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Write Your Own Playbook: Why Women Need to Tell Their Stories & Share Their Expertise · Serious Lady Business

• LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (00:01) Welcome to Serious Lady Business. I am so excited to have Andrea DeWerd with us today. Andrea is the founder of The Future of Agency, a book marketing and publishing consulting agency. She founded The Future of Agency after 13 years in Big Five corporate publishing at Simon & Schuster, Penguin Random House, and HarperCollins. She left HarperCollins in 2022 to launch her own agency and her debut novel, What We Sacrifice for Magic was published in the fall of 2024 by Alcove Press. Andrea, welcome to Serious Lady Business. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (00:36) Thanks, Leslie, it's great to be here. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (00:38) Now, I'm always incredibly excited to talk about the topics that we come up with with guests. But today, we're talking a little bit before and last night I had the most fortuitous chat with a neighbor of mine and what we're talking about today. And so that's write your own playbook, why women need to tell their stories and share their expertise. And we'll be diving into the lack of advice and business books from women leaders. And even if we get them, they're under published and under supported. And so last night I have a neighbor who's launching a women's group and she you know in the current climate there's a lot of women people in general but hers is focused at women feeling powerless or how do you keep your power when there's so much going on around us and she texted me last night asking if I had any books on women leaders that I would be willing to share with her to share with the group and I said yeah sure hold on so I go to my my office my library and I'm like man, man, man, man. There was maybe two books that I pulled and I was so horrified at that. Then also like, what a perfect time to be talking with Andrea tomorrow. So, Andrea, you've been in this business for a number of years. Why do you think women's voices aren't as prevalent in mainstream books and media? Andrea DeWerd | She/her (02:01) Leslie, it's an interesting issue and it comes up every couple of years. Every few years, we'll have this moment of panic and be like, we're not publishing enough women. business and economics category, which gets lumped together, business and econ, sure. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (02:07) Mmm. Mmm. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (02:14) sense, is LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (02:14) Mmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (02:16) definitely under representative of women. I was thinking about this as it's preparing for our conversation today. I think it starts even at a level before publishing. It's about which voices in business are being elevated and which voices have authority, who's being listened to. The fact is that there are so many white male CEOs out there, but for whatever reason, we as a society don't respect women CEOs in the same way. We don't believe their voices. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (02:26) Yeah Hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (02:43) they have the same innovative factor that some of these male CEOs have. When we look at the publishing business, there's about 11,000 business books published every year out of the 3 million books that are published every season, every year. I'd say about 8 to 10 % of those are by women in the business and econ category. That's a dramatic under-representation when we see about 50 % male, female writers in every other category. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (02:48) Mm-hmm. Wow. Mm-hmm. Mmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (03:12) absolutely insane. There's about 200 bestsellers every year. That's the number of spots that there are amongst the different bestsellers. 17 were women in 2020. That was one of the studies I had pulled. So that was 8.5 % women out of all the business books published and considered for bestsellerdom. We can get into this a little bit more, but a lot of women in the publishing industry and women writing business and LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (03:13) Hmm. Hmm. Wow. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (03:41) Econ in this category get kind of shoved over into something that is more like a crossover between business and self-help rather than just a straight business book. And some of the examples that we talk about, Brene Brown had a great book called Dare to Lead, but she came from the self-help industry. So she's LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (03:51) see that. Mmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (04:00) that transition from self-help into leadership. When we look at some of the other women leaders in the category are Susie Orman, Sheryl Sandberg, but some of those books are older. Sheryl Sandberg hasn't had a book for a couple years. Susie is publishing more frequently, but Susie is really the representation of like strict advice how-to happening in this business world for women. it's books for women is also such a terrible moniker. don't know. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (04:12) Right. Right. Right, sure, right? Written by women maybe, right? like... Andrea DeWerd | She/her (04:30) Hi women. I think that's the challenge that we would have on the publishing side of who is the readership and which readers will find these voices authoritative. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (04:36) Hmm. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (04:41) back to general misogyny. If a man won't buy a book by a woman, won't take advice from the woman, won't believe a woman is a good leader, even though women-led startups tend to be financially successful quicker than male-led startups. Despite the statistics, women seemed, I don't want to say women lack the authority. Women are not given the authority in this category. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (04:55) Mmm. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (05:07) Was this something that you saw throughout your entire career in the corporate space and is that what also inspired you to go out on your own and start your own publishing agency? Andrea DeWerd | She/her (05:21) A little bit of both. I have thought a lot about just not necessarily this question of women in business books, but just about who whose stories are getting told. And we see it with DEI as well that there's traditionally under-representation of other. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (05:31) Hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (05:38) other categories as well. And we see it as a challenge also from who is being hired in inside the publishing houses, who is hired for marketing publicity, editorial roles, who are the gatekeepers. Every couple years we would look at it as an industry and we, okay, we need to make a difference. We need more representation of Native American writers, for example, and we would make a big effort for a couple years and then like... LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (05:39) Mm-hmm. to us. Right. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (06:01) the effort would go by the wayside if it wasn't a priority from the top down, if it wasn't something that our CEOs and leadership were really prioritizing, then those of us at the execution level were just kind of left with thoughts and prayers is how it feels. It's a nice idea, but what are we actually doing about it? there are lots of Exactly. Yep. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (06:05) Mmm. We know how well those work. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (06:23) That was really, I think, really one of the challenges I saw overall is just, whose stories are getting told and what are we being asked? I was a marketing director in the publishing world. So what is my team being asked to work on and spend our time on? What are the priorities we're being given? They're being set by leadership that is not always. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (06:29) Yeah. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (06:42) looking at the opportunities that might be coming from other sectors. I say that in part of this is the tyranny of comp titles in publishing. This is very specific, but a comp title is a comparative or competitive title that tells us how should we expect this book to perform? How should we expect it to sell? What readers will be interested in this based on what books they've bought and been interested in in the past? LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (06:44) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (07:06) Well, challenge with that is it doesn't leave any room to break the mold. If traditionally business books have been written by men and bought by men in the past, more just by the strict numbers, if we're comparing a book by a woman to a book by a man, We're not comparing apples to oranges and there's no way to break that cycle of the comp titles when we're being asked, okay, we want to know what is this most similar to? Okay, maybe it's Keith Farazie, never eat lunch alone. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (07:26) Thanks. Thanks Mmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (07:37) but this person doesn't have Keith Faraziz platform. Okay, well then it will never work and we're never gonna publish it and we're never gonna support it if it doesn't have the right comp titles. We see this with authors of color. If you're looking at, well, we've never been able to publish a book by a black woman successfully before, which is something that some in-principles say. Of course, you can't do it and you won't have the data to do it until you break the mold, until you have one, until you put the effort in and put the resources behind one. And of course I'm generalizing, there are lots LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (07:39) Mmm. Thanks. Right. Right. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (08:07) of imprints in lots of companies that are doing this work really well. But at a corporate level, these are the challenges that we see, and these are the challenges that the in-house teams are facing every day. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (08:10) Mm-hmm. Right, I mean, to an extent, you can see like it's a business. They want to ensure that their ROI are right. Like they're putting a lot of money on the line, but you are so right where it's like, there's so much more opportunity money to be made when you take a chance or like when you do break that mold. And so. It's maddening because if you just stay in that mindset, then how do you expect any new voices to break through? And it really probably is those independent publishers and those independent voices that are then, you know, going to be able to break through. then probably, I don't know how it was, but then all the big publishers are probably clamoring to get those people on their rosters by that, right? And it's like, oh, like, why can't you just see it from the beginning and have something, have the foresight? But I know, of course, so it's just, I can't even imagine having gone through that. And then was there a moment Andrea DeWerd | She/her (08:52) Absolutely. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (09:04) where you knew you were going to leave to start your own, to do it differently and to do it right. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (09:10) I was literally sitting in a summer sales conference meeting, it was July almost three years ago, and I was texting a friend saying, I think I could do this better. I think I could do this better. I could do this differently than what is happening right now. And part of that was just corporate red tape of being told no, if you have an idea, you don't have time or you're being given these priorities, so there's no time to explore, do something differently, do something better. That was a lot of just what was rubbing me the wrong way, but coming back LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (09:20) Love it. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (09:40) to the question of readership, I have this feeling that there is a book for every reader and a reader for every book. It is the marketing team's job to be able to find them. We need resources to do it. every book can be published well. Every book can find a readership, but that takes resources. That takes elbow grease. takes advertising dollars. And we weren't always given the opportunity to take a stake on something else that was not being elevated as a corporate priority. It starts to rub you the wrong way. And I saw as a leader, I was leading a team of five LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (09:48) Mmm. Yeah. Right. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (10:10) or six marketers, it's demoralizing to have to crack our heads against the wall on the same thing over and over. We only are allowed to work on the things that are going to be a known bestseller already. And we can't take a chance on anything else or we're not given the resources to put our effort into something else. It's really demoralizing for the team and it's hard to find inspiration when we're being handed priorities from a level that are maybe not in line with personal values or personal... LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (10:21) Mmm. Right. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (10:39) we see as opportunities at a personal marketing level. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (10:43) Right, right. Now you said something so interesting a few minutes back and it's how the difference in how women's business books are presented. They're more maybe self-help versus business. Tell us a little bit more about that. Like, I'm like, my God, that's so true, right? Go. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (10:47) you Yes, absolutely. So I think there's this crossover category where women have to be presented, women in business have to be presented as this like inspirational story. cannot just be advice because they're not given space to just say, okay, do this. Here's what I did. Do this. And you'll learn from me. have to say, women have to fight for their space. And I think, you know, we see this in the books, we see this in every industry that women have to prove their right to be here. So you have to say, okay, I really struggled in my personal life and here's LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (11:10) Mmm. Mmm. Mmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (11:30) how I came up and here's what I did and make it this like inspirational journey to have the authority to say, okay, here's how you do it. So there's all these books that are like half memoir, half business book. And of course there's a space for that. And like that's, that's Sheryl Sandberg, that's Gretchen Rubin in a lot of ways and like, cool. Like I enjoy those books, but sometimes I just want someone to be like, here's what you do. Like here's your manual, start by step. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (11:35) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Right. Right. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (11:56) what I think we talked about this in our pre-call, but when I was looking to grow my own business, I was looking for these resources. I kept looking for, just, I'm like, I just want a how to guide. Like, how do I, how do I run a startup? What do I do? How do I start a marketing agency? I want someone to tell me what to do. And a lot of the books I kept coming back to were like Tim Ferriss or Eric Reese, the startup way where it's very much a step-by-step guide. And it was driving me crazy. And like, I want this book by a woman. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (12:07) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (12:22) I finally found a book called Free Time by Jenny Blake that has been very helpful. And Jenny Blake is just like, yep, here's how I built it. Here's what you do. And I'm like, thank God. I just needed someone with a woman's voice to tell me here's how I built my business. And none of the, I mean, of course there's a place for story and inspiration always, but sometimes you just want to be told what to do. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (12:32) I love it. Yes. course. Right, right, and to be told by somebody that you relate to and that you recognize yourself in. And those books written by men are great, wonderful books, but there's still that missing connection there. And it is such a profound, such a small yet profound difference when you find that right fit. And so I'm going to also drop that book in the show notes, because I have not heard of that book before. And I'm like, I need to get that immediately and go to library, order it, for sure. So tell us a little bit about it. What was it that was still helpful? to you Andrea. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (13:14) Yeah, so Free Time by Jenny Blake. love this book. I've it to so many people because it really is a step-by-step of how to build systems and process. Part of it is like that just jives with the way that my brain works. I love a template. I love an SOP. Like I want a standard operating procedure that tells me A to B, to C to D, what to do. So Jenny gives us actual tools of, she built her business using specific templates or tools. One of them that she recommends in the book is called Clara. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (13:23) Mmm. Yeah. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (13:44) Labs is an AI admin scheduling tool that I use. Claire schedules all my meetings and I hadn't heard of it before. And it's a fascinating woman founded company out of Silicon Valley that I think Jenny Blake is maybe an investor or knows the investors or something. But otherwise I would not have discovered it and it has significantly benefited my business. So it gave me like a very specific list of tools to get started and to use in my business, especially at the beginning when you're building something. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (13:50) Wow! Mm-hmm. Wow. Mmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (14:14) I had all, it's the, the, I'm losing my words here. There's too many choices that you can make at the beginning and you can go any which way and I'm like, I need to. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (14:25) Yes, analysis paralysis, right? Andrea DeWerd | She/her (14:28) Like there you are. I'm like paralysis. I would be absolutely paralyzed by the number of choices that I could make at any given time. Where should I start my business checking account? Where should I do our HR software? And it doesn't really matter in the end. You just need to pick one and move on. That was something that my brother told me who's a government consultant, but he's like, just pick something. But I would be looking at and not knowing how to evaluate some of the tools. And Jenny Blake came in with like a list of here, the 30 things that I use. And it was a great, okay. It gives me something to start from. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (14:47) Yeah. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (14:58) and knowing that she has a relatively small team that comes out of consulting in a similar way, content creation. I was like, ooh, this is what I need. I need someone just to tell me, here's what I did, here's what I use, step by step. So helpful to get those actual tools and see someone's inner workings of their business in that way. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (15:03) you Bye. Totally, because it can be... I want to say easy to start your own business because it's a big thing. It's a big step. But then you're starting and you're going and then you realize, I'm stuck in meetings all day. How do I and I can't maybe afford to hire somebody to be a full time admin or even a part time admin or I know there's tools out there to help me and how do I take what I do and create a process from it so I can then hand it off to somebody that I can hire part time, right? And it's those processes and those things. So the starting can be easy, but it's the scaling that can be difficult and to not even Andrea DeWerd | She/her (15:42) Mm-hmm. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (15:49) And you think, and I felt this too, where I'm like, people do this all the time. There has to be a solution. There has to be a way. What's the answer? And to just have somebody, again, that you recognize yourself and is like, yep. This is how I did it. This is what I recommend. And for you to then go and try those things out too, it's just a game changer. It just allows so many more women and people in general to scale and have a business that functions and works better for them. So then you can stay in it for the long haul because that's really about it as well. Was there anything that was not missing from that book, but that you found that was missing from the resources that you wish you had when you were scaling your business? And so kind of like those books, like, I wish there was a book written by a woman. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (16:17) living. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (16:31) on, I don't want to say work-life balance, but like something along the way, Andrea. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (16:37) One of the specific things I found, I run a marketing agency. I come out of book publishing, we're talking about books and publishing today, but I'm running a marketing agency. And I was looking around, there's many books out there that they all have titles like the seven figure agency, the eight figure agency. It's like, let's one up each other. Let's make a little bit more money. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (16:45) Mm-hmm. Mmm, seven minute abs, six minute abs. It's the same thing. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (16:57) That's 100%. That's all of these books. So I'm looking around and I'm like, you know, I'm sure they are great guys that are running these companies and giving this advice, but I'm like, I'm seeing a bunch of like young white bros who come out of ad agencies. And I'm like, I just, would like to learn from someone who is a little bit more like me, maybe building something. Like my companies, our values are really important. It's really core and... LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (17:08) No. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (17:20) embedded in everything we do. wasn't finding a lot of that out there. So I'm like, how do I find someone who's a little bit more mission driven and dealing with products, books and authors are a unique product. We're not selling widgets. We're not marketing Coca-Cola. Like it's a very specific thing. I just, I had specific challenges just in terms of like, who do I learn from that will recognize uniqueness of my product. My, authors are both the product and the talent. It's a really interesting challenge. So finding someone who may LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (17:23) Hmm. or right? Totally. Mm-hmm. Sure. Yeah. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (17:50) maybe has dealt with talent management or just learning from other female agency founders, that's been something that I've been really looking for. And I haven't found a book about this necessarily. This is where I have really found connection and community in real life. There's definitely room for a book about this. maybe one day, I'm like, maybe I will write this book one day. But I have turned to other PR agency founders, Jennifer. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (17:57) Thank you. Mmm. Yes. Thank Andrea DeWerd | She/her (18:17) Sorry, not Jennifer. Sandra Poirier-Smith at Smith PR has been really helpful to me. The Small Girls PR team, Bianca has been just a super peer mentor in a lot of ways. Kalia Hargrove, the founder of Backstory Consulting, who is very much running a mission-driven company. That's who I've been turning to. I'm like, let me learn from, sometimes from my peers, but maybe sometimes from people like Sandra who are 10, 15 years ahead of me in this business, have been doing it for a while and serving this audience. But I'm like, I want to learn from the women. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (18:22) and Love it. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (18:47) who are doing this in real time. And I haven't necessarily found, you know, lots of books or other resources about that specific challenge. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (18:55) Well, there's that opportunity for us, right? But it's so true. I relate so much to what you said there about these seven-figure agencies, eight-figure agencies, and it's these young bros running it. I was in an accelerator, which was very... great, wonderful, learned so much. But there was one time the founder did a day in the life video, and I'm not even joking. They woke up early, worked out, went to breakfast with their business partner, did a podcast, worked out again, went home and I'm like, what? That's amazing for you. But if I told you my schedule, what I have to do in a day, or that doesn't look like anything, like I don't relate to that at all. And don't really necessarily aspire to that, like at all in a way. need more and like a mission in a purpose and like what's the good here and and so Like you said you have to fight it's been more community driven And that's one of the reasons why I started Serious Lady Business because I'm like there has to be other women out there that are doing These things that I can learn from but I don't see them right now And so and even there's I think I don't know if this is the correct data point, but when I first started my consulting agency a few years ago, was like that 0.9 % of all agencies are owned by women or run by women. 0.9 % out of all of them? Andrea, I was like, what kind of shenanigan, like what year is this? 2025? That was like maybe 2023, but it just kind of blew me away. sure, entrepreneurship is hard, but it's not. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (20:16) I that. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (20:31) It's not, it's not, right? Or it's like you just have to do it and make the choice to do it and to see, like you can't see what you can't be or you can't be what you can't see, right? And so I just, you know, relate so much to what you're saying and to be able to find women that have done it before and are doing what you resonate with. And I think that's something unique to women business owners is that at the end of the day, yes, we want, we're capitalists or we live in a capitalist society, but there has to be more or we're consciously of more than just the bottom line or like in being inclusive and community and doing good, doing well by doing good. And so I think all these things, maybe also too, it's not that men aren't doing it, but that's not what they lead with even in the books that they do. Right? Like I'm sure there's a many good, amazing, incredible businessmen, the ones that write those books are probably very active in charity and giving back commission, but you don't see it. And so when it's not there, you don't even realize that it's going on. And so I think that Yeah, it makes so much sense and I know that I myself resonate with what you shared and I'm sure our listeners are resonating with that too. So when you were, when you found this community and you're learning and launching and scaling, did you create your own methods for growth that differed from maybe the traditional ways that you had experience in the top five publishing, you world? Andrea DeWerd | She/her (21:52) You know, I think what we're doing is definitely different from what traditional publishing is doing. And a lot of it is more just nimble, flexible. work with lot of templates and process so that we can be nimble and respond to what the client needs. And that's maybe not so different from what other agencies are doing. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (22:06) in Andrea DeWerd | She/her (22:11) What I think is really at the core is just like, how do I take my expertise, take it out of my brain, share it with my team and bring everyone up to this level where we are experts in fiction and nonfiction and cookbooks and business books and children's publishing. And how do we have this level of expertise that really flows throughout the entire team? I put a big emphasis on group learning and sharing resources across the team. And like, it feels silly to be like that, that was something that wasn't always happening in corporate. Like we weren't always sharing our resources or sharing what we were learning with one another, but LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (22:18) Yeah. Mm-hmm. No. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (22:41) That feels really different when someone has a problem like go ask the rest of the team What has Amanda or Kelly or Noreen learned about this already? Can we share those resources with each other? Someone learned a new best practice about subject lines and emails. I'm like great. Let's share that with the team Let's make sure everyone is up to speed We end all of our team meetings every other Monday LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (22:43) Yeah. Mmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (23:02) by going around the room and talking about one thing that we've learned recently, which may have nothing to do with our jobs. It may be just something on the internet, some trend. We spend a lot of time looking at social media trends on behalf of our clients. And like, here's something interesting I saw on TikTok. But that feels revolutionary in a little bit of a way to just spend a half hour talking about, I'm learning something new that is maybe not directly related to my current job or the thing I'm doing today or the tactic I'm working on for a client. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (23:07) Yeah. Right? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (23:28) It feels silly to me that we can't always take time for that in corporate, but that is something that I really value. I value learning. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (23:35) Yeah. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (23:36) self-taught. was an English major and now I'm running a marketing agency and running a business. I had no business background in this way. I've learned all entirely on the job. So I believe that's possible. I think anyone can learn anything at any time. But taking the time and making it part of our structure, being able to do that, like that is a little revolutionary, unfortunately, for corporate America, I think, in a lot of ways. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (23:40) Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yes. Mm-hmm. Well, I think also too you connect so much more with your colleagues in that way right and sharing that those types of things and that when you're in corporate, you just feel in big corporations, right? You can feel just like a number or that even if you have friends there, it's like, they don't necessarily know you or connect with you or value anything you're curious about, even if it's just a meme you saw that's blowing up on TikTok, right? And so I think that's so amazing and important. And it might not be something that's relevant to a client or a project right now, but in like two months or even two years, maybe you'll be like, Remember that this is coming into play right now. so curiosity and to facilitate ideas like that and to encourage your team, it makes your whole business more valuable because you're cultivating that curiosity that's going to benefit your bottom line down the road, as well as them as emotion, as like people and humans and the connection there. So I think that's fantastic. And it like, it seems. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (24:35) Absolutely. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (24:57) It's not like you're all going to run a marathon together every Friday, right? You're just sharing ideas, which is just so wonderful. So it just goes to show you don't have to do something completely in depth or time intensive to be different and to facilitate curiosity and innovation. So I love that. Now, Andrea, when we have this dearth of female voices in the business book space, and I know there are women listening right now and I know you even have shared, should write my book. What advice would you give female founders who want to start writing about their business experience? Andrea DeWerd | She/her (25:33) So as a writer, I will say that the imposter syndrome is just devastating sometimes. I'm sure there are lots of women out there who have thought, I should write a book or I'm interested in doing that. Or maybe, you maybe I want to do that one day. All I can say is that your voice deserves to be heard. Everyone has a story to tell. Like I said, I think there is a reader for every single book. And I think, I think writers, we have to tell the story that we want to tell. Tell the story that is interesting to you. Give the advice that is interesting to you. Give the advice or tell the story that wasn't there when, when you needed it. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (25:38) Mmm. Mm-hmm. Mmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (26:03) Those are some of my favorite books. It's just, you know, a book that someone needed to tell their story and hope that it resonated with an audience. Sometimes you're reading a book and you'll think, I didn't know anyone else ever felt like that and here it is on the page. Someone else felt like that enough to write it down. So I would just, I would tell anyone listening to write your down, write your story, start writing it. Your voice is valuable. You have something new and different and your unique perspective to bring to the world. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (26:03) Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (26:32) And the other thing I will say is that writing is a long process. So start today. You cannot write any sooner than as soon as you start. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (26:36) Thank you. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (26:42) my first novel really one sentence at a time, one paragraph at a time, it came out very slowly. There's all this advice of like you have to write a thousand words a day, you have to write for an hour a day. I don't believe in that. You have to do what is reasonable and manageable for you, especially if you're running a business or doing something else. So I started with, you know, 20 minutes in the morning and sometimes it was literally one sentence and that is how my first novel came together. So I would say, you know, it's like the gentle parenting method of writing, like whatever you're doing, you're doing great. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (26:45) Hmm. Hmm. Mm. Right? I love it. Mm-hmm. love it. Yeah, sure. Right, right. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (27:12) one sentence at a time. And I will just say that, you know, I feel like men don't get imposter syndrome in the same way. So pretend you are a man and tell the story that a man would not be afraid to tell. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (27:19) Right? Right? mean, there's out there, there are men out there that don't have your experience, that don't have your perspective, and they're doing it right now. Like, get your voice out there. like you said, like, it's so important. And even like... Let's say you write the book and like, like how many times have have you or we and I know I have picked up a book and I'm like, I'm not feeling this right now. And I put it down and maybe a month or two later, I come back to it and I'm like, cannot put it down. Right. And it's just like, there's like, you said a book for every reader at any particular point, like in their life where, and if you put that story out there, you resonate with one person that's, that's monumental. Right. Like, and you don't have to reach hundreds of thousands, but just getting your story out there is important because every single person. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (28:05) you LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (28:06) is completely unique and has a completely unique experience and matters. That experience matters. And I love that you said just write one sentence, right? Write one word. Just do something little, right, to get that out and... in that incremental process cannot be stopped. I feel like that's something that I've heard in workout classes, like incremental progress cannot be stopped because you feel like, my God, I'm never gonna get that fit body or I'm never gonna get there. And it's like, if you just keep going, you will eventually get there. And so let's say, Andrea, that they've written and they have a transcript, what would the next step be for them? Andrea DeWerd | She/her (28:43) It really depends. There are so many paths to publishing these days. I was at this conference last week and there's a whole session about the different ways to bring a book into the world. I work with authors who are self-published, we call indie authors who have decided to become their own little independent publishing companies. So there are lots of do-it-yourself models, publishing direct on KDP, Kindle Direct Publishing on Amazon, or publishing on IngramSpark, one of our partner resources. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (28:47) Mm. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (29:12) you can also connect with agents. do your research on publishers marketplace, look at what literary agents are acquiring, what they've bought in the past, what they're selling, and connect with agents that are representing work that is similar to yours. An agent will turn it around and sell to a traditional publisher, which might be a big five corporate publisher, or it might be a smaller indie press like the one I was published with, Alcove. There are all kinds of options. And then there's a model in between that is called hybrid, where you, the author, maybe make an upfront investment you're paying for something LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (29:17) Hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (29:42) thing, paper printing binding for example, you might be paying for your distribution, but the publisher also makes a commitment. They are also paying for some of the costs. They might be paying for editorial or proofreading and it's kind of a joint business venture in that way. So both parties make money when the publisher makes money, the author makes money and vice versa. So just say you know research the different paths and it depends on what you want and what your goal is. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (29:43) Yeah. you. Thank you. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (30:09) A lot of the, I think a lot of the question for deciding which route to publish is truly financial. Do you expect to get a big advance? Are you looking for a financial investment from a publisher? Do you have the resources to do it yourself and keep more of your rights and royalties? It's really about who's paying for distribution. Those are kind of the different paths. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (30:17) Hmm. Mmm. Mmm. Gotcha. And tell me, this not correct? But when you get an advance, it's not like that's your money forever. That's money that you then owe back to the publisher to make back, like with the sale of your book. So it's not like you can just take, like, I don't know. I remember, what is it? The Sex and the City. Carrie gets an advance from France, right? But it's like, but that's not her money. She owes that back to the publisher. Isn't that correct? Okay. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (30:52) Not exactly. it's an advance. You wouldn't owe it back. It is yours to keep. you won't make any more money if you don't sell enough books to earn the amount that the advance is worth. So if I have a $5,000 advance, let's say I have to sell. I'm doing a really bad math in my head. I have to sell. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (30:59) Mmm. Mmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (31:11) thousand copies of my book to pay back five thousand dollars. They'll never make you actually pay it back. It's just on paper. But then you don't earn royalties on top of that five thousand dollars until you've sold enough books to earn the five thousand dollars. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (31:14) Mm-hmm. Hmm Gotcha, that's good to know. It's good to know because I want you out there promoting the book and getting the word out and doing a good book, right? That's going to sell. that makes sense. Thank you for clearing that up. If someone's a big reader, Andrea, or a writer, what are some other ways to absorb and then share some of the lessons that we are all craving right now? Andrea DeWerd | She/her (31:28) It's IP. Exactly. I think podcasts are definitely one of them. I'd say, you know, if you don't have time to read right now, that's also a very common thing. We see a lot of readers, maybe as you're younger, maybe you fall off as you get busy, start a business, have kids, become more senior in your job. A lot of people like take a break from reading and come back to it. In the meantime, I would say look for author interviews on some of your favorite podcasts. There are some where you can get a lesson in a half hour conversation and maybe get the summary of a book or, you get the big ideas. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (31:51) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Anyone? Andrea DeWerd | She/her (32:19) down in an easy conversation. There are people like Amy Porterfield is a great example of this. She had she interviewed so many authors and I listen to all of those interviews and I'm like, oh, I'd really like to read that book and I and but maybe you don't have time for it. So you get that you get the big idea from the conversation. I think that's that's a good way to get introduced. I would also say to try audiobooks if you haven't already. I audiobooks are just a different way of absorbing the information, especially with a business book, something that's like a how to, you know, step by step guide. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (32:30) Yeah. Mm-hmm. Right. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (32:49) I like those books in audio format because you can listen to a chapter or two at a time. It is almost like a podcast where you can, you know, one chapter is a complete idea. You can listen to it and then, you know, walk away and not have to listen to the whole thing straight through. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (32:54) Right. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (33:02) fiction and memoir I think are harder to do in audio because you really have to follow the story and keep up with it the whole time. But I love a business book while I'm driving. I might just listen to a chapter or two and then turn it off and do something else. I think those are good ways in. And once you find an author, maybe you listen to some podcast interviews and you find a voice, you're interested in those ideas, subscribe to their sub stack, follow them on social media, go deeper with their content in a different way. Many of those authors are breaking down that content in so many different ways. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (33:05) Right. Right. Mm-hmm. human. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (33:32) every day. once you find someone that you agree with or you like their ideas, would make sure you are engaging with them to get more of that. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (33:40) I love it. Thank you. That's so helpful and important and true, right? You might not have time to read today, but you might have time to skim an email or listen to a podcast as you're walking your dog or driving to work. And so there's really to stay inspired in curious and feel like you're not alone as a business owner and let alone a female business owner, minority business owner. I think it's so incredibly important because what you're doing, what every person out there is doing is needed. Right. And so we want. everybody to get those tools to keep going and to understand that they're not alone and and all that good stuff and so that the content is out there and I would say like reach out to me I'm sure reach out to Andrea we're helpful you need a little pep talk but then even like going on social media and following them like you said on social media and having somebody you know what's it like goodness the mantra for the day or something like something that you see like a quote or something that your favorite author posted that moves you it's like sometimes that's all you need to just get through a busy, hard, tough spot or even day or moment. now Andrea, tell us a little bit, what's next for Future of Agency? What are you guys working on? What are you excited about in publishing right now? Andrea DeWerd | She/her (34:51) I am in the middle of trying to scale as always. I think this is every small business owner. We are getting more big projects, ongoing retainers, lots of great work coming in from potential clients. We're getting a lot of referrals from literary agents that we have great relationships with. And there are days when I'm like, my gosh, it's too much. We're getting too many referrals. I can't keep up with the sales pipeline. have so much coming in. I'm constantly, I've been hiring people. it's like sign a bunch of projects and clients, hire somebody, do it again. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (34:54) Are you? I'm Yeah. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (35:20) and back and forth all the time. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (35:21) Yeah, let's repeat. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (35:23) I am looking at launching a lower price point product that is maybe a membership or maybe access to like our template database to help people who maybe can't afford our full services. It is definitely an investment to work with an agency. So that is something that is on the roadmap probably for the fourth quarter of this year. And I'm excited about it. think we have great advice that we can share with clients at any stage. And it would be really nice if we can make that more accessible. So again, just from a values perspective, that's something LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (35:31) Mm-hmm. Mm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (35:53) that's important to me. So as we're taking on bigger clients and other work, I also am thinking about how can we bring our services to a wider audience. always looking for the next thing, always growing and. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (36:01) sure. Great. Love it. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (36:07) I'm like, I completely forgot about this. just hired a publicist for our team. In marketing, publishing, marketing and publicity have always been kept very separate. This is one of those things that I think is a little bit silly. There are certain teams in the corporate publishing world that are really breaking down those walls and bringing marketing, publicity under one director, under one roof. And I'd like to see more of that. So we are doing that ourselves. are bringing marketing, publicity strategy under one cohesive strategy for our clients. So that's a shift that we're making currently, but it came out of LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (36:11) Amazing! Mm-hmm. Mmm. That's fantastic. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (36:37) know, past goal setting and scaling priorities. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (36:39) Sure, that's fantastic, I love that. And now, tell everybody where they can find you at, where they can follow you, where they can find Future of Agency. Give us all the good details on where we can continue the conversation with you. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (36:50) See you All of our book marketing resources are at thefutureofagency.com. You can request a consultation with us there for any potential authors that might be listening. We are on social at, I have to change this. We are on social at thefutureunderscoreof, which is the handle that we chose a long time ago, but there we are. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (37:05) Yeah. Those Andrea DeWerd | She/her (37:11) on our website, you'll find us. I personally LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (37:12) underscores. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (37:14) am at AJ DeWerd. You can find me on every platform at that handle. So find me, findthefutureofagency.com and follow along for book and other general marketing advice. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (37:25) Perfect. And we'll also drop those links in the show notes for anybody listening. Andrea, thank you so much for joining us today. What a fantastic conversation. Everybody listening, start writing your story. Get it out there, whether it's a sub stack, whether it's becoming a book, whether you want to podcast it, whether you want to talk about it on TikTok or even Instagram. And we want to hear you. Okay. And we're just two women right here. Andrea, any final words before we wrap up? Andrea DeWerd | She/her (37:51) just second that. Start writing one sentence at a time. You can do it and support other women. Buy books by women. Seek them out. Seek other sub stacks, etc. Make a point to do business with other women. LESLIE YOUNGBLOOD (37:55) Yes. Yes. Love that, that's perfect way to end. Thank you so much Andrea. It was a pleasure having you here today on Serious Lady Business. Everybody, we'll see you again soon. Andrea DeWerd | She/her (38:07) Thank you.