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Lessons from Publishing My First Book (with Ken Hannaman) · The Daily Writer

• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Hey my friend, welcome to this special Saturday edition of the Daily Rider Podcast.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Each weekday, we bring you a short lesson that helps you live out the four practices of a successful writer: creativity, consistency, courage, and connection.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: Here on the weekend edition, we take a deeper dive into those topics through conversations with writers and teaching that helps us apply what we're learning.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: For more, you can visit us at DailyRiderLife.com.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: Well, if you've listened to this podcast for any length of time, you know that we talk a lot about writing books around here.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: But if you've never done it before, writing your first book can feel pretty intimidating.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I'm thrilled to feature this conversation with my good friend Ken Hanneman.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: Ken is a possibility mindset coach who has a never-ending thirst for knowledge and personal self-discovery.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Ken is an executive in the corporate space and has just written and published his first book, which is titled Ungraduated, Finding Your Why, and Dropping Out of Outdated Belief Systems.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: Ken is also the host of the excellent podcast, Ungraduated Living and Learning, which I highly recommend, and you can find links to both his book, podcast, and more in the show notes, by the way.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: Ken is one of the most driven, thoughtful, yet kind, and curious people I know.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: Through his leadership experience as well as his personal learning, he's gained the perspective that while formal education is necessary for some basic life skills, what we all really need is personal and self-driven learning.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: He believes that we often need to ungraduate, quote unquote, from the old school of thought that has been socially programmed into our mindset.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: Kim is also part of our daily writer community, and it's been a blast seeing his book come together over the last year or so.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: In this conversation, Kim shares why he wrote the book, the biggest challenges he faced, how he formed his launch team, and he also gives some advice for authors.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: As a bonus, we also get into some topics from his book, including labels, personal abundance, and personal growth.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: Now I gotta tell you, Ken is a master thinker, and I highly encourage you to get his book if you want to be challenged in your thinking.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: And I say, hey, if you're not up for a good challenge in your thinking, then what's the kind of what's the point of existing?
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think we all should, if we're growing in our writing and our creativity and our our business skills, if we're growing in life, we should want those challenges.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: And Ken's book is a really, really phenomenal tool to help you to grow.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: Now, before we get to the conversation, I also want to say that this was actually a training session that we did for our daily writer community.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: Ken came into our group, and actually Ken is a part of our group, but he came in as our guest expert for this particular call a few weeks ago, and he did this session for us.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: So what you're hearing on this podcast episode is the first basically the first half of that training call.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: And oftentimes we do this here on the podcast.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: I feature training calls from our daily writer community where we have the guest expert come in, they do a presentation or I do kind of an interview with them.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: Then the second half of the call is basically our QA.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: So if you'd like to hear the QA sessions from these calls, make sure to join the Daily Rider community.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: I promise you will not be sorry that you did.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: You can find out more at dailyriderlife.com slash community.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: All right, my friends, with that said, let's get to the interview with my good friend, Ken Hanneman.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: So, Ken, welcome.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for doing this.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_03: Happy to.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_03: And I I just want to first, I guess, say thank you for having me, but I really am excited to get back into the community because I've not been as active as I would like to be.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_03: The calls changing from Tuesday or sorry, from Thursdays to Wednesdays.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_03: Now that the book launch is done, like I got no problem pulling aside from a restaurant how I did today to jump these calls.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_03: The time at lunch is usually challenging, but I can always make it work now that they're not on Thursday.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_03: So I intend to get back into the community and be a part of this a lot more because I intend to write a lot more and uh to do multiple books and blog posts and all the things that I've learned so much from this community as I'm joining a year or so ago.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_03: So I know some of the newer members here might not know a whole lot about me, but I was the guy who binged every single one of Kent's podcast episodes.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_03: It blew his mind.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_03: He couldn't believe that I did it.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_03: I had so much to learn.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: You you listen to literally every single episode?
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, not up until the most recent point, but I say from the time you launched your your podcast, I went from in 2017, I think, whenever you started it, when it was the the uh creative, I forget what you were calling it, but I just needed to learn.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_03: I forget I wanted to write a book, and it wasn't just about writing, it was you know the website creation, the blogging, and you know, how to do some IT stuff.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_03: We just had a lot of good knowledge, and that's why I love being a part of these communities, and I'm looking forward to getting to know, even though I've been here for a year, um, been a been a little bit sidetracked with a few things, but all good, purposeful things.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_03: So I'm happy to be here.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_03: So thanks for having me.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I can't decide whether to send you an award or the number for my therapist for listening to all my podcast episodes.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: Anybody who has to be subjected to my voice for that many hours uh deserves something.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure what.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_03: So you know you have a wonderful, soothing voice.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_03: I've listened to you every morning on my workout routines, and I actually enjoyed it.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm just gonna start saying, write that happy little book.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm gonna channel Bob Ross.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: Go to that place, go to that special place in your heart.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: So let's uh let me ask this question first of all, Ken.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: Now that the book has been out for I think is it three weeks?
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, it is three weeks.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: What does it feel like to have to have written and published a book?
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: What does it feel like on that that kind of that far end of the process now that it's out there into the world?
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_03: It feels a little for one, it's pretty cool.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_03: It's awesome, but it feels a little bit unique and funny.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_03: I didn't know what to expect.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_03: My honest to goodness, like I try to not limit my thinking, what the whole book's about, quite frankly.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_03: So I always taught myself, don't think small, think big, because it will be big if you bring in the action and take the the appropriate steps.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_03: But I kept telling myself, man, you know, I'm probably gonna put a book out there, maybe a few people read it.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_03: It's more of a personal objective.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_03: I'd go back and forth between it's gonna be a big thing or hey, I don't have any expectations.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_03: So I didn't know.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_03: I kind of just put it out out there that I'm gonna make it the best I can be and just stop judging myself.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_03: But as it's happened now, the attention that I have gotten, surprisingly, and you know, it's been kind of overwhelming in a good way.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_03: Like I had some meetings with Arby's recently, and my company's been so supportive and great with being cool with what I'm doing, and you know, I'm not putting their name on it.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_03: So my COO who I report to was at one of my meetings last week and um behind my back, without my knowing, bought 200 copies of the book.
• 6:53
  unknown: Wow.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_03: Um, put them in everyone's uh souvenir bags, and before I know it, there's 40 people standing waiting for me to sign their book.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, this is not what I expected at all because I'm a pretty humble person.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_03: I I love to talk and present and coach, and that's what I've done for 20 years.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_03: But as a published author, I don't want people feeling like I'm some special person because I'm just an average guy who's figured out how to push past barriers and try to achieve things in life.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_03: So I don't want people to put me on a pedestal.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_03: I recognize the moment, I'm very thrilled and proud of it.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_03: I don't want to discount that, but it's been unique in people seeing me as an author and wanting to read your work.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_03: That's probably the biggest takeaway.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_03: I've already had numerous emails, numerous texts, hundreds probably of wow, this is really good.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_03: Couldn't put it down.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_03: And um, thankfully, I had a pretty darn good editor who helped me with that entire book.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, who who might that editor have been?
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: I wonder if you're gonna be a good one.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_03: Well, you know, the one only.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Jennifer Harshman, she's been fantastic.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_03: And from our first time of meeting her, um, and walking me through the beginning phase to where the actual launch occurred, it's been quite a journey.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_03: But um I can't over-emphasize whether she was here or not, whether she was a part of this group or not, that that get a good editor aspect is super, super important.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_03: I have yet to, Jennifer, but I'm going to pull out my manuscript and just kind of look back from what I turned in to what's there.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_03: It's my words, but it just is put together more balanced in the story and how it flows.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_03: And as a first-time author, I'm so thankful that I found a good editor who was able to kind of take my knowledge and my story and put it all together that in a way that made sense and made the reader engaged.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_03: So it's been fun.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: What have been some of the biggest what were some of the biggest challenges in getting your first draft done?
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: I think this is a this is a point of friction that a lot of writers have.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I've got I have a coaching client right now who they're kind of stuck in the middle of their draft, and I'm I'm doing everything I can to try and motivate them to really push through.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: When you were writing the first draft of this, what were some of the the challenges that you had in actually getting it done?
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: And how did you address those things?
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: Because I was obviously you did get it done.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and at some point I had to just kind of go with it.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_03: And those double questions and doubts, and I think it's imposter syndrome.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_03: The first time that you do this, we all talk about imposter syndrome.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_03: I know I've been in the leadership corporate world for a while.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_03: I've read hundreds of leadership slash philosophy life books, and I'm comparing what I'm doing to what everybody else is doing and trying so hard to scrutinize.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_03: For me, it wasn't hard to write the material.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_03: It was trusting that, hey, if you trust your editor and you believe that they're gonna do the right thing for you, it will come together how it needs to come together.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_03: And it's not gonna be like anybody else's stuff, it's not meant to be, it's your stuff.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_03: And I think for me, that was the hardest part was at some point I just decided I'm doing this regardless.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_03: And I want to be the best that I can possibly have it, but quit comparing myself to, you know, I'm no Tony Robbins, I'm not trying to be Tony Robbins, uh, I'm Ken Hanneman, and I have my own story to tell, and however the book comes out will be the best, you know, representation that I can possibly have of it.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_03: And it was just pushing past that doubt and second guessing because I could have said, Well, I gotta rewrite that part, or I gotta rephrase this or redo that.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_03: That's the editor's job.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_03: And thankfully, you know, if you have a good editor, they help you with that process.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_03: So at some point, I just made peace with it and said I'm putting that to the world and letting it go where it's supposed to go.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_03: And that was the biggest hardest part for me.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_03: It was just trying to overthink things and be overcritical.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_03: And I I had the knowledge, writing wasn't the hard part.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_03: You know, getting a routine down kind of helped, and I learned that from you.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_03: It wasn't always every day for me, 30 minutes.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_03: You know, I would try that for a while, it would work, and then I'd I'd have a Saturday or a Sunday where it'd be three hours from nine to noon, but I knew I was gonna do it.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_03: So writing a book took about four or five months and uh had up to about 55,000 words.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_03: It's about what I turned it into with uh Jennifer.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not sure what the final count ended up being, but 201 pages.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_03: So it's kind of right what I was shooting for that 200 or less mark.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_00: And you outlined the whole book before you started writing, correct?
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like, did you have a really specific idea of the main things that you wanted to cover in each chapter before you started writing, or did you kind of figure that out as you went?
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I definitely did an outline and it helped me frame up the structure for how I wanted to tell the story.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_03: But if I look back at it, it probably didn't end up being exactly how I thought it would.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_03: But whatever helps get you across the finish line, I think that's the important part is getting, as as Kent, you've always said, get to the finished manuscript, and then it can go through a few more revisions and you know, final changes.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_03: The important thing is to actually have something written that that can be edited.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_03: So I don't think my outline where I began, it might be 50% of what it ended up being, but the message for sure was was what I wanted at the end.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_03: But the outline helped me get the confidence to start, and then turning it over to Jennifer and her team and seeing them take it from what it was to where it ended up being was very rewarding.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_03: I started to feel better.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_03: Once I turned that in, there's that moment of all right, someone else is gonna read this.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_03: Uh here goes nothing.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_03: And and then as I as I as I got that first revision, I'm like, wow, this is even better.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_03: I love this.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, now I'm excited.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_03: Let's keep going with the process.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: How did you how did you stop yourself from rewriting or getting stuck rewriting and revising as you were going through the first draft?
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: That's something.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: So I'll confess here, uh, we don't need a show of hands, or maybe we do.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but some of us here on this call are recovering perfectionists, and we really want things to be perfect, but that's what prevents us from getting that first draft done.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: Ken, how did you stop yourself from getting bogged down in revisions and rewrites as you were doing your first draft?
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_03: So I guess part of the benefit that I share in this is that my my mind's not too wired that way.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_03: It used to be, and I've had to kind of reprogram that perfection aspect.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_03: And now I've almost kind of done a 180 to where what I say is I do a lot of that shoot, shoot, shoot, and then aim.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_03: But at least I'm taking shots, meaning that I'm looking, I'm taking action versus inaction.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_03: So in overthinking things, I just decided that hey, let the editor find the right way to say this.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_03: And even if it didn't sound right to me, Jennifer was able to, or whoever on her team was able to look at it and say, Yeah, let's go ahead and rephrase that.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_03: And I got to approve everything that she sent to me.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_03: So it was the understanding of even if I think that this sounds the best, getting somebody else's perspective who's who's edited a lot of books and knows how it can sound, I'm gonna entrust that person.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_03: I do think the trust aspect is important.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_03: So I would advise, I mean, it's been nice for me that I knew Jennifer, I knew enough of her to give her the trust, but I'd get to know whoever you're gonna work with first, whoever that editor is, is build a relationship, build a report, read some of their work that they've done.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_03: You know, I knew Jennifer edited Tommy Breedlow's book, and he and I became friends and mentors, and you know, he's a mentor for me.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_03: So I read Legendary.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, okay, um, if if this can be half as good as my, or if my book can be half as good as his, I'm gonna be happy.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_03: So I said my message, I put it out there as well as I could, and then I just didn't really think much about it.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_03: I let the editor do the rest of the work.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: I want to ask a question about your launch, and then I want to dive into a couple of questions about the book itself, because the the book itself reflects a lot of lessons that you were using as to help you write the book.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: So it was kind of very meta in in some ways.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but and then I want to open it up to some QA and so forth.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: But can you tell us about what you did for the launch?
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: Because I was really impressed with how many reviews and how how much attention that your book got when you launched.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: So I know you did a lot of of pre-work of pre-launch work before the actual book launch.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: So walk us through some of the things that you did to help you be successful with that.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so I took the the play script right out of Chandler Bolt's book, uh published.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, published is the title, Chandler Bolt.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_03: I think he has a new revision now, but the the one I had might be a year or two old.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_03: But he his big thing was you got to have a launch team, you know, whether it's 20 people, 50 people.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_03: I was able to get about 100 people, and I had I kind of had the hope that at least half of them, and it's gotten to that point, about about half have have actually written reviews.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_03: You just gotta kind of realize that everybody wants to help you.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_03: Your your circle wants to help you, they they they want to support life's gonna happen.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_03: So I knew if I had a hundred people, I'd be lucky probably if half were very engaged.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_03: And for the most part, I had half or more who were very engaged.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_03: So one of my biggest takeaways was I'm gonna have a launch team.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_03: So I've never been a big social media person, but as I've ventured into this entrepreneurial stuff and writing, I've gotten on social media, you know, mostly on Facebook and LinkedIn, um, Facebook and uh Instagram.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_03: I have LinkedIn for work mostly for my RB stuff, but I just put it out there.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_03: Hey, I'm you know, I'm writing a book, and I I I announced kind of like when I first finished halfway of my manuscript, put that out there.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_03: When I finished the uh manuscript, put it out there, and people began to kind of see what I was posting and talking about.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_03: So I asked people, hey, if you like the work or what I present, or if you just want to support me, I'm not making anyone do this, but let's I'd like to have a launch team that I can have some support with.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_03: And oh, by the way, you'll all be rewarded with a book personalized.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_03: I don't care how long it takes me to do 50 or 100 books to send people.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_03: It's it's it's worth my time to have that benefit of grassroots effort.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_03: And within that launch team, and if you read the book published by Chandler Bolt, it kind of goes through like a time frame, you know, of how to engage that launch team, what to ask of them, who within it might have some graphic art skills, who can create a one-page template for you that they can share on social media.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_03: So as the buildup happened, you know, we had a one-page bio that kind of highlighted the book.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_03: I was giving that out.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_03: They were starting to share it and kind of build a little bit of excitement.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_03: Anybody who knew Ken Hannon was like, wait a minute, this guy wrote a book.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_03: What's it about?
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe I'll check it out.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_03: So we had that couple week out buzz.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_03: And then at the at that launch point is whenever they're sharing it and you're asking people to try to do this.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_03: Not everybody did it, but for the most part, a lot of people did.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_03: So, you know, we all know that social media effect of you're one person.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_03: If you can get 50 times 50, you know, who knows whose networks?
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_03: A lot of people were like, hey, who's Ken Hanneman?
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_03: How many of this guy is?
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_03: But they at least saw that I wrote a book and kind of what it was about, and they didn't check it out.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe they did.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_03: But um, yeah, the asking of the of that launch team was meeting up, sharing, talking about it, having some graphics to put out, and then at launch week, downloading the book, writing a review.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_03: So my goal was that they all read those who were wanting to help.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_03: I asked that they read the book.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_03: So I had a PDF from Jennifer about a month out that I gave them in PDF format and said, Hey, let's go ahead and read this now.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_03: By the way, you're proofreading it.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_03: So if you see any mistakes or any issues, I got a great editor, but more eyes on it better than not.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_03: So I was keeping track of letting Jennifer know if I saw anything.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_03: They were getting a flavor for what the book is about.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_03: And um, those a lot of people who were really resonating with it and got more excited about wanting to share it.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_03: And again, it wasn't everybody, but when it came time for that launch week, the other tactic that the book uh published will talk about is do you do a free launch with a free download for a week?
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_03: Do you do a 99 cent launch?
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_03: You know, really for me, it wasn't about making any money.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_03: I know that if I make money off this one day, it'll come from speaking and different things.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_03: My goal isn't to get rich off the book, it's to one, help people from a mindset standpoint, and two, use it as a personal brand that will, at some point, if I wanted to, give me a platform for more.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_03: So I had that mindset, right?
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_03: So I was like, hey, free for the first week, free free Kindle download.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_03: Um, I even lowered my book price at launch and like one of the lowest points that Amazon would let it just for a little bit.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, you don't want to do that for too long, I think, because the book talks about hey, you know, you want to have value, and if it's too cheap, people might, you know, discredit it, but don't overprice it.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_03: So there's all these tactics that the book explains.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_03: I really can't recommend that book enough by Chandler Bolt.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_03: I kind of used his playbook.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_03: I did it free for a week.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_03: Um, and then I bumped it up after that.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_03: And the net net of all of this, it kind of blew my mind.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_03: I had a goal of a thousand books in the first week.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_03: He sold about 1200.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_03: Wow.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_03: And um, a lot of it was free downloads, a lot of it was you know minimum pricing.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_03: I just wanted to get the attention, what Chandler calls Amazon juice is what he calls it, because the algorithms work on how many books are bought in an hour in a day.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_03: And sure as heck, you know, I had this mental image of some kind of bestseller title.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_03: Like it doesn't, it doesn't matter per se from an egoic standpoint.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_03: I just know that you know you can get you can there's some kind of a stamp on that whenever you say something.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_03: And I had the number one new release in that two-week time in a pretty big category.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_03: You know, it was um self-development and new age religion, I think was the cat in books like Eckhart Tolli Power of Now, some big name people are in that category.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_03: So it was only a new release, number one bestseller, you know.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_03: But I I learned all those rankings and how that works and was able to kind of capture a few snapshots of the of the images that I then gave the launch team and let them share that again.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_03: It caught some more attention and we were able to sell, like I said, 1200 books.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_03: And um, you know, we'll see what the book does the the whole rest of the year.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_03: I'm gonna probably put some marketing dollars behind it and try to keep things going.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_03: Um, but to start off with, I was thrilled to even be near a thousand, let alone over a thousand overall downloads, copies, purchases, so on and so forth.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: So all of the I need to review Chandler Bolt's book again.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um actually, it's so ironic you mentioned that because literally just two days ago, so I was listening to a couple of interviews on his podcast, actually.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, one of the people I interviewed was Rachel Richards, who some of you in this call know.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, she's been very successful with the books, and uh then a couple other interviews, but he mentioned that he has a new edition of that book out.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I bought it a couple days ago.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, are all these strategies outlined in his book?
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like all the Amazon stuff, and I know it's a very to a very fine degree, yes.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_03: It very states.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_03: And this was one of my learnings, and you know, I'll share this now.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_03: Like, I didn't know I didn't know that like when you hit publish on Amazon, that's the published date.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_03: Like, I wanted to see how uh how it would look, and I thought I didn't know it, I didn't read any.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_03: Or on Amazon, that like you can't take that down.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_03: Like it starts tracking like whenever you hit publish.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_03: So I was like going through like the previews and I could see all how the book was gonna look from a format standpoint.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_03: But as far as how it's listed on the site, you just don't see that until you hit publish.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_03: So you gotta be okay with don't worry about that.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_03: If your published launch date was for me, it was February 22nd.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_03: Like I think the actual published date on Amazon shows February 13th because I hit publish because I wanted to see it.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm really not concerned about the whole like bestseller title.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_03: I just wanted to make sure that it hit the big splash and it could, you know, catch some attention.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_03: So I had some some learning of you can check the images and they are finicky about the formatting and how it you can't have any kind of borders cut off.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_03: And Jennifer and I were going back and forth making it perfect, and we got it right, but I had already published it.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm like emailing Amazon, like take it down.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_03: They're like, Oh, we can't.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_03: You can take it offline, but that's your published date.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, ah well, whatever.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_03: You know, we just kind of rolled with it, and things all worked out, but that was one learning too, is that once you hit publish, that's your published date.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_03: So they say in the book, one to three days out, no sooner, no later.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_03: And I just there was so much going on, I really didn't think about it.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, I could take it down, I guess.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_03: And no, you can't.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: So I laughed a second ago because because uh that is so Amazon is you know, sometimes you have an urgent thing that you're gonna change on something, and Amazon's like, uh, we'll get around to when we get around to it, you know, their Amazon.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: But uh generally they're they're really, really good, good to authors.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_03: But yeah, he has every step like from like pre-launch to to launch week to post-launch outlined, and I followed it to a T.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_03: And I had the success.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_03: And it didn't, it didn't hurt in all honesty, um, that I have an Arby's following, and probably 90% of the people who know me at Arby's got the book.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_03: And I was a little bit weary of that because I'm like, it's not Arby's development stuff.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_03: There's some spirituality and some personal things and beliefs, and I was a little bit worried about how that might all be viewed, but thankfully it's all been highly supported.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_03: People are loving the fact that I did it.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_03: You know, even our my boss and the brand president's impressed, and I'm like, okay, it's all it's all worked out, but um yeah, I have a pretty big following at Arby's, and I've been here for 15 years and they all know me.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_03: Not everybody bought one, but it helped a lot that I had a pretty big circle, of course.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: Now, before we get into some QA, I want to ask a question about a theme that you touch on in several chapters of your book and graduated.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_00: And this is the theme of personal abundance, which I think is such a critical topic for we we authors.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: Is we authors correct, grammar?
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody correct me.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: Us authors, we, I don't know what it is.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_00: People here on this call who are writers and who will be listening in the future.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna say it like that.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_00: Very clunky English, but I'm not an English teacher, I guess.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: So so anyway, those of us who are writers sometimes really struggle with this idea of abundance and believing that that the best is out there for us to have and experience and to and to obtain.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_00: So, can you talk about that and how how we can have more of an abundance mindset whenever we're writing and launching our books?
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I I I love the topic and it it really is a mindset.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_03: A big part of the book, the whole underlying principle of the book is that we literally are creating our own lifestyles through daily choices and daily self-talk and worldview one day at a time.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_03: So as the days go on, the limiting beliefs, the fixed mindset stuff, the I'm not good enough, I don't have enough, I am lacking.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_03: It's a shift into look at all the greatness I do have.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_03: I am abundant, my life is full of abundance.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_03: It's shifting even on your worst moments.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_03: You probably in this country have it better than most in the world.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_03: Even in the turmoil that we're always going through, it seems like for the last couple years or more, we still have a lot of abundance around us.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_03: So I teach and talk a lot about from my own experiences, my early on part parts of my life where I was in a fixed mindset and used to lack and used to not having enough, you know, more money, met more problems, more money, money was root of all evil.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_03: And I was taught these things and started to believe them until some things started to change in my life, or I was able to analyze it from a more critical aspect and say, wait a minute, what beliefs have I been told about stuff that I need to explore and really dive deeper into?
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_03: And the abundance mindset is simply that it's a place of we always have enough like air, like it should never run out unless you're in a vacuum somewhere, and God forbid that happens to you, or an outer space without an oxygen mask on.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_03: But um, we have the ability to do anything that we want to, and it is a little bit of meta stuff, it is a little bit of um you know personal meditation, if you will, of just kind of reframing.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_03: But in terms of abundance, that mindset is seeing yourself now as the things you want to be.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_03: And that's the trick to it, I think, is that if you want more money, you have to think you have enough now.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_03: You can't be thinking, I don't have enough.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_03: And where it's not so meta, because there is a meta component to it.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_03: I do believe the thoughts are energy and they do begin to shape your life.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_03: But it could just be as simple as as you frame up your mindset, you choose to see things that you weren't seeing before.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_03: Kind of like the glass half full or glass half empty.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_03: You're a pessimist versus an optimist, you're gonna naturally see more positive things if you're an optimist or more negative things if you're a pessimist.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_03: So it may not be all thought energy and you know, thinking yourself in reality, but your actions are then backed up by how you view yourself.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_03: So, you know, I talked about in the book, the I'm too fat label.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_03: You know, I allowed myself to get up to about 252 pounds before I wrote the book.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, I know how to fix this.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_03: I gotta quit telling myself I'm fat because I back up those behaviors with eating ice cream too late or drinking too many sugary beverages.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_03: Like you reaffirm in your mindset the things that allow you to make excuses for where you think you are.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_03: If you're not abundant enough subconsciously, without you even knowing it sometimes, you take actions on things that warrant what you think you are.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_03: And in a book, I uh you know, I talk about the two most powerful words in the English language, I am, because what comes after it is what you're programming into your mindset every day.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_03: Even that that that's right, that self-taught critic in your mind.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_03: You've got to cancel it, catch it, and say, stop it.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_03: I am not those things, I am these things.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_03: And you begin to do that for that 21, 42, 63 days, you've reprogrammed your subconscious behavior to take more proper action for where you want to be.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_03: That's a long-winded way of saying abundance is there for all of us.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_03: We just we limit ourselves by our own thinking in a lot of ways, or the people who are around us, limit us, we don't always know that either.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_03: And that's the challenge of it is seeing where it's coming from and trying to, with love, separate it from the closeness of the people who are around you for family, but still trying to rise above um that piece, that mindset piece of wherever you're in lack, you got to get out of that lack mindset and more towards abundance.
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_03: So that's a long way to try to answer your question, Kent, but hopefully it gave some perspective.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, it's it's wonderful stuff.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: And for everybody who does not have a copy of the book yet, make sure and grab a copy of this.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's really, really good.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's challenging, and I love books that challenge me as opposed to just regurgitating things that I already know or or believe.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I love that.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_03: And the audio book just came out, Audible finally approved it.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_03: That was a whole process, too.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_03: But thank you for Rye.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_03: I think you gave the suggestion of Rye.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_03: Um, he's an audio guy, he does like voiceovers and stuff.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_03: He did a great job.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_03: Even though I have an amazing microphone at home, Audible has these very special set points for decibel levels to where it's not perfect.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_03: So specifically, yeah, he was able to take the take the uh recordings that I did and clean it all up.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_03: And Audible had a little bit back and forth with him and I, but it got approved.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_03: So so that's out there now, too.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_00: Perfect, perfect.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'm gonna use one of my Audible credits on that today.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_00: I've got to do that.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_03: I'm gonna try to.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_03: I've got some emails on promo codes and stuff like that.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_03: I just haven't had time to dig into it.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_03: When I can set up promo codes, I'll send it to the group so you so that you guys can get it for free.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_03: Um, because I want you if you wanted to get it.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_03: And if I can figure out how to do it sooner than later, I'll put that into the group and you guys can download it for free.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, I hope you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: As I'm sure that you saw in this interview, Ken is a really thoughtful and uh just encouraging and inspiring person.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say if I had to identify one takeaway from this one takeaway from this conversation, it would be this.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_00: You can do it.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_00: Writing a book is a planned out process.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: You can take it step by step and you can actually get it done.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_00: You really, really can.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: It has a great effect on your life and it has a great effect on people's lives whenever you put a book out into the world.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_00: So thanks, Ken, for taking time out to be our guest expert for this session in the Daily Writer community, and thanks for allowing me to share this here on the podcast.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: I want to encourage you to connect with Ken.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_00: You can go to ungraduated.com.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: You can also check out his Ungraduated Living and Learning podcast.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I also encourage you, most of all, to get his book, Ungraduated Finding Your Why and Dropping Out of Outdated Belief Systems.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: There'll be links to those things and also Ken's social links in the show notes.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much for listening to today's episode.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_00: I want to take a moment to let you know about our Daily Writer membership community.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: You know, one of the very best ways to develop better habits and impact more people's lives with your writing is to spend time around other successful writers.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're tired of feeling isolated and tasting success on your own, then I know you're gonna love the Daily Writer community.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: For years, I searched for the kind of writing community that I would want to join, but I could never find what I wanted, so I created my own.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_00: Some of the features include weekly writing sprints, monthly community calls, book discussions, calls with guest experts, and much more.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_00: For more info, you can visit dailywriterlife.comslash community.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks, and I'll see you tomorrow.