This was the first time I had put on my own event for my own tribe.

It was full of all the stress, emotions, and craziness that you would assume comes with doing that kind of event.

But it also had a lot of amazing moments.

In this post I’m going to share a few things:

• Why I hosted a conference
• My vision for the event
• What you can learn from my experience

Let’s get started.

Why host an event?

This is a tough one.

Sheer practicality says it’s a bad idea. You almost always lose money on your first event (and I did), it’s a ton of work, and it’s a high stress venture.

There are, however, many intangible benefits, such as:

The joy of physically bringing your tribe together in one place.

At one point during the conference, I asked everyone who had been following me since I tried to sell 10,000 books in a single year, to raise their hand.

Almost half the people there put a hand in the air.

And that project had happened three years ago.

I realized in that moment that my tribe members had been waiting for a chance to congregate.

And there is nothing quite as satisfying as looking out over a crowded room and knowing that you brought those people together.

I got emotional over this fact several times throughout the conference.

Real vs Digital

This was a jump forward for me, because almost everything I do for my work happens behind a computer screen.

That creates a distance between me and my audience that, over time, expresses itself in fear.

I had been feeling afraid that once people finally saw and heard me in real life, they wouldn't like what they found.

I do speak at other people’s conferences from time to time, or host a meetup somewhere. But I had never before taken the higher-level risk of asking people to travel just to experience something I was hosting.

Stepping into that place of risk was an important moment for me.

Like every writer, I’ve got my own fears that I have to constantly face, and this was one of them.

Brand Signaling

It says something, that I could create an event out of thin air and get people to show up.

It also says something, that I could get authors like Pamela Slim, Jeff Goins, Bryan Harris, and Joe Bunting to come and speak on a no-fee, volunteer basis.

This is why, in the logo of the event, it says “Tim Grahl’s Bestseller Summit.”

Similar to how publishing a book changes your status from “writer” to “author,” putting on a conference raises your overall brand to a whole new level.

—

It's true that I lost almost $2,000 in running this event. There were all kinds of reasons for this.

But I was happy to pay that price for the pleasure of spending a couple of days bringing my tribe together, and meeting you all in person.

My vision for the event

When I hired my very first employee eight years ago, I wanted to be a good employer.

To accomplish that, I just thought back to all of the bosses I'd hated over the years, and in every situation, did the opposite of what they would do.

That’s also where I started with my conference.

I thought through everything I didn’t like about conferences I'd attended, and I did the opposite.

Here’s the Do-Not-Do list I came up with:

1. Too many speakers.

Most conference schedules are slammed with speakers. I took a look at one conference that had over 140 speakers listed.

That’s too much, and too overwhelming.

I would rather have fewer speakers, spaced at reasonable intervals, so I can really take in what they're saying.

I've found that for most conferences, for every three speakers presenting, there's one good one, one who's just OK, and one who shouldn't have shown up.

I wanted the Bestseller Summit to have fewer speakers—all of them good, and zero bad.

2. Too little time with each speaker.

When a conference slams their schedule with too many speakers, you inevitably get very little time with each one.

It’s like skipping a rock across the water; you never really get to deep-dive into their expertise and outlook.

I wanted to give my attendees a chance to really go deep with speakers.

3. Contradictory advice.

I was at a conference once where I was waiting backstage to speak, and listening to the guy speaking right before me.

He was giving the exact opposite advice that I was about to give.

While there is room for differing opinions in life, the attendees were there to gain new information and guidance they didn’t already have.

If you give an audience contradictory advice from different speakers, it creates a situation where they can’t discern what they should be doing.

I wanted to make sure that everyone who came to the Bestseller Summit walked away with one clear path to their success.

4. No narrative arc.

Not only is advice often contradictory at conferences, it’s also too random.

You’ll deep dive into character development at one talk, then next have a panel discussion on cover design.

I wanted to create an experience that naturally walked people down a particular path, from start to finish.

5. Too many people.

While I love some aspects of being at conferences with hundreds or even thousands of people, it can quickly become overwhelming.

Plus, you never seem to get quality time with the people you really want to spend time with.

I kept registration for the Bestseller Summit to 75 people, so we would have time to spend with each other and with the speakers (more on this below).

—

However, just being aware of the negatives isn’t enough to come up with a great event.

A few months before the summit, I sat down with my wife Candace, who was coordinating the event, and we discussed my vision for those three days.

I kept throwing out all these ideas from other conferences I’d been to.

After a little while, she stopped me and said, “Tim, this is your event. You can’t make it anyone else’s event. You have to make it uniquely yours, or it’s not going to work.”

So I sat back, thought about how I like to learn, how I like to teach, and the experience I wanted for every person who'd be attending.

The first thing I came up with was the goal of the event.

The goal of the first Bestseller Summit was to fundamentally change the life of every single writer in the room.

I want each person who attended to look back at the Bestseller Summit as the point at which everything changed for them.

That’s a big goal.

How was I going to pull that off?

This is what I came up with …

1. Plan the content.

I broke the conference into four sessions — morning and afternoon, for two days. For each session, I set a clear topic we would be learning about.

The four topics were Permission, Content, Community, and Outreach.

I then chose a specific speaker to address each of those topics (more on that below).

And then I really went Control Freak.

I got on the phone with each speaker, and walked them through exactly what I wanted them to teach, how I wanted them to teach it, and how I wanted them to end their talk.

I even critiqued the content beforehand, and asked for changes to one of the speaker’s slides.

I was obsessed with making sure the content was cohesive and clear.

Thankfully, the speakers were gracious about my craziness, and excited about my vision for the conference.

2. Four speakers, no more.

Once I had my four session topics set, I invited the specific person I thought would be the perfect choice to share on that topic.

Here’s who I chose, and why:

Permission – Bryan Harris

Bryan Harris created the site VideoFruit and the online program Get 10,000 Subscribers.

His sole focus is helping people build their email lists. He works with both big name companies and individuals, and he does it incredibly well.

His advice on getting permission is step-by-step and clear. He’s the guy I go to when I get stuck on how to build my email list.

Content – Jeff Goins

Jeff is the author of four books, including the bestseller The Art of Work.

He is the most consistent writer I know. He not only writes new books often, turning them in on time, but he also regularly creates great content for his website GoinsWriter.com.

He wrote a brand new talk on content just for the Bestseller Summit, to share his process for developing and publishing great content.

Community – Pamela Slim

There was only one person I wanted to speak about community, and that was Pamela Slim. I would have moved the conference dates to fit in with her schedule.

I worked with Pam for a long time, and I was always amazed at how she built such a dedicated and steadfast community of fans.

She broke this down into step-by-step processes for the Bestseller Summit attendees.

Outreach – Joe Bunting

Joe is the creator of The Write Practice. He's a writer’s writer.

He is introverted, soft spoken, and would rather spend his time alone writing than doing anything else.

And yet, Joe has built an incredible network of influencers.

There are a lot of loud, boisterous people who love to talk about networking, but that kind of presenting style is overwhelming to me, and to most writers.

For a talk on outreach, I wanted to bring in someone who was a writer first, and not a natural networker, to share the process they use to get it done.

Joe did exactly that.

He broke down exactly what he does — the timing, questions, emails, and more — to continually connect with new readers. It was amazing.

3. Lots of time with each speaker.

As I said above, I wanted to go deep with these speakers.

If I didn’t have to worry about cramming 20 different experts into the schedule, then I could take my time with each one.

Here’s how I did it:

1. The speaker would give their talk for 45 minutes.
2. After their talk, the speaker and I would do a 30-minute Q&A with the audience.

This means that the attendees got at least an hour and fifteen minutes to learn from each speaker. And most people got their individual questions answered.

4. I spoke four times.

People were coming to the Bestseller Summit not only to learn from the invited speakers, but from me too.

This was another area where I had to get over my fear and own this fact.

So I spoke four times at the Bestseller Summit. I gave a presentation at each of the four sessions.

I wrote brand new presentations beforehand, for each session.

While this was definitely a stretch (a couple of my speaker friends asked me if I was crazy), it’s what I thought needed to be done to make the conference the best it could be.

5. Audience stories.

At each of the four sessions, I brought up one of the attendees to share their stories of success.

These were short, 15-minute vignettes, but I found they had a big impact, because they showed how “normal” everyday authors were putting the ideas presented at the Bestseller Summit into practice.

6. Keep it simple.

In everything I teach, I try to break down each concept to its simplest form.

I believe most good things come from avoiding complexity and focusing on a handful of awesome ideas, instead of trying to do everything at once.

Having only 75 attendees and four speakers meant I could keep things small, focused, and kick-ass, instead of trying to include every bestseller concept or method on Earth.

—

That was my vision for the first Bestseller Summit.

And it went great.

We had some technical difficulties and a few other snafus that happen when you’re putting on live events, but I can honestly say that my vision for the event came through and landed exactly as I had planned.

That was extremely satisfying, and the attendees have given tons of fantastic feedback so far.

What I learned from hosting my first conference

As with any new experience, there are things you know going in, things you can plan for, and things that come out of nowhere to sideswipe you.

Here are the lessons I learned along the way:

1. Ask. For. Help.

I tend to try to do everything myself. I like it that way.

In most cases, I don’t mind that things move more slowly that way. Flying solo gives me the control and freedom to do things the way I want them done.

But I couldn’t do that with this conference.

If it were left to me, my attendees and I would have been meeting in a park somewhere, sharing a bag of Dorritos.

Here’s who stepped up to help in a big way:

Candace Grahl

Candace coordinated the entire event. She helped find the venue, and made sure it had all the features we needed.

She planned all of the refreshments, and set the tone for the event. She kept the master checklist to make sure all of us were doing what we needed to do at the right time.

And she talked me off that ledge, whenever my pre-event anxiety spiked.

Plus, she’s gorgeous!

Ryan McRae

Ryan came in from Chicago to help us behind the scenes.

He fixed the projector when it wasn’t working. He helped me wrangle people up after break times. He carried boxes in from the car.

He was the grunt worker who did all of the unglamorous work, to make sure the attendees had a smooth, fun experience.

Plus, it was just nice to know someone else was freaking out about things with me.

He’s not so bad-looking himself.

Jeff Goins

Jeff puts on his own annual conference, and shared all kinds of knowledge with me.

He also let me rip-off his badge and workbook design graphics.

The speakers

I didn’t have the budget to pay the speakers' fees, so they graciously donated their time. I am so thankful for each one of them.

The volunteers – Eric Slade and Kallie Ross

They welcomed attendees, helped Candace set up, unpacked boxes, and generally made sure everything went smoothly.

They were amazing!

—

You can’t do something on the scale of a professional conference without help from other people.

2. Relax and have fun.

The whole first day I was stressed and on edge. This means I didn’t enjoy the entire first day of the event.

That was kind of sad.

So on the morning of the second day, I was standing in my kitchen making coffee and decided I would have fun that day. And lo and behold, I had a great day.

Work hard, plan well, but ultimately, stop and enjoy this thing you’ve created.

3. Do it your way.

If I had tried to create an event that was like someone else’s, it would have failed.

Candace’s advice to make it mine was exactly what I needed to hear.

You have a vision. You have a calling. Infuse everything you do, unapologetically, with you.

4. Do the thing that scares you.

I’ve been scared of doing a live event for a long time. Now that I’ve done it, I wonder what I was so scared about.

Isn’t that how it usually works?

5. Spend money on the things that matter.

I saved $800 by printing the workbooks in black and white instead of color.

Nobody cared.

I spent $1,700 having the event photographed.

This was a last-minute expense I added, and I’m so glad I did. I would have been really sad if I hadn't documented my first event.

I spent $1,050 on a meet-and-greet the night before the event began.

This made it easy for people to get to know each other before we crammed them all into one room to learn for two days.

Sure, it was just people standing around talking and drinking, but it started the event off with a strong sense of community. Well worth it.

Suck it up and spend money on the important parts.

6. Accept the mess. Things usually work out.

We planned well. Worked hard. Got everything done ahead of time.

And things still went wrong.

Back at my last job before starting my own company, I would run the tech for the big conferences they put on.

One time, I was literally putting out a fire behind the scenes. One of the printers caught fire behind the registration booth, while people were trying to check-in.

I quickly put out the fire, found another printer, and we kept going.

Nobody knew, and they had a great event.

During my own event, the projector didn’t work during the first speaker talk.

The coffee shop next door was loud and distracting. And I forgot to make a few announcements that would have made things clearer for the attendees.

Stuff happens. The attendees still had a great event, and that’s what matters.

If your vision and focus are clear, then things really have to go off the rails for something to be completely ruined.

—

The rules

I opened and closed the conference with four rules for our time together:

1. No shame. You’re not allowed to shame yourself or each other.
2. We’re all in this together. This wasn’t an event for individuals. It was a way for us to come together as a supportive community.
3. We have to help each other. The moment one person sits back, steps out, criticizes, or becomes apathetic, it hurts everyone.
4. Success is taking the next step. We are all at different stages, and it’s easy to look at those ahead of us and feel shamed or “behind.” The problem is, there is always someone you can find who seems to be better or worse off than you. Success isn’t a destination. It’s taking the next step.

These were the rules for the Bestseller Summit. These are the rules I want for you, and all the tribes you’re in.

I put together the Bestseller Summit so that authors could come and learn how to build their platform, connect with readers, and sell more books.

But I also did it so that, for at least a couple of days, we could all feel normal.

We have these dreams and goals that seem so foreign to most of the people in our lives. It’s important to sometimes spend time with a few other people who are in the fight with us.

Thanks to everyone who made Bestseller Summit 2016 a reality, and to every attendee who took a chance on showing up for my very first event!

Lastly, all of the photos above were taken by the amazing Sionnie LaFollette. If you'd like to see all of the pictures from TGBSS 2016, we have them up here.

Below are the resources mentioned in the webinar.

Josh Kaufman's Site

Personal MBA
Personal MBA – Reader Survey
Personal MBA – 99 Best Business Books

Email Marketing

Aweber
MailChimp (free up to 2000 subscribers)

Web Forms

Wufoo

Analytics

Google Analytics (free)
Gauges

Other Resources

TextExpander
TwitHawk
Copyblogger
Copyblogger – Magnetic Headlines

Version 1.0 – March 28, 2016

Todd Sattersten and I recently backed a Kickstarter project for another journal… even though we both knew it wasn't going to work. No matter how many different journals we've tried, nothing seems to be the perfect fit. It's like Goldilocks with 83 different beds to try, and none of them feel right.

What's wrong with current journals?

Whether it's your favorite Moleskine, a spiral bound, college-ruled notebook, or the latest hipster journal on Kickstarter, there are many fundamental problems with the way journals currently exist.

Here's my list of grievances:

1. Can't Expand or Contract

What if your project goes so long that you need more room in your journal? It's impossible to add more pages to your current project. It's the same for contraction. If you just want to do something small, you end up committing to an entire journal. I need something that will grow and shrink with my projects.

2. Poor Organization

Recently, I was making notes on my latest novel. I was one and a half pages in when I had to stop and record a podcast episode. So I flipped to the next page of my journal, and took notes during the recording (sidenote: This makes it way easier during the editing phase.). Then I had a phone call with a client, took notes on that, then went back to taking notes on my novel.

A few days later, I went searching for my notes on the novel and it was a such a pain to have them spread out over all of my other notes.

If you've ever tried to use a journal to keep notes on several different projects, you've run into this as well. I've tried page numbering, writing “continued” at the tops of pages, different colored highlighters and pens, and it all comes down to the same fundamental issue… it's impossible to keep multiple things organized in a single journal, which means you end up using…

3. Multiple Journals

I knew I had a problem when I was carrying three different journals and was considering picking up a fourth.

To really keep track of multiple projects, you end up carrying multiple journals. It's hard to keep track of them all. You forget which one is for which project. And, of course, if you're anything like me, you end up leaving at least one of them somewhere on a constant basis.

(A couple months ago I actually left one on top of my car and drove off. Thankfully, someone found it and gave it back to me, but it had been run over by a good dozen cars at that point.)

But even carrying multiple journals doesn't fix the problem of being…

4. Locked into 1 format

If you buy a moleskine, you have to pick ruled, blank, grid, etc. The same goes for any other journal. You're locked into whatever modality you bought on day one. So if halfway through a project, you decide to start sketchnoting, you're doing it on lined paper which is less than ideal. If you decide to write out a bunch of notes on your blank paper, and you're anything like me, they're running down the right side of the page.

So this begs the question…

What would make the perfect journal?

Here's what I've come up with so far:

1. Modular and Expandable

I would be able to add to and take away from projects at any time. If I start a new project or a new batch of notes, it's not buried in the middle of notes on other things. I want to be able to move stuff around, start a new project, throw one away, etc.

2. Pick the Format that Suits the Project

I can easily use lined, graph, or blank paper based on the needs of that particular project or section. I could also mix and match paper inside of a current project.

3. Small Enought to Fit in Your Bag

It can't be an 8.5×11 notebook. That's too big and bulky to fit in most bags. But I also don't want a tiny three inch version either. The standard journal size seems to be around 8 inches high by 5 inches wide. That's a good size for me.

4. 3rd Party Addons

This is where it would get really cool.

Let's say another journal catches my eye. Maybe it's a journal on creating habits or better calendar system. I want to be able to buy the PDF, print it off, and add it to my current journal.

Trying out a new journal system no longer requires buying and carrying around another new journal.

The Prototype

A month ago I created the very first prototype of my new Perfect Journal. I tried to create something that solves all of the problems above while hitting all of my ways to fix them.

I've been using it on a daily basis to manage everything in my life and it's been working great. Here's a look:

Some things I'm still working on:

1. I don't love my cover right now. I'll be trying a hard back version soon to see how that works.
2. Sometimes it's a little wonky taking notes directly on the paper. Currently not a big deal as I can just pop open the binder and remove the paper, but I'd like to figure out a fix for this.

Two Things for You

1. I Need Your Feedback

Leave your thoughts, questions, and suggestions below. I can't figure all of this out on my own, and would love your feedback on making it better. What am I missing? What could I add?

Let me know in the comments below.

2. Try It Out Yourself

I put together an Amazon list of everything you need to build your own Perfect Journal. I included the laser printer I use that prints on 5.5 x 8.5 paper. Obviously, you can use your own printer for this.

Click below to check on the Amazon list and buy what you need to build your own Perfect Journal.

Build your own Perfect Journal

Up until now, I’ve not been able to share everything I know about those launches, because those methods were one of the main ways my consulting firm made money. So I had to keep things under wraps.

However, I recently sold my consulting firm so that I could focus more on writing, and am excited to finally be able to share all of the gory details of the different launches I’ve worked on.

Here are a few particulars:

• The very first book launch I ever worked on debuted at #9 on the New York Times bestseller list—which only whet my appetite . . .
• I ran the entire campaign for a book that debuted at #1 on the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post bestseller lists.
• Three months later, I ran the entire campaign for a book that debuted at #2 on the New York Times bestseller list.
• I helped an indie author do a multi-staged launch that ended up selling more than 80,000 copies the first year his book was out.
• I had five clients on the New York Times bestseller list at the same time.
• I’ve launched many small, niched books (including my own) that have raced to the top of the Amazon bestseller lists.

And here’s the thing: last year, I was charging $12,000 a book, just to consult (make a few phone calls) on launch campaigns (my last one hit #2 on the New York Times bestseller list).

Which is great if you’re the consultant, but it sucks if you’re an author trying to get your books out into the world for the first time.

And since I’ve spent the last few years sharing everything I’ve learned building platforms for big-time authors, I figured it was time to spill the beans on what I know about launching books.

So this week I’m launching something new (and free).

The Book Launch Crash Course: The Secrets Behind Today’s Biggest Book Launches

Click Here to let me know you're in

I’m going to share the stories and methods behind my most successful book launches — both the #1 New York Times launches, and the smaller indie successes — and explain how you can easily apply the same principles to your own book launch.

FAQ:

Q: What am I going to learn?

A: The exact framework I use to launch books — both big and small — successfully, plus how it can apply to your situation, even if you’re a very low-budget operation.

Q: Is this the same old tired “How to hit #1 in your Amazon category!” that I see everywhere?

A: Nope. This isn’t a shady tactic to game the system so you can get an accolade that ends up meaning nothing in the long run. This is a plan that has been used over and over to successfully sell a lot of books. It works — even for authors who are just getting started.

Q: Who have you worked for? (Or, Why should I listen to you?)

A: Here are a few of the clients I’ve created book launches for: Hugh Howey (Wool), Daniel Pink (Drive, A Whole New Mind), Michael Bunker (WICK, Pennsylvania), Charles Duhigg (The Power of Habit), Dan Ariely (Predictably Irrational), Chip and Dan Heath (Decisive, Switch), Michael Moss (Salt Sugar Fat), Sally Hogshead (How the World Sees You, Fascinate), Jeff Goins (The Art of Work), and Ramit Sethi (I Will Teach You To Be Rich).

I’ve also launched my own book (Your First 1000 Copies), gotten exclusive behind-the-scenes looks at other major launches, and worked with more than 100 different authors, helping them successfully build their author platform and launch their books.

Q: How is this crash course going to work?

A: Click Here to let me know you want to be a part of it, and over the next few weeks I’ll email you a new lesson every few days.

I’ve been planning this crash course for six months, and am so excited to finally share it with you! This course could make all the difference for you, so don’t miss out!

Tim

P.S. I’m going to be honest: even with planning for six months, I’m only about 75% done with the content of the course. The good news is, that means you get to make sure that I cover what you want to know.

Once you click here to get in on the free course, I’ve got a one-question survey for you, so you can let me know the exact topic you want me to cover.

Before I get into today’s post, I want to say how thankful I am to have you here reading and sharing along with me on this journey. It’s been a great year for me and for my company and it wouldn’t have happened without your support.

My hope for you is that 2014 will be your best year ever.

To get started towards that end, here’s today’s article…

There are two things that thousands of people are going to do this week that are a complete waste of time:

• Make predictions
• Set goals

Why are predictions a waste of time?

First of all, they’re notoriously wrong. There is a lot of evidence to back this up. I’ll point to just two sources:

• This Freakonomics Radio episode that shares many scientific, empirically argued studies that show we are often worse than chance at predicting future events.
• This anecdotal blog post by my client and friend, Hugh Howey.

However, the problem with spending time on predictions isn’t the few minutes we waste making them. The real problem is found in the long-term distraction it causes for us.

If you read a few “What’s coming in 2014” articles about the publishing industry and then start making your plans based on those predictions, you are now heading in the wrong direction.

Even the smartest people in the industry will get most things wrong. The future is unpredictable and anytime we fool ourselves into thinking differently, we’re going to fail.

Look back, not forward

The last 1st generation product I purchased was the Macbook back in 2006. I bought one as soon as it was released.

It was a disaster.

First, the fans ran constantly. In my tiny office it sounded like I constantly had an airplane getting ready to head down the runway. Second, the hard drive failed. Twice. There were plenty of other little problems, but I learned my lesson.

I let other people live at the bleeding edge. They can pay full price, deal with the defects and help the company fix problems for future users like myself.

The same goes for predictions.

People are mostly wasting their time, money and effort when they live at the bleeding edge trying to guess what’s next and take action.

I want to watch what is happening around me. What are authors doing that is working? What are they doing that isn't?

I don’t look forward. I look back.

What did authors do in 2013 that worked? What are new tactics authors are building on tried-and-true strategies? How can I deconstruct someone else’s success to make it my own? What successful authors can I email and ask advice?

This isn’t looking forward and making useless predictions. This is looking back at what is working and applying the principles to my own books. What is currently working for other people, will probably work for me.

In the very least, if we are using our experimental mindset, then looking at other people’s success is a great place to start.

Why are goals a waste of time?

I recently read Scott Adam’s new book How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big (here’s a great summary of the book). My favorite quote from the book?

“Goals are for losers. Systems are for winners.”

His explanation:

“For our purposes, let’s agree that goals are a reach-it-and-be-done situation, whereas a system is something you do on a regular basis with a reasonable expectation that doing so will get you to a better place in your life. Systems have no deadlines, and on any given day you probably can’t tell if they’re moving you in the right direction. My proposition is that if you study people who succeed, you will see that most of them follow systems, not goals…”

Last year, I spent an entire day early in the year working through and setting my goals. One of them was to be in the top 10 during a competition in March at my local gym. What happened two days later? I hurt my back and couldn’t work out at 100% until April. I failed my goal before I even got started for the year!

What I realized is that the only thing I can control is my workout system. Now I go four times a week. Same days and times every week. What’s happening? I’m getting better, stronger and faster. At this rate, I’ll do pretty good come March.

No goals. Just a system that has a good chance of eventually getting me where I want to go.

I can do this forever

Every week I do at least two things to promote Your First 1000 Copies. Whether it’s be a guest on a podcast, setup a new webinar, speak at a conference or try out a new advertising technique, it doesn’t really matter. I figure out a couple of things that I think will help me sell books, and then I do them.

I can do this forever. I won’t get burnt out. I won’t hate myself if something doesn’t work. I can just check off my two things for the week and then move on.

I also read at least two non-fiction books a month.

Fiction is my real reading passion. I read it every night before bed. I can easily get lost in a fiction book. Non-fiction, however, is a bit more of a discipline. So I put a plan in place. I keep a non-fiction book by the bed that I read at least a couple of nights a week and I listen to a non-fiction audiobook in the car, walking the dog, buying groceries, etc.

While the odds of any one book changing my life are pretty low, I know that if I continually look for new sources of insights and knowledge, I’ll get smarter and make better decisions over time.

The secret is, I know if I do these things enough for a long enough time, I will end up where I want to be.

What is your system for success? What can you do on a regular basis that will get you were you want to go?

Instead of asking “What are my goals for 2014?”, ask:

“What are things I can consistently do in 2014 that will help me end up where I want to be?”

Yes, I’m a hypocrite

All of this “goals are for losers” talk is pretty funny coming from the guy that has made his 10k Experiment a huge, public goal.

I fall into the same traps as the rest of us.

But the truth is, it’s not as if I will sell 10,000 copies and then say “Great! I’m done!” and stop. After I hit 10,000 copies, I want to sell 20,000, then 50,000, then 100,000 copies. I want it to be the book that every author reads for decades to come.

How can I possibly make this happen?

By doing two things every week to promote the book.

What will your 2014 be?

Instead of making predictions and setting goals, here’s what you should do:

1. Research and find out what other authors are doing to be successful. Read my book. Read Write, Publish, Repeat. Read 61 Ways to Sell More Nonfiction Kindle Books. Read Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur. Talk to some authors to find out what they are doing.
2. Think about where you who you want to be in the future. Sure, this smells a lot like goals, but it’s bigger than that. Do you want to be a fulltime writer? Do you want to release more books every year? Who do you want to be?
3. Figure out something you can do every day, week and month that will probably get you there. If you want to release more books, writing every day will probably help. If you want to sell more books, doing something twice a week will probably help. I say “probably” on purpose. You’ll get it wrong here and there and have to adjust your system, but make a plan that you can stick to and work the plan long enough to see if it’s sending you in the right direction.

Follow this path, and miss the pitfalls that come from wasting your time on predictions and goals.

Most of my time has been spent doing two things:

1. Setting up new platforms for authors and teaching them how to use it
2. Launching new books

Both of these are obviously important.  If an author doesn't have an online platform or know how to use it, then they're not going to sell books.  Also, it's important to know how to leverage that platform to sell as many books as possible when you have a new release.

The part I haven't done a lot of work with and that I'm facing right now, is this…

How do you sustain and grow sales over time?

When I first released Your First 1000 Copies: The Step-by-Step Guide to Marketing Your Book, my goal, for obvious reasons, was to sell at least 1000 copies.  Well, that took me less than two weeks.

Now, my goal has become selling 10,000 copies.

This is a big goal for a self-published, non-fiction book in a very narrow niche.  However, I feel it's an important goal.  For me to be credible in giving you and other authors advice, I need to know that I can do this stuff myself — for my own book.

Why 10,000 copies?

Most books aren't break out successes.  Most books aren't written by celebrities.  Most books don't get random, huge, Oprah-like endorsements that change the life of the author forever.

Most authors have to slug it out in the trenches to build their book sales and their following one person at a time.  And if I can figure out how to sell 10,000 copies of my book, then anyone can.

In addition, I recently spoke with someone who has worked in and around the publishing industry for well over 20 years and he told me the same thing I've heard before. Books that are able to sell 10,000 copies have a staying power that books with lower sales don't. There seems to be a special tipping point around that number that indicates the book will continue to sell year after year.

Which is something I would love to happen for Your First 1000 Copies.

Why do this?

I'm the book marketing guy.  That's what I do.  That's what authors pay me for.  And here I am putting out numbers that I could very easily not be able to hit and could hurt my reputation.

So why don't I just keep mouth shut, tell everyone the book is selling fine and keep doing what I'm doing?

Not long after my book came out I published the unvarnished look at my psychosis leading up to the launch of Your First 1000 Copies.  I felt like it was important to tell the truth and not let everyone think I have it all together.

This is the same thing.

It's fun to share when your book is selling a ton of copies.  It's much less fun to share when it's not.  In fact, I talk to authors all the time that feel a lot of shame and embarrassment around their sales figures.

So I want to run an experiment that could easily crash and burn, but will show the truth behind what it takes to sell books in today's marketplace.  I want to give the scary, behind-the-scenes look at what I'm doing and how it's working.  I also want you to learn from everything I'm doing so you can take the pieces that work and apply it to your own marketing.

But, most of all, I want you to know you're not alone in this.

Where am I at?

As of today I have sold 3247 copies of Your First 1000 Copies (I don't count copies I've given away in my sales numbers).  About the first 2000 of those were sold in the first two months the book was out.  The following three months have accounted for the other 1200.  My goal is to sell 10,000 copies in the first year it's out so I need to sell an additional 6780 copies before June 27, 2014.  That means I've got to sell about 850 copies a month (about 30 copies a day) moving forward which is significantly more than the 368 I sold in October.

What will we learn?

I'm working on how to pull this off.  I'm doing all kinds of fun and exciting stuff to market the book and build my community.  I'm learning from other authors and putting into practice things I've helped my clients do.  And I'm going to share the entire journey with you. The good, the bad and the ugly including:

• The technical stuff like how I published my audiobook
• The outreach stuff like how I'm growing my email list
• The platform stuff like content, emails, Amazon, etc
• Sales figure stuff like exactly how many books I've sold so far
• The emotional stuff like how hard it is when your book's ranking keeps dropping
• What's working
• What's not working

Where are we starting?

I'm going to release a new post every week.  I'm going to start by sharing about the first several months and then move into how I'm continuing to grow sales.

To make sure you get notified as soon as it's published, make sure you signup for the email list below.

I look forward to having you on this journey with me.

Today I want to share the behind-the-scenes on how I launched Your First 1000 Copies.

My premise in Your First 1000 Copies is two-fold:

1. Selling 1000 copies is an important threshold.  Most books sell about 250 copies – traditionally published books included – because this is about the number of people we are connected to.  Friends, family, colleagues, etc.  Once you break 1000 copies, you've reached outside of your direct network and done something bigger.  This also means your next thousand copies are easier to sell.
2. If you have direct connection to your readers, selling your first 1000 copies is pretty straight forward.

So how did it work for me?  These are the questions I've been asked since the launch:

How many email subscribers do you need to sell 1000 copies?

I started the book campaign with 1869 subscribers to my email list.  I launched the book only to the email list.  I did no other outreach or promotion.  While a couple people ended up doing blog posts about the book, this was not due to my outreach efforts.  It was a result of people buying the book.

About 400 sales came directly through the email list.  It's hard to know exact numbers, but that's my best guess based on my analytics.  The other sales came from two places: 1) readers promoting via social media, email and blogs and 2) getting into Amazon's system of recommended books.

Why didn't I do an outreach campaign (blog tour, podcast interviews, etc)?

This is two-fold.  The main reason is because I didn't want to.  I have long-term plans with this book and there's no reason I have to pack all promotion into one week.  I have a fulltime job and didn't want work for my clients to suffer while launching the book.

The other reason is to focus on the email list.  For all of my clients we do outreach and email list campaigns at the same time and it's always hard to tease out which sales came from where.  In my own campaign, I wanted to see the impact of the email list alone.

What super-secret tactic did I use for my own book?

I was asked this several times.  The truth is, book launches are pretty straight forward.  I sent out emails to my subscribers introducing them to the book and it's ideas and then I asked them to buy.  It's that simple.  Also, I don't hold back ideas and tactics when I launch for my clients… that'd be pretty wrong.

How many copies did you sell of print versus digital?

I priced the digital edition at $3.99 and the print edition at $9.99 (which Amazon marked down to $8.99).  Of the 1006 copies sold, 99 of them were in print.  This 1 out of 10 number has held pretty steady for the entire two weeks.  I believe the print version of the book would have sold more if the digital and print were priced the same at $9.99, but my overall sales would have been lower.  The $3.99 price point really encourages impulse buys.

What did I learn through my launch?

I had a client really press me about what “surprised” me with the launch and the truth is… nothing.  What I learned is that what I put in the book works.  The Connection System works.  If you build your Permission list and send great Content, book sales will naturally follow.

Do you have any questions?

Do you have a question about how I launched Your First 1000 Copies?  If so, leave them in the comments below and I'll do my best to answer all of them.

[Note: This was originally an email to the Out:think Insider's list and has been reposted here several months later]

I originally had no plans to make an audio edition of Your First 1000 Copies, but my good friend and fellow author Josh Kaufman insisted on it.  Last year he self-published the audio edition of his first book The Personal MBA and has been completely overwhelmed by the success.  And since I do whatever Josh tells me to, I decided to go for it.

Who, how and where to record?

The first decision I made was to record it myself.  I listen to a lot of non-fiction audiobooks and my favorites are always the ones that are read by the book's author.  While they aren't always as polished as a professional narrator, I appreciate hearing the author's voice.  A few of my favorites are Jon Ronson, Malcolm Gladwell and Stephen King.  I wanted listeners to hear my voice and how I talk about the subject.  Sure, I made mistakes and wasn't as eloquent as someone who does this for a living, but it was something I enjoy as a reader so wanted to do it for my readers.

The next decision was how and where to record.  I read several places how self-published authors were doing it by recording straight through their desktop computer with a microphone, but I know the quality of these final recordings are often lacking.  Plus, the idea of doing all of the editing myself seemed very overwhelming.  In the end I decided to reach out to a friend I have locally who works at local radio stations and has a professional recording studio in his basement.  It took two sessions that started after 9pm at night so his kids were asleep and the house was quiet, but I was extremely happy with the final result.  It's well edited and lacks the unpolished feel that would have come from doing it myself.  I'll admit here that I also got it done for less than $400 which is significantly less than what you'll spend with a typical studio.  It's nice to have friends with the right equipment.

The actual recording wasn't too bad.  I printed the entire book out in large font and practiced turning the pages silently before heading to the studio.  I also practiced my volume and tempo a few times into my own computer to make sure I wasn't going to fast or slow.  Again, while the final product isn't as polished as it would be by a professional narrator, I'm very happy with how it turned out.

Just like self-publishing your digital and print books, quality matters.  People that listen to audiobooks are used to a certain level of quality and I wanted to make sure my audiobook met those standards.  I'm happy with the decision to go with a recording studio whose job it was to make sure it was done right.

The ACX Platform

Audible.com is owned by Amazon.  ACX is Audible's audiobook self-publishing platform.  So in this way, just as CreateSpace is Amazon's print self-publishing platform and KDP is Amazon's digital self-publishing platform, ACX is Amazon's audiobook self-publishing platform.

The process also works very similar.  It's as simple as signing up, claiming your book, filling out the details and uploading the files.  I did press the wrong button early on in the process that put me on the path to hiring a narrator which became frustrating, but the ACX support helped me work it out and everything was smooth sailing from there.  If you've already navigated other self-publishing platforms, ACX will feel at home to you.

The Money

Here's where things get really interesting.  The royalty model is unbelievable.  You start at 50% but then start ratcheting up based on sales numbers.  You can get as high as 90% which is unheard of anywhere else and in any other format.  Sure, you have to sell over 20,000 units to hit 90%, but the fact that it's even an option is pretty amazing.

On top of the royalties, Audible pays a $25 “bounty” if your book is one of the first three books purchased when someone signs up for Audible.  Again, pretty unbelievable.

So if your audiobook costs $10, you immediately start making $5 per unit sold.  However, if you've broken into 20,000 units sold and your audiobook is one of the first ones purchased by a new member, you'll make $34 off of your $10 book.

Which leads me into one caveat you need to be aware of with the ACX platform.  You don't choose your pricing.  The price is automatically decided based on the length of the audiobook.  You can see the details on this page under “Common Questions”.

For my book, I really wanted it to cost at least $10.  I felt like any less would hurt my chances of current Audible subscribers using their credits to purchase my book.  The problem is, Your First 1000 Copies is a relatively short book.  In fact, the total run time of the book was only 2.5 hours.  So in order to make up the difference in time, I added bonus content to the audiobook that wasn't in the original book.  I pulled from case studies and reader questions that had come up since I published the book and put together content I thought would be helpful to readers.  With this additional content, it put me over that 3 hour mark and, sure enough, my book is priced at $10.46.

I'm traditionally published, should I retain audiobook rights?

My definite answer is “yes!”.  In talking to other authors, the audiobook rights are often sold for very cheap — a couple thousand dollars — or never sold at all.  In the example of Josh Kaufman above, his rights were never sold so he bought them back from his publisher.  In the first week after self-publishing his audiobook, he made back the money he spent buying back the rights.

In fact, if you are still shopping your proposal and haven't signed yet, I recommend holding back the audiobook rights (most publishers won't fight you on this) and self-publish it.  There's all kind of upsides to this, not least of which is all of the promotion for the print/digital sales will sell the audiobook edition as well.

Promotion and Sales

Apart from last week's email that you received, I have done zero promotion of the audiobook.  I have a few things I'm rolling out to try and create ongoing sales of the audiobook along with researching what has worked for other authors.  In the future, once I have a bigger data set, I'll share with you more details.
In my experience, most authors have very little understanding or interest in the audiobook edition of their book and I hope this helped give you some information and insight that you didn't have before.

I love running experiments with different marketing ideas to see what will happen.  Most of the time I get to run these experiments with my clients, but when it comes to giving books away for free, this is something I had to do myself.

Since I published Your First 1000 Copies through the KDP Kindle Select program there is built-in functionality that let's you run a campaign to give the Kindle digital version of your book away for free for up to 5 days in any 90 day period of time.  I ended up keeping it open for two and a half days.  So what happened as a result?

Did I promote the giveaway?
The first two days of the giveaway, I was teaching the online course How to Sell Your First 1000 Books live on creativeLIVE for free.  Thousands of people attended the course and I mentioned several times that the book was available.  As a result, it was shared across social media extensively and several people let me know they told all their author friends about it.
How many copies were downloaded?
3408 copies of the Kindle edition were downloaded in the 60 hour window.  At the time, I had sold a little over 2500 copies of my book so I ended up giving away almost 1000 copies more than I had sold.  I was really happy with the result.  Every author's greatest enemy is obscurity, so the fact that over 6000 people have possession of my book now is a huge win for me.  My goal was to give away at least as many copies as I had sold so I definitely hit that goal.

Another win is I made it as high as #101 ranked free Kindle book.  And I'll admit, I was pretty sad that it didn't break the top 100.  So close!

Did my sales go up or down as a result?
Overall my sales have shown about a 10% increase in the two weeks since the campaign.  As I assumed, and heard from other self-published authors, it never hurts sales to give your book away, and this has definitely been true for me.

Any other positive results?
There were two other positive results that came as a result of the campaign.  One expected and one unexpected.

First, as expected, newsletter subscription rates from book readers went up.  In Your First 1000 Copies I embed several links to my website for extra resources.  I am tracking those pages to see who is signing up for this email newsletter as a result of reading the book (you may be one of them!).  As expected, if you give away 3408 copies of your book, newsletter subscription rates from readers are going to go up and this has been the case for me.

Second, unexpectedly, it significantly improved the book recommendations around Your First 1000 Copies.  Before the campaign, my book was often paired with some of the spammier, “get rich on Kindle” books.  Now, it's become a recommended book against Guy Kawasaki's APE: Author, Publisher Entrepreneur and other popular titles.  I believe this will have a helpful, long-term effect on sales.

Any negative results?
None that I can tell.  Some people may argue that I missed out on sales.  In my mind, this is a very shortsighted view of the campaign.  Sure, I may have missed a handful of sales, but instead, I was exposed to a much larger audience than I would have been otherwise which has much better long-term benefits.

Overall, I was very happy with the results of the campaign.  More people have been exposed to my book than ever before, newsletter subscriptions have gone up and my listing on Amazon has improved.  All big wins in my mind.

Over and over I hear authors having success while experimenting with giving their book away, yet so many publishers and writers are afraid to do it.  I highly recommend you put this fantastic tool into your toolbox as something that can grow your overall platform.  This will lead to not only more sales of your current book, but future ones as well!

Would love your feedback and questions as I know this is a controversial topic.

Facebook is often an enigma to many authors when it comes to online marketing. I've talked before about social media and how it works for selling books, but I want to use this article to narrow in on Facebook and talk about how authors can take full advantage of it.

1. Use Facebook as the top of the funnel, not the bottom. Over and over the numbers show that Facebook is an awful place to directly sell your books. However, it can be a really great place to engage potential readers. Instead of trying to get them to spend money, invite them to visit your blog or join your email list.
2. Put Facebook into a bigger marketing system. Getting more fans or friends isn't the point, selling books is the point. Come up with a plan to move people from finding you on Facebook to visiting your platform and then buying a book.
3. Harness other people's fans and friends. It's much easier to get 10 people with 1000 fans/friends each to promote your book, blog post, etc than to build your own base of 10,000. Focus on building relationships with a small group of people that will gladly promote on your behalf.
4. Connect to other authors and influencers. If email or other forms of connecting fail, I've often been able to get people to respond to me on Facebook and then a followup email has a much better chance of success.

Marketing on Facebook is a tricky thing but follow these guidelines to get the most out of your efforts on this social media platform.

Image by bfishadow.