Episode 93
From Traditional to Self-Publishing: The Changing Landscape of the Publishing Industry
In this episode of the Writing Momentum podcast, hosts Chris and Gena chat with Kevin Tumlinson, the voice of indie publishing and the former Director of Marketing for Draft2Digital. They discuss the benefits of self-publishing versus traditional publishing, the changing landscape of the industry, and the best self-publishing options available today. Kevin shares his expertise and insights on reaching readers, marketing strategies, and the power of networking at conferences. He also reveals his exciting new role as CEO of BookSweeps, an author promotions and platform building company. Listeners will gain valuable advice on navigating the publishing world and finding success as an author.
LINKS:
- https://www.kevintumlinson.com/
- https://www.booksweeps.com/
- https://draft2digital.com/
- Liz Wilcox's Email Marketing Membership at http://wmdeal.com/liz
- Get your FREE Move the Needle goal-setting for authors ebook at https://www.writingmomentum.com
- Write with us! Join Chris, Gena, and Rene each Wednesday at noon Central and let's get our writing DONE! https://www.writingmoments.com
Transcript
What are the best self publishing options today?
Speaker:Hey, we can help with that.
Speaker:Hello and welcome to the Writing Momentum podcast.
Speaker:I'm Christopher Maselli.
Speaker:I'm here with my wife, Gena.
Speaker:How's it going,
Speaker:Gena?
Speaker:It's going great.
Speaker:Oh, hey, we are excited because today we have with us...
Speaker:A gentleman by the name of Kevin Tumlinson.
Speaker:Now you may have heard of him before because he's an award winning and
Speaker:best selling author and avid traveler.
Speaker:He's an accomplished podcast host and he's best known as
Speaker:the voice of indie publishing.
Speaker:And he's been in the self publishing community now for a while as the previous
Speaker:director of marketing for Draft2Digital.
Speaker:Which is the leading self publishing aggregator and
Speaker:distributor online worldwide.
Speaker:You can learn more about Kevin and his work at kevintumlinson.com.
Speaker:Hey, welcome Kevin.
Speaker:How you doing today?
Speaker:I am good Thank you for having me on.
Speaker:I think that the title I'm gonna honor most is gentlemen.
Speaker:You refer to me as a gentleman, not even my mother refers to me as a gentleman.
Speaker:You get that title today.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:And definitely a busy gentleman too.
Speaker:That's very evident from your bio.
Speaker:You've been working in the self publishing world for a long time, probably in
Speaker:the publishing world for a while.
Speaker:We're thrilled to have you here.
Speaker:I'm thrilled to be here.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:We met you at a writers conference, and I think you told me that you
Speaker:hit like dozens and dozens of writers conferences every year.
Speaker:You were at a writers conference almost every weekend, it sounded like.
Speaker:For a while there, that was absolutely true, yeah.
Speaker:There was a time where I was going to at least 20 a year.
Speaker:I do typically two or three in a month, and you have a month or
Speaker:two where you get a little breather and then now here's four more.
Speaker:And yeah, conferences have been a big part of my business, actually.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:We talk about conferences all the time on this podcast because we
Speaker:believe that there's really no better way to further your writing
Speaker:career than by going to conferences.
Speaker:They've made a big impact in our lives.
Speaker:And sometimes I think that listeners may get tired of us talking about conferences,
Speaker:but we hope not because we just love them.
Speaker:We just think they're the best thing for your writing career, really.
Speaker:I think they're really eyeopening.
Speaker:I think eyeopening on a lot of different levels, craft wise, but
Speaker:also marketing wise and just getting connected to the community too.
Speaker:And getting to know the players.
Speaker:You can't discount the idea that, you go to a conference and you'll meet.
Speaker:I was there representing Draft2Digital at that time, and there was also Cameron
Speaker:Sutter from Plotter, and we're part of the service side of that business,
Speaker:and there's things that we know and resources we have that, you wouldn't
Speaker:necessarily know existed any other way.
Speaker:If you hadn't heard of us already, that's a good place to meet us and ask questions.
Speaker:And I have a feeling you get a real good pulse on the writing community just by
Speaker:being at so many conferences because you see where beginner writers are at, but
Speaker:also those who have been doing this for a long time, you see how their publishing
Speaker:is changing for everyone, right?
Speaker:And it's interesting, cause I started going to conferences more often.
Speaker:I'd gone to a few before this, but.
Speaker:When I started going regularly back in 2016 and the industry has changed so,
Speaker:so much in those seven years it's crazy.
Speaker:New players have come on board, new services, new opportunities for authors.
Speaker:The author community itself has changed a lot, like when I first started self
Speaker:publishing, like I had a traditional contract briefly, but when I started
Speaker:self publishing back in 2008, it's crazy.
Speaker:Self publishing was still a taboo thing.
Speaker:Nobody wanted to admit they were doing it, but the sort of current of it the
Speaker:timber of the whole industry has changed so dramatically, like now it's a loud and
Speaker:proud kind of thing, self publishing has basically become publishing at this point.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:It's influenced the industry that much.
Speaker:That's interesting.
Speaker:And many of our listeners they're making this transition to go from
Speaker:traditional publishing to self publishing.
Speaker:And when do you think an author should seek out self publishing as
Speaker:opposed to traditional publishing, or should that be the default today?
Speaker:I could be a little biased in that, in the answer on that,
Speaker:personally, but I will say this.
Speaker:The traditional publishing world still has its place and it still has its role.
Speaker:I think that role has evolved and changed a little though.
Speaker:As for like, when should you self publish?
Speaker:It's really a personal preference.
Speaker:But I will say this, if you're very commercial minded, if you're, if the idea
Speaker:is you want to make money and make your living from publishing, You are going
Speaker:to have a much easier time of it with self publishing than with traditional
Speaker:because in order for you to be a level of success that pays those bills and puts
Speaker:you in your own custom built catamaran or, to reach those levels in that world
Speaker:at a Average 1 to 3 percent royalty cut you have to somehow, someway become the
Speaker:next John Grisham or Stephen King or, Danielle Steele otherwise, the majority
Speaker:of people who traditionally publish still have to have day jobs, I'm not trying to,
Speaker:disparage these people, I'm saying, these are the facts, the majority of that group.
Speaker:So I hate when you want to make money as an answer, but I will say it is much
Speaker:easier to establish a writing career.
Speaker:If you are impatient, if you, like I was, and stand the back and forth with
Speaker:agents and or potential agents and publishers the rejection letters and
Speaker:things like that, you might consider it.
Speaker:There's a much lower barrier to entry, obviously.
Speaker:But there's also much bigger opportunities, greater
Speaker:opportunities for you as a writer.
Speaker:I had a conversation with someone yesterday.
Speaker:He's writing short stories, publishing short stories.
Speaker:And that's, he's not writing novels.
Speaker:He's just publishing short stories.
Speaker:I remember back in the early days of my career just trying
Speaker:so hard to sell short fiction.
Speaker:And I did.
Speaker:I managed to do it.
Speaker:But I made pennies, I think one publication paid me the most
Speaker:money I ever made on a short story was they paid 25 cents a word.
Speaker:I gave them like a 10, 000 word, basically novella and you know that I was dining
Speaker:out on that for months as a college kid, but previous to that, I'd made like 200
Speaker:dollars here, a hundred dollars there.
Speaker:I was definitely not going to build a custom castle for myself or anything, not
Speaker:for anything and not for a length of time.
Speaker:But as a self published writer, I have no limitations on when I can print what
Speaker:I can print in even how you sell now.
Speaker:There's a lot of, right now in this, in our industry, there's
Speaker:a lot of focus on direct sales.
Speaker:And I can see why because, getting to keep 97 percent of your revenue
Speaker:is a very attractive offer.
Speaker:But your answer though seems different than what people might've
Speaker:heard even 10 years ago, right?
Speaker:Because 10 years ago it was like the only way you're going to be successful
Speaker:is if you traditionally publish.
Speaker:And yet you just said it's actually easier, you think to self-publish.
Speaker:I know thousands of authors who make a full time living
Speaker:just from self publishing.
Speaker:And a lot of them are exclusive to Amazon.
Speaker:The Kindle Direct KDP Select is the name of the program there.
Speaker:I don't recommend that.
Speaker:That's, to me, that's...
Speaker:Putting all your eggs in Amazon's basket and Amazon's fickle.
Speaker:But, aside from that, like I, these people are not just making a
Speaker:living, they're thriving doing that.
Speaker:Money is not the only reason to do this business.
Speaker:I want to make this clear.
Speaker:Because I call them all "will be authors".
Speaker:The folks who are, haven't written a book yet they love the idea.
Speaker:They're passionate about it.
Speaker:There's a bit of expectation management that has to happen when you're doing this.
Speaker:Cause even self publishing isn't a guarantee to success.
Speaker:But success is a very, like you have to define success for yourself and money
Speaker:is only a small part of that in the end.
Speaker:If your goal is to write full time, to me, the track is much more accessible
Speaker:for self publishing than traditional publishing doesn't mean it's impossible.
Speaker:I have some other goals that make traditional publishing
Speaker:much more attractive for me now.
Speaker:And because of my success in self publishing, I can be very picky about
Speaker:the deals I get, but I have a deal.
Speaker:I'm co authoring something with a traditional author that's gonna get
Speaker:some distribution via Simon & Schuster that is an appealing thing to me
Speaker:because I, at this point, I see traditional publishing as marketing.
Speaker:If I can get a book on the shelves of Barnes Noble or some other bookstore,
Speaker:it's available in the Simon & Schuster catalog, the discoverability for
Speaker:the rest of my work goes way up.
Speaker:I've got 70 plus titles.
Speaker:One good hit, even a modest hit at Barnes & Noble, something that hits the New York
Speaker:Times list, or whatever, could propel the rest of my work into the stratosphere.
Speaker:Take that entire back catalog and make it real active again.
Speaker:I love how you're talking about this because we've encouraged people to really
Speaker:look at their writing like a business.
Speaker:And that's what you're doing.
Speaker:You're looking at this.
Speaker:With a marketing eye, which I love.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:You're passionate about the work.
Speaker:Yes, you want to be, a master of the craft.
Speaker:But there's something about looking at your work with a marketing business eye
Speaker:and saying, okay, where do I wanna go?
Speaker:And marketing is a scary word for writers because they associate with
Speaker:sales, they associate with cold calling people and, hawking things out of
Speaker:the trunk of their car or whatever.
Speaker:But marketing doesn't have to be that.
Speaker:Marketing, so I've always, I have a working definition of marketing, which
Speaker:is that marketing is about making sure your book is in the right place
Speaker:at the right time, ready for the person that's most likely to buy it.
Speaker:That's what marketing is and that's why you've got people doing things like what
Speaker:they call book talk where they're using Tik Tok to promote their books in there.
Speaker:There's a huge spike in sales from that right now I think that's starting
Speaker:to dwindle but I mean before that it was wattpad before, you know there's
Speaker:there always be fads and trends.
Speaker:But Marketing is what are you willing to do?
Speaker:What's the work you're willing to do or what's the outreach you're willing
Speaker:to have that increases the odds that reader will discover your work.
Speaker:And we owe it to those readers to help them find that book.
Speaker:It's not just about money.
Speaker:It's not just about sale.
Speaker:It's, we crafted something.
Speaker:We're told from the moment we start writing to have our ideal reader in mind.
Speaker:That ideal reader is our constant friend.
Speaker:That quiet voice, the person we're trying to please.
Speaker:If we went to all the trouble of crafting this book.
Speaker:Getting through the entire process and getting it ready for prime time
Speaker:and we don't do anything We don't make any effort to get it to that person
Speaker:who's waiting for it We have let them down and we've let ourselves down.
Speaker:I want to go back to a point that you just mentioned a minute ago you said that
Speaker:you're pursuing traditional publishing at this point in your career because
Speaker:it is a tool of marketing for you.
Speaker:Usually when we talk about traditional publishing versus self publishing, the
Speaker:idea is whatever you choose, you're going to have to market in it, right?
Speaker:You're going to have to market if you're traditional publishing.
Speaker:You're going to have to market if you're self publishing.
Speaker:You've got to figure out how to do that, and what does that mean, and all that.
Speaker:You're saying, you're going to use...
Speaker:Traditional publishing as a marketing tool.
Speaker:Right!
Speaker:I'll use the same marketing methods and resources that I
Speaker:already use to promote that book.
Speaker:But the great thing is I have a partner in marketing and promoting
Speaker:that book, which is the publisher.
Speaker:They're going to want to see that book sell as well.
Speaker:They don't put as much in.
Speaker:See, that's the trick here has always been, People think like I get a
Speaker:traditional publishing career or contract and you know the publisher is going to
Speaker:promote that book and it could take off and I could be famous and wealthy and the
Speaker:truth of it is they do a certain amount of marketing but there's an expectation
Speaker:as you mentioned that you are going to have to do some marketing on your own.
Speaker:So the advantage I have is I'm already doing that.
Speaker:I've already got, momentum in that space.
Speaker:And so whatever I do will pair up nicely with what they do.
Speaker:But the bonus for me is, once they discover me, if they like that book and
Speaker:they go looking for more, I got more.
Speaker:You're much better off than most people when they get a traditional contract.
Speaker:Like they come in, if they're lucky, they get a multi book deal.
Speaker:If they're incredibly lucky.
Speaker:These days, you're lucky to even get that single book deal.
Speaker:You're lucky to get a decent royalty.
Speaker:You're not, let's face it, you're not going to get any sort of advance at all.
Speaker:And if you do, it's 500 bucks or, it's nothing to sneeze at.
Speaker:And, or nothing to, leverage your life on.
Speaker:But that's the advantage that I think self published authors are
Speaker:going to have, especially going forward, is if you can create success
Speaker:for your work, you've learned and mastered all the skills you need to
Speaker:transfer over to that Trad pub stuff.
Speaker:I don't think traditional publishing has yet evolved to the point where
Speaker:they realize we should be investing in these successful indie authors.
Speaker:They haven't clicked to that yet.
Speaker:They still see it as competition or they still see it as, those
Speaker:guys skip the gatekeepers.
Speaker:But the reality is eventually somebody is going to realize.
Speaker:This guy has sold a hundred thousand copies of this book.
Speaker:We might want to invest in having them write the next book for us.
Speaker:Someone's going to click to that eventually.
Speaker:The whole industry's changing.
Speaker:Have these doors though to traditional publishing, these have opened for
Speaker:you because of your success as a self published author, right?
Speaker:Because you've been establishing that platform?
Speaker:Did you say that?
Speaker:Yeah, but in a very sort of side loaded way.
Speaker:Because the publishers themselves could not care any less about me.
Speaker:They don't know me.
Speaker:Even if they know me, he's a self published author and they don't care.
Speaker:So I'm not like, I'm not winning over agents and publishers
Speaker:with my success as a writer.
Speaker:But because I go to conferences and because I speak at
Speaker:events and I do podcasts.
Speaker:I'm connecting to people, authors, et cetera, who are in that traditional
Speaker:space or at the very least hybrid.
Speaker:And that is opening the doors.
Speaker:I'm doing stuff.
Speaker:So I do, I host the Writer's Inc.
Speaker:podcast with several people, but J.
Speaker:D.
Speaker:Barker is one of those.
Speaker:He's someone who co authors things with James Patterson.
Speaker:He was tapped by the Bram Stoker estate.
Speaker:He was, he's been writing Dracula novels for the Bram Stoker family.
Speaker:And he did a lot of ghost writing like V.
Speaker:C.
Speaker:Andrews and the Hardy Boys and things like that in his career.
Speaker:He's Established, he's got an established career and he's been doing hybrid
Speaker:work, self-publishing, some things that his agent or editors didn't care for.
Speaker:He's been coming into that bit slowly he's realized, oh, there's actually
Speaker:quite a bit more money at stake if I self pub some titles and there's
Speaker:a synergy of marketing there, right?
Speaker:There's a synergy of, he publishes himself to some self published stuff And he pays
Speaker:out of pocket to promote that and then that leads to people discovering his
Speaker:traditional stuff and then vice versa that's where the doors start to open
Speaker:Authors need to realize like we've got allies all over the place You just can't
Speaker:go running out the door to find them.
Speaker:You have to build that's what platforms are about That's what
Speaker:the whole author platform is about It's not just your readers, it's
Speaker:your tools of discoverability.
Speaker:And, the whole idea of a platform, an author platform, is the whole
Speaker:marketing principle, right?
Speaker:How do I make sure I'm in as many places as possible and
Speaker:as discoverable as possible.
Speaker:That's what it's all about.
Speaker:I think most authors don't like the word networking.
Speaker:It seems like a, scary word.
Speaker:Networking and marketing, you say those in the same sentence and they will
Speaker:literally explode in front of you.
Speaker:But those are, they are both like key to a long term successful career.
Speaker:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker:Networking should not be scary to authors.
Speaker:They do it all the time.
Speaker:They just don't call it that.
Speaker:And the whole okay I've had authors tell me I would love to go to
Speaker:conferences, but I can't afford it.
Speaker:Every major city in this country and probably on this planet has an
Speaker:author conference at some point.
Speaker:If you, and they're always in a hotel and they're always, there's always a bar.
Speaker:So you should do what I call BarCon, which is you don't have
Speaker:to pay to stay in the hotel.
Speaker:You don't have to pay to go to the conference.
Speaker:Don't try to steal their content.
Speaker:Don't try to sneak in, but go sit in the bar and look for the badges.
Speaker:Everybody keeps on their little ID badge the whole time
Speaker:they're doing this conference.
Speaker:Just go strike up conversations with people.
Speaker:Tell them what you're doing.
Speaker:Tell them why you're there.
Speaker:You can't afford to be in.
Speaker:The value of a conference is not the panels and the workshops.
Speaker:Sorry to say, it's the people attending and you can get that for free.
Speaker:I'm a big fan of BarCon.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:It's crashing the party a little bit, right?
Speaker:But it's doing it in such a way where you're saying, Hey, I
Speaker:need to make relationships here.
Speaker:How do you approach someone in a situation like that?
Speaker:Do you just walk up to them and just start talking?
Speaker:Are people open to it at a conference?
Speaker:Yeah, here's the beauty of this.
Speaker:So they're wearing a big badge that says that they're an author, right?
Speaker:Yeah, so they're there for that reason.
Speaker:So you get it.
Speaker:That's your identification.
Speaker:Then you go to them and you say, hey Are you an author?
Speaker:And it's done.
Speaker:Every writer on the planet has been hoping for that moment when someone walked
Speaker:up to them and said, are you a writer?
Speaker:Tell me about your books.
Speaker:They will talk to you for free for hours.
Speaker:They'll skip the rest of the conference if they have to.
Speaker:Like they're there because that's their dream and you're tapping into that dream.
Speaker:And the same is true for the service providers, by the way,
Speaker:like you the industry folk.
Speaker:You know the people.
Speaker:You rarely will see the folks from Amazon or Apple at the bar.
Speaker:Sometimes you do.
Speaker:But there's all these Draft2Digital had a presence there, book
Speaker:sweeps at a present there.
Speaker:There's a book funnel and others at some of these conferences.
Speaker:That's where you really benefit because you make those connections end up
Speaker:benefiting you a lot down the road.
Speaker:That's so good.
Speaker:That's awesome.
Speaker:Now, tell us, what do you think are the best self publishing options out there?
Speaker:And why is that?
Speaker:So even though I am no longer directly affiliated with Draft2Digital, I'm just
Speaker:going to say flat out, Draft2Digital is the single best resource for
Speaker:publishing your work as an indie author.
Speaker:It's what's known as an aggregate publishing platform, meaning you can
Speaker:upload your manuscript one time and they will distribute it, they'll format
Speaker:it for free, there's a whole bunch of tools built into that service, and then
Speaker:they'll distribute it to all the major retailers, there's no fees, no charges or
Speaker:anything and they take a 15 percent cut of your royalty when it's all said and
Speaker:done, but, that's, I consider that like a convenience fee, but the whole principle
Speaker:there is, Reach all these places at once.
Speaker:They take care of making sure the book is formatted correctly,
Speaker:meets all the standards.
Speaker:They troubleshoot, they provide the best customer support there is.
Speaker:That's the top level.
Speaker:The other resources are things like, a lot of people like to
Speaker:go direct to certain platforms.
Speaker:For example, most people go direct to Amazon.
Speaker:And there are some advantages there.
Speaker:As long as you don't do their exclusivity program, the KDP Select or KU as a lot of
Speaker:people call it the Kindle Unlimited thing.
Speaker:Because that locks you in where you can't publish elsewhere then.
Speaker:90 days locked into Amazon's ecosystem and it auto renews unless
Speaker:you remember to turn it off and that means that you literally can't even
Speaker:sell the book on your own website.
Speaker:You are forbidden.
Speaker:And Amazon has been doing crazy things lately.
Speaker:There's been a lot of people who've had their accounts locked out and they weren't
Speaker:able to either publish or collect their royalties, they do crazy stuff I'm like
Speaker:this close to not wanting to distribute on Amazon even to even as a Wide author.
Speaker:What's that?
Speaker:Really?
Speaker:I said not even distribute because they're the number one place, right?
Speaker:That's for everyone
Speaker:They're the number one, right?
Speaker:You get enough traction through the other places?
Speaker:Yeah, so it's taken a lot of time for me to build up that
Speaker:wide presence, but it's there.
Speaker:I'm now becoming very interested in direct sales.
Speaker:I've done some direct sales.
Speaker:I use a platform called Payhip, but I'm thinking of switching to Shopify.
Speaker:And that's where I sell.
Speaker:Again, this is another one of those things that comes down to what is your goal?
Speaker:And if your goal is like wide discoverability and wide fame, I don't,
Speaker:fame, I use that very loosely, to be known and to have your book available
Speaker:for all readers everywhere that is, that strategy is tried and true.
Speaker:And, you tend to make a little less money on it.
Speaker:What's happening right now in this business is people are looking at direct
Speaker:sales because you basically make...
Speaker:All the money minus whatever the handling fee of the processing services.
Speaker:So if you, if someone buys from you and it's Stripe or
Speaker:PayPal or something like that.
Speaker:Like Stripe I think charges like a 3 percent processing fee.
Speaker:That means you're making 97 percent of the money on that book.
Speaker:Which means you could under price, you could cut under the Amazon price.
Speaker:Which they don't like, but hey, whatever, right?
Speaker:But you could price that book cheaper on your website and make
Speaker:probably twice as much money.
Speaker:Because Amazon, the most they're ever going to give you is 70%.
Speaker:But a lot of times it's down to 35 percent depending on what options you chose and
Speaker:how you priced and things like that.
Speaker:But, think about it.
Speaker:Price that book at 99 cents on Amazon, you make 35 cents.
Speaker:You price it for 99 cents.
Speaker:on your on your website and you're making 96 cents, I think.
Speaker:Twice as much.
Speaker:So the burden is on you then to get people to your website as opposed to hoping
Speaker:they'll stumble across it on Amazon.
Speaker:But hopefully you're already doing it, right?
Speaker:Because you've got that platform.
Speaker:So yeah, that is the downside to this, is that if people are buying
Speaker:and it's really successful on Amazon, there's a halo that happens
Speaker:where there's more discoverability.
Speaker:Amazon starts to promote it.
Speaker:But what about those books that aren't doing well on Amazon?
Speaker:If you're a or elsewhere.
Speaker:So if you're wide, if you've got wide distribution, first of all, I don't see
Speaker:any reason to take those books down.
Speaker:People definitely won't discover your book if it's not available for sale.
Speaker:So leave them for sale.
Speaker:But then if you're focusing all your efforts, all your marketing efforts
Speaker:on something anyway why not focus on pointing people to your website?
Speaker:Let the stumble upon stuff happen with Amazon and Apple and Barnes Noble, etc.
Speaker:I would even just use Draft2Digital to go to all those things to make it a one
Speaker:stop, one click kind of thing but then do, focus all your marketing, all your
Speaker:promotion and everything on sending people to your website to buy the book.
Speaker:And you can, there are things you can do there are links, like Geniuslink.
Speaker:Draft2Digital had something called Books2Read which, Works great, but it
Speaker:doesn't yet support direct sales on any platform other than not Shopify, but
Speaker:one of the platforms, but the that's the only one supports, but you can use
Speaker:other links or have various links on the website, maybe there's a Maybe you have
Speaker:a link that's get this book right now for this price And that's the direct link.
Speaker:And then, or find it at major retailers.
Speaker:And you use like the books to read link or something like that
Speaker:to send them everywhere else.
Speaker:The idea would be, you would prefer they buy it from you direct.
Speaker:. And it gets delivered by like Book Funnel, which is a amazing service
Speaker:my friend Damon Courtney founded.
Speaker:But then that way the reader gets a bargain and you actually end up
Speaker:making more money than you would make if they'd bought it elsewhere.
Speaker:And then, In the book you want to tell people go review this book
Speaker:on Amazon and elsewhere, you know.
Speaker:Make sure to tell all your friends and send them to this link and And
Speaker:then what will happen is as people review those books on Amazon likes
Speaker:that so they'll start promoting that book a little On their side.
Speaker:Same with Apple, same with all of them.
Speaker:So you can win the whole game if you Focus on promoting your direct sales stuff.
Speaker:Plus information is power, right?
Speaker:And when you're selling a book on your site, then who bought that book from you.
Speaker:So now you can send email series to them, give them bonuses.
Speaker:The whole thing, because you know that.
Speaker:Whereas if it's sold through Amazon, you don't know who bought it.
Speaker:You can also, if you don't want to play the pricing game, like if you don't want
Speaker:to price lower you could actually price higher for your direct sales if you do
Speaker:things like everyone who buys this gets, this is a special unique cover that
Speaker:you can only get when you buy direct.
Speaker:Or if you buy this and you enter this, your email address, This is important.
Speaker:Buy this and enter your email address, and I will send you, you can fill out
Speaker:this form, and I will mail you a book plate for the print book, or I will
Speaker:mail you a special gift for the e book, that is also encouraging them to get
Speaker:on your mailing list, which means it's easier for you to market to later.
Speaker:Your goal should be to have a massive mailing list.
Speaker:Kevin, every time I talk to you, I want to immediately leave, go aside and
Speaker:start reworking my entire funnel because I'm like, Oh, these are good ideas.
Speaker:I need to do this.
Speaker:I need to do that.
Speaker:I'm available for consulting.
Speaker:I'm just going to throw that out there.
Speaker:You're getting busy because you have some exciting news.
Speaker:Go ahead and tell us what's going on next with you.
Speaker:So the consulting thing was part of it.
Speaker:I've built a little consulting practice where I'm helping mostly the services
Speaker:and businesses that are in this industry that serve the author community.
Speaker:But I do a little bit of author coaching and that sort of thing as well.
Speaker:Not, that's not my big play.
Speaker:But the big news the reason that I stepped down, one of, one of the two reasons
Speaker:that I stepped down from Draft2Digital.
Speaker:Was first, I wanted to be free to build some of these things like the
Speaker:consulting practice, but the second was that I was tendered an offer to become
Speaker:CEO of BookSweeps, which is an author promotions and platform building company.
Speaker:And I accepted that offer.
Speaker:It's secretly, I've been the CEO for a few weeks now, but it's now today
Speaker:November 1st is the official announcement.
Speaker:And we're really excited.
Speaker:I've already gotten everybody in the business once they saw my farewell note
Speaker:my farewell podcast from Draft2Digital.
Speaker:I got hundreds of people pinging me and asking what are you doing next?
Speaker:And there were some, there were a few offers.
Speaker:I had some offers, I had to turn a few really good offers, too,
Speaker:and I had to turn those down.
Speaker:So yeah, now I'm working with Ryan Z, who's the founder of BookSweeps.
Speaker:A lot of people know him, and it's an incredible, we're it's a bit of
Speaker:a banged up baby, we'll be honest, there's things about BookSweeps that
Speaker:were in dire need, they needed me.
Speaker:And I saw an opportunity.
Speaker:This is a piece of...
Speaker:author marketing that I have been preaching my whole career.
Speaker:I'm very focused on what can I do to empower authors in this dream.
Speaker:It is a business, but it's also a dream.
Speaker:We shouldn't forget that.
Speaker:This is, nobody decides to become a novelist, for example because
Speaker:they think that it's, that's going to lead to their millions.
Speaker:That, the people who do that don't stick with it.
Speaker:But the ones who are slaving away Between, taking their kids to school and
Speaker:showing up at their job or taking their lunch breaks or, dictating things in
Speaker:their phone as they navigate rush hour.
Speaker:Those people get it.
Speaker:This is more than a business.
Speaker:This is a passion and a dream.
Speaker:I'm here for those people.
Speaker:And BookSweeps is going to make everybody, it's going to make it much
Speaker:easier for those dreams to come true.
Speaker:I think that's fantastic because you're talking about, again, it's
Speaker:one more piece of the pie to level that playing field a little bit more
Speaker:to get that and to help authors.
Speaker:These self-published authors have one more outlet for their work.
Speaker:So thank you.
Speaker:Thank you for serving the community and congratulations.
Speaker:That's exciting.
Speaker:Thank you very much.
Speaker:I'm excited.
Speaker:I'm more excited for what we're gonna do for the authors than I am for myself.
Speaker:This is just a ton of work for me.
Speaker:And I left Draft2Digital in incredibly good terms.
Speaker:My hope is that we can partner with D2D on some things, because this is a piece
Speaker:that I know D2D's authors need as well.
Speaker:So I'm looking forward to, finding all the synergy.
Speaker:That would be awesome.
Speaker:That is fantastic.
Speaker:Thank you so much for coming on our podcast today.
Speaker:This has been a lot of fun.
Speaker:Very informative.
Speaker:I'm going to go now and rework my entire book funnel because of this.
Speaker:And just really appreciate you being here.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:If you have enjoyed today's podcast, please rate, review, subscribe, and share
Speaker:it with a friend, especially somebody who might be questioning, should they be
Speaker:traditionally published or self published?
Speaker:Which direction should they go?
Speaker:There's a lot of great nuggets here, a lot of great wisdom to learn from
Speaker:others, which is right up our alley because what, Chris, together what?
Speaker:Together we have writing momentum.
Speaker:Bye bye.
