PP 054: How to Write Your Book with Jeremy Jones

Jeremy Jones – Quick Show Notes

If you’re an aspiring author, this is a chat you definitely don’t want to miss. Jeremy Jones, CEO of Jones Media Publishing and I discuss multiple facets of the book writing process including building a platform, choosing a publishing method, quantity vs. quality and more.

Connect With Jeremy Jones

Jones Media Publishing
LinkedIn
Twitter
Jeremy’s Personal Site

Resources Mentioned

Free eBook – Power Authority
The Book District Community and Podcast
Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook by Gary Vaynerchuk
Never Eat Alone by Keith Ferrazzi
Beyond the E-Myth: The Evolution of an Enterprise: From a Company of One to a Company of 1,000! by Michael Gerber
The E-Myth Revisited by Michael Gerber
You Are a Writer by Jeff Goins
The Rapid Writing Formula
The Ant and the Elephant: Leadership for the Self by Vince Poscente

Episode Transcription

KIM: Welcome back to another episode of Positive Productivity! I’m so happy that you joined us today. Today, I am thrilled to have Jeremy Jones, CEO of Jones Media Publishing with us. Welcome, Jeremy!

JEREMY JONES: Hi, Kim. Glad to be here, thank you.

KIM: Oh, I’m so happy to have you here, especially because I’m about to publish a book, and I know a lot of listeners are as well. So I can’t wait to hear what you have to share and about your journey. So welcome again.

With that said, would you mind sharing a little bit about your journey to becoming the CEO of Jones Media Publishing?

JEREMY JONES: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much. So I’ll share a little bit about my background and how I got started with it – because I think it’s helpful, and it could be beneficial to your listeners. My background is, I grew up in Southern California, and I wanted to be able to travel. I just had an interest in traveling.

I also wanted to go to college, and my parents didn’t have money to send me to college. They both worked – they just didn’t have money to send me anywhere. So the best option for me was the military. And so I went into the Navy, and I was an electrician on an aircraft carrier for almost four years and traveled all over the world. And that was a great experience, but I knew the military definitely wasn’t for me.

When I was growing up, I used to go to my mom’s friends’ – she worked in a hospital – and I would go to her friends’ houses and do yard work, and do projects, and make money on the side. And so I had that entrepreneurial spirit. I used to sell stuff – I do art, freehand art – and so I used to draw things and sell them to other kids. And just have an entrepreneurial spirit since I was very young.

And so the military just wasn’t a fit for me. I was very discontent and just didn’t fit the mold. And so it’s great for some people, but just for me, it wasn’t. But I did really well. I got the highest rate you can get in the first enlistment, and the travel was great, and the friends and the friendships and relationships were great.

And when I was getting close to getting out of the Navy was when September 11th happened, and so I was a part of Operation Enduring Freedom for the September 11 attack, and that gave me a lot of time to think. We were out to sea for a long time – we were in Singapore at the time, and we went to the Persian Gulf right after that. So we’re out to sea for 112 days straight without going into port.

And it gave me a lot of time because I was planning on what I was going to do after I got out. And I had in my mind that I wanted to start a “media company”. And I didn’t know what kind of media, and what that even meant, and I didn’t have any family members that ran a business. I just did little things on the side. But that was my vision, and that’s what I wanted to do.

And then when we got back to Seattle – which was where I was stationed, was in Bremerton near Seattle – I got out of the navy. I moved here to Arizona – which I’ve been here since 2002 – to Phoenix, and I got my Bachelor of Arts and started working doing freelance design work. I was doing graphic design, and building websites, and started working with authors, speakers, and coaches.

And because the fact that when I was a designer, I was very good at a skill- I was a good designer, but I had absolutely no marketing ability. I had zero business skills. I had no entrepreneurial skills, other than just a few freelance projects I’d done here and there. And it was a big learning experience for me.

I hired a professional coach to help teach me marketing. I went to a ton of seminars. I took a ton of courses. I read books. Before I could afford to buy a bunch of books, I used to go to the library and walk out with a big stack of 10 books and 10 audio books on CD – and audio on tape, way back then. And was just consuming information like crazy to learn, and learn how to be productive. And learned – what I love about your show, Kim, is positivity and productivity – I just love those topics.

And so, in working with author, speakers, and coaches, I was interviewing them. I started my own show about five years ago. I was working with authors and speakers, and one of the things that they wanted more than anything else was to share their message with the world.

And so I wanted to be able to give that to them and offer added value in advance for them, and so I started a podcast where I helped them share their message with thousands of new people. And it was awesome. I was helping them share their message, I was working with people I wanted to work with.

And along that process, about three years ago now, I was hearing a lot of the challenges that people were facing in trying to find a publisher. They had a good book, they would submit it, it would get rejected – and keeping ownership of your book at the same time, have a good high-quality of being self-published – I saw it was a major challenge for authors, speakers, entrepreneurs. Because entrepreneurs are very busy, they don’t have time to try to figure it out – but they want it done right the first time.

KIM: [ [Audio Glitch?]

JEREMY JONES: Yeah, so I developed a process start-to-finish that entrepreneurs can do: assisted self-publishing. Basically a high level of quality of publishing a book like a traditional publisher, but it’s self-published, so the author owns the rights to the book. And then we do book promotion as well.

So we’ve had – I think, upwards of 15 in the last year – about 15 authors we’ve helped hit #1 Bestseller. And it’s just very exciting for me to help people share their ideas, their positive messages, with more people.

KIM: So we hadn’t talked about this before, I don’t think, in prior conversations, but I didn’t realize that you had a podcast. Is your podcast, or show, still around today?

JEREMY JONES: It sure is, called “The Book District: Ideas That Make An Impact”. So we interview entrepreneurs that are well-read – they read books that make an impact. And so we can talk about the book and three big ideas that they learned from the book that were a positive impact on their life or their business. And so we can promote the entrepreneur, promote their business, and share what they do in their business.

For authors, we specifically talk with the author about their book and three big ideas – ideas that are positive with the world, help people – and we talk about three big ideas from their book, and we help promote the author, and their business, and what they do.

And so I’ve created a community, also called “The Book District”, and it’s for people that are working on a book – they can be a part of a community to get feedback. And people that already have a book out, they have a support community, other authors, other businesspeople where they can help get the word out about their book.

And so it’s a free community. It’s called TheBookDistrict.com – and that’s also where the listeners can find the podcast, and the episodes, and things.

KIM: You’ve just blown my mind. Because – well, number one: I honestly can’t go to library right now because I need to pay off a substantial late fee. Because I’m the same way! I walk around with huge stacks.

Also, I had a couple books – including “Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook” by Gary Vaynerchuk – that were decorated by children. So now I have multiple copies – because that book, for example, I loved it so much that I had to buy my own copy so I could highlight it. I didn’t realize my kids were going to decorate it before I could return it. So I just highlighted that one!

But that leads me to want to know: What’s the most recent book that you’ve read that has made a real big impact?

JEREMY JONES: So many, because I read so many different books.

KIM: How many books are you reading right now?

JEREMY JONES: So I read a about a book a week, and two recent books that really stick out that have just been so fantastic. One that’s been out for a while: Keith Ferrazzi’s “Never Eat Alone”. Have you ever read that book?

KIM: I haven’t.

JEREMY JONES: Yeah, great. I like Keith Ferrazzi a lot. It’s a really great book. And that one has been out for a while, heard about it for a while, and finally went and bought it. And I really enjoyed that one.

The second one is Michael Gerber’s new “E-Myth”. He wrote “The E-Myth” a long time ago, and then “E-Myth Revisited“, and then a bunch of different “E-Myth for….” different types of entrepreneurs. And he just recently released an “E-Myth” book on growing your company from one to 1000 – a company of one person to a thousand. And it was just as impactful for me and for my business, because of the growth that we’re in right now, that “E-Myth” was a couple of years ago when I read.

And I just absolutely loved the first book that he did – and I was actually a part of his book launch team for his new book. And it’s just fantastic. Have you read that the E-Myth? The original one or the new one?

KIM: Okay, I’m so embarrassed to say that it is sitting here on my shelf and has been shouting at me for probably three years.

JEREMY JONES: Oh, my gosh. Yeah.

KIM: I finally just read “Think and Grow Rich” about a month ago. I’ve been hearing about – I’ve been an entrepreneur for five years. You would have thought that I would have read it already.

JEREMY JONES: Well, I’ll tell you this: “E-Myth” – make that a priority. That one – if you’re an entrepreneur, that one will blow your mind. That one was made a huge impact for me in just my mindset as an entrepreneur, and in growing a business. It’s very, very good. So I would recommend it for the listeners.

KIM: Okay, and listeners: All of these books and all the resources that we mentioned will be in the show notes, which you can find at TheKimSutton.com/PP054.

I am actually reading – and not intentionally, given the topic of this call – but I’m actually reading “The Art of Writing” by Jeff Goins.

JEREMY JONES: Oh, nice. Yup.

KIM: Yeah, which is reminding me just to keep writing – just do it. What’s that, Nike? Reebok? I don’t know.

Going back, I want to just go back just a little bit to when you are getting out of the Navy – and I want to thank you for your service. I married to a U.S. Air Force veteran who actually enlisted – he’s sitting right here.

(KIM: You enlisted on 9-12?

DAVE: It was September… I walked in on the 12th, but 10 days for it to get through.)

Listeners, you have now officially been introduced to my husband! So he enlisted – he signed up on 9-12, and it took 10 days to get through.

But when he got out, he pursued his college degree, too. And I believe that you and I have spoken about this before – how you both went through your education, what should have been a four-year education, in three years, which is crazy. I can’t imagine doing that. But good for you both for doing it.

What type of transition was that for you, and would you recommend that other veterans or active military members who are about to get out – would you recommend that they make that same decision? Not necessarily doing it in three years, but using their military benefits to pursue their college education after they get out?

JEREMY JONES: Yeah, absolutely. So one of the things that I think is really tough for military getting out is the transition. I have a good friend that – we went to high school together. He went into the army, and he was a tank operator. And he got out of the army, I think, about two years after I did. He had a little bit longer of a term – he extended.

And it’s like: How does a guy that’s in the Army, that’s a tank operator, get out and then have the confidence to jump into a career? Or if they go to school, they are from a blank slate, now they’re a little bit older, they’ve got to figure out a career path… It’s tough.

And the military – at least when I went through it and got out – they have a very poor program for the transition out. Many times, they just they want you to stay in – they have different programs for reenlistment. Just the transition out is very, very poorly done.

And one of my goals is – actually, is to develop some sort of a program to assist veterans in that transition. Because I feel that they have an incredible skill set in leadership, and teamwork, and discipline, and self-control that a lot of people don’t get the experience to – or don’t get the chance to experience. And one of the things that’s tough for them is understanding the transition of skills – the skill-set transition.

So if they’re a tank operator, you can’t transition the skill-set they’ve developed to operate a tank. However, there are lots of sub-skill-sets, like coordination, pre-planning, being proactive, making good decisions, making tough decisions, coordinating with a team. There’s lots of things that transition that, literally Day One, they could put those into a resume and say “I have these skill-sets.”

But a lot of them, they don’t realize that. They just say, “I was in the military, and I was an operator.” Someone looks at them, and they go, “Oh, well, what does that mean?” It’s the job of the veteran to communicate those skills that they have – and they have lots. So that’s one of the things that I’m working on right now, is some different tools and resources to be able to help out veterans. Because they are an incredible piece of the workforce, but they have a hard time transitioning out because there is just isn’t a very good program for them getting out of the military.

KIM: That is actually something that my husband and I had talked about doing as well. So if you need any support on that?

JEREMY JONES: Yeah, that would be great.

KIM: Yeah, because my husband found the same thing. But I want to go back to you, now: What would you say are the biggest obstacles or shifts that authors need to make? Or maybe, what is the biggest shift when they’re trying to get a book published, and they’re debating between getting it published through a standard publisher and getting self-published? Where does that decision normally come in?

JEREMY JONES: So different phases for different people. What I see typically happen is, someone writes a book – and it’s very blended. So for me to say “it’s one way” or “it’s this way most the time” is really tough to say. It’s blended.

Some people have no idea how the publishing industry works. So what happens is, they have an idea for a book, they get excited about it, they write the manuscript. If they make it all the way through it – which a lot of them, they’ll write, and then they’ll get stuck, and some people stop. If they do make it through – let’s assume that they persevere through, they’ve got it done – now they’re looking at their publishing options.

First option is: Find a publishing company that you can take a finished work to – which means that you have to pay an editor to go through it and have it really polished and complete, because otherwise the publisher won’t even look at it. You submit it to a publisher, and they’re going to tell you: Number one, is the quality up to par? Number two, is there a market for this? And number three, you as the author need to have a author platform – an audience to be able to sell this book.

One of the mistakes – or I should say “myths” – that a lot of authors that are trying to work with a traditional publishing house is they think the publisher is just going to go sell the books for them. Yes, they do create opportunities for the author, they create media opportunities – in some cases. Some cases not. But by no means are they just going to automatically “sell your book for you”.

There’s a guy that we’re working with right now that he was published through one of the major publishing houses – I think it was Baker Books – two or three times. And he just finished his new book, and he submitted to them, and they told him, “Yeah, I know we’ve published your other two books” or whatever it was, “but after looking at your social media profiles, you just don’t have the author platform that we’re looking for right now. Sorry, there’s nothing we can do.”

So they want you to have an author platform, so that they’re confident that you will be able to sell your book – not the other way around, that they’re going to sell it for you. So that’s one thing to look at.

The other side of things is, if someone’s planning to – let’s go to the other end of the spectrum – if someone’s going to self-publish a book, they have a couple of options. They can self-publish it by – and this is the challenge that I saw in speaking with a lot of people – is you’ve got to hire seven or eight different people. Six to eight different people: freelancers, contractors – to be able to do everything.

So first you need a developmental editor, and then you need a line editor, and then you’ve got to revise it yourself, and then you need a proofreader. And then you need a book cover designer. And then once you’ve got a book cover design, you need an interior layout person that has the skill-set and the competence to give you the high quality that it deserves in the marketplace for your book.

And then once your book is is laid out for paperback, then it’s got to be formatted for Kindle, formatted for e-book. And then you have to consider that the person that lays out the interior for your book – you don’t know the page count, exactly because every book is formatted a little bit differently. So then you have to take the page count of the book, communicate that to a book designer so they get your spine size correct.

And then they try to submit their book to get printed through CreateSpace, or wherever they end up doing it. They find out it’s wrong, and then they’ve got to contact the designer, have it adjusted. It’s just this chaotic, very time-consuming – many pieces, many “cogs in the wheel of the machine” to get all the pieces to work right.

And so what we’ve done is, we’ve created one source that someone can go to. Like, let’s say – we’ve had this happen all the time -somebody says, “Well, I’ve already got a graphic designer for a book cover. Can we still work with you guys?” And we say, “Yeah, sure. Because we contract out each piece.”

So let’s say you have a book designer that you really want to use, or it’s somebody that you really trust, you already have a designer. You can have the book cover designed as long as it’s at a high level of quality. We can take care of the other pieces and coordinate with your designer to make sure everything gets done right the first time.

And there’s a lot of publishing companies out there that are even starting to pop up, where if your book’s not totally finished, and polished, and completely done – they won’t even look at it. And we’ll actually give coaching for authors when they’re like 70% with their book, or even just in the early stages. If they want a little bit of coaching on their book, and then developmental of it, and what’s the next steps, we help authors with that as well.

So it’s really one source for something to go to get a high level of quality and still retain 100% of the rights to the book.

KIM: Can you [Audio glitch] accountability for getting the book done?

JEREMY JONES: Yeah, we sure can. And that is one of the challenges, too, with self-publishing, is there’s no “end date” per say. With a publisher, they say, “All right, our book release date is this month next year. So you have 12 months. Your first draft needs to be in by this date.” And they give you these very urgent, very hard deadlines.

And that’s a good thing – it creates that urgency. And we do, we have some flexibility to it as well, because we want the author to do it, because people are busy. And we can help create time frames and accountability. We have on our team two creative writing coaches that can help with the accountability and help. And we found that that’s been very, very helpful as well.

But big thing of it is being productive with your writing. Which I’ve developed through my – I have an ongoing coaching program for people that already do have a book out, or they’re working on their book, and they want ongoing support. I have a program, it’s a video course called the “Rapid Writing Formula”.

And if you’d like, I’m happy to share pieces of that as value for your listeners here, if you’d like. It’s a formula to be very efficient and very productive in your writing, so you can stick to those timelines. You’re not rewriting, reworking, re-arranging things. And we find that’s been very helpful, too, to have resources, video resources, tools, templates, resources that we provide for people.

KIM: Oh, I would definitely love a few hints to that. And also, listeners, I will be sure – we will be sure to get a link for the program into the show notes.

But before you go into the hints, I do have to share: The book that I’m writing is “Chronic Idea Disorder” – and listeners, you’ve probably already heard about Chronic Idea Disorder” on previous episodes.

However, Chronic Idea Disorder has really hit me hard, because I’ve started writing probably five or six different books, and I’ve never finished one. And I’ve realized that’s a big problem with entrepreneurs – well, people in general. We get started – just like you were already saying – we get started, but then we never finish. And I can’t even imagine if they’d just been out.

But I also want to circle back, too, about the important point about building your platform. And actually, my husband and I were just discussing this yesterday – although he’s not an author, he’s a video game developer. And we were both struggling – me with my book, and him with his game that he’s working on – how much do you share about it before you actually release it, right?

So my conclusion – and he reached out to a gaming developer community – both conclusions were that it’s good to talk about it before it launches. I mean, you need to be building your platform, and you need to be getting your platform excited about what you’re about to release. Do you agree, Jeremy?

JEREMY JONES: I do. Yeah, I think there’s a lot of components to it, there’s a lot of different ways to look at it and think about it. But a lot of people are. They’re afraid to tell too much, like “it’s a big secret, and if I reveal the secret, then people won’t be interested, or wont’ want to be”. And I feel it builds anticipation.

Just like if a movie is about to come out – think about this way, too, Kim – if a movie is in production, it still remains in production while they start promoting it. And they put out a movie trailer that shows little bits and pieces of the movie without giving away – you know “spoiler alert” – they give away little action sequences. They give away little bits of the story, little teasers, and just a little glimpse of what the movie is. And they drip that over time.

And one of the things that you’ll notice is, if you go to a movie – like we have two kids. If we go to a movie theater, and we watch a Pixar movie, they show commercials, previews, trailers for other movies for kids. Because the kids see it, they get excited about it, and they go home, and they watch TV. And then there’s commercials about that same thing that start to come up with the trailers and the movie trailers. Now you’re more excited about it.

If you go to see an adult drama, they show movie trailers about adult drama. You don’t get to an adult drama movie and start seeing Pixar trailers, you know what I mean?

KIM: Oh, absolutely. And it’s not like those movies are coming out in the next couple of weeks. Especially the Pixar ones, they’re announcing – they’re giving previews for movies that are coming out next Thanksgiving – a year and a half away.

JEREMY JONES: Yeah, exactly. “A world. With a man. Next summer.” It’s way far in advance. And that’s the cool thing about it – for your listeners here, it’s a big lesson. I mean, think about that. It’s almost – it’s an obvious thing. Like you the listener, you’re hearing this, saying, “Oh, yeah. That’s obvious,” because you’ve experienced it.

But really think about it on a deep level: The way that you can promote yourself is by going to audiences that are interested in that topic.

I’ll share another story, that’s kind of an analogy to this, that I heard from a friend of mine – Joel, who is a award-winning speaker at the National Speakers Association and Toastmasters. And he had told me – I was sitting with him in-person, and he was doing a speaking about his early experience in selling.

And he was one of the top-selling personal development salesman for -I think it was Nightingale-Conant, was the company he was with. This was way back when they had audio cassette tapes, and they used to sell those audio cassette tapes, personal development. And he said he was so excited about this, selling these personal development tapes. And he went out trying to sell to people that were all messed up. And he was like, “These people need this information!” because he got to listen to all of it.

So he’d go to people that were, just, in dire straits. He’s like, “If these people just listened to this stuff, they would be totally changed forever.” And they weren’t interested. They had no interest at all. And they got mad, too. They’d say, “Why are you trying to push this personal development junk on us?”

He went back to his trainer, his mentor. He said, “I don’t understand. This information is life-changing for these people. Why are they not interested?”

He goes, “Well, who’ve you been trying to give it to?”

He’s like, “All these people, where life is a mess, they’re a total mess. This’ll change their life.”

He goes, “Oh, see that’s the problem, is you should be selling this to successful people, or people that already listen to persona development. Because they’re interested in personal development.”

So any time you’re trying to promote a book – which is one of the number-one things they start to teach to authors about book promotion, and we do a lot of training on book promotion – is go where the people are interested in the topic of what your book is.

If you’re writing fiction books, go and find out where people gather, or learn, or read, or review books that are similar to what your book would be – or is. If you’re in the nonfiction category, if it’s a business book in a startup category, then you’re out where people in the startup area are learning about startups. And you can apply that in a lot of different areas.

KIM: That is such great advice [Audio glitch] – and I do actually have a question about that. Because especially here in America, we’ve been going through a bit of “drama”, I’ll call it – and I’m sure you know what I’m talking about – with all the politics.

Listeners, if you’re listening well into the future, we’re recording in early 2017 after after Trump has just taken office. However, I’ve realized – as have some of my acquaintances – that engagement on Facebook is dropping off, because people don’t want to see it. So this is really the opportunity for the author – and even if you’re not an author, whatever field you’re in – to really start building up your presence on other platforms.

For example, if you’re a coach or a speaker, you really have to re-evaluate what you’re doing on LinkedIn.

JEREMY JONES: Right.

KIM: Because I would like to think that that same drama in’t going to be over there. I personally haven’t seen it. So I’ve been re-evaluating it, myself.

So Jeremy, you’re also the author of “Power AUTHORity”, where you teach self-published authors to build their credibility from scratch. Is all of this something that you cover in your book as well?

JEREMY JONES: Yeah it really is. And “Power AUTHORity” is my #1 best-selling book on Amazon when it was released – and it maintained #1 for quite a while – and I wanted this to reach even more people. So even on my publishing site right now – for your listeners, that they can get a free copy of it. And we offer a free paperback copy of that book when you go to a JonesMediaPublishing.com.

And the reason that this book came about is because we were finding – we work with a lot of coaches, and experts, and people like that. What we were finding with a lot of experts, even though they were an expert in a category, that when they would write a book – because a book has such a high level of authority and credibility in people’s minds, in general, right now – that when an expert, or coach, or someone, first-time author to write a book, and they’re self-publishing, that many times they get stuck.

And what stops them is they think, “Is anyone going to read this? Is my book really good enough? There’s lots of other books like this. Who is going to read my book, when Brian Tracy, and Gary Vaynerchuk-” who I’ve interviewed several times on my podcast “-and many other bestselling books – there’s so many good books out there. Now, why is my book going to set us apart?” Initially, when they start, they’re excited about it, doesn’t matter.

When they start writing their book, and they get into it, and it starts coming together, I find it is about 80% – the books about 80% of the first draft, and they get stuck. They just doubt themselves, they have a little bit of self-doubt that creeps in, and they think, “You know, I’m not really an expert.” And then they start hearing about – they need to have an author platform.

And so I wrote this book for that person that, it’s called “Power AUTHORity: How to Develop Your Credibility as a First-Time Author”. And it – it’s kind of tools, tips, tricks on how do you do all that credibility from scratch? And hacks, too: How do you create – if you feel maybe you’re not a credible person quite yet in your industry, is how do you develop it? How do you create it?

KIM: You’ll be getting my request for that, as soon as this episode is over.

JEREMY JONES: Yeah, cool. I think you’ll really enjoy it. And again, you can get the e-book for free, or if you want the paperback, it’s on there as well. You just cover a small shipping fees, you just pay for the shipping, and we’ll ship you out a paperback book.

KIM: Fabulous. So, one of my biggest questions while I’ve been going through this process – and I’m sure a lot of other authors deal with it as well – is the “quality versus quantity” question. Is there such thing as a book that’s too short? Or too long – maybe I should ask, too?

JEREMY JONES: Yeah, so. Hmm. That’s a really good question.

KIM: Something that I’ve just heard that I’m going to follow-up the question with, was – and I think it was – oh, and I don’t know, it was on… Okay, here it is: Jason Fried and David Heinemeyeier Hansson wrote “REWORK”, and in it, they were talking about how maybe 50% or 60% of what they originally wrote was actually cut out. Because it’s better to have less “great” content than more “mediocre”.

JEREMY JONES: Right. Yep. Exactly. If you look at any of the old “direct response marketing”, “sales letters”, “copywriting education” – David Ogilvy and some of the great copywriting people – I can’t remember which of those guys said it. But he said, “I’m writing you this letter, and if I would have had more time, I would have made a shorter.” Because it is a funny thing, that it actually takes more time to simplify, and condense, and say more in less words – it actually takes a little bit more time, and more thought, and more consideration.

So to provide some value here for your listeners and answer your question on that one, I believe that a short book – you can accomplish a lot in about a 10,000 word book. Which is very short, it’s going to be probably about 80 pages. That’s a pretty short book. It’s a one-read, but you can get away with a lot.

But it’s a “one-topic book”. Which we have published books that are that short, with many different people. And it’s a short book, it’s a short read, but they’ve got to be – it’s a one-topic book. And that’s okay. And so it’s a one problem, one solution, type of a book for either consumer education – or just a one-topic type of a book.

So on the other side of it: the longer book. I think you can overdo it. Some people think that they do have to have a extremely thick book for people to take it seriously – like it needs to be a really thick book – and I really don’t agree with that, and I don’t think that needs to be the case. If you’ve got a lot of research you want to provide, and there’s really a lot of content to the subject, yeah, sure. It can be a good, chunky, thick book.

But I don’t think you have to overdo it. I really don’t think it needs to be a big massive book. What does really well, right now, is a one-topic, one-sitting to two-sitting type of a book, which is roughly – which is kind of our specialty, expert-related books, one topic, roughly about 150 to 200 pages. Somebody could finish it by sitting down once, reading a bunch of it, sitting down a second time, and finishing it. Gets your message across, builds trust with them, builds authority, and can lead them into something else – your next book, your next thing.

And what we find is that works very, very well. And you can literally create a body of work. Without having to work on one book for three years, you could launch three books – one book a year – for three years, and each book would build upon itself.

So you release book #1, and then you’re working on book #2 while you’re promoting book #1. And then you release book #2, and then people buy book #2, and they go, “Oh, you’ve got a book #1?” And they buy book #1. So builds on itself. And that’s how you build an author platform. Don’t need to be everything all at once.

KIM: Wow. That’s huge. And I thank you for giving the comparison between number of words and an idea of how many pages that was. I was really curious. So 10,000 words is about 80ish pages?

JEREMY JONES: Mm-hm. Yeah.

KIM: Well, this has been loaded with so much quality content. I can’t even imagine how much you’re blowing minds of listeners who do want to publish this year or in the near future. My last question for you, besides where can listeners find you, is: What is a book that, you really didn’t have big expectations for it, but blew your mind?

JEREMY JONES: Hm. Let’s see. You know, one that comes to mind that was very interesting – it was a book called “The Ant and the Elephant”. And I’m not a huge fan of parable books. I like them, but they’ve got to be done really well.

And this is one of those. It’s a parable book that – and a parable is told in a story format in order to teach something. And this book is written by a guy – I wish I could remember his name. I’m going to look it up while I’m telling you about it. Yeah, I will. I’ll look it up while I’m telling you about it.

So it’s a book about how the conscious mind and the subconscious mind work together. And the way he compares it is: a little tiny ants that sits on the back of an elephant. And the little ant is the conscious mind, and the big elephant is the subconscious mind. The subconscious mind is big, and knocks stuff over, and just goes where it wants to go. And the little conscious mind is real tiny, and sometimes tries to convince the subconscious mind where it wants to go, but it doesn’t listen. It just kind of goes where it wants to go.

And that’s how, through my learning, and coaching, I feel very blessed to have great mentors and to meet just unbelievable entrepreneurs through my clients that I’ve worked with, and in close friends. Like I’ve had the opportunity in the last couple years to do conferences with Arianna Huffington from Huffington Post, who I’ve spent days with at conferences and personal time with – Tim Ferriss, Brendan Burchard, Russell Brunson, conferences with Tony Robbins and Bo Eason…

I mean, entrepreneurs that are just awesome. Regular people – what I’ve found is they’re regular people that have just done extraordinary things.

And the book “The Ant and the Elephant” helped me to get clear on how important it is to develop productivity – your podcast is productivity, so I’ll tie into that for value for your listeners – is how important personal habits and productivity ties into your life with your habits. And that’s what that book is. It’s really good.

KIM: That is so fantastic. I am going to have to pick it up now. Again, listeners, you can find all the show notes once again at TheKimSutton.com/PP054.

Jeremy, this has been amazing. Thank you so much for joining me here today. Where is the best place for listeners to find you online?

JEREMY JONES: Yeah, thank you so much. (Real quick – “The Ant and the Elephant: Leadership For the Self” by Vince Poscente. You can find that on Amazon.)

So yeah, thank you so much, honored to be here. My publishing company: JonesMediaPublishing.com. Right on the home page there, you can get a free copy of my book, “Power AUTHORity”.

I’d love to connect with any of your listeners that have questions about publishing, want some free resources. We do – about twice a month, we do an open Q&A call or a training workshop online through my community, “The Book District” – and that’s my podcast as well. And you can go to TheBookDistrict.com and get that information there.

If you want to just jump straight over to the replays for podcast, that’s on my – kind of my personal website, and that’s AskJeremyJones.com. There’s three free resources for you – I put out a lot of free articles and training in my podcast. We’ve got some great interviews there.

And I just want to leave you and your listeners one final thought here. There’s a great quote by Paul Meyer: “Productivity is never an accident. It’s always a result of commitment, excellence, intelligent planning, and focused effort.”

So if you’re a listener, and you’re working on a book, or you put a book on the back burner – if you block out time every single week to plan what you’ll write, and then write what you’ll plan – before you know it, your book draft will be done. And then now with self-publishing, you literally can share your message with millions and millions of people online.

So don’t let anything hold you back, and stay productive.