Category: Writing

I’m ready for you to tell me what book title you like most!

Every fiber of me wants to “MVP” my book and “just ship it” – as we do in Silicon Valley. But books aren’t software. And this isn’t about a once and done book “launch” to put in their rearview.

Intentionally creating a best selling book that continues to sell over the long term takes careful strategy, research, and continuous early feedback.

And a big piece of the long term success comes down to the right book title; assuring that potential book buyers “Don’t judge a book by its cover” is a real hurdle!

What my team and I have boiled it down to is that a great title has a clear Benefit, makes a Promise, is Succinct, has a Keyword in it, is Emotional, and most of all is Available.

So many great book titles that I love that check all the boxes simply aren’t available. Either there is already a book with the title, it’s a registered trademark, or a product / course / channel exists with the name. Which means it’s a no go.

After far too much time, keyword research, competitive analysis, category research, brainstorming sessions, whiteboards lunches, and literally hundreds of decent name ideas… I’m ready for you to help me decide!

Are you ready to help me pick my book title?

This won’t take but 2 minutes of your time to vote.

Vote for your Favorite Title!

Thank you in advance for your feedback!

And, as a reminder, my book is specifically for founders who’ve launched their business, are generating consistent revenue, and have a flow of customers. If what got you to where you are now isn’t working and you’re feeling stuck, this playbook may be for you. If you are still thinking about starting a business or don’t know how to get customers for your business, this book isn’t for you. Inside, you’ll discover the three levers in your business that you can pull on to grow gross revenue – and profit. These are tried and true techniques that have helped entrepreneurs with businesses like yours to get unstuck and rediscover the passion and excitement that comes from real business growth.

Good news! Book content is up past 76% DONE at this point and I’m close to putting a bow on this first draft of the manuscript!

There was also a tremendous amount of FANTASTIC feedback on the book intro. A special thank you to those who read the intro, made comments, sent your thoughts, emailed feedback, and more. That kind of input is so valuable this early on.

This whole “writing in public” process is a humbling experiment but your feedback and support have been making it all worthwhile!

As for the book title… I’ve been eager to finalize that. This week, I retained a book titling pro to help me dial in the right title for the book, which is really exciting. More on that in a future update!

In the interim, it’s been so great to see my framework getting flushed out and the playbook coming together. It feels wonderful to put down in words the exact strategies I’ve been using with clients for 20+ years in an accessible format that readers can use.

While (surprisingly) controversial when it comes to writing business books, I’m a strong advocate for actionable, tactical books. This means going beyond just the What and Why… and also including the HOW. We’ve all read non-fiction that gets you excited but then doesn’t tell you HOW to do anything. Those might be good for the author’s lead generation… but they’re frustrating to me as an action oriented reader.

That’s why I feel so strongly about the actionable playbook format I’m using! And I hope you feel the same way, too!

Alright, that’s all for now. Thank you again for your love, support, encouragement, and feedback!

The Intro and Table of Contents for my upcoming book have been done for quite some time now with minor tweaks as I’ve been rounding out the overall book content, and I’m ready for YOUR input to make sure the intro resonates with you.

Content wise, based on my Table of Contents, I’m now at 72% complete, so this feels perhaps a touch overdue to ask for feedback on the intro!

Would you be open to reading my introduction and sharing your feedback as to what draws you in, what’s confusing, what’s exciting, where you lose interest, what you love, and what you’d improve?

This is maybe 5 minutes of reading, maximum.

Just reply on back and let me know, and I’ll share the doc with you!

Thank YOU!

What areas of your business do you feel like are costing you more than they should? What questions do you have about expense reduction strategies for your business?

On Friday, I’m going to be interviewing a long time friend, client, and expense reduction expert, and I’d love to get answers to YOUR biggest questions on the topic.

While my book is primarily about how to increase your top line – and in turn your profitability – you can also approach profitability from the other end and increase your bottom line through expense reduction.

That’s why I’m including a bonus chapter on the topic of expense reduction.

There’s no better expert in the expense reduction space than Marc Freedman.

After four decades of helping over 25,000 businesses reduce their expenses, he published an entire book on the topic, Expense to Profit.

His work is typically with some of the largest businesses on the planet and he’s helped them reduce their expenses by literally billions of dollars.

Now, most of his strategies apply to significantly larger businesses, but many of the cost categories exist in your business, too. The same techniques he uses to help big business can also be applied at a smaller scale.

So! What questions would you love for me to ask him on the topic or expense reduction?

You shared some GREAT feedback on my reader Profile, Promise, and Scope and I super appreciate that!

I have a quick question for you in a moment, but before that… a brief update, and a funny story…

As of today, I now have 23,688 (pre-edit) words written. Huzzah for consistency!

Now for the quick story… It’s funny the rabbit holes we can fall into during the research part of writing a book.

The other day I was looking into the background of a story I’d heard about Comet (the household cleaner) and how they went about increasing sales, and I found myself reading up on how Alka Seltzer doubled their sales instead!

The short version of the story is that their sales had flatlined. They weren’t seeing any more growth. The younger generation associated alka seltzer with hangovers and overindulgence and wasn’t buying it. As for their existing customer base, they were already buying all they needed.

They were stuck.

It was their ad agencies that struck upon gold with one of the 16 ads that they tried out. In this one ad, they simply showed a glass with two tablets being dropped in – their now classic “plunk, plunk, fizz fizz.”

Until that time, the package always said to take just one tablet, but when they were speaking with a doctor about aspirin dosage and saw that aspirin was dosed as two pills… they realized that they could simply show two tablets as well, and almost overnight, their customers started taking two tablets.

Alka seltzer didn’t find a new market. They didn’t force their way into a market that didn’t want them. They didn’t even invent a new product. Or a new jingle. They simply repackaged what they already had.

This was all for my chapter on the specific strategies businesses use to increase their Frequency of Transactions (that’s the F in my FAQs to Profit), and specifically for the tactic of Repacking / Reformulating.

It was a delightful story to discover and a strategy I’ve not only seen before, but even used with clients. Now it has an even greater background!

So, for my question! I’ve been a guest on close to one hundred podcasts in the past 12 months, and it’s been an adventure with quite a range of shows. But what I want to know from you is…

What are your favorite business podcasts that you listen to and would recommend to someone looking to scale their business? (In other words, what shows do you think my ideal readers listen to?)

Just wanted to give you a quick update on my book progress, and also ask you for your feedback on a super important question – likely later than I should’ve asked! :|

First, a quick update: Table of Contents has been done for over a month and the writing has been going well. Word count wise, I hit 21,409 words yesterday which is really great progress, especially after being offline for a few weeks during the holidays. I’m grateful that the writing comes easily!

As we all know, though, the real work will be in editing and cutting out what’s not needed.

Now, for my question for you… Every nonfiction book worth reading has figured out its ideal readers, promise, and scope…

This is where I would love your feedback…

Here’s what I have for my book’s reader profile, promise, and scope:

My book is specifically for founders who’ve launched their business, are generating revenue, and have a flow of customers. If what got you to where you are now isn’t working and you’re feeling stuck, this playbook may be for you. If you are still thinking about starting a business or don’t know how to get customers for your new business, this book isn’t for you. Inside, you’ll discover the three levers in your business that you can pull on to grow gross revenue – and profit. This isn’t just theory – these are tried and true techniques that have helped entrepreneurs with businesses like yours to get unstuck and rediscover the passion and excitement that comes from real business growth.

How does this resonate? Is this profile, promise, and scope well enough defined in your eyes? Do you feel this is specific enough? What do you think I should remove?

Thank you so much for joining me on this journey and for your candid feedback as I go!