From Idea To Bestseller: Karen Strauss Reveals The Path To Profitable Publishing

Many aspiring authors have a big idea sleeping deep within their brains, but they have no idea how to turn it into a bestselling book. Karen Strauss helps these promising individuals to write, publish, distribute, and promote their books through her firm, Hybrid Global Publishing. She joins Juliet Clark to discuss how authors can achieve bestselling status by going beyond traditional publishing practices, learning the right financial planning strategies, and fully protecting their intellectual property. Karen also talks about her upcoming three-day event in May dedicated to guiding authors through the intricate processes of publishing, marketing, and funding.

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From Idea To Bestseller: Karen Strauss Reveals The Path To Profitable Publishing

Before we get started, I want to remind you to go over to PerfectReaderPlaybook.com, grab your free three-module course over there for the Perfect Reader Playbook, and really drill down on who you are writing your book for. Also, it is an intro to our layered process of marketing that will help you sell more books, products, and services.

Again, go over and grab that free course. It is at PerfectReaderPlaybook.com. Our guest is actually one of my competitors, but we do a lot of business together. It is Hybrid Global Publishing‘s Karen Strauss. Karen has held various positions in the publishing industry for over 35 years. She has worked at Random House, Macmillan, Crown, and Avon in sales, marketing, and publicity. She has worked with celebrities such as President Jimmy Carter, Jimmy Stewart, Martha Stewart, George F. Will, and Og Mandino.

In 2010, Karen founded Hybrid Global Publishing, a firm that works with entrepreneurs, speakers, and coaches to help them write, publish, distribute, and promote their books in order to generate unlimited leads, get on more speaking stages, and grow the business by attracting more clients. Karen has helped over a thousand business owners become successful published authors and has helped 700 authors reach the number one bestseller status.

You probably notice, if you know much about what I do, that we started our businesses about the same time, coming out of the publishing industry. That is what I love about her. We both had this vision where we saw there was a different way to do this than the publishing houses we were working at. Stay tuned for an interview with Karen and me.

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Karen, welcome to the show.

Thank you, Juliet. It is so great to be here.

I have to mention I am envious of your orchid in the corner because mine died. I just have fake ones in the house now.

That is the way to go. It is much easier.

Yes, it is. The only place I can keep mine alive is in the shower with all the steam. I used to put them around the bathtub so that they got lots of steam. I am jealous. You probably have lots of humidity in New York.

We do. It is bad for hair, but good for flora and fauna.

Finding New Ways Of Publishing And Going Beyond The Traditional

I love it when I go to Florida because everybody walks up and they will touch my hair and they will go, “You have the best beach waves.” It is like, “I do not really mean for that to be.” I was noticing when I read your bio that we started our own companies in the same year.

We did?

2010. I was looking at your back where you had been. I actually was at Price Stern Sloan, which I think is owned by Random House now, and HP Books. I moved on from there into advertising, but interesting. I thought it was interesting because, being on the inside of companies like that and with the industry changing, I would imagine that you saw a different way to do this. That is what happened with me. Could you talk a little bit about that?

You mean, back then, I saw a different way.

Back then, you saw a different way to do that.

I did. Publishing is as old as the hills. One of my clients, who is the owner of a major Chain in Texas, was a very big account for us. He said to me, “Karen, traditional publishers are the marketing geniuses of the 19th century.” They still are. That is not good. Everything was stagnant. We had to do things a certain way.

I was a big mouth, and I was creative, and I was not well-suited, let me put it that way, for a bureaucratic company. You know what is sad is that publishing is supposed to be creative. You are supposed to be arguing with each other, throwing out ideas, not judging them, and brainstorming. None of that really happened.

My boss at one of the companies I worked for said, “You are new here, and you worked for this ex-company, so we do not really want to hear from you for six months.” It was crazy back then. I knew that I would not be happy. I would see that there are different ways to do things. When I was coming up, it was just beginning to form. There were a couple of, you remember there were maybe a few, but they certainly were not prolific like they are where they are now.

Yes, I knew that I was destined to start my own company. Even probably when I was excited to get into publishing and then certainly to work for such prestigious companies as Random House, Crown, and Macmillan, I worked for the best, I thought. I thought to myself, “If this is the best, there must be other ways to serve people because we are just serving the people that we know can get on bestseller lists.” Not really, people who could use help in terms of creating this marketing plan and creating a way to get out there and get their message heard.

No, that was a lot. I think self-publishing really opened my eyes because with my first book, I used a self-publisher. I am not going to say who it was because they were really awful. That really opened my eyes because I thought at the time, “Why are these people taking part in my profits? I paid them to publish my book.”

That is where I started to see, and I was looking at what they were selling people as marketing, like these canned websites that you cannot modify, and these horrendous hosting fees. This site costs $300 a year, and you cannot modify it, bookmarks, or things like that. I started seeing these things. It was like, “This is not how we did things in traditional publishing.”

What was worse with that, Karen, and you probably saw it too, is that I noticed that the traditional publishers were really dissing the self-published authors. At the same time, they were opening self-publishing companies and subsidiaries and basically taking money. To me, it was like, “What are you people doing?” They were doing it in hopes that self-publishing would fail. They failed miserably in thinking that would happen at the time.

It was so disingenuous that they would do self-publishing and hybrid as well. They lumped us all in together, or vanity publishers, so on and so forth. What they did was even worse than just saying, “I am Simon & Schuster, or I am Hay House, or I am this, and we have a division for self-publishers.” They actually hid that fact, and they went to a company like iUniverse, and they had them do the backend. They named it something else.

You had to do some research to figure out, actually, that it was connected to Simon or to Hay House or whoever. Hay House would say, and they would hold out this carrot that said, “First of all, there was a firewall between Hay House and the self-publishing name.” In the next breath, they would say, “We are monitoring the books that come out of there. If you are selling books, we are watching you, and there is a possibility to jump.”

Yes, I think they misled a lot of people with that. I worked with a company a couple of years ago that actually used to tell their clients that if you publish with our self-publishing and you sell 50,000 copies, we will traditionally publish you. I would tell all of those authors who told me that, “If you are selling 50,000 books self-publishing, you do not need them.” I just thought it was a really wild thing. By the way, I think Hay House still does a little bit of that.

I just took on a client two months ago who does these big contests, and they say, “One or two of you are going to win a publishing package.” I told her in advance, she said, “I’ll find out this Friday. I will let you know.” I said, “I can guarantee you will not win it, but they will direct you over to their self-publishing.” She came back to me the following Monday, and she said, “I just had to show you this email. You were right.” She did not win. They got everybody to join this contest, and they promised a prize. For all of those people who did not win, it was a new self-publishing business.

Regeneration for new business, wow.

I thought, “How could I do that?” I cannot, but it is nice to have that big name and be able to do that.

Unfortunately, we couldn’t because we both have reputations. It may not be, “You will be published by Random House or Simon & Schuster or whomever.” If we said, “We are going to take you on as a scholarship, we are going to pay for everything. It is a $25 entry fee.” We would get hundreds of people. They want to be traditionally published, because they think they do not have the money, or they think it is somehow lesser than. It just makes me so mad that people who are not versed in publishing lingo and what marketing is, what does that really mean?

Editorial. What does that really mean? Get taken advantage of all the time. That is one of the reasons I started my company. I was seeing what was out there, particularly at the beginning, when hybrid publishing was really a pioneer zone. People would lay out a shingle, and they would just say, “We are going to charge $25,000, and you get a copy-edit polishing.” What does that mean? A copy-edit polishing. You get twenty bookmarks.

People still come to me to this day, and they will say, “How many free books do I get with that?” I am like, “None.” We do not really do that anymore. They had all these perks that people were like, “I get 25 free books.” That book probably cost me $2 a piece. Did you really get a perk? I may charge you more on the back end to order those books, but for me, I am getting them wholesale. There were a lot of gimmicks. It is a testament to both of us that I have seen over the years people come in, and they are like, “I am a publisher,” and a year later, they are out of business. We stood the test of time, probably because we came from that industry.

That is a big reason why many people decide to work with me, because my pedigree is in traditional publishing. That is how I set up Hybrid Global Publishing. The author’s journey is just like it would be if you were publishing with Random House, Macmillan, and Crown. I only have people that work with me, editorial people, typesetters, and proofreaders, who have worked at traditional book companies, so they know what it is like.

It is incredible to me that people do not even understand, not the new authors, they do not need to, but when a proofreader comes to me and says, “I would like to work for your company,” I will go, “Great. Do you proofread over the Word document or do you proofread over the PDF?” They go, “Just the Word document.” That is not proofreading.

Proofreading is to look at the design of it and make sure you do not miss words. Also, to pick up the straggling editorial and the grammar, but it is just a test. I would never hire a person like that. There are so many people out there who are just hanging up shingles. “While I was really good in high school, and everybody was saying I was good in grammar, and I have this cousin.”

I know they do that a lot. I know you develop books, and you are going to be part of our book development panel in June. We work a little bit differently. You have to bring us the edited manuscript, and our editor that we send people to actually stays with you all through that. What people do not understand is that through that formatting process, your eyes are so tired and your brain is replacing things in that formatted document that you think are there, and they are not. I love that you have a proofreader, and our editor stays with you through that because that is truly the point where I know everybody is super excited about their book, but every time I get to that point, I am sick of my book. I am in tremendous pain.

I get it.

From A Big Idea To Book Publishing

People do not get that at all. We do things a little bit differently. Talk about your process because you are truly a company that takes people from “I do not have a book, I just have an idea” all the way through publishing. Talk about that a little bit because that is one place where I feel I am weak. I have no business being a book developer.

That is not true. We do take you from soup to nuts. If you have an idea, that is why I do my two and three-day events to help people discover their big idea. We set you up with a developmental editor. Ghostwriters can be very expensive. They will add $40,000, $50,000, and $60,000 to a project. Most people do not need it. What they need is a developmental editor who is going to take you, interview you, get all your content together, and help you structure the book.

Still helps you with the arc and the flow. You are writing the book. That is the difference. A ghostwriter will write your book, interview you, and write the book. Here, you are writing your book in your own voice, which is what we want you to do because we want your authenticity. You only have your unique story to tell. I just wanted to say that people are scared of writing a book or finishing their book because they think they should be writerly. There should be some mystery to it.

No, we want you to speak in your own slang and your own flow and tell your story that only you can tell. That is what makes you unique. The developmental editor helps you with really making it stand out in your voice. We send it to copy editing for spelling and grammar. Everything is collaboration. We are a partnership publisher. You own the rights. You own 100% of your intellectual property. We started having our authors set up their own KDP accounts, mostly for the ebook.

We do the same.

You can change the data very fast if you are doing an Amazon bestseller campaign or review campaigns. 100% of those royalties are yours. We also use IngramSpark for distribution. We do not have sales reps who go out to bookstores. There are reasons for that. I like print on demand because Barnes & Noble, any library, any wholesaler, any independent bookseller will order books from Ingram. Ingram prints it and then sells it to the stores.

If you set it up correctly, the stores can return the book just like they can if they order directly from Random House. We can get our people into Barnes & Noble, their local stores. We can get them to buy the book and to do book signings. That is really all you need. Some independent stores in your locale. If it takes off, that is what we have for distribution. We do the ebook. We do the print book, and that could be a paperback and a hardcover if that is what you want.

We do not charge extra for the different formats. The proofreading, the typesetting, and the cover design, which I think is your most important marketing tool. We have some fabulous cover designers that we work with on a regular basis. Depending on what your topic or genre is, we will assign you a cover designer. I meet with you and the cover designer. First of all, I love to do that, and I want to be part of it.

We will work with you on the cover early in the game because we want you to have something to go out and sell with early and to make it real. As soon as you have a title and subtitle, we are off and running with designing the cover. We meet with you once a month to make sure we are catching up on the timeline. You have a project manager assigned to you to make sure that everything flows on time.

We meet with you once a month on Zoom, more if we need to, particularly if we are getting into a marketing campaign. We have several marketing meetings with you as well. We have a package that includes all of that. The editorial, the design of the book, the cover, the interior, the ebook, the distribution, all of our meetings, and the marketing execution strategy, which we will develop with you.

If you want to do a bestseller campaign, you have got something that a lot of our authors have been very happy with, the author Promocast, and other things that we’re working with you on. We work with a video guy. He will do a package if you want ten short videos to put on YouTube or social media. He will do that for you. He will write you a sell sheet. He will even do some copy for you.

Anything that you need, we have graphic designers who will also do social media posts, particularly if you are doing a bestseller campaign. We have a lot of different ways we can help you in terms of getting your message out there. Radio shows, podcasts, and getting on speaking stages. We go from big idea to you making a profit.

Yes, that is. I know we use our mutual friend for those podcasts. She does a great job. I want to mention the Promocast for a minute because I want you guys to understand a little bit about what she does. There is a book arc. When you go into presale, you sell and sell. It releases. Your bestseller, and then probably a week or two into it. It gets a massive drop.

That is where we pick up with Karen’s clients, after that bestseller campaign. On that way down, that is where we start with the promotion. You can see we basically have the same company, but we work together on projects as well, which I love about all my partners. We are all in the same business, but we are very collaborative, picking up different pieces. We all have complementary products that we can work with.

I can send people to Karen for book development as well, because I do not like it. I do not do it. I ghostwrote a book once, and I thought it was awful because you are trying to do somebody else’s voice. The person who contacted me for it just said, “I want a beauty book,” but she did not help with it. She did not tell me, “I have these principles I want.” She just said, “Go do your research,” and it came out like a commercial.

What You Can Learn From “Publishing The Event”

You have an event coming up. I want you to talk about it because this is the part where “I do not have to do this on my own.” I have seen some of the worst books when someone says, “I want to write a book,” and then they start writing it on their own, and it is not structured correctly. They do not think about the marketing or the long term. Talk about your event because I feel like your three-day event covers everything that they are going to need.

It is called Publishing the Event, a three-day experience that goes from a big idea to a bestseller to profit. It is on May 19th, 20th, and 21st, 2026. I am really excited about it because it follows the author’s journey. It is discovering your big idea. This is not just going to be talking heads with PowerPoints and speakers teaching. We will have some of that, but it is experiential. That is what I love. You are actually going to go through all of these different exercises, and you are going to actually discover your big idea. We are going to do book mapping.

Even if you come up with the idea that you want to write a book, that is great. Sometimes people in the past have said, “I just discovered a different idea that I want to do now.” Sometimes they say, “I want to continue with the book that I am writing, but I discovered now I can write ten other books through this exercise.” Everybody discovers something different in this exercise. Once you decide which book to write, you are writing your own outline. I cannot even talk.

You are writing your outline for the book, you are writing your talking points, and the stories are going in. Our philosophy is that books are about storytelling. People will not really remember what you have to say, but they are going to remember how they felt when you said it. In a book, it is the stories that really make them feel close to you. They resonate with you. If they do resonate with you, they are going to want to keep in touch with you and become what I call one of your evangelical fans.

That’s the reason for it. You are going to write all that. You are going to come far with that book. We are actually going to have a speaker’s night. This is usually the best part of the event, where we are going to have my friends and colleagues who are experienced. Some are literary agents. Some are speakers. Some teach about speaking and publicity. We will have speakers. If we have 60 people on, obviously, everybody cannot speak.

Some people will get the opportunity to actually do a two-minute pitch on their book and get invaluable feedback. For the others, maybe we will have you record your two-minute pitch, and then we can get you feedback afterwards. We will figure out something so that people can really participate. I am excited about that. The second day goes more into what publishing is. How should I publish?

One of the mindset things is that a lot of people might write their book, and then afterwards they go, “How should I publish? Do I want an agent?” You see that too, right? “I have a book to read, and I am not sure if I am going to self-publish it. I heard about this hybrid thing, but I am not sure what it is.” No, you should decide now while you’re writing the book. At least do some research. I am going to do a lot of teaching on the pros and cons of traditional, hybrid, and self-learning.

We are going to talk to you about what a launch plan looks like. What does a six-month launch plan look like? A lot of people do not even know what you need to do three months in advance. Most people think, “I am going to put it on Amazon, and people will come.” No. We talk about that. The third day is really marketing. It really is very strict. “Do I need an audiobook? Do I need a bestseller campaign?” Getting on radio shows and getting on podcasts. All the things you have to offer.

How do I market myself so I am visible? If you are a business person, how do I not become the best-kept secret in my niche? I do not want to be the best-kept secret anymore. I want to get out there and fly. That is what we are going to teach you. If you are writing a memoir or legacy, come one, come all, because that too is really important.

It is a little bit different in terms of marketing, but we have got you. We have fiction as well. We love historical fiction and contemporary fiction. It is really for adult writers, people who want to write a book, or have not really finished the book. We will certainly have ideas for you if you have a finished manuscript, but you are open to some kind of editing of it.

What I love about this, too, is that you probably see the same thing. I would say 90% of the authors who come to me are underfunded. They are underfunded because they did not attend something like this and find out, “What does that cost for self-publishing? What am I going to have to pay for editing? What am I going to have to pay to build that author platform?”

That is the biggest one I see. “What am I going to have to pay for book marketing?” You really get an idea of what this is going to cost overall. It can get pricey. If you do not build that author platform, you’re probably not going to have the resources if you are nonfiction, because that is a business builder as well. You’re going to get a really good idea of what this costs because I think a lot of people suffer from that underfunding.

You will. I am glad you mentioned that because we’re going to do a whole session on financial planning. This will apply for hybrid, self-publishing, whatever, however you want to publish. This presentation will apply. Just learning what the costs of editing could be and the work involved.

That is fantastic. The event again is May 19th, 20th, 21st, 2026. Karen has a code for you that will get you the event for $1. What is that code? I know we do not have the URL right now, but what is that code to grab the $1?

It is DIP1.

It is D-I-P-1. Definitely sign up for the event. Get yourself started and find out what this really takes. For many people, you are an expert in your field. You understand the language. This is a whole different ballgame. We have a whole different language for reviewing the cost. Find out what it is really going to take to get that book out there.

I also wanted to mention that the storytelling she mentioned is really incredible. I gave an interview on my podcast to all of the people you sent me for listicles and Promocasts. I read their books prior, and I remember Tracy Doyle’s book. The storytelling, I literally was like, “If I thought I had a bad childhood, it was nothing compared to this lady.”

This was a business book for her Aurora method. I was really impressed. Before I read it, I thought, “God, not another trauma book.” The storytelling really set it apart from “This is interesting,” and the way she came up with this. The storytelling that you get from this book development is really important.

Tracy just got chosen to put her book into the swag bag for the Academy Awards.

She told me that because she was asking if I had a promo. She had just missed the Golden Globes. Tracy was really excited about it. She was just out in Park City for something, and I could not meet with her. It would have been lovely to meet her in person. You guys, grab the event. Karen, if they do not grab the link, is there an email or is there a place they can contact you to get directions?

Yes, they can go to my website, HybridGlobalPublishing.com, or they can contact me at Karen@HybridGlobalPublishing.com.

Great. Karen, thank you so much. We will see you at the event.

Yes.

Important Links

• Karen Strauss on LinkedIn
• Perfect Reader Playbook
• Hybrid Global Publishing
• Karen@HybridGlobalPublishing.com
• Published! The Event

About Karen Strauss

Karen has held various positions in the Publishing industry for over 35 years. She worked at Random House, Macmillan, Crown and Avon in Sales, Marketing, and Publicity.

She has worked with celebrities such as President Jimmy Carter, Jimmy Stewart, Martha Stewart, George F. Will and Og Mandino. In 2010 Karen founded Hybrid Global Publishing, a firm that works with Entrepreneurs, Speakers, and coaches to help them write, publish, distribute, and promote their books in order to generate unlimited leads, get on more speaking stages, and grow their business by attracting more clients.

Karen has helped over 1000 business owners become successful published authors and has helped 700 authors reach #1 bestselling status.

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