This is a short YouTube presentation by Julie Broad (founder of Book Launchers) advising authors to treat a book as a business. She outlines practical business-minded steps — make decisions about resources, track expenses (tax write-offs), identify your ideal reader, set business goals and plans, and choose an appropriate business structure — and points to follow-up videos on related topics.
Chapters
When you become an author, even if this is a side gig, hobby, or part of a bigger business, your book is a business. You're now the CEO of your book business and you need to own that. If you're wondering what that means and looking for tips to run your book business in the best way possible, then this video is for you. Hey there, I'm Julie the Book Broad multi award winning Author, Amazon Number 1 Overall Best Selling author and founder of a fabulous self publishing services firm, Book Launchers. Now some of our authors are writing memoirs to share their story. A few are writing books for legacy. Some are writing books for building their funnel for their business. And a big chunk of our authors are writing their book as a tool to grow their business, brand and income. Every one of them has a book business and you do too. So let's make sure you're thinking about this like it's the business it is. Number one, make decisions. Like a CEO, you need to make decisions about your resource allocation. I'm talking time, energy and money. A smart and savvy CEO of a business knows they aren't the best person to do all the things and they seek out the best people. If you think a book is something you can do alone, well, it's not something you could do well alone. Most of our book projects have a minimum of 12 experts and professionals that work on each book. Some have as many as 16. That's in addition to the author. Books are a team sport, so determine your resources and then plan your allocation to do the best with what you've 2. Track your expenses. Speaking of resources, you will have expenses and you will be generating some revenue from this book. So guess what? There is a very good chance your book expenses will be a tax write off for you. Now, I'm not an accountant and I've only written books while residing in Canada or the United States and all three times they were part of a business. But in every case, every penny spent on my book development and marketing was a business expense. Coaching writers, editors, designers, PR people, or book launchers are more than likely an expense you can write off in your business or against your personal income if the book is going to be owned by you personally. Again, I'm not an accountant, so consult with a good one, but keep your receipts other things like part of your home office, pens, paper, printer ink, wi fi. There might be many other things that also qualify. The cost of paying an accountant for quick consult could quickly pay for itself in tax savings. Number three who are your customers? Any business without a clear sense of who they will serve will be very unlikely to succeed. Your book is the same. Who's your ideal reader? What problems are they having? What is the thing you offer that they really need? What's the outcome you can promise from entering your ecosystem and buying your book? I know my YouTube besties like Emojo, Mike Herd Scully, House of Thrillers, Linda Kaylee, Brian Krieger and Veronica Prior Faciana know exactly what I'm talking about because they've heard me say it dozens of times. Thank you by the way for all your likes, comments and shares. You really are the best bookie. No, they're the best bookies. You guys, you're awesome. Got Vegas on the brain, right? Thank you by the way for all your likes, comments and shares. You really are the best besties a book broad could ask for. And if you aren't in the mind of your reader yet, I'll link to a video at the end that will help you become a reader. Psychic Number four what are your business goals? At Book Launchers we have a monthly plan, a quarterly plan, and an annual strategic plan. Above all of that we have our client centric mission where we want to become the first choice in book publishing, not an alternative to traditional publishing and everything we do is building up towards that bigger mission. Most authors think of their book as far as launch and not much more. Some authors think about how it will be the tool that gets them speaking gigs, but they don't actually strategically plan the steps to use the book as a tool to get those speaking gains. So get clear, create a bigger plan and a shorter sub plan for your book. A book is so much more than a launch. Are you going to be a multi book author? Is this for legacy? Are you using this as a lead into your sales funnel? Is it a tool for speaking? Know what you want your book to do so you can break it down as to how it will actually achieve the bigger goal for you. And now you can make decisions with that big picture in mind. How big is this business going to be or how big do you want it to be? Now you can make sure it has the right foundation to get there and you're committed to getting there, right? Number five speaking of business size, what does this business structure look like again? I'm a Canadian doing business in the us so my structure is very different than what the majority of people would need because I have a C corp because I'm a resident alien like beep boop beep boo. So don't do what I'VE done. Do what makes sense for you. If your book is part of an existing business, setting up a DBA or a fictitious business name under that business is a great option. No new bank accounts required, just a quick trip to the courthouse and file a bit of paperwork. I have a great video on creating your publishing company name, whether you set up personally or under your existing business, so I'll link to that at the end. Now, there are different structures, but the bigger name authors I know often have an llc. If you're going to be selling a lot of books or you're really worried about risks, an LLC might make sense. But I wouldn't do it at the outset unless you feel really strongly about this setup because there's a lot of extra expenses. Like in California you get to pay $800 a year no matter what just for the pleasure of having that LLC in that state. So I wouldn't really recommend you do this unless it's going to be pretty financially profitable business venture or you have a really strong reason for needing that set up for your author business. That said, you know what I'm gonna say, don't you? Yep. Consult with your attorney and tax accountant to get the right advice for you. Now in a future video I want to talk about a few other pieces like who you might want to hire for your author business. I'm not talking about Book launchers. You absolutely should work with us if you're writing a book to grow your brand or your business because we are awesome at that. And you should pause this video and fill out this form right now if that's your goal right there. Book launchers.com apply, but that's not actually what I'm talking about. I'm talking about people like virtual assistants, bookkeepers, social media managers, and other common team members that authors may want on their team to help them with their book business. So make sure you've subscribed to the channel and turn the notifications on to be notified when that and other high value videos are dropping. Now let's talk publishing company setup that video to help you figure out DBA fictitious business stuff. Those right here. And that video on becoming a mind reader, knowing your ideal reader intimately to serve them the book they really want and need. That video is right here. Either way, after you smash that thumbs up button, click on over and start watching. I promise you'll be happy you did.
