Part 2 of my favorite shows of the year so far...
This week Betsey & I finish off talking about practical ways to use your book once it's complete. Using 'traditional' publishing strategies as the idea, we look at how you can tweak the tactic to really get the most bang for your book.
Continuing from last week we look at:
The best ways to give copies away (including at live events)
The problems with teaser content
Opportunities for product placement
and a handful of grab bag ideas
If you have any ideas we missed, Send us an email
Links:
Ready to get started: 90MinuteBooks.com
Questions/Feedback: Send us an email
Show notes: 90minutebooks.com/podcast/026
Transcript: Book More Show 026
Stuart: Hey everybody, it's Stuart Bell here with Betsey Vaughn. Betsey how is it going?
Betsey: Fantastic. It's great to be back so soon.
Stuart: I know. This is part two of what turned into a pretty great practical launch ideas podcast last week. Anyone that's not listened to last week's show, dive back in the podcast feed on the website. This is going to be Episode 26, so pick up on Episode 25. We covered the first two topics there, which ran to 40 minutes so this is the second part. I'm excited to get into it. Last week's show we got some great feedback. It was really well received.
Betsey: Fantastic. Yeah it was a great call I felt like. It was a lot of valuable information that we put out. A lot of people can use it, because we get asked a lot, "What do I do with my book?", How do I get it out there?", What do I do with it now that I've done it?" So yeah, I think people enjoy it.
Stuart: Yeah, some practical stuff ...
Betsey: Practical stuff. I like that.
Stuart: Excellent. Okay, right let's crack on. So for anyone just joining on this episode, we're talking about some practical book launch ideas, so thinking about what traditional publisher do. Obviously, we're not interested in book sales as much. We're more interested in the marketing message behind it. So what can we take from what they do and pivot it into something that's a bit more useful for us?
The next on the list was things like buying 10,000 copies. Now obviously, I can't think of a practical situation where you would want to buy 10,000 copies. In the traditional publishing sense, some of the reasons it's done is to hit best seller lists. Some of the reasons it's done is to push books out into partner organizations or to people you've got relationships with. Some independent book chains require purchases up front. All of that type of thing. So really, what you're trying to achieve there is visibility and kind of breadth, getting it out to a number of places.
Now, in our scenario, we're mainly talking about online lead generation for the most part, I think in most cases, because as we've said before, what we're really interested in is starting a conversation, capturing someone's email address or even potentially address details, which this ties into quite nicely. But capturing the details to start a conversation, rather than the book sales themselves being the end goal. With that, that breadth and visibility, it's still something we're just as interested in, we're obviously just usually talking about a slightly more niche or targeted and narrower target audience.
So looking at the purchasing, like a book purchasing option in order to get it out there, some of the benefits that we can take from that is to really scale it back. We're not going to buy 10,000 and just start giving them away. But we might want to buy 100 and give those away in a particular place or for a particular purpose. So some of the things that's sprung to mind there, we've talked to, I think the Hinmans, who wrote the Vibrant Child book at the end of last year, they used this tactic in a conference that they were speaking at.
So they printed off a number of copies to take with them. They were giving them away as part of the package of information that they were giving away at the event. And a lot of the conversation that I had with the guys was talking about how to bridge that into being able to collect details. Because it's a little bit disingenuous almost, to be at a stall at a presentation, or speak from stage and say, "I've got a whole load of books over here, but actually I'm not going to give you one until you give me a name and address." So we were thinking of ways of still achieving the same goal, but doing it in a slightly more, not even authentic, but a slightly more compelling way, I guess. It seems like it was giving something, rather than just taking something.
We'll circle back to a couple of those ideas in the next section. I don't want to jump ahead too far. The next section is going to be talking about giving things away. So we're going to circle back to how you can position that in a slightly more authentic way. But here we just want to think about the practical ways of printing off copies, in order to give them to people.
When you're talking to people in kind of the day to day conversation that you're having, do you find that many people are talking about doing things in physical environments?
Betsey: They are, and I say that because when they want to order books, I see people coming back saying, "Hey I need more books. I'm out of books." So I do, but it's a lot of like what we're talking about, conferences where they know they have a target audience of their peers or people in their industry. So they'll order the books to give them away. We've got some folks who are doing, I would call it, more grassroots you know. Some real estate guys who are putting their books in different locations throughout their little towns, their communities, as giveaways for people to pick up. And so they're not capturing a lead there, but they're still using it to market themselves.
We're seeing some of that, a little bit more of that than we have been. Which is a great way, I mean again, you're not knowing who's taking it and how interested they are, but if it just so happens you get one new client or one new buyer if you're in real estate, or one new seller then it's worth the effort.
Stuart: And that's how I was saying, I mean it's a great point. There's no right answer, I mean we’re often saying that really we're interested in capturing leads, and what can we do to do that? But you're absolutely right. There's plenty of opportunities or examples where that's not always going to be practical. The conference ones, a good point, oftentimes the conference organizers will provide the speakers with all of the contact details of the attendees. So to a certain degree, you've got all of the details already. You might not have a one to one relationship with people who have specifically opted in, but you've still got all of the details in order to start that conversation and follow up with people afterwards.
I think the example that you were saying there of the real estate example, where a larger number of books might just sort of percolate into the local environment. Almost like a, I don't want to say a flooding campaign because that kind of sets the tone slightly wrong, but definitely a presence building campaign. But there we often talk about the specificity of the back cover call to action. The way of helping people at a minimum viable commitment level, take the next step or raise their hand in the next way. And I think that one's really important for anyone that's using the books in this way. In a way that you really don't have that one to one relationship with people holding their hands up. Really think about what's the easiest way of encouraging people to raise their hands, based on the back cover. That means that you've still got an opportunity to capture the details.
We've said before with Amazon sales, same thing. You're not going to get the lead details from Amazon, so having something on the back cover that can raise people's hands in an easy non-committal way. I think the real estate one, we've got, obviously most people know Dean I think. He's got a big real estate background. For those people who don't know who are just joining from different routes, Dean Jackson my co-founder at 90-Minute Books has a huge marketing background, started doing real estate.
We've got a big separate real estate business. And a lot of what we do in that arena is similar. It's about starting conversations with people at the earliest possible stage in their buying cycle. So for the real estate ones, we'll do a lot of guides to the local area. So for example, the Orlando Lakefront Home Guide, that could percolate out into the local area. You're not necessarily going to get a one to one relationship for it, but some of the core functions throughout the book and on the back will be things like home-loan report or we'll pinpoint price analysis or the latest pricing guide to a particular area.
And all of those are easy ways for people to take the next step. It's not saying, "Okay you've got this book. You don't know who I am, but now you've read it. You've seen my picture on it, so immediately you come into the office, and we'll sign you up as a client." It's that easy next step.
So there's definitely not one answer, but buying a number of books in order to get them out into an area, I think as long as you think about it in terms of a campaign. I guess that's the only kind of caveat or constraint I'd put on it, or suggest people put on it. It's rather than just kind of the built-in "they will come" device, and "they will come" type approach. Really think about it in an orchestrated campaign of okay, I'm going to do this, what's the next step. Think like Dean said before, think like a chess master and think two or three steps ahead.
So if you are just buying copies to put out there, then how is that going to translate into something rather than just, I'm going to do it, and I'm sure it will be fine. Think more specifically about what that next step is.
Betsey: Right. Exactly. That's great.
Stuart: I was going to say, we're 10 minutes in, and I've already drunk all of the coffee that I made to get me through this episode.
Betsey: Oh no.
Stuart: And my voice is sounding a bit croaky. And I'm thinking, okay this is going to be one of those shows again, where we're going to get one subject in. Because there's so many ideas that spring to mind, there's a kind of a desperation in my mind to get them out.
Betsey: You know we'll do it again. You know.
Stuart: It can be a series.
Betsey: Right.
Stuart: The one that I was just going to piggy-back off the back of that further and just think about the practical implications of that. So with the naming the book process particularly, I mean the whole point is that it's fast and cost effective and easy to get something that's specifically targeted to a goal out into the world. So for the ... In fact, you were talking to someone yesterday. It's so funny how coincidentally, how that conversation and then talking about it today. You were talking to someone who had $7,500 getting to the point of just having some rough outline of some words.
Now I'm sure we were saying, after you'd had the conversation, what they did in the exercise is absolutely going to be valuable and useful, because that is an amount of research that wouldn't otherwise be done. So there's definitely a value there. And with an amount of effort to get it over the line that would still be a great product. But when we compare it to the naming a book process, I mean by the time they finish that, it's probably going to be close to nine-ish grand, I guess? That's-
Betsey: Easily, yeah.
Stuart: Yeah, so that's four books that you could have written, targeting four individual use cases. But even if you're just thinking about writing one book and really using it for multiple different purposes, because I can imagine it's easy for us to think about writing four books, quickly getting them out there, having four funnels to back it up. It's easy for us to visualize, because we do it day in and day out. But I can imagine for someone listening to this, thinking about their first one, that's a bit of a daunting prospect.
So even if you're just thinking about writing one book, with a relatively generic call to action on the back. I'd still say keep it as focused as possible on the subject. But still think about re-utilizing that one in multiple different ways. If the call to action on the back is something that is useful for the broadest set of the audience, so sticking with the real estate example, putting a book out there, which would be the guide to staging your home, how to create $15,000 worth of value with $150 worth of effort. A guide to staging your home for maximum return. Then that is relatively broadly appealing. It's not quite as targeted as doing it for ranch homes versus town homes or that type of thing. But still, it's going to have broad appeal.
The call to action on the back can then be for, obviously if you're thinking about selling your house, knowing what ... If you're thinking about moving, obviously knowing what your house is worth is one of the most valuable things that you can find out in the early stage. So fill in our pinpoint price analysis assessment, and we'll use our expertise to get the most accurate price back out to you. That overall setup is going to be useful for a broad range of things, and there's tricks that you can do to "nicheify" for want of a real word, nicheify that into a particular funnel by doing things like sticking a sticker on the front of it, adding a postcard into it that really dials it down, sending it out with a cover letter that makes it more specific to the particular funnel that you're doing.
So if you're speaking at an event, stick a sticker on the front of the book that says, "Hey attendees of the Orlando Home Show. We've recorded a video specifically at the show here, looking at some of the latest tactics, the latest ways that you can make your house look like a show home with some of the products that the vendors at the show here have provided. So here's a quick URL. Head over there and watch the video." Obviously, you're not going to quite fit all of those words on a sticker, but you get the point. Really dial into that target audience.
If you were giving the books away to a ... What would be a comparator? So a decorating store, maybe you've got a relationship with a local decorating store, and you want to leave 10 books on the counter there all the time. Adding a postcard into it to say, "Hey you customers of Bob's Discount Décor, we've got some great tips looking specifically at the things that Bob stocks, so head over here." All of these things that just very quickly allow you to reuse that asset that you've created and by dialing in, making it more specific, you're just adding value all the time in a very smallest amount of effort possible. You're making the maximum amount of return for that asset by making it specific.
Starting a conversation with people, having it more engaging, making it seem more personal, having more of a one to one relationship, and all these things. It's like I think we used the analogy last week, or maybe I did when I was on the week before with Dean saying these two guys walking through the jungle and they spot a lion. And one guy goes to put his Nike trainers on, and the other guy laughs and says, "There's no way you'll outrun a lion." And the other guy turns and says, "I don't have to outrun the lion. I just have to outrun you." And it's exactly the same thing.
All of your competition is starting to do some more of these things now. A book is by far a huge advantage, because still not many people are doing it. But to be able to differentiate yourself, to make it that little bit more personal, that little bit more dialed into the audience that are likely to be receiving it, it takes the smallest amount of extra effort on your part to think about the context. But making it context-specific just really amplifies the results.
I'm going to take a breath now, because that really felt like some sort of sermon I delivered.
Betsey: No. That's great. That's great. We had talked about people who ... One I particularly had somebody who wanted just to give away a sampler of the book, like a chapter of the book almost as a teaser. What are your thoughts there on doing something like that?
Stuart: Yeah, I think that one ties in with what I was starting to say before about the problem or the challenge slightly with having a book on the shelf behind the counter and saying, "Hey I want to give away the book, but I'm not going to give it to you until you give me something in return." The challenge is it just leaves a little bit of a bad taste. It's not all coming from the position of giving, and the risk is that you lose, not credibility, but if you were gonna get a hundred karma points of just giving it away to someone, then you'll maybe get 80 karma points and lose a few because you're not asking for something in return.
I mean it's like the whole More Cheese, Less Whiskers podcast. The whole premise of that is around making it as cheesy, as beneficial as possible and really not revealing any kind of marketing whiskers. So I think the challenge with giving away a chapter, is that you're already ... The flip-side of that statement is there's 80% of it I'm not giving to you. So it's not that I'm going to give you this one thing, it's that you're immediately not giving something else.
I was talking to Dean yesterday, and we were testing some Facebook ads. We were talking about the difference between a $20 free gift card and a 20% discount off a product or service. And financially the actual dollar amounts might be exactly the same. If you're selling a hundred dollar product, for example, but the premise of giving someone a $20 gift card is you're giving them 100% of something. If you're offering them 20% off something, then you're still charging them 80%.
So the same with giving away a chapter of the book, there's definitely some areas where it does work. I think if you've got something of a relationship with people already, so you can position it as a teaser. Where it works is things like fiction, where the book itself is the product. So you're giving away a chapter, and that chapter is 80% of the product, sorry it's 20% of the product. And the product is the book. Giving away a chapter as a teaser for some of the content where the main product is whatever service you're selling. The main product isn't the book. That's where the disconnect comes in. Does that make sense or that analogy makes sense?
Betsey: Yeah. Yeah. That makes perfect sense. Absolutely.
Stuart: Yeah, so it's a challenge, but I think the better way of doing it is to create specific content that is based on a chapter. So say you've got a financial planning book, and the financial planning is talking about the five things you need for social security, the 2017 social security plan for maximizing your retirement benefits. So, as you're coming up to 62, you're needing to make some decisions on the retirement. Here's the five things that in 2017, you need to bear in mind. So you could give away chapter one, which talks about whatever the first topic is.
But it would be better and more authentic to say here's a separate thing that I want to give away. Whether that's a video or a checklist or a blog post type article or some audio, I mean even an infographic or something relatively small like that. Give away that first thing, and then have the lead out of that saying, "All of this information here is based on the 2017 Social Security Guide. Head over here and grab a copy of it, because we talk about this more in depth and cover the other four important questions you need to know." And have people opt in there.
So rather than give away the first chapter and say, oh but there's always more, by creating something else, you're able to give away 100% of the thing. Even if it's much smaller, you're still able to give away 100% of it. Where the guide itself isn't the product, whether or not you're charging for it, the guide isn't your main revenue stream. So even if you're charging a small amount to kind of add a perceived value to it, starting with something 100% free, then charging a very little bit or relatively little bit for the book and then leading into your product and services. To my mind, is still going to be better than just trying to give away the chapter, because of this disconnect, well not disconnect, but the position that it comes from. It comes from the position of scarcity or holding back, rather than just on the position of giving.
Betsey: Right. Exactly. Exactly. Fantastic. We had someone, and I need to follow-up with them. I'm going to do that. We had a client who was speaking on the stage, I think you might remember this, about a month ago, maybe not even that long ago. And she was speaking on the stage, but she still wanted to get her book out. And it was a target audience for her.
So we kind of worked with her a little bit on coming up with some ideas on how she was going to be able to briefly mention it from the stage in her spiel. And we ended up using a marketing postcard that we put together with all of her information that was going in the SWAG bag the organization was giving out but was also directing them to her booth.
But if they didn't have the opportunity to get to her booth, all the information was on this postcard that she had printed out. So I'm really curious to follow up with her and see how that turned out for her. Where did she see the biggest return? Was it at the booth? Was it people downloading it from her website? I'm really curious to sort of see how that worked out.
Stuart: I think that's a great example of context to gain. So the context of being at the event, so there's the point maybe that she might have all of the contact details already because the event organizers have provided them. If they haven't, then there's the practical constraint of dealing with the number of conference goers getting to one little bit of the room to pick up their copy of the books. So if she'd just gone down the route of saying, "Come to the back of the room, and I'll give you a copy." Then how's that practically going to work? If she's followed by four other speakers, by the time it gets to the break people might not even remember that she was on stage.
So I think that thought of context, putting yourself in the mind of how people are going to engage with the offer to get your book, and how can you make it as straightforward as possible is a great example of not just going with the, oh my first thought is to, well it's fine. I'll just tell people to come to the back of the room, and that'll work. Think through the execution of that, the practicality of that.
It would be interesting to see. So I mean you could do things like put the postcard in all of the SWAG bags, have like a name and email address box on the back. Maybe have a name and email and physical address box on the back, if physical addresses are useful to you. We mentioned on this briefly last week that particularly if you're in local area, being able to follow up with people in the mail is going to give you another channel to get in front of people, so that can be particularly valuable.
So the opportunity to say to people, "Okay, everyone that's in the room, we're going to be at the back for the next day and a half or so. Come and see us, and we'll give you a copy." If you need to collect name and email addresses, ask people to write it on the card. Although there's obviously a practical constraint on that a little bit, do people have pens? Are they going to be able to ... This thing about are people going to want to fill in their details, just for a copy of it?
So adding additional things to the package, so say to people, "Okay, here's the book we wrote. Come to the back of the room and get a copy of it. If you can't do that today, or you miss us today. No problem. There's details on the card, so you can just follow up when you get home. I've already been here for two hours, and we've already had four or five fantastic questions about this particular thing that I'm talking about. What I'm going to do is this evening, we're going to sit down, collate the six or seven most valuable questions, and we're going to spend an hour answering them. We're going to shoot a video and make that available to you guys. So when you request a copy of the book, just make sure you fill in your name and email address details. And then we can get that out to you, and all of the questions that have been asked here, we'll make sure that we've got some really valuable resources that address those things specifically. If you want a physical copy of the book ..." Although I've just said I've got physical copies of the book at the back.
Anyway, the physical address part of it, you may be at stage one, you're just going to deliver the digital part, and then if people want a physical copy, tell them to put their name and email address. Then you can post it out, and then you've got this other channel to get to people as well. So all of these things, thinking about the overall funnel, think about how you can deliver the most value to people in the easiest way and tailor it specifically ... Is there a way of tailoring it specifically to that audience that really adds on that value.
There's that old Glengarry Glen Ross saying of like ABC, always be closing. But you really want ABC, always be contributing. Can you just add value, add value, add value. If you've been in business for any amount of time, I mean it's like this podcast. I mean I just looked at the time put in on the show, trying to keep this to 30 minutes. But we're already 25 minutes in, and I could talk for another hour on this.
Because we do this every day, and it's the same with you guys listening to this, because you are in the business every day, you can keep adding value at a relatively low cost to yourself, because all of the knowledge is in your head. So by adding to it, to an audience that's desperate for that information, that's super engaged with that information, rather than just doing the minimum thing, adding that little bit more to tailor it is just really going to amplify the results to that audience and just encourage more people, give people more reasons to raise their hand.
Betsey: That's great. That's great stuff.
Stuart: That was my short answer.
Betsey: I know, but I gotcha. Thanks. What should we talk about next?
Stuart: So we have got, we're just coming past 25 minutes or so. We've got two quick ones. Next week we've got a call with Dean scheduled, and I definitely want to get in the flow. We've got some Q&As that have been waiting for a little bit, so I think if we quickly wrap this one up, and then if anyone's got any questions or wants to talk about launch ideas or has any feedback, then shoot us a note to podcast@90minutebooks and we'll collate all of that and we'll pick it up in a wrap-up show in a few weeks time. But we've got a couple of more things on the list, so we'll go through those fast. And then that'll be a nice wrap-up. Then we can pick it up again in a few weeks. So... the last one we had on the list of ones to particularly cover was product placement. That is something you see in traditional publishing a lot. By product placement, I don't necessarily mean copies of books on coffee tables in sitcoms, that type of thing, but more going onto talk shows or radio shows or having your book present in other peoples environments. I can't really think of a downside to this. I mean there's practical constraints on you're not going to do it to the same level that a big production house would, but if you scale it back and think about ways that you could partner with people to use your book as an excuse to go on other peoples podcasts or local radio shows.
I can't remember who it was, but we've talked to a couple of people at the end of last ... It might have been Kevin Craig even, at the end of last year. Anyway we were talking to a couple of people who had been on local radio shows and local TV with their book as the excuse, or not the excuse, but the reason to be present there. So that's a great opportunity that you wouldn't otherwise get.
It's almost like all of the knowledge that you put into the book exists elsewhere and exists in your head and has existed for however long. But bringing it together into a physical thing that you can hold in your hand and wave in front of people, is an excuse. It's a line in the sand, a point in time to have a reason to talk about something, so that kind of product placement with influences.
Things like Instagram searches or Twitter searches or Google searches for people who, I use this phrase of complimentary non-competing quite a lot to people who are in the industry who have an interest. We mentioned Victor last week and his book Erin’s Law Solution. That has a huge audience out there of celebrities, for want of a better term, but within the industry. People influences within the industry who are interested in the subject, and would more than likely want to share the book with their audience, because it adds value.
Things like giveaways almost, working with other channels, other people to give away copies of the book, of your book to their audience as long as you can find that tie in. We mentioned in the last topic, the real estate agent's example of having it physically present in the local area. If you've got any local footprint, it's such a great opportunity to put the product, place it in places where your audience are likely to be.
Even things like, and this isn't really product placement as such, but this is more like the sharing, the giving economy of getting it in front of the right people. But working with community groups or elderly groups or, I'm just trying to think of some examples of some books that have come through recently that are on financial or real estate. There was the ... Was it Kiki? Who did the decorating-
Betsey: Rachel Elise.
Stuart: Rachel, yeah. So Rachel's book is a fantastic book. She's an interior designer. Her book was specifically about kind of reusing, recycling existing cabinetry to revamp her kitchen. So that's a fantastic opener for people who are going to be interested in general interior design. Now only a small subset of those people are going to be clients, but still the crossover, 100% of the people who could be clients are probably going to be interested in that subject.
Not everyone that's interested in that subject is going to be a client, but still by pushing it out of that, by giving something away that isn't ... She didn't write the guide of "how to hire me as an interior designer", or "the 10 reasons why you need to be an interior designer". Her book was entirely educating people on how to do something themselves. But it gives such a fantastic opportunity to speak on other decorating shows. Give it away on Pinterest channels. I mean the whole interior design world is so kind of social media based. There's such a lot of eye-candy that goes along with it.
And having a book ... I don't know whether we've ever mentioned it on the show, but particularly from a Facebook perspective, promoting posts with text on the page, there is a threshold in which Facebook won't allow you to post, or they'll restrict the reach of a post with words on the image. But a book cover is exempt from that, because the book cover is seen as an image regardless if the book cover has words on it. So it's almost a way that you don't get in any other channel, of getting words in front of Facebook viewers.
So imagine boosting a post, so Rachel boosting a post to some of the bigger design channels. She's got the opportunity and her title there on the page, even if people don't click on the ad and follow through, it still increases some awareness. Add in a layer of geo-targeting to that, so she can just target people in her local area if she's only physically working locally. Then this idea of product placement, this idea of getting your book in front of people, it's leveraging someone else's audience from a position of completely giving.
Yeah, so. I've just realized I've talked for another five minutes. A couple of last ones that we have-
Betsey: I was going to touch on Rachel. She's been on my mind. I follow her personally on social media, and she's really building her social media presence, and she's in the Phoenix area. She's a dynamic personality. I had the opportunity to meet her when she was here in Orlando for one of Dean's events. And she's just a dynamic personality. She is now on the local channel a lot doing segments on do it yourself products. But she's also doing a lot of things, she just announced I think this week, she's going to Indianapolis to speak to a group. And she's been to Chicago.
So it's really been interesting to watch her with what she's done in a short amount of time. And I would love to have the opportunity to talk to her in this format and just talk about where she is with her book and with her business and how she's boost it. But she's very out there. She's in different worlds, and it's sort of grown a little bit with her. So I've enjoyed on a personal level, just watching that growth in her.
Stuart: Yeah. We hear that a lot. I mean again, not to say that these people who are picking something up and running with it are dynamic people, who even if it wasn't for them writing a book, they would probably be doing something else anyway. And at the end of the day, everyone that's listening to this has that entrepreneurial bent to get out there and share their message because they're passionate about their business.
I'm not saying that the book was the catalyst to all of this, but we've heard it so many times from people feeding back to say ... Kevin Craig, a whole coaching organization now specifically contributed to creating the book in the first place or definitely leveraged by that. I know when we were talking to Rachel in the early days, then she wasn't as present as she is now. Rob Saik, who's one of the first books that we wrote, The Agriculture Manifesto. He's used that to leverage conversations on TED talks and national Canadian syndicated TV and Radio.
I mean it almost acts as a catalyst for bringing together a lot of energy that people had anyway and really focusing it into something that people outside, external people can kind of hook onto. It's a reason for them to want to talk to you, or for you to promote or suggest talking to them in terms of kind of external comms. A follow up would be I think I agree with you would be interesting afterwards.
Some of the other things quickly I felt then were things like we mentioned, Facebook and Instagram and Twitter, but giveaways there following through ... Again and again I mentioned last week Gary Vaynerchuk, how anyone that's listening here and doesn't follow Gary on social media should just do that and borrow some of his ideas. So things like if you've got a footprint, if you've got an audience already, they've been recently doing like 60 second giveaways. So people engaging in posts and following and sharing within like the first 60 seconds or so, they'll pick a few people and give them like SWAG basically. So you can use your book as an example for that.
Engaging, I mentioned before, engaging with influences and A, giving them a copy of the book, but B, also saying, "Hey, I'd love to give your audience 10 copies of this book." And just do that as a presence building, as a relationship building exercise. The kind of whole random acts of kindness type approach of just being out there, being present in the marketplace and with no expectation of anything in return. Just giving copies of your book away to people who would find value in it for whatever reason.
This is all drifting now into the slightly bigger presence building. The bigger kind of footprint of you as the authority within the area, and I think particularly in a local area is even easier to do as we mentioned last week, because the audiences or the competition is smaller. But just being able to go out there and give people something of value with no expectation of something back. It just creates a good feeling within the community, and that builds over time and helps reinforce your presence. And a book is a great way of doing that in a way that seems entirely giving-based and not asking-based. Particularly for those books that are written like Rachel's like Victor's, are written purely from the point of view of, "I've got this information that will be useful to you, and I want to share it in a way that doesn't necessarily ask for anything back immediately."
Betsey: Exactly. That's great. Great information. Yeah.
Stuart: Fantastic. I think we made it through the list. Yay.
Betsey: Yay. Great. Well I think we have some great follow-up ideas too, you know, from this, so that would be exciting to get to those at some point.
Stuart: Yeah, definitely. And anyone that's listening, if you've got any questions or points you want to raise, if you'll just shoot us an email to podcast@90minutebooks then we'll pick that up. The show notes and the transcripts for this and any links to anything will be on the website, so head over to 90minutebooks.com/podcast and this is Episode 026. It's going to be called the Practical Book Ideas Part Two. As I mentioned at the beginning, if you haven't listened to part one then dial into that, because that covers the first two topics that we talked about.
The show's always posted on Facebook as well, so if you haven't yet head over and like the Facebook page. That's just Facebook.com/90minutebooks or follow the link from the website. And then we've talked a lot about books so as soon as you're ready to get yours out there then head to 90minutebooks.com, follow the get started link, and it will be exciting to talk about your book on a future show.
Betsey: Great. Fantastic.
Stuart: Perfect. Okay, thanks for your time again Betsey, it's been good and we will catch up in the next show.
Betsey: Sounds good. Thanks so much.
Stuart: Thank you.