Small Business Expo follow up

"Foreign."

Stuart: Welcome to another episode of the book More Show. It's Stuart here with Betsy, Betsy Vaughan. How's it going?

Guest: Fantastic. How are you?

Stuart: Very good, thank you. It's been a couple of weeks since we last recorded. We had a show with Mike Mack last week which if anyone hasn't caught it, well worth a listen. It's a really interesting episode to see how Mike's using his book and he's actually just getting ready for a bit of a more public launch this weekend, coming around Thanksgiving. So it's a really interesting episode to listen to how he started and then over the last 12 months has rethought it and pulled it back together as a different version. So that was a great show last week that.

Guest: Well, you know, that was probably one of my favorite. I mean I'm a Mic Mac Rupee, but he big fan. But I really enjoyed it and I enjoyed just listening to him, how he really used our process, you know, they took it the next level. So I really enjoyed like he went to the version one and he did a version two and what he did in that version two, you know, with his book. So it is a great episode. If people haven't listened to that one, I definitely recommend you're doing that.

Stuart: It's really interesting to start getting that feedback more and more from people on how they've kind of picked up on it and maybe started with one idea, but then it's developed and using it in a very specific way or for a specific purpose. I think so often the kind of the mental overhead or the baggage of creating something in the first place kind of not dims your view. But it takes up so much focus and attention to get the thing done, despite how straightforward we try and keep the process. But it's not sometimes until that checkbox is checked and then you can move on it can then really start thinking about the utilizing of it. Talk quite a bit about the beyond the book process and okay, now you've done it, what next? And I think sometimes until you've kind of passed that first check mark, even with the best intentions of the world, it's very difficult to think about the second stage. And we often talk about start with the end in mind, but the practicalities of that, even when people follow the advice and make a very good effort at having that approach, it's sometimes a bit. It's not until you've passed that point that you can then look back and see it with more clarity and then kind of take the next step and move forward again.

Guest: Very true. Very true.

Stuart: I think same goes even for our own stuff. We were talking the last time you and I spoke about the small business expo that we went to, or that you went to rather. We'll follow up on that in a moment. But we were talking then that we were having the realization that the 90 minute book itself is perfect example of the Night minute book. It really encourages people to take that next step. But we often talk about lead generating books and lead converting books as two separate things and the 90 minute book itself kind of bridges across those two. So we've over the last couple of weeks have been working to not so much plug those gaps, but put other books in those individual places. So it kind of builds on the suite of information that's out there for people as they come in at different stages. But even for our own stuff, looking back at it, or taking a moment to look back at it and reimagining how, which purposes, which jobs of work it could do better. It's not until you've got something that you can then look forward or look to move forward and develop it even further. I've been working quite a bit over the last couple of weeks with business owner over here in the UK who owns osteopathic practice and their book. We might do a show with Paul in a couple of weeks time. Maybe I'm going to head back down there and have the opportunity to do it then. But Paul's book, which talks about shockwave therapy, which is a particular type of medical procedure but non invasive medical procedure, and that started out as a book for patients, but actually it's been taken up and there's been almost far more interest from other practitioners and that's not spinning off, but there's a separate consulting business which is developing even further because of that and then the manufacturer, which is also the global kind of body, the industry leader for that particular technology, they've picked up on what Paul's been doing quite a lot, they've promoted quite a lot of his stuff. I was just talking to him earlier on today because he's got a consulting day which is something that he'd done in the past, but not as concerted and not particularly around this side of the business, more around the osteopathic side of the business. But this consulting job almost came directly on the back of the book, which was taken up by the practitioners. And that whole kind of surprising side, sort of tangent away from the original thought of the book has come up. And again we say it time and time again, it's that kind of lean approach of create something and then kind of pivot depending on the real life feedback. Some of these things you just really can't tell until you've kind of taken that first step and something's out there, something seeing what's resonating. So with Paul, for example, we're just in the process now of outlining a second book specifically for practitioners that kind of serves that market that's identified itself as very interested in the subject, but serves them even more specifically because this book is going to be tailored to them, rather than the patient focused book, which still has some crossover and still some value, but creating something that is very tailored now for that job and can leverage and amplify the concern stuff that Paul does in that space. Again, none of that would have happened or not in the same way were it not for creating the first thing and then getting out there and getting that feedback, which, looping back to last week's show, is what Mike did as well, to kind of dial in what he thought his message was and who he thought he was targeting. And they kind of amplify what he's now doing in his business. So great to get this feedback.

Guest: Yeah, it really is. I like, I think we hear that people have an idea, you know, like Paul, he was gearing it towards patients and then lo and behold, you know, it's other practitioners that are interested and we hear that a little bit, you know, from our clients. They may have a target market in mind and then it just happens to get in the hands of somebody else and becomes valuable to them, you know, and then who they thought it was geared toward really wasn't, but. And it ends up benefiting, you know, more than one market, you know, essentially. So I'm excited to hear that Paul's doing another book. So that's great. You know, what can lead to doing something else, you know, really targeting them and being valuable to the other individuals versus the patients and the practitioners versus the patient. So it's always a surprise and people, you know, people are always surprised, I think, when they had this idea in mind. And sometimes there's another path that's presented, you know, for them.

Stuart: The other thing that we see quite a lot as well is how straightforward people find the second, third and fourth books to create because. Absolutely, yeah. That overhead of doing anything for the first time. I can remember years and years ago I imported so as listeners can tell from the accent, I'm crossing the UK at the moment. So we drive on the correct side of the road, the left side of the road, but worldwide, there's not many other places that do it. Japan is one of the places that does it. So you often see quite a few imported Japanese sports cars over here, because the Japanese market has. This tangent is going somewhere, believe me, but the Japanese market means that they have a high turnover of vehicles, something to do with like emissions tests or like annual certifications on the vehicles. Once they get over a couple of years old, it then becomes disproportionately expensive to keep the vehicles. So they. The turnover is a lot higher. So you see a lot of Japanese imports across here. So, anyway, long and short of it is I imported a Japanese sports car across here and you need to go through all sorts of legal jumps and hoops to get it certified in the uk, that process, I mean, it must have taken months. I must have driven back and forth to the test and centre goodness knows how many times, because it would just keep failing for one little thing and one little thing and one little thing. Which leads me to the question, why didn't they just give the full list in the first place? But it's almost like it was get so far and then something would fail and then they wouldn't continue with the test the next time. Anyway, point being that that whole learning, interesting though it was, and obviously I had nothing better to do at the time, but that was interesting, but completely wasted because I had no intention of importing another car after that. It was just something I wanted to do at the time. But all of that organizational understanding of what it takes to get it through was then kind of wasted because there was no leverage. And the second one would have been infinitely quicker than the first and the third quicker still. And I think it's very much the same with the book process, particularly with the outlining, with the way that we get people to think about titles. Outlining. Towards the end of the call as well, we'll talk about an outlining workshop that we've got coming up this week. So I'll give you the details before we finish today. But once you've got that model in mind, it's so straightforward to create the second one compared with the first one, because all of that mental groundwork, the kind of foundations, the baseline of what we're trying to achieve, and even the language that we use is kind of in already. So it just really accelerates the process. And it's not necessarily a surprise to see people creating three, four, five iterations or versions of kind of a core theme or related series of books to target Each individual funnel because the cost and overhead of creating an additional one decreases dramatically. And the specificity or the usefulness of having it in a funnel that you're going to use all of these things kind of, it amplifies on the one hand and becomes easier on the other hand. So it's not necessarily a surprise to see people creating that series of books. And certainly, I mean we just had, over the last couple of weeks we've had a couple of authors in from. A couple of authors, sorry, a couple of orders in from another author who's got a series of. Don got four or five books in his series, but ordering a couple of hundred at a time just because each of those funnels is targeted in a slightly different way. And they now get to the stage where they're really dialing in that mechanism for getting the books out there, promoting the product and service, the funnel for following up with people. And it really becomes quite a solid foundation. You can then build up all of these different channels, opportunities coming in in a way that seems difficult to imagine when you first start the first one. But over time obviously it becomes more straightforward and, and really kind of leverages the assets that you've got out there.

Guest: Absolutely. I was just sharing that before we. With the gentleman that I was speaking to who, who has an idea for a series, you know, and he's written a larger book not with us in the past and that's his idea. He said, I have this great idea for the series. He said, are people, people allowed to do four or five, six books? Absolutely. You know that. I mean, he already has that vision in mind for each single target marketer subject matter, you know, and was happily sharing them with me and, and he has yet to go through our process. He's just starting and he still just, he gets that. I think, I think the fact that he has done a big book, he realizes how simple this process is going to be and so really has some, some great work already laid out in front of him.

Stuart: So I think the other thing is. Yeah, exactly. And that is having that, that goal or that vision of how each of these little things, it's almost like imagining the. I was trying to tie technology based things back to like the real world example. And it's someone having the vision of saying, okay, I'm in a storefront here, seeing these four or five different groups of people go past, all of which could be potential targets, target markets, but understanding how I need to engage with each of those is going to be slightly different in the physical world. It's easy to imagine how that works. You can imagine having a slightly separate conversation with one customer versus another customer as they walk through the door, but then just substitute in that conversation or that starter with a book and how that can start the conversation and that conversation flows down a slightly different path. It's. Yeah, it's great to see people starting off with that vision and being able to kind of facilitate the easy way to create that thing for them.

Guest: Yeah, absolutely.

Stuart: I was just going to say something else as we were talking. Oh, that's the other thing. So we are recording now on the Monday 13th November, so we're about six, seven weeks away from Christmas. So the other thing that's definitely worth mentioning briefly, which is a terrifying thought in and of itself because I can very clearly remember January 2017, things have disappeared. So the other thing that's worth mentioning at this time of year is the annual based books, the time based books that we've got a number of people who've written them or obviously we talked to quite a few people where as we're trying to steer people down a path of lead generation and talking to people about the titles and what's the most compelling way of getting an invisible prospect to raise their hand. So at this time of year, it's also worth thinking about the 2017 guide to something other versus the 2018 guide to something or Other. So that model. So I always go back to the Realtor model that we've got of the 2017 guide to Winterhaven house prices because it's an easy one for pretty much everyone to conceptualise. So for any businesses where there's any kind of indication of an annual change, so whether that's like the house prices reports, the house prices guides which annually change year on year because everyone appreciates that house prices fluctuate year on year. So up to date information is valuable. But also things like tax. Well, tax regulation is obviously a hot subject at the moment, but as tax laws change year on year, as other kind of legally mandated things change year on year, as thresholds for things change year on year, or technology changes year on year, all of these things where the date is a compelling factor, obviously a subject that's evergreen. I'm just trying to think of something that it's not relevant for. Well, like Mike's book is remarkable service that's got nothing to do with one year versus another year. Particularly it's a book about a particular subject or even our own stuff like the 90 Minute Book, the 2017-2018 guide to writing a book isn't that compelling because people's expectations are that it doesn't change that much. Although, I mean, you could probably force something into it if you could position it as this is the latest information around book publishing as lead generation. But it's not. You're kind of trying to shoehorn the content into the framework of an annual change there. But anything like the tax changes or the threshold changes or the market data changes, anything like that, where it does change year on year, having the content of the book remain broadly the same because year on year the information might be broadly the same, but the numbers changing or the market review or the assessment or the conditions, all of these things change. Whether all of these things that change on a regular basis where you can add an additional layer of insider information of knowledge to the book and have a reason to update it, that's another great thing to be thinking about at this time of year because obviously as people go into the new year, there's a spike in interest of people who are looking for the latest information on that particular subject. So like calendars, the number of calendars that sell in December and January far outstrips it for the rest of the year. So anything that's time based now is a great time to be thinking about that and having something in a funnel ready to go, ready for the new year or for the first couple of weeks of the new year, have a campaign around that to capture the interest that's out there already. Again, now is a perfect time to be thinking about making a move on that, to position yourself as January comes around.

Guest: Oh yeah, very good. Definitely thinking about that.

Stuart: Yeah. So that's me doing a lot of talking again. I'm going to be quiet for a second because do you want to give us a quick update on. The last time we spoke was heading into the Small Business Expo. So we've talked obviously, but it'd be interesting to share with everyone listening our experience of being there, particularly around we know there were some other people talking about books as creating books and then if anyone else that you saw there using books as lead generation or to start conversations.

Guest: Right. Yeah. So I. That was my first real experience with an event like that from a professional standpoint in this industry. And there was happened to be. And I was. We were not there as no vendors or speakers. I was simply observing and taking and searching up some knowledge that some of their speakers had, you know, to offer. And there were some great ones, I will say there happened to be another book company there that's much larger than us. You know, I like to say that we're just sort of simple and classic and an easy process and, you know, simple and classic. What's that? Simple, classic. I don't know. We're, you know, we're, you know, we're. There's not a lot of flash dust. And so I put myself in situation. How, how would I, how would we be in there selling, you know, our product and trying to inform people about what we do. But so I did sit down with somebody and it's funny because the reality of it is what I learned from, from this person is this, this group of individuals really, it's the same thing. It's. We. There's all the same reasons why we don't write a book. We're all hearing it across the board. You know, we don't have time or I'm not the, I'm not an expert or the people really want to listen to what I have to say or you know, sort of the same, same things that people sort of come to us with, you know, they think that they're not ready or whatever. And the reasons to do a book are, you know, relatively the same thing. So the reasons to do it is to create yourself as an expert, to have that credibility to, you know, that this company was not necessarily looking so much at lead generation as much as we do. They do sort of across the board, a few other things, but still the same. It's all basically the same. I think if you're writing a 90 minute book or you're writing, you know, a book with Tucker Max and book in a box, there's all the hesitation is all the same and all the reasons you should do it are the same. You know, the process is just a little bit different. So being there and seeing people and people are excited. Like, you know, I sat through, there was maybe 30 people in this, in a setting and you know, how many people thought about writing a book and you know, I, I can't believe. And everybody wants to write a book. Everybody has a book in them. And I heard that so much even not just in that workshop, but I did sort of a networking couple of, well, like three or four networking sessions and so got to interact with roughly 20 people each time. And the same. Everybody wants to write a book where they feel like I have a book in me. I wish I had a dime for every time someone said that to me. I have a book in me and it's our clients, people I meet on the street, people who find out What I do every. That is the line that I hear. And I think generally people do have something to offer, but they just don't know how to go about doing it. So that was a big surprise from people. Like they were surprised particularly at how we work and how we do things like the timber, how simple it was, you know, to how. I don't want to, I don't want to make it sound like it's not an effort, you know, because it is, but it's just not time consuming, you know, it's not going to, it's not a huge investment. Right.

Stuart: And that's the big difference that I hear was listen to a podcast over the weekend and completely unrelated, it was just technology podcast. And one of the, one of the speakers on the podcast, one of the guests was saying, I've got a book, but it's been, yeah, hopefully it'll be finished, I don't know, next year sometime. Yeah, it's been a long process. I mean, everyone knows what a pain in the neck is. It's been over a year and I completely accept that. The term book is quite wide ranging from like a academically cited in resources encyclopedia document from one extreme to a work of fiction which takes a lot of creating down to the lead generation, 90 minute bulk approach of that single target market offering them the most value to answer the specific question and start a conversation. But still, that baggage that people bring into the process, it's quite difficult for some people to kind of break that mold and get past it because increasingly that means that people get caught up thinking about, well, it has to be this big, it has to be this much of a challenge, it has to be difficult, it has to have so many pages because of all the preloaded baggage. Instead of thinking what's the job of work? What's it trying to achieve? What's the value that I can give to someone within this time and cost constraint and let's move forward with that. I think it really does a disservice to people who are thinking about it because they immediately shut it off as it falls into the too difficult camp.

Guest: It really, it really does. And people, that's one of the questions that I got a lot during this small business. I feel like that's it, that's all I have to do. I heard that somebody said and I'm like, it really is. I mean, how does it, how does that work? Well, the same questions I always get. Well, doesn't it have, doesn't it need to be bigger? You know, a big book or I need 200 pages. And I just had this conversation on Thursday with, with some gentlemen who were just that we needed to. We need a 200 page business book. And I bet they said it no fewer than 11 times and during the 4 7, 4. And I said what if you can get the set, you can offer the same value with an hour and a half of your time and 70 pages. And what if, what if you get the exact same thing, the same results?

Stuart: Yeah, exactly. Everyone's thinking about.

Guest: They just don't get the people that don't fall. They just think it has to like there's that, that, that bag. It doesn't. Right way to put it. Like it has to be this big and it has to be say this and. But you know, sometimes we find and we find because we read these books that sometimes those bigger books tend to just be repetitive.

Stuart: You know, because people are thinking about. Yeah, people are going into it thinking about the effort, the work and the outcome as being a certain number of characters on a page. Not going into it thinking the outcome is the beginning of a conversation or an educated member of the public or this bit of knowledge shared with people. And then you can't help but become focused on the just volume. It just becomes a volume exercise. It's kind of quantity over quality. And again this isn't saying this is the case for every book that's over 100 pages. Far from it. But it then does start going to. Well, this takes a year's worth of effort and many tens of thousands of doll and it really is a full time job. And if the outcome. Exactly as you said, if the outcome can be achieved in 70 pages, in 50 pages, why get hung up on this big thing of. It has to be so big. Yeah, it's just looking at it from the wrong. It's not being outcomes based.

Guest: It's not. Yeah. So you know the business expo, I use an example a lot. I won't name his name but we have a gentleman who did a book with us and I think his book is 35 pages and he is so happy with this book. He takes this book to boat shows and things like, you know, these things and he's out there. I mean it's a 35 page book and he is so thrilled with it and has been, you know, just was. It's happy with what he's doing and the results that he has gotten and the exposure he's gotten just from doing that. So I tend to use that person as an example quite often just to say hey, you know, maybe 35 pages isn't enough for somebody who's in a certain industry. Maybe they do need a little bit more, but the reality of it is maybe you don't.

Stuart: Yeah, exactly. The funny thing is, I mean, the 90 minute book itself, we'd intentionally. We've just kind of revised it a little bit in the last couple of weeks, so that's why it's kind of front of mind. But we'd intentionally left that pretty roughly edited. Way more roughly edited than we would do for a customer's book. Because we were trying to prove the point of once you start the conversation, it's done its job. So we've done over 400 books now, all stemming from the 90 minute book. And that was only 34 pages. I think it's small. And it was pretty roughly. It was intentionally left pretty roughly edited. But the point being that it still generated all of our business because the title is a compelling title and it gets people to raise their hand and it starts the conversation. The. Yeah, if the job. Like we were saying, I think last time we were talking, that's difference between writers and authors. If you can author an idea and have a fantastic idea communicated with people with not having to be a writer, the writer is the technical skill of getting the words on the page and the language very strongly associated with fiction and all of that type of thing. But as a business owner, if you want to be the author of an idea and communicate that idea in a way that makes invisible leads visible, then focus on the outcomes. Focus on sharing the knowledge and starting the conversation. Not on the content. Not on the page count. Rather, sorry, do focus on the content. The content needs to be good, but content is.

Guest: Content needs to be good, but page numbers don't. Yeah, word count is not important, you know, so, yeah, it's difficult not to

Stuart: sound evangelical about this. I know a couple of people have commented that you always harp on the same points, but I'll tell you what, as soon as people start getting it, then I'll stop harping on about it.

Guest: Right, exactly. It is. It is. It's interesting. And some people I feel like I can really get honest with when you have those. And some people are just so caught up in that, you know, so. And I'm always very hesitant. You know, someone who says I have to have 200 pages, I want. Well, you know, that is not. Ideally, it's a lot of work for our team, and I think there's a different expectation. So I'm always very, you know, cautious to Say I don't, maybe that's not the right fit, you know, if that's not it. But let's focus on my way and be really, really in that. Now of course I can use Mike Mac who took his book from 76 pages to 180 I think doing the second version. So that's a great example. I had to say, hey, you know what, let's get that first version out and then focus on the second version. If it doesn't do what you want in the first version, which I think it probably will, then we can put the effort into, you know, adding content to it and making it your 150 or 200 page book, you know, so,

Stuart: so one of the things I wanted to ask, which I'm not sure whether we talked about was we were saying that if we were there then the example that we would go in with is to create a nine minute book specifically for that audience, the small business or the small business owner's guide to creating all the leads that you want by using a book. I still haven't worked on a better title but we would create something that was more catchy, specifically targeted that and then we would give away that book as part of an opt in campaign as much as practical. Whilst being there, did you see anyone else who was there who was using a book as a lead generation tool?

Guest: Not as a lead generation tool. I mean, sort of, kind of. The one company that was there, they sort of did a lot of different books. They spoke about it, but their process was, you know, a financial. Was a much larger investment and they didn't actually help you write the book, they just sort of. You paid them to tell you how to write the book and they were, there were some talk about using the book as a lead generation, but it's also selling the book ahead of time before they've even written the book. And we're going to show you how to write the book in 40 hours. I believe it was there, you know, 40 hours of your time kind of thing. But, but that was really it. But a lot of people love the idea of, you know, of doing the book.

Stuart: I heard were there vendors using books. So as you're walking around, there was

Guest: a thing I had, I spoke to a vendor who, he was in something. It was funny, it was sort of, it was. I don't even know if I shared this with you. Maybe I did. It was talking about his, his email system and it was very similar to the nine word email which of course is a Dean Jackson specialty. And So I was really interested. We had a conversation. So he had written a book himself with the purpose of it was a lead generation tool. So he had started the book and written. I think he's almost finished with it. But it was. It had taken him a few months to. I think he, he told me it would launch in January. This was October. He'd been working on a few months. It's probably about a six month process for him to put that together. So, yeah, so there was, there was some definite interest. I've had a lot of conversations. There's been, you know, a handful of conversations that come through. I've gotten calls from individuals that I either spoke to or that picked up. You know, my, my card gave me a call. We're very interested in doing this process. And they're all these happen to be. Which is interesting for me. I'm based out of Tampa, and so these are just local Tampa individuals. So we have a few clients here in Tampa. But it was interesting to really see, wow, how we could sort of focus on one market from a zip code standpoint, you know, if you will.

Stuart: I think like we said last time, the next event that we get to go to in the new year, I think we'll really create that book and then give that book away at the event and use that as the kind of lead capture tool there and really kind of demonstrate the effectiveness of it in kind of eat your own dog food type example. But it'd be interesting to see how many leads were captured by the other vendors or the other exhibitors there doing the normal thing, kind of trying to get people to drop business cards into like a fishbowl or.

Guest: Yeah, there was a lot of that. Yeah. Yeah, there was a lot of that. And yeah, that's always interesting. I have. I'm involved with someone in my life that, that he. That's how he captures a lot of leads. You know, he owns a local business and everybody has their thing that they do, you know, like, you know, he'll give away $100 gift card to Publix and people will drop their name in. And he was an event, a local event here a few weeks ago. And I think he ended up with 400 leads based on, you know, people dropping into their business card or signing up, putting their name in there, and he'll turn those into. Probably 10% of those will turn into actual customers. You know, so everybody's always, you know, there's so many ways that people are looking to grab those leads. And there was a lot of that There, you know, because there was a lot of bankers, merchant, you know, companies, a lot of. Who else was there? Like printing companies, you know, stuff geared local. There was a lot of large companies as well. Like, you know, some of the large cell phone providers there were. I was surprised that there were two of those there, you know, at this event. But overall I think those are just. There's a good bench to go to and I'm glad I spent the day, you know, there and there was valuable information and it's interesting to hear local small businesses and some, some of the individuals I spoke to are, you know, I'm talking like two man deals and a really small business, you know. So I heard just somewhere. I don't know where I heard this, but a small business is technically anything under $10 million. And that kind of shocked me because when I heard that, because I was thinking, wow, there's so many businesses just think of that are small, you know, where do they fall into the category that are not even doing. They're doing 5 million, 2 million.

Stuart: Yeah. Even tens of thousands less than that.

Guest: Yeah, yeah, right, right.

Stuart: Yeah.

Guest: And so yeah, for someone like. And that was one of the things that one of the gentlemen I spoke to, he happened to own a printing company. He said, you know, I just don't. Well, I do. I actually had a long conversation with him and he sent me an email. He is a. It's. There's like three employees. One happens to be his wife and then he has somebody else and he does printing. And he is a local one man shop in. Tell me where he's located here in Tampa. I know exactly where he is. And he's like, you know, I just, he was. I. I've never really thought about a book. It's a lead generation tool. He said, honestly, he said, but, you know, he just. But I take with printed materials people all the time. You know, he's handing out his own brochures that he's designed and his own business cards and he has koozies and all this stuff and he's sending out the.

Stuart: You can imagine that for that local business where there's a local presence. So some sort of local awareness of the business. A lot of people will have driven by branching out a little bit further, which. So there might be geographic constraints if he doesn't ship stuff, for example, if he physically needs to be putting to go there. But whatever his constraints are, they're obviously big enough to keep the business going, otherwise they'd be out of business. But you can imagine him Creating the Small Business Guide to the Tampa Small Business Guide to Printing to print savings or struggling with titles today. But anyway, something that really is beneficial for other small business owners in the area to get the most of their printing budget. Creating a book with his inside knowledge. Particularly if he's been in the game for a while. There's probably all sorts of. Not even tricks or tips, but just things that he knows that are more effective than other things. We see it even here, the expectation or the. I mean rightfully so, the lack of understanding, but people just not realizing that like images, when images need to be printed, there's a difference between the quality of an image that you'd want on a screen on a website versus the image quality that you'd need for being in a printed book. Like the print dimensions I would imagine is a thing. The fact that one type of dimension is probably going to be far more common than another type of dimension. So if you can get your stuff printed in this way, it's going to be far more cheaper. The difference in paper stock, the ability to physically deliver printed material afterwards, the lead times, all of these types of things that. The Small Business Guide to Printing or Return on Printing, all of this type of thing I would imagine is just in his head and he probably does it without thinking. But creating a book and then sharing that into the local community. Every new business that gets started up, joining the SCORE or the Chamber of Commerce or the Rotaries, you would imagine that would be a fantastic, valuable

Guest: lead

Stuart: generating or lead identifying or community educating piece that it could create very simply. So there's always an example of something that you can add value and give back in.

Guest: So. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, you know. Yeah, that one was. Just happened to be interesting too because I thought, well, you're passionate. I mean he had a whole. He had me all his stuff, you know, material. So I thought that was really interesting, you know, when speaking with him. And like I said, since then he has reached out. So maybe.

Stuart: Right. And the effort to create that and the. The lack of specificity around it to a certain degree. Just the kind of. We've always done this and this is what's done generically in our industry. So everyone does this. It's sometimes a little bit difficult to break that mold because you kind of just get. It's almost like the path of least resistance. This is what's always been done. So until you got reason to kind of think down a different path, you just continue doing the same. And there's almost certainly value to doing some of it, but, but breaking out of that is,

Guest: I think it's hard for people. Like you said, it's always, this is how it's always been done in XY industry and that's what people expect. And so I think sometimes I was thinking about that while I was at this event because I had a big area where they said, drop your business card. So you can just leave stack to business cards. And you know, business cards, it's funny how people get really. Either they're just simple and to the point or people really go to extremes, you know, And I think I saw so much of that like business card in the envelope and you know, and it had, it was glitter, it was black and glitter and. Yeah. And there was all these fancy things, you know, and I thought you could just see people saying, I need to do something that's just a little bit different, you know, but then the practical side of me, which is who I am, is like, you know, I took it, but then I threw that envelope away and I had, you know, because like, what am I going to fit into everything else? You know, so. But it was, it was interesting to see some people who just did things that's a little bit different. It's nice to think outside the box, you know, with the printer, with the book. And we say, you know, as an example, I said to this gentleman, you know, we use the 90 minute book as sort of an extended, you know, calling card. It is your, it is that business card, you know, it's that extension of it. And I will say that actually Bill Walsh, who was involved with this particular group, he was on stage talking about, you know, the importance of writing a book. And, and it's interesting, he kind of gave his steps on how to write a book and. Which is all great and fine and dandy, but it's still a several month process, you know, doing it that way. And you have to have the time.

Stuart: Yeah, you still got to do it.

Guest: You still have to do it. And so. But it was very interesting to hear it. But he said, you know what, the business card, he was like, you need more. I mean, he said that you, you need more. He said, people will take their business card, but nine times out of 10 they end up in the trash can, you know. Yeah. And he said, with the book, nobody's gonna throw your book away. Yeah, you can't justify going, oh, that's a book. You know, somebody just gave me a free book, so I'm gonna, I'm gonna hold on to that. You know, it'll Be one of those things you can move 10 times and it's gonna follow you everywhere you go. Justify throwing it away.

Stuart: That's a long conversion time.

Guest: Yeah, exactly.

Stuart: I've just realized that we're heading towards 45 minutes on the typically 35 minutes show, so. But we've still got quite a bit to talk about. So we were going to go into. We talked last time about the. I mentioned it briefly before creating the specifically lead generating book around the 90 minute book framework. We can talk some more about that next time. The other thing I wanted to mention is the lead converting book. So I think we've talked about school cards on the show quite a few times before. The school card model that we've got, the framework that comes from Strategic Coach, we talk about that quite often. People want to see an example of it as it sits at the moment. Head across to profitactivatorschool.com which is the other side of the business, the entrepreneurial coaching side of the business, that breakthrough DNA framework, the eight profit Activators framework and the Profit Activator score scorecard that's built around it is a great way of taking the framework that's talked about in the eight Profit Activators book and then setting it to a framework that allows people to almost evidence and convert themselves by scoring on a particular sliding scale of each of the eight mindsets. So that as a lead converting book in the funnel is a great tool. Had great success with it on that side of business. We've helped several people create their own scorecards, mainly coming through from Coach obviously because it's Coach that promotes creating the scorecards in the first place. But for the book funnel, creating an author readiness scorecard is something we've almost completed now. So we'll talk about a little bit more about that process in the coming weeks and people can grab a copy of that as soon as it's available. So we'll talk about that in the next show. And then the last thing, just before we cut everyone loose is talking about the outline workshop that's coming up on Thursday the 16th at 3pm Dean's going to do a outlining session and then we'll follow up with a Q and A, similar to we've done with the titles workshops in the past. So great opportunity to dive in, listening to the outline structure, how to best think about it and then chance to ask us some questions at the end on kind of dialing in and tailoring your outline to the purpose you're trying to get from the call. So I'll put a note to that in the show notes, which are@90minutebooks.com podcast and this is episode 44, so 044. And also we obviously make sure that we send an email out to everyone and we'll have the link details in there as well. So great opportunity to get that element kind of ticked off in your head and get some more information on the outline.

Guest: That should be interesting.

Stuart: Yeah, I'm really looking forward to it. Yeah, and me too. We've done a couple of titles calls in the past, but this will be the first outline one that we've done. I think this is going to really add some value to people who are kind of thinking about creating that and, and helping them just dial in that bit of their thoughts and. And again, really get it nailed down so you can get it created and out there collecting leads in the. In the first part of the new year.

Guest: Yep. Very good. All right.

Stuart: Okay. Thanks, Betsy. My voice is really getting croaky now, so it's a good time to finish. Thanks everyone for listening in. As I say, show notes, head over to 90minutebooks.com podcast and this is Show 44. As always, once you're ready to get started, just head over to nineminutebooks.com and follow the get started links. And if you ask us any questions before jumping on board, then just shoot us an email to support at 90 Minute Books and we'll be able to get back to you and answer any questions. So.

Guest: Okay.

Stuart: Thanks for your time, Betsy.

Guest: My pleasure.

Stuart: No problem. We'll catch you next time. Thanks, everyone.