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A Survival Guide to Publishing Your First Book
15 lessons from book publishing from author Steve Pratt
Hey honeys and hustlers,
Today, Iām bringing you some words from Steve Pratt, the writer behind the Creativity Business newsletter. Six months ago, he released his book, Earn It: Unconventional Strategies for Brave Marketers. I ran into Steve at Podcast Movement Evolutions in Chicago, and he wrote an incredible article on video podcasting following that event. Today, Iām sharing his article on his learnings from publishing a book. I really enjoyed it, and I think you will as well.
ICYMI: Steve joined me in his first-ever Substack Live on Thursday! Hereās the replay of our conversation.
This is a truncated version of his article. You can find the full original article here.

Six Months of Insights
Wonderful and unexpected things happen when you publish a book. Publishing a book is a timely event that puts you top of mind for many people. As a result, consulting opportunities show up. Speaking opportunities show up. Invitations to events show up. Itās weird and almost magical. Iāve had so many surreal experiences in the last six months that would have never happened without the book.
Itās hard to sell books. You really have to āearn itā when it comes to a book sale! This is obvious, but unlike a podcast, YouTube video, or Instagram post, you have to get people to BUY a book. Itās not enough to convince them to give it a try. Itās not free. Itās not $1. Itās a real commitment, financially and time-wise. Iām so grateful to all of you who have bought a copyāthank you!
Manage expectations and measure differently. Similar to podcasts, success for most books is not defined by reach or volume. To me, so far, book success should be measured in the impact your book has on readers. The impact comes from the amount of time people spend with your stories and ideas, not necessarily the volume of people who read the book.
If youāre used to millions of downloads or views, you need to really calibrate your expectations for book sales.
There are better ways to make money than publishing a book, but there might be no better way to create an impact on others with your ideas.
My insight has been to focus on making sure the people the book is written for (brave marketers and content creators) know that Earn It exists, and to try to gauge the impact the book has on the ones that actually read it.
Be aware of The Job of your book. Earn It is not designed to be a NYT best-seller. Lots of best-sellers promise quick results, shortcuts, hacks, or core ideas that are easy to comprehend. The message of Earn It is that there arenāt any shortcuts and that you have to do hard creative work to get results. This is a less attractive proposition than becoming a millionaire in a weekend :-) Would I change the message of the book to sell more copies? Absolutely not. This is the book I wanted to write because I know that whatās in the book is true and it works.
There are no shortcuts. A book will not sell itself just because it exists. You need to market the book, and that requires a lot of effort over an extended period of time. And over that extended period of time, you have to be consistent with your quality and messaging. Patience is required. I am regularly reminded of a section in the book when Michael Bungay Stanier talks about marketing The Coaching Habit for two years⦠before it took off and became a million-copy seller.
š Community Spotlight
Stephanie Graham is a multidisciplinary artist, photographer, and filmmaker based in Chicago. Her work explores themes of social class, subcultures, race, and genderāoften with humor and heart. She produces and hosts the podcast noseyAF, which features conversations with artists, activists, and everyday changemakers. She works professionally in the film industry on commercials and television, including shows like Chicago PD and Somebody Somewhere.
Open to: collaboration, conversation, accountability partners, and creative exchange.
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Book success is about more than just the book. Most book businesses are an ecosystem. I think itās smart to think about success as the aggregate of everything that comes out of having a book. There are two different ecosystems to consider.
The first is a revenue ecosystem. The book itself generates revenue, but it also leads to all sorts of other revenue that would not exist without the book, including speaking, consulting, coaching, and courses.
The second ecosystem is content. When you build a multi-platform content ecosystem, the impact of the ideas in the book reach a lot more people, and each element in the ecosystems serves as marketing for the book or your other revenue streams. Whether itās a newsletter, a podcast, a YouTube channel, or social posts and videos, looking at the overall numbers in your ecosystem shows a more accurate picture of the impact your ideas are having on others.
The backbone of both the revenue and content ecosystems is the book itself. None of the other elements would exist without the book existing first.
You become whatever you write about. I wrote the book to wrap up a chapter of my life and career by sharing all the best strategies and ideas Iāve learned from working with all sorts of amazing brands at Pacific Content, as well as from a lot of time in podcasting, television, radio, and digital media. Before the book, most people thought of me as the āpodcasting with brands guy.ā
Post-book, itās been very noticeable that a decent chunk of people think of me as āthe attention and differentiation strategy guyā and āthe author./speaker.ā
Digital > traditional media. Podcasts and email newsletters are terrific for generating awareness. I owe a huge debt of gratitude to all the podcasts and newsletters that did interviews and spread the word about the book. It has, and continues to be, so much more effective and targeted than traditional media coverage, and I have a hunch that the digital properties drove more book sales than traditional media coverage precisely because they were laser-focused on exactly the right audiences for the subject matter of the book.
The book industry is comparatively (and refreshingly) slow. Again, relative to other media formats, books are a long process. They take a LONG time to write. There are multiple editing processes. There is book design and layout. Thereās printing. Thereās distribution to all the bookstores.
The other area that is unusual about books is that itās slow to get a full view of how the book is doing, because there are so many retailers, there are physical books, digital books, and audiobooks.
And you know what? Itās wonderful! In a world where algorithms try to force you to publish every single day and creator burnout happens all the time, a book is a truly special creative project to undertake.
I recently read Cal Newportās Slow Productivity advocates doing fewer things, doing them at a reasonable pace, and focusing on quality. (P.S. These are also key themes in Earn It!) You get to embrace every aspect of slow productivity with a book, and it is a generous gift to give yourself the time for a project where singular focus on a high-quality product over an extended period of time is the entire point.
Each stage of the book publishing process is its own creative project. The book is about how to earn attention with creative bravery, so I knew that the book itself and all the marketing would have to employ all the strategies inside the book.
So I decided to treat each element of the process like a separate creative project, and it was so much fun. Working on the design of the book with Peter Cocking at Page Two was a creative joy. Recording the audiobook with my brilliant friends, Pedro Mendes and Gaetan Harris, and ending up with a unique and unconventional product still fills me with pride. Organizing launch events was stressful, but it paid off with two truly memorable nights full of friends and colleagues that I will never forget. And working on keynote talks that embody the ideas and spirit of the book is scary, has a steep learning curve, and is deeply engaging.
Perhaps the most fun I had was deciding to make a stupid mockumentary videos about marketing the book with Steve Scarrow and Perry Pannu, BC Bob, Jody Vance, George Stroumboulopoulos, Jordan Kawchuk, and (above) my son. Making the marketing a fun, enjoyable creative project all its own was a real joy and it made it SO MUCH easier to talk about the book with an unusual format for book marketing like this.

Launch events are overwhelming. I wasnāt sure whether to have a book launch event, but Iām so glad that I decided to do one in Vancouver and one in Toronto. The rooms were filled with all sorts of important people in my life. If youāre writing a book and not sure whether to do it or not⦠do it! Everyone will be there to support you in your big creative journey. Itās a surreal and overwhelming experience. (Itās a bit like a wedding. Itās a total whirlwind. Itās over before you know it. And there is no way you can have meaningful time with everyone that you want to, but everyone understands.)
Talk to other authors about their experiences. Ask them for suggestions and what theyāve learned. I talked to all sorts of authors before, during, and after launch, each of whom was extremely kind and generous with their time and insights. (Thank you to Dan Heath, Michael Bungay Stanier, Ann Handley, Jay Acunzo, Liane Davey, Ron Tite, April Dunford, Stephen Shedletzky, Gill Deacon, Larry Gaudet, Rob Volpe⦠and my dad!)
Donāt plan to return to ānormalā soon after launch. Clear a lot of your schedule post-publish date (for months!) so that you can say āYES!ā and accommodate the unexpected opportunities that arrive on your doorstep.
Your book publisher matters A LOT. Be picky about who you work with as your publisher. I have been so incredibly fortunate to work with the talented and experienced team at Page Two, and Iāve always had a palpable sense that everyone on the team has been cheering for the success of Earn It. Iāve heard a lot of stories about publishers that disappear two weeks after launch, but I continue to talk semi-regularly with the sales, marketing, and promotion teams at Page Two and they continue to generate new ideas and opportunities to showcase the book. (Iām pretty sure this is quite rare in publishing!) Their goal is to work with authors who have big ideas that can change the conversationāif thatās you, I highly recommend Page Two.
Iām still not aggressive enough in asking people to buy the book or the audiobook! (P.S. if youād like to learn how to earn loads of attention, a successful content strategy that delivers business results, and loads of actionable ideas and strategies for idea generation, differentiation, and audience growth⦠I have a book recommendation for you!)
Thanks for reading! š

Steve Pratt is the author of Earn It: Unconventional Strategies for Brave Marketers and the founder of The Creativity Business, which offers speaking, workshops, and consulting to help companies develop differentiated content, marketing, and messaging that earns attention.
Prior to embarking on his entrepreneurship journey, Steve was the director of digital audio at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), where he ran a content innovation lab, launched one of the worldās first legal music podcasts in 2005, and grew a highly engaged online community at CBC Radio 3.
Steve originally learned how to earn attention by producing television, working in genres ranging from music to childrenās programming and entertainment journalism to local news.
Steve is also the co-founder of the worldās first branded podcast agency, Pacific Content, named one of Entrepreneurās 100 Brilliant Companies. Pacific Content worked predominantly with US-based brands, including Ford Motor Company, Audible, BMW, the New York Times, Dell Technologies, Facebook, Rocket Mortgage, Slack, Shopify, Zendesk, Morgan Stanley, Charles Schwab, Prudential, Adobe, and Atlassian.
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