Amazon Charts, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck Book Review & More - LIVE

All right. Hello, welcome, everybody. I'm just gonna give folks another minute because we're starting this broadcast just a little early because sometimes I have technical issues on my side, so. Yeah. So welcome. Hello, Hello, Ron. Hopefully you were able to connect. I know, I saw your note. Come on, are you ready? I'm ready to go. So hopefully you're able to connect now. No problem. And I'm just, like I said, gonna give everybody another minute so you guys can watch all the goings on around me as people walk by. This is the busy. The busy office space here. So people. People smile, nod and make faces. So it makes things really interesting. All right, so it is now top of the hour. Welcome, welcome, Hello. Please say hello when you come on, so I know who to say hello to. All right, so hold on a minute. It looks like we do have a technical glitch, so just one sec here. This live video should start soon. Okay, well, you guys are joining, so I'm just looking at the live feed on the website and it's saying that the live feed is supposed to start, but it started and I see Paul's here, so hello, welcome. So I guess you guys are figuring it out. Oh, and we've got the green wizard in the house. Welcome, Ron. Glad you were able to connect. Thank you for saying hello. Alright, so for those of you just joining who may not know who I am, I am Julie Broad, founder of Book Launchers, author of two books and working on the third. So that'll be some news for you guys later in 2018. Alright, so today in the first. Today in the show, which we've been calling the First Look, Book Reviews by the book Rod. I have lots of cool stuff for you guys. So first of all, we're going to do an audiobook review of Mark Manson's the Subtle Art of Giving a F. I don't like saying the F word on camera, so I'm just going to call it the Subtle Art of Not Giving an F bomb. How about that? All right. Yeah, awesome. Thanks, Ron. Thanks for confirming that you guys can hear me and see me and that everything's going great. So that's awesome. Thank you. Oh, hey, Julie. Good to see you. Okay, so I'm gonna be doing an audiobook review. We're gonna talk about how you can get your nonfiction book reviewed. So I'll review those things. For the folks just joining us for the first time, we're gonna talk about audiobook production today versus podcast. Laugh out loud. The Subtle Art of Not caring. That would work too. But I don't want to change his name, Jacqueline. So, yeah. Hi, Jacqueline, by the way. So I'll just call it the Subtle Art of Not Giving an F Bomb. We'll stick with, you know, keep it as close to the top title as possible. All right, so audiobook production versus podcast production. I have some great comments on this subject. Also, just talk really briefly about audiobooks, given that we're doing an audiobook review today and of course, a prize draw, a special announcement, and if you guys have any questions, and of course, just chat away with me. It always helps to not feel like you're talking to yourself if people are, you know, thumbs up, waving, saying hello. Hey, Dale. Welcome. All right, great. We've got an awesome crowd here. Okay, so I'm just going to dive right in with the book review, which is the Subtle art of not Giving an F bomb. I love it when the thumbs up come up. Thanks, Dale. If you guys have never done a live video, they float across the screen. So it's. It's really quite delightful. Okay, so first, a caveat. So this. This, of course, we'll call it the first look book review. And the Subtle Art has been out for, I think, 18 months now. So the caveat on this is the reason I actually picked up book is because it was the number two most read on Amazon's charts last year. And so this is a really cool feature. If you're not familiar with Amazon charts, they. I love the Amazon charts. They've come out. You can go onto Amazon and sign up. And what I love is not just that they're telling you which books have been selling, they're telling you who's like, what. What books are being read. And this is really cool because this is not anything you can gain, right? Well, maybe they can. I mean, somebody can game everything, but. But it's not so easily gamed to figure out what people are reading. So they're going by the Kindle, reads like what's being read. As well as on Audible, the Subtle Art was the number one book being purchased and read for a really, really long time. Hey, Dave. Welcome. And so I finally grabbed this book. So two things before I get into my review. And Jacqueline listened to that one on audiobook as well. Yay, library. So couple things. First of all, I picked this because not because it was something that I was really, like, super keen to read or listen to. I picked it because it was so popular. I wanted to see why everybody was loving it. Second thing is all the ratings were so, so high. So my Expectations were, like, right here. Okay, so that's my caveat to the review that I'm about to give. Also, it was audiobook version that I'm reviewing, not just the book itself. I didn't read the book. I didn't buy the book. I just used one of my audible credits because download the book. So the subtle art by Mark Manson, and it was narrated by Roger Wayne. I've got my notes right here. So here's the honest truth. I never actually finished the book. I got bored. I got bored of listening to it, so I never finished. So I'm doing a review of a book that I didn't quite complete. It's five hours and some minutes, and I only got through four hours of it. I got bored. But here's. Here's the thing. I do love the message. I absolutely love the message. So I'm curious, Jaclyn, you listen to it. I'd love to hear what your thoughts are if anybody else listened to it or read it. Blasphemy. That's right. So the thing is, I love the message. I absolutely love the message. But it didn't require five hours and 40 minutes to get the point. Because the thing is, the subtle art of not giving a F bomb is really. It's really actually all about choosing what you're going to care about and letting the rest go, which is fantastic. I love that message. And so I made a couple notes of some of the stuff that I thought was fantastic from the book. Yeah, see? Okay, thank you. So Jacqueline said it took a very long time to get a very simple message across. So in my eyes, like, two hours was plenty. Like, if the first hour, I loved this book. I was like, yes, this is awesome. I second thing, by the way, because this is an audiobook, Mark Manson didn't narrate it himself. And I've heard him on a lot of podcasts. I've heard him give talks. And the thing is, like, his voice is great. He should have narrated this himself. It bugged me the whole time that it wasn't him. The voice of the narrator was close to his voice, but it wasn't him. And the narrator did this weird thing when there was little girl voices. Right, Jacqueline? You listened to it, so you know what I'm talking about. It threw you totally out of the book. You're like, what was that? Now you guys are gonna go get it on audible just to hear what I'm talking about. But it was not good. Yeah. So if you're gonna do voices, they can't they can't be creepy little girl voices. I'm sorry. You can't be a man and do creepy little girl. It's not cool. So. Yeah. So I really think Mark should have read this himself. It's a very personal book. He tells a lot of personal stories. And. And really, I think that that would have made a big difference in this book, too, into how I felt about it. Yeah. So Jacqueline said it was strange, but she didn't know his voice beforehand. So I had heard him on some podcasts. Dave can and does little girl voices all the time. No comment. Dave's my husband, for those of you who don't know. All right, so here's a couple points that I really did love about it. He talks about pursuing the pain. And I think that, you know, as authors, all of us working on books, we can certainly relate to this. The only way you're going to get a book out there in the world is to suffer a little bit. I'm afraid that's there. I don't think there's another way to do it. Right. There's some suffering involved in putting a book out. Even if you work with a ghostwriter, you're going to have to suffer through figuring out your message, finding clarity, digging in and getting those good, juicy stories and figuring out how they can be explained. So there's going to be some pain. So you got to pursue the pain to get to the good stuff. And he talks about at the gym, you got to work hard to get results. You got to pursue failure in business, which I think is a hard mindset for a lot of us to follow. But I do know, like, every time I have failed, I've learned some of the most valuable lessons and really, I think am better at business because I have had failures. And I celebrate them later. Never at this, never when you fail. I don't celebrate them. But, you know, there's always the greatest gifts in it. And one of them, because we're talking about books, I've talked about it before, but, you know, when I got turned down, you know, when I worked with Wiley for three months and I thought, yes, this is my book deal, and then they ultimately turned me down, that was the greatest gift. Like, truly, that was one of the greatest gifts I've had in my life because it forced me into self publishing and it forced me into this whole wide world that I love and that I probably wouldn't have known existed if it weren't for that quote, unquote, failure. So I love that message. In his Book. I also like how he talks about suffering through your fears and anxieties is actually what creates courage. So I mean, for us, leaving Canada, moving to the States, opening a new business, having a baby at 40, I mean, all of these things were huge changes. I was terrified. But the greatest gifts. So I think that that message is great. You know, push through those fears and struggles because in your gut, you know when something's right and you just got to go for it. And that's where the courage and the strength comes from in the future. So those are great messages. Love it. And he basically, his overall message is don't give an F bomb about the pain, just push through it and you'll become unstoppable. So if you're not dwelling on how much it hurts, how, you know, how much it sucks to, you know, suffer financially while you give up something to get what you want or, you know, suffer because you have to give up some sleep, whatever it is, just push forward. So I love that message. But again, so if the book was really short, I would have given it a five star rating for sure. And again, my expectations were here. So that was my caveat. For those of you just joining, my caveat of this whole review was that because it was five stars, the number two overall red book in 2017, the number one audiobook, the number one listening audiobook, my expectations were here. So because of that I'd probably give it a three and a half because it was so long to get a simple message across when a two hour book would have been great. And I would have given it a four or four and a half if Mark had read it himself. I'm sure of it. So. Hey, Kelly, welcome. It's a family affair. My husband's on, your husband's on. We're all there. Okay, okay. So now also I just want to mention I. The whole concept that he talked about was there was an interview with James Altucher with Tony Hawk. It was from 2016, but he just re released it. And he was talking about how Tony Hawk was talking about how he thinks he may have succeeded where others failed. And this was another concept from the subtle art. And that is he pursued constant improvement. So it was never about like getting to this. Like, you know, this is my success point. It was always, I want to be better, I want to be better, I want to do the next best trick. And so, you know, here's Tony Hawk. I think he's celebrating his 50th birthday coming up and he's still doing massive amounts of tricks. And he's still, you know, a name that everybody knows where a lot of the colleagues that he, you know, was trying to get that, what do you call it, a 900, you know, where they spin and spin and spin. Where he was trying to get the 900, there's five of them all pursuing it at the same time. And Tony Hawk got it first. But you can't name the names of those other people unless you're hardcore into that skater culture. But you probably know Tony Hawk's name. And one of the reasons is because he's constantly pursued personal improvement, like, he's always going after the next trick. So I think that's a great philosophy and a lot of what was coming through in the subtle art of not giving an F bomb. And my mom's in the house, so I definitely want to be calling it an F bomb now. All right, so that was my thoughts. Thanks for your input on it, Jacqueline. Glad I was, you know, I felt bad giving this, you know, super highly rated book a low rating, but that's how it is. That's how I felt. And, you know, I did get bored and didn't finish it. So maybe the last hour was the best and I really missed out. Okay, next up, how to enter your book in to be reviewed. So next in two weeks, when we go live again, because we go live every Tuesday at 2pm Pacific, 5pm Eastern Standard Time. So I'll be doing a review of Warrior Chick. If you see her on YouTube, it's her book. So that will be her book I'll be reviewing next time. And if you want me to review your nonfiction book, all you need to do, it's super simple. Subscribe to my YouTube channel. I know we're live on Facebook. YouTube doesn't like me going live. For some reason they have. I'm still banned from being live on YouTube, if you can believe it. Something I've done has really upset them. But that said, I still will send you to YouTube to get your book reviewed. So. So what you do is go to the YouTube channel. So it's Book Launchers TV. Subscribe to the channel, and then you can post your link to your book down below in the comments of this video or any of the other recent ones. And that's right when you're on YouTube live, go join Dale and Kelly. They have a fantastic show every Thursday. They go live every week. They're pretty hardcore. And sometimes they do extra live shows, too. And I think it's at 2pm Pacific note. Is it two note three. You'll have to tell us when it is. Okay. Yeah, YouTube thinks I'm a spammer or something. My content was deemed inappropriate for the YouTube audience or something. Next live will be May 29th. Thank you. That's probably Jacqueline commenting as book launchers. May 29th at 2:00pm Pacific Standard Time. So that will be when I'll be doing the draw for the next viewer. First look. Book reviews. Viewer, book review. Okay. And I'm very Canadian. I'm very controversial. It's at 3:00pm Pacific, 6:00pm Eastern Standard Time. Thanks, Kelly. Okay, so that's how you enter your book to be reviewed. I get people asking me all the time, will you review my book? That is the only way you can enter your book to be reviewed. I will review one viewer's book a month. So you got to be in that draw to be entered. Okay. Oh, I should join you. Sure. I can't this week. My husband. Thursday is my husband's birthday and we're going away to celebrate his birthday. But I will put it in the calendar for next week and I would love to join you guys live. You guys have such a fun show. So if you'll have me, then we'll do that. Okay, so, exciting news and announcement. We are going to host a very intimate writer's retreat right here in Los Angeles. Some of it will actually happen in this office. We won't be in that boardroom, though, because people can spy on that boardroom. People. People like me. You guys can see it, right? There's a meeting going on. Yeah. So Ron saying, happy, happy early birthday. And so is Jacqueline to you, Dave. Okay, so Writers Retreat, June 21st, 22nd, 23rd. It will be happening here in Los Angeles. It's going to be just a dozen authors. We're going to have our fantastic Emmy nominated writer who acts as our writing coach for the company, as well as a fantastic PR professional. Someone who is who wrote the very first book on Twitter will be here guiding you on social media strategy. So it's going to be a fantastic event. Very intimate, very exclusive. I'm really just testing out the format to make sure that we can help you get a whole bunch of things done in a very condensed period of time. So I want to have a small number of people here so we can get one on one with everybody and really figure out what. What works. Book launchers.com juneretreat if you want to check it out. And I do have a little bit of an early bird special going on right now. So if you're Interested? You can post a comment in this video and I'll make sure you get the details to the early bird offer. It's going to be fantastic. We're going to make sure that you get some. Besides the fact you're going to have eight hours of uninterrupted writing time, you're going to get one on one time with the writing coach, you're going to get one on one time with the marketing folks and you're going to walk out with a very clear marketing plan, a very clear writing plan to finish your book. And plus you're going to get a lot written before you even start. We're going to make sure you've got a fantastic book outline for a book that's going to sell. It's really, really important. I won't harp on this too much because I know if you watch my videos you already know that this is the most important thing is to know who your reader is and know what the hook of your book is. Because there has to be something there to market. You have to have something that's going to be unique and will stand out. It's Juneretreat book launchers.com Juneretreat I think is actually the link Jacqueline. So yes, you have to have a unique hook to your book. And I actually had to turn somebody away yesterday. I felt, I felt really bad because he was a super wonderful guy with a nice writing style. But the book just, we just felt like there was nothing there for us to market. So that was. You kind of said, sorry, we can't help you because if there's nothing there to market, we're not going to succeed in getting your book into readers hands. And that's our goal. And it's not just about getting a book published. We want people to read your book and buy it. And yes, Tim can help. Thanks Ron. Tim is brilliant. He's the Emmy nominated writer. He took a computer book and pitched it to a TV network and got a seven year running TV series and was the star and the writer of that TV series. So he has a really interesting perspective on finding the hook of even subjects like computers. Yeah, things are popping up on this Facebook Live. It is a crazy party. So yeah, thumbs up, hearts, all that stuff. It makes it look like a party too. Not just the show where one woman sits in a glass bowl that looks like a fishbowl and talks to herself. Which is in essence what people think I'm doing when they walk by. Okay, so that's the news. Just check my notes make sure I didn't forget anything. All right, so now before I go on to. Yeah, Yay. It's a party. Thank you. Okay, so before I get to the segment where I talk about audiobooks, I want to give a huge shout out to the folks who've been commenting on my YouTube channel. At this crazy, awesome spike last week, which was so fun, I was celebrating 3,500 YouTube subscribers, and then, boom, I'm at 3,750. I'm still behind Dale, but I'm chasing. I'm chasing hard. All right, so I just want to thank the folks who. Who show up and always comment and hang out. You guys, it means the world to me. So Skyler and friends, which I believe is Paul, who's on the. On the. On this stream today, Kevin McGuire warrior chick, Andy W. And of course, Dale Roberts. Thank you guys for all of your support. I love when you comment on my videos. It makes my day. So thank you. Thank you. And by the way, this is how you get entered into a prize every. We have new videos coming out every Friday, and if you comment on the day the video comes out, we've got prizes for you. So that leads beautifully into today, where I'm going to draw for the prizes. Oh, there's Paul, my dog. And I ride around on my scooter promoting my upcoming book. I know. I saw it. It's on your YouTube channel. It's fantastic. Okay, so I'm just folding up all of the names of everybody who commented. So and because there's two Fridays between every. Every live, that means that some people get their name in here twice, right? Your names are in here twice because you commented both Friday. Both Friday videos that came out. Thanks, Dale. Okay, here we go. So, yeah, you guys should go check out Skyler and friends on YouTube, the YouTube channel, because then you'll see Paul and his. His dog riding around on the scooter. Okay, so these are all the folks in here. Oops. I'm just gonna make sure they're split up. I'm just making sure these are the names. This is the cup. So you're being entered to win this fantastic book launchers mug that also says no Boringbooks. People are walking by smiling at the live stream here. One of these days, I'm going to turn the camera around. That's what I should do. I'll turn the camera around so you guys can see the folks that walk by and smile at me. All right. I show up every week, but don't review me. Well, you can. You can Always just say hello. You don't have to ask to be reviewed wrong. Okay, cool. So here you go. There you go. All the names in there, I made them really small this time. So hashtag no boring books. Yes, it looks, I think it's backwards for you guys. You have to put the live stream in the mirror to read it. Alright, so just so you know, I'm not cheating. You guys can see that I'm pulling the name. Here we go. And congratulations. Oh, yay. Skyler and friends, Paul Cross. So congratulations. Send me your mailing address and we'll get you one of these fantastic mugs. Yay. And you're even here live to win. So I love that. That's fantastic. So yeah, just send me your mailing address and we'll make sure that you get one of these mugs in the mail. Okay, so now let's just check here. Oh yeah. So again, to win your own mug or future prizes, we will. Anybody who comments on the Friday that a video comes out on that video that came out will be entered to win. And we'll make the next draw on the next live stream on May 29 at 2pm Pacific Standard Time, 5pm Eastern Standard Time, right here on Facebook. Again, because Facebook likes me more than YouTube. Okay, so on to the final piece. Why create an audiobook? And then I just want to cover some notes because my art, the woman that we work with to coach people on voice coaching for their audiobook, but also do the mastering the editing of the audiobooks, she sent some great information on the differences between podcast and audiobook production. And I, it would be really, really important to just hit on those points so we won't get super technical because I'm not the expert. I hire experts for this stuff. But it's a topic that's come up a lot and I thought you guys might like to know about it. So first of all, why create an audiobook? I have a video. I actually took, I took the original video down because the sound was so bad and for the first time in a long time, people were complaining about the sound and it was in a really bad studio. So I've reshot it. We'll have it coming back out again. But why create an audiobook? It's easier to stand out. And just to prove the point today, before I got on the video, I just did a quick search for the videos that were released in the last 90 days and there was 960 business books released on Audible and that's all languages. That's not just English. So I don't know how to search for the last 90 days of books released on Amazon in business category. I'd be scared to find out what the numbers are, but that's a small. That's a small number of books to stand out in on Audible in the last 90 days. So it's way easier to stand out. If you do this for your niche and compare it to Amazon, you'll see the differences. For most of the tests that I did was about 20%. So it's about 20% on audible. Oh, hey, welcome, Scott. And your release will definitely include an audio version. That's very smart of you. So it's 20. About 20% of the marketplace, roughly, is the audiobook compared to the Amazon. The entire space on Amazon. So that's a much smaller pool to stand out in. It is the growing market. I mean, I shouldn't say the growing market, because actually, nonfiction printed books grew by 6% in the last quarter. So they're still growing, which is kind of cool. But audiobooks is growing rapidly. And as I've talked about in my newsletter, the launch letter, it's. I mean, with all these devices coming into our homes, you know, I'm saying, hey, Alexa. Well, at least until our Alexa broke down. I don't know if anybody else got the echo dot at Christmas, but ours is done. It's like, hey, Alexa. And nothing happens now. But for a while there, it was like, hey, Alexa, read me a book. And. And Alexa could open up Audible and read the latest book to me. And. And it's a powerful tool between the cars, the mobile devices, all these things. It is audio is just the way of the future. So not that I think books are going anywhere. I don't. But I do believe that in most categories, in. For most authors, it makes a lot of sense to create an audiobook. And podcasters, if you're podcasting, your audience is much more likely to. To buy your book in audio format. They're less likely to read it now. That said, they might buy both. So Whisper Sync, you guys probably know about this, but they. A lot of my books, A lot of my books are. Or, sorry, a lot of books are sold. And they'll. They'll buy it in two formats. So they'll buy it in the E version and the printed version sometimes, but they also buy it in the E version and the audio version and they switch back and forth. And Whisper Sync allows them to do that seamlessly. And so you're getting two sales. It doesn't equate to the same revenue, but you do get a few, you know, a dollar or so. Yeah, thanks, Dave. Dave is really mad at Alexa because Dave tried to spend a few hours trying to fix Alexa and we couldn't figure it out. So he's probably going to take a hammer to her anyway. But also it's credibility. So when somebody logs onto Amazon, looks at your book and sees multiple formats, they see the audio format, they see the soft cover or even a hardcover, that's that says you're the real deal. And one of the issues a lot of self published authors have to face is yes, Dave, my mom is on. Your mother in law is on watching. So one of the issues a lot of self publishers have to face is personally their own feeling that nobody said, hey, you can write a book like so they feel a little bit of that fraud syndrome. Not everyone, but it does happen. But the other thing is other people looking at it. If all you have is an ebook version, it just doesn't look as legit. Right? Nothing screams I self published this book. Like only an E version. And if you have multiple versions, people won't even question. They won't even think you self published. And so it's not even. And that's to me, it shouldn't be a question of self published versus traditional. It should be professional or not professional. And nothing screens professional more than audio version there too. Hardcover also does that for a lot of people. Psychologically it comes across as more professional as well. End of rant. Moving on. So just a few notes on the audiobook production and I will, I will actually read some notes because I don't want to get this wrong and this is not my area of expertise. Another person just made a face. Okay, so this is coming from Gail again. She has won six different awards. So she's Canadian, so all of her awards are in Canadian film and tv. But it's kind of the equivalent of winning an Emmy, I think a Tony. I can't remember exactly what it is, but she's won six different awards for her audio editing. So she's brilliant. And she said this comes down to compression. So the difference between audiobook production and podcast production comes down to compression. If you took a gallon bucket of water and poured it into a quart jar, how much water would you lose? That's what happens in audio. It's volume based. So when we compress it from high resolution source to a streaming source, we have to decide what to throw out. And this comes down to the original harmonics and audio information. We don't get that choice, technology does. And that's why mastering and audio editing is so important when it comes to audiobooks, because the listeners care. Now, as we get more used to AI, the bots reading, the bots reading our books, then yes, we may lose some of that, you know, you're, you're, you're hearing and you may lose some of that critical, like, you know, me criticizing the voice, that voice of the narrator for making the weird girl, the weird girl voice. So we may lose some of that criticism. But right now, if you want to read what kills an audiobook, its performance and the editing and people will crush your book. Also another comment. So this is where I may not recommend if you have a really short book to create an audio version. And the reason is because Audible sets the price, you have no control over it. And a one hour book will be one credit, just the same as a five hour book will be one credit. So the challenge is that if you have a really short book. And so just so you know, Audible is typically subscription. You can, you can buy a book on Audible, but most people will probably do a subscription where they get one or two credits a month and they'll choose what book they're going to use that credit on. So here's the thing. That credit can buy you a $14 book or it can buy you a $2 book. And if you're the purchaser, which one do you think you're going to use your credit on? It's going to be the more valuable book, unless you really, really, really want to hear that $2 book. So think about that before you create an audiobook. Because if you don't have a book of any substance that will detract from your Audible sales, it'll be cheaper to produce. So the upside is that there'll be less costs involved in the production. Oh, yes, Ron, I'll answer that question. That's a great question. Using our own voice to do a book. I'll answer that in a second. So, yeah, just think about that because if you have a really, really short book, you might not want to do the audio version for Audible. You might want to still record, record an audio version, but you might use it as a giveaway or a promotional piece or you might want to sell it yourself in another way. It's tricky. So something we could talk about offline or in another venue if you want to get more into it. Okay, so I'll just keep talking a little bit more about this, but generally I'm going to tell authors to narrate their own audiobooks because I think especially we're talking nonfiction. Fiction is a different beast. Fiction. I think you probably want a voice actor. You want someone who can really do those girl voices in a compelling manner and really build the suspense and build the mystery and add the humor and deliver it in a way that is going to engage the audience, which most authors probably won't be able to do. But nonfiction, you're doing this for credibility. It's probably got your own personal stories. It's got your expert expertise in it. It makes a lot of sense for you to do it yourself. Plus, your voice in people's head builds trust and credibility. And that's often what you're going for anyway. Plus, it's your stuff. So you're going to know what to enunciate, where to put the passion, what, what words are meaningful in what you've written. That said, a quick run through with a voice coach and you'll find out whether you should because there are some people who just don't have the voice coach for it. And I do recommend everybody go through voice coaching for this because there's things that professionals would do. And I actually have a great video on YouTube. I think it's called the Six Tips for Creating an Audiobook. So check that out. Maybe Jaclyn can even grab the link and throw it in the comments because it'll help you if you want to record your own audiobook too. Oh yeah, and I'll come back to that. Dale, that's a great question too. Dale just asked about the aggregate audiobook. Describe distribution platforms of authors Republic and Find a way voices. I'll come back to that. Okay, so I'm just going to finish the notes from our audiobook editor so that we can have. These are great questions coming in. Okay, so when we go from high resolution audio source to a streaming source and then through the AudioBook Encoding Source 1 for each version, we lose even more audio information. And unfortunately, any audio anomalies like a slightly off mic or background noise or clicks or weird breathing, which by the way, we breathe in weird ways when we. I recorded my own audiobook and it's kind of creepy. Some of the things your mouth makes really weird sounds sometimes and it comes through loud and clear when you're recording an audiobook. So you need to have somebody cleaning all of that up for you. So she's talking about that, how it, it'll. It'll fall within the spectrum of frequencies that fit into that compression pipe and. Oh, that's great. Paul loves doing children's voices and he's gonna do it for his book. That's great. So the good stuff, which is the voice is compromised and it's degraded and there's only so much room in the pipe and digital software can't differentiate between your voice and some of these funky sounds and it'll fall within the same frequency. So you have to start with the highest resolution recording possible and get the cleanest recording possible to get a class A audiobook. So there's a lot of things that are involved and it's different than podcasting because when you podcast it's, it's. What does she say here? I'll read her thing. The podcast, you're not going through this encoding process as it goes direct from a desktop to streaming, so there's less audio information lost. Plus, podcast is more forgivable as you're a listener in a giant auditorium versus podcast is more intimate, one to one conversation. So that's why the expectations are different. Right. When you're listening to a podcast, you don't have the same expectation of professional production quality that you do when it's an audiobook. So it's worth. Well, I really think you'll, your audiobook will suffer if you don't get it properly edited, you don't record it properly at the highest resolution proper at the highest resolution possible. And so it's really, really, I think important to have a professional on your side side to create your audiobook. But it is expensive and that is the drawback. And that's why I think you have to carefully consider if it makes sense for your book. Uh, if you're doing self help and you want to be a professional speaker, you have a podcast, your book is, you know, 40,000 words or more. I think in general it'll make sense for you to create an audiobook, but you're not going to make a lot of money off audiobooks right now. I think right now it's a credibility play. It's a wider audience, but play, it's an easier to stand out and be found play. But it's because it is more expensive and you're going to make a little bit less money per unit and the volume probably isn't as big. It's not a profit game on audiobooks right now. So if you got questions about whether you should create an audiobook, I'm happy to have a chat. And of course, if you want to hire a phenomenal, phenomenal voice coach and audio editor, we have one on our team. So we can help you out. Okay, so back to Dale's question about the aggregators. So basically what he's talking about is going, instead of going direct to Audible and uploading your book, they have what's called acx and going direct to them to get it on Audible. The terms are a little bit more favorable if you go direct to them and I think go exclusive. Instead of them, you can go with a company like Authors Republic or Findaway Voices, and they'll distribute it to a bunch of different audio platforms like Audible, but also itunes and drawing a blank on some of the other ones, I think overdrive. So the library, like where Jacqueline got hers. So the difference, there's a few differences. And the big thing is that as an aggregator, they're going to take a little bit of the profit. Right? They have to make. They have to make their share too. For offering this service for me, though, I went with Authors Republic for my audiobook. And the reason was strictly I was in Canada. I'm Canadian. For those of you who don't know Canadian, living in LA at the time I was in Canada, didn't have a Social Security number, didn't have a US address. And so acx, which I think has just changed, acx, did not allow Canadians to publish books. So I'd gone ahead and created this audiobook and had no way to distribute. I love AADP of A R, F, V. I don't know what you're talking about, Dave. It's like you let Jackson and type on the computer. So I was basically forced to go the route of Authors Republic, But I love their service and my book is available widely. They Pay me by PayPal every month. And I also have this thing with going exclusive. You know, as much as I would make more money if I went through Kindle, if I went through Kindle Unlimited, you know, I would make more money, but then I would be exclusive to Amazon. And there's been all kinds of stories lately of people's books getting pulled off of Amazon for weird things, you know, lots of little glitches. So I always feel a little uncomfortable putting all my eggs in one basket. Like, you know, if I relied solely on YouTube to let me go live, you guys wouldn't be hanging out with me right now. So it's good to spread yourself around. I haven't actually had any exposure to Find a Way Voices, but I'm very happy with Authors Republic. Dale. Don't know if that answered the specific question or specific thoughts that you had, but, yeah, it's a Pretty solid service. And I do like that my book can be downloaded anywhere. Okay, well, not Dale's thing. This is a kids show, all right? Dave is taking this place, taking the show places that I had no intention for it to go. All right? So let's just check my notes, make sure I didn't miss anything else here. Oh, and Gail also noted marketing studies have been done that show if there are two similar books on the same same topic available on Audible, that those whose sound is real, as in the author is on the couch next to you sharing their book. So it's super high quality recording, as opposed to podcast style where there's no quality standards and no need for a direct connection to that listener. Because again, in the podcast, you're really eavesdropping on people, right? You're sitting there and you're kind of eavesdropping on a lot of conversations. Whereas that audiobook is that that author or narrator is reading the book directly to you. So it is a different experience. And you want to always think about the experience you want your readers to have when you are putting something out there into the world. So that's the difference. And so she said there's no need for a connection to the listener in that podcast versus the intimate quality version of the audiobook. This is all on acx. You can go to Audible site and search not only the quality quality recommendations, but also these studies. So bottom line, start with the highest recording resolution recording possible. If you want to be a front runner on audible.com and I agree with that. All you need to do is spend half an hour reading the reviews on Audible podcasts or on Audible audiobooks and you'll see why people pan them for bad quality, even if it's a phenomenal book. Hey, Kelly, nice to see you here. So that's it today. You guys got anything else you want to talk about? That's cool. I think Dale must have left because he didn't answer if. If I addressed his question. So that's okay. He's busy guy. He's probably gone off to do another live stream of his own. Check out his YouTube channel. It is fantastic. Dale public, Dale Roberts self publishing on YouTube. It's really, really great channel. Lots of great. Oh, you're still here. So I don't know if I answered your question. Dale, on authority Republic or not, you're cutting pineapple. Well, I hope you're going to share. Okay, let's see. Next time. May 29th, 2:00pm Pacific Standard Time, 5:00pm Eastern Standard Time. Oh, Ron, would Add in background. Sorry, there's a thing. It's going too fast. Here we go. Would add in background to come across like having a short talk, be good or bad, like adding in background sounds to it or adding background to add contact or content to your book? I'm not sure what you mean, Ron. Either way, it's not typical in an audiobook version, but for your book, your book, super, super short. I think that, you know, doing some sort of a recording and using it as something to give away when people buy your book might be a great. Might be a great place plan. Still trying to keep the quality high, but maybe not having to go so professional, like, not, you know, get a studio pimped out studio. There might be value in that. But because your book is going to be so short, it, you know, like you said, you want it to be like an hour and a half conversation style, I think. Yeah. Birds tweeting. I think that would be distracting. Like, that's podcast stuff. People put sound effects in podcasts, but you never hear sound effects in audio books. It's all just a voice. The best quality voice possible. And I think that probably would not come across. Yeah, exactly. Jacqueline's echoing, Echoing my thoughts on that. So, sorry. I'm going to see what else I missed here. Love pineapple. Question. So Dale just said question. Okay, here we go. Kelly and I discovered our local library recording booth. Oh, yeah. Great. Yeah, awesome. So, yeah, I've heard this. I haven't seen it myself. Just one sec here. Okay. Sorry. Little runny nose. Yeah, so I've heard that. That a few libraries have a local library section inside of there that you can record your audiobook, which is great because studio rental. You know, even if you get a good deal on a studio rental, you're looking at like 50 or $60 an hour, plus then you're still paying for the editing and mastering of your audio file. So, yeah, check out your local library because that is a great option for a lot of these services, especially the newer ones that are being built. They're building. They're not really just focused on books anymore. They're doing a lot of other things. So. Yeah, that's great. I appreciate that. Heads up. Oh, hey, it's my brother. This really is a family show today. Yeah, I think Jacqueline is mostly the newer libraries that have that feature, so. Yeah. Hey, Wes, Good to see you. You welcome. Any other questions, you guys? Those are great questions today. And still, I don't know, Dale, if I answered your question about Authors Republic, but hopefully I did and you guys. Have you guys done audiobooks? Dale, I think you guys have. I'm trying to remember if you. If you've done any audio or not. Yes. Our. Our library. Well, back home, I haven't been to our. Our local library here, except for. For children's book readings where I discuss discovered. Okay, great. Awesome. Where I discovered the Baby Shark song. For anybody who wants to go nuts, you can just Google on YouTube or Google the baby shark song. Baby shark. Anyways, the. But the library's the library back home for me in Nanaimo. They. They were the one of the first people to buy copies of my book to put it on in their. In their local shelves where the local book store didn't want to have me there for a book signing. Go figure. But I could do signings all over Canada. But you hire out narrators. Well, you should be narrating your own book. But anyways, that's a whole other discussion for another day. Fiction. Fiction. I totally get hiring out narrators, but I think for. For us nonfiction folks, it's tricky. Baby shark performance. That's right. I just had it there. So, yeah, the local. Most local libraries will do a lot to support their local authors. So I think it's great for local authors to support their local libraries. There's so much going on at local libraries, so definitely check that out. I highly recommend it. And local independent bookstores are also great supporters of local authors. It's the chains that are often tricky and not always easy to get support. They're really different. Every. Every store location is different when it comes to the chains. All right, awesome. Thanks so much for being here, you guys. It was so super fun to have you all here. Like Dale said, it was kind of like a party with lots of thumbs up and questions and. And all that kind of stuff. And congratulations, Paul. You'll be getting your very own no Boring Books mug. Yay. Fantastic. And so we'll see you guys here again May 29th, 2:00pm Pacific, 5:00pm Eastern Standard Time. And if you want to know more about the writers retreat happening here in Los Angeles, book launchers.com juneretreat and we'll be doing your chicks so that and your book and you know what to do and if you don't back up. We talked about it early on in the start. All right, thanks, guys. Have a fantastic rest of the day.