A Hook For Your Book with Justin Breen

"Hey everybody."

Stuart: Welcome to another episode of the book More Show. Stuart Bell here and today I'm very excited because I got a chance to catch up recently with Justin Breen. Now, Justin, I was introduced by Bill Bleam, Bill's name you might recognize from previous episodes, has written a couple of great books with us and got some great examples in previous podcasts. But Justin, super interesting because his background for many years was as a journalist and more recently he owns a PR company. But with his background, it's very dialed in to what interests the media, what hooks we can use to kind of engage them a little bit more and in the sea of things that they have passed by, encourage people to pay attention to our stuff. And with some of his clients in the past and Hindman himself, obviously a book is a very great way of getting people's attention, sharing that story but also putting in, putting it in an interesting context. So great show today. Highly encourage you to check out some of the show notes. I've got links there to Justin's work, his website over@brepicllc.com and he also shares a story about a particular media hook that he had. I won't spoil it, but a story that involves his wife and a year's worth of dates. So again, links and show. But the main takeaway for us is this idea of the information that you stop sharing with customers and potential customers is fantastic for starting that journey. But the media have got different motivations. They're less interested in the individual details because it's too granular. There's not much of a story. What they're looking for is a hook. And very often that hook is a personal element or a story or some background, something of public interest or general interest that is going to give them something to talk about, give you a reason to be in front of them and give you a reason to share that message and encourage people to take the conversation further elsewhere. So with that, let's get on with the show.

Justin Breen: Hey Justin, how you doing?

Justin Breen: I'm doing wonderful.

Justin Breen: Fantastic. It's good to catch up. We had it's a catch up which now seems like a long time ago, but the year goes fast so it's good to touch base with you. I'm excited to get you on the show and share your experience and background with, with the audience here.

Justin Breen: Thanks so much. I'm really excited to talk. It's been a wonderful journey since I started this company. A lot of ups and downs and I think I've got a lot of great advice to Share with folks.

Justin Breen: Yeah, it's going to be really interesting to hear your take on it. So I'll give a bit of background how, how we met from my perspective and then you can jump in with the background of the organization and fill in the, fill in the gaps and then we can go from there. So Justin was introduced to me by Bill Bloom. Bill, you'll have heard on the podcast before we did an episode which I'll link in the show description earlier this year, talking about his book and how he's been using it. And then Betsy and I, as we're talking, we refer to Bill pretty regularly because he's a great example, it stands out and that it's easy to give context to people as you're listening in. So Justin was introduced as someone else in the Chicago area. Bill recommended that we had a chat. I think we'd scheduled maybe a 15 minute catch up and almost an hour later we stopped talking. Yeah, definitely one of those relationships that resonates. So Justin's got a super interesting story because his background is bringing comms and corporate community. Well, I'm going to call it corporate communications, just don't correct me if that's wrong, but the communication strategy to the things that we're doing and how to get the story out there. So books obviously resonated as a jumping off point, but what really struck me about the conversation that we had was how to weave in some of the elements of a story that starts with a book. How that can be the hook, but how that can then weave into the whole rest of a narrative and a communication strategy. So do you want to jump in, Justin, and give people a background more on the organization and then your, your version of that conversation?

Justin Breen: Well, I really appreciate you having me on. My entire business has been built just by connecting with high level folks like you who took a chance to achieve their dreams in life and then more importantly are actually doing that and accomplishing it. So I had a dream about 30 months ago to create a PR firm. That entire business model was based on how PR firms annoyed me for 20 years when I was a journalist. And so everybody laughs at that. But like that's why my company, it's called Brepic, that's why it works with amazing visionaries around the world now. And I just work with the people I want to work with and I'm starting to scale my business and it's just amazing from what I've learned, meeting with high level folks and listening to them and implementing some of their strategies into my Business too. But just very, very quickly, cliffnose version. My company creates stories that are super interesting, very similar to what I did as a journalist. It becomes a link on the client's website under like news or blog or something. And then I pitch that link to media around the world. If media's interested, I put them in touch with client contact moving forward. So I've worked with giant companies like Allstate and University of Illinois and Morgan Stanley, but I also work with solopreneurs, a lot of folks who are launching books because it's an obvious newspeg, but the model is what works. And it works with any vertical, any size company, any location. It doesn't matter. So it's been fun, man.

Justin Breen: Wow. And it's interesting the way that it came about. You're talking about. Oftentimes people talk about companies starting from scratch in an itch, but almost the way that you started was an itch coming from other people in the business. So seeing what the pain points are and then jumping in to solve that from the, from the recipient's end, I think starting off as a journalist and coming to, to the PR comms world for how can we create things that are going to be the most effective for the people that are kind of ultimately being sold to in the point of view of picking up that pitch? So we see it quite often as people reach out to us. They've got the beginnings of an idea or something that they want to talk about, but don't necessarily have that dialed into a strategy or a funnel or a campaign, as we sometimes call it. So looking at that, you mentioned the word having the book as a peg there. Have you got any advice for people as they're thinking about writing something on what is the best approach, whether it is to have the story and then look for a hook or a peg, or is it to think of the peg and how it might resonate with journalists out there as a campaign and then tailor the story to meet that. Is it a chicken and egg type situation?

Justin Breen: Excellent question. So here's what. I'll answer like this. So here's what media needs in terms of a good story. They need something interesting that's not press release y and boring. So something inspirational, something clicky, something just kind of fun. And my skill set, my unique ability is I can talk to somebody for an hour and 55 of those minutes will be totally worthless to what the general public and what media cares about. But in five minutes, somebody will tell me something around like, oh, that's your be the story. And that's how, that's how it should be framed. So media needs that, but then they also need a news peg, meaning why is it a story now? So the fact that you're launching a book or you're expanding your business or you're going to be speaking at some big event, that's something to tie the story to in terms of writing an actual book. I'll just tell you my kind of background on that. I created this list of 30 things that I've learned in the 30 months that my company's been around. Again, just from listening to very high level folks and then squirreling some of that information away and then implementing it and then watching it, how it helped my company. And so I created this list, posted it on social media, because I've got about 37,000 followers on social media. And I'm like, oh, this would be a great social media post. But what happened is, is that so many folks are like, you have to write a book on this because it's inspiring me. Like I'm struggling starting my business or it's like, I don't know whether I should start a business and how, how to even get started. And people were like bringing this list to meetings with me. They were, they printed it out and stuff and I'm like, oh my, okay, so if enough of these high level folks tell me to do something at this point in my life, I'm like, okay, I just do it. So that's where the inspiration. Because like, that's where the inspiration for this book came from. It wasn't. There was no intent to do it at all. But I'm like, if enough people are telling me to do this and these are people, it's worth listening to, like, all right, I'm gonna go do it, so why not?

Justin Breen: That's it. It's surprising how, how the seed of an idea that doesn't necessarily. You don't necessarily see the end game from starting, but it's 1 out of 10 things will get traction and then the comments and the feedback and the direction starts coming from external sources. It's really quite important to be dialed into that. As you're saying, if enough people with credibility are saying it, then there's definitely something there that's worth following up. I think that so often happens that you can't necessarily tell what's going to be the success or which piece is going to resonate with people beforehand. But being on the lookout, being tuned in and waiting for those indicators as and when they happen, that's where you can then amplify it and run with it from there.

Justin Breen: Yeah. And the cool thing is like, you know, this book isn't going to be hard to write from my perspective because it's been in my head for two and a half years.

Justin Breen: Right.

Justin Breen: If not longer. And so like the writing of the writing is not going to be that challenging. I don't think it's more of the, the marketing aspect of it and you know, that kind of thing and design. Like I'm not, you know, know I'm not a designer per se, but like media's already wanted to talk to me about, about this book. They're excited, they're excited that it's coming.

Justin Breen: So, so with that in mind, I guess sticking with that as the example is going to be interesting because as people are listening they can follow the, the genesis of the idea through to the, the beginning stage of its, of it coming together and then how you plan to use it in those first couple of, first couple of months after launch. So you were talking about the peg as being some, an event or something that the media can grab onto as a reason for writing something in the first place. So the fact that the book is being written and comes out there, I'm guessing just from hearing the couple of words already, some of the backstory to that and why it's interesting is going to be your journey and your story and how the book came to place, the fact that it was out there just as a blog post to begin with. But that's correct. You started to get all of this feedback which makes it broader and there's reference to other people and more interesting. Would a strategy be, Would a strategy be given that it's 30 steps, so there's a natural progression to that and 30 things that could go out from it. Would a strategy be more to orchestrate that into a longer burn for the follow up campaigns or the way that you position it with different media at different times? Or is it more a case of okay, we've got a peg that's timely, it's been released now, so let's do almost like a blitz on everything as quick as possible to try and get more of a groundswell of interest at this point of time. So is it better to try and string it out because you can't necessarily match with all of the cycles out there, or is it better to try and go all at once and really go from the peg?

Justin Breen: These are such good questions because these are the same types of questions I have for my clients in terms of. Half of my clients are long term, one story, two stories a month, over six months or a year. Other clients are one story and I just pitch it over three months. So there's the longer play and then there's the, you know, let's get this out, quick hitter and try and drag it out as, you know, as long as we can, but obviously not too long because there's only a certain amount of time you can do that for.

Justin Breen: Yeah.

Justin Breen: So for me, I see this one again. Background. I never expected to write a book on this, so I'm going with it and I'm enjoying it because that's why my business is successful, because I just, you know, I do the things that I feel are. Other folks have requested that I do. And again, they're high enough level where I'm like, I know this will lead to success. So, yeah, looking at, looking at it on a visionary perspective, I foresee this book to be a very big deal to help people, to be a constant talking point in media as people are constantly starting businesses or struggling with starting their businesses. And also a potential thing where it will help lead to me doing speaking engagements. So I can see it being big even now as I'm talking about the book, even though there's not even a title yet, obviously when it launches, but then also, you know, potential book tour and things well after the month that it, that it launches in. So I foresee this being something that can be a huge business card for my business for, for years to come. And let me quickly tell you as well that. So my wife is. She's super intelligent, very grounded and very practical. She's been. And she doesn't like, get excited about things in terms of my business. So. And that's good. I actually appreciate that. So she's been excited. Yes. So she's been excited two times since the start of this company, which was the official corporate incorporation date was April 16, 2007. 17. So the first time she got excited was when I told her I was starting a business. And the second time was when I told her about this book. So that's it. That's the only two times. So I. Because when I started the business, she's like, you're gonna do really well with this. And I was like, really? And she's like, yes. And I'm like, okay. So she was right about that. And with this book, she said, her name's Sarah, by the way. She's like, this book is going to be a very big deal for a lot of people and I'm like, really? She's like, yes. So that's why I'm really excited about it.

Justin Breen: Right. It's nice to get that kind of semi impartial to the air of, to the side of not getting overexcited. It's good to get that feedback from someone who's kind of in that camp to kind of give an indication that they're interested and excited about it as well. It really helps kind of reinforce the idea that you want to do a good thing. Yeah.

Justin Breen: So it's, it's just, it's nice to have that perspective where it's like, obviously she's my biggest fan but like she also is not like a BS or she will tell me the truth. So.

Justin Breen: Right, good. And the interest in the subject. So similar here. My wife's Lucy. As everyone knows who's listening. She's not interested at all, particularly in the business search. Talk about marketing and the technology of it until people get bored and tune out. But that's really not her back. So on the odd occasion that she'll get interest and engaged or, or interested in something, again, that's a impartial indicator that. Okay. It's not just because we're all drinking the same Kool Aid. It's someone else out there. Yeah. Yeah. The point that you raised there about it being an ongoing. There's ongoing opportunity because there's an evergreen element to the, to the nature of the book, both for yourself and as people are listening and thinking about their individual titles. If the book isn't particularly timely for any reason apart from the fact that you've just written it. So it's not like you're writing a book on some financial situation or the tariffs that are going on at the moment or anything that's timely. So in order to capture that attention of journalists and of media, we had a show with Jonathan Schulthouse a few months ago now and he'd got some success. He's a financial planner, written a book that had a particular hook about how to. How small changes can lead to big changes and then had got some success with like daytime TV and news type shows in local media areas because they're obviously to some not they're looking for content that would be interesting. So he got some traction there leveraging the. The fact that he had written something and he reached out to them while than them coming to him and he was just trying to pitch it in the local market a little bit and they had time to fill so they needed that. They need Content that's interesting, of course, for other people who are looking to do something similar. Is there anything that you can kind of elaborate on around that? What makes it interesting to journalists? So just the fact that it's written isn't necessarily interesting itself. And if it's not timely, it's not matching another news cycle. So anything to elaborate on that?

Justin Breen: So in terms of interesting, journalists have different brains. If you talk to most journalists who are like hardcore folks, they're just wired differently. So. Yeah, right. And it is what it. I mean, so I was just. Right. But so interesting is like a very broad term. But it's like, if you're. If you're a journalist, you will look at something and know right away whether it's total BS or like, oh, my God, this is an unbelievable story. So, like, it's kind of hard to explain to someone who's not a journalist. But, like, my brain will literally, like, again, I'll talk to somebody for a long time and they'll say nothing of interest. And then they'll say something and it'll be like, bing. That's like, that's. That's the story right there. So it's like, if this helps answer the question, for the most part, media doesn't care about what you do. They care about who you are. So as a person, you need to be somewhat interesting or do something if your company's not interesting. Like, if the topic's not interesting, are you doing something interesting? Are you running across the United States or something? Or did you survive cancer? Or, you know, did you adopt five children? I mean, these are just random examples. But, like, what about you is interesting? Like, my wife and I, we went out on 52 dates last year, once a week without the kids. And again, there was no intent to get media coverage at all from that. But we got a big story in the Chicago Tribune. We were on the Today show, a TV show called Windy City Live, did radio interviews, like, all these crazy cover of local newspapers because, like, that's interesting. It's really hard to go out without your kids once a week when you have young children. So that's the. You know, try to find something about yourself that's interesting. And a lot of people, they look at themselves and, like, I'm not that interesting. And I'm like, I bet you are.

Justin Breen: Right?

Justin Breen: Just, you have to, like, do a little digging on yourself.

Justin Breen: So that's super interesting because I think as technicians, we get so caught up in the what rather than the why. So I've used the example before of slightly disproportionately large amount of the books that we've helped people write come from the financial services sector because of the big crossover that we've got with Strategic Coach and they've got a similarly big footprint. So a lot of the books there will, a lot of the beginnings of conversations will talk to people and what they're actually talking about. Because industry to industry or niche to niche, it's all really the same thing. Especially when you're dealing with a business that's just very fact based. But the difference comes within the approach. So we'll talk to people about what differentiates the way that one person's describing an IRA from another person. And is it the way that you do it or is it how you do it? Do you have a framework around it that you can kind of name and claim that type of approach? But I must admit we're not very. We haven't really thought that much about adding in the personal element. So we always start with an introduction to the book and try to get people to talk about why it's important to them. But almost as just an opening paragraph to the individualness of the content, which isn't that interesting from. There's no personal interest element to it. So adding in that personal journey and why you've got an approach, why your approach is the approach you've got, what's led you to that point, why you're passionate about it. I'm guessing now that adding some of those elements is really going to help anchor some of those points and if you did then want to get media coverage is going to help reinforce that point and just highlight even more why it's of interest, why it's of interest to people.

Justin Breen: You're 100% right. And I think for those who follow sports writing or sports broadcasting. I'm 42 years old and right when I graduated college I met Skip Bayless, who at the time was a Chicago treatment columnist. He went on to ESPN and I think he's on Fox Sports now. But so he's a really good commentator and he told me something that never forgot. He's like, my goal is to inform and entertain. So a book can be very informative, that's fine. But you got to give like an article too. It can be informative, but you have to like escape from the nuts and bolts as well. And you have to give that personal side of things. So to your point, the book, I don't want it to be like this nuts and bolts, kind of boring read like oh, here are some lessons I learned, yada, yada. It's like, well, who are the people that taught me this and how did I implement it? And why on my personal journey was it so important that now this relates to my family and more free time and all that kind of stuff too? Because, you know, it's great that I built this successful business, but what is it? What does it mean? How does it help me and how can it help you? Because, like, I have met a lot of entrepreneurs who are very, very wealthy and I always ask them, so do you spend time with your family or friends? And most of them do, but there are some that they're like, yeah, my regret is that I didn't spend enough time with my wife or my kids or never had kids. And you can just see that, you can just see and tell from how they talk like that, the tone or inflection, the sadness in that. And these are people that are very wealthy in terms of financial. But you see that, how it impacted them personally. And frankly, for me, that's not worth it. Like, I'd rather make a lot less money and spend way more time with my family than anything. But the other thing is you can have both this company's achieved financial dreams that were never attainable in corporate and. And I work less and spend more time with my family. So it's a win, win, win, win.

Justin Breen: I think that's the thing, isn't it? Remembering that it is that balance and there's the opportunity. So the same from the lifestyle point of view and the quality of life. The same with the, the book and the message that's in there. It's not like we wouldn't recommend writing a story that was just 100% about a personal journey because.

Justin Breen: Right.

Justin Breen: Without a celebrity element. Yeah, exactly. Who cares? Yeah.

Justin Breen: He needs something to base it on, right?

Justin Breen: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Why did. What are people getting out of it and why do they care? But to be able to amplify and illustrate it with personal stories, that's really the thing that can take it to the next level. I'm always, I mean, completely disconnected. Example. But it reminds me of even just last night, Lucid got a. She was looking for some Christmas decorations in a cupboard and in the cupboard was an old photo album from when we were back in college 20 something years ago. And Arbery is picked up and looked at it and was flicking through the pictures and then I'd gone into the kitchen, was looking through too. And it was interesting because those were photographs taken from a point in Time that we were both in college in the same little town. So there were things that were common to both of us, although we didn't know each other all the way through. We only met in the, in the last year. But what was way more interesting versus way less interesting was probably 60% of the photographs were of, of things, of landscapes or sceneries or signs or things which. There was an element of interest there because it was the town that we both went to college in. But way more interesting were the pictures of the people, even though I only knew a third of the people who were photographed because the other third were in the group of people I didn't know. But even so, those people and what those people's relationship to Lucy was and how they fitted in the mix and how come it was that just coincidentally my path never crossed with them. It was those, the personal things that were way more interesting than just the factual. Here's the, here's the reminiscence about a sign or a mountain or a lake or whatever it was.

Justin Breen: Okay.

Justin Breen: Yeah, it's really that, that personal connection, it's really got me thinking the, the opportunity that we've got, as for us as we're helping people to write, the process, as, you know, as the people that listen know, it's very kind of audio based, oral based. We work on an outline and then record the content through asking questions. So even as we're talking, I'm thinking about how we can work with Christy to who does most of the recordings, to amplify those questions and move the, move the framework slightly from following up with more questions, drilling into more details, but instead of doing that, following up with more details to get the kind of, the softer edges of the story to come, almost reminds me as well of. There's like a Tony Robbins quote I remember from years ago and I remember it because I bought the T shirt. It says something like, in fact, I can't. This is a terrible story now because I can't remember exactly what the quote was. It's just gone from my head. But it was something to do with emotion. Things are way more rooted when there's an emotional element connected to it rather than just a factual element. So, of course, yeah, it adds to it. Looking at that then from your book, so the 30 stories, the 13 points that will be in the book, there's going to be some of them that have got very strong emotional stories and some of them personal stories and some of them have got less. So. So thinking it will second nature will come to you. But anyone that's listening to this and are thinking to themselves, okay, I've got the book now about whatever the subject is. I need to add some personal, some emotion to it and some background and some story. Is there a line between what comes naturally and what very much comes, comes across as forced? If someone's listening and thinking, okay, I can think of. Of the five things, three of them swing to mind easily, but two of them I'd really be fighting for, to give it. To elaborate on it at all. Is it worth. Where's the line of which you should.

Justin Breen: The answer is less is more

Justin Breen: because

Justin Breen: that'll come through, right? I don't anticipate my book being longer than 100 pages because. Let me. So I've started working on the prologue. I wrote it in 15 minutes and it's maybe, maybe a thousand words. I can write a thousand words in 15 minutes. That's not a big deal. But my point is, like I said before, it was in my head anyway. And it. There's a. There's a couple powerful things in there, but it's boom, boom, boom. Get to the point, get to the point. Because one, most of the people who I'm, you know, trying to appeal to in this story, they're entrepreneurs or whole entrepreneurs or those kind of folks, visionaries. They don't have time to read more than 100 pages. They just want the. They just want the. The good stuff, the meat of it, and they don't care about the other stuff. So that's. That's my voice of less is more.

Justin Breen: Right. And that, I think, is worth hammering home a little bit because it's so easy, especially when you start thinking about the less factual, maybe the softer side of the story to really start elaborating and going deeper and turning it into a piece of prose and a love story that you're writing. But that balance of adding in some interest and some personal elements but still keeping it concise and to the point and punchy really makes such a difference. And I'm so glad that you were talking about that kind of 100 pages or so as a kind of threshold. We sometimes think about it as we've talked about before, homes in Philadelphia and the offices in Florida. So that flight up and down is about two and a half hours each way by the time you're kind of taken off and the seatbelt light's gone off. So that two and a half hour time frame to be able to read something in that space, to drink a cup of coffee or whatever served and look out the window for a little bit and think about what you're reading. That tends to correlate to about the same. It's about an hour and a half's worth of recording. Recording in the way that we record it. Assuming it's relatively concise and punchy. It's about a hundred, somewhere between kind of 60 to 100 pages of the 5 by 8 layout that we've got. It's all positioned. It's so interesting that it's all positioned about the same time. It's this thing that's consumable in one go. We're not expecting people to necessarily put it down and come back to it too many times. It's more. Here's the content, here's what you can get from it, and here's the next step. Here's how you can take this. And that's correct. More. Yeah.

Justin Breen: And I would be surprised, although I'm just telling, like, this. This book will be very powerful to the right group of people, but I'm still guessing. Most people just scan it and look at the, you know, look at. Find the chapters that they want to look at, and that's fine. It doesn't, you know, it doesn't matter to me. I'm just genuinely trying to help people this, because I like starting a business from nothing, dude. Oh, my God, it is. Everybody's like, oh, you're doing so well. But, like, it is really, really, really, really, really, really hard. And it will take you to places. That's the other thing. Like, I'm going to be talking about the good and the bad in this, and most people don't ever want to talk about the bad, but, like, I'm going to be talking about that, and people need to know that part of it. Because, like, entrepreneurship can, like, really, like, do some serious damage to people if they're not ready for it or they don't understand the ups and the downs. And people need to know that, dude.

Justin Breen: And it's lonely as well, isn't it? I think there's a much bigger audience now than there were 10 years ago, but even so, it's an audience of. I sometimes think of it as kind of lobsters in the. In the pot of the restaurant. It might be a tank full of lobsters, hoping that the bad things happen to someone else, not to them in the nicest possible way. You were talking there about the. The nature of it is punchy. We talk a lot about that as well. And there should be. This is the beginning of a conversation that you'll have with people and they can follow the journey elsewhere. So in terms of, of media and exposure and getting more bang for the buck than just the book itself, are there any pointers that you've got for people of how that they can engage with media in a way that does lead people elsewhere? So rather than a story that just talks about the thing and then it ends and cuts and goes on to the next segment, is there any pointers you've got of how to keep that conversation going but using media?

Justin Breen: So this is my advice for that. I have numerous clients that they get on a radio interview or they get on a TV interview and they do a really good job and they're just like super professional. They look good on camera or in the studio and they don't mumble or stumble during their answers. And what happens is media invites them back in two or three months. So like that's the way to do it. Like get these interviews and then do a good job. And then as you said before, media is looking to fill time many times and they will, or someone will cancel and they're like, oh, we need to find a guest and oh, that person did a great job three months ago, let's get her him back on the air. And so that's, that's the way of keeping things going. It's just do a really good job when you're, when you're getting these interviews done and then also post things on social media, especially LinkedIn. LinkedIn for me has been a goldmine. And then it just keeps you at the top of the, of people's heads when they see your posts. That's the way to like every now and then just remind people, hey, I'm, I'm out here, I'm doing cool things.

Justin Breen: So that's actually a great point as well. We don't, we probably don't do enough of a job on our end of talking to people about social and the opportunities that they've got to leverage the things that they do a little bit more. But I think the point that you made before about journalists or people as a whole aren't so much concerned about the what, but the who. And there is a certain amount of celebrity or your externally validated credibility that comes from appearing in media in any form. So the back to it is a great opportunity to leverage it far beyond the end of the interview itself.

Justin Breen: Yep. And so people hire my firm for two reasons. One, to grow business right away. And that anecdotally almost always happens. But two, and what I think Is more importantly, more important is that it increases your validity and credibility when people Google your name or your business and you see them in all these very reputable publications. And that's the long play. And that doesn't go away. Those links don't go away. You can use those forever on your website as seen on CNBC or on this podcast or whatever. And that's, that's the beauty of reputable media, not this paper play nonsense like actual media. And the beauty is too, is that there's more reputable media than ever before. Business has never been better for me just because there's some newspapers are struggling and other things like that. There's all these new types of media opportunities that are reputable, are legitimate, and are very interesting. That didn't exist even three or four years ago. And my clients love being on those avenues.

Justin Breen: I guess it's so easy to assume that things are more difficult now because the playing field is more crowded and more people are trying to do this. But the reality is that although the numbers are higher, the people who are doing it in the right way and in a beneficial way are still few and far between. So if you do take the extra time to put the effort into that channel, that's where it really pays off. And I guess that's where your clients see even a greater payoff by using an expert like you. Because you can cut to the chase. There is more in terms of quantity, but the quality is the same as it was before. And being able to tell the difference is a real game changer.

Justin Breen: That's correct. Yep.

Justin Breen: Yeah. That leads on to. I guess we're kind of approaching the 40, 45 minutes or so, so.

Justin Breen: No kidding. Wow, that went fast.

Justin Breen: I know. It's great, isn't it? We should definitely redo this again and, and follow up after the book's out because then we can talk about the back end of the journey and kind of close the loop for people. In the meantime, though, if people want to learn more about what, what you do and, and the services that the company provide, where's a good place for them to head across to?

Justin Breen: Sure. So my website is brepicllc.com so that's B as in boy, R E, P as in pony, I c as in cobra.llc.com Bradbik llc.com I got all sorts of fun things on that site.

Justin Breen: Fantastic. And I'll be sure to link to that in the, in the show notes as well. So if people didn't get a chance to take that note, there's Just head over to the. To the website in the podcast episode, and there'll be a link to Justin's stuff in the. In the show notes there. The. I was just on the site earlier on today, and it's always. It's always interesting to see sites that really just cut to the plate, cut to the chase, and kind of deliver some of the information rather than ones where you've got to hunt around for it. So it's. Yeah, well, one of the things I'm

Justin Breen: writing about in the book is that, like, people come up to me and they go, what does your PR firm do? I go, well, we write stories and get you in media. That's it. And they're like, wow, that's amazing. I talked to these other PR firms and they can't answer that question. Why? What do you do? I go, I know. I've been dealing with that nonsense for 20 years.

Justin Breen: Right?

Justin Breen: So this is what I do. And you want to do it, great. If not, see you later, I don't care.

Justin Breen: And that's such a great. I mean, even that we're saying it will wrap up. But. But. Well, let's finish on that point because that's well worth resonating with or diving into for a second, that having the elevator pitch, for want of a better term, that sentence that really encapsulates exactly what you do for each of the elements. So for the business, if people ask about the business. For the book, if people ask about the book, just thinking about that core sentence and then being able to articulate it in a way that people can understand, that's it. Well worth it.

Justin Breen: Like a third grader, right? Like you're talking to a third grader.

Justin Breen: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Fantastic. Okay, well, I will catalyst because I will be here for another 45 minutes, but let's definitely pencil in another show for. Well, I guess it'll be the beginning of next year now because we're. We're December already, but I look forward to catching up again. Thanks again for your time, Justin. And as I said, we'll have show notes on this episode with links to all of Justin's stuff. So head over to 90minutebooks.com or if you're taking a note, then it's. It's B R E p I c llc.com pr epic and see more about what Justin does. So thanks again, Justin.

Justin Breen: Thanks, dude. Appreciate it.

Justin Breen: Okay, speak soon.

Stuart: And there we have it. Another fantastic episode. So great to catch up with Justin. We really resonated the first time we were speaking on the phone spoken a few times since, and it was really great to get the opportunity to share his background with you. As you see, I mentioned at the beginning that the idea of this whole book and the personal story, the personal connection, is super important to build into the framework of the book that you're creating. It's that piece that adds to the narrative flow and keeps people engaged. So not that we're suggesting it turns into an entirely personal story, but it's relatively straightforward and definitely something to remember as we talk about one of the book blueprint mindsets, that kind of value driven content. It's very easy to then remember to add in some personal elements into those stories just to illustrate and amplify it a little bit more. So if you want to take the journey a bit further, then highly recommend heading over to bookblueprintscore.com and then you can score your book idea against the eight book blueprint mindsets that we have. One of those, as I say, is talking about value driven content and how you can build in. And a reminder from this episode is to build in some stories. Show notes as always, of course on the website so 90minutebooks.com podcast and this is episode 89. And of course as soon as you're ready to get started, we're here to help you and guide you through and we can certainly give some advice and guidance on dialing in the content and talking about the ways of engaging people a little bit more or in the context of leading to to an outcome of more business. So head over to 90minutebooks.com and then follow the get started links and we'll be here waiting to help you get your book out. So with that, have a great week and I'll catch you next time.