Do I Have Enough Content To Fill a Book?

Everything I write on this site is addressed to business professionals who know they need to produce content, including books, to enhance their professionalism, to grow their client base or to achieve a social outcome.  If this applies to you, read on, but if you want someone to help you write a novel, I’m not the person you’re looking for.

Start with 15,000 words

Let’s put a stake in the ground and say that a book has at least 15,000 composed words. Whether those words are delivered to the user electronically, in an MP3 or on paper is a matter of platform. Just how big is 15,000 words? These examples may help:

• Do you read newspaper opinion columns? They average 700 words, so if you’ve written 22 pieces of that length, you could compile them into a book.
• Most blog posts average 300+ words, so 50 posts would total 15,000 words. Count the average words in your blog posts and do the math.
• How many speeches or presentations have you delivered?  Those add up, too.  If standard speech without long pauses runs 150 – 170 words per minute, a 20-minute speech is 3,000 to 3,400 words.  If you’ve delivered five 20-minute speeches on your subject, you’re ready to roll.
• Your old newsletter articles are good book fodder.

Begin with a guide

You could begin writing your book by publishing a series of “guides” for download or as handouts after Rotary Club meetings or as leave-behinds with prospects. These are also called white papers, executive briefings, special reports and ebooks.  Subject ideas:

• Credit repair guide for those who’ve declared bankruptcy or lost a home in foreclosure
• Estate planning guide for those who want to leave money to family members and social institutions
• Annotated checklists:
  • to help business owners perform due diligence on an acquisition
  • for life insurance clients to ascertain that their beneficiaries are in order
  • necessary to maximize tax deductions
• Suggested points in an operating agreement for family-owned businesses buying the previous generation’s interests
• Case study of how you helped a client use a Qualified Personal Residence Trust to pass real estate to children

Enjoy the ride

It’s important to enjoy your  book’s subject. Even if you hire a ghost writer to do the grunt work, you’re going to be immersed in the book project for quite a while, from writing it, to the promotional activities required to get a return on your invested time and money. That’s another reason starting with something smaller than a full-fledged book is helpful — if you tire of the book or you’re out of material before the first guide is written, that’s an early sign that the book concept needs to be re-formulated.

Yes, you can buy book authorship

If you don’t have any original content and you’re not willing to develop it, there are companies that will sell you a pre-written book that you can lightly customize. Beware that in the world of digital downloads and interstate commerce there’s no guarantee that your audience won’t catch on to this ploy. If they do, your strategy will backfire. I can’t help you there.  Where I can help is in  writing blog posts, newsletters, articles and other materials that we can roll into a book later.

“Involve Me, and I Will Understand”

Since I’m an avid BMW motorcyclist now, I came across this video on a forum I belong to.

Don’t dismiss it just because you’ve no interest in motorsports — there’s an important takeaway for professionals who want to connect at a deeper level with clients and prospects.

Involve = Engage

This video underlines the importance of engaging with clients and prospects instead of broadcasting to them.  BMW could have splashed its logo on the screen and called it a day, but wasn’t it a better idea to involve the audience? Even to the tiny extent of telling them to close their eyes?

The emotional nature of the message, “Look inside yourself…” and the novelty of the message’s delivery seared the brand into viewers’ memories. Granted, establishing an emotional connection in a novel way is more difficult for a lawyer than for BMW, but it’s being done every day.

Start with key messages that resonate emotionally

What are you selling? It’s not financial planning, accounting services and legal advice. Take it deeper. Is it security? An edge? Peace of mind? Reliability? These are emotion-laden terms, and they resonate where descriptions like financial planning, accounting services and legal advice clank and thunk.

If you can’t distill your key messages to something emotional for your audience, you’ll miss your mark. You’ll waste your time and your money.

Social media involvement

Social media is a natural way to engage clients and prospects. I know business professionals arriving late to the social media party with misguided expectations that a Facebook Page or Twitter account will work for them the way it works for a colleague or competitor who’s been at it for a while.  Like everything else in this world, social media produces a yield for those who do their spade work.

Spade work means “involving” yourself in the lives of your prospects and clients by giving away some of your expertise in the course of conversations and interactions. Yes, giving (some of ) it away. And yes, plural conversations and interactions. Social media success isn’t magic — it’s working a strategic plan over a period of time.  Spade work.

This is easier to do when you’re producing content – newsletters, blog posts, ebooks, white papers, books, videos, podcasts or presentations. When you’ve stocked your content pantry, it’s easy  link that content  to someone whose Tweet or status update indicates they need your expertise. Valuable content is a real “follower” magnet, too.

Connecting with audience

Being in front of a captive audience isn’t enough to ensure they’re engaged in your message. Take it a step further.  Several months ago I wrote about providing an audience with a  note taking guide along with my presentation.  Throughout the session I  drew their attention to the guide and invited them to share their notes and observations with the rest of the group.  This worked on a couple of levels — helping them stay with me and enlisting their fellow audience members to re-enforce my points.

As the video says, “Tell me something and I will forget. Show me something and I can remember. Involve me, and I will understand.” Therefore,  in every marketing plan, every communications plan, every pre-conference plan, in every thing, ask how you can involve and engage others in your emotional message.

How to work with a Ghost Writer

People ask me all the time if there’s A WAY to work with a ghostwriter. Chemistry and work preferences vary so  I can only answer by describing the way I work with my clients.

Choose a writer who knows YOUR stuff

Before you hire someone to write for you, be sure they have domain expertise. My specialty is business writing and nonfiction because I have the background and education to do the job well.  If someone asked me to write for pharma or hi tech I’d have to take a pass — actually I’d have to question why they called me in the first place!

The right relationship starts with due diligence, including work samples and client referrals.

Getting started with a ghost writer

With a bit of ramp up a qualified writer can get to work writing newsletters, blog posts, articles, white papers, presentations, even memoirs in short order. The ramp up includes determining your key messages, perhaps some SEO targets and an editorial calendar. I talk about key messages and an editorial calendar in this video.

Getting YOUR voice out of a ghost writer

If you haven’t yet watched the video above, or stopped it before the end, queue it up to 2:30 where I talk about the advantage of using a sound file when working with a ghost writer.

I find that if clients begin a project by writing it themselves, or responding to my questions in writing, they focus on their spelling and grammar and perhaps their bad typing skills. This means I get less out of them and their project takes longer than if they simply respond to my questions in a natural, conversational way.   Any smart phone can serve as a recorder with a downloaded app. If you must buy a recorder, get a Sony with a USB for less than $75.

A voice recording enables me to write for clients in a way that replicates the way they think and express themselves. Of course  I clean up grammar, arrange  the piece sequentially, dig for case studies and add headlines, tags, illustrations, etc., but the end result is something that sounds familiar to the reader — only better than my client could have produced without my assistance.  My clients really do say, “It sounds like me, only better.”

Editing the Fed

I’ve been so bold as to edit Prince Charles and the pope, so why not the Cleveland Federal Reserve Bank?

Consider the Fed’s analysis of Canadian vs. American housing and lending trends.

Why Canada might be “a country that got things right”

The report led off well enough:

Housing markets in the United States and Canada are similar in many respects, but each has fared quite differently since the onset of the financial crisis. A comparison of the two markets suggests that relaxed lending standards likely played a critical role in the U.S. housing bust.

It’s written in easily-understood prose and comes to a succinct conclusion. But if you read the report (and re-read once or twice), you’ll agree that my re-write would have been a better approach, not just by virtue of the writing, but also by virtue of the more comprehensive (and candid) conclusion:

Unlike the U.S., Canada has not experienced a dramatic increase in mortgage defaults, nor has any Canadian bank required a government bailout. This article explores the differences between the two countries’ monetary policies, financial services structure and regulation, and the kinds of mortgage products offered. While the primary culprit behind the American financial services crisis was the rise in subprime loans,  those products, and indeed the housing bubble itself, were enabled by monetary policy and financial services regulation.

Conclusions drive structure

An introduction like this would have led to an entirely different STRUCTURE of the paper, as well.  As written, the Fed meandered through data on housing prices, loan-to-value stats, delinquency rates, central bank target rates, and benchmark mortgage interest rates before getting around to contextualizing them. Most readers’ eyes were glazed over by then.

I would have taken the inverse approach, noting the differences in subprime booms between the countries (and the American bust) and then comparing and contrasting the factors that DROVE those differences, including monetary policy and regulation.  I would also have quoted sociologists on the differences in risk tolerance between us and our “neighbors to the north” as we so often call them.

The Fed is not apolitical, so I guess I should give a nod to the possibility that it was motivated to obfuscate.  Alas, these are the times in which we live.

Working with a Ghostwriter

Used to be the word “ghostwriter” conjured images of a wily hack with a battered Olivetti sitting at a Hollywood swimming pool coaxing confidences from a star.

Lately the word has gotten traction in the music world (evidently lots of rappers use them). Politicians have always used ghosts — a recent Christian Science Monitor story estimated 90% of politicians’ books are “heavily ghostwritten.”

Now businesspeople are convinced they need to be content producers to drive search engine results and keep their names top of mind with customers. This makes my job as a business ghostwriter easier to explain, but there are lots of misconceptions out there about what we do, how we work, and how we’re paid. In case you’re thinking about hiring a ghostwriter, this might help you think things through.

Q:  What kind of work can you give to a ghostwriter?

A: There is no professional organization that certifies ghostwriters. Generally speaking we can write anything on your behalf. The devil lies in the details of how well a ghostwriter works with you, whether they know your field well enough to hit the ground running, and whether you can agree on a fee structure.

As a financial ghostwriter I craft presentations and management letters. I write blog posts, newsletters, white papers, articles and (soon) books. Each writer will produce each type of publication with differing levels of proficiency.

Do you want to rough out a topic then turn it over to a ghostwriter? Or does the sight of a blank page drain your mind completely? Working with a ghostwriter is a partnership, so begin your quest by identifying your needs, working preferences and limitations. These will determine the offsetting strengths to look for in your writing partner.

Q: What do I look for in a business ghostwriter?

A: You need to find someone who knows enough about your field that they can focus on production. You might also need to find a writer experienced with Chicago Manual of Style, MLA, etc. That said,  if you find a great writer they can learn the styles. A good ghost won’t upcharge you for coming up the learning curve, provided there’s sufficient upside for the writer.

You might also need help devising an editorial calendar or other marketing/public relations capabilities, so be sure to ask your writer if they can provide that expertise. In today’s social media environment a ghostwriter should have a working understanding of how search engine optimization works, but beware the writer who tries to convince you that writing in a stilted style to feed the search bots will serve you well with human readers.

Q: Where do I look for a qualified ghostwriter?

A: Tap your professional circles first. With so many corporate communications departments being downsized, domain experts who write well are a LinkedIn search away. Whether they can effectively ghost for you is another matter. My advice is to start with domain experts and then refine the search by chemistry, mutually-acceptable work styles, pricing, etc.

Q: How much will a ghostwriter charge?

A: Your business ghostwriter will charge in the range of a self-employed accountant in private practice.  Specialists in other subject areas will differ, but this will give you an idea of how to budget.

Start by asking yourself the qualifications someone would need to write intelligently about your field. (For example, could a nurse write about biotech?)  Put a number on what that person would make working for an employer full time. That’s just a start. You can’t just divide that by 2080 annual working hours; you must add something for administration and overhead costs, and allow that of a 40 hour week, about 25 is actually billable (the other fifteen are spent in client acquisition, proposals, professional development and administrivia). The accountant study shows similar productivity.

Let’s crunch numbers. Say you want an MBA Who Writes Like An English Major with a background in finance. Let’s assume that person would earn $100k in their field. OK, add the employer-paid taxes, employer-subsidized health insurance and two weeks of vacation and the result is about a 20% bump over base salary. We’re at $120k. Divide that by 2080 “standard” work hours a year and you get $58/hour. For reasons explained above, the $58 would translate to more like $94/hour when they actually get on the clock.

Q: Will ghostwriters work at a fixed rate?

A: When you hire a writer with domain expertise, they’ll likely bid your project on a flat fee or bid a price per (accepted) page. This will take some pre-work on your part defining the scope of the project and giving the writer sufficient source material to get to work.

Q: How will a ghostwriter price my project?

A: The more organized and efficient you are, the less you’ll pay the writer. If you have all your research compiled and outline your expectations up front (number of pages/slides/word count) the writer can adequately estimate their work effort.

Your personal organization and efficiency plays a big role in keeping the project on budget, too. An experienced writer will devise a project timeline with deadlines and expectations for YOU.  You’ll have to uphold your end to keep the contracted price and schedule. If the contract says you get one editorial pass and one line edit pass, you’ve got to make best use of each. If you get to the line edit round and start moving big chunks around or inserting more copy, chances are your writer will need to charge you for that editorial re-work. A line edit consists of tweaking for clarity and correctness, not re-drafting. I find that clients often want to make changes after copy they’ve approved has been handed over to the graphic designer/desktop publisher; such re-work is not in scope.

There are some professional pay guidelines out there for different types of writing/editing on a project and page basis.

Q: Do I have to work with a ghostwriter face-to-face?

A: Each project drives the tactical means for getting it done. If I’m writing a white paper, the client provides me with the source material, we discuss relative weighting of the topics and the general outline and I take it from there, circling back for commentary, elucidation, additional source material, etc. Many of my blog and newsletter clients will forward news updates from their professional organizations for me to base a commentary upon. While I’m pretty flexible, I can’t speak for other writers.

I have to learn the client’s “voice” to emulate it. A client should never sound like a stranger in real life to someone who’s been reading their work. I prefer that my clients use digital recorder as much as possible; the digital file is easily attached to email.  Not only do I learn how they speak, I also glean from their inflection what matters to them most and any key words or phrases that they favor.

Most people say more when speaking than when writing.  Clients may think they have two articles for their newsletter but they start talking, I might “hear” three articles for the current edition and another for a blog post or future newsletter.  Occasionally a client will be in the middle of answering a question when something pops up that we can use later.

Q: How to proceed?

A: I suggest you audition one or two potential writing partners. Already writing a newsletter? Give the writer an earlier version and ask what they’d do differently. Never written one before? Give the writer three news topics and see what they want from you before they begin writing and how they would propose to learn your voice. I will sometimes offer to do an audition piece without charge and then if the client hires me I’ll bill them for the work.

More questions? Give me a call and we’ll discuss your particular project: 704-907-2811

Do Your Stats Stack?

Great tables in Epsilon’s Email Trends and Benchmarks study released this July. Great for benchmarking.

Open Rate Comparison By Industry Business Products and Services General

Epsilon’s Conclusion: “Consumers are taking a variety of offline actions as a result of permission-based email communications...sophisticated marketers are incorporating triggers, transactions, preferences, segmentation and other advanced analytics to produce more successful campaigns.” (Emphasis mine)

My comments:

• These stats relate to permission-based email communications, which include newsletters. No studies available on newsletters by themselves
• Newsletter publishers need to learn how to incorporate triggers, preferences and segmentation.
  • For example, an accounting practice might begin offering a newsletter focused on the tax-planning needs of smaller segments of its client base.  Retailers, contractors, biotech, import/export businesses have different concerns and will be grateful for focused communications — otherwise, they’re likely to tune out. Publishers of e-newsletters can accomplish this by simply allowing people to opt-in to a different/additional publication in the sidebar of the publication they currently receive
  • Service providers don’t dismiss the idea of using a “trigger” to entice your clients to download a white paper or special report. It’s a competitive world out there and you need to continue providing value between service engagements

Please share best practices here.  I’m especially interested in what service providers are doing well with email initiatives.