The Exchanges

Q And so, you Is there a reason, tell us, I'm sure there's, if you were looking at financials, you might self-publish, but maybe influence, you get a publisher. How do you make the decision between each?

A Yeah, I mean, great question. We could probably do an entire, you know, podcast all on that. Um, so I'm trying to be, be concise here. I would say there are pros and cons. Um, it's not necessarily the case that it is financially better to self-publish. Um, like I, I do make a good living with my books and I've been able to do that, you know, working with a traditional publisher. Maybe one benefit that a lot of people don't think about Is a big publisher has relationships with international publishers all over the world. Uh, so I've been fortunate to see my books go out in more than 30 languages so far. Um, there's no way in the world I could manage that process myself, you know, so a major publisher has relationships with sub-agents, other publishers, they do the translation, they put those out. Not every one of those has been a huge bestseller, of course, um, but some of them have. And so it's great that now I have like this really active community in Japan Or in Brazil, or somewhere else that's actually consuming my content in their native language, I would never be able to replicate that on my own.

AI assessment note: “it's not necessarily the case that it is financially better to self-publish”

Q like these packages, which are like bonus packages. They throw in digital products, et cetera. But then those usually go through like Shopify or Gumroad, which I imagine don't actually count towards Amazon ranking. So how do you, like when you email your list and you say, go here to buy, do you put them to Amazon to grow your ranking or do you put them through the Gumroad checkout?

A Yeah. Great question. Um, it depends on what stage we're in with the book publication process. So before the book comes out, um, I take all the orders myself. I'm actually using Gumroad, but I've used like one shopping cart or whatever before. Um, take all the orders myself. Once the book is out, then I'm going to send them directly to other retailers. And the reason I do that is because before the book comes out, I definitely want to, to maintain as much control over my pre-orders as possible. Um, if it's just going through Amazon, I don't necessarily know what the numbers are. I mean, you can look and see the rank, but that's kind of a deceptive Figure. It really depends on what else is selling and all kinds of other factors. So, uh, before the book comes out, I've got this, you know, pre-order strategy where I want to make sure I have as many as possible. Then once it's out, it's all about the momentum of, uh, pushing it through whatever channel people want to buy from.

AI assessment note: “It depends on what stage we're in with the book publication process.”

Q Very cool. Okay. Let's talk, before we get to my favorite part of the show, let's talk again, born for this. So, uh, you must've had an inkling, something hit your brain a while ago that really got you excited about putting this book together. What was it?

A Yep. Uh, so you mentioned community, like community is kind of what it's all about for me. And I have this, this great community all over the world. Um, kept hearing all these interesting stories of people, uh, maybe like yourself, I don't know, but people who said like, I have a dream job. Like I'm doing exactly what I want to do. I feel very fortunate. Uh, I would go to work even if I didn't get paid, but I do get paid. So that's great. You know, they often talk about winning the career lottery. Like, I feel like I won a career lottery, either if it's a job in a company or an organization, or if it's something that they've created for themselves as an entrepreneur. So I wanted to understand like, what was that process? Um, not just from like an anthropologist, Anthropological or a journalistic perspective, but how can, how can the reader, you know, do this? How can people find the work they were meant to do? Like, I really do believe there is something that each of us are meant to do. So is there a way that we can not just mysteriously like come upon that at some point in our lives? Um, but what are the active steps we could take, um, to get closer to something that we really love to do, um, that is sustainable and makes a good living and allows us to do something that we're really good at.

AI assessment note: “kept hearing all these interesting stories of people... who said like, I have a dream job.”

Q before we get into Born for this, help me understand, I mean, based off your Instagram feed, your Twitter feed, etc., you have created a life where you have full control and full freedom. But Chris, people always tell me, they go, why the heck would you want to be an author? They make, like, no money, and they're broke, even if they write great content. How would you respond?

A I mean, I totally disagree, you know, respectfully. Uh, respectfully. So first of all, it's not something you should do if, if you don't want to, you know, like, but for me, books were always special to me. I grew up reading books and I love online content too. That's great. You know, I've been a big fan of Twitter since the beginning, but I guess when I, when I was a kid, I could think of books I read that kind of impacted my life for the better. And I couldn't really think of any tweets that changed my life. You know what I mean? Like reading, you know, a 140 characters. It's awesome. But like, uh, I guess I'm interested in going deeper. And like I said, I have been able to be successful, you know, You know, with it. So I'm not an evangelist that says every listener here should go out and write a book. Um, but I would say, you know, don't just listen to what everybody else is telling you. And so if you hear everybody that says, oh, first of all, you can't make money writing books. That's not true. Second of all, you know, you have to self publish if you want to make money. Also not true. So just, you know, just be aware that there's usually more than one way. So it's important to be clear on your own goals and then pursue that for yourself.

AI assessment note: “if you hear everybody that says... you can't make money writing books. That's not true.”

Q And you, you've obviously do a great job at community building based off your following. In terms of your ability to convert the Following a social media and book readers into an actual email list, which is like a direct telephone line, obviously, to your community. How successful have you been doing that? What size is your email list or community at this point?

A Sure, sure. Well, success is always relative, right? Because like anything in life, there's always somebody, you know, with more money, younger, prettier, sexier, whatever. But, uh, I guess the current email address, email list, I have a few different ones, but maybe a 100,000, a 130,000, depending on How do you count them? I mean, so it's like, yes, better than some people, but then you probably talk to folks who are like, I got three million people on my email list, you know? So I guess, I guess I just try to keep my eyes on the prize. It's not so much about, you know, comparing yourself. I think that's always a really difficult thing. Um, I'm trying to do a good job serving the community that I have.

AI assessment note: “current email address, email list, I have a few different ones, but maybe a 100,000”

Q So give me an example of a relationship you'd invested in over years and years and years. It's two weeks before pre-orders open. You email this friend. What does the email say?

A Um, what does the email say? Well, since it is my friend, I was probably like, Hey dude, you know, rather than like, Hey, so-and-so it's like, Hey, but you know, cause I'm kind of casual. So it's like, Hey dude, got this thing coming out. You know, if you believe in it, if it's a good fit, can you, can you help me out? Uh, and then they might say, okay, cool. Like, what do you need? And it usually helps to have a really specific ask. And sometimes, you know, if I'm not sure what to ask, I will just say, I like, I'll be like, I'll leave it in your hands because you know, your audience, you know, your community, um, Um, you know, people will respond based on the tone, the voice that you use. Um, so if you feel comfortable helping me out, please do so. You know, otherwise, no worries. And I do that a lot over and over. As I said, it's a two-way process. I try to do it for other people too. Um, but I try to kind of focus all these efforts around a specific time. Maybe that's another thing, um, as opposed to just like lots of stuff going out all at once. I kind of tend to save stuff for this two to four week period when the book is first out because That has a huge impact on what comes next. If your book does well in those first few weeks, uh, has a much greater chance of continuing to do well, uh, as opposed to just kind of dying away, like, like what happens with a lot of books, u…

AI assessment note: “Hey dude, got this thing coming out. You know, if you believe in it”