Signing and Speaking in Seattle!

I love my life. I get to travel, ride motorcycles and meet great people for a living! If you’re in the Seattle area the first week of April, please get in touch. I’d love to grab a cuppa and hear YOUR story.

Signing books and riding motorcycles

On Friday, March 30 I’ll hit Seattle at 11am and be signing books at South Sound BMW by noon!

The South Sound team has asked me to stay until 2pm or until the throngs (ha!) disperse.

You know how much I love the Roundel, right? Well, I’ll be riding a F650GS around Seattle for five days thanks to TourUSA Motorcycle Rentals. I’ve ridden the F650GS before and look forward to its responsiveness in metro traffic. The only version of the GS line I absolutely cannot ride is the F800–I can’t even get my leg high enough to swing it over the seat!

East Coasters, if you want to ride the Pacific Northwest but don’t have time to ride all the way out there, consider renting from TourUSA and tell them I sent ya.

Saturday, March 31

I’ll be learning how to “ride like a cop” on a big CHiPs bike at Northwest Motorcycle School. I’ve never had a desire to OWN a big honking bike, but I’m looking forward to learning how to operate one (in a bucket-list kind of way).

I’ll be joined by two or three of my fellow Conga riders — that alone will make it fun for the spectators! I’ll bring the helmet cam. This school runs rain or shine, and as I’ve learned before, rain adds a layer of complexity to the learning experience; but I agree with the old saw that smooth seas do not make skillful sailors.

Tuesday, April 3 at Seattle Cancer Care Alliance

When I visited Seattle a couple of months ago, the managers of Seattle Cancer Care Alliance’s cancer speciality store, Shine, fell in love with Live Full Throttle. They asked me to come back to sign books and speak to the patients staying in the SCCA House and the SCCA patient education department asked my Conga sis, Karen (pictured left), to team up with me for a evening presentation open to the entire community.

We have plans to razzle dazzle ‘em when we’re there April 3. We’ll start with a book signing/mix-&-mingle from 4-6pm and continue upstairs for the “formal” presentation from 6:30-8pm. Both events are free and we’d be delighted to speak to a full house! SCCA is at 207 Pontius Ave. North, Suite 101, Seattle.

Karen’s story

Karen cracking up in Shell, WY 2011

Karen’s got such a great story to tell–if you have a copy of Live Full Throttle, her story is in Lesson Four: You’re Terminal Too, Embrace It. Here’s an excerpt:

Given an eight-year prognosis, Karen says that while you can rail against it, pout, whine, deny, and try every new treatment, the real choice is whether you face cancer as a victim or a survivor. In the words of a true Pacific Northwesterner she resolved, “I’m not dead yet; I’m going to pilot this.” She doesn’t tell people she’s sick, “I’m no different than anyone else, I just have cancer.”

Karen had always wanted to learn how to drive a motorcycle but put it off because she was afraid she’d really love it and would therefore have to “do something about it.” She was right. I met her during our 2010 Conga, when she had been riding just a little over a year. By the time we met again in 2011 she was one of very few to pass a grueling motorcycle course designed by law enforcement officers to help civilians drive like cops.

If you’ve ever wanted to learn how to live life with a gift you never wanted, Karen’s got an inspirational message for you!

I’m hoping to get time with the good folks at Gilda’s Club, Cancer Lifeline, American Cancer Society Breast Cancer Resource Center, and a couple of Meetup groups while I’m in Seattle. Please let me know if there’s someone else in the area I need to know, ok?

Book Tour: SoCal to Seattle

After a great book debut at Dilworth Billiards in North Carolina 12/8, I jumped on a flight the next morning for the West Coast to promote “Live Full Throttle” in cities where the International Motorcycle Show is touring.

Long Beach

Southern California was my first stop, and the show in Long Beach is one of the largest on the tour because so many companies have a presence in SoCal.

In addition to signing books and finding distributors for it, I met social media friends for the first time in real life (including moto-journalist Adam Mercado, aka @LeanAngles) shown here.

I saw several marvelous bikes in the “Dream Pavilion”including the Moto Guzzi v7 Racer, which made me swoon a little. I love the looks of a classic bike and of course the Italians are wonderful designers. My friend Neale Bayly, a moto-journalist, tells me it’s a sweet ride too.

Friday night I signed books at Yellow Devil Gear Exchange just a mile from the show. Yellow Devil has a terrific concept–a motorcycle swap and consignment shop with some brand new merchandise sprinkled in for good measure. You can find everything from helmets to racing suits and vintage “motorabelia” like  posters and key chains.

San Francisco

After a quick flight up the coast Sunday night, I spent Monday with photographer Christina Shook, who collaborated with me on Live Full Throttle. We brainstormed book marketing while getting pedicures in Orinda (eat your heart out corporate marketing drones in your gopher cubes!).  Later that night, over bowls of chili with friends, I rehearsed my book tour presentation. Thanks to their feedback and suggestions, the reception it got in Portland and Seattle at the end of the week was unanimously positive.

Motorcycle Gear Shopping

In an effort to improve my “big city” commuter skills I took BART (the train) from Christina’s to San Francisco’s Mission District, where I ate breakfast at the terribly-named but deliciously-stocked Pork Store with my friend Joanne Donn (aka @GearChic). Fortunately I didn’t have to make any transfers in my commutes. A lesson for another day.

Joanne then helped me find new Rev’It motorcycle pants at Scuderia West, also in the Mission District. What a treat, having a personal shopper! She knew which brands offer the functionality I need in cuts for my “American” proportions and emphasized the importance of proper fit. It  hadn’t really occurred to me how dangerous my now-baggy gear had become (I’ve lost weight since I bought the gear in 2010), but skid pads slide away from the areas you want to protect when baggy gear meets the pavement. Ouch.

Marin County Cancer Institute

The next day was spent with friends across the bay in Novato, who took me to the Marin County Cancer Insitute, where one of them is being treated for breast cancer. I learned that Marin County is a breast cancer “hot spot,”  which means the incidence of breast cancer per capita is extremely high.

After touring the Institute, I met Cancer Resource Specialist Diane Brandon (pictured right), who enthusiastically placed a copy of “Live Full Throttle” in the resource center and introduced me to the gift shop team, recommending the book for sale there.   I fully expect to see the book in the gift shop soon!

Portland

Another quick flight brought me to Portland, where I signed books at Latus Motors, a Harley-Davidson dealership. My dear friend Nadine, who put me up at her farm and arranged the signing with Latus, ordered cupcakes with pink frosting ribbons from Safeway and we were both surprised when she picked up this cupcake cake instead. I’ve never seen so much frosting in my life!

Latus has a strong community of riders and in spite of rain and cold the week before Christmas, about 20 of them turned out to hear me talk about the Conga rides I’ve taken over the last two summers and the story behind “Live Full Throttle.” As with Long Beach, many of them were social media friends that I was happy to hug in the flesh.

New Friends Facing Cancer

In the middle of my talk, one woman dashed in with fresh news that a neighbor had just that day been diagnosed with cancer and asked me to quickly sign a book so that she could take it to him.

As often happens, one woman bought two books, one for herself and another for her sister.  She had breast cancer a few years ago and her sister has a recent diagnosis.

An oncology nurse, whose father has cancer, surprised herself by crying during my talk. She thanked me for putting her in touch with feelings that her profession has caused her to sometimes repress.

On an upbeat note, I also met a wish grantor for “Make A Wish”  and learned about the training and screening processes she went through to make wishes come true for children with life-threatening illnesses.

I’m grateful for the people and stories that keep coming into and blessing my life. As I’ve said before, motorcycling brought me to the cancer community quite unexpectedly.  I’m here for a reason that is not clear to me just yet, and trust that I can be a channel for good as I continue walking this path.

Seattle

I love traveling by train, so I was delighted to learn that for $51 I could travel from Portland to Seattle on Amtrak’s Cascades line. Here’s a picture from the dining car.

Continuing my big-city commuter education, I jumped on a city bus instead of renting a car or hiring a cab to get to the apartment I had rented in the Lakeside area of Seattle. I find mass transportation to be sooooo convenient (and cheap). I wish my city, Charlotte, had a more complete system. We have a meager bus service and a tiny line of light rail. That’s it. I digress.

Speaking at the International Motorcycle Show

Saturday morning I opened the show with a talk on recommendations  for newbie riders. After all, three months after I passed my licensing course last year I set off on a coast-to-coast journey, and repeated it this year, returning unschathed both times.

Since these trips involved fundraising with my Conga friends, I talked about traveling with a pink bra strapped across my bike’s windshield and gave some of the back story of “Live Full Throttle.” One of the women in the audience burst into tears when I told this story, then returned several minutes later to finish hearing what I had to say. Since she didn’t approach me, I am unsure what provoked her tears, but I bet was related to cancer.

West Coast Book Tour Schedule, December 2011

Thanks to everyone who came out to Live Full Throttle’s debut at Dilworth Billiards. Great pictures here by my friend Terry Pittman.

The next morning I jumped on a plane for my West Coast tour. Please find me and introduce yourself!

Friday, December 9, Yellow Devil Gear Exchange signing books from 6-8

Saturday and Sunday, December 10-11 International Motorcycle Show (IMS), Long Beach with the WRAPTER booth

Thursday, December 15, Latus Motors  4:00-6:00 pm (870 E. Berkeley St., Gladson, OR) (Portland area)

Saturday, December 17, IMS Seattle 10:30 am  (Convention Center)

Saturday, December 17 at Ride West BMW 2:00-4:00pm  (8100 Lake City Way NE, Seattle, WA)

Self-Publishing: Book Prototype for Publicity and Advance Sales

So far we’ve talked about the need to hire a book designer and editor. I took the step of developing a prototype for Live Full Throttle: Life Lessons From Friends Who Faced Cancer.  Mine is in a PDF and included the cover, introduction and first chapter, but you could include less. You’ll see that I used the Flash capabilities of Scribd to embed it here.

Intro and First Chapter of Live Full Throttle: Life Lessons From Friends Who Faced Cancer

Nine ways to use your book prototype

• Send it to possible reviewers to see if they’d like to provide a blurb
• Include a link to it in your social-media and traditional press releases
• Query with it for interviews with podcasters, bloggers, radio, TV and other media
• Post it on your social media outlets to build buzz (including LinkedIn). While we’re talking about social media, listing it on Scribd will help it gain a wider audience and Scribd provides great statistics on readcasts.
• Get your book listed in catalogs by the time it’s in print. For example, there are motorcycle accessories companies that carry books and I’m using prototype to go through their screening process before they’ll  include it in their inventories
• Want to speak at a conference?  Most will ask if you’ve published a book. Send a link to the prototype with your speaker/panelist proposal
• Going on tour? Send it to interested groups to get on their calendar by the time the book is back from the printer
• Send it to professional magazines/journals for possible syndication
• Use it to generate advance sales (speaking of which, you can do that today!)

Lessons from the Road

Helmet time often produces deep thought. On my motorcycle for 40 days this summer, I had a lot of helmet time. Among other things, I pondered relationships, physics, environmental economics, disease, mortality and the direction I want to take my life.

Fear as a motivator

I thought about the role of fear in our lives and how it seems to motivate people more than anything else. Americans seem to particularly fear failure.  Surrounded by crumbling institutions, people are living their lives as if there’s no margin for error.

I almost took my life after a business that I owned failed and took down family and friends financially. A lot of people can relate to that experience, sadly. I’ve drained the dregs of failure’s cup and have decided to move onto a different beverage.

During my 9559 miles of summer I thought about my life’s lessons and how easily I could contextualize them with motorcycling metaphors. Helmet time has that effect on me. Here’s a start:

• Lean in, lean out: Techniques used to control the motorcycle also apply to life
• Everything wobbles:  But a wobble doesn’t inevitably lead to a spill
• Blind corners abound: Ride your best ride and take uncertainty as it comes
• Exploit the detours: They’re usually providential
• Embrace the switchbacks: The safest way to the mountaintop isn’t the shortest

Taking those lessons on the road

People are fascinated by motorcycle travel, especially when undertaken by someone who breaks their stereotypes of who’s a biker. In the last year I’ve been asked to speak to business and community groups and been interviewed for newspapers, radio and television. Thanks to helmet time I’ve decided to reach out with the lessons I’ve learned in a more proactive manner, through a book, keynotes and presentations. Here’s who I’m reaching out to:

In Search of a Sugar Daddy Publisher

When I talk to prospective authors about their publishing plans very few know what they’re up against trying to get a traditional publisher to fund their project. That’s how you should think of it — funding the project.

Before an aspiring author settles into a daydream of how to spend all that advance money and how lavish her book launch party will be, she needs a dose of reality on the  economics of publishing from the publisher’s perspective.

A Fantasy Scenario

A publisher takes care of several things, pre-press activities, printing and distribution. Promoting the book is almost always the author’s responsibility.

Printing Press by Digitalholgi on Flickr

Pre-press costs

Let’s engage in fantasy and say the book is so well written it only needs copy editing before it’s ready to be designed and sent off to the printer — that’s a quantum leap but we’ll take it.

A quick search through self-publishing price charts gives you a sense of cost to get the book to the printer, including covers, page setup, copy editing ISBN number, bar code, etc.  Let’s pretend $4000 is a reasonable estimate to get the book ready to go to the printer.

Printing costs

The cost to print each book is a volume game. Createspace has a handy calculator that shows your cost at about $2200 for a run of 1000 softcover copies of your 100-page book.  Sure, you can get printing at better prices, but this is close enough for Fantasy Land.

So far, without your publisher paying you anything for the time and effort to write the book (much less the cost to pay someone to write it for you), you’re looking at $6200 to produce 1000 books including pre-press and printing.

Distribution costs

Distribution is a hefty expense.  The distributor will charge $500 to establish an account for your book, plus a monthly fee and storage charge for warehousing your book. Then, they’ll take a chunk out of the retail price of each book to handle shipping, selling it to retailers, collecting money, etc.

When you add distribution charges, you’ve got an $8000 project for sure WITHOUT paying anything to promote it. Can you move 1000 books to your network without a promotions budget?

An easier way to make a living

Selling 1000 books means your publisher will have to price the book at $20 to make $12,000 gross. Because this is a fantasy, let’s say you took no advance to write the book and negotiated 30% royalty on sales. Congratulations, you and your publisher just scored $6000 each.

Let’s be honest, there’s an easier way to make a living.

You say you want an advance to write your book?  Even just a trifle? Let’s do the math with a $10,000 advance and the same 1000 book run.  Do you know 1000 people who are going to pay $30 for your book?  Hold on before you answer. Mark Twain’s 760-page autobiography was priced at $34.95 retail.  Oh well, since we’re in fantasy land let’s say you sell all 1000 copies at $30.  Your lucky publisher can hope to make $12,000 and you’re not going to make any royalties on top of the advance.

Yep, there are lots of easier ways to make a living for both you AND the publisher.

Are you writing a book to make a profit or to meet some other goal(s)?

Skinny profits mean the publisher’s’ most important concern is the author’s ability to SELL the book. The business professionals I work with can usually sell 1000 books to their built-in audience, more if they can sell them at speaking engagements, but even small publishers will need to sell more than 1000 books to make it worth their while.

Of course profiting on the sale of your books isn’t the only reason to write them. This post will help you think through your goals.

Bottom line for aspiring business authors:  self-publishing is probably going to be more profitable, provided you can FUND THE PROJECT. If you need help with funding, you could always sell “shares” in the book or sell advertising or licensing rights. There are several creative ways to fund it without involving a publisher.

Case Study: My Social Media Road Trip

I had the opportunity to debrief the Business Sorority of NC on the vital role that social media played in my 2010 road trip. I used Twitter, Facebook Pages, Vimeo, Flickr, and my travel blog to:

• raise money for my expenses and  the National Breast Cancer Foundation
• get news stories in four states during my trip and hours of local coverage
• find co-riders throughout my trip
• earn sponsorships from Caribou Coffee, AAA and BMW

I asked how many of the Business Sorority members used the same tools for their businesses and was surprised how many used Facebook and how few used a blog; here’s the final tally:

• Twitter used by 10%
• Facebook Pages used by 90%
• Video by 5%
• Photos  by 0%
• Blog by 30%

The most important social media tool

In the Q&A one woman asked which I felt was the MOST useful/important of these applications.  I answered using the Swiss Army Knife example — in social media you’ll use a couple of the tools more than the others, but when you really need that tooth pick/Tweet, you really need it.

For example, when I reached Bend, Oregon (my westernmost destination) I wanted my hometown NBC affiliate to take the feed from the Oregon station and run it in the Charlotte market so I tweeted asking if anyone had a connection to WCNC. Sure enough! While WCNC didn’t get the feed from Oregon, they did three times more than that: they covered my arrival home, featured a live interview with me on their morning show and used footage from my arrival and interviews in a feature story about women motorcyclists.

YEAH, that’s the power of  the right tool at the time!

Start with a blog and Facebook page

While YMMV (your mileage may vary) from project to project, I think you’re best served to start with a combination of  a blog and Facebook (FB). The blog is your hub and the only asset you truly own. Any of the free online apps can change their terms of service on a moment’s notice, making you vulnerable to losing data or functionality at best and money at worst.  For the 90% of Business Sorority members using FB, for example, I asked what would happen if FB decided it was only going to keep the last 3 months of updates?  There is no satisfactory answer to the question if you don’t have a blog.

Why Facebook over Twitter? Notwithstanding my success with Twitter, if you’re a beginning social media user, it’s easier to use and a critical mass of most everyone’s friends and business associates are already using it. The key is to place content in your blog FIRST and then link to it from your FB page. That’s not to say you shouldn’t upload videos or pictures to FB, just store them on your blog for safekeeping.

The versatile  blog

I use a WordPress theme on my own url (not the free one on the WordPress site). Unlike FB or Twitter, a blog lets me write posts of unlimited length  and insert multiple graphics, videos and sound files in each. Facebook allows you to embed ONE thing and with Twitter you can only insert links.  I drive traffic to my blog using all the other apps but also send traffic out to those apps via widgets.  Take a look at my home page for example, where you can follow my tweets, watch my recent Vimeo videos and connect to my other social media outlets.

If you want to know more, reach out to me or Andy Ciordia, the impresario who makes everything I do online possible.

I’m Baaaaaack! Watch Me Tell the Tale

I feel like a kid on the first day of school telling my classmates what I did on my summer vacation!

I think most of my regular readers also follow me on Twitter or Facebook, but for the record, I traveled across 20 states with a pink bra strapped across the windshield of my motorcycle to raise awareness and money for breast cancer research.  Along the way I interviewed financial traders for a book I’m co-authoring with Matt Davio called “Tradeoffs: Leveraging the Longs & Shorts of Life.”

Up to speed

The last time I spoke of my trip here I didn’t have a motorcycle and hadn’t completed my training. Happily, I’m now the owner of a BMW G650 GS that carried me 7500 miles across the country without incident!

I posted a series of videos on my travel blog from a breast cancer fundraising event in Charlotte, NC this month.  If you watch the entire series you’ll learn the basics: how I prepared, what I saw and did along the way, lessons learned and how advances in treating breast cancer have benefited other cancers.  Here’s the first segment; the rest are available on the road trip site.

Let’s talk about the presentation

If you set aside the obvious things like the audience being seated to the side of the screen and other items of ambiance outside my control,  my performance illustrates a few things I’ve been preaching about here on the blog for a while.

Zen slide design

Sometimes I have the advantage of working with a talented designer like Andy Ciordia, but when I have to go it alone (which was the case this time), I do my best to employ Garr Reynolds’ advice about structuring and designing a presentation.

Oh, and if you need a speaker for your next event, please think of me. I can talk about my travels, breast cancer, or how I used social media to promote the trip and garner media coverage.

Social Media: Ethics & Best Practices for Attorneys

Like financial professionals, attorneys bear the burden of using good sense and propriety online.  Would that everyone bore a similar burden! (but I digress).

Friday morning I co-facilitated a continuing education seminar for the Mecklenburg County Bar on social media with Andy Ciordia and Ted Claypoole . The attorneys asked great questions and the three of us presenting enjoyed the lively discussion.

Peppering his ethics guidance with jaw-dropping anecdotes of ethical lapses by legal professionals, Ted boiled everything down to four categories of concern:

• Talking too loosely
• Improper investigation (pretexting)
• Sites that don’t provide room for proper disclaimers (think: Twitter)
• Advertising Rules

I’m unqualified to say anything about legal ethics, but from a middle-aged lay person’s vantage point,  much of what Ted said seemed like common sense and good manners: don’t say anything about someone behind their back that you wouldn’t say to their face; don’t misrepresent yourself or your behavior; and don’t tell a judge you need a continuance because your father died if your Facebook page shows you were getting smashed at your college roommate’s wedding!

Advice for blogging, Facebook and Twitter

Andy and I showed several examples of what to do and not to do on the big three social media platforms:

Blogging: We didn’t need to dwell on the oft-repeated advice to publish frequently — they’d all heard it.  We took it further to show how you can subscribe to content feeds to supplement your own articles but also warned to keep non-pertinent content off your site. We showed an example of an otherwise-good blogsite by a divorce lawyer who inexplicably featured an article on SEO and Google.

Huh? Stick to your knitting.

Facebook: We see lots of lawyers using their personal FB profile as a professional site. Some even call it “The Family Law Firm of Jane Doe” or similar appellations — a big no-no and a violation of FB’s terms of service. FB created “Pages” for commercial use.  Go to my AUTHOR PAGE of FB and you’ll see how it differs from the personal.

Twitter: The main concern Andy and I expressed here is lack of engagement. Most of what we saw lawyers do is BROADCAST new blog posts or news of the firm. Blech. If you’re not engaging people on Twitter, don’t waste your time with it.

If you’re unsure where to take your social media marketing efforts, reach out. If I don’t have the answers, Andy or Ted will.

Presentation Note Taking

This morning I co-presented a workshop on social media for real estate agents with Andy Ciordia and Beth Griffiths.  The Broker In Charge asked us to provide the presentation in advance so that she could print it out for everyone to  take notes on.

This is what people ask you to do because they’re accustomed to death by PowerPoint. In such a death, the speaker lards the presentation with bullet points and basically reads them to the audience (like a first grade teacher at story time).

We don’t subject people to so-called presentations of this ilk.

Our presentations lend visual interest to what’s being said and reinforce the points.

Responding to the request

What did we do? We devised a handout for “guided note taking” that gave our audience questions and prompts to go with the slides.  For example, Stop thinking about “creating” traffic. With social media, it’s about “getting in front” of it. What are you doing to use web-based sites and tools to get people to notice you?

Try this technique next time and be sure to wind it down with a solid question like these:

• How many homes would I have to sell each month to pay for this service?
• How many more homes could I list/sell if I were doing this?

In case you’ve never seen this video on the proper use of PowerPoint (or any multimedia during a presentation) be sure to watch it here.

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