Welcome to the six Figure Business Mastery Podcast, where every week Kirsten and

Jeanie dive into the essential topics to fuel your business growth, from

copywriting to course creation mindset, to video marketing, they've got you covered.

Tune in for expert guest interviews on all things marketing and

business, and learn how to work on your business, not just in it.

So get ready to unlock your business potential and take it to the next level.

What if the book you've been meaning to write could become the smartest client

attracting asset in your entire business?

Hey everyone.

I'm Kirsten and my lovely co-host, Jeannie Wilson.

We're so excited to have you here today for six Figure Business Mastery Podcast.

We bring experts on to help you grow your business.

And today I'm over the moon, excited about having Shauna here.

Shauna is gonna talk to us about how writing a book can help you build.

Authority and your expert in your industry, and it's a great

way to get yourself out there and to market your business.

So Shauna, thank you so much for joining us today.

Today's episode is sponsored by our Profit Clarity Masterclass.

If you've been avoiding your finances and promising yourself, you'll deal with it

later, you're not broken, you are normal.

Join us for a free live masterclass.

To learn a simpler way to bring clarity and relief, visit less

math more money.com, and we look forward to seeing you there.

Thank you.

This is a pleasure.

I'm really happy to be here.

I always love asking what led you down the path of helping people write books?

Oh, I have a passion for books.

Since I was a little girl.

I would love to read and then I wanted to write and I dabbled in it over the years.

And finally I got to a point where I had been struggling with time and

I had learned so many life lessons around time, and so I wrote my first

book more as a passion to help.

Other people that were struggling with it to find some of the things

that I found that helped so much.

And once I put that together, that started things.

And I've published two books at this point and I've got three more

that are like partly done, and it's been such an interesting journey.

But my background was in project management and I am like a detail nerd.

It's the nitty gritty details.

Joked with friends about, I wanna write the book.

That's the 197 steps to get published because I self-published and there were

so many pieces of what to do there.

There were so many elements that would be easy to miss, and so I wanted to

help others get their books out there.

And in the business world, because I've always been an entrepreneur, I

realized that there's so many ways that a book can help a business.

And people that have a book about their business, about their expertise, they

get on stage, they get more clients.

And so I wanted to help them in particular because I would get questions from people.

And once they learned, I'd written books and published and

they said, how do you do that?

And I love to help.

I love to share what I've learned.

So that's what got me started.

I love that.

And you don't really think about it, but a book.

Though a lot of work, I'm sure is an asset that's working for you 24 hours

a day for years and years to come, and you obviously have the opportunity

to go on podcast and talk about your book and go on different stages.

So I love that.

So what was when you first started helping people write their books?

Because that's a learning curve too, right?

Helping people.

What was your biggest aha moment when you're working with business owners?

I realized a lot of them just didn't even know where to start, and because I have

such a passion for writing, I joined this one group and they had come out with some

software and because I was a member of their company, obviously you join, you

get a membership, and I came across some.

Great software they put together that helped you actually do an upfront

analysis of what the client would be looking for when they're looking for a

book on the topic that you're writing.

And that combined with the client research, it would actually dig right

into so many things about clients.

That's like about, you've got your typical client research and avatar,

but if you ever want to write a book on, I don't know, building an airplane.

Whatever your topic is, you can go out and you can find

hundreds of books on that topic.

And a lot of times it's what makes mine different.

But the nice thing about things like Amazon is there's all those reviews

and so it goes in and it, rather than going through and having to

read everybody's review and saying, what did they like about this book?

What did they hate?

How can I do it better than the, all the other books combined?

And so with this software, I can see.

Start right there and generate 10 15 page report with all those

answers, and that gives you a place to start and then generating the

blueprint, your vision of the book, the client analysis all together.

You bring that those pieces together and you develop an excellent

blueprint where basically from there it's paint by number and then.

From there, it's the rest of the pieces.

I've got a six step strategy for getting through all those different pieces,

but number one is getting started.

Yeah.

Researching the topic, just like you said.

So do you recommend that people go to Amazon first or do you recommend that they

maybe, I don't know, survey their audience and see what people are looking for?

What's really the very first step?

There's a couple ways to do it.

My fast start method just makes it really easy 'cause it, you answer a

few questions, you get all the answers.

If you want to do the thorough research, there's a number of ways to do it at,

everybody's got a little different method.

If a book has 500 reviews on Amazon, it's not like you're gonna want to sit

there and read through all the reviews.

Looking at Amazon will give you an idea of, it can inspire your

own titles by looking at what other people have used for titles.

Because the title is one of the most important pieces.

People do judge a book by the cover and what's on the cover, and the title

is what Either Attracts or Repels.

I love your idea of having you use the tool to do that research because

I think if I went to Amazon and really dug in to do research about writing a

book on a certain topic, it may make me think, I don't wanna write a book.

Oh, there, like you said, there's so many books out there, but having someone

who says, no, let's find all the holes, let's find all the missing pieces.

Let's find the misunderstandings that people have about this topic so that

your book can answer all of those things.

I love that tool.

That's an amazing jumpstart for anyone who wants to write a book, is just to have

you be able to do that for them, right?

Yeah.

If you think about it, as far as the business owner goes, we know it's a

great tool to have to market ourselves and to attract our ideal clients.

But most of us are really busy, and I'm really excited right now, but I'm

excited about 2026 because I think more and more people are realizing

that we deserve and we need support in our business, and we don't necessarily

want another course or program that shows us always how to do something.

We're at a place where we want done for you or done with you, and that's

the type of service you're offering.

And I think that's a game changer because now you have accountability.

But you also have someone who has the expertise and all these

tools that can fast track it.

So that for me, would make it something that would be much more easy to think

about adding to my goal list, because again, I think doing something with

someone else and having someone else's expertise gives you the time

to do it because you're not spending all your time doing all the research

and trying to figure it all out.

That's already been done for you.

So I think that's awesome.

Yeah, it definitely helps.

Just getting you jump started.

Yeah.

So once someone writes a book and it has to do with their business, what

do you encourage them to do with it?

Like how do they attract their ideal clients?

Obviously it's the title and the cover imagery.

How do you get that in front of them?

What's the best ways?

Oh yeah, that marketing is such a huge topic.

You did mention getting on podcasts, things like that.

Definitely getting on stages actually, once you've written

a book and people realize that they'll be inviting you to stages.

I had that happen to me with my first book, and it was an amazing experience.

I'm not a person to get on stage and talk, but it was well received in the

audience and I really enjoyed the process.

But marketing starts actually the day you decide on what your topic is.

And if you can just, especially with social media, if you can be

out there and just start sharing.

Now, this is something I didn't do myself with my first two books that I published.

I've not been a fan of social media and I didn't even know about this.

This is something I learned later.

But if you actually can get out there right away with the start and

say, I'm about to write this book.

And if you take people along the journey with you, get them engaged in

the process and it's like even ask, do you like this title or that title?

Better start getting some involvement and engagement.

So marketing is something that starts right off the bat and it goes

way beyond your publishing date.

So many pieces to marketing, and we cover some of that.

And I have basically a book project management program.

So it's like I help you manage all these pieces as you go

through the whole process.

I wouldn't even really have thought about asking people,

what title do you like best?

So that is a huge help.

Not only are you helping them write the book, but you're also helping

them start laying the foundation to make that book really successful.

And again, as a business owner, our time is one of our most valuable asset.

And if you're gonna write a book, I think it makes so much sense to

have a marketing strategy going hand in hand with the process.

And to be honest, we've interviewed a lot of people about writing books

and you're the first person I've ever heard have this approach.

What about you, Jeannie?

I have heard something along those lines, but I just think it's such a great idea

because we all love storytelling so much, and you are bringing people on

the journey, like you said, but you're also getting them personally involved.

You're saying, Hey, do you like this or that?

And then when the book comes out, they're gonna be like, oh my gosh,

I had something to do with this.

They feel a little ownership.

Is that what you find that Yeah, that really helps.

The other process that's used in the marketing strategy is

what's called an ARC process.

It's an advanced reader copy, and this is where you get people

that actually want to help.

They wanted some feedback from people before.

They get feedback from some broad public, and so they'll find, you know, some

people that would like to take a look at the books, sneak preview and read it

beforehand and provide some feedback.

And because they've read the book and this, you do, at a certain point

in the process, you wanna have it.

Pretty much done at this point, but you send them an advanced reader copy and

get their feedback and their input, but you're also going to invite them to do

a review when you launch, because Amazon for one, if you get a lot of reviews,

you'll get a little more promotion, a little more visibility on Amazon.

And if you can get a whole lot of reviews right up front when

your book is fresh and new.

That's when you're going to get the best result.

So the arc process is quite detailed and it's nice to have systems

in place, which I didn't before, but with my next book, I'm gonna

really get to utilize that process.

And I think that's so awesome.

And as you're helping clients, Jean and I always say that as we work with

our clients, we learn so much of how to tweak things and how to do things better.

And our clients often ask us things and we're like, that's a great question.

Let's integrate this into our process.

So I'm sure as you're working with clients, you're learning a lot.

From them.

If you could tell any business owner out there who has this desire or this spark,

or they've been thinking about it, and if you were to tell them anything about

moving forward with a book for 2026, is it making that part of their strategy?

What would you tell them?

Be patient with yourself.

It's like.

Sometimes we put deadlines on ourselves that are just not realistic, and it's

good to have deadlines, be gentle with yourself, but keep moving forward.

It's so great to have an accountability partner because it's so easy to just let

the book sit on the shelf, half done.

And that's actually one of the reasons that I put together a

summit, and it was a great summit with a lot of fabulous people.

There was so much information I'm gonna be doing again in 2026.

And so maybe a few times because the wealth of knowledge that's out there and

people aren't getting that knowledge.

And it's, like I said, I love to share what I've learned and I'm even

learning during my summit with new practices, so I'm learning as well.

I love that.

I have a question, like a tactical question, if you will.

Do you encourage your clients to charge for the book or to give it

out free as like a free lead magnet?

Or do you encourage them to say, A lot of people will say, oh, you can buy my book.

You just pay for the shipping and handling, which is

basically paying for the book.

I don't know if you have a thought on those options.

It depends on what your focus is and what you're trying to do with the book.

So if you're just looking to get a whole lot of book sales, and that's a whole

different strategy than if you're using your book to promote your business, if

you're using it to promote your business.

There's always the free PDF, which is one way to do it, to keep your own costs down,

but always carry your books with you.

And if some someone says, oh, can you, oh, can I buy one of those?

It's have a nice just round price point that you can sell it to them.

Also have it to just hand out of having a conversation with them.

You get that They're a real potential client for you.

It's here.

This is a book.

That might help you gain some more information on what you're trying to

figure out, and I can help you with that.

So it depends.

It's not a one size fits all.

Yeah.

And I guess even for one person, you could do different things with it, right?

You could sell it or you, like you said, you could use it.

I don't think it has to be, again, any one of those, you could probably use all three

of them on the same book strategically.

Yes.

And one of the nice things too with Amazon is you can sell your Kindle at

$0 for a limited period of time at.

Recurring intervals.

And so that's one way.

If you've got a nice email list with your clients and prospects on it,

then you can say, today you can get my free book, and you just do it

for a couple days here and there.

And it's, it's one way to get the book out there as well.

Yeah.

Using it as a lead magnet.

That's awesome.

Or, and also content for people that are already on your list.

Yeah.

Do you help people also with doing like audio versions?

That's something that I'm working towards.

I'm actually investigating that right now because one of my clients right now

is he's just getting ready to publish.

So we're getting through that first step.

And then what we're gonna do is we're gonna look at translations.

And right now he's deciding whether he wants to audio record himself

or get a professional reader.

So yeah, we're jumping into that next.

Yeah, that's exciting.

'cause I love listening to books.

Especially love when the author reads it.

Yeah.

You jump into your car, you get to the gym and you just pop that

on and you're in another world.

Yes.

So Shauna, do you take care of all of the editing and all of that?

Because for me, writing a book, that will be the hardest

part, will be thinking about.

Editing it and structuring it, because that's something

I have zero experience with.

Is that something you help your clients with?

That is something right now I am researching to get

some really good editors.

There's so many ways to edit and there's so many levels of editing.

You always wanna use a developmental editor.

They take a look at your.

Big picture book and they look at things that don't flow well and

tell you if you move this section down here, it will flow a lot better

and suggest adding pieces up here.

'cause it's, there's a gap.

So a developmental editor, once you've got your first message draft done, that's.

The first editor you want to talk to, and then there's the

copy editor and the line editor.

There's up to three to six kinds of editors, depending on who you talk to,

but the developmental editor is, and just to make a point around that, I said messy

first draft is just get the book written.

Don't worry about how ugly or messy it is.

And get that done first.

Then you polish it up.

It's like when you're doing a throwing clay, you get a little finesse to it and

get a little bit of a shape going on.

But you do some fine tuning after you get the basic shape.

So I'm assuming you work with people to help them with an outline to

get 'em started, but then flexible outline so that things can be moved.

Yes.

Definitely the outline helps you get started.

In fact, when I did my first book, I didn't even have an outline.

I was just like, I would write, I wanna talk about this about

time, and I wanna talk about that.

And then I scrambled and put it together after I wrote all the

bits and pieces, which wasn't the most elegant way to do it.

But if you've got an outline, you can say, I covered that topic.

And then you can always rearrange it later.

And you'll sometimes feel inspired to write a chapter that's

close to the end of what you.

Planned in your book, and that's perfectly fine because whatever's on

your heart at the moment that inspired writing is what makes it really great.

Yeah, I've heard of inspired writing, but I've also heard people who

say, I'm gonna commit to writing a certain amount of words per day, and

I'm gonna do it during this time.

They just get their head down and if the ideas or the inspiration doesn't come,

they've still got something on the page.

Yes.

That's a great practice because it keeps you going.

And sometimes with myself when I would try to sit down and write, I just

was, this is planned writing time and I just, I don't know what to do and

sometimes you just start writing it.

I'm not sure what to write next.

I know I need to write about, just dump it out.

Just let your brain get flowing and it'll come.

I love the fact that one, you are helping people because you went

through the struggle yourself.

So you pulled yourself up by your bootstraps and did it.

And probably looking back, wish you had hired someone like you to help you do it.

So I love the fact that you've been there, you know what it

feels like, so you know what your clients are really going through.

And then I love the fact that you are using your project

management skills for this.

We forget how people have so many amazing skills, I like to say, from their

past lives, from their past careers.

This is a great way for you to integrate that because again,

most of us, I'm definitely not a project manager type of person.

I'm all over the place.

So having someone like you to give that value and that support and

structure probably makes it just, it would probably feel very supportive

and nurturing to me to know that I have someone there doing those things

and holding my hand along the way.

But I love the fact that on the backend, you really have a plan.

Like you, you are great at managing projects, so you're the one

calculating how to get it really good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think that's so important.

Just.

Having someone right there that's supporting you is priceless.

Yeah.

And the accountability, because typically books are not

something that have a deadline.

It can take you years and years, but if, if you have somebody who's working through

this project with you, like someone like you, then oh, I'm gonna meet with Shauna.

I've gotta have, so to show her exactly.

Oh my gosh.

Shauna, I know that you mentioned that you will have ongoing master classes.

Or ongoing summits, I guess I should say.

We could put a link for your summits in the show notes, but how else would you

like people to get in touch with you?

They can go to my website, ask shauna.com, and what we're planning to do, I don't

have it up yet, but the summit will always be your book, your message.com,

and we will have an in-between link.

There for people that you know where we don't have the next one scheduled

where they can join a wait list, and that way they'll be notified as

soon as we get the next one planned.

Awesome.

We appreciate you and to all the listeners out there, I hope that if

you've had a book, you're thinking about a book, definitely reach out to Shauna.

It's always worth having a conversation, but even if maybe you're not ready to jump

in, write this second, have a conversation with her and figure out if maybe it's

something you do want to put in your marketing strategy for next year and

then schedule a time to make that happen.

But Shauna, thank you so much.

This has been amazing.

And I know I've learned a lot and I know Jeannie has, we've talked about writing a

book, but we haven't quite got there yet.

But that might be something we'll reconsider now that we kinda have

you in our pocket, so to speak.

That would be great.

Thanks again, Shauna.

It's been lovely to have you and we've learned so much and I'm sure the

people listening have learned as well.

So we will put all your links in the show notes below, right.

So thanks again for joining us.

Thank you.

Thanks for listening to the six Figure Business Mastery Podcast.

If you enjoyed listening to this episode and you are ready to leverage video

marketing on all online platforms, or maybe even start your own video

podcast, then you need to check out the Done for You and Done with You program

at the marketing va advantage.com and take your business to the next level.