Latest / If I'm Being Honest: Straight Talk About Book Publishing & Promotion / How To Grow Your Reader Base With BookFunnel

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How To Grow Your Reader Base With BookFunnel · If I'm Being Honest: Straight Talk About Book Publishing & Promotion

0:10
Joel: Hey everybody, welcome to the If I'm Being Honest podcast.
0:15
Joel: My name is Joel Pitney.
0:16
Joel: I'm the host here, and I'm really psyched today to be talking to Jack Shilkaitis, who is uh who is a master of all things BookFunnel.
0:26
Joel: Um, for those of you who haven't heard of BookFunnel, uh uh it's uh it's a very cool company that I'm an that I've encountered at many different conferences.
0:35
Joel: Um that's where Jack and I met.
0:36
Joel: We met at the San Francisco Writers Conference.
0:38
Joel: Um Jack is the lead author support specialist, um, and he's also host of BookFunnels podcast and then their monthly seminars, which are called Book Funnel Live.
0:50
Joel: Uh and he is a prolific writer himself.
0:52
Joel: He's he's written over 30 books since 2012, all in the sh uh sci-fi genre.
0:56
Joel: So thanks for being on the show, Jack.
0:57
Joel: Yeah, thanks for having having me here, Joel.
1:00
Jack: It was it was a pleasure to get to meet you in at San Francisco.
1:03
Jack: I think we might have like bumped into each other uh a couple other times, but we get probably in Las Vegas and yes, other places, yeah.
1:11
Jack: Yes, and uh, but uh to get the chance to to chat with you and and get this whole thing set up.
1:16
Jack: I'm I'm happy to be here.
1:18
Jack: Great.
1:18
Joel: And so, you know, the theme of this show, if I'm being honest, is we're always looking for straight talk about book publishing and promotion.
1:25
Joel: And I could tell, you know, I've heard a lot of good things about book funnel, and I could tell from our conversations that that's kind of your thing too.
1:31
Joel: We actually sat on a panel together.
1:33
Joel: Um so I'd I thought it'd be great for us to talk a little bit about um book funnel today and to let listeners of our show um to know about this resource and this tool.
1:44
Joel: So um maybe we could just start off talking a little bit about Book Funnel.
1:48
Joel: What is it?
1:49
Jack: Yeah, yeah.
1:50
Jack: No, it's it's one of my favorite things to talk about.
1:52
Jack: So this is not going to be hard uh for me at all.
1:54
Jack: Good.
1:55
Jack: Uh, but for those, if you don't know what BookFunnel is, um we're a we're basically a uh a suite of tools that allow authors to deliver their digital books, ebooks, and audiobooks direct to their readers in a number of different ways.
2:12
Jack: So you can use our tools for a few different purposes, right?
2:16
Jack: Whatever your goals happen to be.
2:18
Jack: Uh for some authors, they're looking to build a mailing list, and that's like their main goal, especially if they're new, right?
2:24
Jack: That's what everybody is told.
2:26
Jack: You've got to build a mailing list.
2:27
Jack: BookFunnel has tools to help you with that.
2:30
Jack: Uh, if you're looking for reviews or to find arc readers, BookFunnel has tools to deliver arcs.
2:36
Jack: Also has some tools you can use to find those readers, really, once you build a newsletter.
2:41
Jack: And we have some advice on that as well.
2:44
Jack: Uh, and then for direct sales is another reason why authors would want to use a book funnel.
2:50
Jack: Not the only other reason, but uh, you know, if you're wanting to sell your books through your own Shopify store uh or other sales platforms, we integrate with those so you can sell your books on your website.
3:02
Jack: Instead of selling them exclusively on Amazon or Apple or elsewhere, you can make the biggest uh profit when you're selling direct.
3:11
Jack: Uh, but we also assist authors and have tools for delivering things like Kickstarters and uh rewards for Patreon and other ways that authors do that sort of direct-to-reader uh sort of thing as well.
3:24
Jack: So that's kind of the long and short of it.
3:27
Jack: We can really get into the weeds with all the little features that BookFunnel has, but uh whatever stage you're at in your author career, BookFunnel has tools for you that can help you uh facilitate whatever it is you're trying to do, reach those goals, essentially.
3:43
Joel: That's cool.
3:44
Joel: Well, so you know, back when I got my start in digital marketing, you know, in like when was that, like 2005 or something?
3:52
Joel: You know, funnel, the funnel has always been a key point in digital marketing, right?
3:58
Joel: What is how do you create a funnel?
3:59
Joel: How do you create a funnel?
4:00
Joel: And you in uh it's a cool idea, right?
4:03
Joel: Because a funnel, you think about the shape of a funnel, it's broad at the at the top, and then it gets narrower and narrower and narrower and narrower down till the bottom, right?
4:11
Joel: And so in digital marketing, a funnel is how do you cast a wide net to engage potential customers, which in the case of writers is people who might eventually buy books and then kind of cultivate them and bring them closer and closer until eventually they become a reader, right?
4:30
Joel: Yep.
4:30
Joel: Yep.
4:30
Joel: So how does book funnel?
4:34
Joel: I mean, you know, you talked about a lot of those things, but what's kind of like the bread and butter, like of a typical author using book funnel?
4:40
Jack: How does that work?
4:41
Jack: Yeah.
4:41
Jack: So let's get into that.
4:43
Jack: So uh the the bread and butter for most authors using book funnel are gonna be two of our features, which are landing pages.
4:50
Joel: Okay.
4:51
Jack: Book funnel allows you to create them really easily.
4:53
Jack: You can set up a book funnel landing page, like from the time like you you've created your account, you can have a landing page up and ready to go in less than 10 minutes.
5:01
Jack: Oh, that's great.
5:02
Jack: It's really quick and easy, customizable.
5:05
Jack: They look nice as well.
5:07
Jack: So you're not having to like tinker with some some uh landing page builder.
5:12
Jack: There's some great ones out there.
5:13
Jack: I've seen authors that have like beautiful author websites and and usually they have somebody else design that for them, but in certain contexts, you know, that's that's not always necessary or that's overkill.
5:25
Jack: And so book funnel makes it really easy for you to just create a landing page for a specific purpose.
5:29
Jack: Um, whether that's to collect emails for a reader magnet, that's one of the most common ways that authors use our landing pages.
5:36
Jack: The landing page shows the book cover, can show the description, whatever tagline or or or uh you know call to action you want to include on the landing page.
5:45
Jack: Like I said, it's customizable.
5:47
Jack: And then they can put in their name and email address and consent to join your mailing list in order to get that book, essentially to claim it.
5:56
Jack: BookFunnel also then handles the delivery.
5:58
Jack: So they download the files from us in that context.
6:01
Jack: Uh and then we also follow up on the back end to support them.
6:06
Jack: So if they have, pardon me, if they have trouble getting that file to their device because they will have to sideload it in some cases.
6:13
Jack: Like if they want to read it on their Kindle, they're gonna have to use send to Kindle.
6:17
Jack: Sometimes readers have trouble with that.
6:18
Jack: It's not very often, but when they do, our reader support team is there 365 days a year uh around the clock to help them with uh getting that book to their device and being able to open it and read it and access it.
6:31
Jack: So if you're worried about readers having trouble getting the book, we have kind of that insurance there for you on the back end.
6:38
Jack: Um now, a landing page to give away a reader magnet is a great way to build your newsletter.
6:45
Jack: Right.
6:46
Jack: But you have to get traffic to that landing page.
6:50
Jack: And there's lots of ways to do that.
6:52
Jack: Authors will put that landing page, like they'll link to it from their website, they'll link to it from social media if they're active there, or some authors will even run ads if that's in the cards for some of them, that they have the budget for that to run ads to a book funnel landing page.
7:06
Jack: It's a strategy that works, right?
7:08
Jack: But not everybody that doesn't work for everybody.
7:11
Jack: However, BookFunnel has a way for you right from your book funnel dashboard to get traffic to your landing pages to find readers in your genre.
7:20
Jack: And those are our group promotions.
7:22
Jack: Okay.
7:22
Jack: Group promotions are organized by book funnel authors like yourself, and so they will post a promo or organize it, as we say.
7:31
Jack: Uh, and then it goes live on the dashboard for all book funnel authors to browse.
7:35
Jack: Okay.
7:36
Jack: Each author who participates in the promo will throw a book in, right?
7:40
Jack: Maybe one, two, three books, depending on the requirements.
7:44
Jack: Uh, and all those books go on a bundle page.
7:47
Jack: And so when readers show up there, they get to browse all those books.
7:50
Jack: And they're gonna inevitably see yours and they're gonna click on it and this looks interesting, and they're gonna join your mailing list.
7:56
Jack: And they came from another author because each author participating has to share the promo with their newsletter.
8:04
Jack: So that's where the traffic comes from is readers who are already on other authors' mailing list and engaged in that way.
8:11
Jack: So you know you're finding readers who are interested in your genre and not just, you know, say a random list of people or anything like that.
8:20
Jack: Right.
8:21
Joel: So there's a lot, there's a lot to unpack there.
8:24
Jack: There was a lot, yeah.
8:25
Joel: So no, the the first thing it's cool, you know, when you said landing page, right?
8:29
Joel: We're we're talking about we're not necessarily creating a landing page just to promote the book, right?
8:33
Joel: The idea is you want to start broader, you want to give away something free in return for someone to join your email list so that you can start to cultivate them as a fan, right?
8:43
Joel: Exactly.
8:44
Joel: So those landing pages are really focused on a on a lead magnet.
8:48
Jack: Yes, primarily.
8:49
Jack: We have we have landing pages for different purposes.
8:52
Jack: So that would be our email collection page, which is uh which does what I described.
8:57
Jack: Yeah.
8:57
Jack: You could also connect that to your mailing list service with integrations.
9:02
Jack: So if you use something like MailerLite or MailChimp or Kit or what have you, you can have those connected.
9:07
Jack: So when they claim the book on BookFunnel, they automatically get added to your list.
9:12
Jack: That it can initiate an automation sequence or a welcome sequence, right?
9:17
Jack: To start nurturing them right off the bat.
9:19
Jack: So we work hand in hand with like a mailing list service uh like that.
9:24
Jack: But we also have landing pages for other purposes like our universal book links, where they're not downloading the book from BookFunnel, but rather you're linking to all the stores where the book is available, which is great.
9:37
Jack: That's useful primarily for like if you're if you're a wide author and your books are in lots of different stores.
9:43
Jack: You have one link to share with everybody, and then they can pick their store of their preference.
9:48
Jack: Or if your book isn't available available in multiple formats, so ebook, audio, physical, like paperback books, right?
9:55
Jack: Those those universal book links make it really easy to to share all of those links in one place that's also you know easy to navigate.
10:05
Joel: So you're really making you're kind of like a one-stop shop that gives you all the infrastructure to create a very simple turnkey reader magnet into actual reader solution.
10:18
Joel: Yes, exactly.
10:19
Joel: I love that.
10:20
Joel: So I want to let's talk about reader magnets, you know, because I think that I always encourage everyone to use a reader magnet.
10:27
Joel: So let's talk a little bit about what that is uh and why it's important.
10:32
Jack: Right, right.
10:32
Jack: No, a lot of authors, uh, for a lot of authors, a reader magnet is kind of an afterthought, I think.
10:38
Jack: And I know it was for me my my first um my first foray into uh self-publishing.
10:45
Jack: Yeah.
10:46
Jack: I had I had nine books written in a series before I even was like, oh yeah, I should have I I need a reader magnet.
10:52
Jack: Right.
10:52
Jack: Um so don't do what I did, right?
10:55
Jack: I I recommend your reader magnet if you're if you're starting a new series or you haven't watched yet, have that ready to go beforehand.
11:02
Jack: If you've already published a few books, it's not too late.
11:05
Jack: I'm not saying that, but yeah, reader magnet is very important.
11:08
Jack: And so this would this could be something like a short story, it could be a novella, it could even just be uh the length of a chapter.
11:17
Jack: It doesn't have to be really long.
11:19
Jack: Like most readers aren't expecting like a full novel, right?
11:22
Jack: Right.
11:23
Jack: Uh uh, there's maybe a little bit of genre expectations in some cases, like if your genre tends to lean towards like the higher word count, you know, you might want to do a novella uh because it gives it gives them something meatier, right?
11:37
Jack: If you're in like epic fantasy, for example, a novella is probably a a good suggestion.
11:43
Jack: Yeah.
11:43
Jack: And if you're in fiction, you're wanting to focus on introducing like the main character, introducing the stakes, introduce the setting, and in the same tell the same kind of story of what they're gonna get once they crack open book one.
11:58
Jack: Okay, so that there's kind of this nice continuity.
12:02
Jack: A lot of authors will do this as like a prequel, right?
12:05
Jack: This is these are the events that lead up to book one, and so there's kind of a natural momentum.
12:11
Jack: But reader magnets work in nonfiction as well.
12:14
Jack: And in fact, nonfiction authors, I like to say, have an advantage in this regard.
12:19
Jack: Pardon me, because there's so many different ways that a nonfiction author could package a reader magnet, uh, you could do it as a worksheet, you can do um like uh oh, there's all kinds of different things.
12:33
Jack: I'm not I can't even list them all because I'm not a nonfiction author myself, but you can introduce the problem that you're aiming to solve and maybe get which can be compelling in and of itself, and then that leads them into what you're offering next.
12:48
Jack: I know some authors will do like mini little case studies as well in nonfiction.
12:52
Jack: So for nonfiction authors, the strategy also works.
12:56
Jack: It's not just a fiction author thing.
12:59
Joel: No, it's great.
13:00
Joel: It's great.
13:01
Joel: No, and and uh I I it's such a great email building tool, you know.
13:06
Joel: And I think and I and I know it, you know, nonfiction and fiction are quite different in how you build your platform, right?
13:12
Joel: But um I find that fiction authors, absent a lead magnet, have a much harder time building a platform than a nonfiction author.
13:20
Joel: Because a non-fiction author can be giving all kinds of advice and different things.
13:23
Joel: Fiction author, you kind of just have your stories.
13:25
Joel: So it's a really great way to build an email list and a platform independent, um independent of your books.
13:33
Joel: So Yep.
13:34
Jack: Yep.
13:34
Jack: And for the nonfiction authors who do have a reader magnet, you're just adding it on.
13:38
Jack: It's just added value, right?
13:40
Jack: Yes.
13:40
Jack: For the right, if you if you set it up right.
13:43
Joel: So win-win.
13:44
Joel: So in terms of so you got the reader magnet, and you know, and I I know that you have you can you have some audience that you can bring within book funnel.
13:53
Joel: My guess is that's not the biggest thing.
13:55
Joel: And the what I book funnel is giving you the infrastructure to be able to build that funnel, but the main, but then it's up to you, the author, yeah, to go out with that mi lead magnet in place, with all the book funnel infrastructure that's going to take you from lead magnet to reader in place, all that.
14:14
Joel: You've got to go out and find readers.
14:16
Joel: You do.
14:17
Joel: Um how does what how have you seen that work most effectively with your book funnel um authors?
14:23
Jack: Yeah, yeah.
14:24
Jack: So there's there's there's a few stages that authors go through.
14:28
Jack: And book funnel promos are a great way to lay a foundation.
14:31
Jack: Um and then it kind of depends on your business model to some extent.
14:37
Jack: For a lot of authors that are focused on Amazon, right?
14:41
Jack: Uh, you're gonna be putting your books into Kindle Unlimited.
14:43
Jack: So having a dedicated reader magnet is essential, something that's not in Kindle Unlimited.
14:49
Jack: So you can you can make that wide.
14:51
Jack: You can also put it in BookFunnel, you can put it everywhere, and have a link to a secondary piece of content in it, right?
14:59
Jack: Uh having bonus chapters uh in your uh in your content, whether whether it's K U or wide, is also another way we've seen authors have a lot of success, especially as you're starting to see sales happen on platforms and you're starting to get some traction because then each book essentially has that little uh you know, handcrafted reader magnet at the end of it as they exit the book, which also gives you some interesting data if you have multiple reader magnets here, because you might have your prequel novella that's at at the top of the funnel, but then you have these little bonus chapters along the way.
15:40
Jack: And if you're keeping track of that in your mailing list, which you should be, right?
15:45
Jack: The book funnel has tools to help you do that as well.
15:48
Jack: Then you can see, okay, so this person got the bonus chapter from book one and two and three, and and you can start to see that read through and get some data on that as well, which is great.
16:00
Jack: Um, so yeah, bonus chapters are another great strategy for some authors, uh, especially authors doing direct sales.
16:07
Jack: Um, the ads route is kind of the direction that they tend to go, uh, obviously, because you know, when you're on Amazon or you're on any other retailer, they're gonna do a certain amount of pushing for you.
16:21
Jack: It's not not what it used to be, right?
16:23
Jack: But there's gonna be a certain amount of visibility you get by default.
16:26
Jack: When you're doing direct sales, it's all on you.
16:29
Jack: And so ads are absolutely essential when you're doing direct sales.
16:34
Jack: Uh uh for for I'm there's probably some authors out there I know.
16:38
Jack: In fact, there's some authors I know of that rely on different strategies and do direct sales, but but for the most part, that's what you're gonna be doing.
16:45
Jack: And you can use a reader magnet there in a number of ways too.
16:49
Jack: Sometimes it's it's easier to get them to say yes to the free book and then upsell them in that moment, or just the fact that when you're doing direct sales, you are also essentially collecting that information.
17:02
Jack: You're getting that reader's email through Shopify or or whatever platform you happen to be using.
17:08
Jack: And so you have the opportunity then to follow up with them and actually build your list as you're selling books.
17:15
Jack: Uh so it it direct sales kind of turns every book you're selling into a reader magnet in that sense, too.
17:22
Joel: They no, that makes sense, yeah.
17:24
Joel: So that's that's really cool.
17:26
Joel: I know one thing that we that we experiment a lot with is um most of our authors are not doing direct sales.
17:32
Joel: They're publishing through KDP and Spark in different places.
17:35
Joel: So you don't get the customer data directly.
17:37
Joel: Right.
17:37
Joel: So we'll run what we will often do is run a giveaway, especially if they're an author who's done a series.
17:43
Joel: We'll run a giveaway of the first book, and we make sure that on the last page of that ebook, we give away the ebook, right?
17:50
Joel: Yep.
17:51
Joel: After it says the end, there's a call to action with a download to you know for the read the reader magnet, because then that gives them an opportunity to either sell another book or um or get the customer's information right away.
18:04
Joel: And we have not integrated with BookFunnel, which is something I want to look into.
18:07
Jack: Yeah, yeah, for sure.
18:08
Jack: For sure.
18:09
Jack: No, yeah, it's it's it's kind of simple.
18:12
Jack: Um when you when you when you get down to brass tacks, you have to decide what what what business model you're gonna pursue.
18:19
Jack: Because it's not like, you know, man, 10 years ago there was one business model.
18:25
Jack: And now there's authors today who have proven that there are so many like just with TikTok and social media, and now we have direct sales, and we have we have authors that nobody's ever heard of making five and six figures on Patreon every month.
18:40
Jack: And right, like there's so many different ways to build a funnel and have so many different business models that work for authors now, that you kind of have to want to figure that out first.
18:49
Jack: I know for a lot of new authors, KU is kind of the the obvious choice, it's the most logical choice for a lot of new authors.
18:57
Jack: And I understand why.
18:59
Jack: Um, but regardless of where you are in your career, right, you want to build your funnel around that business model.
19:06
Jack: So if it's direct sales, okay, we're gonna be, we're gonna be probably running ads.
19:11
Jack: We're probably gonna want to have an option to give away that free book and then have a good welcome sequence on the back of that.
19:17
Jack: If we are focusing on KU, then the bonus chapter becomes essential, right?
19:22
Jack: Because you're gonna be sending people, you're gonna be sending traffic there and you want to catch them on the back end, right?
19:28
Jack: So I think you have to look at your business model first, but also be prepared for that to change down the road if you adjust.
19:37
Jack: Uh and book funnel, book funnel be there for you either way.
19:41
Joel: That's great.
19:42
Joel: That's cool.
19:43
Joel: Well, so one, you know, one thing I like to do, uh, you know, since this is if I'm being honest, um I always like to I always like to ask two things uh, you know, about this.
19:52
Joel: So one of them would be um, you know, if you're being honest, what do you think is the most if you if you had to point to one thing that you think is most important for an author to focus on.
20:03
Joel: Um and then we'll get to the second one after you answer that question.
20:07
Joel: Yeah.
20:07
Jack: Yeah.
20:08
Jack: So the most important thing, um and somebody has has probably heard this already.
20:14
Jack: So I'm not gonna be the first person to say this.
20:16
Jack: The most important thing I think you can do as an author is focus on writing your next book.
20:20
Jack: Right.
20:21
Jack: Um there's certain cases I know where an author writes, you know, they write one book and that's all they need to do for the rest of their life, right?
20:30
Jack: That happens.
20:31
Jack: Uh but there's a certain amount of momentum that you gain just psychologically even, uh, beyond like having the next book ready.
20:42
Jack: I've seen this for myself too.
20:44
Jack: If I'm actively working on my next book, I am more likely to send out my newsletter and engage with my readers there.
20:52
Jack: I'm more likely to post on social media because I feel like I've got this momentum going.
20:57
Jack: Like I'm gonna, I'm doing stuff, right?
20:59
Jack: It's uh it's uh on a psychological level.
21:02
Jack: Even if the progress I'm making is slow, even if I'm only writing like 500 words a day, uh, making that progress in that regard, you know, the things can get kind of clogged, right?
21:14
Joel: No, that's really interesting because usually I've never heard anyone quite I've I've heard many people talk about write their next book, but never quite like this, because I think a lot of people think of it as a zero-sum game.
21:25
Joel: They're like, well, if I'm gonna be working on my next book, I don't have any time to do marketing.
21:30
Joel: Or if I'm gonna go out there and do my marketing, then it'll take up all my creative time and I don't want to do that.
21:35
Joel: But what you're saying is that you actually the two actually work together.
21:38
Joel: I love that.
21:38
Joel: Yeah.
21:39
Jack: Yeah.
21:39
Jack: Well, it's it's the the fire that that fuels everything else, right?
21:43
Jack: So you you I try to keep that fire burning.
21:47
Jack: And I know when it's gone out, and there have been times where it has gone out, every everything else for me shuts down.
21:53
Jack: I know some authors can you they can step away from writing for longer periods of time and still market them.
21:59
Jack: Books and that's that's totally everybody's different.
22:02
Jack: I I I totally get that, totally acknowledge that.
22:05
Jack: But uh but yeah, you you you you you keep those those gears turning, and now it's now you have something to talk about, right?
22:14
Jack: You when you're coming to your newsletter, like, yeah, you know, this is what I've been working on this week.
22:18
Jack: And I myself have been dabbling with even releasing some of the things I've been writing as I'm writing them to my audience.
22:24
Jack: Oh, that's cool.
22:26
Jack: Which, oh no, it's very cool.
22:28
Jack: And and this is more on the author side rather than the the book funnel side, but I I use book funnel in tandem with this, of course.
22:35
Jack: Uh, but um, but it's very motivating.
22:38
Jack: It's kind of like you get a mini little launch, you know, two or three times a week when you release a new chapter.
22:44
Jack: And you release it to just a select group of fans.
22:47
Jack: It's not everybody, it's not out there for, you know, um, you know, people can find it.
22:52
Jack: Uh, but it it it makes it makes those those stepping stones.
22:56
Jack: So like, okay, I'm releasing this chapter this week and now I'm working on the next one, and it keeps me motivated and and also engaged and still marketing that.
23:05
Jack: And I'm also even getting like data right at the beginning, like, okay, this this book is like, or these, this, these first few chapters readers are really engaging with.
23:15
Jack: And that gives me ideas how I can promote the book later on down the line.
23:19
Jack: And you start working on all that stuff uh ahead of time or as the book is being written, instead of waiting to be done and then going, oh gosh, like how many, how many people have finished the book and be like, now I have to write a book description?
23:32
Jack: Now I have to write like a tagline and ad copy, and what was the book about again?
23:37
Joel: And you know, and then they just go to Chat GPT and have them do it for.
23:42
Joel: Yeah, yeah.
23:43
Joel: Interesting.
23:45
Joel: Well, so um, I want to ask you one more question, but I but uh I want to remind everybody uh if you if you enjoy this this interview with Jack and anything that we do on if I'm being honest, make sure to follow us.
23:57
Joel: Um subscribe, like, comment on all your we're on all the different social media platforms um our and uh podcasting platforms.
24:04
Joel: So uh it helps us reach other people who need help, and that's what we're here to do.
24:08
Joel: Um the last my last question is similar to the first one, which is you know, in the in the theme of honesty, um as as you know, being in the book world, there's a lot of dishonesty, there's a lot of there's a lot of false promises, there's a lot of inflated, you know, tactics, that kind of thing.
24:24
Joel: Yeah.
24:25
Joel: If you're being honest, what would you say is the most, I guess, uh over things that a lot of people say are important that you don't think are?
24:37
Jack: Just like in in the book industry.
24:39
Jack: Anything.
24:40
Joel: It could be anything.
24:41
Speaker 2: Oh man.
24:42
Joel: Something that you're hearing all the time that people are coming to you and saying, I gotta do this, I gotta do this, someone says I gotta do this, but actually you don't think it's that effective or it's not important.
24:52
Jack: Well so uh without intending to offend.
25:00
Jack: I want to preface it.
25:01
Jack: That's okay, it's a safe space.
25:03
Jack: Uh book launches.
25:05
Jack: But let me be clear, not right, specifically book launches, because I know that some authors the idea that you have to get it right the first time or it's all over, right?
25:14
Jack: You can relaunch your book.
25:17
Jack: Right?
25:18
Jack: You can you can come back to it years later and reinvigorate it.
25:22
Jack: The idea that you gotta get your book launch right the first time, it all has to be perfect, like I've for it's great if it is, right?
25:32
Jack: And uh we have we we help authors all the time in book funnel author support because they're using our tools to find art readers to get reviews lined up on release day, and they've got this launch window.
25:44
Jack: And I we had an author recently who came to us and they just signed up.
25:48
Jack: And they're like, I've got two months to build an art team and get a hundred reviews on my book.
25:51
Jack: How you know, how they got to help me do this?
25:53
Jack: And it's okay.
25:55
Jack: Realistic expectations a little bit.
25:57
Jack: There is some of the conversation we have to have with some authors, with all due respect.
26:02
Jack: But even if you launch your book and maybe you're disappointed with the results, like take a step back and just acknowledge what you've accomplished, right?
26:11
Jack: You've launched a book, right?
26:13
Jack: Which is something that most people do not do.
26:16
Jack: And it's not over, even if it doesn't go as well as you thought it would, right?
26:21
Jack: There's there's a very long tail on this journey, right?
26:25
Jack: Um, so not to again to for clarity here, you should launch your book.
26:30
Jack: Absolutely.
26:31
Jack: Do a big book launch, put all the effort into it that that you want to.
26:36
Jack: But um, but if it doesn't go as well as you thought it would, don't feel like, oh, it's all over, right?
26:44
Joel: I that's amazing.
26:45
Joel: I love that.
26:46
Joel: And it's it's interesting because uh we just we just did another episode of our podcast uh on this topic.
26:54
Joel: Sadie and I just rift on this uh because and I think I think the I think what you said was beautiful.
27:01
Joel: And the one the one thing I might add to it is that part of the problem with that, I would call it book launch consciousness, right?
27:09
Joel: Or book launch obsession.
27:10
Joel: Yeah.
27:11
Joel: Is that people will often do that at the expense of the things they really need to be doing to build something long term, like building a book funnel, for instance.
27:20
Jack: Right.
27:20
Speaker 2: Right.
27:20
Joel: They're overly obsessed with trying to get everything right for this tiny little thing.
27:24
Joel: Uh, whereas instead of putting all that energy into building something real and lasting and you know, something that's gonna actually bring them success.
27:34
Jack: Right.
27:34
Jack: Or they've they've compressed that timeline for arbitrary reasons, like my book has to launch on this date.
27:40
Jack: Right.
27:41
Jack: Well, have you built a mailing list yet?
27:43
Jack: Like how big is your is your ex existing audience now?
27:47
Jack: Because they're gonna help you get that thing launched.
27:50
Jack: And so if you're not there yet, well, what do you really need?
27:53
Jack: Do you need a bigger audience or do you need to launch a book on this date?
27:56
Jack: You probably need to work on building that audience first.
27:59
Jack: And you can you can do that ahead of your launch.
28:01
Jack: There's many ways to do that.
28:03
Jack: Uh, and that that launch date, you can push that back.
28:05
Jack: Stretch that time out if you need to.
28:07
Joel: And you can also launch your book and then build your audience afterwards.
28:10
Joel: And it's okay too.
28:12
Jack: Absolutely.
28:13
Jack: No, absolutely.
28:13
Jack: I've I've seen authors who've done that.
28:15
Joel: You're not going to get pen people get afraid that somehow's algorithms are going to penalize them and because there's their sales are slow.
28:22
Joel: And that it's just not really a thing for most people.
28:24
Jack: Yeah, all Amazon cares about is that when people land on that page, they're converting.
28:28
Jack: Yeah.
28:29
Jack: Right.
28:29
Jack: And they don't care how long that product, that ASIN has been uh active.
28:34
Joel: That's awesome.
28:35
Joel: Well, Jack, this has been really wonderful.
28:37
Joel: I appreciate you taking the time to do this.
28:39
Joel: And I encourage everybody to check out all the things that Book Funnel has to offer.
28:44
Joel: Check out BookFunnel as a product, but also make sure you check out their podcast.
28:48
Joel: And then also they do free monthly seminars.
28:51
Joel: Is that right?
28:52
Joel: BookFunnel Live, right?
28:53
Joel: Yeah.
28:54
Jack: So we've got obviously if you go to bookfunnel.com, you can learn everything about BookFunnel that there is.
28:59
Jack: Uh, we also, our YouTube channel is a great source uh for the BookFunnel podcast.
29:04
Jack: Our webinars go up there as well.
29:06
Jack: Uh, we host webinars uh monthly, usually at the beginning of each month, um, and on a variety of topics.
29:13
Jack: We even have guests come on and so forth and from the industry for some of those webinars on more specific niche things.
29:20
Jack: Uh but yeah, if you just go to YouTube, search up BookFunnel, you'll find us there.
29:24
Jack: We're also on Instagram.
29:26
Jack: Uh and uh as far as the podcast is concerned, I know we're up on like Apple Podcasts and Spotify as well.
29:32
Jack: So if you prefer to listen as opposed to watch your podcast, you can you can find us out there on most podcasting platforms.
29:39
Joel: So awesome.
29:41
Joel: Well, thanks a lot, Jack.
29:42
Joel: I appreciate you you being here today.
29:44
Joel: And again, if people enjoyed this episode, uh please uh rate and review us, share with your friends.
29:50
Joel: Um, we're trying to reach lots of authors who need who need to help help support guidance and inspiration.
29:55
Joel: So thank you very much.
29:57
Jack: Yep.
29:57
Jack: Thanks, Joel.