503: Amazon Author Secrets: Get Published, Work Backwards, Stay Motivated, and Sell At Least 26,000 Copies with Writing Coach Frank McKinley

Robert Plank 0:00 Music marketer of the day, number 503, Amazon, author secrets, get published, work backwards, stay motivated, and sell at least 26,000 copies with writing coach Frank McKinley. Hey, everyone, we're so glad that you joined us. We're talking right now with Frank McKinley. And Frank is a published author. He's a writing coach, and he's an entrepreneur, and he has sold over 26,000 books, and he's the founder of tribe builders network. And Frank is passionate about helping writers get published and getting their books into the hands of those they're called to help. So Frank, glad to be talking to you.

Frank McKinley 0:34 It's great to talk to you. Robert, yeah, so,

Robert Plank 0:36 I mean, what do people these days need to know about making books, selling books, being successful in books. I mean, what's the hot stuff we need to know these days?

Frank McKinley 0:47 Well, the thing that's been on my mind a lot lately is now you hear a lot about people have to have an email list, they gotta have a blog, and they've got to have an audience and all this stuff in place before they can sell a book. And I'm here to tell you that when I started, I didn't have any of those things yet. I was still able to sell lots of books, and I'm still selling books, although I have acquired those things along the way. But I would say that, you know, as nice and as wonderful and helpful as those things are, they aren't necessary to get started.

Robert Plank 1:24 That's a good message that helps to keep things simple. I know that, that, you know, I have the problem sometimes now the others have the problem of the chicken and the egg, sort of where it's like, well, I need to make a book, I need to make a website. And maybe people say, Well, I can't have a website if I don't have a book, I have a book. Now I'm letting the website get in the way. And so that's that's really reassuring, that we don't need to have everything out of the gate. We can keep it simple. And so you're saying that you made a book you sold a bunch of copies without a website. So how the heck did you get attention to it and get those sales without the website to do it?

Frank McKinley 1:57 Yeah, well, of course, at first I just, I told everybody in my network that, you know, hey, I've got this book coming out, you know, I'd love it if you would buy it and review it. And, you know, I got a few sales from that. But I also was studying copywriting at the time, so I thought, you know, this is really the key to selling a book, is to learn how to sell. So I spent a lot of time learning about what Amazon offers you on your book page to help you sell your book, and that goes from the cover to the title of the book, and even what I call the sales copy on the page. I mean, it's called the book description when you go to the dashboard and put it in but really, to me, that's just a prime opportunity to seal the deal right there. And if you don't, then it's going to be really hard to sell those books. If you don't have all those things in place, even more important than a website or a blog or any of those things that you need, you can actually use the book as Chandler book with as Chandler bolt would say, sorry about that, to build that audience.

Robert Plank 3:11 Well, cool, and that makes perfect sense, that you know you don't need the website, but then what is important is the copy writing language that you use on your cover and on the page. Because, I mean, what's the point of having all this text on your book description or all this text on the website, if it doesn't motivate people to buy? And I know that, like early on, when I, when I first had to figure out this copywriting stuff, I resisted it at first, because I thought, well, oh, I have to conform to this, this weird template. And and I finally, you know, eventually, bit the bullocks. I knew that well, if there's there's a reason why things need to be said a certain way, structured in a certain way, in a certain order. So that way, when someone comes it, it sort of moves them along to where they need to go. But did you have any sort of similar difficulties in maybe getting over the the ego, or getting over the creativity side of things, and say, Okay, well, writing a book, I can structure that any way I want, but with the copywriting, maybe it has to be a little more carefully thought out. So did you have any difficulties in figuring out that copywriting stuff?

Frank McKinley 4:10 Oh yeah, I did have to adjust the copy that I wrote a few times, but I think it helped me a lot just to study what other people had done and what was working and just try to fit all my bullet points into that. And you know, that's one good thing to use in your especially if you're writing a non fiction book, is to use some bullet points to tell people, you know, hey, here's some of what you're going to get if you buy this book, you know, give them a taste of what's inside. So they're thinking, Okay, well, I gotta buy the book to find out the rest of the story. You know, so, but things like that. But I think if you if you think about all those things that we talked about, kind of like a pyramid, and the top of the pyramid is the cover, and if that cover, you know, being pretty small there, if it doesn't grab. Up somebody's attention and pull them into your page. And you know, you've lost everything right there. So I put a lot of time into thinking about how to make my cover, you know, fairly simple, and make the title easy to read and that small thumbnail. And of course, you can read it on the, you know, the text right next to it, but keeping the title something relatively short, and maybe use the subtitle to give them more information and give them more reason to go in and see what the book's about.

Robert Plank 5:31 Okay, so you have that cover, you have the simple, easy title, you have the subtitle with more information, so that cover grabs their attention, and then once they're they click onto your book page, or maybe they're staying on your book page. Then what do you make sure to have in there after that, to make sure that they they stay hooked?

Frank McKinley 5:51 Well, I'll in my particular book I was writing about leadership. So what I did was, actually my book was part of a project I was doing at work. I'm a writer, at least part time here for my employer, and what I was doing is just writing a series of articles that our clients who were daycare center directors, so they could use to maybe do their jobs better, or, you know, manage the teachers that are in their centers, or anything like that. But I also wrote it in such a way that it wouldn't just apply to daycare centers. So one thing is just finding a need that's out there in the niche that you've chosen, that's, I think that's crucial. And the way, the way that I did that, I was just started reading articles, just to see what people were talking about. And I actually happened upon a list article, and I thought, You know what? I could take this list and I could expand a lot on that and just make a series out of it. So that's what I did. And did that several times, and it actually seemed to work pretty well. You can also kind of test it out as you go. Let's say, if you're a blogger, you wouldn't necessarily have to write that article exactly the way it's going to be in the book, but maybe, you know, similar, just to kind of test and see, okay, is this idea something that people care about? Is this pain point that people are experiencing that they want to get rid of, and that's that's really valuable information, and helps you create a good book that's going to be a lot easier to sell when the time comes.

Robert Plank 7:32 Super cool that that's very logical that you you started by looking at what was out there, looking at the list post, getting ideas, getting just, you know, fresh food for the brain to say, Well, I've seen this list of 10 things. I'm seeing this list over here of five or 12 things, and getting the creativity going and seeing and saying, Well, what are the commonalities? What kind of things am I expanding? And then I love your idea as well. To try out some of that material in a blog post, knowing that it might not be exactly the way it ends up in the final book. You might edit it later, but you try out that material as blog posts to see what kind of engagement that you get. And so for those of us following a lot along at home, is there any easy way to look at this book that you put out, that you're talking about here

Frank McKinley 8:21 to look at the ones that that I have on Amazon,

Robert Plank 8:24 yeah, like that, that leadership book that you mentioned, is there an easy way to find that, to check out what you have going on?

Frank McKinley 8:32 Sure, sure, I have an Amazon Author Page, and I also have a page on my blog, Frank McKinley author.com that has a list of all the books that I have available on Amazon right now. And if you put my name into Google, you'll find my blog is probably the first thing there so and then when you get to the blog at the top of the menu, I think one of the items is books. And you can go to that page, and each title you can click, and it'll take you directly to that book page.

Robert Plank 9:08 Okay, cool. So research Frank McKinley, or we go to Frank McKinley author.com to find that list of books. And so I'm looking at, uh, I'm looking at your books right now. So let's see. So we have that, uh, that lead, the 10 Steps to Effective leadership. Is this the first book that you put out that you had all the success?

Frank McKinley 9:25 Yes, yes, that was my first big success. Right there. I actually have, out of the total which, last time I counted, was about little over 28,000 but that's, that's a combined total of that whole series that I have on Amazon right now. Now, probably about 8000 of those are 10 Steps to Effective leadership. Okay,

Robert Plank 9:52 well, well, cool. Super interesting. And so, so I'm noticing, so, I mean, alright, so you have you you learns this copywriting. Stuff. You made sure to have everything sort of configured to get attention, like a good cover the bullet points. You base things on a need. You open loop them so that you say, Well, you know, it'll solve this problem, but without really giving away the punch line, to get them curious, you mentioned that you reached out to your network and you got people to to buy and leave good reviews and things like that. Was there anything else, or was that all it took just to get all these sales of books that you had

Frank McKinley 10:29 well that, and with some of them, a little bit of testing, which, you know, you can set a list of keywords for example. And I actually just used some words for the first book that people would think about when they think about leadership, and that particular book is sort of a foundational one. So I put, I think one of the words was new leader. I put that in and but now that I have a little more experience, I would say, if you're going to pick a list of keywords, and it's good to start with the natural words that you would use to find a book on the topic. But then you can also go to and put that word up in the search box on Amazon and see what comes up and from, say, the list on the first page, I would go into each one of those, and just see, you know how, how well they're selling. And you can find that out pretty easily. Just go down to the bottom of the book description, and there's this little paragraph there that has a list and says Amazon sales rank. And then it can list a few categories, which gives you some clues as to what categories that that genre is using. So things like that, I would just, you know, if something wasn't working as well as I wanted it to, I would just tweak it until you know it did work the way I wanted it to. But there's one caveat to that, too. If you're gonna change anything, just change one thing at a time. Don't change everything at once, because then you'll have no idea, of course, that which, which one of those elements actually made the difference.

Robert Plank 12:07 That's great. And I have to say, I love your thought process here, because you might have come across this as well, where it seems like a lot of authors out there, they either make things too complicated, or they let their ego get in the way, or they want to be too creative with a lot of these things they want to just, you know, write the book that they themselves want to write, and, to heck, what everyone else thinks. And I'm going to do it exactly this way, and I'm unwilling to change. But I really like the way that you you've laid things out here, and that to get ideas, you look at stuff that's already out there, you search for the keywords, the phrases people would search for in order to find your book. I mean, what a concept, right? And then based on that, you look at the existing books to get an idea of not only what keywords they do, but also you look at and also, not only keywords, but categories as well. You kind of look at those books, but then you look at those rankings. So that way you're not spending weeks or months of your life making this book that no one's ever going to read you. You have that starting point of, what is the need, what's the want, what's popular, and then you flush it out scientifically and add a little bit of creativity. But it's not completely free form. It's not completely I'll make whatever the heck I want. It still has to circle back around to what it is. What is it that the rest of the world wants? And it's not one and done. It's not just okay. I'm going to do some really quick looking and set some things up. I'm going to make my best stab at it, and then if it isn't selling the way that I want, or if it's selling just okay, and it could do better, then maybe make another pass and look at those competitors again, or try out different things, and like you said, change just one thing at a time. That way, you're not that way. You don't make 20 changes and say, Whoa, the sales went way up. I don't know which one of the 20 things did it you you make these changes over time. It's an ongoing thing. That way, your book just gets better and better.

Frank McKinley 13:57 Oh, absolutely, yeah. Always be willing to change things. Because, I mean, I've been fortunate that over all these years that I've found the sales copy and the keywords that would, you know, create some steady sales, day after day, week after week. And you know, it won't always work on the first try, but, I mean, you might get something. But does this be willing to be flexible and say, Okay, well, this worked. This didn't you know, be willing to conform to what people are looking for, although you know inside that you do have some creativity. You can bring your story into your methods, and that can set it apart. And then, as you're doing research, you can also say, Okay, well, this is what the other authors are doing, and here's how I can do this one thing better than than they're doing it. And I think that'll help you too to really stand out and grab those sales that you might miss if you just you. I, you know, don't consider that as part of the process.

Robert Plank 15:05 So do you have any secrets on staying motivated throughout all this? Because, like, there's, there's one aspect of the actually getting the dang book done and getting it published and getting the description, so there's, like, I'm sure that that, you know, there's a lot of, there's problems getting to the finish line with a lot of people, right? They make things too complicated, or they start in a book and they don't finish. Or it keeps getting crazier and crazier with all the research. So that there's that aspect of it, the, you know, getting the first edition of, the first version of the book out there, there's that part. And then there's the ongoing component, where you're looking at, you know, how to beef things up, how to make it better, and so and so, I'm sure that's easy to forget about and, you know, not check the book for a month at a time. So do you have any secrets to keep things going in both of those areas of, you know, sticking to it and being consistent? Because I'm sure that it's easy to get discouraged, to give up, to forget about things. So how the heck do you stay so consistent with this?

Frank McKinley 16:02 Yeah, that's a good question. Yeah, a book can be a giant project, for sure. And I think the key that I have found over the years it's just to work backwards. And what I mean by that is just have a picture and write it down. What do you want this book to do when it's done? And then you know, once you're you know, give that as much detail as you can give it, then you'll know what kind of marketing you need to do. You'll need to know. You'll also know, well, this is what I need to put into the book, and this is the audience that I'm after, and all that stuff I think will help motivate you, because you won't feel so much like, you know, I gotta figure this out as I go, and I'm running out of ideas, and I know for me, that can be a little bit frustrating. And two, also, you know, make sure you edit the book as good as you can, but don't wait until it's 100% perfect to ship it as you know, I think it was Steve Jobs said, you know, the where stuff gets done is when you ship it. I mean, you could probably look at any New York Times best selling author, and there's going to be maybe a typo or two that slips through in their book. So I would say, you know, just do the best you can with that for sure. But don't stay up at night worrying about it, you know, get it out there, because chances are, you know, you might be the only one who notices that anyway. The message is the really, really important thing. So focus on that and just have a big goal that you're going after, and let that motivate you and and get you going. And I think that'll make a big difference.

Robert Plank 17:49 That's very reassuring. And you're saying that, and you're reminding me that, you know, we've all read mass market paperbacks where there be a little typo in there, or textbooks at universities where they always have the section of the errata to say, well, now we're in the eighth edition of the book, and we still made these handful of mistakes last time. So I mean, if those types of, you know, publishing houses with all kinds of budgets and huge team, if things still fall through the cracks with them, then it's perfectly okay for it to fall through the cracks in a solo printer business, or even if you have a virtual assistant. So, so, yeah, really reassuring there. And so that, that question there of you know, what do you want this book to do when it's done? That makes perfect sense to me, because that way you have a plan. That way, if the book get becomes more and more of a hassle, then maybe people will be motivated to remember what the point of it was, and not let the perfectionism get to them. So that question, what do you want this book to do when it's done? I'm curious about what some appropriate answers are. So I mean, what the heck is? Uh, is your answer to that question? What do you what did you want that first book to do when it was done?

Frank McKinley 18:59 Well, I just wanted it to reach as many people as it could who were new to leadership, or just maybe wanted some sort of a reference book that they could go to to say, Okay, well, here's where I'm you know, need to grease the wheel a little bit or smooth off the rough edges. And I did have at least one reviewer say that, yeah, you know, I've been in leadership for 28 years, and this is a great book to fall back on, just to remind myself of what's important and what isn't. And I thought, Man, that's great. But I read somewhere that when you have a blog, then one of the main things that should motivate you to even have one is, what kind of change. Do you want to bring to the reader that's coming to your blog? I mean, otherwise, you know, why would they bother to come if there's if they're not expecting something to be better than it was before they got there? So I think that's really important. And we'll keep you on your. Of your message as well, and it'll also keep you from drifting off track. Because, I mean, I know, with a big project like that, if you come along, you're probably going to say to yourself, you know, once in a while, okay, man, this is good. I didn't think about this when I was making my outline. I ought to put this in when, you know, maybe it's better if you go ahead and finish what you're working on and then just make another book out of that side road that has come to mind. But, I mean, it's going to really just depend on what you're doing, but I think generally that's something that you have to keep in mind.

Robert Plank 20:36 I love that advice, and one of the most helpful things I ever heard about writing a book was someone said you don't have to put everything you know into one book. It's okay to have one book about one idea, and even if it's a little on the short side, at least the books out there and then you have another idea. Make a whole book about that doesn't have to be 10 or 20 things in one doesn't have to be at your whole entire knowledge packed into one book. And even if it is, then it'll probably be a freaking mess, and it'll be this big, thick thing that no one finishes reading, and then you won't even be able to explain it, because it covers all these different things. And if you focus on one, it wouldn't, wouldn't do justice to the other. So that that's, uh, that's really reassuring, and especially, all of your advice for today has just sounded like we need to keep things simple. And it's really tempting to start out with a plan and to say it's halfway done, and ooh, I thought of some new stuff, but it's better to set that aside for book number two and just stick to what the original plan was. Because if we keep changing the plan on ourselves, that we keep making things bigger and bigger in scope, then we probably won't ever even finish and so do you have any just writing advice in general that you like when you look out there and you see the mistakes people are making? Do you have any that's really common advice, or maybe advice that you'd give yourself, or you give advice that you would give your past self? Maybe those times that you were stuck with writing, anything like that come to mind? Any just like number one piece of advice for writers out there,

Frank McKinley 22:02 yeah, I think the thing that has worked for me is, you know, having to just, just having a template to start with, and I have one I use I write non fiction, so I just have these five questions that I answer and fill in the blank once I have a one main idea to focus On, and that just makes it a lot faster, a lot easier, and it makes gives it a lot of continuity, just to have the same template that you use over and over and over. And if you're a storyteller, then there's probably a different template that fits whatever your niche is like. If you're a mystery writer, you're going to use, you know, a certain process to write that, or then you would if saying you're writing romance, or, you know, any of those other things. So for me, I think just to save a lot of time, it's just to have a process that you follow every time you write, and let it evolve as you write more and more, you know as you find ways to improve the process, and I think that just just being able to get stuff done in a in a timely manner is really encouraging for creative people who need to have A consistent connection with their audience.

Robert Plank 23:21 Great. I agree completely that it's important to have that template to start, so that way half of the blanks are already filled in for you, and you're following something that's proven for that mystery niche, or for that how to niche, and having your own process and being aware of that, so that way you know what stages you're doing, and that way you can repeat over and over, and that encouragement factor that you mentioned there. So that way, once you begin picking up this habit, this pattern of, I have an idea for a book. Got the book done. Now I want to make the book better, get some more sales, got it done, having this repeat pattern, this momentum of getting things done, really, I agree. Seems like it'd be super duper encouraging. And so you mentioned that you have that template that you asked those five questions, and I'm sure that people out there are maybe salivating at the mouth and saying, Oh, I gotta have this template. So is there an easy way to find that? Is it in like a book or a course or a freebie of yours somewhere? Well,

Frank McKinley 24:16 I'm actually going to put it in a course I'm working on now, which I hope to have done by the first part of March, and I'll be glad to share those details with you, and you can put that in your show notes.

Robert Plank 24:28 Okay, yeah, we'll put them in the show notes. But for now, if people say, Well, I can't wait. I'm listening to Frank right now. Got to have it. Got to find out what he has going on, where can people reach out to you and find you and and check up on you?

Frank McKinley 24:41 Well, my home base is Frank McKinley, author.com, I'm also on Twitter, at at and then it's the lower underscore. Oh, sorry, it's Frank, and then the lower underscore. McKinley, on Twitter, I. I'm on there. I'm on there at least once every day. Those are the two main places you can find me. And also have Facebook page, which is, I think it's Frank McKinley books.

Robert Plank 25:14 Super cool. So Frank McKinley author.com, Twitter at Frank underscore McKinley, and then Facebook, Frank McKinley books, so I mean, yeah, if your appetite is a little bit wet now, valid. You've heard some of Frank's advice. Heard about some of these things that Frank had to figure out through trial and error. And you say, you know, I don't want to go through all the hassle that a lot of these other authors went through when they had to figure it out themselves. It makes more sense to listen to the advice of someone who's done it before me, from someone who's done it over and over again and had a lot of success with it. So it makes more sense to model what works, as opposed to figuring it out yourself, because you figure it out yourself, it might take you five or 10 years, and all of Amazon stuff will be completely changed by then. So why not get it done fast? Because you only have so you have a limited number of days left in your life. Might be 50 years left. Might be two years left. So time was of the essence. You need to have your book out yesterday. So use Frank's advice and check him out at Frank McKinley, author, check out his blog post, check out his content there, check out his books. And especially when he has that course ready, you'll find the link to that in the show notes, but I'm sure you'll be able to find the course somewhere at Frank McKinley, author.com and Frank. Thanks Frank for stopping by and sharing this writing advice, some of your own personal stories. I thought that it was really encouraging and motivating, but I also learned some great stuff. So thanks for giving us the whole package.

Frank McKinley 26:37 Thanks Robert for having me on the show. I enjoyed it. Today's episode

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