72. Chandler Bolt: Author of Published.

Hello, Book Thinkers family, and welcome to episode number 72 of our personal development podcast, Book Thinkers Life-Changing Books. During each episode, I interview one of the world's top authors. And as a listener, you can expect to discover new books, new mentors, and new resources that you can use to achieve more and live better. In this episode, I have the pleasure to interview author Chandler Bolt. Chandler is an investor. He's the CEO of Self-Publishing School and selfpublishing.com. Forbes 30 Under 30, and the author of 6 bestselling books. Self-Publishing School is an Inc. 5000 company the last 3 years in a row as one of the 5,000 fastest growing private companies in the US. Chandler is also the host of the Seven Figure Principles podcast and the Self-Publishing School podcast. Through his books, podcasts, YouTube channels, and Self-Publishing School, he's helped thousands of people write a book that grows their income, their impact, and their business. Our conversation today is all about his book, Published: The Proven Path from Blank Page to 10,000 Copies Sold, which aligns with my goal for next year, my biggest goal, which is to sell 10,000 copies of my upcoming book. So without further ado, please enjoy this amazing conversation with Chandler Bolt. Chandler, welcome to the Book Thinkers Life-Changing Books Podcast. How are you doing today, man?

I'm great. Great to be here. Thanks for having me.

I'm excited for today's conversation. Now, for those in the Book Thinkers audience that are not familiar with you or Self-Publishing School, I'd love to have you tell everybody a little bit about yourself.

Yeah. So Self-Publishing School, we're an online education company. We help people write and publish books that grow their impact. their income and their business if they have one. We believe that books change lives, right? How many of you listening have had your life changed by reading a book? Probably almost everyone, at least almost everyone, if not everyone in this audience especially. But so books change lives of readers, but then books change lives also of the authors that write them. We always say it's not about the book. It's about who you become in the process of writing and publishing that book. And so we're on a mission to help 100,000 people write and publish their book by 2035. We've published about 6,000 books in the last 6 years. So a lot of good progress so far and a long way to go. Our goal and really mission is to change lives through books. And so that's what we do all day, every day is help people write and publish a book in as little as 90 days. And that grows their impact, their income, and their business if they have one.

Yeah, I love it. I think everybody in this audience is a great candidate for what you offer. I think everybody should write a book. As I mentioned before I pressed record, I'm in the process of writing my first book. And We'll touch on that in just a couple of minutes, but bring us back to the first moment where you realized you wanted to write your first book. And it was called The Productive Person. It was right before you went to Austria. And yeah, tell us that story. It was really interesting.

Yeah. So it was, you know, I'm a C-level English student and a college dropout with ADHD. So kind of the last person you'd ever think that would write a book. But, you know, maybe like some people listening is feeling like, hey, I've got this life experience that I want to share. With other people. And, and I feel like the best way to do it is in book form, even though writing a book is not maybe necessarily the easiest for me. I know I have this concept called leveraged impact. It's the ability to do work once, you crystallize your knowledge into a book, and then that book lives forever. So long after you're off this earth, that book is still making a difference. And that book is able to impact thousands, tens of thousands, maybe even millions of people. So leveraged impact, you're bringing leverage to the impact that you're trying to make. Now, I wouldn't have articulated it like that when I was about to write my first book. It was just, hey, I feel like, you know, there's some things I learned and I had some friends that I wanted to teach. And so it started as a, as a 20-page PDF that evolved into a full ebook that then started making a few thousand dollars a month in royalties and kickstarted a whole business and all of those things. And so, but it started with just that kernel of, hey, I want to help people with this book. And then it was, oh wow, this is this passive income thing. I was kind of, didn't think would happen, but now it's happening. And I've created this asset that years from now, it'll still be making money every single month. But more than that, it's bringing in leads, sales, and referrals for my business. It's helping the business grow. Like it's just kickstarting a bunch of things. Yeah.

You say in the book about that leverage piece, that once you see it, you can't unsee it. And I think that that's happened with me. When I create digital content, people watch it while I sleep. I mean, once I that, I can't unsee that. And the same thing is true with books. They're low margin of reproduction, super high leverage points for yourself. Now, how many pages did that ebook end up being? So it was a 20-page PDF. And then how long was the ebook?

Yeah, I think it morphed into probably 120 pages or something. So pretty short. I want to say it was maybe 15,000, 20,000 words. So very short read. We leaned into that as a selling point too, where we said, hey, this is a book about productivity. You probably don't have a lot of time if you're reading this book. So let's get straight to the point with practical tips for entrepreneurs who are struggling with work-life balance. And that would be just a tip within that for folks is get as specific as possible with the topic that you're writing about. A lot of people want to write broad books. And it's live an amazing life, be happy and pursue your passion. It's like, Boring. I don't know what this book's about. Right. And it doesn't seem that interesting. There's 1,000 books like this. And so be as specific as possible, and you'll write a better book, and your book will sell more copies.

Yeah, as somebody who's now read hundreds of nonfiction, mostly personal development style books, you can tell when an author's just added in a bunch of fluff. And, you know, it makes you want to skip over. So I respect the shorter books a lot more than I think I did when I first started the journey, because I I thought longer books provided more value. It's not always the case, right? Like a doctor doesn't perform extra cuts during surgery, right? They're trying to do it as efficiently as possible. So, Yes. I love it. And then you decided to drop out of college. Now, in the book, you talk about how these business professors, you know, they're not out in the field actually doing things. You were getting college experience out in the real world while everybody else was just in the classroom. I had a very similar experience. So could you expand on that for a little bit? Like what sort of disagreements did you have with the traditional education system?

Yeah, you know, I'm a big fan of learning by doing, and learning from people who have done what I want to do. And so when I kind of got to college and realized, I'm learning how to run a business from a bunch of professors who have never ran a business, that didn't make too much sense to me. So I decided to drop out, right? That was, that was the litmus test is I'm learning more by actually running businesses at the time than I was from professors. And, and I had a couple kind of disheartening experiences where I had this unbelievable internship and with a company called Student Painters, and they teach you how to run a business by running an exterior house painting company. It was so amazing. And then I had this amazing experience and then I came back the next year. I was like, hey, can I like— I'd love to do some recruiting at the business school. Like, this is it. This is like for people who want to run a business. This is it. And they turned me down. And then they were just recommending all these either unpaid or just coffee pushing internships from like from alumni. Just stuff like that. And I'm like, what? What in the world? Like, what do you mean? They're like, oh, well, that's a— that's a— this sounds like a pyramid scheme. And I'm like, okay, well, I have to— I have to be very selective about who I recruit. And they're my branch managers, and then I train them. It's like a franchise. It's very, you know, it's like a franchise meets internship. Very simple business model, not a pyramid scheme at all. I'm getting on my soapbox a little bit here, but they were like, well, hold up, do you make money off the people under you? And do the people above you make money off of you? And I'm like, that's every business.

That's every business.

I know. I'm like, do you— oh, so you report to the Dean of Education, uh, and he reports to the— and then do you have professors under you? Uh, and that professor teaching me? Of course, like, that was the worst possible way that I could have presented that. They're just mad now. They're just defensive and they're like, get out of my office. So that left kind of a bad taste in my mouth combined with realizing that I could learn more by doing this And so I went out in the real world and started learning how to actually run a business.

Yeah, we are cut from the same cloth. So I worked for a competitive company. It was called Collegiate Entrepreneurs for 2 summers.

Cool.

And same exact program, exterior house painting. They covered things like workers' comp and would distribute payments to my employees. I was in charge of everything from cold calling to managing work sites and everything in between. And I remember I went back after my first summer and I was sitting in an entry-level accounting class. And there were probably— I went to a big college, there were probably 300 kids in this lecture hall. And the professor on the first day said, everybody here should want to be an accountant. Why? Because it's the highest paying degree outside of, like, once you graduate. And I just remember looking at him and thinking, then why aren't you an accountant? Why are you a professor making a lot less money than these other accountants? And that disconnect didn't make any sense to me. And I had, I had all this real-world experience. And then I sort of looked at every business class through that lens moving forward. So we, we were both pushed into entrepreneurship for those reasons.

100%. Yeah, you look around and you realize there's got to be a better way. I want to chase this dream. And I want to go learn by doing it. Yeah.

And so we are here today to talk about the updated and revised version of Published, which is a book that you put out back in 2016. I just finished the older version, and I found a ton of value in it. But I'd love to have you Describe who is the target reader for this book and why did you write it?

The target reader is, is really someone who wants to write a book to make an impact and to grow their business. And those 2 things don't have to be mutually exclusive. For me, it was, you know, the first version of this book has been downloaded and purchased hundreds of thousands of times. And, and Self-Publishing School, you know, we've evolved over the years, we've, we do 1,000 coaching calls a month with our students and know, we've done a bunch of curriculum overhauls, and we've created a children's book program, a fiction program, a memoir, some memoir training, and all that in addition to our core nonfiction. And then I went back and read the book. And I was like, man, this could be so much better. All of our curriculum and content changed, but the book stayed the same. And so that was when I said, you know what, I've got to go back. This is one of the best things that I can do to grow the business, but also to make a bigger impact with this book and make this the definitive best book for people who are thinking about writing and publishing a book. And so So that sparked writing the second edition and, and also wanted to prove that it's possible at the highest level on one of the shortest timelines. And so I said, hey, I'm just going to go practice what I preach. And I'm going to go from pen to paper to book published in about 100 days. And that's what I did. That's what I'm in the process of right now. And, and just, just showing that it's possible and making a better book. And then this, this will be a big part of of how we grow the business.

Yeah, I love it. Books can be a great business card and they can be a great lead funnel. And that's exactly what you've positioned yours as and what I'm looking to position mine as in the future. So one of the things that you teach early in the older version, and I'm excited to read the new version, I don't have a copy of it yet, but I will very soon, is that you say the first step in discovering your purpose or the first step in the writing process is discovering your purpose and setting an end goal. So, I'd love to have you talk a little bit about that because I see a lot of authors come knock on our door and it seems like they've written a book and still don't have a purpose or an end goal. So, why is it important to declare those things upfront?

Yeah. Well, it's, I mean, Stephen Covey, begin with the end in mind, right? Or Alice in Wonderland, if you don't know where you're going, any road will do, right? And so, there's a dual purpose. And this is where I think it's like, oh, well, what's the purpose behind your book? why are you writing this book? It's like, oh, well, I want to, you know, help people. I want to do all these things. And it's like, okay, well, that's the purpose for your reader. And that's awesome. You need to be super clear on that too. But you need to be clear on what's the purpose for you as the author. And so there's— that's the dual-sided purpose. So there's the purpose for the reader, but then there's also the purpose for the author. And people will often miss one or both. Sometimes they'll miss both. you know, a lot of times they'll focus on the reader, and then they don't think about how this fits in with what they're doing. And so when you think about that, is this an impact piece? So this is part of my impact and my legacy. And maybe this is even a shared experience book, I'm sharing an experience that I had, you get asked about this all the time. It's like, alright, I'm gonna write a shared experience book to grow my impact. Or is this an authority builder? The root word of authority is author. It's hard to become an authority without first becoming an author. And so is this a an authority builder, or is this to grow your business? Or maybe, you know, you want to sell as many copies as you want to become a full-time author. So this is the first of multiple books, but either way, you need to have intentionality behind that so that you can craft— how you write the book will change based on that. How you market the book will change based on like all those little, all those decisions along the way will change based on where you're going. That's an important thing to know right up front. So I'll just give you an example with an example. The second edition of Published, I had 3 or 4 goals with that. The number one goal is to write the definitive book on writing and publishing a book. So that's kind of the author-facing goal. It's like, I want to drop the mic on this, claim the space, and people— this is the book that people point to. So I want the book to be so good that people refer it and that they take the next step to sign up for Self-Publishing School if they're a fit. And so those— that's kind of like the ideal outcome for the reader. as it relates to me and my business, right? Then there's, okay, I want to grow the business significantly using the book. So I want to get the highest percentage of folks who read it to book a call with my team to sign up for Self-Publishing School that is— who are a fit, but do that without— in a way that's like ruining the reader experience, right? Where it just feels like I'm just beating people over the head for the entire book and it's just an advertisement for Self-Publishing School. And so There's that. And then there's some other like tangible goals of, okay, I want to hit 2,500 reviews on Amazon on the physical and on the ebook and print book. I want to hit 1,000 reviews on Audible for the audiobook. I want to sell or move a million copies of the book over the next year. There's just kind of tangible goals that I have with that lens. It's like that million copies is not just sold. I'm willing to give the book away for free. Like crazy, because I know that instead of paying for leads, I'm getting paid to get leads, or, or if I'm giving the book away for free, maybe I'm spending a few bucks. But that is, that is impacting someone and spreading the message of what we want to teach and bringing back leads, sales, and referrals for the business. And so through that lens, I'm able to make a bunch of decisions, but because I'm clear on the end goal of the book that I'm creating.

Yeah, I love that. I think after listening to you describe that and also going through the book, I realized that although I'm months into my writing process, I still have some work to do on sort of the two-sided purpose. Just to kind of go through it at a very high level, I've read 400 or 500 books over the last 6 or 7 years in the personal development space, and I have implemented hundreds of different things from them to improve every area of my life. And so my specialty is becoming implementation and behavior change, reading as a form of education, not entertainment. And I'd like to become the authority on that. So I'm going to write a book on how to effectively implement information from books, but also, you know, how to choose the right book for the problem you're trying to solve, how to take notes, how to create accountability externally and internally, how to revisit information over time, right? So I'm looking to become the authority on that so that I can monetize complementary products and services like speaking, And coaching, etc. But then on the reader side, exactly what I kind of described, I'm looking to help people get more out of the books. I think that there's an opportunity cost to reading a personal development book without the tools that I've discovered over hundreds of times with trial and error. So I just wanted to go through that out loud sort of as you had described it so that I could see if I could work my way through it.

Yeah, that's awesome, man. I love that topic.

Yeah, it's going to be a lot of fun to write. So You mentioned that authors who just want to make money usually end up failing. I thought that was an interesting part of the book. Why is that? So if an author just says, hey, you know, on my side of the duality here, I just want to make money. Why is that usually a recipe for failure?

Yeah. I mean, a lot of reasons. I think you'll write a worse book because you'll cut corners and you'll try to cut costs and that sort of thing. But it's like a— it reminds me of advice I got from a mentor of mine. His name is Michael Hyatt. He used to be the CEO of 7th largest publishing company in the world, Thomas Nelson. And now he's a mentor for me and advisor for Self-Publishing School. But he was giving me advice one time. He said, I mean, it's a common saying, but it just landed the way he said it, which was, it was, don't trip over nickels to pick up pennies, or whatever the version of the saying is. And so I think that can sometimes be the case where it's okay, I'm going to hold things close to the vest, I'm not going to give freely and give information and all that, because it's like, I've got to make money from this immediately. You're playing a short game versus playing a long game with the book. And so that's— I just wholeheartedly believe in playing the long game and giving as much as possible and not being like, all right, I've got an ROI positive, like day 1, month 1, because you probably won't. And then also, there's this, there's this double whiny, if you're going to be super frustrated, it's not going to compound and you're not going to keep passionately marketing the book like you should and like you could.

Yeah, no, that makes total sense to me. Before we go any further, I'd like to have you sort of define the different types of publishing that are available. I mean, obviously, you've got Self-Publishing School, but what are the other forms of publishing? And maybe why is self-publishing your favorite? Hello, Book Thinkers family. A quick word from today's podcast sponsor. Today's episode is sponsored by Audible. Audible is the leading provider of spoken word entertainment and audiobooks ranging from bestsellers to celebrity memoirs, business, and my favorite, personal development. And as part of Audible's partnership with us, we're actually offering listeners a free 30-day trial. This trial includes 1 credit good for any premium selection titles you'd like on the whole platform. So that's pretty much any book. Including the one we're talking about today. That book is yours to keep even after the trial is over. Now, this trial also includes access to Audible's Plus catalog of podcasts, audiobooks, guided wellness programs, and Audible Originals. You can listen all you want, no credits needed. Now, everyone on the Book Thinkers Instagram knows that I love physical paper books. There's nothing better than having a book in your hand, scribbling notes everywhere in the margins. I kind of tear those things But I've been completing an additional 20 to 30 books every single year using Audible by listening when I'm in the car, doing chores around the house, or while I'm on my morning walks or runs. You could take advantage of this free trial by clicking the link in today's show notes or going to www.bookthinkers.com/audibletrial. You will not regret it. Now back to today's episode.

Yeah. So there's really 3 main, 3 main choices that you have. You've got self-publishing, you've got hybrid publishing, you've got traditional publishing. Most people are familiar with the 2, self-publishing, traditional publishing, and then hybrid publishing. Some people call it vanity publishing. It's where oftentimes you're paying someone to publish the book for you. It could be $5,000, $15,000, maybe more. Maybe let— maybe there's no cost, but they'll take a bigger cut of the royalty. Those are— that's kind of the widest range is hybrid. For 99.9% of people, it makes the most sense to self-publish or to hybrid publish, and even more leaning on the self-publishing side of things. Now, obviously, I own selfpublishing.com and Self-Publishing School. So I try to be as non-biased as possible. But obviously, I'm a little bit biased on that. But the reason— there's a bunch of reasons why But I'll say 99.9% makes more sense to self-publish. The only time it makes sense to traditionally publish is if you can get a big advance in a book deal. So if you can get $50,000, $100,000 plus, which you're only going to get that if you have a big audience and they know that you can sell books. That's kind of how the business model works is you've got to be able to sell books for them to justify the advance. You're going to sell the book, they're not going to sell the book. So only then does it make sense to traditionally publish. But even then, sometimes it makes sense— excuse me— to self-publish, just depending on your goals and what you care about.

And when you're talking to people who are thinking about writing their first book, and I'm sure that there are a lot of people thinking about writing their first book in the audience today, what are some of the limiting beliefs that you kind of get hit with, right? These like false objections, reasons why they can't start today. And why are they not true?

So I would say the 2 biggest ones, and then there's a bunch of— there's like, who am I to write a book? Or there's imposter syndrome. And there's all those things. But really, I think the biggest one is I don't have time. And sometimes it's disguised as the timing isn't right. And people think, oh, maybe next year, maybe someday. But maybe next year, maybe someday becomes maybe never. For most people. And so the timing will never be right, and you never have time to write a book. You've got to make the time. And this is what I just kind of mentioned earlier, is I wanted to show people that it's possible and do it myself. Is I was in that same boat. It's like I knew I needed to do the second edition for a while. And then finally I said, you know what, I've just got to make a decision. And I got to map it out. And I see you've got— I know not everyone's watching this, but you got your 75 Hard shirt on. So we have kind of like, we call it 30-Day Rough Draft Challenge. And so it's kind of a similarly structured challenge where it's like, all right, you got to make this decision. And for 30 days, put your hands on the keyboard and write and write every day and make consistent progress. And so it really takes that, okay, I'm going to— the decision to get started. No one has the time. You got to make the time. So that's the big one. Because for me, it was, I can rattle off a list of things that have been on my plate over the last 60 days. And it's a lot running the company, with moving to a new city, with looking at acquiring a couple of companies, with trying to buy a house, with being on the road 20 out of 30 days, like all those things, like, still got the draft done in 49 days. It's— you've got to make it a priority if it is, if it is a priority.

No, absolutely. It's funny to think about that 75 Hard. I was able to complete 75 Hard, but I can't write for 3 days in a row. So I need to steal a little bit of that recipe and follow your 30-day That makes a lot of sense to me. There's a point in this section of the book that I thought was also really interesting where you said, listen, it's called bestselling author, not bestselling writer or best writing author. A lot of people think that they need to be great writers in order to put out a bestselling book, but that's not always the case. It's about storytelling. That's what you say in the book.

Yes. Writing a great book is a prerequisite, but it is called bestselling author for a reason because it's based on book sales. So you got to become friends with SAM, which is sales and marketing. You don't have to like it, but you do have to learn it. It's the only way, or not the only way, but I mean, it is the way to at least— because a great book, once you get it to a certain place, it can— sure, it can keep selling and there's momentum and there's referrals and all that. But like, you've got to get it to that tipping point. And, you know, I've interviewed hundreds of the bestselling authors of all time on the Self-Publishing School podcast. The thing that they all have in common is that they consistently market their book. It's the glaring obvious thing. It's like when I'm asking them, like, how have you sold so much books or so many books? It's like, that is the commonality, is consistently marketing the book. And I call this the 1-year launch. It's the Lamborghini launch versus the Toyota Camry launch. You know, if you know anything about Lamborghinis, you know that they're fast, they're loud, they use up a lot of fuel. They're sexy, but they're gone in a flash, right? And if you know anything about a Toyota Camry, you know that they just keep going and going and going for hundreds of thousands of miles and for decades. And so most people treat their book launch like a Lamborghini. They use a lot of time and energy, they focus all on one week, it's gone in a flash, they're burnt out. I would, I would recommend instead to treat your book like a Toyota Camry. So it's like, how do you continue to market, market it? But then how do you also set up evergreen marketing assets to keep the book selling long term? And so that's, that's what I recommend is that people commit to the 1-year launch, not the 1-week launch, and that they create assets so that the book actually has a long-lasting impact, isn't just a flash in the pan. maybe even a flash-in-the-pan bestseller, but a flash in the pan nonetheless. But that you focus on those, the long-term marketing of the book.

Hmm. How much, how many copies of a book does the average self-published author sell? Or maybe a better question is like, how much does somebody that's not leveraging your resources sell versus how many does somebody that leverages your resources sell?

The average self-pub— I mean, I think that it's the average self-published book is like less than 100 copies or about 100 copies, which is just horrendous. And I wish we had better data because we aren't a publisher. So people keep all that— the benefit is people keep all their royalties, right? But the downside is that we don't have all the data, which I wish we did. But I know it's, it's at a minimum hundreds more copies, if not in a lot of cases, thousands more copies sold by actually writing and publishing the book the right way and marketing it.

Yeah, the marketing piece is really important. I mean, like I said, I think that the target customer for The Book Thinker is so social promotions that we do is somebody who puts out a book and then they realize they don't have an audience, they didn't put together a launch team, they have nobody to talk about the book.

Yes.

And so they come to us because we can get them impressions, but that's a flash-in-the-pan type of promotion, right? It goes away pretty fast in our feed. You really need to be marketing for a year or more. Do a lot of your customers— like, do you provide a lot of help on the marketing side, or is it really just getting the book done?

Yeah, it's— I mean, we do a lot on the marketing. We have a Sell More Books program, which is all about selling more books. But I think this is the part that we're really, we're really good at is, is the marketing. Now, I think we're really good at helping people actually get their books done, which that's the part that not a lot of people want to in the publishing industry, especially that nobody wants to, nobody wants to do that. They're like, hey, talk to me when you got a finished manuscript.

Yeah.

And that's like, then you can work with us, then you can whatever. So But we, we're just really passionate about that. And so we, I think we're really good at helping people actually get their books done, the systems, the accountability, all that, but then also the marketing. I mean, there's a reason we've been one of the 5,000 fastest growing companies in America the last few years in a row. And that's because we're really good at sales and marketing and growing a thing. And so we got a lot of resources and a lot of focus and emphasis on that. That being said, like a lot of authors, it's tough because a lot of people think if I build it, they will come. And it's more exciting to move on to the next book than it is to continue marketing the current book. And so it's like a battle that you just got to fight day in, day out. It's like, no, you need to keep marketing this book. Don't move on to the next book or you're going to have 7 books when none of them are selling well. And so I think it's something That's really, really, really important.

No, I do too. I'm excited to dive into some of your resources in that area, the sales and marketing piece, because that's what interests me the most and where I think I have the most to learn. Now, 30 days, you go through the program, you have your first rough draft. What happens after that?

There's 8 milestones in, in the author journey that we teach. And so the, the first milestones are getting the draft written. Right? So you go through the MORE writing method. So you mind map, you outline, you create the rough draft, and you go into editing, right? So there's self-editing, then there's professional editing. And then you're really moving into— from that, from that piece, you're moving from you've got the book professionally edited to now you're creating your title and your book cover, to then you get the book formatted, then you're prepping for launching, you're launching the book. And so those are kind of the phases. I'd say the The hardest part is getting your rough draft done. And that is the most important part. So for anyone listening to this, watching this, like, that is the number one thing that you should focus on. So Nick, for you with your book, it's like, that's the most important thing. Take the 30-day rough draft challenge, focus on getting the draft done. And then you'll start to believe that it's possible when you get that done. And then I'd say the second hardest part is self-editing. Because that's when you read what you've written and you're like, Man, this sucks. I suck. I don't even know why I'm doing this. This is never going to be any good. Hold up, this is getting better. Wow, this might actually be good. Whoa, that was amazing, right? Like after, after you launch it. And so it's just like, that's the creative process. It's a roller coaster. And so those are— that's the overarching process. But then I'd say those are the 2, 2 places of emphasis that it's hard. But once you get past that, especially the rough draft, Once you get the rough draft done, you start to see the light at the end of the tunnel and you start to believe that it's possible.

Well, for people listening today, Chandler provides a ton of good value on the importance of the title and why you should leave it to the end of the process, advice on titles, make them bold, etc., covers, you know, resources to get those done. But Chandler, I just wanted to skip over those because I know that we're limited on time today. Some of the other things that I thought were really interesting in the book, was this concept of a launch team. And I know that there are tons of variables around a launch team. But I think this is something that's totally missing in most of our clients. So what is a launch team? And how do you assemble one?

Yeah, a launch team is a small group of people that support you or the topic of your book. It could be 15 people, it could be 50 people, it could be 100 people. The most important thing is that they read the book ahead of time and leave a review on day one. So that is the most important thing. And then, you know, they can do other stuff to help in addition to that. But that's the most important thing. And then there's what they get in return, they get a free digital copy of the book, I like to put their name in the digital copy of the book. People love that. That's a launch team. I talked about kind of the in-depth processes in chapter 15 of the updated, or the second edition of the book. But that's like the short, long and short of it. Teams is an acronym. It stands for tell everyone you know about the launch team, enroll the people who are interested and set expectations, ask people to leave a review, and then message everyone individually to follow up. Because people aren't just going to leave a review, you've got to message them individually to actually get folks to follow through. So that's the TEAM acronym. That kind of is the overarching structure of how to, how to actually recruit and run a launch team.

Yeah, I'm definitely, I'm definitely looking forward to building one of those, uh, over the next couple of months, and I'm really excited to do that. You also said make sure you remind people of your goals. So, hey, I'm looking to get 100 Amazon reviews by X date. I'd love if you could help contribute, because then it feels a little bit more personal, like they're actually helping you achieve something that, that's tangible and can be measured. So that was really good advice. What is, um, what's Amazon juice? Because You just said you need everybody to write the review on day 1. I have a feeling that has to do with this Amazon juice concept.

It's really getting down early traction, downloads, and reviews on your book. And once Amazon recognizes, oh, this book is starting to get traction, they will start marketing the book for you. And so that's really what our goal is, is like, okay, during launch week, how do you get as much traction, as much downloads, reviews as possible so that Amazon will then go out and market the book on your behalf.

Yeah, I love that. Everybody always talks about the infamous Amazon algorithm, and it sounds like it's as simple as just getting a lot of activity up front and then trying to continue to keep that activity level as high as you can for as long as you can, and Amazon will do the rest.

Not easy, but it is simple, right? And I will say this, Amazon's algorithms weigh very highly towards reviews. So search rankings are weighted highly by reviews. Like there's a lot of things on the platform that are based on reviews because Amazon exists to make happy customers. A frequently reviewed book, and especially if it's frequently positive review— or sorry, I'll take it even a step back. A frequently reviewed product on Amazon and a frequently reviewed positive product, they want to boost that. They want more people to see that product. because they know that they're more likely to buy the product, which Amazon makes money when you buy stuff, right? So people are more likely to buy products that other people like. And so it helps them make more money, right, when they boost those to the top. So that's why reviews are so important. And that's why I focus a lot on reviews.

Yeah, I love that. It's— I live in the world of Instagram most of the time. And Instagram's algorithm is very similar. If you put out a piece of content, And it does really well in terms of engagement right up front, Instagram will share that with more people. Why? Because they want the user to stay on the platform. Otherwise they can't pump advertising in every 10 posts. And so if you put out a poor piece of content, then Amazon, I mean, Instagram will kind of push that into oblivion because they don't want people to leave the platform. And so it makes total sense to me. And Chandler, I know that we are going to give away 50 copies of this book. So can you tell everybody a little bit about that?

Yeah. So just as a little thank you for checking out this interview and, and checking out Nick's podcast, I want to give 50 free copies of the book for the first 50 people who are interested. So this is no strings attached, physical copy of the book. I will literally pay to print it, pack it, ship it, all the things. So all you have to do is go to publishedbook .com/nick. It's published, as in I published a book. So publishedbook.com/nick. First 50 people fill out the form. Just all you gotta do is just enter your information and tell me where to ship it, and I'll ship a copy of the book. The book comes out on December 14th, uh, of 2021. So depending on when you're listening this, it either is about to happen, has already happened, or maybe it's a really long time ago. If you're listening to this way after, but either way, you can grab the book on Amazon. And if you're one of the first 50 people, go to publishedbook.com/nick and grab a free copy.

Yeah, we will have that link down in the show notes and people will be listening to this podcast for years to come. So if we're talking to you in the 2030s, hello. But Chandler, I had a really good time speaking with you today. I look forward to expanding our relationship between Self-Publishing School and Book Thinkers moving forward. And for those that want to learn a little bit more about you or the other resources, where should they go? What should they do?

I'm on Facebook and LinkedIn, kind of old school in that way. And then we've got a lot of helpful content at Self-Publishing School and at selfpublishing.com. So those are kind of the best places to find me and best resources. And Obviously, if you— the book is, I mean, it's all of the best content that I have as a 10,000-foot view to help people write and publish their books. So that's a good place to start kind of content-wise.

Amazing. Well, thank you for coming on today's podcast, and we'll talk soon.

Nick, thank you.

That is a wrap. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of Book Thinkers: Life-Changing It would mean the world to us if you could write a review and share this episode with a few of your friends. I mean, these books truly have the power to change people's lives, and by reviewing or sharing our podcast, you're helping us make an impact. If you have any recommendations for future guests or any constructive feedback for us on how we can improve our show, please feel free to submit a form on our website, www.bookthinkers.com, or send us a direct message on Instagram @bookthinkers. With that, I am signing off, and I hope you have a wonderful day. Don't forget, go read something.