A YouTube podcast conversation (May 21, 2018) featuring Julie Broad and a second speaker about why people should write books. Julie describes motivations (mission, fundraising, sharing a message), business benefits (marketing, authority, credibility, speaking fees), and practical pathways (self-publishing, building a company to help authors). She shares an anecdote about a book leading to a $6 million business sale and notes memoirs can be positioned for TV/film opportunities.
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And that combined with the self publishing, which has always been there, I've always been helping people and I love books and I love helping people share their message. It all just kind of combined to. When I move to the States, I'm going to build a company that helps people write and publish and sell a fantastic book that will help them in their business.
Wow, that's so cool. That is so cool. I love hearing stories like that. The challenges that you go through. One of my questions is, why should you write a book? Why would anyone go through the unknowing, the time it spends, all of the challenges that come with that? Why would you do that?
Yeah, I mean, well, I can ask you, why are you doing this book?
But I know exactly why. Because I want to benefit for charity. I want to raise money for charity. That's my underlying motivation.
Exactly. So you've got a mission. And that's like the perfect reason to write a book is you have a message to share and you've got a mission for this book and you're willing to commit. Like, the thing is, you should not write a book if you're just going to try to wing it because it's easier than ever to publish. And you can publish absolute crap. But is that something you're going to be proud to hand to anybody? Are you even going to be proud to tell people you've published a book in a year if you wing it and you don't publish something that is really, really great? So I don't think just anyone should write a book. But I do believe that we all have powerful stories to share and experiences to share that will a difference in other people's lives. And so when you get to that point where you have this mission, so whether it's raising money for charity or you want to, you have a powerful message or an idea that you want to get out there and you've got this, this kind of drive behind it, then I think it's a great time to write a book. And why should you? Well, the benefits if you write the right book and you do a good job are enormous. I mean, one story that I've been sharing this last couple weeks is I was interviewed by someone who's written a ton of books, but he said one of my books actually didn't sell very well. But he said one of the people who read my book decided, I like the sounds of your business, checked it out and ended up paying him $6 million to buy his business. So, you know, and you don't really know Right. Like you can plan a lot in advance and set it up for the most possible success, but you don't actually know for sure what will happen with your book. Like, he never could have predicted that somebody would buy his business as a result of that. But you can set yourself to charge more to attract new clients to get speaking engagements. I mean, if you want to be a paid speaker, you pretty much need a book to get on most of the stages to get paid. So it really depends on your goals. And we're working, because I'm in Hollywood now, we have a little bit of a Hollywood angle, so we're working with some people on memoirs that they want to see hit TV or movie screens. No guarantee that it will get there, but there's things they can do to set it up for success. So why should you write a book? Well, it really depends. But there's so many benefits. And as a business owner or someone launching a business, to me the simple answer is it's great marketing. And people pay you for that marketing. And it's not like a brochure, it doesn't hit the bin right away like a book. If you give them a physical book, it sits on their desk, it sits on a shelf, and they're more likely to give it away than they are to ever throw it out. So there's massive, massive value in it.
You know, I love that. I also love the fact that it helps with authority in whatever specific niche you're in.
Yes, thank you. That was another. I mean, there's so many. We could, we could have an entire episode on all the reasons you should write a book. So, yes, that's. Credibility and authority is frankly one of the things that a lot of people don't realize is that look around your industry like whatever you want to call your, whatever your industry is, and think about how many people have degrees. Probably depending on your industry, the majority of people have some sort of training and they all have the same training. But how many of them have written a book? Right. 35% of Americans, I believe, have some sort of post secondary education or a degree, but less than 1% have written a book. So even if you're in a career, it's a great way to stand out and to get the next promotion or to get the new job. That's your dream job.
