Ep. 10: How Much Do A Publisher’s Ethics and Mission Matter? The Answer Isn’t Simple.

Welcome to the Pub Date Podcast, the show where two book broads discuss what should happen before, during, and after your book publication date. Brought to you by Broad Book Group with your host Vanessa Campos and Jen Dorsey.

Welcome, welcome everyone to another episode of the Pub Day Podcast. Today Jen and I are on our, on our own, all by ourselves, but it's, it's going to be a good one because, Jen, there has been something in the news that it got me thinking about, you know, Broad Book Group, why we started it, and, you know, what we were hoping to achieve. So before we get into that, Jen, how are you?

I am so well.

It's Friday.

It's not 100 degrees where I am for a change. Yes, I'm stoked. I'm stoked for the weekend. How about you?

Same. Although we are getting close to 100. I mean, it's 90 and 70% humidity. But you know what? The fires aren't anywhere near me, so I'm thankful for that. And I'm hoping and praying that everyone in the crossfire is It's gonna be okay. One of the things that I was thinking about, you know, as the pandemic is rolling out and things are slowing down— before, it's a lot of hurry up and wait right now— and I was thinking a lot about who we decided to, um, reach out to as Broad Book Group and what we decided to make our mission. So why don't you tell the listeners a little bit about that?

I absolutely would love to do that. You know, when you and I started noodling on this idea to, to go into business together and do something really great and fun that we loved, we wanted to make sure that we represented voices that maybe don't always get the best representation in publishing. So we wanted to focus on women and marginalized voices in the nonfiction space and kind of share those stories of people who may not be, quote unquote, prime for one of the big four publishers. So that's kind of what I feel like we are and who we are. Do you agree? I hope so because we're going to do this.

I 100% agree. And I think at the root of it, I— one of the big things that I really wanted to do is, yeah, you're right, you know, being in traditional publishing, you always had to look at the bottom line, the P&L. What did the P&L tell you? Was this going to be a successful book? And it's kind of like gambling in terms of picking the right— again, air quotes— the right project for the right season at the right time. And, you know, a lot of those projects that just kind of went away because they weren't a good fit for the publisher, or they just didn't have their author platform ready to go. But we, we knew that they were going to do something great later on down the road.

Maybe just not at that moment and not for that publisher.

Exactly.

Yeah.

So why do we bring this up this week? Well, I don't even know if it was last week, but it's been in the news for a while. So Hello Sunshine— Hello Sunshine is Reese Witherspoon's entertainment group, and it just got sold by a company which is backed by an equity firm called Blackstone Group. That was interesting for a lot of reasons. One, that group of people who actually made the purchase and who are now officially run— well, running the show are two men, two dudes. And that just kind of raised a lot of eyebrows for a lot of people in the community, people who support Reese, people who support the mission of Hello Sunshine, which is a mission to change the narrative for women. And how we're seen in media. And, you know, they started off with Celeste's book and putting that into production and making it into a TV show series. And she's got that show with Jennifer Aniston. So really putting women, women's stories similar to what we do, you know, the marginalized stories that don't get told. But then she sold it to two dudes, two white dudes.

Classic, right? I mean, I think this is something that you and I have seen a lot because our background is in business books. So it's not uncommon for people to build up their business, build up their company, and then have an exit like that where the goal is really to sell the company to investors or to, you know, somebody else. But yeah, I think the selection is odd, um, especially knowing the history of Blackstone and kind of how they invest in the kinds of companies they invest in. So I am hopeful that they will continue the mission, but I feel like maybe the mission is going to be somewhat diluted. I think that's the thing that people are concerned about and worried about here.

Agreed. And for me, a lot of my friends have worked for companies that have gone through, um, really big mergers and acquisitions. And one of the statements that the, um, Mayor and Staggs of Blackstone said, you know, they said they look forward to backing Reese, Sarah, and the world-class team as they continue to produce identified dynamic, engaging content. There is no mention of women in that statement. And another big thing that I'm worried about is, you know, when you are funded by a big corporation, they are basically a holding company. You know, they do investment in businesses, investing capital on behalf of pension funds. So that means that they have shareholders. In my experience, in these type of situations, whoever holds the purse strings has the loudest voice in the room. So that's going to be interesting to watch, I think. But I'm really hopeful that Reese gets to actually put her, you know, best foot forward and still continues to do what she's doing.

I agree. And this is something— not only is this like a broader business issue, but this is a publishing issue. And we've seen this before, um, you know, especially with company smaller imprints that get eaten by one of the Big Four and they get to, you know, to be a part of this bigger ecosystem. And Simon Schuster is a really good example of that, right? So S&S owns a ton of different imprints and for all different kinds of categories. They have, you know, they have home and garden stuff, they have narrative nonfiction, they have fiction, they own everything under the sun. And some of those imprints are like super conservative and some are more liberal. And so they all kind of live under that umbrella. So like, let's talk about the Josh Hawley thing for a minute, because there's a good example of you know, kind of interesting publishing. How do I want to say it? Different ideas under the same umbrella that kind of fight with each other a little bit.

Yes. So the whole conversation around Senator Josh Hawley was Simon Schuster had announced that they were releasing his book. And if you don't know, he's the representative who was basically— well, let's call him a thought leader behind the attacks. On the Capitol.

Yeah, oh, that's a good way to put it.

So what was interesting about that is, you know, for obvious reasons, the people who work at Simon Schuster were like, hey, we don't want to work on this, this is just bad. So now Simon Schuster at the time was saying— and I think that this is, this is the, the power struggle of, you know, wanting to print as many voices as possible But then the question is of ethics, in my opinion. Um, does this person actually need this platform? Likely not. So eventually, and I'm sure everyone knows, Simon Schuster, um, stepped away from it and said that they weren't going to release the book. But then what happened, Jen?

Well, then somebody else picked it up, a smaller publisher that's a little more in line with maybe his Worldview picked up that book. So everyone thought, okay, hey, you know, S&S let go and it's some different publisher. Well, it turns out Simon Schuster doesn't own that imprint, but they distribute it. So S&S has a big distribution arm in addition to all of their publishing stuff. So they were still making money off of it because they were distributing it. So it's sticky, right? It's, it's not like the Reese Witherspoon thing, that's a different kind of sticky, but you just I don't know, it's just, it's hard to kind of determine what the voice and tone of a publishing house or a media company is because sometimes they are so big that they have all of these, you know, different, different forces at play. So I don't know, it was— I think it's left a lot of people wondering what the goals were at S&S because it's not the first book that they've published like this that's going to be one of those wildly controversial books. But at the same time, it's like, well, you know, people kind of cry, well, free speech, free speech. Well, free speech doesn't mean that you get a book deal either.

Exactly.

It's been a really interesting thing to follow. And I think it just, for me, it brings kind of back to front and center that question of, if I'm an author and I want to go out and I want to get my book published, where do I want to align myself? Like, do I want to align myself with a company that reflects my goals? And what I stand for, or do I kind of not care? Do I just kind of want to like go wherever I can, I can get my book published? I think that's sort of the central question here for authors when they review this kind of news and think, okay, what does that mean to me as someone in publishing?

Yeah, and that's not to say that there aren't good people at those, at those publishing imprints or at those distributions, you know, but it is, it does really bring up a good point in making sure as an author that you're doing your homework as to who you're you're getting into business with, because books are a long-tail project. I mean, it can take up to 2, 3 years. I've seen that a lot, where you're working hand in hand with this group of people or editing, copy editing, proofreading, really getting into the nitty-gritty of it all. But then they're going to be intimately promoting the book, promoting you, hopefully. I mean, that's the whole point of a nonfiction business book, is to get your idea out there into a larger audience. So knowing who you're getting into an alliance, you know, like that, uh, the new meme. Would you like to form an alliance with me? Yes. What are your ethics? And if that's important to you, then yeah, absolutely go on to Book Twitter and find those hashtags. Go on Publishers Lunch, Publishers Weekly, get into the news if that really matters to you. One of the big things that I always tell people is, you know, find out who your book is actually speaking to. Because at the end of the day, even if it's a memoir, a business nonfiction self-help memoir, you don't matter as the author. It's your audience who matters. And the publishing house or the publishing partner that you decide to work with, they matter. Have they sold books like yours? You know, um, are they good at selling books like yours? So that really puts us into a position of thinking about the proposal.

Right.

Why is that important? And really, how do you get it to cater to that specific audience and niche that, you know, your publisher has expertise in?

Yeah, I think that's a good question. So when you're thinking about this and you're kind of looking at your hopes and dreams for your book project and what you want to do with it, yes, you have to kind of do your research on what the various houses are to think about all the things we just talked about. Does it align with my goals, my ethics, my you know, my point of view on life, whatever. But also, yes, do they even publish in my category? And, you know, how do I then pitch to them so that I can differentiate myself from everybody else in my category? So that's where the proposal really comes in. So I think you have to start with that kind of research, that big high-level research, and then kind of like think of it like a funnel. Like it's really wide at the top, like what publishers align with me? And then narrow it down. Okay, within that publisher, what imprint might be a good fit for my book? And then narrow it down even more and do some deeper research. What specific editors might be interested in my book? Looking at the acknowledgments pages of similar books is a really great way to do some of that research before you dig in and write the proposal. But once you have those three kind of— excuse me— those three funnel chunks in your brain, then it's time to start catering your proposal language to kind of fit all of that. So when you think about writing your proposal, um, I would say start with that high-level research and then start to hone your language and how you kind of make your elevator pitch for your book so that it sounds interesting to your intended audience.

That's a really good point in terms of the editor. I hadn't thought about making it that granular, but in my very short stint as a literary agent, that was really who you're talking to. You're talking to the editor, you're talking to the editors that are going that have published books like yours and that have a current manuscript wish list that matches yours. I will say on a, on a technical level, don't go out there and say that your book is just like Brian Tracy's Million Dollar Habits if you don't have the platform or the sales history. But do go after books that are midlists, so newer authors, people who have a platform like yours, even though at this point you probably don't have a lot of content written out. In the type of books and trim sizes, so trim size, you know, is it a 6x9 paperback or is it a 6x9 hardcover? How many pages? So that'll also give you an idea of whether or not you think that your hardcover book that's a 6x9 trim is going to sell for $30. So that also helps you level out those types of, um, just what you think that your book is going to sell. So tell us a little bit more about not just, you know, competitive titles but— and copy. What do you do in terms of getting in? What's the best approach of putting together content without having to put together a book? Because I know that for nonfiction, we don't want to see that, right?

Right. I don't want to read your whole book. I just want to see your proposal. And here's why: because when you come in with a really great nonfiction idea, you kind of have to have a roadmap, be open to suggestions. So it's different from fiction. Fiction has a very specific storyline and narrative that it follows. The story is the story in fiction, period. Other things can be tweaked— character development and, you know, slight plot twists and rising actions— those can be tweaked in fiction. So that's a different animal. But in nonfiction, sometimes your idea is really broad and your editor is going to help you narrow it, or your editor might help you think of a different avenue to take that particular topic. So that's why we don't want you to waste your time writing a full nonfiction book first. We want the general gist of it. We want the roadmap. We want the idea. So, what I always tell folks when I'm working with them on proposals is, give me that. Start with your table of contents. Like, what are your high-level ideas? What are maybe the top 10 things you want to say? Because most books in, you know, in some of these nonfiction categories you and I work in have about— that's a good medium for chapters. Like, you know, they don't have just 3 or 4 chapters. They don't have 50 chapters. Between 10 and I would say 12 is a good solid place to start. So think about what those ideas are. What is your main thesis, so to speak? We can go back to freshman comp class, right? And say, what is your thesis? What are the 3 or 4 main claims that you want to make about it? That is how you build a table of contents. So that is the first thing you want to think about on just like the writing piece of it. And then I think you want to go into really nice chapter descriptions. So maybe a paragraph or two telling the editor what each chapter is about. How it ties into the rest of the book. That's all I need to know about the content, really. Everything else in the proposal is marketing-based, right? I mean, that's— at least that's the way I view it.

Yes, I think, you know, again, going back to the competitive titles and the competitive authors, where are those authors? Where are you in terms of platform and in terms of where you're speaking to an audience? Thinking about those things is really key, and making sure that, you know, your audience is aligning with those like audiences, even though they're exactly the same because we don't want it to be exactly the same. You know, you have your own personal story, you have your own personal narrative, you have your own personal flair, and we want to see that. You know, there's, there's one of the things that I've always thought about in, in terms of book publishing, especially in business nonfiction, is there's nothing new under the sun. It's just a matter of how you tell your story and, you know, what your background is and why you can identify to those people. I think that's really, really important in terms of making sure that you give the publisher what they're looking for. Another big thing that I would absolutely recommend doing is don't start marketing the book or yourself or the topic once you've actually gotten a book deal. Start marketing that book idea now, because I, as a, you know, looking at a book proposal, I want to see what you're doing now in terms of marketability for yourself and the topic. Are you already talking about the topic? Even if it's just a weekly webinar or a weekly Facebook Live, that's enough to kind of get the ball rolling because then, you know, you never know who can, who can pick it up. But once you're actually doing the marketing halfway through the book's development, editing, I think that is a, that's a mistake unless you're, unless you're, you know, Brian Tracy. And I'm, I just have Brian Tracy on my mind today.

You do?

Reese Witherspoon. You know, you can, you can market a book anytime you want. But however, you know, most of the people that we work with, going back to the idea of developing Broad Book Group to work with marginalized voices and people's stories who we weren't able to actually produce and get out into the world because of these reasons, we definitely want to make sure that those things are front and center. So we want to make sure that you're already doing that. You know, they say that an audience is great, a platform is great, and you can have a million followers, but if they're not engaged with you, that's a problem. So make sure that you're working on that. And I always tell my authors, well, what are you, you know, what are you doing in terms of engagement? And it's like, oh, I have, you know, 1,000 people on my newsletter. Great. How often do you reach out to them? And most of the time it's not often. So that's, you know, get into the habit of doing that now and making sure that you have those receipts to back it up. And I think that that's really important.

Absolutely. And I think that's another way that you can also kind of prove out some of the major concepts in your book. So, you know, you, you're growing the platform, that's the marketing piece, but use it editorially as well. When you're getting out there and doing those Facebook Lives or you're doing something on Instagram, test out topics, see what kind of engagement you get from those topics. That doesn't mean you should write your whole book based on social proof, right? But it's a good thing to kind of pay attention to, like, oh hey, topic A that I covered last week, topic A got me 100 new views that I didn't have before, whereas maybe topic B just kind of fell flat and it didn't really resonate with people. So those are good things for you to know, kind of develop the, the writer side of the, of the proposal too.

Yeah, I know, that's a great idea. There's a lot of content out there, and we were talking about this earlier, there's a lot of content that starts off as a blog or a zine that really does get great reception from that niche audience that ends up turning into something that's valuable and something that can reach a larger audience outside of that niche. And we were talking about, you know, into going back into this whole production companies being sold, is it all starts with just this tiny little idea. And, you know, there may not be money in that zine, there may not be money in that article that you wrote, but the money is in selling the bigger idea. And I think that that's really important. So Jen, is there anything that we can deliver to our audience that will help them prepare their book proposal?

Oh, absolutely. As it turns out, we're going to have a course about this. I'm so excited about it. We're going to launch it later this month, Writing a Winning Book Proposal, and I am stoked. We're going to walk people through every single bit of how to do your book proposal. We're going to help you, you know, write it and plan it and do all the things that you need to do to make it just shine for agents and for editors who want to take a look at it. So pay attention to our site. We're going to have a place where you can go online and go ahead and order that and pre-order and get in the queue so that we can have a really great cohort for this particular course. I'm excited for it.

I'm excited too. And this is one of, I believe, a mini series of courses that we're planning on releasing to help you out and figure out whether or not you're ready to write the book, ready to write the proposal, ready to market the book. So this is going to be really exciting. It It's definitely going to tend to be, you know, something that you work on at your own pace. So that tends to be the case in writing a book, working on your own pace. I know that you and I have been talking about writing books, and it's definitely one of those things where you have to be kind to yourself. So we understand that. But yes, definitely, for more information, please visit our website, www.broadbookgroup.com. You'll learn more about it by signing up on our newsletter.

Oh, we can't wait to have everybody, and hopefully this will be the first of many, many courses where we can hold your hand a little bit and give you that cheerleading squad that you need to help you get your publishing dreams in action, get in motion.

Absolutely.

I'm stoked.

Well, that's it for us today. Um, again, thank you all for listening to us. If you want to hear more about us, visit us on Stitcher, listen to the Pub Day podcast, A big thank you to Paul Roberts of OC Talk Radio for being our producer, and Emily Carpenter Polskamp for being our executive producer. Thank you very much, Jen, for joining me this week and talking a little bit more about news and publishing.

Uh, thank you, ma'am. I will see you next time. Have a great week, everybody. Bye-bye.

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