Powerful Marketing
DENISE M. MICHAELS
Leverage with Your Book
GHOSTWRITER, AUTHOR, SPEAKER, BOOK COACH Copyrighted Denise M. Michaels
I’m always interested in the smart ways my clients use the books I help them with to market themselves using the powerful marketing leverage a book provides. Rarely do they come to me with illusions of getting on the New York Times bestseller list. Their books generally appeal to a niche market and, their objective is to use a book as a way of pumping up their credibility and influence. As a result, they get more of the business they’ve been doing for years. I must share a story about a client who used his book in an extraordinary way which has resulted in $450,000 in sales since February 2020. Sales that have helped him, his business, and his family sail through this pandemic without any blips to their sixfigure income and lifestyle. But I digress. Honestly, his situation isn’t the norm. Most of my clients use their books to get more speaking engagements, media appearances, and as a result, more clients. Some do special printings of their books to corporations who buy them in large quantities. The books have the company logo on them. While there are still a scant number of live and in-person conferences and seminars happening since we’ve been quarantined, your book can be an entree to speaking at a Zoom conference or event, on podcasts, webinars, and more. A full-length book (over 175 pages) is the ticket to these bene-
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fits. People respect the thought and experience required to write a full-length book. Mini books have become popular in recent years and can generate online leads or help build an email list. However, a mini book won’t garner the respect and gravitas that happens almost automatically with a full-length book. Minibooks are often perceived as trivial fluff – because many are just that. Fluff. How do I know this? If you’re pitching yourself as a visiting corporate trainer or a guest on a podcast or TV show – often you’ll be asked, “How many pages long is your book?” They probably won’t say your book is too short. But they’ll make excuses about how busy they are and how the time for guest speakers is limited – blah, blah, blah… Back to my client’s story. His expertise is in the human resources arena. So, with a lot of humor and great content, we crafted a book about bad bosses. He set up a page on his website where visitors can buy a copy of his book anonymously and have it sent to their terrible boss. Well, someone did exactly that and the terrible boss was the CEO of a Fortune 100 company. My client saw the name of the CEO and called him a short time after mailing the book. The CEO was livid with rage that someone would dare send an anonymous copy of a book because they view him as a bad boss.
