MBA1127 Should You Write a Book to Promote Your Brand? + Free Ride Friday!

Let me tell you about Intuit QuickBooks. When I was starting out my business, I remember sitting at my desk late at night not working on my business but cleaning up numbers, tracking and reconciling payments and wondering how this became my life. But once I automated the admin side of things of my finances, those nights had disappeared and I felt a whole lot better. Outdo it with intuit QuickBooks QuickBooks is the trusted end to end solution that businesses rely on for getting paid, managing finances, paying employees, finding new customers, and more. QuickBooks provides a team of AI agents and trusted experts, so doing it yourself no longer means doing it alone. Their payment agent gets you paid faster, their customer agent finds leads, follows up and secures more sales, and the accounting agent automates and categorizes transactions. Get your critical business jobs done with QuickBooks on the Intuit platform.

Ready to save on new tech? It's time for Dell Tech Day's annual sales event celebrating our customers with fantastic deals and benefits. Product perks include Dell Rewards, free shipping, premium Support and more. PCs like the Dell 14 with Intel Core Ultra processors will help you do more faster and with a premium suite of monitors and accessories, you can upgrade your whole setup with amazing savings. Visit Dell.com deals.

Hey there listeners. Today is Free Ride Friday so make sure you hang on to the end of the episode to hear who won this week's Free Ride. Every Friday we give away a lifetime membership to one of our programs. This month we're giving away ezcourse, our 30 day course on how to build your own online course. It's a $500 value over at EasyCourse Co, but it could be yours for free. Just leave us an iTunes rating and review and you enter our weekly random draw. Every Friday we announce a winner and we do that every Friday until you win. So just leave us a review on itunes to get into the action and you can win a free ride. All right, let's jump into today's episod. Hey O welcome to the $100 MBA show straight answers for your business every single day with our daily 10 minute business lessons for the real world. I'm your host, your coach, your teacher Omar Zenholm. I'm also the co founder of the Hundred Dollar mba, a complete business training and community online. And in today's lesson you will learn should you write a book to promote your brand? Many people call a well written book one of the best business cards, calling cards or whatever you want to say that you can have. It's like an entry point for clients or customers. In today's episode, we're going to explore if you're trying to promote your brand, trying to get more traffic, more clients, is writing a book a good way to do that? If that's the main goal of the book to promote your brand, can the book be successful? Is it worth your time, your money, your effort? And what are the options if you want to go down that path? We got a lot to cover and make sure we get you some answers in today's episode. So let's get into it. Let's get down to business. All right, let's get into this and let's get some honest answers when it comes to writing a book to promote your brand. I want to start with the raw truth here. The only business books or self development books that actually help people's brands are successful ones. People, period. If your book is not successful, if not enough people are reading it, if your book's not getting picked up in publications or write ups or reviews, if your book is not worth reading, if it's not noteworthy, it's not gonna do anything for you. That's the raw truth. Yes, there's less than amazing books that hit the New York Times bestseller or Wall Street Journal bestseller. But that's because the people that launch these books are dumping hundreds of thousands of dollars in marketing. And in my opinion, if you have that cash on hand, then writing a book just for the sake of promoting your brand and, and then spending all that money to market it, it's not the best use of marketing dollars. The reason why you may want to go down this path to promote your brand, to write a book to promote your brand, is because you want to get the word out about what you stand for, what you believe, and what kind of information and value you can add to people's lives and businesses. And if that information is significant enough, it can really take you to the next level, can really take your business and brand to a different stratosphere of exposure. I can name a few books that just took that person's brand and business to, to a whole new level. I'll Teach youh to Be Rich by Ramit Sadie is a great example. Or Michael Port's book, Yourself Solid. He built a whole business based on the success of this book. Where many of Ryan Holiday's clients come from, the fact that Obstacles Away was a great book that just spread like wildfire from NFL teams to celebrities. So it really, really ignited a fire for his brand. But here's the bottom line. You cannot half ass it you can't just do a half baked job. You can't just see this as a marketing sort of exercise. No. You have to write a quality book. A book that's going to knock people's socks off, that's going to provide them with insights and aha moments and practical advice. The book has to make a difference, really, to get people to talk about it. So in order for your book to make an impact on your brand, it's going to make an impact on other people. So we talked before in a previous lesson on, you know, self publishing versus going with a publisher. And there's advantages and disadvantages for both. If you don't have an existing audience or an established brand already, it's going to be very hard to get a credible publisher to publish your book. Why? Because the publisher wants to sell books. They want to make sure that you can move units that you already have an existing audience that you can sell to when you announce the release of the book. Somebody like Gary Vaynerchuk has no problem getting a publisher. Why? Because he's got a million followers on Twitter, he's got a tremendous email list. He is everywhere on YouTube and Snapchat. He has an audience. So the publisher knows that they can bet on him. He's going to sell books. He also has a track record. Every book that he's released has been a New York Times bestseller. But even if you've never published a book, but you already have an existing audience, whether you have a podcast or a YouTube channel with a huge following or a big social media presence, then publishers will be willing to take a chance on you. The advantage of having a publisher is that you don't have to worry about publishing the book, getting it printed and getting into stores and getting into to Amazon. And a lot of times the publisher will do some of the marketing for you. In this day and age, much of the marketing is your responsibility. So you're gonna have to push books, push units as much as possible. Now self publishing, you have no gatekeepers. You could do whatever you want. And Amazon has a great system when it comes to self publishing. And there's lots of new books now that are being self published that are hitting some of these top lists now with control means more work. You're gonna have to do a lot more work when you're self publishing your book. You're basically creating your own little publishing house as well as writing the book. Here are my quick tips on making sure that your book is beneficial to your brand. Number one, make sure the book is on brand, meaning that the content that you deliver must be similar to the service or product you deliver in your business. Why? Because if somebody reads your book and loves what you just gave them, they're going to want more and you want to be able to deliver more. And the best way to do that is make sure your book is aligned with your business, your brand, your products, your services. So I mentioned Michael Port. His latest book that he released was Steal the Show, which is a book about public speaking in your daily life as well as on stage. Now, if you read that book, you'll say, wow, this is a great book. I learned so much, I want to take it to the next level. Well, you would look up Michael Porter and realize, oh, he's got a whole coaching program I can take called Heroic Public Speaking. So you see how it's all aligned. So the book actually promotes what he does. And a good way to look at it is the book is kind of like a one on one class. Even though books can be, you know, 2, 3, 400 pages, you can't cover so much in that amount of pages. You can only cover certain aspects. And you want to make sure you get the basics, or I would say the fundamentals of what you talk about, of what you provide. So they start there, they get value, they kind of get the ball rolling and then they can continue with your business. So it's got to be aligned with your business. Number two, the book again has to be great. It has to deliver on its promise, it has to deliver value. If you're promising somebody something with the title of the book, you got to make sure that you actually deliver that or people are going to feel disappointed. It's all about expectations. If I write a book about how to start a business for under a thousand dollars, but by the end of the book, you really can't do that. I don't give you the tools, the steps, the strategies. Then I didn't deliver on my promise. And people will be disappointed. They'll feel like they got, you know, hoodwinked. So make sure you deliver on your promise and that the content is brilliant. Number three, it has to be well written. There's nothing worse than this is an epidemic in business books. I've read a lot of business books that could be so much better, but it's written so poorly, it's hard to get through. And I can really feel the difference when I read a book that has been written poorly right after a book that I've read that is really well written. Books that are written well are clear, easy to understand, and it's faster to read. And when I say well written, that also means well edited. You need to make sure you have an editor to take your book seriously, to cut out unnecessary fluff, to rewrite things that just don't make sense, to reposition things, to make sure that put things in the right chapters or in the right sequence. A book is teaching in written form. You need somebody to structure your lessons and an editor can help you do that. The next tip is probably, in my opinion, the one people neglect the most yet is so important and that's that you have to budget. You have to put money aside to market your book. Any good author knows that most of the work is in the marketing of the book, not the writing of the book. Gotta get on podcasts, you gotta get on shows, you gotta be interviewed. You have to be written up to market within your own audience. You have to make sure that people know about your book and many authors have a hard time with this and want somebody to do it for them. Yeah, if you have a marketing team, great. If you don't, you're going to have to roll up your sleeves and spend money and time on marketing. So prioritize that. Otherwise the book will flop and all your hard work is going to be wasted. You're not going to be able to capitalize on making sure the book promotes your brand.

Does it feel like it's getting really hard to figure out the best way to save for retirement? Fidelity can help you find clarity so you can save the best way for you. With a free personalized plan, goal tracking and timely insights, you'll be set to take on retirement your way. Get started@fidelity.com future expenses charged by your investments and other costs and fees associated with trading or transacting in your account. Apply Fidelity Brokerage Services Member NYSE SIPC.

Dear McDonald's, your breakfast menu fire tens across the board. I could be happy with anything even though I order the same thing every time. Thanks for not judging me. I'll try something new next time.

Maybe score a two for five dollar deal on a sausage McMuffin with egg and more. Limited time only. Price and participation may vary. Cannot be combined with any other offer single item at regular price.

Ba da ba ba ba. One final but huge piece of advice I want to give you to wrap up today's lesson on Is it a good idea to a book to promote to write a book to promote your brand? If you're gonna go down this path to write a book or books to promote your brand, then I would plan on writing more than one book. Being an author is a skill. It takes time and it takes effort and it takes repetition. And one of the best pieces of advice when it comes to this area that I've heard is from Ryan Holiday and he says one of the best ways to market a book is to write another book. Why? Because if you write that second and third and fourth book, it might appeal to a different audience or different people, or it might just be marketed better and people will hear about. And then when they read a good book from you, they'll be like, hey, what else has this author written? And they're going to find that older book that you wrote and it's going to market it. So I would see this as a long term plan, not just like a once and done type of thing. Maybe see yourself like, okay, let me commit to writing three books in the next five years. And with that in mind, you're going to know what to put in each book. Rather than trying to make one book as successful as possible and the only book you write for the rest of your life, see it as a long term plan and part of your marketing plan to market your brand and business. Thank you so much for listening to the $100 NBA show that wraps up today's lesson. But today's episode's not over. It's Free Ride Friday. I gotta announce a Free Ride Friday winner. Let's see who won this week's Free Ride. Our weekly random draw with all our iTunes rating and reviews to see who won a lifetime membership to easy course, our 30 day course on how to build an online course. Let's see who won. And the winner is. Claudia Cox from Switzerland. Claudia says 5 stars. Fantastic resource. The 100 LBA show is a quick, compact, learning, focused podcast. Each 10 minute episode tackles a different topic like motivating a team or creating a budget or creating your own website. I love how the host, Omar Zenon breaks down each episode into a valuable lesson. I think this podcast is a fantastic resource. Well, thank you Claudia for that review and you are a Free Ride Friday winner. Congrats. Your mission is to email me at omar100mba.net so I can hook you up with the Free ride. If you're listening and you want to win a free ride. If you want to win a lifetime membership to one of our programs, easy course, a $500 course on how to build and launch your own online course in 30 days, just leave us an iTunes rating interview and you enter our weekly random draw and then listen in on Friday and see if you won. You enter the draw for every week automatically. Once you leave us a review, it's our way to say thank you for showing us love on itunes. That's it for me today guys. But before I go, I want to leave you with this. If you think you're not a good writer but think that you would enjoy the process of writing a book, I would go for it. We all are self critical, but if you feel like you hate writing, you don't enjoy writing, then that's totally fine. I know some people ghost write their books or they do audio recordings and somebody transcribes it. Personally, I don't find books that are written that way to be as valuable as those that were written traditionally. I could be wrong, but that's just my own opinion. So if you think it'd be a fun adventure, go for it if you can't stand it. If you hate writing, there's no compulsion. You don't have to do it. You can find a different way to promote your brand. Thank you so much for listening to the Hunter Ombay Show. I'll check you on Monday's episode. I'll see you then. Take care.

Is it time to reimagine your future? The right business skills may make a difference in your career. At Capella University, we offer a relevant education that's designed to focus on what you need to know in the business world. We'll teach professional skills to help you pursue your goals like business management, strategic planning, and effective communication, and you can apply these skills right away. A different future is closer than you think with Capella University. Learn more at Capella Eduardo.