Episode 32 Show Notes

Become an Amazon Bestseller: Self-Publishing Expert Jyotsna Ramachandran Tells Us How

You’ve got the experience and the ideas, and now, it is time to write them! 

Many business owners wish to become bestselling authors, but the amount of work that takes to make this project a reality can be overwhelming without the proper guidance.

In this episode, we invited bestselling author and publisher Jyotsna Ramachandran to tell us how can we can turn our books into bestsellers on Amazon. Pam and Jane ask everything you want to know about self-publishing and monetizing your book successfully. 

If you have a lot of knowledge to share that can sure fill out pages, then this is the episode for you! 

Today we discuss:

  • [01:30] Introduction to bestselling book author and publisher, Jyotsna Ramachandran. 
  • [03:11] How to choose the perfect topic for your book. Jyotsna explains her Topic Selection Framework
  • [08:16] Strategies to start and actually finish writing your book. How to keep yourself motivated.
  • [13:17] What does it mean to be an Amazon Bestseller? How do Amazon’s charts work.
  • [16:29] Self-publishing the right way. How to manage the project to get your book to look like a New York Times Bestseller.
  • [20:47] Common mistakes authors make when self-publishing.
  • [24:47] How does publishing a book can help you grow your business. Strategies to turning your book into a lead generation tool.
  • [28:56] How to turn self-publishing projects into speaking gigs to leverage your book.
  • [32:54] Monetizing your book. What are the income streams available for self-publishing authors.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Find more about Jyotsna Ramachandran on her social media or go to her website happyselfpublishing.com. 

You can also schedule a book strategy call with her and her team to get your book project going!

And, if you don’t yet have a concrete plan settled and writing a book is more of a distant idea, you can join her Facebook group, Happy Authors Tribe. Jyotsna offers live boot camps and great content that will help you find your next bestselling book idea. 

Don’t forget we have a free assessment to test if your mindset corresponds to that of a CEO. It’s simple, do you think like a CEO?

Take our free assessment now and find it out! 

Thank you for listening to this episode of Flourish+Grow to CEO! We hope it has given you more confidence to put your ideas out there and start self-publishing!

Don’t forget to rate and subscribe to this podcast on the platform you prefer and leave us a comment in the comment section telling us what was your favorite part from today’s episode. We would love to hear from you!

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Pam (00:00):

You’re listening to the Flourish and Grow to CEO podcast. This is episode 32,

Speaker 2 (00:27):

[Inaudible]

Pam (00:27):

You a lady boss making 50 to a hundred thousand in your business. And you’re ready to break through that six figure barrier.

Jane (00:34):

You’ve done a great job of creating a nice life as the ultimate gig master, but know your inner CEO is calling you to greater Heights. You’re in the right place. If you want to create and implement solid fundamentals in your business without sacrificing fun.

Pam (00:48):

I’m Pam Ivey, I’m certified in small business management and I concentrate in the areas of training and certifying real estate assistance, coaching and mentoring entrepreneurs in online business, marketing growth and profit acceleration. And I take men and women business owners aged 40 plus to bucket list destinations around the world for a month at a time to work, explore, and live in community. And I’m

Jane (01:15):

Jane, Garee known as the sales strategist for the non sales person. And I work with business owners who want to increase their conversion rate, shorten their sales cycle and have more impact and influence with the work they do all while having more fun with selling.

Pam (01:30):

Well, welcome back everyone. We are so excited. We have another guest to introduce you to, and if you’ve always wanted to become an author, I think you’re in for a real treat today because this lady is really going to help you. Her name is Joe Snow Ramachandran, and she’s joining us all the way from India. Hello there?

Jyotsna (01:52):

Hello Pam. Thank you so much for having me on the podcast. We

Pam (01:57):

Are so excited to talk about. I mean, everybody I talked to and I know Jane dogs do, and Jane is a budding author as well. Everybody wants to write their own books. So I think this is going to be a fantastic episode. So let me just introduce Jote snuff for you. She’s a best-selling author, a book publisher, Ted X speaker. How cool, and is an international author success coach who helps coaches, trainers, speakers, and experts to build a super profitable author funnel with the help of their book. She founded happy self publishing to help overwhelmed yet purpose driven authors experience a transformative journey of self discovery through the process of publishing their book and amplifying their message so far Jyotsna has helped over 400 authors from 35 different countries through her global publishing agency, happy self publishing while she isn’t working this mom of two also loves to dance, run plan her next solo trip and is a passionate advocate for educational rights. So impressive, Jyotsna, for sure.

Jyotsna (03:07):

Thank you so much, Pam, for that wonderful introduction.

Pam (03:11):

How are you today? I’m doing great. Awesome. Well, we have a lot of questions for you cause there’s just so many people who want to write their book, you know, and get that thing published. So let’s start off with a very, I guess, basic question that’s really going to help us to jump right off here. How can an author choose the perfect topic for their first book?

Jyotsna (03:36):

Yeah, this is such a great question. Would you like me to dive deep and explain the entire process?

Pam (03:42):

That would be wonderful. Sure.

Jyotsna (03:44):

I think it all starts with first defining who our target readers are and based on our target reader, we need to understand what are their pain points and what are their goals? Because a lot of times we may think we want to write about a subject, but if that doesn’t resonate with our target reader, it really doesn’t make any sense. So it’s a good idea to, especially if you’re a business owner, then here’s the important thing your target client for your business is exactly the target reader for your book, because ultimately you want some of your readers to become your clients, right? So it’s exactly the same persona. It’s the same avatar. So whoever is your target client for your business, make them your target reader for your book and list out their challenges and pain points and see if you can solve any of those using your expertise.

Jyotsna (04:31):

Now, if you are an expert, then probably there are more than one thing that you can solve for your reader. So this is where the challenge happens because now you have probably three different topics that you don’t know which one to choose. And for this, I recommend my topic, selection framework. So this is basically a matrix. So where you write down the topics that you have in mind on top and the columns and rate these topics on five different paramitas. So the first parameter is expertise. So the topic where you have the maximum expertise gets a five and then you can rate the other topics on a scale of one to five based on that. And then the next thing is the uniqueness, because you want your book to be unique as compared to the other books out there. So if your life experience is very unique around that topic, then it gets a higher score as compared to the other topics there.

Jyotsna (05:22):

So that gives you the uniqueness score then comes the effort. There are some topics where, you know, if you just handle with the mic, you can just keep talking, go and going on and on. And that shows that even when you attempt to write it as a book, you are going to be effortless. And was it just going to flow? So you give a higher ranking of five to a topic where the effort is less and the lower, lower score for a topic where you think you probably need to research more and it’s not going to be as effortless, right? So the fourth parameter is profitability. So you want your book to be profitable for, because you’re going to spend months in this project. So you want to choose the topic. That’s going to give you more profitability. So a couple of ways to do this, you can go into Amazon and look for other books on that topic and see what their Amazon rankings are.

Jyotsna (06:11):

If the book is selling really well, it’s going to have a lower rank. That’s an external validation, but you can also do an internal validation by either asking your existing audience are seeing if the topic is skills is related to your business, because if it is then the chances of somebody signing up for your services or products is higher. So that way the profitability of that book topic is going to be high up. So that’s a way to mark your topics on profitability and the final and the most important parameter is alignment. The topic has to be in alignment with your vision and who you really are and what you believe in because sometimes you can be an expert on a topic. The market may need it, but if you don’t totally don’t believe in it, then it’s going to be out of alignment. So that’s another parameter that you’re going to mark these topics on. So let me do a quick recap. You’re going to mark all the possible topic ideas based on your expertise, the uniqueness, the effort you need to put in the profitability and the alignment. And finally you add up the scores and the topic that gets the maximum score should be the topic of your first book.

Pam (07:17):

I love that we use matrix is so much for so many decision-making things, but I love the topics that you had us rate, you know, each of our ideas under, I think that’s a wonderful way to really narrow it down or actually arrive right at your perfect topic.

Jyotsna (07:36):

Thanks, Pam. I actually came up with this after having a lot of difficult times with my clients because sometimes, you know, when you just tell them what should be the right topic for their book, but somehow when they don’t get convinced, it’s important to have a logical way to arrive at certain things. And that’s when I came up with this and it’s been working really well for a lot of authors. Yeah.

Pam (07:59):

That totally makes sense if they don’t have the buy-in, it’s a lot of work to write a book. So they won’t have that excitement to really dive in every day to get it done. Right. Exactly.

Jyotsna (08:09):

Yeah. It has to really, you know, spark joy and it has to make them get up and write.

Pam (08:16):

So that kind of brings me to my next question was I know that you’re really good at getting books done. So can you give us maybe some tips on, I don’t know, do you do it daily? How often should you be working on your book and how do you continually stick with it?

Jyotsna (08:33):

Yeah, this is also really important because if you don’t have a strategy for writing the book, it’s going to take forever. I’ve seen so many people, who’ve been writing their book for years and it has still not been published. So what I would suggest is to have a proper goal or timeline of when it comes to the publishing date, because we have a date in mind, it’s easier to work backwards. And if we are going to give it a years time, it is going to take a years time. But in my experience, three months of time is good enough for writing and another three months for all the publishing and the promotions related stuff. So six months is a good timeline to complete the book project. And for anybody who’s thinking of writing their book, my biggest suggestion would be please don’t do it along with launching your course along with launching your membership or your live, you know, something else.

Jyotsna (09:26):

So because when you have 10 different projects, your book is definitely going to take the back burner. So it’s important that you make this your priority, at least for the next three months till you finish your manuscript. That’s the first thing. The second thing that I would tell people is in order to create accountability, let the world know that you’re writing a book. Don’t keep it as your secret project. Get your book cover designed as soon as you decide the topic and just put it out on social media, that you are the author of this upcoming book, because it’s not just going to create that sense of urgency in you, but it’s also going to make it feel very real because you’re actually seeing your books cover. And that’s another way to keep yourself motivated and then comes the writing schedule, which you were asking about Pam.

Jyotsna (10:09):

So you can either write every day if that works for you. One hour of time, every day is good enough to write a 30,000 word book in two months, because if you can spend one hour of time, an average writer can write about 500 words. So it’ll take you about 60 days to write 30,000 words. Why 30,000, because that I think is the sweet spot for entrepreneurs when you’re writing business books, because it can easily get converted to a good 200 page book when you publish it. So that should be your target for the word count and the time. But if you’re not somebody who can write every day or maybe you’re too busy in your business or with the kids during the weekdays, and you can even allocate a larger chunk of time during the weekends, that really doesn’t matter, but you need to have that focus of some kind of a routine to write and pleased. I have a specific designated place to write every day. So it shouldn’t be the couch one day and the dining table on the other day. But it’s important to have a quiet space where you do not have the internet. This is really important. Turn off your wifi and just write on a blank document because if you have your wifi on, most authors get to this habit of researching more and more about that topic and they never actually do the actual writing. So it’s, you’ve been watching me.

Pam (11:26):

I’m just saying you’ve been watching me because that’s exactly what I do. I’ll research forever. I’ll never get that book written.

Jyotsna (11:35):

I mean, I have such vast experience and I believe anybody who is an expert in their subject, or who’s been serving others in any area have already 80% of their manuscript in their head. It’s just for the remaining 20% that you’ll probably have to refer other books, listen to other people’s interviews or go and interview other people. So those are important things, but if you start with doing that, your actual writing will never happen. So first do your part and then go and do the extra research. That’s what I would do.

Jane (12:05):

I know, as as a writer, I’ve been a paid writer for years, but I still haven’t finished my book for a lot of the reasons that we were, but I, one of the best things I read years ago said that amateurs wait for the muse professional writers, just sit down and get to it every day. And I love that and it really changed my, my mind and focus on, I need to get up every day and tackle this and just set a timer right for 20 minutes or 30 minutes and set an hour because it, it, it really is true. Amateur is just kind of way to be inspired. And writers are like other profession, you know, basketball or any sport or cooking or anything. They don’t, they don’t wait to be inspired. They just get out and go do the discipline, go do the thing that they need to do. So I love those tips. Thank you very much. So true.

Jyotsna (12:54):

In fact, Jane, I made the people in my academy do the same thing. And I usually pair them up as accountability partners. And I told them that for one hour of time, every day, both the accountability partners should come on a zoom call. You should keep your video on just say hi, and then mute yourself and in front of each other, just do the right thing. So that’s where you can’t escape each other and you will get something done.

Jane (13:17):

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Well, I have a question about the Amazon bestseller. So everybody is always claiming to be an Amazon bestseller, but what does that, what does that really mean? And what kind of tips can you give us about pursuing that or not pursuing that?

Jyotsna (13:33):

Sure. So there are different types of bestseller charts like the New York times, the wall street journal USA today, and then the Amazon bestseller charts. So for somebody who self publishing their book, especially as a first time author, the Amazon chart is something that’s very much obtainable. If you have the right strategy in place, unlike other charts, Amazon chart is an hourly chart. So that way every hour, they’re actually going to take a look at all the books, selling in different categories, and they’re going to rank them from one to a hundred. So if you have a good launch team in place who are there to support you with the initial reviews, and also they’re going to buy your book, you’ll just have to plan your marketing in such a way that within a short span of time, you make a lot of people buy your book.

Jyotsna (14:18):

So here’s the thing. It doesn’t matter if you sell, let’s say 500 books in a month, but if you’re able to concentrate the sale and make it happen within the first week, that’s what is going to help you climb the charts in the respective categories. So it’s a, it’s both the speed at which your book sells and the right categories that play an important role. So what we do for our clients is because a lot of people don’t have a huge audience. We partner with a lot of websites that have genuine readers, like people looking for new arrivals, people who are looking for discounts. And then we price discount the book and we put the ebook at 99 cents. And then we advertise it on all these different platforms. So readers who are genuinely interested in the topic end up clicking it and buying it. And when hundreds of people do this within a few days, Amazon’s algorithm gets the alert and they will start increasing the ranking of your book.

Jyotsna (15:12):

And let me just tell you a little bit about the categories inside Amazon. There are hundreds of categories and subcategories. So let’s say you’re writing a book about starting a new business. You could be in the overall business category, or you could place yourself inside a home home-based business category, but a smaller category will always increase your chances of becoming the number one bestseller, because there are not too many people competing for it. So those are the, you know, minor things that you can do in the backend. You can write to Amazon and place your book in 10 different categories, thereby increasing your chances of hitting the bestseller charts. And then once your book gets enough number of sales, that it outfits all the other books in that category, it’ll automatically be at the number one position, which serves two purposes. Basically it gives you more credibility because now you can just go, go and tell the whole world that you’re a best selling author can put it on your website. It’s good for your new clients to give you that kind of credibility. And also for the visibility, because when you launch your book, there are so many other books also getting launched at the same day on Amazon. So you don’t want your book to be buried under the big heap, right? So it’s important to be visible. So because of these reasons, I would definitely recommend a new book to have that vessel alone.

Jane (16:29):

Wow. Okay. That was, that was really great information. So when you, when it comes to publishing, I know I know from having my own little self publishing company for years, that’s really what it is. Amazon’s doing the fulfillment. So what can you give us? What kind of tips can you give us about self publishing so that you don’t get overwhelmed with it?

Jyotsna (16:50):

Yeah. So this is such a great question, Jane, because a lot of times authors go ahead with self publishing, thinking that they have no other option. That’s why they are self publishing it. But I have now they’re seen a lot of big influencers are very established entrepreneurs, intentionally choosing self publishing for the advantages. So it’s not that they didn’t get a publishing deal from a big five publishing house, but it’s really because they know that by self publishing their book, they have total control over the rights and the royalties that they’re going to make. So when, so that’s, I think the mindset is the first thing that you should be consciously doing it for all the right reasons. And not because you’re too lazy to try going with a traditional publishing house. But once you decide to self-publish, it doesn’t mean you have to do everything yourself.

Jyotsna (17:36):

So self publishing doesn’t mean you have to do everything yourself. You need to do the important things that only you can do. For example, bringing the expertise into the book is something only the author can do going on a podcast to promote the book is something only the author do, but pretty much everything else need to be outsourced to professionals who can do it the right way. Like the cover design, the editing, the interior design, the marketing, and even sometimes the right thing, because not every author needs to be a great writer. So you can work with an angel writer. You can work with a book coach to get these things done. So that way, when you have a team working with you, the author doesn’t have to really feel overwhelmed because the team is going to take up a lot of the things from your plate and you can focus on your zone of genius.

Jane (18:21):

Yeah. I love all of that because one of the things I definitely have learned about sitting in the seat of the writer and also the publisher, and then also the sales and marketing person and the PR person and Andy and Dan, Dan, that writing the book, getting it to print and getting it distributed is very much like being the solo preneur, where you’re the CEO and everything else. And I know some things that will really affect the sales of a self published book are things like the cover design and even the formatting and font. And there are all these little things that I didn’t know when I first started that I wish I would’ve known before. And then therefore I would have hired people to do the things that I really want to do or didn’t know how to do or didn’t care to learn how to do. So. I think it’s really important for everybody. If you’re thinking about writing a book and getting it to publication, keep that in mind, just like you don’t want to be every single person in every single department in your company. Even if you’re the solopreneur, it’s the same thing with writing a book. You really don’t want to tackle that whole thing front cover to back cover unintended on your own.

Jyotsna (19:29):

Yeah. That’s what I tell my clients too. And I tell them, you may not hit the New York times bestseller charts, but you can make your book look like a New York times bestseller. So just doing these things, right? Yeah.

Pam (19:40):

Hey lady, boss, do you think like a CEO when your business starts taking off, you’re ready to scale up at this point, you’ve got to stop thinking of yourself as a solo preneur and start thinking of yourself as the CEO of your company. If you remain in the mindset of a one person operation, then you won’t be able to grow. You’ll never have the time, energy or expertise to do everything by yourself and your business. Won’t be the success that it has the potential to be. So are you thinking like a CEO take our free assessment to find out you can find it@flourish.biz forward slash think that’s F L O U R I S H dot B I Z Ford slash T H I N K. Once again, that’s flourished.biz for slash think. All right, lady boss, let’s get back to the show. So

Jane (20:40):

That would actually kind of into the next question, which are, what are the top mistakes that authors make while they’re trying to self publish?

Jyotsna (20:47):

Yeah. The first thing which we just discussed is trying to do everything yourself, because then you’re just going to get burnt out and you will not have the bandwidth to really focus on the important things. And the next thing comes I think selecting the topic itself could be a big mistake because if you’re going with a traditional publishing house, they are going to tell you what’s going to work and what doesn’t work. But when you self publish, there’s nobody who’s going to give you that input on what’s. What’s going to be good for your book. And a lot of times authors make this mistake of writing about their life story, making the entire book about their journey. So there’s nothing wrong about writing a memoir or an autobiography, but the problem is if you are a new author and nobody has ever read your work before people are not really going to be interested in your life story. So I suggest my clients to write a lot about yourself, but position it in a way that the reader feels that it’s going to help them achieve something or overcome some kind of struggle. So it’s let it be a how to book.

Jane (21:52):

That’s brilliant. That’s brilliant. And I, this next thing I’m going to say with love, but I get, I do get a little kind of preachy about it, which is when self publishing or anybody can be an author, which everybody can be an author. Everybody should be an author because everybody has a story. And not just one, everybody has multiple stories, but something happened probably about eight or 10, even 10 years ago at this point where there, there, this perception was because I go out and tell people about my life and my friends say, wow, you should write a book that all of a sudden that becomes truism. And I don’t know how many conversations I’ve had, where I’m the most supportive of anybody’s dream. And I never want to squash anybody’s dream. And as a business person, I would say to them, here’s the thing you telling a three minute story about your divorce and your wild teenager does not a 200 book.

Jane (22:47):

Interesting read make, you know, you gotta be really careful and it’s not that your story. Isn’t interesting. There’s a difference though, between sharing your story two to three minutes in a presentation or with your girlfriends, or even on social media posts and spinning that thing and into, into a several hundred page book, or even a 75 page book that people are actually going to find interesting. And you’re so right with the positioning, because that’s what I teach in sales, which is, I always say everybody brace yourself because you’re really not going to like me. When you hear this, nobody cares how awesome you are. They just not interested in you. What they’re interested in is the experiences that you have had that can translate into making them awesome. That’s what you got to think about from a positioning standpoint.

Jyotsna (23:33):

Exactly. Yeah. You’ve, you’ve just told this in such a good way to him. This is exactly the point that I was trying to drive because nobody really cares how horrible your life was or how amazing you’ve become. They just want to know what’s in it for me. So just talk a lot about your life, nothing wrong with that, but also tell them how they can use it to make their lives great. So that’s the positioning part, which a lot of authors were self-publishing miss out on because there’s nobody to tell them. So that’s one big mistake they make. And the final mistake, which I think is huge is when it comes to the launch and the marketing, most authors think that it’s a big accomplishment to publish a book on Amazon. And once they’ve hit the publish button, they just think that magically, the books should start selling.

Jyotsna (24:16):

But unfortunately there are millions of titles on Amazon. And why would somebody buy your book unless you are constantly marketing the book? Usually around the launch, there is a lot of hype, but after that, the author moves on with their business and life and they forget about the book. But I think book marketing should be an ongoing process. And usually big companies publishing houses have a year long plan for their authors. But when an author is self publishing, they need to do this themselves. So these are certain things that one should be careful about when they are self publishing. Yeah. Okay.

Pam (24:47):

So we have our book published. Now. I know, you know how we can build a business around that. So can you explain that a little bit?

Jyotsna (24:57):

Actually, I suggest clients to think about how the business is going to help their book, even before they start writing their book. Because for a lot of authors, this is usually an afterthought. Now I’ve become an author now, how am I, how am I going to use the book to generate leads for my business? But this should actually be the something that they have to think right at the beginning, because right on the topic to the positioning, everything will change based on the purpose for writing the book. So if the purpose is to attract clients to the business, then there definitely has to be a bridge between the book and the business. And this is where a lot of authors fail because they, they would have written a fantastic book. The reader was totally excited about all the things that they’ve read, but after closing the book, they forget about the author.

Jyotsna (25:43):

Now this is where the authors can use a couple of methods. I call one the pull strategy and the other one as the push strategy in the pull strategy, you need to talk enough about your business without making your book look like a sales brochure. So tell about yourself in the introduction and the about the author section, and also throughout the book, sprinkle a lot of anecdotes about what has happened in your life or case studies about your clients so that the author knows that this person can help me. If I reach out to them and also give your contact information so that those who really want to take that next step, who want to implement whatever you told the book can reach out to you. So that’s the pull method where you’re pulling the author, you’re pulling the readers to you. The next method is the push method where you need to somehow cleverly collect your readers information.

Jyotsna (26:35):

That is their name and email so that you can push more and more value towards them. So at some point of time in future, they become your clients. But what’s important for us to remember is Amazon is not going to give out that information of people who are reading your book. Even if you sell a million copies, you will know who those million people are. So as the author, it’s our responsibility to give away something for free inside the book, we call it a reader magnet, which can be a value added bonus, like an audio book or an action guide or a three-part video series or an assessment. Anything that can be super useful for the reader, please give that away for free inside monk, inside your book in multiple locations. So people don’t miss out on that, let them download it, give their name and email, and then you give them more and more good stuff like your podcast, interviews, your blogs, and then at the right point, talk to them about your services. And that’s how they, there is a chance that people will convert into your clients. So use both the pull and the push my thought. Otherwise there will not be a connection between the book and the business. I love it.

Pam (27:41):

And I have seen more and more of both of those methods being used as I read more and more business books. It’s just more prevalent, especially the, you know, get the workbook that goes along with this for free. Or as you say, an assessment, it’s great for building your list. So you have people to market to.

Jyotsna (28:01):

Yes, absolutely. I think the book is right on top of the authors funnel, but after somebody reads your book, let them get all these a freestyle, let them enjoy it. And at the right time, give them a product, which is a smaller price point, like a $97 membership or a, a one $97 course and not everybody is going to buy, but a small percentage of them will those, especially the ones who want to take action and get some results and then link them to the highest level that you have, which is one-on-one coaching or a done for you service. Again, not everybody will, but some, some people will definitely do it. So if you sell a hundred books, maybe 30 will join your email list. Maybe five bucks, people will buy your course, but there will be that one person who will upgrade to that $10,000 coaching program. And that would give you the complete ROI from your book project.

Pam (28:52):

We’re getting so much juicy advice, right?

Jane (28:56):

I gotta go, I gotta start writing. So I, I, I actually, you’ll like this. I have a a book with a scheduled release date on August 1st and of course I’m self publishing it. So I’ve had it on my schedule and I’ve been disciplined about it and I’m actually really excited about it, but all of this talk is making me extra, extra kind of antsy to just get back and start writing. So one, one other question, most authors want to parlay their book into a public speaking gig or presentation, or sometimes really even a Ted talk. So what kind of advice give all of us to make that transition so that you can leverage the book and get speaking gigs from it?

Jyotsna (29:43):

Sure. So this is what I did, so I don’t know how other authors and speakers are doing, but for me, being on a TEDx stage was a dream for many years. And finally I realized that instead of waiting for somebody to find me and reach out to me, let me just proactively reach out to all these organizers. So I just went to the ted.com website and started looking at gigs that are coming up around my city. And I reached out to 10 of them. So you have the curators information there, their name and email. So I just wrote to 10 of them and I got replies from seven of them. And three of them offered me a speaking opportunity and I went and spoke on two TEDx stages. So that’s how I did it. And this is the content of the email, which I think could be useful for our listeners.

Jyotsna (30:31):

I told them three things in my email. The first thing was a topic that is, you know, what do you sharing? So I looked at what was the event? What was the theme of the event? And I came up with the topic that was in line with the theme of that particular event. So I’m sure as entrepreneurs, you can speak on dozens of different things. So instead of telling that, Hey, I’m just good at these three things. It’s important to look at what they are looking for and customize your topic to suit that. So that’s the first thing I did. And the second thing I did was they need to know that I’m a speaker. So I shared my YouTube channel link with them, and I asked them to watch a couple of videos. So they know that I can speak because if, if your idea is great, but you can’t speak, it’s not going to be a good fit. And the third and the most important thing is I told them that I’m an author of this book. And I shared the link to my Amazon books. So they saw hundreds of reviews for my book, and probably that helped them in deciding to have me as a speaker because usually people consider authors to be, you know, good at speaking as well. And that’s how I landed those gigs. So

Pam (31:34):

What were your two Ted talks then? What topics did you talk on?

Jyotsna (31:39):

Or one was about don’t wait to become the number one expert. So that’s, again, something that I preach all day, because a lot of my clients are hesitant to work, hesitant to become authors because they were waiting to become an expert one day and that one day never happened. So you just go ahead and write your book first. And then the world will look at you, look up to you as the expert. And the second book, sorry, the second TEDx speech was on the importance of hiring your own boss when you’re an entrepreneur. So you need to have coaches and mentors in different areas of your life. Especially once you’re an entrepreneur. When you become your own boss, you can be a horrible boss because you could be a bottleneck in your own growth. So I spoke about the importance of going and finding coaches and hiring them and working with them. Excellent,

Pam (32:26):

Wonderful experience. That’s for sure. I get up on that TEDx stage.

Jyotsna (32:31):

Yes. It, it helps in so many ways, especially when it comes to people, the way people perceive you. Right? So I started attracting higher quality clients, people who are playing a much bigger game than me after I did those stocks. It’s not that I became a different person, but the way the world looks at you changes once they come to know that you’ve been on big stuff.

Pam (32:54):

Yeah, for sure. It is a real perception with the TEDx talks. That’s for sure. Now I know that you know a number because we talked a little bit before a number of different income streams for authors. Can you talk about that? A little bit?

Jyotsna (33:10):

Most people that I work with are either coaches, consultants are experts in some way, so they are either running their businesses. So for these kinds of books, which are based on your expertise, you can monetize it in multiple ways. The first way is the different book formats itself. A lot of people think, oh, I’ve just written my first book. Let me just put it as an ebook, but I request all your people to have it as the ebook, the paperback, and also the audio book, because you’ve already put the effort of writing the book. It’s just going to take a little bit of effort by the format or the narrator to have it in multiple formats. So please do not think your book should be an e-book because it’s your first book. When you have it in multiple formats, it becomes multiple streams of income directly.

Pam (33:59):

Who would you have narrate? Would you narrate the book or would you hire somebody to narrate it?

Jyotsna (34:04):

The first preference would be to have the author to narrate the book themselves, because I think as an author, they’re not going to just stop with the book they’re going to, their watch is going to be heard on stages, on podcasts, on their YouTube channel. So it’s a great way to build a connection with your reader by narrating the book in your own voice, unless, you know, you have some unique challenges. Like for example, right now, I’m, I’m pretty confident about my accent though. It’s not an American accent. I’m from India, but six years ago, when I wrote my book, I did not have that confidence. And my market was predominantly in the U S so I hired an American narrator to narrate my book. But today, if I have to do the same for my next book, I will do it myself.

Pam (34:50):

I think that’s a great point. It’s that continuity that we’re always preaching. So I just love that. Thank you.

Jyotsna (34:56):

Right? So that’s one way to monetize your book. The other ways could be everything else related to your expertise like your online course or your membership site. People can read your book. The book talks about what to do, but your course can be about how to do it. So that’s another way to use your book to monetize more and then comes the physical products that you can have inside the book. Like you can recommend a lot of things you can recommend. For example, if I’m a health consultant, I can talk about health supplements I eat. I can talk about you know, a diet tracking software that I use. You can either have your own products or be an affiliate for other people’s products and promoted through the book. The other thing that people can put together are online events, summits workshops. You can probably price it for a lower price point and then sell something higher at the end of the program.

Jyotsna (35:49):

Those are again, great ways to monetize your book and then comes the real high ticket offers like your one-on-one coaching group, coaching, speaking that you do at events as a speaker and done for you services. Like for example, if you’re an Instagram influencer and that’s, what is your jam? You write all the greatest strategies about Instagram in your book, but not everybody’s going to read the book and implement it. Some people may buy your course and they may just learn a few tricks, but the real busy entrepreneurs are just going to tell you to get it done for them. So then for you services are also great. So I say authors have a few things in this funnel, but it’s important to just see what, which are the missing pieces and start adding them one by one. You don’t have to have everything ready to launch launch with just one or two things like probably your book and your course, but eventually a few years down the line, it’s nice to have this entire ecosystem where one thing feeds into the other and you actually create a business that have multiple streams of income.

Jane (36:52):

Wow. This has been to be so value packed. Thank you so much for all of this. Where can our listeners find you if they want to pursue their, their dream of becoming an offer?

Jyotsna (37:03):

Sure. So if somebody has already decided to get started either they have the manuscript or they want to work with our angel writer or book coach, it’s good to just go ahead to happy self publishing.com and schedule a book strategy call with me or one of my team members. And if you’re somebody who is still just thinking about the idea, it’s still not a concrete plan, then you just have to join our Facebook group called happy authors tribe. So you can go to happy self publishing.com/forward/drive. It will take you to our Facebook group because that’s where I do my live boot camps. I’m going to teach. What are the next steps you need to take to create a strong foundation for your book project?

Jane (37:46):

I love it. Happy self publishing. Knock-On that’s so great. Thank you so much. Thanks, bye.

Pam (37:53):

Yeah, it’s been a real pleasure and I think, oh my goodness. I’ve learned an awful lot and I know Jane’s now itching. Cause she’s Facebooking me over here. I want to start writing. I want to start writing. So thanks so much. Jyotsna

Jyotsna (38:10):

Super happy when I come back next time and you know Pam and Jane, both of you have your books ready? It will be amazing. Yes.

Pam (38:18):

I know Jane will. She has it on her. Her goal is October, right? Jane?

Jane (38:23):

Yeah, October 1st. And then, you know, we haven’t been big travelers you’re in, yeah, it’s called Chennai. It’s an India. China. Yeah. I knew it was in India. So, so now we have to have a, an author over there in Chennai.

Jyotsna (38:38):

I would love to host you all. It would be amazing

Jane (38:43):

To two people that you actually don’t want to say that too. Cause we’ll take you up on it. We’ll be

Pam (38:47):

There. It’s about the truth.

Jyotsna (38:51):

Well, would do it, especially due to the pandemic. I’ve hardly seen people outside my family. So anybody who comes over, I’ll be super happy to isn’t

Pam (39:00):

That the truth. Wonderful. Well, thank you so much for all the great information and so many tips I’ve taken literally two whole pages of notes here. So thanks. Yes. Thank you so much. And once again, happy self publishing.com and your Facebook group,

Jyotsna (39:21):

Happy self publishing.com forward slash tribe. That will take people over to our happy authors drive.

Pam (39:28):

That’s excellent. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Have a wonderful week, everybody. Well, that’s a wrap everyone. Thanks for joining us this week on the flourish and grow to CEO podcast. Be sure to visit our website at [inaudible] dot biz. That’s F L O U R I S h.biz, where you can subscribe to the shows in iTunes, Stitcher, or via RSS. So you’ll never miss an episode. You can also find our show notes and resources there too. And while you’re at it, if you found value in this show, we’d love for you to leave a rating on iTunes. Or if you’d simply tell a friend about the show that would sure help us out to now get out there and flourish.

About Flourish + Grow to CEO

What does it take to build a successful business? That’s the question we want to answer for women business owners, so we can flourish and grow together from solopreneur to strategic CEO. Flourish and Grow to CEO is hosted by small business management certified, Pam Ivey and sales strategist, Jane Garee, who share their experiences in business ownership, sales and marketing to help women entrepreneurs scale their business and flourish confidently into the CEO role.

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