It’s not enough to just claim you’re going to write a book and then sit down and magically will words to paper. Before they begin, every nonfiction author should consider their who, what, and why. When these three things are in focus, the writing process is easier, and the author has more clarity, confidence, and control. When authors have a strong foundation, they have a strong finish. Award-winning author, international book coach, and ghostwriter Ally Berthiaume will provide authors with valuable expert insights to establish their strong foundation.

Tailored to those who are just getting started and want to start on the right foot, this talk will focus on the importance of authors identifying their ideal reader (who), their main message or promise (what), and the objectives of writing this book, for both them and their audience (why). Pulled into the fold will be key principles from Berthiaume’s latest book, Do Not Write a Book…Until You Read This One. This is training you won’t want to miss.

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Watch the episode here

 

Listen to the podcast here

 

Strong Foundation, Strong Finish: The Who, What, And Why Every Nonfiction Author Needs To Understand BEFORE They Start Writing Their Book

Introduction

Welcome to the show. This is a free training. If you’re someone who prefers to see the slides and see what’s actually going on, tuning in on this show might be for you, but you can go catch it over on YouTube and actually see little Ally’s pretty face and what’s going on in her back and her slides and all that. She’s so cute. Before we get started, I want to remind you guys that we are rerunning the AI Author Academy in September. Some amazing stuff happened to people.

Last time, I showed them programs that they could actually put their book in and create a course or create a quiz. Whatever it was, there’s a program out there that is so powerful for all of it. Hint, it’s not ChatGPT. You can sign up for that over at AIAuthorAcademy.com. If you’re not quite sure it’s for you, jump on my calendar, ChatWithJuliet.com and we can talk it through and see if you’re ready, you’re not ready, if you’re going to hate it, and you want to tell me to go away, you can. I love my sales speech, please buy from me, but don’t buy from me.

Our guest is Ally Berthiaume. She’s usually known as Ally B, but she publishes under A Y. She’s got multiple aliases. Maybe you can get into that background of why you have so many names during the course of it so we know you’re not a criminal. We didn’t fingerprint her before we started the interview.

She is the Founder of Write Place, Right Time, her virtual boutique of book coaching and ghostwriting services. Ally serves as leaders, entrepreneurs, and visionaries across North America and Europe in writing books that will light up their world and ours. Ally is also an award-winning author of Dear Universe, I Get It Now: Letters on the Art and Journey of Being Brave and Being Me, and the co-author of Do Not Write a Book…Until You Read This One with Bridget McGowan Hawkins. Ally, welcome.

Topic Overview

Thanks, Julia. I’m super pumped to be here. Alida and Andy, it is nice to have you here because that means we can customize our time together, which is my favorite way to go. We’re going to kick off here with Strong Foundation, Strong Finish, the Who, What and Why Every Non-fiction Author Needs to Understand Before They Start Writing Their Book. I will be pulling in a few principles from my latest, Do Not Write a Book Until You Read This One, which you can find at any book retailer near you or online if you prefer to shop online.

Number one, I’m hoping Alida and Andy will be fully present here, but I do want you to interact. What I want to know first before we get going is which of these are true for you? I’ve always thought about writing a book and I’m getting as much information as I can at this time. I’ve been told I should write a book. I’ve written a book and I’m thinking of another, but I want to do it differently.

I’m in the middle of writing a book right now, but I want more insight and expert advice. Some combination of the above or none of the above. I want to gauge where you’re at on this journey. That way, I can think of that as if I’m giving you some information. We’ve got Scott joining us, which is amazing. We’re gauging where people are at on their writing path. If you want to take a look at those prompts on the screen and let me know where you’re at and what things are, then that would be great.

Andy, you’ve written a book, and you’re thinking of another, but you want to do it differently. Follow-up question, Andy. In what way do you want to do it differently? What did you think you did the first time? Maybe wrong, incorrect, or inefficiently. Give me a little bit of information there. Alida, you’re in the middle of writing a book right now, but what more insight and expert advice? Alida, your follow-up question is, is there something that’s a particular sticking point for you where you could use some extra advice and insight? I’d love to know that. See if I can hit on that. Voice and personality. Andy, what was your first book’s genre and what’s the second one that you’re thinking about?

I did a collaboration book and Christy actually helped with all the editing on that. I am looking at writing my own book and I’ve been working with Juliet about that changing about putting a little bit more of a personality rather because I’m a very analytical guy and I normally write very analytical. I’m like boring.

You’re going to be working on a non-fiction book. The subject matter is?

It’s health and longevity. Can I interject for Andy a minute? Andy is like the poor man’s Tony Robbins when it comes to health and wellness. If you ever read Tony Robbins’s book, he has all these great solutions, but you’ve got to be a millionaire to take part in a lot of the solutions he throws out there. Andy’s a little bit that. Andy, when he says voice, he’s analytical, but he also has this tremendous sense of humor that I think needs to shine through. That’s what he works with Kris on too, she knows him so well getting that authenticity down.

That’s a great context for me to have. Alida, you’re in the middle of writing a book. You need some more insight and expert advice so tell me a little bit about what you’re looking for.

I had written more than half of my book a lot. Maybe if the book’s shorter, it’ll be done. No, I’m teasing. My son died. It was very traumatic for me. He was 49. I dead stopped in the water writing it. It was making incredible progress. Now, it’s like I need a kick in the butt. I need to get going again. What I’m thinking about is that my granddaughter’s going off to college here at the beginning of August and it’ll leave a void in my house. Is she so vibrant? I’m thinking about how that might be my restart. I’m looking to restart. I’m looking for anything and everything that can put me back in the zone of writing, which you have to be in the zone, and to embrace my book and bring it to the finish line.

For you, Alida, I want you to be thinking about if there are any of these elements we’re talking about that you haven’t yet considered. Good places to jumpstart. If you’ve already considered them, I want you to think about whether or not it’s time to re-evaluate them as a way to start getting back into the material. What we’re talking about is all foundational stuff. These are things that I think you all need to know before you’re cruising to the finish line. This is great stuff for you to be like. Did I ask myself that question?

How could that actually influence the problem that I’m having? This includes you, Andy, about voice and personality. I think you’ll find that the more that about the reader, the more that that can inform how you want to come across on the page to connect with them. Scott, we haven’t heard from you yet, though, and I don’t want to leave you out. Scott, you’re also writing a book but need more insight and expert advice. Where’s that falling for you in terms of challenges or barriers?

First of all, thanks for doing this. I’m happy to be with you all and meet some new faces. I appreciate that I can be here and talk with you people. This is lovely. I would call it a proposal that I’m working on. I’m not quite in the middle. I’m fleshing out essentially an introduction. What’s the book about the basics there? I’m working on the structure and chapter outlines. I know where I’m going. I have a pretty good idea of how I want to do it. My obstacle is myself.

I focus way too much on the structure, and I get down to the question, how does this puzzle piece fit here? For context, the topic is essentially exposed, but it’s an institutional expose about some federal policy work I did for about a decade, which was never successful. The question I want to ask is why it is not successful. The failure was a huge eruption of bad news for the Department of Justice, and what we were doing was supposed to prevent the bad news from spreading. How do these two things exist at the same time?

I personally don’t want to throw anybody under the bus. What I want to do is tell this institutional story about what I think the failures were. It’s an insider look at this thing. I guess it’s a huge project. The policy work was a huge project trying to figure out the hooks. The bad news is a great hook, but is that enough? There’s much more that I want to fill in there. I get stuck on the structuring of it. I don’t do enough to get the writing done. That’s what I’m doing.

Scott, you said you’re working on a proposal. Is the proposal something you’re putting together for yourself as a blueprint to lead your writing, or are you trying to get a traditional publisher, so you’re starting with a proposal to try to get an agent?

Trying to get an agent. That’s the direction I want to go. I’m hoping to be able to shop this around by September and do something from there.

For you, Scott, the things that we’re talking about, all these elements would be in the proposal. If you haven’t gotten to these pieces, you’re going to want to think about them because somewhere in that nonfiction proposal, you’ll need to address them. Maybe there are some things in here that will help get you thinking a little more broadly rather than getting stuck in the weeds.

One thing when it comes to shopping, the traditional marketplace is your query letter, for your agent cannot be so far into the weeds that they throw you into the slush pile. You’re going to need to step up and out and be able to see your book more broadly in terms of why you, what its impact, why it is compelling, versus on chapter 11, page 232, which you won’t know yet. If you’re shopping your proposal and the manuscript doesn’t get written, you’re not going to know that piece yet anyway.

Quickly, Scott, talk to me about agents. Depending on which side of the aisle that falls on, I may or may not have a lead for you.

Awesome, thank you very much.

I am not going to go and reintroduce myself because Juliet did a great job of doing that for me. She even got my last name right. There are a lot of extra values at the end of Berthiaume, which makes it super confusing. My birth name is Alyssa. That’s what I get called when I’m in trouble. I’ve been called Ally since I was little because nobody could say Alyssa when I was growing up. I shortened it, but because I was five and didn’t know how to spell, I put two Ls in Ally instead of one, which is the same way Alyssa is spelled.

Building A Strong Foundation

When I became a published author, I decided to go by my first and middle name initials, which is why it’s AY. That is the story behind why I have so many names. You can call me about any of those things, and I will respond as long as you are kind about them. What I want to talk about are three things that you should know before you’re writing any book. Your who, your what, your why. I strongly believe that when these three things are in focus, the writing process is easier, and you, the author, have more clarity, confidence, and control over what you are doing.

That is why I say strong foundation, strong finish. When your foundational elements are not aligned and in place and you have no idea what you’re doing, why you’re doing it, or who you’re trying to talk to. Your manuscript can bloat and get way too big because you don’t have any handlebars or containers around the amount you’re saying or sharing. Likewise, you can also go too thin and have an undercooked project instead. This is a way to try to put some shape around it. It doesn’t mean these things don’t evolve with the writing process, but they’re nice to start with and think about to guide you.

We don’t want you to be like this person. There are pitfalls to writing a book when you don’t know what to look out for. A pitfall might be that you’re not strategic about the idea of writing your book. There’s willy-nillyness happening all over the place, and you’re sitting down hoping that through osmosis, this brilliance is going to come onto the page with no direction or clarity. You’re not strategic about your book’s title. Titling is important. It’s like your most critical piece of promotional retail. It’s the thing that’s going to be everywhere and on everything as you start talking about your book.

 

You need to have a strong title. We’re not going to talk about titling, but since we’re talking about pitfalls, I’m going to mention them. Please don’t be serious about the editor you choose for your book, and pick your high school friend who is good at English class. Hire a professional. Kris is one. You cut corners with the goal of saving money. Please don’t cut corners. Books are an investment. You won’t want a professional final product. Put the bucks behind the book.

You won’t regret doing that at the end of the day and you think that your book will make you rich or that it will make a lot of money with little to no effort on your part. Let’s agree that that is not the way that it goes right now. We’re not going to talk about how to put in the effort necessarily, but we will talk about the effort and why that’s important. We want to stack up our why, who, or what, and those things all lead to this greater thing, which is the outline. I believe in having some outline to begin writing with, even if that outline shifts and changes and expands or contracts.

All these things now lead to clarity, confidence, and control. They all overlap, which is why they’re in these circles. They all impact one another. I don’t necessarily see it as like one directly leads to another. There’s more of an interaction and exchange between these three things that we’re going to talk about. A well-developed manuscript with good writing stems from clarity in these three things. Now, well-developed, meaning it’s not a one-and-done. You’re going through an iteration process. One draft, edit, revise. Another draft, edit, and revise until you get it crystal clear.

None of this like, “I wrote it once and I think it’s good enough and I’m going to hit publish.” No. Please, don’t. That won’t serve you, it won’t serve the person you’re trying to reach and then all of that time, money, and energy that you invested will be down the toilet because you didn’t do your due diligence to make sure that you maintained the integrity of the process by revising as many times as is required. Good writing means it’s organized, compelling, and interesting, and there are no gaps in the logic or argument.

Also, it’s not so bogged down with unnecessary details and irrelevant information, but it’s slowing down the reader and they’re getting bored or confused. It has to be well-balanced. I’m mentioning the outline again because all the pieces we’re talking about would ultimately go into an outline. An outline is a separate document that basically is your GPS or your map to help you reach your final destination. Rather than get in the car and drive, thinking you’re going to get to a place that you’ve never been, you usually at least have an address that you plug into your phone or your car, and it gives you multiple routes that you can choose, and it tells you when to turn.

An outline is your GPS to guide you to your final destination. Share on X

This is the success of your outline. It doesn’t mean that you might not take a wrong turn, end up with a detour, have bad weather, and need to stop, but it’s a place to go back to and remind yourself of where you started and what you were intending. If those intentions shift a little, that’s okay, but at least it keeps you on course from getting lost. Now, here are the pieces that I think, at a minimum, should be in an outline. An outline, Scott, can be very similar to a proposal.

Let’s say you start to shock your proposal to an agent and an agent doesn’t pick it up. Having gone through the work of putting together your proposal, I see that you are still amazing because now, if you choose an alternative publishing route, you have your own blueprint and guide to get that book written, and you publish it differently. My point is this is not a useless exercise. Everyone should go through the process of writing an outline or proposal for themselves because it’s that helpful, in all honesty. In your outline, you want to make sure that you’re addressing who your reader is. What is their problem?

Your promise for your book, if you’re writing something that’s in prescriptive nonfiction. If you’re writing something, let’s say, Scott, like you want to expose this institutional thing that happened. There still needs to be something in it for your reader. Informing them, letting them in on the secret. You still want to be thinking about your primary promise, even if the goal of your book isn’t necessarily to teach them how to get to a certain transformation. There needs to be something in it for them. You should also have a working table of contents.

That’s a list of your chapters and chapter abstracts. Those can be summaries of what’s going to happen in each of those chapters. It could be a paragraph, a bulleted list, something that makes sense to you and shows the way that your mind works, but it basically gives you what’s going to happen along the way. If you’re doing a traditional proposal, then you might have some market research in there, such as what you’re planning to do for your promotional activities and other books in the market that your book would be compared to.

Quite frankly, like Alida and Andy, even if you weren’t shopping for your book at a traditional market or a traditional agent and publisher, you would still want to know, and Juliet would agree. You would still want to know what you’re going to do for promotional activities. You’d still want to know what other books in the market are similar to yours. These are all things that are in your outline. We’ll talk about three of them. The number one rule that I want you to all walk away with, and this is one of the things inside, is not to write a book until you read this one. This is what I call the A, B, C, and D.

Approach your Book with the Commitment to Doing it right. Anytime you’re getting fatigued in this process and you’re thinking about cutting those corners, call in that high school English pro. I want you to remember A, B, C, D. Am I doing what is right by my book and by myself at the end of the day? Am I tired and need to take a break? Your book is forever. Your name is going on it. It’s a piece of what you’re leaving behind, so do it right and you are committed to doing it right from the very beginning.

 

This is why training like this one and having people like Kris and Juliet and your corner and me like to help steer you along is so important so that you don’t fall into all of those kinds of first-time author or second-time author pitfalls that so many fall into. The second rule that I want you to commit to memory is that your book is your business and you are the CEO. If we think about the departments of a business and what goes into them, they are immediately transferable and equal to what happens in a book. A business has marketing. A book has marketing.

A business has a mission. A business has a financial plan. A book should have one. You should know what you intend to spend time and investment of dollars in before you get going. The biggest thing is that a business has a CEO, the visionary who believes in what they’re doing, understands what they’re doing, understands who they’re trying to reach, the problem they’re trying to solve, and the transformation they want people to have. All of those things are the same for an author. They know who they want to reach, what their problem is, what their vision is, or what the book’s going to do out there in the world for their reader and for themselves.

The Why

Our first piece enters here, and that’s why. There are two reasons I want you to consider, and I want you to ask yourselves. The first why is why this book matters to you, the author. The second is why the book matters to them, the reader. It needs to fulfill both of these things. If you don’t have a crystal clear why as to why you’re doing it and what you want to get out of it on the other side, it’s going to be hard to keep the stamina to get through this whole thing because this is a marathon.

If you don’t understand why it will be relevant to your reader, then something will fall flat in the manuscript and no matter how you publish, it will not do well. You’ve got to keep your reader in mind. Marathon mindset. This is a long-distance run and not a sprint. Some of the things that I want you to be thinking about is I want you to have the end in mind, like right now. Even though you’re all in the beginning stages of developing this book, I want you to be thinking about crossing the finish line. The book’s out in the world. Why are you writing this book?

What is motivating you? What do you hope the book will do for you? What are you willing to do for it? This goes back to something I said earlier about one of those pitfalls, expecting to put the book out into the world and have no effort or participation in promoting it. Wrong answer. Do not pass go, do not collect $200. What are you willing to do for your book as the CEO of this title in order to reach these goals that you have? What are those goals or objectives? Do people need me to repeat the questions again so that you can think about those a little bit later? We are good.

One thing that I feel like I cannot not talk about is ROI. This is important because when people think about their end zone and start thinking about dollars and cents and the return on investment on their book, they get tripped up because they think that the ROI from their book is in sales and sales alone. This means that I sell a book for X dollars, and if I sell that many copies, I will make back my investment over here. They’re thinking of it in a one-to-one ratio. Here’s the thing, though, it’s not a clothesline. It’s not linear.

It’s not. I spent $10,000 on this end, so if I sell X number of books at this amount, I will make the $10,000 back. Number one, that is a very long way to get your return on investment, especially when the average self-published book will sell 250 copies in its lifetime. Not 250,00, 250 full stop. When we think about ROI, we need to think about it more like tangled Christmas lights. Your book is in the center somewhere in there and leads to a variety of different opportunities with money attached that can bring back the revenue. That’s where you get your ROI.

Let me provide an example. Speaking as an example. You want to get on a podcast with big numbers, lots of followers, and lots of people paying attention. That podcast is looking for somebody who has a published book but you don’t have one yet. Once you have the published book, you can apply to that podcast because you’ve fulfilled one of their requirements. They invite you onto the podcast. You now talk about your book in front of the thousands of people who are listening and a portion of those people go and check you out.

It leads to your book page or buy it on Amazon. They now purchase your book. Your book sales are now inflated, not because you did a direct sell to customers, but because you went through a podcast channel to speak to their audience, to get in front of those people, and for those people to actually know about you. It’s this windy loop that might lead to those book sales. A separate example using speaking, you get into a conference to be a keynote speaker. They give you a small stipend to be that speaker. Now you’ve made money off of speaking.

You got the speaking gig because you were able to talk about the fact that you are now a published author. The book has opened the door to the speaking gig. The speaking gig has now paid you. Now, we have a little return on investment because that book exists. Not only are you paid to be the speaker, but you’re also able to sell your book in the conference bookstore. After everybody comes and listens to you talk on stage, they go and buy your book in the bookstore. Not only that, but because you’re able to pitch your services or your course or your product, whatever it is, by hearing you, they now go and check out your website and they start to buy from you over there.

All because the book created the door for you to walk through to get into the conference, to begin with. It’s about your book being the center of a bunch of different revenue-generating opportunities. Not only that, but I also have a book, and now I’m going to sell the book directly to readers. We have to think broader and bigger. In a real-life case scenario for myself, I’ve had more than one person who decided to work with me. After reading Dear Universe, I get it now. $14.99 and then they bought an offer for me that was thousands of dollars. That’s ROI.

Now, did it happen maybe within the first year of publishing Dear Universe? No, but Dear Universe has been out since 2020, and I’ve had multiple people in the last four years sign with me as a result of what they learned about me or the way that I wrote my book. The other piece of this ROI puzzle when you’re thinking about that as a part of your long-term planning is that your ROI might not come back in the same shape that it left. You might spend more money at a faster rate than what you’re making it back in. It’s not book sales or royalty payments that’s going to produce the ROI.

Here’s the other thing about the ROI and people getting it wrong. People assume that they’re going to get back the full retail amount of their book after a sale. My book, Dear Universe, retails for $14.99. Do not write a book is like $34.99 because this thing is a behemoth and it’s hardcover. I only make a portion of that back in a royalty payment because I don’t get my payment until everybody else has gotten theirs. Every press is going to be different in terms of your percentage. What you get all depends on their model and how they do it.

Of course, in the traditional publishing realm, your percentage is teeny tiny because they bought the rights to your book on the front end. The important thing is, when you’re shopping publishers, you’re having those conversations to understand the royalty payment calculation. That’s one question you should always be asking. What is your actual cut after everyone else gets theirs? The bottom line, your ROI is equal to your strategy, effort, and participation. It’s not about uploading your book to Amazon and then watching the people flock to it.

Nobody’s going to know about your book unless you are the spokesperson for it. That’s true of any model. Even in a traditional publishing instance, you are going to have to promote your book. They are not going to do it for you. Another thing on the other side? Your end zone. Another thing to be thinking about on the other side is how you’re going to publish. There are lots of options. Traditional is not the only way to go, and neither is self. There are smaller presses that are still in the traditional marketplace. There are hybrid presses. There are independent presses.

There are self-publishing author concierge services. I mean, there are a myriad of ways to publish your book at this point. I like to say that publishing your book should be based on your goals, your mission, and your vision. That should drive your avenue, not necessarily self-publishing being easy or traditional being the only one that’s reputable, which isn’t actually true anymore. Think about what you’re trying to achieve and then choose the publishing avenue that matches your book’s vision, mission, and goals. You got to know your way around the publishing landscape, and that could take us another hour.

We’re not going to dive in here, but what I would say is since you were all early enough in the process, you have time to think about your options, your paths, and what avenues are there for you. Actually, Do Not Write a Book Until You Read This One, Shameless Plug, covers a variety of different publishing paths and explains the differences, advantages, disadvantages, cost points, and those types of things. I’m going to take a break here for a second. Are there questions about this front end of material like ROI publishing and what to think about in the long run? Juliet.

I was trying to stay muted. One important thing to understand is that when she talks about everybody else getting paid first, the retailers want 55% of the retail price. You’ve got to figure that there’s a big chunk that went right out the door. The cost to print your book, depending on how big it is, what paper you use, and what it is, all costs money. When you’re thinking about what you are going to get from each book, it’s usually two to $4, that’s it. Do you agree with that?

I got a big royalty payment the other day for Dear Universe. It was $10.

I know I probably get about $20 a month, but I have a lot of books. It depends on what’s sold, but it’s what I do with it and the money on the other end because that’s where my ROI is selling stuff. As I said, my ROI has been potential clients. Seeing something in me by reading the book and then wanting to work with me. My ROI has not necessarily come from individual book sales, which is why I always get cracked up when the royalty check comes from Onion River Press. I try to guess how much it is and if they sent me something that’s below two digits because it’s comical.

The Who

I think the first time I got a royalty check, I was excited and then my son was like, but it’s only like $50 or something. That was like right when the book came out and sales were higher and, whatever. I was like, “Honey, when you’re older I’ll explain the whole mathematics here.” I’m still excited. Don’t rain on my parade. The second part of the why. Why does it matter to you? Now, why does it matter to them, your reader? In order to answer this question, we have to understand better who we are writing to.

Now, the reason we’ve got the big pointy finger is not because I want you to join the US Army but because I want you to be thinking about someone specific. Here is where I feel like authors can get into trouble. I’ve heard this time and time again. “What I’m writing about speaks to anyone.” Please never say that. Scott, definitely don’t say this in your query letter to an agent. They will throw you right out immediately. Somebody once said to me that when you try to market to everyone, it’s like trying to sell dog food to cat people.

I never forgot that. Dog food to cat people. Cat people don’t need dog food. They’re not even going to be paying attention. Even though you might think that dog food could be important to your cat because the ingredients may be similar, any pet owner anywhere would want to know about healthy ingredients in their pet food. It doesn’t translate that way. With billions of books being produced every single year and lots of different ways to publish them and put them out into the market, you’re already screaming into a very large crowd.

Not having a very clearly defined reader is only going to hurt you further. I want you to be crystal clear and specific about who you are trying to reach. Know them. I want you to make an avatar. I want you to personify them. I want you to find a picture of who you think you’re trying to speak directly to. Give them a name. Print that picture out. Put it in your writing station and every time you sit down to write, speak directly to them. It will come through in your writing when exactly who you’re trying to reach.

With billions of books published annually and countless options flooding the market, it’s crucial to stand out. A clearly defined reader is your key to cutting through the noise. Share on X

Now, Andy, this is where I think this is helpful to you. When you can clearly identify who you want to get your health and fitness protocol or method or perspective, whatever it is, but you also want to use that humor, then something about your ideal reader is going to want somebody with humor. I want you to think about somebody who you make constantly laugh with that beautiful sense of humor. Think about why I feel comfortable being funny with them. How do I come across?

What’s the situation around which I’m feeling like I can be that type of person that gets me a little bit out of my analytical shell? I want you to like to imagine that context and scenario when you sit down to write to try to unlock and crack open some of that natural you to get it onto the page. If there’s like a particular setting. Let’s say you always feel laid back and you hang out with this friend, like at a particular bar, go right in the bar. I know that sounds strange. Probably not a lot of people are bringing a laptop to a bar.

What I would encourage you to do is break down some of the defenses that are having you write a little bit more stiffly to get to Andy. Underneath all of that, who is this funny, humorous guy? I want you to think about mostly the psychographics of your reader. Less geographic location, less age, and socioeconomic status. Those things can be informative, but for me, I think it’s the psychographics that are where you want to spend your time and develop your avatar.

What’s keeping them up at night, which might indicate why they want or need your book? That’s a little bit pain point marketing. The other way to look at this is what transformation, aspiration, or desire do they have that your book could fulfill or touch on. Andy, like in the health and wellness space. If they desire, let’s say, a beach body without having to join the body movement and pay thousands of dollars, then you might hit on like, “I can get you there.” You might think about what exactly the block or barrier to that transformation is, but then work on how to hit on the aspirations, not the barriers.

Think about what you know, and only you can tell them. Scott, this might be a little bit something for you to think about. You were talking about whether or not you’ve got the right hook. You have this inside track, you worked in this area for ten years, you couldn’t prevent the thing from happening. Beyond that, you’ve got knowledge that nobody else has and a perspective on this thing that nobody else has, play around with that. There might be your hook in there, indicating who cares about your story. That’s where you want to be focusing.

The What

Who cares and why would they care? Why do they care about the body, health, and fitness? Why do they care about this institutional mishap? When you know what they care about, what’s keeping them up at night, what transformation they’re seeking, what aspirations they’re reaching for, what results they want, and what they want to learn about, it informs your what. The promise of your book. This is why I remember saying how your who, what, and why are like: they’re interacting, and they’re dynamic.

It’s not like, you figure out one piece and then you move on to the other like they all relate to one another. The more that you know about who you are, what’s troubling them, what’s keeping them up at night, and what they want, the more you can dial in on the promise. That promise needs to be specific. It’s not that there cannot be multiple results that they get out of reading your book, but if you were going to hang your hat on one central focus, what is it? What’s it going to be? This is also why I think it’s not serving or helpful to an author to sit down and write without thinking about these things because then you’re like, you could say all kinds of stuff because you’ve all lived full lives.

You have a myriad of experiences. You might’ve been in your industry for decades. If you don’t know what you’re driving at, you could sit there and you could be inflating this manuscript with all kinds of nonsense that nobody cares about. Get clear as much as you can. Now, some things that you can think about beyond, like the reader’s struggle, what’s keeping them up at night. You could think about if you’re already in a space where you’re serving clients and the book comes with, what you’re already doing in the world.

Think about how you speak to your ideal clients. Think about their pain points. Think about what you provide to your clients that they’re always talking about that they love. Some solution of yours or process that you give them that they’re always raving about. There could be a clue to your promise in there. If there’s something in your industry or field that people are getting wrong or that you have a different approach or perspective on, that might be your unique angle, and there might be a clue to your promise in that. If you have your own framework or methodology that’s gotten results, maybe there’s something in there that you can focus on.

Now, the thing that I will say about any and all of these. A framework or methodology is something that other people are getting wrong in the industry or field. It could be multiple things, like the size of a mountain. The more you put into your book, the bigger your book gets and the less focused it will become. Consider your book the appetizer platter. Not the 10-course meal. Give them a bite-sized portion of what you know. Let them digest it. Let them get a quick hit, a quick win. Bring them back for more so that you can keep it self-contained. Kris or Juliet, do you want to say anything about the promised piece? I know that this is important that you agree with that.

The more you put into your book, the bigger it gets, but the less focused it will become. Share on X

The promise of the big juicy promise in the book. You better live up to it because that’s why people bought the book. Lose it. You don’t want your back cover blurb to promote a promise, and then you don’t want to deliver it on the inside.

That big promise, one big promise per book. Don’t try to attack everything that you know about it in one in one book. One big promise, deliver on it. If you have another big promise, do a second book. One per book.

What do you want them to get their hands around by the time they’re done reading? That’s where you’re focusing. That’s where you want to put the ball, put the ball in their hands. What are they holding by the time they’re done? You could think about what you’re going to teach them. You could think about what action or transformation you will inspire. You can also consider what’s going into the book when you’re thinking about your book long-term, and you can consider the things that are going to elevate that message.

What other materials might be in there? Are you going to provide reflective questions, charts, graphs, to-do lists, research, and study from other places that help illustrate your point? Scott, this might look like pulling in clips from newspaper articles that touched on the issue, but in a very bias-contained way when you’ve got more of the story. When you’re thinking about your what, you can also be thinking about the ancillary things that help promote the promise and bring the promise into clearer focus within the book.

Those are things that you can identify in your outline as well. The various pieces that are going to help you. This all leads back to why this book matters to them. When you can understand the problem they have or the aspiration or what you want to teach, and what they need to know, you can figure out why it would be relevant for them to pick up this book. Now, the thing that maybe I haven’t made explicit or obvious is that I will say this now. We’ve been talking about the who, what, and why in terms of you actually writing and developing the manuscript.

The who, what, and why also drive your marketing, your promotion, your platform, and how you converse about the book on the other side. These are not like strong foundational elements from the perspective of good manuscript development. These are things that one must know for the entire life cycle of your book. They are never going to be outdated. It’s like they are your North Star. I guess that is my question.

Open Discussion

I want to leave it up to questions. I’m going to put a couple of things on here for people to have, but I want to open it up to dialogue and conversation and hit Scott and Andy and Alida, where you’re at. New things are coming up for you, or we can dive further into your particular challenges if you have specific questions.

Ally, I’d like to add something. Going back to the outline thing. One of the things that, and Scott, I heard you saying this, is, “If you lock yourself into editing before you’ve written the big picture, that will stall you out.” What’s happening is you’re focusing on one little piece and self-editing yourself and you’re blocking.

For the outline, if you have a general outline to start, give yourself permission to be a little vague if you have to at certain points and know that it will come together as you start to write and you love this chapter. It’s awesome, but this one isn’t working. It’s okay to let that one go, save it for another book, and then tweak your outline a little bit and flow with it. Don’t edit until after you’ve got a first draft. I think this part sucks, but I’m going to keep going anyway.

Ironically, Kris, I think my article in Breakthrough Author Magazine, this past issue, is about that very thing. It’s like stalling out on the first words or first chapters because you’re constantly in revising mode or getting too far down into the weeds instead of getting the whole draft done first. Now, with Scott putting together a proposal with nonfiction, they’re not necessarily going to need the entire manuscript, but they’re going to need some portion of the manuscript.

It would focus more on whatever subset of chapters or materials they need to be compelling enough for them to pay attention. You’re still going to need a higher-level approach to the book within that proposal. Even your chapter abstracts, though they are necessary for your proposal, need to be somewhat contained and not give away too many details because they won’t read. Beyond that, though, you want your proposal to be well-fashioned because what you determine in the proposal is going to help you write a succinct and snappy query letter.

You have to win the query letter hurdle first so that agents will even request the rest of the proposal, unless of course, you find an agent who wants the query letter with the proposal and then you’ll have to go that way. Be sure you’re looking at what the agent specifically wants and do it exactly the way they are requesting it because that’s one of their top easy ways to rule people out when people don’t follow basic instructions. Follow each agent that you find like right to the T.

I like that one. All the thumbs-ups, I’ve never seen that. Is that like a new Zoom thing? My Zoom looks totally different like they updated the look and everything. I was like, perfect. The day that I’m going to give free training, I probably won’t be able to find anything because they’ve changed it when I think that I’m finally figuring it out. Alida, I want to check in with you. Do you feel you’ve got some new ways to jumpstart yourself back into writing once the grand kiddo is off this fall?

I want to thank you tremendously. I have done nothing over the last year, but say later, it’s not time. I’ve only felt that in the last couple of weeks after vacation, which is lovely. I am getting ready to start again. I’m thinking, as I mentioned before, about August when Ashley goes off to college. Now, what you’ve primed my pump with is an amazing, different look as I’ve looked at my book before. I’ve always known as I’ve been writing it, but I believe the reader would want to get out of it.

I’ve had that thought, but you’ve inspired me to take what I’ve written tons of notes, to take what you’ve given me, and write more succinct notes. One of the first things I know I need to do is get familiar with what I’ve written. I literally, it’s sitting right here on the floor behind me. It’s not far away, and the cover of the book is right here. I have the cover. It’s like, I am ready to reread what I wrote. That’s going to take a while because I’ve written quite a bit. Remember the structure. Remember my outline. Remember all that was there.

I feel like it will awaken better. You’ve given me some tools, thoughts, and processes to use while rereading my book. To see what’s there and what do I need to add. As I’ve been writing it, I’ve always felt that I’m hitting a home run. I’ve had that feeling that I have something to say, teach, and share, and the people, the readers, are ready for this, but I want to prove that to be true. What you’ve shared, thank you so much, is very inspiring to me to get started.

You’re so welcome. I’m going to give you an exercise to do while you’re reading. Do you like Post-It notes?

Yeah, I have them right here. I have a drawer full of them.

Perfect. Do you have four colors? As you’re reading, what I want you to do is pick a color for who, pick a color for what, pick a color for why, and pick a color for new questions that you need to reflect on. As you read, if you hit on something that seems to speak to your who, what, or why, write it down in a Post-It note and file the Post-It note away. Post-it note every single time. I want you to have a whole library collection of Post-It notes by the time you’re done reading through your entire manuscript.

Go back and look for patterns and trends. If you have a stack of Post-It notes that are all about who you are, and the same seven things keep coming up, that’s a clue about your reader because you kept writing it and kept coming up top of mind. Read with your stack of Post-It notes, and start capturing your who, what, and why. Look for patterns and trends afterwards and then go back to the stack of questions separately to say, “What new things do I now need to wrestle with after looking at my manuscript with fresh eyes?”

Love it. I love processes like that. That fits me.

That would be helpful for you, too. I would help you too.

Thank you, Andy.

Thank you.

Wrap-Up

Are we ready to wrap this up? This is a long episode, but well worth it. Thank you guys so much. Go over and check out The Write Place, The Right Time, and see if you can get some tips and help over there. Ally, thank you so much. I’ll see all of you guys soon.

 

Important Links

• AI Author Academy
• Chat With Juliet
• Ally Berthiaume
• Dear Universe, I Get It Now: Letters on the Art and Journey of Being Brave and Being Me
• Do Not Write a Book…Until You Read This One
• Write Place, Right Time

 

About Ally Berthiaume

Alyssa Berthiaume (usually known as Ally, but published under A.Y.) is the founder of The Write Place, Right Time, her virtual boutique of book coaching and ghostwriting services. Berthiaume serves leaders, entrepreneurs, and visionaries across North America and Europe in writing the books that will light up their world and ours. Berthiaume is also the award-winning author of Dear Universe, I Get it Now: Letters on the Art and Journey of Being Brave and Being Me and the co-author of Do Not Write a Book…Until You Read This one.