images of the book, the 350 00:29:42.640 --> 00:29:46.240 fonts, all the typeset, all the look up onto all these social 351 00:29:46.240 --> 00:29:48.720 media headers. I was able to get the front in the backs 352 00:29:48.720 --> 00:29:51.760 for the YouTube videos. I was able to get a lot of just the 353 00:29:51.760 --> 00:29:55.600 watermarking done. And then I was even starting to put out from there 354 00:29:55.600 --> 00:29:59.120 the videos about going a little further into this is what I talk 355 00:29:59.120 --> 00:30:02.560 about in this chapter. These are some of the ideas. Here are 356 00:30:02.560 --> 00:30:05.360 some of the quotes. I was putting the quotes up Through Goodreads, 357 00:30:05.360 --> 00:30:11.440 through Quotes.net/OwnQuotes.com and through these other places I was building 358 00:30:11.440 --> 00:30:16.800 simultaneously while writing the book. And then yeah, it went to editing and went to, 359 00:30:16.800 --> 00:30:20.560 you know, tech editing and proofreading and the whole nine yards and 360 00:30:20.560 --> 00:30:23.760 a lot of that stuff. Yeah, that's down the line. And again, the writing 361 00:30:23.760 --> 00:30:27.040 process, it might be a little bit longer for you. Not saying you have to write it in 362 00:30:27.040 --> 00:30:33.840 four months, you might write it in two years. But still in the first phase in 363 00:30:33.840 --> 00:30:39.520 this security, stability, foundational phase, consider the outline, 364 00:30:39.520 --> 00:30:44.640 consider the blueprint. Consider putting this together for yourself, 365 00:30:44.640 --> 00:30:51.760 working with someone like me, or working with me on one of these so that you have 366 00:30:51.760 --> 00:30:57.440 all the formats in place, so that whether you're pre pitched to a hybrid, a 367 00:30:57.440 --> 00:31:00.960 major, a literary agent, whether you're doing this yourself and you just want to 368 00:31:00.960 --> 00:31:07.760 protect the story as it goes out, whether you want to build up the advanced traction 369 00:31:07.760 --> 00:31:11.120 before the book comes out, you're setting a precedent 370 00:31:11.120 --> 00:31:16.160 with a better foundation that's that much more stable to build 371 00:31:16.160 --> 00:31:22.560 and get the exposure you're looking for. Consider taking your concept, and this is part of 372 00:31:22.560 --> 00:31:27.840 where you protect it as well, into a level where it's showing up in. 373 00:31:27.840 --> 00:31:32.800 It's almost like blockchain book writing, for lack of a better word, that it's not 374 00:31:32.800 --> 00:31:37.040 just I'm working on a book and it's coming or something that you pop out on your 375 00:31:37.040 --> 00:31:43.360 personal, your business, social media, but that the domain is taken, the social 376 00:31:43.360 --> 00:31:48.720 media handles are taken, the outline of what you're creating is out there. 377 00:31:48.720 --> 00:31:55.040 That this begins to showcase a strong, viable product that has the legs 378 00:31:55.040 --> 00:32:03.600 to it to run for a long distance. That idea of stating if you can, multiple audio 379 00:32:03.600 --> 00:32:09.440 chapters released over an extended amount amount of time discussing in options if 380 00:32:09.440 --> 00:32:13.680 there are other books inside of you or other books that tie to this, that here's the 381 00:32:13.680 --> 00:32:16.320 book that I'm doing, here's the outline of it, here's the 382 00:32:16.320 --> 00:32:19.760 opening thoughts, closing thoughts, taglines of chapters, 383 00:32:19.760 --> 00:32:26.000 tagline of the book as a whole. And from here I would go to here figuring out some 384 00:32:26.000 --> 00:32:29.440 of the market and some of the analytics and the brand of where this 385 00:32:29.440 --> 00:32:35.520 may impact the best. Not, excuse me, not shortcutting. 386 00:32:35.520 --> 00:32:40.160 If this is to be something a little bit bigger than that local little, you know, 387 00:32:40.160 --> 00:32:45.920 mom and pop self publishing publishing house that can pop you up on Amazon and print 388 00:32:45.920 --> 00:32:49.440 you 500 copies is not going to be the answer. 389 00:32:49.440 --> 00:32:52.880 There's also in between the self, the hybrid. 390 00:32:52.880 --> 00:32:57.920 There's also investment opportunities, there are ways to go for investment for your 391 00:32:57.920 --> 00:33:04.880 books. And once you showcase what's going on, you may be able to draw 392 00:33:04.880 --> 00:33:11.120 out investment. So the main point being and kind of summing things up and then 393 00:33:11.120 --> 00:33:18.480 a last thought, prep the best foundation that you can for 394 00:33:18.480 --> 00:33:24.880 the authenticity and the authority of your story so that even while you're in the 395 00:33:24.880 --> 00:33:31.040 midst of writing it, you're promoting it, while you're building the message across 396 00:33:31.040 --> 00:33:36.480 it, you're marketing it and that you're already bringing in all the authentic 397 00:33:36.480 --> 00:33:40.480 structures prior to the editor, the proofreader, the tech reader. 398 00:33:40.480 --> 00:33:45.920 You're authoring out and advertising what this thing is going to be to the public, 399 00:33:45.920 --> 00:33:53.920 to media, to literary agents in advance. And in the last part of this, and this 400 00:33:53.920 --> 00:34:01.600 impacted me with a particular book in the last part, read carefully the contracts 401 00:34:01.600 --> 00:34:08.480 and the deals that you get into. Look for the warning signs, look for 402 00:34:08.480 --> 00:34:14.560 situations that don't maybe appear at first. This goes 403 00:34:14.560 --> 00:34:19.920 with anything I would say. And I used to say I don't say it anymore. 404 00:34:19.920 --> 00:34:25.840 And I really corrected myself shortly after one of the books came out that I felt a 405 00:34:25.840 --> 00:34:30.000 little bit screwed over by a situation that occurred. 406 00:34:30.000 --> 00:34:36.880 And in the end it was my fault. It wasn't. These people chose to do something 407 00:34:36.880 --> 00:34:43.040 that was not very moral, not very ethical and absolutely questionable. 408 00:34:43.040 --> 00:34:48.880 And it cost a lot of. But I didn't take the time to read a 409 00:34:48.880 --> 00:34:52.240 section of a contract that I thought I just buzzed across it. 410 00:34:52.240 --> 00:34:59.120 It seemed fine to me, but it wasn't fine. And it cost me a lot in the long run. 411 00:34:59.120 --> 00:35:03.600 And while I'm still proud of the work and the work still is out there promoting, 412 00:35:03.600 --> 00:35:08.480 there was also a piece of that that it was very harmful, but it was harm that I 413 00:35:08.480 --> 00:35:13.120 caused because of my lack of due diligence, my lack of vetting, and my lack of 414 00:35:13.120 --> 00:35:17.840 double checking. If you get right as you're getting to that point of whether it's 415 00:35:17.840 --> 00:35:24.800 signing or distributing or whatever deal that you might end up cutting, look very 416 00:35:24.800 --> 00:35:31.520 carefully. And if you're not 100% sure and really in all to get a lawyer 417 00:35:31.520 --> 00:35:37.840 to review a contract or if you're really clear on parts of it, to say, okay, I'd 418 00:35:37.840 --> 00:35:43.920 like to book this consultant, because there's this one page or this paragraph or 419 00:35:43.920 --> 00:35:49.600 this that I'm a little unclear with. Having that legal person review that 420 00:35:49.600 --> 00:35:57.360 with you, it can make all the difference. So in close, consider the 421 00:35:57.360 --> 00:36:01.440 brand strategy of your book, the optics of your book, 422 00:36:01.440 --> 00:36:04.640 the foundation, even before you've written the whole thing. 423 00:36:04.640 --> 00:36:07.840 Consider moving away from the idea of I need to write a book and complete this 424 00:36:07.840 --> 00:36:13.280 thing. Before I think about any of that, I say do the very beginning steps 425 00:36:13.280 --> 00:36:20.880 simultaneously to create the greatest foundation so that the IP stays yours, 426 00:36:20.880 --> 00:36:26.480 so that people know. Begin to learn your quotes, begin to learn parts about your 427 00:36:26.480 --> 00:36:29.920 story, things that you can  feed into podcasts, into 428 00:36:29.920 --> 00:36:35.520 videos, into short videos, into the quotes that go out, into articles, even into 429 00:36:35.520 --> 00:36:38.480 parts of it, of a little bit of the story of where you're at with 430 00:36:38.480 --> 00:36:43.520 how you're writing it and bringing this whole product 431 00:36:43.520 --> 00:36:49.600 that goes beyond just the book itself to a finish line that is a starting point for 432 00:36:49.600 --> 00:36:54.960 the book, for the subsidiary elements of the book, the ebook, the audiobook, 433 00:36:54.960 --> 00:37:00.560 whatever else, the speaking,  if there are seminars, 434 00:37:00.560 --> 00:37:04.640 whatever else is involved, or if it's cross promotion of products or 435 00:37:04.640 --> 00:37:11.440 your services, whatnot. But when you add that different view and when you 436 00:37:11.440 --> 00:37:16.080 power up a little bit more with this blueprint and this foundation and you have 437 00:37:16.080 --> 00:37:23.040 that genuine story, I believe you can have and create a greater impact in media, in 438 00:37:23.040 --> 00:37:28.480 the publishing world, and then in the launch, sales and recognition, as well as 439 00:37:28.480 --> 00:37:34.400 genuine reviews, and be able to get that just that much further out to the 440 00:37:34.400 --> 00:37:52.000 world, that's all I got. My name is Loren Weisman. Have a good one.