First Issue

Gino Wickman, business leader and coach, wanted to publish a book that shared his successful system for helping companies get what they want from their businesses. The ultimate goal was to increase implementation of his proprietary Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS) by getting his message out to as many people as possible.

Gino drafted a manuscript that captured his passion for EOS and his determination to share its tools, model, and process with entrepreneurial businesses. His first thought was to find a traditional publisher—but after many frustrating months of shopping the work around and finding no takers, Gino decided to explore self-publishing as a way to bring what he knew was a valuable idea to the market.

Making It Happen

• Highspot put together a realistic assessment of the time, process, and budget required to take Gino’s manuscript and turn it into a finished book.
• Highspot then managed the entire project, from an initial edit to sharpen the book’s message right through to final printing and e-book production.
• Along the way, Highspot was available as a trusted resource for testing ideas and asking questions about book production, marketing, and distribution.
• For Gino, one of Highspot’s most valuable contributions was the team’s role in keeping him free to serve his own clients while Highspot handled the many details involved in getting a book to market.

Seeing Results
Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business launched as a hard cover book in November 2007 and as an e-book in 2008. Available through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Borders, and other leading retailers, the book has sold over 10,000 copies.

As a result, Gino has seen an upswing in his business. In the last two years, he has added 20 new EOS implementers to his team and successfully helped more than 200 companies implement EOS.

“There’s no question about it,” says Gino. “We’ve leveraged our business model because of this book. Our long-term goal is to help 10,000 companies run on EOS. Every book we sell gets us closer to this goal.”

Gino is now working on a second book, excited to repeat his positive experience from Traction.

Download a PDF copy of this case study.

So e-books are taking over the world. Depending on who you ask, that’s either a good thing (readers who travel) or a very bad thing (publishers). Either way, the genie is out of the bottle for good. The big challenge is how to tap into the gift market.

If I purchase a p-book (you know, the traditional paper kind), I can read it myself, lend it to others, or give it away. There’s a lot of value in all three of those options. When I purchase an e-book, leaving aside the problem of being trapped on one type of e-reader, I can mainly just read it myself. That’s pretty limiting to the expansion of the market.

Barnes and Noble have tackled the lending issue with the Nook, which lets you lend an e-book to another Nook owner. While the book is out on loan, you get locked out of reading it yourself. But the loan feature has some major flaws, including the fact that you can only lend an e-book title once and there’s a two-week limit to the loan period. Who reads a loaned book in 2 weeks?

So far, no one has created a legal way for the general public to give e-books as gifts. There are ways to cheat to provide free copies to your friends, but that certainly isn’t happy news for either authors or publishers.

The illicit trading of music files is one of the ways that MP3s permanently transformed the music industry. In response, Apple started iTunes and legitimized the buying of music in single tracks. Now a whole “good” portion of the population is comfortable buying music online. Unfortunately, Apple hasn’t solved the issue of giving music as a gift, other than offering the ubiquitous gift card. E-books suffer the same fate.

Trouble is, gift cards don’t create emotional connections to a personally selected item, like a particular book can. With books being a popular gift (and my favorite), this is a big issue to solve. Wish I knew how to crack this one. I’d be sitting pretty on the royalties.

Rob Walling recently wrote a blog post called Why Startup Founders Should Stop Reading Business Books. At first the title made me scoff, but when I read the post in detail, his arguments made a lot of sense.

Many business books are actually a short paper with some good points; the main ideas are often found in the introduction and maybe the first chapter. Sometimes the whole point of the book is contained in the flap copy. But a book, to be a book, has to have weight. Translation: the page count has to be much more than 25. So many redundant pages are added.

Rob’s target audience of startup web entrepreneurs doesn’t have time to read extra pages. They are busy “doing” and usually running their businesses by the seat of their pants. In this context, his advice makes sense. (And he provides an out to read for fun and interest, so Malcolm Gladwell is still “okay” - whew!)

What Rob misses is that not everyone can absorb and integrate new information in a meaningful way just by reading the bullet points of a PowerPoint presentation or short article. Most of us need stories to remember and apply the lessons. In order for the information to stick in our brains, and therefore be useful, we need context and repetition.

So maybe startup founders should stop reading business books, but the rest of us could benefit from reading great books that share valuable lessons. The question is, Which books are worth taking the time to read in full? What’s your take?

We’ve entered a time where getting a book to market is as simple as 1, 2, 3. First, write the book. Second, make sure it gets a thorough edit. Third, self-publish in print and e-book form. Boom — “published” author. That isn’t to say it’s easy, but there has certainly never been a better time to get a manuscript off the shelf and into the hands of interested readers.

But some are asking, in a world where anyone can become published, how do you find something “good” to read? How do readers sift through the exploding number of titles to find the gems in the pile?

The answer may be, “just as they do now.” Even with a flood of new titles available, it stands to reason readers will continue to choose titles using the same criteria they have in the past. Google has determined (through some fancy algorithms) that there are nearly 130 million published books in the world. Readers have managed thus far to sort through those millions of book titles to find the ones they’re interested in. With that in mind, one can only assume readers will be able to do the same as the self-published market explodes over the next few years.

People gravitate towards what they like. They find authors or genres or subject matters they care about and are interested in, and make choices out of that pool. In fact, adding more titles will only grow the pot for readers, giving them even greater options on the subjects they enjoy.

Author Scott Nicholson explains it well in his article on the topic. He offers the analogy that despite her popularity, he has no idea what Lady Gaga sings, nor does he ever care to. But he finds new music that does appeal to him, when he wants to, through the channels he always has. Finding book titles would be the same. He finds and reads what he already likes.

Perhaps the growing wave of self-published titles will create some complexity and debris in the market, but how much it affects consumer buying and reading habits, if at all, remains to be seen.

Coming up with a great title isn’t easy, but it may be the single most important thing you do for your book. Both the title and subtitle can have a major influence on your book’s success. A great title alone won’t sell your book, but a poor title can make sure it doesn’t sell.

Too many first-time authors try cramming a 25-word synopsis of their book into the title. They end up with titles that are insufferably long, hard to understand, and impossible to remember. Yawn.

For the main title, you want something memorable and easy to say. Titles are usually very short—sometimes just one or two catchy words. The subtitle then picks up the job of describing what the book is about in a bit more detail. The title piques interest, the subtitle explains.

Consider these partnered titles and subtitles:

The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More
Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Cost of Everything
Death By Meeting: A Leadership Fable About Surviving The Most Painful Problem in Business
Small Giants: Companies that Choose to Be Great Instead of Big

Brainstorm a list of keywords related to the content of your book and its intended readership. What is the main benefit someone will get from reading your book? Use these keywords in your title and subtitle to help draw the right people to your work.

Read through your preface, introduction, and cover copy. Sometimes you’ll find a choice concept or turn of phrase that can be pulled out and turned into a catchy title.

Once you’ve come up with keywords and done some brainstorming, narrow your list to one or two contenders and try them out on others. Your best test audience is made up of people who fall into your intended readership. Poll some clients if they’re the ones you want buying your book, or talk to colleagues in your industry if you wrote the book for them.

Avoid getting too attached to a title before the feedback comes in. And if you find yourself stuck without a title after all of this, get help. With so much resting on what goes on the front cover, it’s definitely worth the investment.

UPDATE - July 13, 2010 - Well, it’s happened already. Sony just broke the $100 e-reader barrier. Looks like there will be e-readers for everyone this holiday season! - R.S.

May 1st was a big day for the e-reader market. That’s when the Kobo, at $149, became the cheapest and most stripped down e-reader you could buy. Soon after, Borders started selling a competitive but cheaper reader, the Aluratek Libre for only $119.99. Now Barnes & Noble has a version of the Nook at $149, and Amazon Kindle promptly slashed its price to $189. Sony, not to be left out of the fun, has also dropped their prices. What’s really going on here? Is it simply competitive pricing, or something more?

Let’s look to the printer and toner pricing structure for a possible answer. Each day, printers are sold with more features, and at lower prices. The catch is the toner: It continues to be ridiculously expensive. I break out in hives when I have to buy toner cartridges for my colour printer. I even purchased a new printer once because it was cheaper than buying the toner! Don’t worry, I found the old one a new home at a recycling charity. Seems e-books are the new toner, and e-readers the new printers.

The first e-readers were expensive ($359 for the first Kindle), and e-books were cheap (typically about $9.99 per book). The publishers didn’t like it, but they had to live within a model where the retailer set the price. When Apple’s iPad launched this spring they forced a change that swept the industry, and now retailers have less discount wiggle room. Not surprisingly, e-books prices have shot up to the $12 range today.

The only lever left to support the rapid rise of digital book sales (and save the publishing industry) is for e-reader prices to continue to drop. Cheaper means much more accessible, and the number of people who own an e-reader will explode. Back to my printer and toner analogy, almost anyone can buy a colour printer these days, but the toner is a whole other story. We need to keep an eye on e-book pricing, and take bets on which e-readers will survive the price wars (the iRex has already filed for bankruptcy protection in the USA), and which ones will go down with last year’s colour printer models.

As Bette Davis/Margo Channing said in the movie, All About Eve, “Fasten your seatbelts. It’s going to be a bumpy night!”

In the not-so-distant future, say 10 years from now, books will be sold in three main formats: e-books, cheap print-on-demand paper books, and specialty hard cover collector editions.

1) E-Books
Digital readers are becoming cheaper every day. The Kobo is priced affordably at $149 and the magic sub-$100 price point is coming very soon. At the same time, digital readers are also getting better: better screens, better graphics, color eInk options, wireless and Bluetooth capabilities, and more memory for more books. Although the iPad may not crush the Kindle, it introduces a different kind of experience complete with audio, video, and virtually anything else you want to add. The environmental/green angle of digital books is also a great selling point. Kobo (formerly Shortcovers) was created in 2008 for a digital book market that was expected to account for 5-10% of all book sales within five years. Now the estimate is as high as 95% in 10 years. Add it up and digital is the future of books.

2) Print-On-Demand Books
Some people will still want their “beach-proof” copy of a book or something they can mark up in the margins. Technology like the Espresso Book Machine has made it cheap and easy to print single copies of a book and have it available in minutes from your local bookstore (yes, they will still exist), Costco, or even the public library. The difference is that these books will be produced digitally, then output to a paper format for a small group of buyers. They still make vinyl records after all, so we won’t be done with paper for a long time.

3) Specialty Hard Cover Collector Editions
Back in the old days of publishing, there were two types of books published: inexpensive paperbacks meant for mass consumption, and leather-bound hard cover books that only institutions or the wealthy could afford. The latter were as much to be collected and displayed as to be read. Well, what goes around, comes around. J.K. Rowling may have single-handedly created the rebirth of the collector concept when she packaged Tales of Beedle the Bard for Christmas 2007, complete with jewel-encrusted cover and handwritten manuscript.

Collector books will have full-colour interiors, embossed covers, and other features that will make them feel like pre-Gutenberg illuminated manuscripts. They will be gifts for people who have everything or decor for people who want to be seen as having everything. They will not meant to be read, just visually enjoyed. Remember the special edition of The DaVinci Code with all the beautiful pictures? Like that, only more so. Prices will be upwards of $75.

So where will you be in the transition? Leading the wave with your e-reader device or lugging around printed books? As I always tell my 85-year-old mother-in-law, how do you know you don’t like it if you haven’t tried it? Just like cell phones 15 years ago (who needs one of those?!?), e-readers are here to stay.

We live in a post-industrial age where information is the coin of the realm. Knowledge is the most valuable asset that a business owns. For most businesses, that knowledge exists primarily in the heads of the people who work there. For entrepreneurs and sole practitioners, what’s in their head usually is the business. That’s both limiting and dangerous.

Let’s take the example of a successful management consultant. Drawing on her knowledge and experience, she’s able to hire herself out at a substantial hourly rate. The trouble is, every time she wants to make some money she has to trade away some of her time.

What happens when she goes on vacation and is no longer putting in time? Her income goes on vacation too. What happens when she’s sleeping, or when she gets sick, or when she wants to retire? As soon as she stops putting in time, she stops getting money.

Even if she could work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, there is still a limit to how much money she can make simply because she can’t create more time. When you trade time for money, you put an automatic cap on your income potential.

Something else also starts happening to our consultant. The more successful she is, the more her services are in demand, the harder she works. Did you go into business to work long, hard hours for limited reward? I didn’t think so.

Knowledge products create passive streams of revenue, that is, money that flows to you whether you’re working or not. How? You create the products once and then sell them over and over again. You make an initial investment of time and money and then reap the benefits in multiples. You can’t do that with time; you can’t sell the same hour twice.

What Exactly is a Knowledge Product?
Quite simply, an knowledge product is any chunk of information that has been recorded in some fashion — whether that be print, audio, video or multimedia — so that it can now be passed on to others. There are dozens of ways to package and sell information. These are just a few:

• Print books and e-books
• Booklets and special reports
• Manuals and workbooks
• MP3s and podcasts
• Teleclasses
• Subscription-based web sites

The key is taking something intangible — the knowledge in your head — and turning it into something that others can enjoy and use even when you’re not around.

Every process you employ to serve your clients, every opinion you have on the news in your industry, every past experience you carry with you can be recorded and shared. What’s stopping you?

The e-book self-publishing world is about to get a little more crowded. With the launch of Pubit! this summer, Barnes & Noble (B&N) has inserted itself directly into the publishing process, joining other retailers like Amazon and Sony. Pubit! is a DIY option for independent publishers and authors to deliver their works digitally through B&N’s site and e-book store.

While this may on the surface seem like great news for the indie publishing crowd, there are definite issues. For example, B&N has been noncommittal up to this point about royalty information, which makes it difficult to know if Pubit! can offer a more attractive deal or not. Another challenge authors and publishers face with an ever growing list of retailers offering self-publishing is how to choose. Which retailer might offer the best audience and reach? Does it make sense to manually publish with every major retailer, one by one, to make sure the playing field is covered despite the time and effort?

In order to make this really work, and work well, we’re going to have to see some consolidation happen. A company that is already running ahead with this is Smashwords. Publish with them and they do the distribution for you to their own site, as well as Kobo, Apple, Amazon, Sony, and even B&N. One site, one process, and one revenue payment makes it simple and transparent. What a concept! Big book retailers like B&N should consider taking a page out of Smashwords success manual.

Barnes & Noble just announced they are creating a distribution platform for independent authors to sell self-published books on the B&N website –- e-books only.

Smashwords allows anyone who can create a MS Word document to self-publish and distribute on nine platforms including Amazon Kindle, Barnes & Noble, Sony, Kobo, Apple, and the Smashwords site itself — e-books only.

Of course, Amazon has offered e-book distribution through the Kindle for what seems likes ages now.

So there are many ways to sell and distribute an independent book as long as it’s an e-book.

But if you want to sell a p-book –- that’s a traditional paper book — as a true self-publisher, you have limited options: your own website and Amazon. That’s about it.  Only Amazon offers a program to allow easy sales and distribution of paper books, books that still make up at least 95% of all book sales.

The Amazon program is pretty simple. For $29.95 USD per year, you can have a seller’s account on Amazon.com and your book is listed in their search engines. They won’t keep many copies in stock, so your sales need to drive their purchase orders. But they guarantee you 45% of the retail price of your book. Not great, but manageable. When you start to sell in volume (i.e., you’re shipping them cases of books rather than one or two books at a time), it starts to pay off. They pay you each month with a direct deposit to your bank account. Plus they are the largest e-tailer in the world, so there is value in the exposure you get.

Oddly, as everyone rushes to compete in the emerging digital market, they are leaving Amazon to its monopoly on p-books for the self-publisher. No one wants to challenge the mighty Amazon? Really?