800 CEO Read Author Blog

Sure, the idea is the key element to your writing, but stating it clearly and interestingly, while writing it in a grammatical style that matches your genius, is important.  Even if you have an editor, the better you write initially, the more time, energy, and (likely) money you’ll save in the long run.

Smashing Magazine has gathered 50 resources for better writing, including copywriting, dictionaries, references, punctuation and grammar guides, and more.

Next week, I am going to be in Washington D.C. speaking to author co-op at Berrett-Koehler. They asked to put together a talk on the things we have learned over the years in working with hundreds of business book authors and our most recent experience of becoming authors ourselves.

I don’t think very well in PowerPoint world, so I am going to be speaking from a MindMap.

On the right you will see a Knowledge/Skills/Attitudes model I have been working on and on the left is the metaphors I am going to use in the talk.  My ideas are still gelling, so there may be some additions after the talk.

After the event, I’ll come back with longer post, a slidehare, or something to share.

“You can have the greatest book in the world, but if people don’t know about it, nobody will read it.” – Logan and Noah Miller

You might not recognize the names of Logan and Noah Miller, and that’s exactly the point.  They made both a film (Touching Home) and a book (Either You’re In or You’re In the Way) with no previous experience doing either.  They did not have a “built-in audience” of people who had been hearing them speak, visiting their blog, etc.  Yet somehow, the book got picked up by HarperCollins, and when they asked their editor how they could get the book on the best-seller list, the editor told them they needed pre-sales.

With no audience, how could they get pre-sales?  Family? Friends? Not nearly enough, even if each of their family and friends told all of their friends.  They needed something big to happen, and happen quickly.

What would you do in this situation?

To read about what they did, check out their story at Publisher’s Weekly.  Great stuff.

“most lengthy business books don’t have much of an engaging story to tell at all”
This is a quote from a recent post by Joe Wikert about the future of business books as a format for content. He argues that a lot of business books contain a lot of filler, and could be condensed down to 30-40 pages and still get the main points across. Combine this shortened version with digital, and you have something that Wikert calls a new product model that we might just see moving forward.
But let’s go back to the quote I posted up top. Is this true? If the “filler” stories are bad, then might the whole concept be too? This leaves me to wonder about the totality of an idea. If an idea is good, it should be good for 30, 40 or 300 pages in the hands of a smart thinker, good writer, and skilled editor. Wikert is definitely on to something, but there is also something to be said within this discussion about refining the quality of what is published, as well as how it’s published.

It’s probably worth considering, that if you write business books, you should read the the most well-written ones. Not for content’s sake, but for the writing itself. Jack Covert and Todd Sattersten, if you didn’t know, have created such a resource for you. It’s called The 100 Best Business Books of All Time. Again, for this purpose, don’t think so much about the content, but the craft. Jack and Todd certainly made their selections based on content, but that wasn’t the only criteria.
Readability was an important factor of choosing which books would be included. There are great, long books that weren’t included because it’s unlikely people would read them. Does this sound like your book? Instead, they chose books that would be easy to digest and put into action with sound theory behind them. Take a look at their list, read those books, and use that as inspiration to make your writing even better.

According to David Meerman Scott, author of World Wide Rave, there are a few tips to get the attention of publishers: building a platform via the web, funneling your content into different channels, and more. David has lived what he preaches. Check out what he says in this video below:

Obviously, there’s a lot that goes into making a book a reality. The idea gets developed, discussed, written, and published. Likely, there’s also some sort of marketing strategy put into place both individually and with the publisher. And with the economy and instability of the paper publishing industry, that strategy (and even the momentum that exists pre-strategy) is very important to any publisher an author might work with.
Jesse Kornbluth has an interesting take on this in the recent edition of Publisher’s Weekly. He believes that the book should come last, meaning that the idea should launch online with all sorts of marketing surrounding it.
The benefits of this?
He states, “…the community interaction on the Web site will strengthen the content, serving as a kind of pre-edit. Later, when the book is published, it enters the marketplace with a ready-made audience of buyers and buzzers.”
He goes on to talk about how publishers need to shift their focus to be in the intellectual property and content business, not just the book business. In his opinion, publishers should not only embrace and encourage authors focusing on their idea within the web, they should help support it.
It’s an interesting stance, but leaves me to wonder that if this approach works, and works well, why might the book even have a place in line at all?

If you’ve written a book, you’ve likely talked to many people about your idea. In fact, it might be ALL you talked about for quite some time. Then, when the opportunity arose to speak to an audience about your idea, you probably thought, “piece of cake!” and then found out, not so!

Just as there is good writing and bad writing, so is the case with speaking, and worse yet, if it is bad, you’re actually standing in front of the audience. So, best to be prepared.

Jane Atkinson has been helping people with this very issue for 18 years, and she’s got some great ideas to help authors make a successful transition to public speaking. She is also the author of the book Wealthy Speaker.

I had the opportunity to ask Jane a couple questions I figured readers of this blog would be interested in:

What is the main reason clients come to you, and what is the biggest lesson they learn once they start working with you?

The biggest reason people come for coaching is because they know how to speak, but they have no idea how to position or market themselves. We work through the Ready, Aim, Fire process.

Ready, is getting crystal clear on what we’re selling;
Aim, is moving that message (with a clear promise) into our marketing and
Fire is rolling it out to the marketplace.

Funny thing is that many people will already be at the Fire stage, but aren’t at all clear in what they are selling. The biggest lesson I’d say for most, is around the clarity of the promise. It’s not uncommon for any business to lack a focused tag line that allows people to immediately see the value, the WIIFM.

Your blog talks about a “t-shirt test” and creating memorable statements in a speech. How do you help clients develop these kinds of statements and what other kinds of opportunities do you see these kinds of statements leading to?

I originally heard about the idea of a through-line or call back from the comedy world. Some comedians use it brilliantly, like Larry the Cable Guy’s “Git-R-Done”. In speaking, it’s a phrase that you plant at the beginning of the presentation and then reinforce throughout the speech. By the time the end of the presentation comes, people are saying it with you. Ideally it has such impact that months or years later, they are still repeating it in the board room. Of course you want it to be brief and meaningful and a key question to help develop that is “will this look good on a t-shirt?” If it’s not pithy enough, of course it won’t.

My buddy Joe Calloway (author of Becoming a Category of One) once gave a speech to a group of speakers and told them that if they wanted to move forward in their business, they had to let some stuff go. The phrase “let it go” was introduced and reinforced so much that the term took hold and was still being brought up amongst speakers several years later. And, it passed the t-shirt test.

These phrases can become a brand that you are known for. Years down the road, someone might say “let’s get that Purple Cow guy to speak at our conference” and everyone will know that they are talking about Seth Godin. Having anything that is memorable can only increase business and will also lead to some nice ancillary product sales.

How does public speaking connect with social media?

Well the idea of a great keynote (or seminar) is that it has a great message. And social media is all about spreading messages. Most speakers who are thriving today, are doing it with the help of technology. Spreading their ideas virally which then leads to more books being sold and more speeches being booked. Your business model can include a waterfall type chart that allows you to see how your leads flow through to become business and social media can be a huge feeder right near the top of the falls.

If you use all of the medias, ie: blogs, linkedin, podcasts and e-mail blasts wisely, with a focused message, you can become know to your followers for one thing. And when the need for your expertise arises, you’ll be top of mind for that follower who is the decision maker.

Describe how a great idea can be lost on a poor speech.

With blackberry’s poised in every audience member’s palm, the tweets can spread fast and furious. A bad speech can set your career back in a big way. I’ll give you a short list of no no’s:

- Don’t open with I’m glad to be here in (vegas, wherever). We all know where we are, just get to it. Open with a story.

- Many people spend a good portion of time “teaching” rather than telling stories. Stories paint mental pictures for your audience, use the point-story-point format and you’ll be remembered more readily.

- Use stories that are unique to you. Draw ideas from your own business or life and that way you know they are original.

- The joke in our industry is 3 points and a poem. You don’t need the poem, but 3 points is about right for a one hour speech. You should be dealing in high level ideas not lists of 50 ideas.

- And for goodness sakes, plan a good closing story. One that ties things nicely together and leaves your audience feeling complete.

There’s a lot of talk about authors having to “do it themselves.” If that’s the case, what can all these other things (publishers, speaker’s bureaus, publicists, etc.) do for them? How does a great speech help both the author, and their dealings with some of these other entities?

The speaking industry isn’t quite as dysfunctional as the book industry in that there aren’t nearly as many people trying to get a piece of the pie. That said, it’s very similar when it comes to marketing and promotion. If you want your speaking business to get off of the ground, in most circumstances, you are going to have to do it yourself. Sorry.

An exception might be a best-selling author who gets picked up by a bureau as an exclusive. Of course if your book does a good enough job, then the calls should be coming in for presentations. Hiring a publicist will work on both the book and speaking front, but there are few publicity firms who “get” the speaking business and how to achieve bookings. Check their speaker references. I typically recommend that speakers work the business themselves for a year before handing over the duties to someone else. That way they can train their agents/publicists/employees properly on how to sell.

More helpful information on speaking and about Jane Atkinson can be found at her site:www.speakerlauncher.com

Sure, it’s yet another page to enter info on, but the FiledBy site is growing, and there’s a lot of authors you’ll recognize there. It takes seconds, and it’s a great place to have a profile if you’ve got a book out. With reader reviews and comments, it’s a great place to connect with an audience and see what people have to say about your idea.

I added Jack Covert there today. Hopefully some new people will find him there and check out the book.