If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

What do most people get wrong when it comes to publishing a book?

That’s what I asked Sierra Melcher of Red Thread Books, a nonfiction publishing house where 59 of 77 titles have won awards—including two Nautilus Book Prizes.

Sierra believes that the finished, printed book is a side quest. What she's actually in it for is the person who emerges on the other side of writing one—someone who spent years convinced they couldn't do this thing, who goes through the "dark night of the soul" of the writing and publishing process and who comes out the other end asking a completely different question: not "What can't I do" but "What else can I do?"

Sierra came to this the hard way. She's dyslexic, tried to write for a decade and was certain she couldn't. Now she's watched dozens of authors—from a nurse paralyzed in a hospital parking lot to a supply chain expert with a wildly niche book that landed her a job saving a company millions—go through the same transformation. We talked about the moments clients try to quit right before publication, why she still cries with clients over manuscripts and her surprisingly relaxed, curiosity-first take on AI in the publishing world.

In this episode:

• Why Sierra believes the physical book is a "side quest"—the real product is the transformed person who wrote it, not the object itself
• The recurring pattern of authors trying to quit right before publication, and why she treats holding their feet to the fire as part of the job
• Her framework for evaluating every nonfiction book she publishes: "How could we do this differently?"—applied to grief, love, business, or personal change
• Why she believes AI is a revolution, not an apocalypse, and where she personally draws the line on what she'll let it do for her versus never let it touch
• The exercise she runs with every author to fight impostor syndrome: visualize the exact person who needs your message, because the book was never about you in the first place

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/pocket-anna

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 www.annadavid.com

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!

If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

David Homan has a background so sprawling that introducing him almost broke the show: composer with seven albums and now the person who quietly runs what may be the largest private network of "connectors" on the planet—2,800 of them and counting.

His book, Orchestrating Connection, co-written with UC Irvine professor Noah Askin, landed at #2 on the USA Today bestseller list for business books the week it launched. But the real story isn't the list placement—it's the decade of networking philosophy that got him there.

What I loved most about this conversation is how unflinching David is about the parts nobody tells you about publishing: the friends who promise to show up and don't, the launch-day silence from people you'd bet on, and the eight-year-old sending WhatsApp videos threatening a family friend into buying the book. We also got into his new startup, SOAR Connect, which is trying to solve relationship intelligence without doing what every other tech company does with your data.

In this episode:

• David's five-principle system for "orchestrating connection"—curiosity, vulnerability and diversity as strategic tools, not soft skills, for building real relationship value
• Why he built a private, no-membership network of 2,800 connectors around one hard rule: you can only stay if you ask for what you need
• The book as catalyst, not finish line—how it changed his credibility and fundraising even though everything he was doing was already true three years earlier
• The hard truth about launches: for every 1,000 people who actually showed up, roughly 2,000 who promised to didn't—and why that's the real lesson for authors
• What SOAR Connect is building—a relationship intelligence platform based on trust scores, designed so your data stays yours instead of being harvested like everywhere else

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/pocket-anna

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 www.annadavid.com

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!

If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

A listener asked me a two-part question: as she gets ready to publish her book and launch her speaking career, what's the simplest, most economical path to having a box of copies on hand, and what should she budget to get there? I love this question, because I'm currently doing the exact thing she's asking about with the relaunch of On Good Authority.

I've been following what I call the Alex Strathdee method—seeding signed, gift-wrapped copies into communities run by people I know and treating the request as the favor it is rather than a favor I'm doing them. That approach has already turned into an October speaking opportunity, and it's why my answer to her question is simple: never sell books after you speak, because giving them away builds far more value than the $60 you might walk away with from selling a few copies.

Printing runs about $3 a copy—with shipping as the real cost to budget for—and I'd rather spend $1,000 giving books away than make $1,000 selling them, because that investment tends to turn into far more down the road.

In this episode:

• Why treating a book gift as a favor to someone's community, not a favor from you, changes how people respond.
• The specific packaging details—stickers, highlighters, custom cards, ribbon—that turn a free book into a memorable gift instead of a giveaway
• Robert Cialdini's concept of reciprocity and why gifting a book creates a different kind of obligation than selling one
• How collecting addresses at events, following Joe Polish's thank-you-card approach, led to an unsolicited podcast invitation

P.S. — Want me to answer your book question on a future episode? DM me on Instagram (@annabdavid), message me on LinkedIn or email [email protected].

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/pocket-anna

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 www.annadavid.com

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!

If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

Most traditionally published authors go through a moment (or 100 moments) when they realize that their publisher isn’t actually doing anything for them. Some just accept that while others ask themselves the age-old question: can I get my rights back?

That’s what a listener asked me this week: when a publishing contract expires, is it better to renew or get the rights reverted? I'm not a lawyer, and I don't know the details of this person's contract, but I'm naturally biased toward reversion.

I got the rights to my book Party Girl back from HarperCollins, and it changed everything. I republished the book under my own imprint with the cover I actually wanted, then rewrote it years later as a PG version that landed me coverage in the Wall Street Journal and a spot on Access Hollywood.

That said, staying is worth it if your publisher is actually providing value: real marketing, real distribution, strong retail presence. I never had that kind of relationship with any of my publishers, and I'd say it was closer to antagonistic, probably partly my fault for being slow to understand how publishing actually works.

This isn't all or nothing, though. You can go back to your publisher and ask what they'd actually commit to before deciding either way, and if reversion feels like a nightmare because you don't want to deal with relaunching on Amazon yourself, I get it (and I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that this is exactly the kind of thing Legacy Launch Pad does for people).

In this episode:

• Why publishers have no incentive to help you use your book to build your own business, only theirs
• The Amazon control most traditionally published authors don't realize they're giving up—no A+ content, no author excerpts, no ability to fix your own description
• The Party Girl category mishap—how a publisher listed the book as humorous science fiction and what that reveals about how much attention publishers really pay
• Why higher royalties, pricing control and cover control are the biggest practical arguments for getting your rights back
• The negotiation questions to ask a publisher (sales benchmarks, marketing commitments and better royalty terms) before deciding whether to renew or walk away

P.S. — Want me to answer your book question on a future episode? DM me on Instagram (@annabdavid), message me on LinkedIn or email [email protected].

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/pocket-anna

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 www.annadavid.com

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!

If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

Two of you sent me questions that looked different on the surface but landed in the same place: how to market a book under a pen name, and why past launches haven't performed the way you wanted. My answer to both is the same.

Lead magnets, newsletter lists and social media followers have done almost nothing for me, and the data backs it up. Justin Timberlake and Billie Eilish still had their books fail despite millions of followers, and Amy Chen sold just three books off a $10,000 TikTok campaign. What actually builds a career is relationships and by leading with generosity long before you need anything back.

A Wall Street Journal story I read recently proves the point. A self-published book called Theo of Golden has sold more than 2.5 million copies and hit number one on the New York Times list, nearly three years after it came out, because the author's niece personally sent it to more than 70 book clubs and treated every reader who wrote back as an advocate.

That's the whole lesson. If a reader feels completely seen, they become your publicist, and someone else recommending your book will always land harder than you recommending it yourself. Word of mouth isn't luck—it's built intentionally, one relationship at a time.

In this episode:

• Why lead magnets and newsletter lists have produced almost nothing in the way of actual clients or sales
• The Justin Timberlake, Billie Eilish, Jessica Ciencin Henriquez and Amy Chen examples that prove followers and views don't equal sales
• Why relationships built in book clubs, Facebook groups and Threads outperform social media presence
• The Theo of Golden story—how one self-published book hit 2.5 million copies and the New York Times list nearly three years after launch, through 70 book clubs and one relentlessly personal outreach campaign
• Why treating every reader like an advocate is the single highest-leverage thing an author can do

P.S. — Want me to answer your book question on a future episode? DM me on Instagram (@annabdavid), message me on LinkedIn or email [email protected].

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/pocket-anna

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 www.annadavid.com

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!

If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

A client of mine named Jimmie Applegate asked me a question I get from almost every author I work with, even though he was too polite to ask it quite this bluntly: he has a published book, Addicted to Failure, and a great Psychology Today feature to his name—and he still doesn't know what to do next.

Instead of answering him privately, I answered him on the show, because I know that so many other authors wonder the same thing.

Jimmy got the press hit. That part's done. But the Psychology Today feature is living in exactly one place—Psychology Today—instead of his website, his LinkedIn, his speaker page and every bio he's ever written. I walk through what we call “the $50,000 press hit” at Legacy Launch Pad: the document I give clients that shows them how to take one media win and multiply it into 50 different pieces of content, mentions and proof points.

I also get into my own Good Morning America clip. The appearance sold maybe five or six books directly. But it's brought in a steady stream of new business because of how many times I've referenced it since—in videos, in Substacks, in podcast episodes, in my own bio and everywhere else (including here!)

In this episode:

• The $50,000 press hit framework—how one media mention becomes dozens of touchpoints across a website, LinkedIn, speaker pages and bios
• Why every bio you've ever written (Amazon, Facebook, network directories) needs a fresh audit and an update the moment you become a published author
• The six-month relaunch: revisiting Amazon categories, keywords and book descriptions instead of assuming a launch only happens once
• Why sending a book beats sending a brochure, a PDF or a deck—the case for replacing every prospect touchpoint with a physical copy instead
• The 100-person list exercise: writing down everyone who could change your business and checking, honestly, who has actually received a copy of your book

P.S. — Want me to answer your book question on a future episode? DM me on Instagram (@annabdavid), message me on LinkedIn or email [email protected].

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/pocket-anna

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 www.annadavid.com

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!

If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

Paul Colligan has written 13 books, is in the Podcasting Hall of Fame and has helped Donald Miller, Brendan Burchard, JJ Virgin and Joe Polish turn podcasting into what he calls a “grown-up business strategy” instead of a hobby. He also sent me a question I love: when you already have a working book, how do you know if it’s time to write a new one or keep leveraging the one you’ve got?

I have very strong feelings about this one, mostly because I got the answer wrong for six years and recently got right.

And Paul’s specific situation is one a lot of multi-book authors may recognize. He has a workhorse title, How to Podcast, that has been the category-defining book in its lane for years. But the world has changed underneath it—AI, the death of “if you build it, they will come,” the shift from downloads to impact.

So….does he update it? Write the new manifesto? Write nothing and double down on the consulting? I had a take on all of the above—and more.

In this episode:

• The six-year mistake I made early in my career that the publishing industry rewards you for making
• Why cranking out a new book every 18 months might be hurting your authority instead of building it
• The specific move I told Paul Colligan to make with How to Podcast
• The Amazon trick that lets you treat an old book like a new one—and why almost nobody uses it
• The exact month of the year I would release a relaunch (and the month I’d never release one in)
• The audiobook question every “updated edition” author has to answer—and the answer that surprised me

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/book

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 www.annadavid.com

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!

If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

I'm trying something entirely new on the podcast. I asked you to send me your book questions and I'd answer them like the brass tacks book strategist I am, and the first person who took me up on it was Brenda. Brenda has three different book ideas in her head, a 100-page version of each, an abandoned memoir and a new instinct to pivot into the longevity market. I'm going to tell her to scrap most of it and write one big book instead. Here's the case.

Brenda is a personal development coach with sharp instincts—the kind of practitioner who saves clients years of therapy in a few sessions. Her ideal client is smart, entrepreneurial and allergic to anyone who can't keep up. She has a framework for personal development in the wings, multiple levels of teaching groups, a memoir she's already concluded isn't publishable, three short-book ideas across different topic areas and a fresh instinct to chase the biohacking-for-longevity market. Which is exactly the kind of fork where an outline appointment can save you a decade of writing in circles.

But my answer really goes into the case against multiple short books, because Brenda is leaning that direction. I've published eight books and trust me—by the third one, even the people who love you stop caring. You don't get to compound enthusiasm by stacking projects—you compound diminishing returns. The people doing it well are doing the opposite. Yes, Dan Sullivan has a whole shelf of helpful little Strategic Coach books, but the big books he started doing with Ben Hardy for Hay House made a much bigger difference in his business. The little books are useful. The big books are what made him known.

We also get into why I always ask what tax bracket your ideal clients are in, the case for niching down to "how to all pretend we're ants in a colony"-level specificity (every weird Facebook group has hundreds of thousands of members) and the sign-two-copies move that has turned more cold prospects into clients than any other recommendation I make.

In this episode:

• Why Brenda should pick one big book over four short ones (and what Dan Sullivan's career proves)
• The tax-bracket question I ask before I help anyone build a book strategy
• Why Amazon's "biohacking for women over 40" search reveals an opportunity hiding in plain sight
• The 40,000-word memoir I abandoned—and why I tell people to stop writing the book that won't move their business
• Why no niche is too small (the Facebook-group test that proves it)
• Sign two copies, send them to your two most-wanted clients—and what happens next

P.S. — Want me to answer your book question on a future episode? DM me on Instagram (@annabdavid), message me on LinkedIn or email [email protected].

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/book

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 https://annadavid.com/

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!

If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

The Five-Minute Audit That Tells You If Your Book Is Invisible to AI

Last week I did something I probably should have done two years ago: I asked AI whether my novel Party Girl is one of the best funny novels about addiction and recovery. One AI said yes and listed me alongside Marian Keyes and Carrie Fisher, which was the closest thing to a dream I have ever had as an author. Another AI did not know I existed. (Rejection wasn’t new; rejection by a robot was.)

This is a solo episode and one could call it my confession. For 20 years. the question was: does my book come up on Google? Then it was: does it come up on Amazon? 

Now the question is: when a prospect asks ChatGPT for the best books in your category, does your name come out of its mouth? Your buyers are asking right now. 

Most authors have never once checked what AI says about them.

I spent the week figuring out why one AI knew my book and one didn’t, how these systems actually decide what to recommend and what I am doing this week, on the record, to fix the gap. Including one move on Amazon KDP I am pretty sure I am not supposed to be able to make.

In this episode:

• The five-minute audit that tells you whether your book is invisible to AI (free, right now, from your phone)
• The “vocabulary trap” that makes most expert books unfindable—and what to put in your bio instead
• Why AI doesn’t actually recommend the best books and what it recommends instead
• The exact question to ask AI about your own book that, in my case, turned into a free publicity consultation
• The change I made to my Amazon listing this week that I am pretty sure Amazon doesn’t want you to know is possible (and which may not be possible actually by the time you read/hear this)
• Why doing this work feels embarrassing—and the reason I would tell you to do it anyway

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/book

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 www.annadavid.com

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!

If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

Nicolas Cole built his first ghostwriting business by answering questions on Quora in 2014, and somehow that has compounded into a $10M+ portfolio of writing companies that he runs with his partner Dickie Bush—anchored by Premium Ghostwriting Academy, the 16-week program that's trained roughly 2,000 ghostwriters to charge premium rates.

Cole is a three-time guest on this show, which is a record nobody else holds, and there's a reason for it. We met at a party years ago and immediately started geeking out about books and publishing like two people who'd finally found each other at a conference for a very specific kind of weirdo. He's one of the few people I've watched scale, burn out, blow it up and rebuild without losing the part of him that actually loves writing.

The part I really wanted to get into was the 10x argument, which is the cleanest case against traditional publishing I've ever heard anyone make.

A traditional publisher pays you roughly 10% in royalties, meaning you keep 10% of the book and they keep 90%.

Self-publish and you keep 100%.

This means that to make the same money as a self-published author, your traditionally published book has to sell 10 times more copies. 

We also get into his Medium loophole that paid him hundreds of thousands of dollars in royalties before they emailed him to make him stop, the Christmas Eve in 2019 he tried to duct-tape together a paid newsletter six months before Substack existed and how he emailed the Substack founder to invest the moment he saw their first round.

Also discussed: his Write With AI newsletter that now does $400K a year in subscriptions and feeds a $1-2M business on top of that and his case for why the only book worth writing is one you’re willing to write about on social media day after day after day after day.

In this episode:

• Why a traditionally published book has to sell 10 times more copies than a self-published one just to break even
• The Medium loophole that paid Cole hundreds of thousands of dollars before they emailed him to stop
• Why Cole emailed the Substack founder the day they raised their first round and what happened when they said no
• The $400K-a-year Substack newsletter Cole built by following the money
• Why charging less than $3,000 a project means you have a faulty relationship with money, not a pricing problem

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/book

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 www.annadavid.com

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!

If you're thinking about writing an authority building book, and I really hope you are, and you don't want to be counting pennies or checking your book sales all the time, you actually want a book that's going to change your life, I can tell you how. Just go to sevenfigurebooks.com. I'm not trying to capture your email or anything. You can just download this PDF that's going to tell you exactly how to turn an authority building book into revenue, speaking, authority, and no exaggeration, a whole new life. 

Gary White is a Scottish marketer who spent years building funnels for Russell Brunson at ClickFunnels before he got obsessed with one specific kind of client: people who cared so much about a subject they wrote a book on it. He turned that obsession into bookfunnels.io, a company that's helped hundreds of authors stop selling books on Amazon and start using their books to acquire actual paying clients.

I have to admit something. I got on a call with Gary, hung up, decided to poke around his site to see what he was about — and within an hour I had entered my credit card and signed up for things I did not need or really understand. That is how good his system is. So I figured the only responsible thing to do was have him on the show to explain exactly how he did that to me, so all of you can do it to your readers.

The framework is called the TINY Book Client System. The T is the perfect bait, meaning your book has to attract the exact person you actually want to work with, not just any reader who might buy a book on your topic. The I is the independent selling system, which is how you stop renting your readers from Amazon and start owning the relationship. The N is the never-ending traffic source, and Gary has a story about spending five days making a YouTube video that got 82 views, then taking a single iPhone photo of a box of his books and selling hundreds the same week with a 30-second Meta ad. The Y is the implementation offer, which is the thing your book is secretly selling the whole time.

We also get into "cash cycling"—the mechanic where every dollar you spend on ads comes back on Day Zero so you literally cannot lose money, why he thinks LinkedIn ads are a waste for most authors even when you're targeting CEOs, his case for "tiny books" of around 120 pages (just thick enough to have a real spine and an ISBN) and the warehouse-in-California-while-he-lives-in-Scotland setup that lets him sell physical books he has literally never touched.

In this episode:

• The TINY framework Gary built after running funnels for Russell Brunson at ClickFunnels for years
• The 5-day YouTube video that got 82 views and the 30-second iPhone photo that sold hundreds of books the same week
• "Cash cycling"—why every dollar you spend on Meta ads comes back on Day Zero so you cannot lose money
• Why Gary thinks LinkedIn ads are a waste even when you're targeting CEOs (and where to find those CEOs instead)
• The "tiny book"—roughly 120 pages, real spine, real ISBN, none of the months-of-staring-at-a-blank-page
• The audience-capture trap Gary warns every author about before they write a single chapter

Want to know more about my company? Legacy Launch Pad Publishing is a boutique hybrid publisher for entrepreneurs and established founders. We help clients create books that build authority, attract opportunities and grow businesses. More info 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com

Want to ask me how to build authority with your book to generate seven-figure returns, speaking opportunities and high-value clients? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/book

Interested in working with a selective hybrid publisher that focuses on strategy, authority and long-term business growth—not just publishing a book? 👉 https://www.legacylaunchpadpub.com/apply

And if you just want to know more about me,  👉 www.annadavid.com

Remember, if there's anyone in your life who you know could be considered an authority in their field if they were better known, share this show with them!