Jaime Tardy' s webinar was about "Building my Business & Group Coaching Program through my First Book (The Eventual Millionaire Book Case Study)".
The book just happened sort of serendipitously. It wasn't anything she'd really been set on. She was growing with her podcast, "The Eventual Millionaire". People started to like it, so she was considering writing a book. But it wasn't until the literary agent of Business Model Generation contacted her that she really decided to do it.
Jaime mentioned two main purposes of the book: to get leads and to do a lot more speaking and be paid more for it. She knew that going the traditional publisher way - the hardcover way, as she called it - would set authority and get her more speaking gigs. And the book really created the credibility she was looking for.
In spite of everything ending up great for her and the book once it was launched, she says she wouldn't repeat the traditional publisher route. It's too long a process. They gave her 6 months to write the book and then three to edit it. But things didn't go well with her first editor, so she had to hire another one. And then about 4 months went by from the moment she finished editing the book until it was published. Altogether it was almost a two-year process. To top it all, she had to dive deep into book marketing, because the publisher wasn't helping.
The marketing tactics that Jaime used and believes really help move a book are:
- having a list of people willing and ready to help and support you in different ways
- doing guest posts and podcasts (she always sent out two copies of her book to each blogger and podcaster, one for their audience, the other for them)
- doing free giveaways (in her case, a workbook of the book that people can download without buying the book)
- having a book site (she created hers with Leadpages and did a video to promote it)
- tweeting and posting on Facebook
- a live 2-3 hour webinar with eight millionaires.
Two curious comments she made at this point was that all this involved mostly time, not cash. The second one: "a book is always an asset", so she can always relaunch it.
On the monetization side the book has helped grow her business. Credibility together with a voice that people care about have brought in new clients. Having had to systematize all the information she had for the book made her clear about what she needed in order to help people and that has been great for programs she created afterwards. She has group coaching, one-on-one coaching and digital products. Related to this she said something very interesting: "A program is good to make people do something that they won't do just by reading a book."
The book has also made money on the backend due to her model of programs, links in the book that bring in leads and a funnel she set up. The book is the beginning piece of the funnel. From there people can go to the digital products and the programs.
Jaime's parting tip for people struggling with a first book: "learn from somebody who's done it before". Learning from someone will save you time and will make the process faster. She doesn't mind the mistakes she made, but she does mind the time she wasted because of not having somebody tell her what works and what doesn't work now in book publishing.
Thank, Jaime, for a lively and enlightening webinar. And thanks for your great moderation, Chandler!