Are you struggling to be seen and heard? Is your ideal audience out there, but you’re having trouble breaking through the noise? The Maestro of Business Acceleration, Dr. Richard Kaye, cracks the publicity code in today’s episode. Learn the power of profitable publicity to help authors accelerate book sales. He also reveals the different ways to leverage publicity. Are you ready to finally get noticed? Join Dr. Richard Kaye and crack the publicity code!

Dr. Richard Kaye is the proud recipient of the White House Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award. You can schedule a call with Richard at http://TalkAboutPublicity.com

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Cracking The Publicity Code

Welcome to the show. We’re going to talk about publicity with our friend Richard Kaye. Before we get started, I want to remind you, we are running the AI Author Academy again in June 2024. We ran it and had great results. We taught our people how to build their avatars stronger. AI is a garbage-in, garbage-out system. There are certain things that you have to do well to get good results from AI as an author. Once you get those things, all of the platform building is streamlined. That’s what so many of you complain about. It is so hard to build a platform to get those books products and services sold. I encourage you to go over to AIAuthorAcademy.com and get yourself signed up.

Our guest is Dr. Richard Kaye and he’s the maestro of business acceleration. For over two decades, Richard has been the driving force behind the success stories of countless entrepreneurs propelling them to unparalleled growth. His secret weapon is profitable, powerful publicity that transforms businesses from early-stage infancy to revenue-rich maturity.

Richard isn’t just a consultant. He’s a trailblazer in the world of evolution. A sought-after guest on podcasts and webinars, he’s left his mark on the radio and television programs of the world, gracing the screens on KGTV in San Diego and KTLA in Los Angeles. Forbes Magazine has acknowledged his expertise and PBS featured a special that showcased his profound impact. He is a proud recipient of the White House Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award. You can schedule a call with Richard at http://TalkAboutPublicity.com. Looking forward to that talk with Richard.

Before we get over there, do you want to feel young again? If you’re older like I am, Andy Nam and Lifewave have the answer for you. It’s a way to reclaim your youth, strut around like a boss and heal faster than a superhero. If this sounds something like something you’d want to pursue and it’s holistic that’s the best part, then go on over and schedule an appointment for a free consultation with Andy at Calendly.com/thefoolishcouple/superbrand. I use this product for myself. I love it. I’m still an athlete at 63 and it hurts. It hurts a lot. Go on over and schedule that appointment with Andy and stay tuned for our interview with Richard.

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How are you doing? 

Outstanding.

I’m excited to talk about publicity because people always think about how they’re going to build their platform. How are we going to publish the book? They don’t realize how much work comes afterwards to keep that book at the top of Amazon, keep it in the public eye and I see a lot of people give up at that point. 

When people don’t know what we don’t know, there are a couple of ways of approaching life. It’s either, “I’m going to go through this thing,” or as you say, “I’m going to give up because it’s work.” People say, “I’m going to publish a book on Amazon and I’m going to be a bestseller.” No. You’re going to have a book on Amazon.

It is. I think that the biggest thing is when we get people up, we do that hype. We push them to an Amazon bestseller. It’s exciting, but Amazon is an hour-by-hour algorithm. You do have to pick that up. Once it’s released, you’re competing against all of those other books that have reviews. All those other things spice up the algorithms, too so you’ve got to do a lot of work. When people are looking at hiring a company, what’s the difference between PR, advertising, and publicity? 

It’s a great question and I’ll tell you why. It’s because most people confuse them. Before I answer that, I want to speak to what is it about, ladies and gentlemen, 7,500 books are released every single day. How does your book stand out from the crowd? How do you stand out from the crowd? The last time I looked, there were 33 million books on Amazon. It’s like going blindfolded into a library and say, “I’m going to get the best book there.”

PR, which is what most people refer to when they think of getting the word out there, public relations is you or you hire someone to go make phone calls, send emails, yes, even send faxes with good headlines, a hook, and then you pray to God someone says, “I like this story. I want to run with it.” Does it work? Beautifully. Is it effective? No. It’s a crap shoot because you’ve got to get the right moment at the right time. We’re all used to advertising . If you watch television, go to the movies, read anything, or drive up the streets down streets, marquees all over the place, that’s advertising. You know someone paid for that. You know that it’s there to make an impression, so you make a buying decision.

Marketing is an end cap at Costco or the supermarket. It’s to get your attention. It’s most visible. That’s more point of sale. Great, all that’s nice. What’s publicity? Publicity in the way that we do it, we guarantee that you will be featured in big city newspapers, in magazines, on stages. As a matter of fact, at the end of this, Juliet, I’m going to give your readers something about how to leverage any publicity you’ve got.

If you’ve been in anything in a magazine, even on a podcast, how do you leverage that? You must have top of mind to awareness. Publicity is getting you out into the world. Here’s the key. People say, “I’ve heard your name. I’ve seen you around town.” If you’d like I can share a story about how I do my chiropractic practice on publicity. That’s what it’s about.

When I lived in LA, I had a billboard on New Hall Ranch Road when I was a real estate broker. It was funny because about halfway into the contract, I realized that every small child in town knew my name, but they weren’t the people with the money. 

See, that’s a key. It’s who’s your target? When I was practicing chiropractic, a buddy of mine was faced with a malpractice suit. The attorneys in our group said, “It doesn’t make a difference. Just make sure they spell your name right in the newspaper,” because people remember the name what it was about fades. It’s always an interesting perspective. I’d rather not, yeah.

What is that saying about all bad publicity is good publicity?

Name Recognition

True, because it’s name recognition. I don’t want to go down a political rabbit hole, but that’s what publicity is about during these crazy times. It’s name recognition. That’s why they all raise money. Just remember the name. How many times do we go into the vote and be like, “I recognize that name. I have no idea what party what they’re about. I know their name.” That’s publicity.

Yeah, and the sound bites. I think that one of the things that most people don’t understand is even getting on a TV show, it’s not all about you. It’s the sound bites that will encourage people to remember you. It’s not, “Go buy my book.” A lot of times, it’s that nugget that’s relevant in that particular time-space.

It rattles around in your head. You’re absolutely right. Back to have heard your name. That’s how I grew my chiropractic practice. They know my name. That was all over the media in San Diego and they know my name. It’s called top of mind to awareness.

I think one of the things that confounds authors the most because they don’t have experience with it is the scary prospect of how do I pitch? How do I get in front of someone? Can you tell us a little bit about that process? I’m sure there are ways to do it and there are ways not to do it. I happen to know that from the people who pitch my show. 

There are ways to do everything. I’ll begin with what not to do and that’s don’t be a pain. Don’t keep nudging because people say, “I got other people I want to deal with.” If you don’t have the proper resources and connections and engage with people who do, and Juliet, that’s where you’re brilliant with people. Getting them out into the world and getting them out there. There are three kinds of publishers. This is a 50,000-foot view. There are the big boys, the Random, the Putnam. If they take you on, they’re going to ask a very important question. What’s your marketing budget?

If you don’t have one, if they take you on, what do you get? You get bragging rights. “Random House published my book.” “Who’s reading it?” They won’t take it on unless you’ve got a budget. The downside of Random House and I’m using them as a metaphor here, of course, is that they own the copyright on your book. You can’t do a thing with it for five years. Do you have a better offer that comes along with a movie deal? No. They own it and you get very little in residual. They get the money. Juliet is you and me, ladies and gentlemen, you and us, as we can go on Amazon KDP and publish a book and you get to say, “I’m a published author?” “Who’s reading it?” “Maybe my mother, maybe my sister,” if you are lucky.

I think my grandmother bought all the copies of my very first book.

There’s no budget. You have what we do here, which Juliet does, is a hybrid publisher. The publisher gets you out into the world. You own the rights. We do the marketing, the publicity, get you on stages so that so that people know of the book. Why do people buy a book? It’s because they’ve heard of it and a friend told them it’s good. When you go into a bookstore, unless you going for that particular book, why do you take a book off the shelf or in a library? The title and the cover. You must split-test the cover. That’s one of the things we do. We split-test the covers so that they are attractive to people. It’s always top-of-mind awareness that gets your book out into the world, and that rabbit hole I said I was going to go to, don’t plan on selling 1 million books. That’s not the goal.

Publicity: Top-of-mind awareness gets your book out into the world.

The goal is how am I going to make $1 million on the books? Unless your name is Michael Connelly or John Grisham or someone like that, the odds of you making a significant income from the book are not large. It’s the courses and the programs and the workshops that you have behind them. We know people we work with people to get that place and then the ongoing publicity.

I’m very transparent when I talk to people. I tell them right off the bat, “You are probably not going to directly get ROI from this publishing package. Chances are you will not sell enough books to cover it.” What is that next project that that book is the nurture tool for? That next project, when you’re charging $4,000, $5,000, $6,000 for a program, you’ve paid for that book in usually 2 to 3 programs. You have to have that next step in place. Now, when you guys work with people in the pitching, I know you pitch the book, but do you also pitch the programs with it so people know what are best steps? How does that all work? 

We let people know that they are there. That’s not our niche. We’re going to stay in our lane. We know where our niche is. We do not develop the courses. They ask to do podcasts, too. That’s not our thing. There are a gazillion people out there. Just like you, Juliet, you know these people are sometimes probably the same people and we can refer to them. We don’t want to take money from someone like you and so one of the reasons I like you, unless there’s honesty and integrity.

We tell them, “Unless this is a vanity project, don’t plan on making money on the book.” We’ve got a client like that. She wanted her book out to the world. God bless her. She’s got the money and she can do that. Most people want to make money. That’s on the back end. Someone you and I know is a publicist and when Michael and I had this conversation, he had 100 New York Times best-selling books and 1,000 Amazon number-one books. “Michael, how many people made money on their books?” Two. They had the money on the back end.

If I were to come to you and I wanted something, let’s say you got me in the LA Times, how can I use that article? Obviously, the people who’ve read it now have awareness of me, but can I use that to leverage other things?

Leverage Your Publicity

Absolutely. That’s what you’re going to get at the end of this conversation 10 ways to leverage your publicity. Stay around. Unless you’ve hired a big company like Putnam or Random, they own the rights, but you can still leverage the fact that you’re a published author with them. I’ll give you an overview. I’ll give you an example. My email signature says, “Recipient of the White House Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award.” That’s leverage. Now, sidebar when I got that, it’s like, “How do they even know who I am?” It’s not political, by the way. It’s the White House, not the person there, so I don’t care what side of the fence you’re on.

That’s called leverage. You include your outstanding awards in your email. When you’re pitching to somebody, a prospect, you weave it into the story. Totally transparency, as I did. Otherwise, you wouldn’t know unless you get emails from me that I’m the recipient of that award. When people know that, it’s like, “Wow.” We talked about my wife. She’s got twelve prestigious awards for her books. That’s part of her signature. I don’t think she has all of them there but part of them. You let people know that other people recognize you.

Let’s use the music industry. Let’s say that you’ve been under a rock for the past decade and you never heard of Taylor Swift, but you hear everyone talking about her. You might be inclined to say, “What does she do? Let me hear her,” and then you you make your own decisions. Juliet, when I started my chiropractic practice, and ladies and gentlemen, the story is going to sound like it’s about me. It is because it’s my story. Please take this as a metaphor of what publicity does.

There were 300 chiropractors in San Diego when I started my practice. How do you start a grow any business in a crowded field? In spite of how wonderful, brilliant and sharp you are, you’re in a crowded field. Recognize that. I got myself invited to a morning television talk show. I turned that into being invited back every month. I got an article in the San Diego Tribune. I got an article in the Los Angeles Times. I’m going to pause here because people say, “I only want an article in my town.” People are not going to drive from Los Angeles to San Diego, especially during rush hour.

I can attest to that. Nobody does it.

I had reprints of that. Color reprints. They were colored pictures. What does that say? They’re writing about me, but here’s the key. The day I get a phone call from the producer of ABC News, the question was something akin to, “Who are you?” We’re talking about, “We’re seeing your name around town. We’re hearing about you.” Now, I got a 6:30 news set. I then got a similar call from the producer at PBS. Similar kinds of questions, “We’re hearing about you.” I got a PBS segment about it. I’m no longer one of 300 chiropractors. I have top-of-mind awareness. People heard my name all over town and they were all other articles and radios and things like that.

Ladies and gentlemen, that’s what publicity does for you. You want someone to say, “I’ve heard about you.” That’s all it is. That’s what it accomplishes, then it’s up to you to do the business beyond that, obviously. That’s what publicity does for you. Does the best-selling book help? Absolutely, Juliet is a masterful of that. Get your book. Get the publicity beyond over, under and you build it and then it’s a legacy and your brand is out there.

Don’t wait until your book is done at the editor to start. I’m going to tell you guys briefly. I was the number one listing agent and office of 400. That didn’t happen because I got into real estate and I liked it. It happened because I came into real estate with a big marketing budget. My name was out there like that. Rookie of the year of the first one, top listing agent within 4 or 5 years. 

That’s planning what it is going to cost and everyone should be doing this at the beginning, anyway. What is it going to cost to publish? What is that book developer cost? What is the publicity for this? How am I going to keep it going? All of that needs to be budgeted in advance. It’s not just, “My book is done. Now I’m going to find out how much that costs.” If you wait, chances are you’re going to have problems. 

I love that you told that story because people will tell us well, “I want to wait until the books done,” and my response is, “When was the last time you saw a commercial for a movie and it said, ‘Opening tonight in theaters near you?’” It’s opening next year. Yes.

One of the big lessons I learned early on, I worked at Chiat/Day advertising. I came on right after the famous 1984 Apple commercials. A lot of you may not know this, but when Chiat/Day put out that commercial, Apple didn’t even have a product and people thought that they were crazy. Their investors thought they were crazy. That’s an example. Even at an idea stage, you can start planning all of this and get it out there. That commercial won a lot of awards, an awful lot of awards, and there was no product.

There’s no reason why you can’t follow that model as well. If you’re an expert, you already know what that book is about. Richard, I’ve never asked you this question, but it popped in my head. If I’m somebody who has an upcoming book and I want to come to you and get publicity for my expertise, is that something you guys can do? “The author of the upcoming book,” and just shining the spotlight on that expertise before the book even comes out. 

Trailblazers’ Summit And Conference

You build upon that. “By the way, here’s my new book.” The answer is it’s about you. It’s not about the book. It’s not about the business. We have some very wealthy clients, two billionaire clients. They haven’t even written their books yet. It’s the business that is beyond that. Ladies and gentlemen, don’t get stuck in a rut of saying, “I don’t have a book yet.” Yet is an operative word because it suggests that there will be one and you may not need one. Juliet, yes, we get people on stages.

As a matter of fact, we have an event it’s coming up soon, at the end of June, and it’s called Trailblazers Summit and Conference. I’ll send you the information, Juliet. I called a long time ago friend of mine you would know, Lisa Nichols. She says, “I’m in.” Who have we got? We got Mark Victor Hanson. I’ve got Dennis Waitley and John Demartini. We’ve got some amazing people. I’ll get you information so your audience may be interested in this and it’s free to come and play and hear from people who are true absolute trailblazers. We’re having a conversation with Michael Gerber of E-Myth.

I’ll be calling another friend of mine, Barnet Bain. You may not know Barnet’s name. He produced What Dreams May Come with Robin Williams and I brought him to see CEO space many years ago. This is publicity and they’ll be opportunities for people to speak there. This is publicity. What does it do for you, Juliet, or anyone reading to say, “I share the stage with Lisa Nichols or I shared the stage with Michael Gerber?”

Juliet and I met through an organization that is now pretty much non-functioning called CEO Space or you may have known it is Income Builders International or IBI, and we had pictures with some amazing people because you get to know them. That’s publicity. You go to galas and black tie events and take pictures with people you say, “I know that person,” but that’s not support. Juliet, you know the expression, “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.” Take that a step further. It’s who knows you. That’s what publicity does. You get to know them, and they get to know you.

I’m going to take that for a minute, if you don’t mind. When Richard is talking about these speaking events and you go and you’re being seen with these people, also go and talk to the other people there whether you’re speaking or you’re not speaking because we actually had a woman several years ago. She had a brilliant book and used to fly into big events, one in Germany with Peter Drucker, I think, and she said, “I’m flying into this event and then I’m gonna fly out.” 

I’m like, “Why aren’t you staying and talking to the people in the audience?” We actually put a quiz together for her and the people who met the criteria. I asked her to stay for two days, set up appointments with those people for 15 to 30 minutes, get to know them, and talk to them. She did four times more business than she’d ever done in an event and it was as simple as talking to people. 

Don’t ever think you’re so big that you’re going to fly in and fly out. Be accessible because that’s where people remember that, “I met Richard Kaye at this event. He was lovely. I would love to talk to him more and work with him sometime.” It’s as simple as that sometimes in getting the business from those things. 

Show up in service. Don’t ever show up to take how much can you give. Juliet, what you said, that’s what people remember. I’m just putting it in different contexts. People remember, “That person came and all they wanted was my leads.” No. How can you serve people? Who do you remember most? An emotional connection. We don’t remember mundane stuff but remember the emotional stuff. You go back to your childhood. Show up in service to people and that’s brilliant mentoring, Juliet. Stay, hang out, talk with people. No one’s too big to come up, get on a stage, and say, “I’m out of here,” because they’ll remember that too.

Publicity: We don’t remember one day and stuff. But remember the emotional stuff.

I actually went to an event one time where the person had a hot mic and told security to get these people away from her and that was on day one. You’ll love this. Picture being on the back end of many events. She also got up on stage at first and she said, “We’re going to play it by air for the next four days. I’m going to get downloads and we’re going to go where the spirit takes me.” Being on the backside of those events, you know that every single minute is accounted for and scripted. I thought, “I don’t know how many people in this room are newbies, but I will never buy anything from her.” That was so out of integrity. 

That brings up a memory many years ago. John Gray from Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus, by the way, he’s on this Trailblazers thing too, was speaking at this CEO Space conference. As all our faculty, did they hang around and a young lady was asking me, “I need a good endorsement from my book.” It was a relationship book. I sad, “Wait a minute,” and I went over to John. John being his gracious, he said, “Of course, bring her over here.” She’s got a great endorsement from John Gray. That’s how this world we live in works. John would not say, “I’m off stage. I’m out.” He’s hanging around schmoozing and meeting people and being in service.

That is such a wonderful story because we’ve actually had people where we’ve reached out and they’ll say, “Yeah. All right, if you buy 1,000 books.” What am I going to do with 1,000 of your books? You’re making $2 or $3 a book. I’m paying you $2,000, $3,000 for that. Richard, tell us where we can get this free gift and how we can get a hold of you if we want to explore maybe future publicity or publicity now?

The easiest way to get in touch with me is TalkAboutPublicity.com. It takes you right to my calendar. Set up a call. We’ll explore how we may be able to serve you. Now, the gift I was talking about, I want to give you a reference again. You’ve got publicity. Now, what? What do you do with it? A single shot is great. What do you do with it afterwards? Now, I’ll tell you, when I had the PBS special about me, Juliet, I wouldn’t say it was a long time ago, but I had a stack of VHS tapes on my counter in the office.

How old are you? Okay, readers, do you know what a VHS is? I’m going to assume they do. If you don’t, go look it up.

I was on PBS. I will say, “Dr. Kaye was on PBS. Give this to your neighbor and your friends.” That’s publicity. I can’t get you on PBS now but you’re going to learn how to leverage what it is that you have got RichardKaye.com/leverage. It’ll ask for your name and email address and you’re going to get how to leverage what it is that you’ve got. It doesn’t make a difference if it’s a podcast, if it’s a little clipping in a newspaper. Whatever it is, you want people to know that someone else is talking about you. That’s what you get to leverage. It doesn’t make you more important or better than. It’s like my presidential award. What does that mean? Does it impress people? I have no idea, but to me, it’s important enough that it’s on my email signature and you have fun with it.

It probably doesn’t impress people anymore. We’re so upset with politics. 

That’s why I say it’s the White House. It’s not the person. I don’t care whether you are for or against Biden. It’s the office that we should respect.

Yes. Richard, thank you so much for being on the show. 

Thank you, Juliet.

Important Links

• Richard Kaye
• AIAuthorAcademy.com
• Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus
• TalkAboutPublicity.com
• Calendly.com/thefoolishcouple/superbrand
• RichardKaye.com/leverage

About Richard Kaye

Dr. Richard Kaye: The Maestro of Business Acceleration! For over two decades, Richard has been the driving force behind the success stories of countless entrepreneurs, propelling them to unparalleled growth. His secret weapon? Profitable, powerful publicity that transforms businesses from early-stage infancy to revenue-rich maturity.

Richard isn’t just a consultant; he’s a trailblazer in the world of business evolution. A sought-after guest on podcasts and webinars, he’s left his mark on radio and television programs, gracing screens on KGTV in San Diego and KTLA in Los Angeles. Forbes Magazine has acknowledged his expertise, and PBS featured a special that showcased the profound impact of his work.

He is the proud recipient of the White House Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award.