Steve Gordon | How to Write a Business Book in Just 30 Days
Unknown: Hi, and welcome to the
wealthy woman lawyer Podcast.
I'm DaVita Frederick, and I'm
here today with a dear friend
and colleague of mine, Steve
Gordon, Steve Gordon is the CEO
and founder of unstoppable CEO.
And I've had the pleasure of
working with Steve over the last
few years, he and his brilliant
team helped me start my podcasts
about the woman lawyer podcast,
and manage that for over I think
we're into our third going into
our fourth year of this podcast.
And he's also been the guy to
help me get these two books
written and published through
his publishing company back
there somewhere. There you go,
there you go. And so today, I
want to I'm so so excited to
have him on because I want to
talk with you guys about what
it's like to write and publish a
book. And Steve has a lot of
expertise in this, because he is
a five time author, as well as
the founder of his own podcast.
And so I'm excited to introduce
him to you guys. And we're gonna
have a wonderful conversation
today. If you've been thinking
about writing a book, then you
definitely want to listen up.
Hi, Steve. Welcome, Davina.
Thanks for having me. This is
exciting. We get to actually
talk on a podcast normally we're
talking behind the scenes.
Right. Exactly. Exactly. I'm
glad to have you here we
actually had you on before. And
at that, in that first one, we
talked about podcasting, because
it's been such a wonderful tool,
both for you and I and growing
our businesses. And I can't
thank you enough for helping me
kickstart the wealthy woman
lawyer podcast and manage all
that. Because there's a lot to a
podcast that people don't
realize that goes on behind the
scenes. But today, I really want
to focus on the books because I
have a lot of women law firm
owners, you know, kind of have
that on their wish list that
someday I'm gonna write a book
or I think I might write a book.
So let's, let's talk about that
and share some insight from
them, especially from somebody
who's written five books. What,
what prompted you
to go down that path to begin
with? What made you write your
first book unstoppable
referrals? So I wrote that in
2014. And
it theoretically is book number
three, but the first two ended
up in the trash can.
Yeah, I mean, you can relate to
the struggle, right? It, it's
really difficult to try and, and
encapsulate all of your
knowledge, all of your wisdom
into a book. And at the same
time, it is the single most
powerful way to demonstrate to
your future clients, your
expertise, and prove that you
are the expert that you claim to
be. And I think that's become
more and more important. I mean,
every industry is commoditize.
Now law is no different. You
know, it came to the professions
late, but it has hit them full
force. And, and so if you want
to stand out, you really need to
be the one that wrote the book,
and, and wrote the book for your
specific type of ideal client,
and in their specific niche.
And, and when you do, you end up
being the only one. And that's
what really motivated me to want
to write the book I was, you
know, I, as you know, I live in
Tallahassee, Florida, we're not
a large city, I think we're like
the 11th largest market in
Florida, which means we're not a
big place.
We were a little one and a half
person, marketing consulting
firm, it was me and a part time
assistant. And we had a handful
of local clients. And I had a
bigger vision than that. And I
knew we were doing really great
stuff, but I didn't have a way
to get that message any further
beyond what we were doing. And
that book gave me a way to do
that. And, you know, we can talk
about, you know, what happened
when we when we launched it,
because it was really, I still
think back and it's like
astonishing, how quickly, it
transformed things, but
but it's just for me, it is the
for any professional is the
number one way for you to go out
and demonstrate your expertise
and create the credibility that
the clients want. It gives them
the confidence to hire you
because you've become a known
quantity because you've written
a book. Right, right. I actually
even though Tallahassee is my
hometown for people who don't
know I was spent most of my
childhood there and I've been in
Central Florida for 30 years,
but I actually met Steve because
I discovered his book. And I
read the book and I thought it
was it was great. He had some
ideas in there that really
struck
chord with me, and I kept it for
a while, and I thought I'm gonna
begin to follow him, you know,
stalking online, all those
things. And eventually that led
to an opportunity to have a
conversation with him, I read
reached out to him. And you
know, the rest is history. We've
been, you know, working together
now for a number of years. And
tell me,
I want to hear about this
transformation of your business
and tell me what that first book
did for you. And, and then I
want to dive into is like your
second, third, fourth, and so
forth. So tell me what what that
first book did for you just kind
of immediately within a year or
so I had no idea what to expect.
I mean, the average nonfiction
book sells 300 copies in its
lifetime, in its lifetime.
And I thought, well, if I can do
more than that in the launch,
then I'm going to be off, you
know, in on the right foot and
heading in the right direction.
And I had a podcast
before the book, a different one
than what I have. Now. I ran
that for about a year, I'd
interviewed about 50 people,
other marketing consultant type
people. So basically
competitors, don't you think
about it. But in different parts
of the world, some of the US
some in Europe, one or two in
like New Zealand, Australia,
because it's just such a great
tool, you can connect with
people anywhere in the world.
And because I interviewed them,
I built relationships with them.
And I stayed in touch. And so
two years later, the book is is
ready didn't take me the two
years to write it, we can talk
about how we write them really
quickly now. But
I was ready to publish the book.
And I went back to the people
that I've maintained
relationship with. And out of
the 5015 agreed to help me share
the book and they were going to
share it with the people in
their network or in their
audience. Some of them had
really big followings, and some
of them had tiny little networks
that they shared it with. And,
and so it was the second week in
July. In 2014. I happened to
time it perfectly. We had a
family vacation plans, and we
were in Costa Rica, the week of
the launch, I don't recommend
taking a vacation during the
week of your book launch. It was
a little harrowing, trying to
check the numbers on a dial up
connection from Costa Rica.
But we we launched it, and
within about a week 5000 People
had grabbed a copy a little more
than that, as about 5268 had
grabbed a cup of coffee. Now to
put that in perspective, leading
up to that we barely had 1000
people on our email list total.
And so that I mean, you know, if
if in a week you can five extra
impact? And Will everybody do
that? No, of course not. But the
thing that we see again and
again and again, is that it is a
multiplier. And it's a fast
multiplier for for most people.
You know, and so we doubled that
year, we doubled the following
year, we we've grown every year
since
on the back of that first book,
and then the subsequent ones
have certainly helped. But you
know, if you can get one out
there and in the world and
consistently promote it. That's
usually all you need. We still
get clients back just just in
the last week, we've landed two
new clients, who both got the
book more than five years ago,
got that first book more than
five years ago. And one guy was
telling me he's like, I just
love the approach. I've followed
all your stuff for all this
time. And you know, your your
book is on my bookshelf, and
it's I've moved four times. And
it's moved with me four times.
Now what other marketing or
sales piece can you create that
someone will move with them?
Oh, absolutely, absolutely.
That's the thing. One of you
that I think convinced me is
that in your book you talk about
you talk about referral kids
like creating a referral kid.
And there's different kinds of
referral kits. But a book is one
of the best referral kids
because you mentioned in in, in
your approach that, you know,
first of all, who did who passes
out business cards anymore,
nobody but it used to be the
thing. Everybody's passing out
business cards, and you say
business cards can easily wind
up in the trash, or they wind up
if you're like me, I had a
basket and I would throw
business cards at it. And I
would never look at that basket
and those business and I would
say One day I'm gonna scan all
these into my CRM and all of
that, but I would just put
things in every few years I'd go
through and I go, Oh, this
person's not even in business
anymore and I'd be throwing
things out right. So, but most
people you know, like you'll
also find in business for
Apart from the bottom of your
purse from somebody you met at a
networking event, you know, but
this is cards are so easily
disposed to dispose up. But a
book is something that people it
has value. And people tend to
keep it I have, even though I
have an enormous amount of books
on Kindle, and I use Audible, I
also have three very full
bookshelves in my office plus a
coffee table shot shoved under
my desk with stats at book books
on it, right? Because I'm if
you're a collector of knowledge
and information, you want to
learn how to do your business,
you're always looking for good
business book. And you're always
looking for that little gold
nugget that you can get out of
that book. And if you get a book
and you're like, I don't have
time to read it right now. But
one day, I'm going to I'm gonna
get that gold nugget. And you
say you hang on to the book,
because one day you're gonna
have time to read the book
right? Now, you had a very
interesting story where you said
that there was you had
someone who kept the book on
their nightstand for a couple of
years planning to read it. Tell
me about that. Yeah, so
this guy from the UK books an
appointment on my calendar.
I've never, never met him.
Never heard heard from him
prior. He gets on the Zoom call.
And, and he starts off by
saying, I'm a little
embarrassed, but I've never read
your book. And I'm not going to
and I'm like, Okay, well, this
is an interesting start to a
conversation. But you know, he
said it in in that British
accent, which always sounds, you
know, polite and intelligent.
And he said, you know, a buddy
gave me a copy of your book a
couple of years ago. And I stuck
it on my nightstand. I had every
intention of reading it. And
it's just been sitting there and
I've never read it. But I need
what it says on the cover, and
your name is on there, and your
website was on there. And I just
finally decided I wasn't ever
going to do it myself. I needed
help. And you're my guy.
See, how powerful is that? That
that story alone was hugely
persuasive for me and writing a
book, because I can relate to
that. I mean, I have read, you
know, I bought books that I
really have every intention of
reading, because I'm such a
voracious reader. I'm always
buying, there's always more
books, you know that I buy and
Newt some new shiny thing, and
not being able to get to reading
it, even though I have the best
of intentions. And so I love
that story, because that shows
how I think a lot of people have
fear around. Well, if I write
this book, and I tell people my
secret sauce, which is what you
did it unstoppable, unstoppable
referrals, you basically laid
out the plan. This is how you
want to get more referrals for
your business. This is it ABCD
you know, and you lay out the
plan.
That is a a very powerful story.
Because a lot of people have
fear around. Well, if I lay out
the plan, then why would anybody
hire me? So let's talk about
that a little bit. Because I'm
sure you've heard a lot of
people say, say that to you,
when they're thinking. Okay,
they're sort of with the number
one question, is it? Yeah, it's
nothing. In fact, with a new
client, we just on boarded
yesterday. That was the first
question he asked is where
where's the line? Where do I go
between teaching them everything
I know, and holding things back.
And,
you know, there are a couple of
ways that we kind of get around
that. And one is that for most
of the people listening to this,
you have invested a tremendous
amount of time and energy and
money in mastering your practice
of law. And I don't care if
you're just day one out of law
school. You're what is the law
school three years.
So you're at least three years
ahead of everyone else in the
population. And probably more
than that, because you were
really focused for two years. We
take the bar exam, all that so
all tool from LSAT, the bar
exam, it's usually a four year
process, pretty much, right?
Yeah. And so you have at least a
four year Headstart, but
probably more than that, because
very few people would be as
focused as you were through law
school, on that singular pursuit
of knowledge. There is no
possible way. We could summarize
everything that you know, at
this stage in a 100 to 150 page
book. We probably couldn't
summarize it all in a 500 page
book or 1000 page book.
So you can't give it all away if
you wanted to. It's impossible.
And clients aren't looking for
that. I mean, particularly with
the profession.
John's with, you know, law and
medicine and the others.
Clients don't want to learn how
to practice law, they just want
to know that you understand
their issue, that you've deeply
thought about it, and that you
can show them that you deeply
thought about it and that you
have a process in place to solve
their issue.
Right, right. I once had a
conversation with somebody who
said, you know, when you're
creating content of any kind,
there is tremendous value in
just articulating the problem
and really giving clarity around
the problem. So even discussing
a problem and consequences of
not taking action, it has value,
but you start getting into, you
know, what, what something is
and why somebody needs to pay
attention to it, that has
tremendous value, you don't have
to get into all the nitty gritty
of the house. Now in both of my
books, I do go in a little bit
into the how on how to do
things, but like you said, it
was really hard. I mean, I'm
very verbose as anybody who
knows me knows. And
you it was hard, because you
were helping to corral me and
say, do we need to make this
shorter, we didn't make it.
Because I wanted to put
everything I knew, you know,
once you start talking about
something, you go, you know, the
temptation, especially for our
attorneys who think in terms of
rules, exceptions, exceptions to
the rules, we want to put
everything in because we feel
like you have to have a complete
picture. And so even in my
marketing book, and in my
systems book, I wanted to go
into detail. And I did go into
some detail, probably more than
I shouldn't have. But
that can also be overwhelming
for our people. And I think a
lot of times when we're thinking
about writing a book, we're
thinking, Why do you tell them
everything because they need to
know it all, because there are
exceptions to things. But that
can also really overwhelm people
and cause them to not take
action of any kind, right?
Because they feel like, I just
feel paralyzed with that. So you
kind of have this philosophy of
airplane, what what what we call
airplane books, right? Where you
can read it on a flight from
point A to point B at our 90
minutes, something that you can
read on a flight a couple hours,
maybe. And that is really
different from what we've seen
in the past, even with my first
two books are probably closer to
200 pages. The third one that
we're working on is going to be
a lot shorter than that. And
part of it is is because like
you said, people don't have the
time these days, especially if
you're already a successful
business person.
And you're just wanting to get
your wanting to get a little bit
of an edge on something. So talk
to me about how you came to
realize that because I know a
softball referrals is a larger
book. But each of your books
have kind of gotten a little bit
more concise as you've gone
along. What made you realize
that that was a change that you
needed to make?
Well, the the nightstand story
is one I mean, here's a guy who
wouldn't read 150 I mean,
unsolvable referrals is about, I
don't know, 35 36,000 words,
150 160 pages. It's not a really
long book.
But here's somebody who could
have been helped. That wasn't
now ultimately he was right. And
it worked out. Because he came
and worked with us. But
I, you know, what really did it
for me is a few years ago, we
had a client come to us who had
already written his book. He had
an award winning buck in his
industry, like literally had
one, you know, like the top Book
Award in the industry. And he
had been trying to market it and
use it as a tool to attract
clients to his consulting
business. And it hadn't worked
and he was so frustrated, he
tried everything, you could
think of every tactic you could
imagine he tried. And people
would get his book, but they
wouldn't go any further than
that. And it really took me a
little while I studied I would
study his book and then I'd look
at other ones that either
clients of ours or mine or other
books that you know by other
authors that were just working
really well for them.
And it finally hit me one day
that he had written a textbook
and the all the books that had
been really successful at
driving new business. Were not
textbooks they were what I now
call a transformation book and
and his textbook had everything
in it in the kitchen sink, it
had all the detail. It was like
400 Plus pages long. Wow, yes.
And it was really good. It was
really good. But it was dense.
Yeah. And his target was, you
know, VP of sales, that was his
target client. So here's someone
who
probably isn't super technical,
and this was a little bit
technical,
probably doesn't have a lot of
time, you know, we'll look at a
300 page book and go, Yeah,
that's really great, I'll get to
it, and then never gets to it.
And, or looks at it, and reads
it and gets a third of the way
in and goes, this is really
complicated, I'm overwhelmed as
doing it to your point. And,
ultimately, that's the
conclusion I came to was that,
that book was never going to
drive business for him because
it was thorough, and it was a
good book won awards.
But it wasn't, it wasn't
describing the transformation
that could happen, and I wasn't
doing that successfully. And
when I looked at the books that
had been most successful,
they described the path from
from point A to point B, from
suffering to redemption from
problem to, you know, a better,
brighter future, after the
solution is deployed. And, and
so that's really what we've come
to focus on with our clients is
creating that kind of book. And,
and that doesn't need to give
the reader every little detail
and how it's solved. They just
need to see that. Here's a
problem that they they they
have. And sometimes they don't
know that they have it. I mean,
sometimes you mentioned it, the
most valuable thing you can
often do for someone is identify
for them a really big problem
that they're unaware of.
Or that they they only maybe
minimally perceive as a problem
and show them no, no.
Here's the real consequence of
this if you don't do anything,
you know, and,
and giving them that can
sometimes save a person's life.
Absolutely, absolutely. Let's
let's talk about the sort of,
when you brought up this as a
very technical book, it reminded
me of the conversation we had,
when I was reading the wealthy
woman lawyers guide to marketing
in the virtual age. And my
temptation coming, you know,
being a professional writer, and
then being an attorney,
was wanting to like do citations
and footnotes and all of that
kind of thing. And one of the
things that you said to me,
because I knew attorney, other
attorneys would be reading it,
right. And so I had that just
sort of, you know, like, I need
to cite this source or cite that
source or whatever. And one of
the things that you said to me
is, like, really, what we're
talking about here is your point
of view, and you're wanting to
share your point of view. And
you showed me a lot of very
popular and famous
business books that were around
transformation and mindset and
said, this book has zero
footnotes in that it has zero,
you know, it is this author's
point of view about something
right. And I do think a lot of
attorneys will get caught up in
feeling a need to make it like,
like a brief or a law of law
review article, right? For a law
review journal. And I know
you've worked with some
attorneys, what kinds of things
do you say to them? To sort of
help them understand that this
is a different type of book with
a different audience?
Well, I again, it kind of goes
back to this idea is is it
textbooks all of your law
textbooks had references on
every page probably doesn't.
But really, what you're writing
is a marketing piece. And it's a
good marketing piece, and it's
going to be intelligent and
thoughtful. But you don't
necessarily need to have every
every claim that you make
reference because some of these
are just your assertion of the
best way to do things. You know,
every professional I know who
owns their own firm does so
because they were once at a firm
and they went you know what?
The guy that has his name on the
door or the gal that has her
name on the door, doesn't know
what the heck they're doing, and
I can do it better. I have my
way. Right. So
Your book is really an
expression of your way.
And so you are the reference.
Does that mean we don't
reference anything? No, of
course not. Sometimes it really
can help bolster your case to
have third party proof. And so
often, if there's a relevant
study or, you know, someone else
has some data that will back up
a claim that you're making, yes,
it lends credibility to having
that. But we've we've certainly
published books that were, that
were devoid of all of those
things. You know, we don't
always but again, it's a
representation of your
opinionated worldview. This is
how you see the world and how
you solve the particular problem
that you solve for clients. And
what the client is most
interested in is one that you
understand the problem that
they're facing, that when they
read the beginning of that book,
they Oh, ah, she gets me.
Right, right, right. So let's
talk about themes and sort of
ideas for attorneys. Of course,
there are many attorneys in
many, many different fields. And
one of the things that a lot of
my clients will say to me when
we're talking about, they're
asking my advice on a book.
What will What do I write about,
like, what is my What do I
what's, you know, in my field,
what do I write about, and to,
to discuss how somebody might
share a point of view in a
practice area, one thing that
came to my mind is like, if you,
you're a family law attorney,
and you have a philosophy or a
belief that family law matters
don't belong in the courtroom.
And so you practice
Collaborative Law. And
Collaborative Law is, you know,
for those of you don't know,
collaborative family law, you're
basically agreeing, all parties
are agreeing not to take this
thing to trial. If they if the
parties ultimately decide to
take it to trial, they have to
hire all new lawyers, that
instead, there's a team of
people that are going to jointly
help this couple separate in a
way that doesn't involve going
through court. So a lot of
people choose to do that,
because they have children that
they are afraid will be
negatively impacted by taking
somebody to court. So if you
have a strong philosophy around
why we need to keep family law
cases out of the courtroom,
that's, that can be a great sort
of topic, if you're a
collaborative family lawyer. On
the flip side, if you're a
family lawyer that believes that
you should,
I often was will see women,
particularly when I was
practicing family law,
walk away from relationships and
walk away from assets, and
financial, you know,
you know, things evaluate
financial value, because they
just wanted to get out of their
relationship. And it really
negatively impacted their
future, because they just walked
away from years of savings or
from the house, anything they
had built as a couple of add
value, because they just wanted
to get away. And so if you're
that attorney, you might, you
might have a philosophy that
you cannot afford to walk away
from that at this stage in your
life. And so we need to fight
for that, right. So you find
your everybody has beliefs
around it, especially if you've
been practicing for some time.
And you've seen a lot of cases,
you have strong beliefs. And I
know because I have a lot of
conversations with with
attorneys. So I know you guys
have strong beliefs. And so we
did that is looking at sort of
that philosophy. And I know a
lot of people will look for book
ideas in sort of explaining the
basics to clients, right. So if
you're estate planning lawyer,
you realize that a lot of people
don't really understand what a
wheel is, and how it's different
from a trust. And they think
only rich people need them. And
so you may write a book, even
though there are 1000s of books
out there that talk about estate
planning, you may write a book
that is still goes over the
basics of estate planning,
because even though there are
1000s of books out there like
that, there are going to be a
lot of people come into your
office and I know you know,
because every week you meet with
them, who they're not reading,
you know, they have read that
book, but you can give them your
book, right? And they're gonna
so appreciate
that you took the time to
explain that to them without
sitting explaining it to them
and charging by the hour to
explain it right. And so that
alone is going to get them to
hire you to handle their stuff
because you did the favor of
educating them. So there are all
kinds of different things how
what kind of processes do you go
through when you're helping your
clients sort of come up with
their topics because I imagine
that you get a lot of those
questions like Well, Steve, what
do I write about?
Yeah, we well, we we go through
a process where we
first want to understand who the
ideal client
So who, who's the person they're
trying to attract? That is going
to read the book? And then what
are the challenges that they're
facing that would cause them to
seek out that particular
attorney. And, and really
understanding what those
problems are, what the
consequences of those problems
are, is the starting line for
figuring out what should go in
the book, because this isn't so
much about beating your chest
and saying how great you are as
an attorney. It's about
identifying where your future
client is really struggling. You
know, if you think about their
journey,
you and I know from marketing,
the idea of the buyers journey
in the profession. So my
background is engineering before
I started helping other
professionals with marketing, I
built a multimillion dollar
engineering consulting firm. And
we don't talk about in the
professions, we don't talk about
the buyers journey. Right,
right. You know, because their
clients, they're not buyers,
well, they are buyers, and the
buyers journey has stages. And
it begins with someone who is
unaware that they have a
problem, you know, and then the
next stage is that maybe they're
aware that they have a problem,
but they're not aware of any
solutions. And then they become
aware of solutions to their
problem. But they don't know
about your specific solution.
And so then they become aware of
your specific solution in the
final stages that they're called
Brand aware, they're aware that
that, that you offer the
solution that you're the right
one for them, basically, they're
ready to write the check. So
every buyer goes through these
stages. And if you think about
where they are before they walk
in your door, and you can
empathize with them, kind of and
by that I just mean put yourself
in their shoes, what are the
questions that they have? What
are the things that they're
worried about?
Particularly for attorneys,
you're dealing with people who
are almost always at a point in
their life, where they have a
problem.
I mean, unless I wouldn't be
calling you, they wouldn't be
calling you to make an
appointment. Nobody makes sense.
With an attorney for fun. Like,
even though we're fun people,
nobody does.
Your fun people and the so I my
business attorney is the only
one I ever call, usually, when
something really good is
happening anyway. In fact, we
did it in January, I have a new
opportunity, I need some
agreements, right? And that's
fine. But most everything else
is like, Oh, I have a major
problem. And I'm now going to
interact with the law. And I'd
better have help. And if you can
kind of get into that mode and
empathize with them. And then
take them through that journey
of educating them about their
problem, walking them through
what the solution is, and then
painting a picture of, okay,
once once we've solved this,
here's what life will look like.
On the other side, there is
hope. You know, and this is what
we're, you know, we try to take
our clients towards the, you
know, the the ultimate end game.
And when you can lay that out
and describe it, even in general
terms, it gives them such great
confidence that you understand
them. And then you have a plan.
And that there, there is hope
for an outcome here. And I know
you can't guarantee the outcome,
there are too many variables for
that. But if you can just paint
the picture of this is what we
want to work towards. And let
them know that it's going to be
complicated. Let them know that
it's not an easy process maybe
to go through depending on the
type of law that you're
practicing. But giving them all
of that up front now creates for
you a very educated client, who
now isn't going to be looking at
you like, oh, my gosh, what are
they doing? Why are we sitting
here for three months? And I
haven't heard anything, you
know, why is it this moving?
Well, that's sort of the way the
law works sometimes. And you can
do a lot of that educating right
off the bat fact, because you
graciously referred one of your
clients, one of your coaching
clients who asked and we spoke
yesterday, and that was one of
the things that she said,
Really, she was looking forward
to because she repeats herself a
lot, you know, with when new
clients come in, she really has
to educate them on the process,
that they're about to go through
both between what she's going to
do with them and the court
process and all of that. And she
said, you know, if I if I just
can get this book done, then I
can just hand that to them. And
you know, once they've scheduled
the meeting, say here, this will
take you an hour to read. Please
read it before our meeting. It
will make the whole experience
so much better for you. Because
you'll know what we're talking
about. You know, people need
time to absorb, you know, people
need time to absorb things and
so they may be
Listening to you in a meeting
and they can't forget half of
what you said. And if you give
them that as a homework kind of
thing, that's a great thing too.
But it, the beautiful thing
about Book Two is shareability.
They can also share that with
people I know I've gone through
some things in my life. And I've
had friends who've gone through
similar things, who've shared
books with me, and said, Here,
you need to read this book, this
will help you. And those kinds
of things, I think, are very,
very powerful as well. Because
you might not be able to tell a
friend, let's say you're, you
have a friend who's you know,
combating some extra weight, you
may not be able to tell them,
you know, hey, this might help
you, you know, but if they ask
you questions about something,
you can say, here's a book that
I read, right? I just had a
conversation with my hairdresser
yesterday, she was we were
talking about getting older
getting our 50s. And some of the
things we go through. And I was
like, oh, you know, I have this
great book, I recommend you read
it. Right. And so it that is
what your clients to will do
once they've gone through an
experience. And people say, ask
about their attorneys and say,
well, here, like, here's our
book, we read it, you decide for
yourself. And that way they're
not, you know, responsible for
making a referral. They just
they just, they just gave you
the book, right?
We're talking let's talk about
that for Yeah, let's let's dig
into that a little bit. Because
I think that's an important.
That's a really important point.
And one of the reasons that I
wrote unstoppable referrals was
we had discovered that
all the old advice for referrals
in professional services
basically didn't work. I mean,
it works, but nobody wanted to
do it. The advice boils down to
two things, we'll ask your
clients for referrals every time
you interact with them, and make
sure you follow up both with the
client so that they follow
through and refer and with
anyone that they refer to you
until they basically buy or die.
And the problem with that is for
a lot of professionals that
makes you feel like a sleazy
used car salesperson.
And for your clients, you know,
it puts them in kind of an
awkward position, particularly
in professions where you're
dealing with sensitive issues
like law.
You know, we work with a lot of
folks in in financial services
as well. And people don't want
to talk about their money either
or their retirement.
And if you think that no one
will read a book about law. We
wrote a book or about a year ago
for one of our clients on life
insurance.
If I could think of the most
topic. Yeah, I mean, like the
most boring topic on planet
earth that you could possibly
concoct would be a book about
life insurance. Well, I talked
to our client a couple days ago,
and they've just recently
promoted it again. And they've
done this, I don't know, a dozen
times over the last year,
probably, they send out an email
to the people that have, you
know, asked for information from
them, saying, Hey, we have this
new book called Life Insurance,
would you like a copy? And I
think he said, they got about 50
people to respond and say, Yeah,
I want a copy. So they mail them
the book, and then they invite
them to attend a webinar, they
used to do in person stuff
before COVID, where people would
come to the office and meet with
them in kind of a seminar
setting and learn, you know, and
so they had 37, people show up
to a webinar, who had requested
the book, and then 37 of those
people, or excuse me, out of the
37, I think 15
came in and made an appointment
and bought life insurance from a
life insurance book. So when we
start talking about the business
development, parts of this the
benefits of of having a book, it
makes every kind of business
development that you do better.
So if you're running ads, then
in addition to running your
straight Google ads, or your
Facebook ads, you can run an ad
for the book, because anybody
that requests a book about your
area of law is likely dealing
with a problem. So it's just one
more way you can do it. And
guess what you're going to show
up very differently than every
other lawyer who is on that page
with an ad. Exactly, exactly.
It's so powerful.
You were talking about
people showing up up for this
life insurance client. One of
the things that I think also
makes it such a powerful
referral to tool is you can
write a book
that your you can share with
your referrals. And I know some
attorneys, like a lot of
attorneys that I am
that I've spoken with about it,
you know, they have their they
have their ideal client, right.
They have the person who comes
in maybe consumer or business,
they may be b2b, you know, but
also you can write a book for
attorneys who want to be
educated on your practice area
enough to be able to have a
intelligent conversation with
them.
In referred to you, right,
because sometimes you are you
may be in a practice or practice
area where you're, all of your
business comes from attorney
referrals from people in other
practice areas or some aspect of
your practice area. But they
handle one part you handle
another, and but they need that
sort of education so that they
can have an intelligent
conversation with a client. So
the client trust them around
that so they can refer to right.
So I think it's a great tool in
many, many respects. Because I
know some people are listening
to this thinking, Well, you're
not really a consumer, and like
my clients aren't irregular
consumers, like a family law
estate planning on some offshoot
of something.
And so my people referring me
business or other professionals,
so you can write like other
attorneys, or maybe financial
professionals. So I imagine the
life insurance person is passing
out those books, to financial
advisors and other people to get
them to share and their attorney
who does estate planning to get,
you know, sitting in their
attorney's office for estate
planning, it's a great thing
where your referral sources can
add value for their clients by
just having a book there. So
even if they don't hire you,
they've added value, and that
makes them feel good. Make sure
referral sources feel good,
right about what they're doing.
I'm sure you've done. It,
certainly.
Yes, certainly does that. And I
mean, it gives your referral
sources confidence, because
again, they're referring to the
person who wrote the book, in
that particular area. So once
again, one of our mutual clients
who's just starting the book
process with us now, that was,
her thought was, you know, she's
in a very specialized area,
she's got an appellate practice,
all of her business comes from
other attorneys. And she wants
to create a book that sort of
educates them on when a case is
sort of ripe, to move to her,
you know, and what do they need
to know about it? What are the
issues? What are the things that
they need to think about? And,
and so there are lots of ways
that you can use it. And going
back to what we talked about
earlier, and how to figure out
what goes in the book.
That's where we start with
every, every professional that
we work with is sort of
unpacking? Where are your
clients coming from? Who is the
one that's influencing them
coming to you? Is it the
consumer? Is it another
attorney? Is it an allied
professional? You know, if
you're a business attorney and
doing a lot of business contract
law, do you need to have a
referral network that's full of
CPAs? You know, what, what does
that look like? And how can you
arm them with something that
makes them look good, because if
they if they can go, you know,
I've got the best attorney. It's
not like any other attorney.
She's the woman that really
wrote the book in this
particular area, you've got to
talk to her.
I mean, that's the best referral
ever. Now, you're not just any
other attorney that they haven't
ever relationship with. They're
referring you because your
authority, you're the authority
in that area. And it's just
very, very powerful. Right,
right. Absolutely. So we only
have a few minutes left. So I
want to make sure that we get
into and discuss
the program that you have, you
have a couple of different
programs. But there's one that's
kind of new that you put
together that you have, you've
had several people go through
it. But why say new within the
past year, and you put together
a little special deal for my
audience and my community, and I
wanted to be able to share that
with them. So they could have
some help, because they know I'm
a professional writer with a
degree in journalism. I have had
bylined articles. I've had
credit for newspapers and
magazines I've written I've been
an editor for associate for an
affinity magazine, you know,
manage all kinds of things for
the year round words and writing
everything. But when it came to
writing my book, The thing that
I think that was a huge help for
you, because like you my first
is not my first book. I've got
other books that live in my
Dropbox.
But the thing that really helped
me to get this book from idea to
finish and ultimately published,
was it you have come up with a
structure that makes writing it
go much more smoothly and
quickly. So in this new program,
you actually help people use
your structure and guide them
through that process so they can
get that book written within
what 30 days voters say. Yeah,
so the writing can be done in as
little as 30 days. And so again,
we're not talking about writing
your magnum opus, these are
short consumable bugs. And we've
given
or the process around writing 30
minutes a day, five days a week
for about 30 days. And, and that
will that will get you a book
that is long enough to have an
impact and long enough to get
your message across. And if you
want to do a little bit more,
certainly you can. But certainly
you can have it done in 30 days.
And if you want a little bit
longer, maybe it takes another
week or two. But if you think
about what most people go
through and trying to write a
book when they try and do it by
themselves,
they might spend years. And the
reason that they spend years is
that that pesky blinking cursor
is it's costing you It's
haunting you, it'll get you
it'll take you out, I just want
to throw this in. Because I
think this is important, as
somebody like I said, so when
you have been a professional
writer, your whole career, I've
learned how to write in
journalism style, when I learned
how to write the journalism
stuff. And I started law school.
It didn't work, nobody told me
that there was a certain
methodology for illegal writing
that was different from
journalism methodology, which is
different from sales, copy cop,
actual copywriting, which is
different from writing blogs. So
now I've learned all these
different styles. Writing a book
is a different thing too,
because my temptation and the
reason I struggled and has so
many pieces and parts of books
that over a couple of years, is
because I wanted to sit down
from the beginning. And you
know,
in the beginning
to data created whatever, and I
wanted to just write sort of,
like straight through from
beginning to end. And that
really is not the best method
for writing. Like you really, if
you're writing a business book,
it there is a certain structure
to writing a business, but
there's a methodology for
writing this book. That is not
that right, that is not the same
as writing an article for a
newspaper, or writing an
academic article for a law
review or writing a brief for
the court. Those are all
different writing styles. And so
that to me, I think was the part
that was so illuminating. Was
this it and also gave me a lot
of sense of relief, is because
we went to we sat together and
you're like, No, no, here's like
the structure, let's get all
this laid out. And then, and
then there's a lot of making
sure that you're asking and
answering the right questions in
there, not just putting
everything that you know. And so
I wanted to just point out that,
that's one of the great things
that I got out of working with
you, and writing books. And then
ultimately the the piece that
was helpful to was sort of the
publishing part of it. Right? So
in this program, I would, we're
going to share the link in the
show notes for people who are
interested in learning out
learning more details and
scheduling conversation with
you. But kind of give us just a
quick sort of
explanation beyond the 30 days
of writing sort of like what
else is, is in that kind of
program? Sure, yeah. So we
actually work together for a
total of about 90 days. And that
gives you enough time to write
the book, get feedback from us,
all the way through. So it's a
very interactive process, you
know, we'll we're going to help
you structure the outline of the
book and really think about what
should go in it and help you
build out a great outline. And,
and use a persuasive structure
that we know is going to do a
good job of taking a client on
that transformative journey from
the problem they have through
your solution to where they want
to be.
And then as you're writing, you
know, we've we've got, we call
it the the the Never Alone
support system, like you're
never stuck, you're never by
yourself.
And we've got a system where you
can submit a chapter. So hey,
I've written a chapter or a part
of a chapter, I'd love to get
some feedback. And you can do
that every day. You can do it
multiple times during the day if
you want.
And we'll give you feedback. And
you know, we do this all the
time. So we're able to look at
it. And, you know, let you know,
okay, well, because we're not
experts in your area of law. We
read it and as a kind of a
neutral third party. Yes, it's
clear to us or no, it's really
confusing. Let's work on
clarifying. Here's what we think
would improve it. Here's the
part that didn't land. Having
that kind of feedback will both
speed you up.
It will give you confidence. And
it'll result in a better book at
the end of the day. And then
once you get the writing done,
then our team will come in and
design a bookstore quality cover
for you. So we have a full
graphic design team that will do
that. You have a completely
custom cover. high enough
quality that you would you might
see it on the shelves and you
know, Barnes and Noble or some
place like that. And, and we'll
help you lay out the interior of
the book. And those are places
where most people get a little
bit stuck, we'll walk you
through the publishing process,
and you can get it published.
And and you don't have it
available for sale on Amazon, if
you want to go that route, or
have it available on your
website. So we'll, we'll walk
you through those steps. And
most importantly, we're going to
help you create two plans for
promoting the Book One is a
launch plan, because we want you
to get really quick results. And
the other is your ongoing
marketing plan, and how you're
going to integrate the book into
the other business development
that you're doing. And so if you
are doing things like
advertising and those sorts of
things, we'll show you how to
use the book to enhance those.
And if you're really not doing
much right now, sometimes, you
know, we talked to professionals
who they're at a point where
they know they really need to be
doing some business development.
Well, in those cases, we'll show
you how to begin using the book
to really ramp up your
referrals. And for probably
about 80% of our clients, just
implementing the referral
strategy gets them to a point
where their practice and their
pipeline is full. And that's all
they ever need to do. And they
don't have to worry about things
like advertising. Wonderful,
wonderful. I love it. I love it.
As you know, I love it, because
I've I've written two books with
you and got a third one coming
down the pipeline. So I am
definitely a testimony for you
for that. Because for me, it is
even above and beyond the the
experience of people reading it
and referrals and all those
kinds of things. Just the idea
just helping me get my thoughts
and philosophies down in a way
that helps it makes it easier
for me to explain it when I now
go on a podcast. You know, I'm
really dialed in on and and
other people are very clear on
where I'm coming from and what
I'm doing. It's an incredible
credibility piece as well, just
having a book that you've
written because now I'm not just
a writer or a copywriter. I'm an
author. And that really is just
like being a lawyer. You know,
when you say you're a lawyer,
you get instant credibility. And
when you say you're an author,
you get instant credibility in a
different way. Right. So I can't
recommend it highly enough. We
do need to end, Steve, I know
you and I will probably have
many more conversations about
this topic. But I thank you so
much for being here today and
sharing we are going to share in
the show notes. How you guys can
connect with Stephen find out
more about this program. And
thanks so much for being here. I
really appreciate it. This has
been fun. Thanks for having me
and love the conversation. So
keep going with the podcast.
You're doing great stuff. Thank
you
