Latest / Plan Like A Boss | Planning, Productivity, and Strategy for Entrepreneurs / 7 Ways to Make 7 Figures as a Thought Leader with Aurora Winter

Transcript

7 Ways to Make 7 Figures as a Thought Leader with Aurora Winter · Plan Like A Boss | Planning, Productivity, and Strategy for Entrepreneurs

0:25
SPEAKER_01: That's the message.
0:26
SPEAKER_01: Five weeks of sun, fun, and tax shelter became the new message.
0:32
SPEAKER_01: And that message, those seven words, made three million dollars in one week.
0:37
SPEAKER_00: Welcome back to Plan Like a Boss.
0:38
SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Tanya Lawson.
0:40
SPEAKER_00: And I am so excited today to be here with Aurora Winter.
0:44
SPEAKER_00: Aurora is a strategic brand showrunner, TV writer, producer, and the founder of SamePagePublishing.com.
0:51
SPEAKER_00: Her book, Turn Words into Wealth: Seven Ways to Make Seven Figures as a Thought Leader, lays out a complete system for building a personal brand, launching a book, and generating seven-figure income as a thought leader in the age of AI.
1:06
SPEAKER_00: She's the host of Strategic Basics and has appeared on hundreds of podcasts as a guest expert on messaging, publishing, and personal branding.
1:14
SPEAKER_00: Aurora is also the author of The Magic Mystery and the Multiverse Fantasy Trilogy, an enchanting adventure for young adults.
1:22
SPEAKER_00: And it's already coming to life through the animated Anna Zest series.
1:27
SPEAKER_00: Aurora is based in Los Angeles and has written 10 books spanning both nonfiction and fiction.
1:33
SPEAKER_00: Aurora, welcome to the show.
1:35
SPEAKER_00: That is quite an accomplishment.
1:38
SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you for that great introduction.
1:39
SPEAKER_01: I was doing your Vanna White there, a little uh visual cues.
1:42
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, let's go.
1:43
SPEAKER_00: I've got a copy right here myself.
1:46
SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
1:47
SPEAKER_01: Well, you got to tell us what stood out to you.
1:49
SPEAKER_01: But what I'd love to do today is help our listeners and our audience turn their words into wealth and also understand how they can really benefit from AI by leaning into their four human superpowers, which make you invulnerable to AI.
2:06
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
2:07
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
2:07
SPEAKER_00: And I love the book.
2:09
SPEAKER_00: It's so well written.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: And so let's start with giving us some of your background.
2:16
SPEAKER_00: Tell us your story.
2:17
SPEAKER_00: How did you get here?
2:18
SPEAKER_00: Because, oh my goodness, from television exec to writer to to everything.
2:26
SPEAKER_01: I am a creative entrepreneur, that's for sure.
2:29
SPEAKER_01: It's interesting how life has so many different chapters.
2:32
SPEAKER_01: But I'm glad you like the book Turn Words Into Wealth.
2:34
SPEAKER_01: It's available wherever books are sold.
2:36
SPEAKER_01: But also, your audience can get it for free if they go to TurnWordsIntowealth.com.
2:42
SPEAKER_01: Turnwords into wealth.com, they can get the free hardcover book with a bunch of bonuses.
2:47
SPEAKER_01: Um, they just cover the shipping.
2:49
SPEAKER_01: So back to answering your question.
2:51
SPEAKER_01: Um, I I love creating.
2:54
SPEAKER_01: Ever since I was a kid, I've kept a journal.
2:56
SPEAKER_01: I've always been writing.
2:57
SPEAKER_01: I was inspired by C.S.
2:59
SPEAKER_01: Lewis's Narnia series.
3:01
SPEAKER_01: And when I was nine, I decided I would be a writer because writers are like wizards.
3:05
SPEAKER_01: I think communicating is making something out of nothing.
3:09
SPEAKER_01: But the story that I think would be most meaningful to your audience is like you, Tanya, I have an academic background.
3:16
SPEAKER_01: I studied honors economics, I have an MBA.
3:19
SPEAKER_01: So I've got a lot of bad training from that higher education in how to communicate.
3:25
SPEAKER_01: And this almost bankrupt my first business.
3:29
SPEAKER_01: So my first business with my husband was actually selling boats, and we had we rented the boats as well.
3:34
SPEAKER_01: And uh we were sort of eating mac and cheese.
3:37
SPEAKER_01: Things were, you know, we were just two kids in our 20s, so it was struggling.
3:42
SPEAKER_01: But then I had a breakthrough idea.
3:44
SPEAKER_01: I was certain it was a million-dollar idea, but unfortunately, I did not wrap it in a million-dollar message.
3:51
SPEAKER_01: So we were maxing out our credit cards.
3:54
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, why aren't people buying?
3:56
SPEAKER_01: This is a genius idea.
3:58
SPEAKER_01: But they weren't getting it.
3:59
SPEAKER_01: And of course, if the audience isn't getting it or your prospects aren't getting it, the problem is you.
4:05
SPEAKER_01: When you point a finger at somebody else, there's a bunch of fingers pointing back at you.
4:09
SPEAKER_01: So we actually had a breakthrough.
4:11
SPEAKER_01: My husband said offhand, well, pfft, people only use their boat for five weeks a year anyway.
4:16
SPEAKER_01: You know, most boats are sitting in the marina.
4:18
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, that's it.
4:19
SPEAKER_01: That's it.
4:20
SPEAKER_01: He's like, what?
4:21
SPEAKER_01: What's it?
4:22
SPEAKER_01: Like, that's the message.
4:24
SPEAKER_01: Five weeks of sun, fun, and tax shelter became the new message.
4:29
SPEAKER_01: And what happened was it's like stand-up comedy, like five weeks of sun, fun, and you're not expecting tax shelter to come after that, right?
4:36
SPEAKER_01: Especially with a picture of a boat.
4:38
SPEAKER_01: What?
4:42
SPEAKER_01: Tell me more.
4:44
SPEAKER_01: And that's what you want with a good message.
4:46
SPEAKER_01: And that message, those seven words, made three million dollars in one week.
4:52
SPEAKER_01: They doubled our profit margins from 12% to 24%.
4:56
SPEAKER_01: Radio stations called us.
4:58
SPEAKER_01: We got on the cover of the local magazine, the BC Business magazine, and it changed everything.
5:06
SPEAKER_01: So why I wanted to start with that story is because I think it's very encouraging to everybody to know I didn't change the product, I didn't change the team, I didn't change anything except the message.
5:19
SPEAKER_01: And the result was going from, ah, we're running out of runway, this is not looking good, to millions of dollars in a week.
5:28
SPEAKER_01: So that is the power of what I call a million-dollar message.
5:31
SPEAKER_01: And that's what I do now at Same Page Publishing.
5:34
SPEAKER_01: I help people design a million-dollar message that makes their ideal client go, lean in, tell me more.
5:42
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
5:44
SPEAKER_00: That is such a great story.
5:46
SPEAKER_00: Now, you've had lots and lots of experience throughout the years, and you've done a lot of research.
5:54
SPEAKER_00: In your book, you say you spent several years researching communication and studying what separated seven-figure businesses from nine-figure empires.
6:02
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
6:02
SPEAKER_00: How did you even begin that endeavor?
6:06
SPEAKER_00: I'm just obsessed.
6:10
SPEAKER_00: It's the academic in you doing the research.
6:12
SPEAKER_01: It's the academic in me.
6:14
SPEAKER_01: I bet that we have that in common.
6:16
SPEAKER_01: So you can learn so much by just leaning in.
6:19
SPEAKER_01: I did also take my MBA in that period of time.
6:22
SPEAKER_01: And I took an MBA that had a focus on neuroscience.
6:26
SPEAKER_01: So we actually studied the neuroscience of communication.
6:30
SPEAKER_01: And one of the studies that really stood out to me is again to do with what happens in the brain with different words.
6:39
SPEAKER_01: So they I took my MBA in Italy.
6:41
SPEAKER_01: So naturally, we were studying wine.
6:45
SPEAKER_01: And the experiment was, you know, people were served wine in uh just plain glasses, and they were told, okay, this wine comes from this vineyard in Tuscany.
6:57
SPEAKER_01: You know, this vineyard has been in the family for generations, and we harvest the grapes just at this perfect time in the fall so that, you know, they're crushed and uh just so and and the result is after proper aging, this is the Pièce de Resistance wine.
7:14
SPEAKER_01: And then people tasted that wine.
7:17
SPEAKER_01: And then they were told, okay, well, here is another bottle of wine for you to compare with the one that you've just had.
7:24
SPEAKER_01: We want to know if it's better or worse, the same.
7:27
SPEAKER_01: And this is just, you know, the from the local Costco equivalent in in Italy.
7:32
SPEAKER_01: Uh people's brains, and it was actually the same wine, people's brains lit up differently in the pleasure centers with the story.
7:43
SPEAKER_01: So a story actually changes the value, it changes the sensor, sensory palette, it changes what uh pleasure centers light up in the brain.
7:56
SPEAKER_01: So when you add a vivid story, you're actually changing the experience that the other person has.
8:06
SPEAKER_01: You're adding value.
8:09
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
8:10
SPEAKER_00: And and so true.
8:12
SPEAKER_00: It is so true.
8:13
SPEAKER_00: We all love a good story.
8:14
SPEAKER_00: I mean, if you think of some of the I mean, I hate to to demean this to commercials, but if you think of some of the the best commercials, it's they they pull at your heartstrings.
8:24
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
8:25
SPEAKER_01: And that can change, you know, change your brain.
8:28
SPEAKER_01: In fact, studies show that the same items sold with a story or without a story, you as an academic would like a story like this because it's got a data point.
8:37
SPEAKER_01: So they had a hundred different distinct objects on eBay with or without a story, and the stories are written by a hundred different people.
8:45
SPEAKER_01: The stories didn't add hype, but they added meaning.
8:49
SPEAKER_01: And the result was, well, guess.
8:51
SPEAKER_01: Do you think things sold for more with the story or without?
8:54
SPEAKER_01: I'm guessing they sold for more with the story.
8:57
SPEAKER_00: And how much more would you guess?
8:58
SPEAKER_00: Oh, probably double.
9:03
SPEAKER_00: More?
9:03
SPEAKER_00: Higher?
9:04
unknown: Yeah.
9:05
SPEAKER_00: Triple?
9:06
SPEAKER_00: Quadruple.
9:07
SPEAKER_01: Almost well, you stopped it.
9:10
SPEAKER_01: 27 times more.
9:12
SPEAKER_01: 27 times more.
9:14
SPEAKER_01: So this is the message I really want our listeners to take away today.
9:19
SPEAKER_01: So many hardworking people are, you know, working so hard, crafting their product, refining their service, wearing themselves out, delivering it.
9:28
SPEAKER_01: But then at the end of the day, they don't have time or they think they don't have time to work on the message.
9:33
SPEAKER_01: But if you could add 27 times more revenue just by adding a story, wouldn't you take a little bit of dedicated time when you're fresh to work on your story?
9:44
SPEAKER_01: And this leads me to what I wanted to share about AI, but give you a chance to pop in there.
9:49
SPEAKER_01: Did you want to add a comment?
9:51
SPEAKER_00: No, I was I was just gonna say, you you can't not take the time to create a story with those kinds of returns.
9:59
SPEAKER_00: Exactly right.
10:00
SPEAKER_00: And and yeah, going into AI, I was gonna just ask, what about those those peoples out those peoples?
10:06
SPEAKER_00: What about those people out there that are inventing that have this great product or this great service?
10:11
SPEAKER_00: And they're just like, I have no idea how to tie a service into my new bottle of shampoo or a story.
10:19
SPEAKER_00: What what can I do with this?
10:21
SPEAKER_00: And you mentioned AI.
10:23
SPEAKER_00: Are there tools out there that can help them?
10:27
SPEAKER_01: I wasn't gonna use, I wasn't gonna go to AI.
10:30
SPEAKER_01: Let me let me paint a word picture first before we go to the AI tools, because I think it's really wrong to jump into tools without setting the framework.
10:39
SPEAKER_01: So AI is both a great opportunity and a great danger.
10:45
SPEAKER_01: So wherever the markets are drastically changing, there's opportunity and there's danger.
10:49
SPEAKER_01: What is the danger?
10:51
SPEAKER_01: The danger is becoming like everybody else.
10:54
SPEAKER_01: The danger is generic stories, generic words, same, same, same.
10:59
SPEAKER_01: Now, if you are the same as everybody else, you've just destroyed your brand.
11:05
SPEAKER_01: Because a brand is a story.
11:07
SPEAKER_01: A brand is a what is distinct and special and unique about you and your business.
11:12
SPEAKER_01: So the big danger of AI is everybody's using it, they're all going to sound the same.
11:17
SPEAKER_01: And if you all sound the same, you have no brand.
11:19
SPEAKER_01: If you have no brand, you're competing with AI, China, and Costco.
11:24
SPEAKER_01: This is not a path to success.
11:26
SPEAKER_01: So before using any AI tools, which we can certainly get into, AI is great to scale your brand, but not to create your brand.
11:36
SPEAKER_01: So there's four things that I'd love everybody to lean into that make you invulnerable to AI.
11:43
SPEAKER_01: They make you the expert that AI quotes instead of the one it destroys.
11:50
SPEAKER_01: And the number one is your story, because nobody else has your story.
11:55
SPEAKER_01: And a lot of entrepreneurs and leaders, perhaps you have the same thing with the people that you work with.
12:01
SPEAKER_01: You know, they hesitate to tell the mad midnight moments, the time when they were almost out of gas, the time when, oh, holy moly, we're gonna have to shut the doors if we don't come up with a solution.
12:13
SPEAKER_01: But I told a story just like that to start this conversation.
12:16
SPEAKER_01: I told you about a time when we almost, you know, we're running out of runway.
12:19
SPEAKER_01: We could go bankrupt without the right story.
12:22
SPEAKER_01: And then I told you the breakthrough.
12:23
SPEAKER_01: That makes the story far more memorable, right?
12:26
SPEAKER_01: And it's true.
12:28
SPEAKER_01: But a lot of people want to erase all of the struggle.
12:31
SPEAKER_01: Don't erase the story struggle.
12:32
SPEAKER_01: My backgrounds as a film and TV producer.
12:35
SPEAKER_01: Every movie has got struggle.
12:37
SPEAKER_01: No struggle, no hero.
12:39
SPEAKER_01: No struggle, no story.
12:41
SPEAKER_01: So you need to have your story, practice your story.
12:45
SPEAKER_01: You'll have multiple stories and collect and practice sharing the stories of your clients or the people whose lives you transform.
12:53
SPEAKER_01: So that's item number one.
12:55
SPEAKER_01: And harvest them like a garden.
12:58
SPEAKER_01: Like you, you want to really nurture these stories and have them alive in you so that you can share them at the top of the hat or you can write them in your book or shoot videos.
13:07
SPEAKER_01: The second thing is I we're gonna make them all S's so we can remember it, is your smile, by which I want to remind us that showing up in person, whether it's on a live call like we're having right now, or in person networking with people, or like you just said before we started recording you one of my address, because you're gonna drop me a note, a personal little note.
13:29
SPEAKER_01: I sent you a book was a personal little touch.
13:32
SPEAKER_01: That smile or that presence, that human touch is more valuable than ever.
13:37
SPEAKER_01: As more and more things get automated and automatic and generic, that becomes worth less.
13:43
SPEAKER_01: And the little human extra touch, the smile, matters even more.
13:47
SPEAKER_01: And then the third one is your style.
13:52
SPEAKER_01: So I think back in the day when we just had 150 people in our community, yeah, you didn't really want to be the tall poppy with the purple hair that stood out, right?
14:03
SPEAKER_01: Because you would get smacked.
14:05
SPEAKER_01: But now we're living in a worldwide economy.
14:09
SPEAKER_01: So yes, you do want to be the one with the purple hair or the one who loves music and teaches music as well as having a podcast like you do, Tanya.
14:18
SPEAKER_01: So it's important, it's valuable, it's necessary to have a valuable brand, to lean into your quirkiness, your humanity, your flaws, your special sauce.
14:31
SPEAKER_01: So we don't want to forget to do that.
14:33
SPEAKER_01: And I give everybody full permission to stand out, be the one that stands out, shine a spotlight on what makes you unique.
14:40
SPEAKER_01: And then the fourth of the human superpowers, because we want them all to be with S, I call Socrates.
14:48
SPEAKER_01: So what?
14:49
SPEAKER_01: Socrates?
14:50
SPEAKER_01: What?
14:51
SPEAKER_01: How does that go with that list?
14:53
SPEAKER_01: Uh well, I think if you know anything about history, Socrates is remembered for asking powerful questions.
15:02
SPEAKER_01: Asking powerful questions to other human beings is valuable.
15:05
SPEAKER_01: You may see their genius, their gold, their amazing soul.
15:11
SPEAKER_01: And when you ask a powerful question and you let them answer, you let the human being answer, it changes the brain.
15:19
SPEAKER_01: Again, back to neuroscience.
15:20
SPEAKER_01: It literally creates new neural pathways or new myelin in the brain.
15:25
SPEAKER_01: That eureka moment is actually a neural pathway in your brain.
15:29
SPEAKER_01: And when you do that, you can help somebody change their speed in their brain from two miles an hour to 200 miles an hour.
15:37
SPEAKER_01: So it is substantial.
15:39
SPEAKER_01: But you also want to ask powerful questions when you're working with AI.
15:42
SPEAKER_01: Sloppy questions, sloppy answer.
15:45
SPEAKER_01: So, very important to lean into questions.
15:48
SPEAKER_01: Also, the more that you ask questions, the more your brain is changing.
15:54
SPEAKER_01: Whereas if you just ask questions passively and wait for AI to feed you the answer, you could possibly be getting stupider and stupider.
16:03
SPEAKER_01: So those are the four things for people to lean into to build a valuable brand in the age of AI: their stories, their style, their smile, and Socrates.
16:14
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
16:15
SPEAKER_00: And I I love the four S's.
16:17
SPEAKER_00: You're right.
16:17
SPEAKER_00: That does make it so much easier to remember.
16:20
SPEAKER_00: Now, AI can't replace those things.
16:24
SPEAKER_00: So how then do people leverage AI in this destroying their voice?
16:31
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
16:32
SPEAKER_01: Once you get really clear on who you are, who you serve, the transformation you provide, the problems that you solve, and those four S's, then make a big long ass document with all of that and feed it into the LLM of your choice.
16:48
SPEAKER_01: Which one is the best to use is going to change from day to day, month to month.
16:53
SPEAKER_01: But Chat GPT or Claude are uh common examples, perplexity, Gemini.
17:00
SPEAKER_01: And then have it a have a project.
17:02
SPEAKER_01: So, and then anytime you're writing anything, filter it through that project.
17:07
SPEAKER_01: Is that my voice?
17:08
SPEAKER_01: And push back.
17:09
SPEAKER_01: It does tend to be very confident and very generic.
17:13
SPEAKER_01: So you need to give it a very long document.
17:16
SPEAKER_01: In my case, I've I've got I've written 10 books.
17:19
SPEAKER_01: So I feed in a whole book and I say, be true to this voice.
17:24
SPEAKER_01: But I don't let AI write for me.
17:26
SPEAKER_01: But where it is really helpful is uh spell checking, research, or like when I'm tired at the end of the day, I'm like, give me five more headlines that could go with this, you know, subheading.
17:38
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, that here's my here are me my three ideas.
17:41
SPEAKER_01: They're like, okay, but and sometimes it just combines things or gives me something else, or you know, whatever.
17:48
SPEAKER_01: I really love it for spell checking.
17:52
SPEAKER_01: For example, this book, Marketing Fast Track, I just republished it like this week.
18:00
SPEAKER_01: So I went through the whole book and um and I uh chapter by chapter using Claude and I just said, you know, find typos.
18:09
SPEAKER_01: Is there anything where I repeated myself?
18:11
SPEAKER_01: And there were two changes that were were worth making.
18:14
SPEAKER_01: For one, it noticed typos that I didn't notice, especially like words that had two spaces, two spaces between them, or no space, there were a couple of those.
18:24
SPEAKER_01: And then there was one story that should have been in point number one and it was in point number four, and I just moved it.
18:29
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, that would have taken me so long to do that if I had been like agonizing over it.
18:36
SPEAKER_01: So it that's a good way to use AI.
18:39
SPEAKER_01: So the way to use AI is not to be your voice, but once you're clear on your voice and your message, to scale and amplify it.
18:49
SPEAKER_00: I love that because AI is kind of being portrayed as the devil at the moment.
18:54
SPEAKER_00: And it's not it's gonna be around for a while.
18:57
SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah, it's gonna be around.
18:59
SPEAKER_01: We want to make sure that it is working for us as a tool instead of us being employed by AI.
19:05
SPEAKER_01: That would not be good.
19:06
SPEAKER_01: Well, how are you using AI?
19:07
SPEAKER_01: I know you help people with their SEO.
19:09
SPEAKER_01: Do you use it for that?
19:11
SPEAKER_00: I, you know, I use AI, some for SEO.
19:17
SPEAKER_00: SEO has changed a lot.
19:19
SPEAKER_00: Um I'm sure you know a lot now, yes.
19:22
SPEAKER_00: Well, you you have you have AEO, you have GEO, you have L L M O.
19:27
SPEAKER_00: It's the entire alphabet soup.
19:29
SPEAKER_00: But what I am loving right now is is helping my clients be the ones that are quoted by AI by implementing the backside of that.
19:41
SPEAKER_00: The the AI, the I call it AIO, artificial intelligence optimization.
19:46
SPEAKER_00: And it's it's kind of the Venn diagram where they all meet together.
19:50
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's very important.
19:52
SPEAKER_01: Oh, I think it's very important to communicate, not just for other human beings, but also for for, well, I'm gonna call it AEO because it's shorter.
20:02
SPEAKER_01: So, for example, like on same page on the website, same page publishing, if people want to see how I did that as an example, I took every chapter or the first half, I've not finished, of this book, because this book just came out, turned words into wealth.
20:18
SPEAKER_01: The way to write for human beings is quite different from the way to write for for LLMs.
20:25
SPEAKER_01: So LL people like stories, they like contrast, they like emotional words, they like vivid word pictures, they like you to get to the point, they like nice big headings.
20:35
SPEAKER_01: And um, so but uh LLMs like neutral, fact-based QA.
20:43
SPEAKER_01: They like this whole QA thing because obviously that's how we use it.
20:46
SPEAKER_01: So on same page publishing, you can click on the wealth lab, which is really F A Q, written for LLMs.
20:53
SPEAKER_01: And that's probably what you help your clients do, something like that.
20:56
SPEAKER_01: And so it's it's a question and answer format written with me going, okay, there's the content in this chapter.
21:02
SPEAKER_01: Now, if I was a human being, what question would I ask an LLM that that is the answer to?
21:07
SPEAKER_01: So it actually took a bit to flip it to that.
21:11
SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
21:12
SPEAKER_00: That is that is definitely one way to do it.
21:14
SPEAKER_00: Now, in the book two, you you talk about a three-step system.
21:17
SPEAKER_00: Write a book for legacy IP, speak on podcasts, media, and stages, and then add ongoing touch points through YouTube, social media, and newsletters.
21:26
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
21:27
SPEAKER_00: How have you used that three-step system in your own business?
21:30
SPEAKER_01: Well, I'm doing step two right now, right?
21:33
SPEAKER_00: Right?
21:34
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
21:34
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so step step one is write a book.
21:36
SPEAKER_01: That's what I help people do, or one of the things I help people do at same page publishing.
21:41
SPEAKER_01: There are multiple benefits of writing a book, but one of them is that you get clear on your message.
21:46
SPEAKER_01: And the whole process actually has people, in my experience, stepping far more boldly into who they are and their full potential instead of leaning back because they didn't bother to get clear.
21:59
SPEAKER_01: So just getting clear yourself is super valuable.
22:02
SPEAKER_01: And then, of course, what I love about books, and which I love about video and I love about podcasts, is you want to communicate one to many, not one to one, so that you can leverage your time.
22:14
SPEAKER_01: But you don't want to leverage your time before you have gotten your message crystal clear, right?
22:20
SPEAKER_01: You want to, once you get your message clear.
22:23
SPEAKER_01: So um, Amazon is the number three.
22:25
SPEAKER_01: Search engine, which is why I recommend that anybody who's got a business with some kind of special expertise, anybody who solves problems at a profit, which is how I define entrepreneurship, is really well served to have a book on Amazon with the right title and the right subtitle.
22:41
SPEAKER_01: And I also really think it's important that you've got reviews and awards and not just slap something up there and then don't have any reviews or don't pay any attention to marketing it.
22:52
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so Amazon is the number three search engine.
22:56
SPEAKER_01: YouTube is number two.
22:58
SPEAKER_01: So I've written 10 books.
22:59
SPEAKER_01: I've obviously checked that.
23:01
SPEAKER_01: In fact, I'm up I, as I said, I updated Marketing Fast Track this week.
23:05
SPEAKER_01: Turnwords into Wealth came out in March 2026.
23:09
SPEAKER_01: So definitely walking my talk.
23:11
SPEAKER_01: And then Strategic Basics back there.
23:13
SPEAKER_01: I have three YouTube channels.
23:15
SPEAKER_01: My biggest YouTube channel is Strategic Basics, and YouTube is the number two search engine.
23:21
SPEAKER_01: 16% of all internet traffic is on YouTube.
23:25
SPEAKER_01: The other thing that I like about your YouTube channel is podcasts have the disadvantage oftentimes that they're just audio.
23:33
SPEAKER_01: And in this age of AI, I think it's very important that people see your smile and get to know you and know that it's it's real.
23:42
SPEAKER_01: It's it's flawed, but it's authentically human.
23:45
SPEAKER_01: It's not polished and generic, you know, AI produced.
23:49
SPEAKER_01: So, and then if you have those assets, you've got your book that you've written, you do the modified version, put it on your website or blogs or newsletters or whatever so that it can be source material, your book you have on good reads, and then go on speaking or podcasts or radio and TV, which I'm usually on a couple podcasts every week.
24:11
SPEAKER_01: I've been on lots of big shows, I've been in some big magazines like Success and L Magazine.
24:17
SPEAKER_01: So I am doing this, a walking my talk.
24:19
SPEAKER_01: Um, then you have a good probability of being quoted by LLMs so that they will they will seek you out and see, oh, Aurora, Aurora Winter is an expert at helping people launch as thought leaders.
24:31
SPEAKER_01: Oh, she's got the you want more than one source of information.
24:36
SPEAKER_01: So you ideally, if you have books, you've got Goodreads, you've got your website, you've got podcasts, you've got your own YouTube channel, um, that will work for LLMs, but it also helps people.
24:48
SPEAKER_01: Like you don't need to write, well, one book a year would be great.
24:52
SPEAKER_01: Some people manage to do just one book, like uh um Atomic Habits, James Clear had 10 years between books, but he had a really great book and then he talked about habits.
25:04
SPEAKER_01: The problem with one book is you you don't just want to leave it there.
25:07
SPEAKER_01: You need to keep top of mind.
25:08
SPEAKER_01: So have an email, newsletter, podcast, YouTube channel, etc., so that people who want whatever you're helping with can be reminded about you.
25:20
SPEAKER_01: So you have a legacy book and then the ongoing touch points.
25:23
SPEAKER_01: Is that kind of what you're doing?
25:25
SPEAKER_00: Yes, absolutely.
25:26
SPEAKER_00: Well, I don't have a legacy book yet.
25:29
SPEAKER_00: Yes, absolutely.
25:30
SPEAKER_00: And and building out that visibility ecosystem is so important.
25:34
SPEAKER_00: That's what I like to call it because AI is not just looking for one source, they're checking the entire internet.
25:42
SPEAKER_00: And the more times you're coming up in different places, it's going to add credibility.
25:48
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
25:49
SPEAKER_00: It all still goes back to old school marketing of no like and trust.
25:54
SPEAKER_00: Bingo.
25:55
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
25:55
SPEAKER_00: And and that even goes with AI.
25:57
SPEAKER_00: AI's got a no like and trust you.
26:00
SPEAKER_00: That's exactly right.
26:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
26:02
SPEAKER_00: Now, you made$250,000 in 90 days with a short book that saved you from having to get a real job.
26:10
SPEAKER_00: So tell us about that.
26:11
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, now it's another, another crisis averted at the last moment.
26:16
SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh.
26:18
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
26:18
SPEAKER_01: So the story is I've had multiple businesses, yacht sales.
26:22
SPEAKER_01: I launched a film and television production company, raised five million, made eight films.
26:26
SPEAKER_01: But the company before the one I have now was training grief coaches.
26:32
SPEAKER_01: So I was known as the founder of the Grief Coach Academy.
26:36
SPEAKER_01: But I got to a point in my life where I was like, my husband died when he was 33, and I was 31, and our son was four.
26:44
SPEAKER_01: So I spent about a decade helping people through grief.
26:46
SPEAKER_01: I've invented a lot of processes.
26:49
SPEAKER_01: I think I made a difference.
26:51
SPEAKER_01: But at a certain point, I'm like, shoot me if I have to talk about grief for the rest of my life.
26:56
SPEAKER_01: You know, I wanted it to be a chapter of my life that was honored, but I didn't want it to be the whole rest of my life.
27:04
SPEAKER_01: Uh and I'm like, okay, Aurora, I hear you, but you're known as the founder of the Grief Coach Academy.
27:11
SPEAKER_01: How can you test a new idea quickly and inexpensively?
27:17
SPEAKER_01: Because I'm all about doing 90-day test on a shoestring budget.
27:20
SPEAKER_01: You don't want to spend more than three times your monthly rent on the test.
27:25
SPEAKER_01: And I think 90 days is enough to see if you've got product market fit.
27:29
SPEAKER_01: I think people waste so much time and money thinking about, oh, people will love this.
27:33
SPEAKER_01: And you're solving a problem nobody even knows they have.
27:36
SPEAKER_01: So it's a bad mistake.
27:38
SPEAKER_01: Anyway, at the time, people kept asking me, you know, how did you get on radio and TV?
27:42
SPEAKER_01: How did you write so many books?
27:44
SPEAKER_01: And they actually used the words, would you help me fast track my marketing?
27:48
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, maybe I could help you with that.
27:51
SPEAKER_01: And interestingly enough, the boat that I owned with my late husband, we named it Fast Track.
27:56
SPEAKER_01: So the little, the little book that eventually got born is called Marketing Fast Track.
28:00
SPEAKER_01: It has a new cover as of this week with a sailboat on it.
28:04
SPEAKER_01: So what I did is I approached a friend who was a director of coaching for Tony Robbins.
28:09
SPEAKER_01: He had previously interviewed me to his hundred coaches talking about how to help people through grief or through stress.
28:17
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, would you interview me about marketing?
28:20
SPEAKER_01: He's like, sure, I know that you're an entrepreneur.
28:22
SPEAKER_01: Like, he knew me.
28:23
SPEAKER_01: Sure, we can talk about marketing.
28:25
SPEAKER_01: So I choreographed the interview and gave him questions to ask me.
28:28
SPEAKER_01: This is the key part most people don't understand.
28:31
SPEAKER_01: To be good on a podcast or in an interview or speaking on TV, you don't just wing it.
28:38
SPEAKER_01: You prepare what you want to say that you think will be most valuable and that will fit in the amount of time that is available.
28:45
SPEAKER_01: So he interviewed me.
28:47
SPEAKER_01: I liked it.
28:47
SPEAKER_01: I turned it into a PDF.
28:50
SPEAKER_01: It wasn't even a book.
28:52
SPEAKER_01: Using that PDF, I got a TV, C C TV, twice.
28:57
SPEAKER_01: CTV?
28:58
SPEAKER_01: CBS.
28:59
SPEAKER_01: I'm forgetting.
29:00
SPEAKER_01: Which CBS, I think.
29:01
SPEAKER_01: Jenny Tosi interviewed me.
29:03
SPEAKER_01: And it and just from the PDF, it attracted about uh$50,000 of new business because I emailed my list.
29:12
SPEAKER_01: Then I turned it into a little soft cover book, uploaded it onto Amazon, and I offered it to my my list, which was fairly small, about 12,000 at that time.
29:23
SPEAKER_01: And I said, you can get this book for free.
29:25
SPEAKER_01: You just have to cover the shipping.
29:27
SPEAKER_01: And then you'll also get a series of videos to add more no like and trust.
29:31
SPEAKER_01: And at the end of those five videos about marketing, I said, hey, if you'd like a business breakthrough call, you can click at bookcall.biz and we can have a chat and I can see if I can help you.
29:42
SPEAKER_01: So when it became a soft cover book, it made more money than a PDF, as you'd probably expect.
29:48
SPEAKER_01: And it made, it generated new business of$250,000 in 90 days.
29:54
SPEAKER_01: Let's be clear, it didn't make$250,000 by selling the book.
29:58
SPEAKER_01: I gave the book away for free.
30:00
SPEAKER_01: People just covered the shipping.
30:01
SPEAKER_01: So it was more or less a break-even.
30:04
SPEAKER_01: So, but even well,$250,000 was great.
30:08
SPEAKER_01: But also the other thing that was great is that I knew I could pivot from being known as the founder of the Grief Coach Academy to helping people with their marketing, messaging, and book publishing.
30:20
SPEAKER_01: And that's what I to do do today at same page publishing.
30:24
SPEAKER_01: But I um can't overemphasize enough the value of doing a short test with something and real money.
30:34
SPEAKER_01: Don't just ask your neighbor and your mother and your sister-in-law if they like the idea.
30:39
SPEAKER_01: People need to give you real money.
30:41
SPEAKER_01: And even if they just pay a few bucks for shipping, that is substantially better prospect than somebody who just downloads a PDF or, you know, something for free.
30:51
SPEAKER_01: So in fact, if you want to see how I do it today, you can go to TurnwordsIntowealth.com and get this book for free and just cover shipping.
30:59
SPEAKER_01: And it actually comes with the ebook and the audiobook as instant bonuses.
31:03
SPEAKER_01: So, because I know people get so impatient they don't necessarily want to wait for the hardcover book to be uh mailed to them.
31:11
SPEAKER_01: So they get the instant ebook and audiobook.
31:14
SPEAKER_01: The thing also I wanted to point out is while Turnwords into Wealth is a 50,000-word book, like it's a substantial book based on a bunch of work.
31:24
SPEAKER_01: The first little book, Marketing Fast Track, was based on a one-hour interview.
31:29
SPEAKER_01: Wow.
31:30
SPEAKER_01: Right?
31:30
SPEAKER_01: So I tidied it up.
31:32
SPEAKER_01: The version that I just published this week, it explains what happened before and after so that people can model it.
31:39
SPEAKER_01: And I give them um, basically, I give them a free swipe file.
31:42
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, here's the email that I sent, here's, you know, what I would do differently today.
31:47
SPEAKER_01: And so I give them the whole, the whole blueprint for how they could use a little book to grow their business.
31:53
SPEAKER_01: Ideally, you would have somebody interview you and you would think in advance what you want to talk about so that you're not rambling.
32:00
SPEAKER_01: Um, but most people ramble until they get media coaching.
32:03
SPEAKER_01: And that's what I do at Same Page Publishing is I help people create books by talking.
32:09
SPEAKER_00: Gotcha.
32:10
SPEAKER_00: Gotcha.
32:10
SPEAKER_00: Now, you reference everybody in this book from Alex Ramousie as the throat into Taylor Swift.
32:16
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
32:17
SPEAKER_00: She's got some branding examples for us.
32:20
SPEAKER_00: What can, you know, well, that's it.
32:22
SPEAKER_00: What can we learn from looking at others that are very successful, even if they're not necessarily in the same field we're in?
32:29
SPEAKER_01: I think especially if they're not exactly in our field, that that's when we can really um have a breakthrough.
32:36
SPEAKER_01: I love in business to take two ideas that work and combine them.
32:41
SPEAKER_01: So, for example, that uh example I gave at the very beginning about selling boats with the five weeks of sun, fun, and tax shelter.
32:49
SPEAKER_01: That was combining the tax shelter that was available in real estate with selling a boat.
32:55
SPEAKER_01: We were the first people, maybe the only people to ever do that.
32:59
SPEAKER_01: And so there can be a lot of value looking outside your industry.
33:04
SPEAKER_01: So Taylor Swift is a great example of she got knocked down, and a lot of people would have just said, well, folded on I'm out when her back catalog got completely sold and she basically lost control of her life's work.
33:18
SPEAKER_01: But instead of just giving up, she's like, No, I'm gonna re-record Taylor's version of these songs.
33:27
SPEAKER_01: And she made a movement around it and basically really enrolled her fan base in the real version, is the Taylor's version, not the original version.
33:38
SPEAKER_01: And people loved coming to her support.
33:41
SPEAKER_01: They loved getting their re-recordings.
33:44
SPEAKER_01: She and she sold the story.
33:46
SPEAKER_01: She didn't say, oh, the new recordings are this much 10% better sound quality.
33:51
SPEAKER_01: Nah, had nothing to do with that.
33:53
SPEAKER_01: It had to do with the heart of the artist.
33:56
SPEAKER_01: And I think a lot of people really connected with times when they'd felt passed over, times where they felt that they'd lost out.
34:02
SPEAKER_01: And yeah, they wanted to be a champion for Taylor Swift and felt really connected to that mission.
34:08
SPEAKER_01: So all the diehard Taylor Swift fans only buy Taylor's version.
34:13
SPEAKER_01: So I thought it was a great example of it was the story that made the difference there.
34:18
SPEAKER_01: Right?
34:19
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you love music.
34:20
SPEAKER_01: Are you a Taylor Swift fan?
34:22
SPEAKER_00: I I love all music.
34:25
SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, I mean, I think I think Taylor Swift, I I she's a brilliant businesswoman.
34:32
SPEAKER_00: She is masterful.
34:34
SPEAKER_01: So there's a lot to learn.
34:35
SPEAKER_01: Brilliant businesswoman.
34:36
SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes, she is.
34:38
SPEAKER_01: And then Alex Harmozy.
34:40
SPEAKER_01: Oh, sorry.
34:40
SPEAKER_01: No, go right ahead.
34:42
SPEAKER_01: I was just gonna say Alex Harmozy is a great example of you don't have to get an agent or a New York publisher in order to sell a lot of books.
34:51
SPEAKER_01: In August 2025, it was actually August 17th, I remember, because it was my birthday.
34:57
SPEAKER_01: He launched his third book in his hundred million series, 100 million money models.
35:02
SPEAKER_01: And he launched them on two YouTube live streams.
35:07
SPEAKER_01: Again, number two search engine, YouTube, number one asset book.
35:10
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so we got those two things covered to his community that he'd been um growing by having weekly or more frequent updates, building that no, like, and trust that we talked about before.
35:22
SPEAKER_01: And he got the Guinness Book of World Records for the most nonfiction books ever sold on a launch.
35:29
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, sold spare by Prince Harry, which was published by one of the top five publishers.
35:36
SPEAKER_01: I can't remember the exact numbers right off the top of the head, but it was over$100 million that he made.
35:42
SPEAKER_01: And he also was an example.
35:44
SPEAKER_01: His book is called 100 million money models.
35:47
SPEAKER_01: And he was an example of doing all the different money models.
35:51
SPEAKER_01: So the people got the hardcover book either for$29.95 or for free, plus shipping.
35:57
SPEAKER_01: But then the upsells were substantial.
35:59
SPEAKER_01: So you could um buy more books and donate them to other entrepreneurs for I think$6,888.
36:08
SPEAKER_01: You could do something that was, I don't know,$16,000 or something like that.
36:10
SPEAKER_01: So the upsells are substantial, but he added a lot more value and uh and spread the word to help other entrepreneurs.
36:18
SPEAKER_01: So again, he used the story of how you and I, his community and and him, were gonna help entrepreneurs have breakthroughs by giving them the gift of this book, 100 million money models.
36:33
SPEAKER_01: And if you would like to help, you could get one for yourself and donate 199.
36:39
SPEAKER_01: So again, a brilliant example, but he was very smart because one of the things that the New York Times bestselling authors have is that New York Times bestselling bragging rights.
36:52
SPEAKER_01: So how he solved that problem by having a different bragging right, Guinness Book of World Records, most nonfiction books ever sold.
37:01
SPEAKER_01: But he had to think that through in advance, and he had to have somebody from the Guinness Book of World Records there to acknowledge that that had been achieved, otherwise it wouldn't have counted.
37:12
SPEAKER_01: So that's another example of thinking outside the box.
37:15
SPEAKER_01: So if you if there's something that you're trying to do and there's no way that it can happen, is there another route?
37:21
SPEAKER_01: You know, take if the front door is locked, go through the back door.
37:26
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
37:28
SPEAKER_00: If you can give my listeners one piece of advice, what would it be?
37:34
SPEAKER_00: Like think back to yourself when you were you were first starting out, trying to sell those boots, eating that mac and cheese.
37:40
SPEAKER_00: If you could give them one piece of advice, what would it be?
37:44
SPEAKER_01: My goodness.
37:45
SPEAKER_01: Boiling it down to just one.
37:47
SPEAKER_01: I think the most useful first piece of advice is solve a problem at a profit.
37:57
SPEAKER_01: Take the spotlight off yourself.
38:00
SPEAKER_01: Who has this problem?
38:02
SPEAKER_01: Is it a problem that you can solve?
38:03
SPEAKER_01: Are you really, really, really, really good at solving that problem?
38:07
SPEAKER_01: Would you like to solve that problem?
38:09
SPEAKER_01: Like, does that give you joy?
38:11
SPEAKER_01: And then who is that solution worth the most to?
38:16
SPEAKER_01: So, for example, uh, after I've finished my MBA and I segue to helping people with their marketing and their messaging and publishing books and launching YouTube channels, I'm like, oh, okay, I could help, I could help a lot of people with that skill set.
38:29
SPEAKER_01: But who is it worth the most to?
38:31
SPEAKER_01: Well, it's worth the most to somebody who's already got a business who can probably go from six to seven figures or seven to eight figures if we put all the pieces and lot together and launch them as a thought leader.
38:44
SPEAKER_01: So if we, you know, launch their best-selling award-winning book, get their YouTube channel launched, get them media savvy so they get on podcasts, book the podcast for them, do their YouTube channel video edits, like that could easily 10x that person's revenue.
38:59
SPEAKER_01: And it could also 10x somebody else's revenue.
39:01
SPEAKER_01: But if somebody's only making$1,000 a month, 10Xing it's still$10,000 a month, which is a lot.
39:08
SPEAKER_01: But if they're making$10,000 a month and we 10X it, that's$100,000 a month.
39:14
SPEAKER_01: So sell to people who have the problem that you solve, who know that they have that problem, and that it would be worth about 10 times what you charge to them.
39:28
SPEAKER_00: It sounds so simple.
39:30
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it really is.
39:32
SPEAKER_01: It sounds so simple.
39:35
SPEAKER_01: I can't tell you how many people just they have an idea, but they they don't nobody has nobody knows they have that problem.
39:42
SPEAKER_01: Nobody wants to buy it.
39:45
SPEAKER_01: Don't go there.
39:46
SPEAKER_01: Don't go there.
39:47
SPEAKER_00: No, no, I love that.
39:48
SPEAKER_00: Well, where can they find you?
39:51
SPEAKER_01: All right.
39:52
SPEAKER_01: Well, they can get the gift book, Turn Words Into Wealth, absolutely for free.
39:56
SPEAKER_01: They just have to cover shipping at turnwordsintowealth.com.
40:01
SPEAKER_01: Turnwords into wealth.com.
40:03
SPEAKER_01: And it comes with digital bonuses.
40:04
SPEAKER_01: You instantly get the ebook, the audiobook, and a 31-page digital workbook so you can keep track of where your answers are.
40:12
SPEAKER_01: Um, and then we ship the hardcover book to you and you just cover uh the shipping.
40:17
SPEAKER_01: Or if people would like help launching as a thought leader, please go to sampagepublishing.com because I come on the same page with my clients.
40:27
SPEAKER_01: We sit on the same side of the table.
40:29
SPEAKER_01: So go to samepagepublishing.com and you can see uh a lot of stories of the clients whose lives I have changed, and you can sign up for a business breakthrough call if you'd like to chat.
40:41
SPEAKER_00: Fabulous.
40:42
SPEAKER_00: I'll make sure to link all of that in the show notes.
40:45
SPEAKER_00: And like our said, it's that simple.
40:47
SPEAKER_00: Find somebody with a problem, be able to fix that problem, and get paid to do it.
40:52
SPEAKER_00: And until next time, keep planning like a boss.