How To Turn Books into Thought Leadership Assets | Kevin Anderson | 703

And welcome, welcome, welcome. This is Peter Winick. I'm the founder and CEO at Thought Leadership Leverage, and you're joining us on the podcast, which is Leveraging Thought Leadership. Today, my guest is Kevin Anderson. He's the founder and CEO of Kevin Anderson and Associates, which has offices in New York, London, and soon to be Dubai. He works closely with writers, literary agents, publishers, and a long list of public figures and aspiring authors. To help them write and launch their books. And instead of going into his long and very prestigious bio, we'll just, we'll just talk to him 'cause he's sitting here. So, uh, welcome Kevin.

Thank you. Glad to be here.

So in this sort of world of authors, thought leadership, all that sort of fun stuff that you and I both play in, but differently, tell me, describe your land. Like what's the perfect scenario for you and the perfect sort of client situation for you?

Yeah, we work with authors at any stage of the journey, whether they're just starting out or whether they have a completed manuscript, and we just help them figure out the best way to achieve their publishing goals. So, and we do this, we work really on the creative side with the book itself. So if they're an author that can't write or doesn't have the time to write, we can do a ghostwriting approach. If they want to write, we can do a book coaching type of approach. And also just if they want to find a publisher, we can help them navigate that. We do agenting for clients as well. And we just look at the whole big picture in terms of how to help an author elevate their book to the highest level and achieve their publishing goals. And we're not, we're agnostic. We don't just feed traditional publishers, even though we have done million-dollar deals with traditional publishers. We, we understand that it's really our clients' goals that come first. So if that's a self-pub or hybrid option, then we'll push them in that direction, whichever way is going to make sense for them.

So it's, it's, it's a bit different because it's, it's sort of a one-stop shop, right? In many instances, they'd have to find an agent and then and then a ghostwriter, and then, and then, and then. So I, I sort of like that holistic piece. Tell me the things that first-time authors sort of think are true that aren't. Like, let's burst the bubble of the Easter Bunny if we, if we shall.

Yeah, I, I think the, I think the, the, one of the mistakes that a lot of authors make is that they, they, they think that they need to make a whole bunch of progress first before bringing in a professional, which is a really big mistake. Because sometimes what you end up doing, you know, you'll hear these, you'll hear these advice guys say, oh, you just gotta, you just gotta get started is the biggest, most important thing to just start writing. And you know, there's some truth to that, but you know, bringing in a professional early, you know, in a half hour, 45-minute conversation with a professional coach, they can help you figure out exactly what, which way you're going wrong, which way you're going right, and give you some really good advice and reality checks to help you figure out your journey so that when you do really put the pen to paper or focus on your book, that you're not wasting your time and going in the wrong direction and just having that confidence that comes with professional advice. You know, the biggest mistake is authors don't get a professional involved early. We've seen too many times where it all comes in like, hey, great news. I finally finished my manuscript. I did it all on my own. And you look at it and you're like, oh my God, like if we would have been here early on, we could have saved you some real heartache here. Cause we've got to rewrite this whole thing. Cause it's not going to achieve your goal the way you've done it.

Well, let's, let's, let's go to the other side of that as well, which is A lot of authors, be they first time or not, don't really wrap their heads around sort of the marketing side of this thing, right? And you know, it's like, oh, I'm gonna write a great book and then the publisher or some other mystery person will take care of that, whatever that is, right?

Yeah.

But how important is it to build that followership to whether it's on social, whatever the case may be, and, and how much weight does a potential publisher give to that when evaluating sort of a proposal with a strong following versus without?

Oh yeah, it's critical. You know, you know, one of the, one of my favorite literary agents, Jim Levine, who, uh, represented Rudy Dalio and Tom Brady, you know, he always says, do not ask what publisher can do for you, but what you can do for the publisher. And, you know, a publisher can help you leverage a lot, but they are looking for turnkey solutions. They are looking for authors that are going to be promoters that are going to find an audience. You know, they're not looking to make all that happen for you. They're looking to help leverage what you already have built and what, what platform you've kind of established. So especially if you're going to a traditional model of publishing, you absolutely have to have some way to reach an audience. Doesn't mean you have to have a million followers on social, but it means that you have to have some kind of plan and ability to find buyers for your book because a publisher makes money on selling books. So. If you do a hybrid approach, it's a little bit different because you're paying the hybrid to publish your book for you. They're— you're paying for the services. However, again, you can't expect them— they're not going to be able to just create your platform and your connections and your network and, and the marketplace for your book. They'll help you better reach them. But yeah, even with a hybrid approach, if you want to— if book sales and visibility is, is, is an important thing for you. It is really important to think about the strategy of how you're going to reach actual book buyers.

So let's go there on the, on the book sales piece. So one of the things that, that I find is sort of the, when you really get down to it, what is the rub between, let's say, the publisher and the author, right? Because everybody wants more book sales, right? Like nobody's against that. Nobody, no, no author comes out there and say, I'll be, I'll be happy if it sells 500 copies, whatever. Right. But the publisher only gets paid on number of units sold times some profit per unit. The author gets paid on that as well, but dot, dot, dot. There's lots of other things and lots of other revenue sources and opportunities that an author has as a result of getting the book out there, and they're not aligned to the publisher. Yeah, absolutely. So, and therefore, you know, I've talked to authors and many of which, you know, and they say, you know, hey, you know, I've sold millions of books, but there have been 5 that have made me millions of dollars. I just don't know which 5 they are. So talk about sort of what authors should be thinking about, because if you're trying to justify the investment of your time and energy and resources into this thing based on outcomes and profit just on a, a book basis, it's silly math. Like it just does kind of doesn't work.

No. You know, book sales. Yeah. If you're looking to make money on the book sales and that's your primary goal, you might just go into the S&P 500 instead with your money because your return, it's gonna be better. Than whatever you're going to make on book sales most of the time. But that's not the real ROI for most authors. For most authors, especially in the nonfiction space, the ROI is what it does for their business, what it does for their personal brand or their professional presence. And it's the clients that you earn over time. You know, the, and that's why, you know, that's why so many clients are going to the hybrid approach because it's really having that book and having it available and showing that thought leadership, showing that authority in the space. Showing that separation, what separates you from your competition, and able to leverage that on, on your socials or on your speaking gigs or wherever it is, what clients you earn through having that book and the authority that it's—

so, so stay there for a minute. Let, let's sort of do a quick overview, educational touch on publishing, right? Because I think a lot of folks are delusional early on saying, oh, I'm gonna get an agent and then the agent's gonna go sell this book. And then I'm gonna get a big fat advance and then rainbows and unicorns. And then again, here's reality, right? Like, so the idea of getting an advance, you know, they're, they're smaller and smaller and smaller today than they were in the past.

Yeah.

Right. And an advance, when you think about it from a business standpoint, is really just a cash flow issue. It's an advance against future sales, right?

Yeah.

So hybrid means the business model is the, the quality is the same. Right? There's no difference in it used to be different, but, but the quality and the integrity and the editorial piece, a hybrid is you're ponying up the cash as a business owner and you're keeping the vast majority of the revenue down the road. And then self is you're publishing whatever you'd like, you're burning all the costs and all that. Where do you see people getting most confused or frustrated when they're trying to make the right choice for them? Because there is no, people ask me all the time, well, what's the right way to publish? And I'm like, well, the better question is what, what's the right way for you to publish?

Yeah, exactly. A lot of it, a lot of it comes down to timing. Timing and control. So for instance, um, you know, this, this book right here, the Oz Perelman book, Read Your Mind. Yeah. It was, it's been a New York Times bestseller. It got a near million dollar deal with Viking. He had a big platform. He's been all over the place, 60 Minutes, everywhere.

Yep.

You know, we worked closely with him through the whole process. And that book, you know, like I said, it got a near million dollar deal, but he also had a huge platform. He had a way of, of, of and he wasn't in a big hurry to get the book out right away. He could wait the year and a half from the time that he went through the journey until, you know, that made sense for him. However, this, this guy, this is the CEO of Calvin Klein. It's hard to see the book, but it's called The Great Fit. This was published by a hybrid publisher, Greenleaf, uh, which is a really great hybrid publisher. Tom Murray, CEO of Calvin Klein for 14 years. He did, he did not want to wait a year and a half and he wanted to tell it just the way he wanted to tell it. He wanted to have a little bit more editorial control, whereas With which, by the way, sounds like your typical CEO or entrepreneur, right? Right, right. And he, and the value for him was to have it soon because he wanted to immediately give it to friends, go on a speaking tour. Yeah. That, that was important to him. So that, that made a lot more sense for him to do the, a little quicker, more, uh, hands on the wheel approach of the hybrid publisher. So, you know, different, different platforms, different goals, you know, mean a different process for, for the, uh, or a different publisher that might be a better fit for the author.

And what are you seeing now in the marketplace that's different or creative or innovative from a publishing standpoint?

Well, yeah, well, there's good and bad innovation right now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, there's AI, there's been a lot of bad AI innovation and yeah, I don't know how much you want to get into that, but there are a lot of hybrid publishers, a lot of scam hybrid publishers. And ghostwriting firms that are really utilizing AI and churning out really bad content. And there's a lot of just mistakes being made as we're kind of learning the curves with that. You know, I mean, there's a lot that, that's beneficial. I mean, the book covers and the creative side or the digital, like the visual side of this has been absolutely a game changer in a good way, you know, for publishers and, and helping figure out titles and stuff, you know, like AI has been really helpful to kind of figure out that and also to help you with strategy.

But stay for a second. I think, you know, any tool could be used for good or used for harm, right? And AI is so new in this world that there is a lot of garbage out there. You could, you read stuff like, oh my God, nobody talks like that. Nobody speaks like that. This was clearly written by AI. But to me, the great use cases for AI are sort of, I would say invisible, but the research that can be done. Or, you know, we've got a book coming out in a couple months. And we went through, we have over 600, almost 700 episodes of our podcast, 2.3 million words. We used AI 'cause we have, you know, we're humans, we're limited to our memory and say, find me a couple of times that we spoke about this topic with this type of person. And we're like, holy cow, that would've taken an army of interns a lot of time. And by the way, it was, it was, you know, trust but verify everything it, it put out. We put through sort of a, a, a rigorous process. So I think it's a sparring partner. I think it's a research partner. I, I like the design piece that you talked about. But I also think, like you said, you know, there's been this, and this hasn't gone away, this whole industry of, you know, book in a box, or you can, we'll create a great book for you in 24 hours. Like, no, you can't. And why would you want to put your name on something like that? Right.

Right. Yeah. A lot of that kind of backend research process. I mean, it can really save you a lot of time. Like you said, you got to verify everything and double check. You also want to be careful what you put into AI because you really put a lot of trust. If you're putting, if you're putting original content into an AI, You know, there's leaks, there's, you know, you really got to— I mean, it's early stages. So, you know, just be careful what you're kind of putting into the machine, into the sludge pile.

Got it. What should I be thinking about if I'm thinking about calling you and your firm? Like, because you get lots of calls every day from folks and you've got to make choices of who do you want to work with. So what are, what are the things that, that are intriguing to you when you're having an initial conversation or someone on your team is and what are the things they're like, uh-oh, this is gonna be a disaster?

Yeah. Well, yeah. Okay. So, well, number one is the why, right? Like, well, you know, the Simon Sinek, uh, you know, start with why. You know, why do they want the book? What, what's it gonna do for them? That's always where we start because that's where we, we always wanna start from the goal and figure out what's the, what's the best path to get there. And, and, and yeah, I mean, this industry's the best 'cause you just meet so many incredible and interesting people. Yeah. Incredible stories and reasons why they wanna reach people with these stories or these messages. So, you know, our, our perfect fit client is always gonna be one that has a, a, a burning desire to get this book out and a reason, a raison d'être for why this book needs to be in the world and, and who it needs to change and, and, and help and, and what, or what it does for them, you know, in their, in their professional career. Where we get, you know, where, where we kind of turn clients away is, you know, I mean, anything unethical or, or racist or, I mean, that, that stuff just right away. And we get tons of that, you know, tons of requests for, you know, for that stuff. But where the, where it can get complicated is when an author just hasn't, doesn't understand what they, they, they know they wanna write a book, but they have no idea what they want it to be. We can always start there, but yeah, they really have nothing to give and they just want someone to write the book and then, then just stamp their name on it. That's just, that is not, that's not what we do. You know, what, what we're doing is, is extracting.

So let me, let me unpack some of that because I, I think there is, some confusion around, well, what's a ghostwriter? And when people ask me, and I'm not as deeply involved in it as you are, obviously, I say there isn't one answer to that question. I, I look at it as a continuum from like on the one hand, like you said, oh, someone that will do all the work and just put your name on it.

Probably not good.

Right. And then there's folks that are more sparring partners. There's other folks that are more wordsmiths. So there's not one, one answer to that question. I think the better question is what would the right type of ghostwriter for me be given how much time I have, where I go, what I want to achieve, et cetera.

Yeah. And how involved you want to be within the writing process. So yeah, you're right. It's a real sliding scale. It could be everything from just doing interviews or even accessing existing content. Like maybe you've written 60 blogs or something and data mining all of that and putting it into a cohesive narrative that, that's in their authentic voice. But yeah, I mean, it's a lot of collaboration. It's, uh, A lot of people hire a ghostwriter, mostly the, the, the number one reason usually is because they want to have a really high quality product that really resonates with readers, but also is in their authentic voice. And a lot of authors are, they're great speakers, they're, they're really business minds, but they are just not great at putting the pen to paper in a way that's gonna connect with people.

Yeah. I mean, it's, it's a profession, it's a craft. I mean, the art of the storytelling, and I think some people think like, Oh, you know, my colleagues or peers will think less of me.

Right.

And it's like, no, they won't. Right. Like, like every CEO has a CFO. They might be great in finance, but they're not gonna do it all. Like, I think to have respect for the, the profession and the art and the science and the craft of, of writing. What else would you throw out there now? Like, give us some things that we should be thinking about if we're in this space or are considering writing a book?

So you wanna just think about the reason for your book. Again, back to the why. I mean, if it's, if it, if the goal is to elevate your profile and to, uh, make you a thought leader, then you wanna make sure that the, the, the, what you're, what you're creating from that book is serving that purpose. So, so sometimes a lot of authors in the nonfiction space, they really wanna share, um, some element of themselves. They get lost in the, the memoir side of it without the lessons. Yeah. And you know, stories are great and stories are really important and they help connect to the reader. But if there isn't like an actual takeaway, and of course I'm referring to like prescriptive nonfiction for the most part.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

If there's not a clear takeaway to the reader that they can actually apply in their own lives, then you're gonna, you, you're probably not gonna, you're probably not gonna reach a lot of people. And the, and also it's gonna be a lot harder to get a publisher or even help the publisher find your audience because if it's, you know, everyone has a, Trust me, I've heard a million crazy stories.

Yeah.

And we get, we get those, we get those calls all the time. Once you hear my story, you'll pay me to write my book.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So much. But that's just, trust me, every, there's so many amazing stories out there. What readers want to know is how can it apply to their life? How can it make their life better? How can it help them live a better life in their everyday, uh, experience? And so, but no, and I think that's, that is stamp that. Yeah.

I think because, you know, listen, lots of people that you and I both work have had amazing lives, and if they want to talk about that, that's not our biography. Right. You know, but if you're talking about sort of nonfiction in business, it should be okay. As a result of reading this book, what can I or my team or my organization do differently to grow the business, drive the business, attract talent, all the things that we need to do in business. If it's just, wow, and then there was the time, like, you know, this, this braggadocious, you know, or craziness or whatever.

Yeah.

That might make, make an interesting Hallmark movie, but probably not a great—

yeah. Or you do it, or you do it as your follow-up book. Like, grab another one here. So this one there, that's, uh, Paul, that's Tom D'Alessandro.

Yeah.

Yep. Yep. Founder of Paychex, uh, $40 billion company. He came to us wanting to write a memoir and, and he had, cause everyone told him, you know, and this happens with success, right?

Story.

Everyone told him, oh, your stories are amazing. You got to write a memoir. And he wasn't wrong, but the problem was that no one knew who, no one knew who he was. And he didn't have a real following. He didn't have a big search, even though he was the head of a giant company. So what we did was we said, well, look, you know what? You can definitely write your memoir, but you're not gonna find a publisher for this unless you write your business book first. 'Cause people wanna know, how did you start a business? I mean, you started a $40 billion business on a $3,000 credit card. Yeah. So how did you do that? Like, that's what people wanna know. How did our— learn from you? So we did the business book first, sold it to Harper for a couple hundred thousand. Yeah. And then once we had the readership, once we had him he was all over, did the whole media circuit, was on Bloomberg, was everywhere. And then we sold the second book to HarperCollins, the memoir, the memoir that he always wanted to write at the beginning, but now it had actual home because it had, he had already built a following. He had built a readership to make, you know, to actually be able to sell the memoir.

Yeah, that's interesting. The sequencing of that. Well, this has been great. I appreciate your time, Kevin, and I appreciate your expertise in this space. Thank you so much.

My pleasure. Thank you so much.

To learn more about Thought Leadership Leverage, please visit our website at thoughtleadershipleverage.com. To reach me directly, feel free to email me at peter@thoughtleadershipleverage.com. And please subscribe to Leveraging Thought Leadership on iTunes or your favorite podcast app to get your weekly episode automatically.