In this episode, authors will learn everything they need to include in their bios. AJ and Mike share the different types of bios, from short social media bios to longer bios meant for the interior of your book and everything in between. You’ll also learn what not to include to avoid looking like a newbie.
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Children’s Illustrator (My Money Bunnies and others), Eevi Jones
The Biology of Trauma, by Aimie Apigian
AJ’s Authorship Planning Workshop
AJ Harper, website
AJ’s Socials:
Mike Michalowicz, website
Mike’s Socials:
Episode 109: “Author Bios”
Mike Michalowicz:
Welcome back to the Don't Write That Book podcast where you can learn how to write your bestseller and own your authorship. Follow along with us as we give you an insider's view of the book industry. Now, here are your hosts, myself, Mike Michalowicz and AJ Harper. I love when an episode starts with. Well, that's what you asked for,
AJ Harper:
It is, and you said, I wanna do an episode on author Bios. 'cause we said we would do it, and then we didn't.
Mike Michalowicz:
We didn't.
AJ Harper:
Which happens. Sometimes we get excited and then we forget.
Mike Michalowicz:
You know, what happens behind the scenes is we text each other saying, oh, here's a topic, here's an idea. And sometimes in episodes we say, oh, we're, we gotta talk about this at some future point. And, uh, I, I gotta take a responsibility for actually tracking when we say we're gonna do something. 'cause we say, we'll get to it and then don't listen. Or I forget.
AJ Harper:
I try to remember. So if you're listening and we promised you an episode that you really wanted and we haven't done it yet, just email us and you can be naggy. It's all right.
Mike Michalowicz:
That's perfect. So this team Epi episode for the first time, remember I, on the team episode, I have it highlighted, um, to actually right when we finish today's recordings, to reach out to, um, Erin to line that up with our teams. Um, and yeah, let them have their discussion. You're listening to Don't Write That Book. This is episode 1 0 9. We're gonna talk about author bios. AJ and I write books together. Uh, and we write, well, she writes them independently. I would never do something without AJ. The newest book we worked on is called The Money Habit.
AJ Harper:
But you did. You did, you did. You did My Money Bunnies.
Mike Michalowicz:
My Money. I did a children's book by myself. I shouldn't say by myself with a, um, a team that helps with the illustrations and construct. Um,
AJ Harper:
Do you know, I met that? I know that person.
Mike Michalowicz:
Oh, do you?
AJ Harper:
Um, do you know that's Eevi
Mike Michalowicz:
Eevi, um, oh gosh, I can't remember her last name.
AJ Harper:
So I Do you wanna know, wanna hear a funny story about it? Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz:
Yeah.
AJ Harper:
We're both in Selena Soo's, um, group, and we have these little, she organizes these quarterly pods.
Mike Michalowicz:
Oh, cool.
AJ Harper:
And so there's maybe a four. So there's a big group, and then there's small groups in the pod. And I'm in this pod and I'm researching, they send you a, an email that says, here's who's in your pod. And I go look. And I see, and looking at Eevi, who, y'all, does children's books, um, based on thought leader. Like she does 'em for, she, um, she started out with, um, oh God, who did? He's not... This is perimenopause. This is what's happening.
Mike Michalowicz:
Oh, Todd Herman, she did the Alter Ego.
AJ Harper:
Todd Herman, she started with the Alter Ego, where she did a children's book version of, of Alter Ego. And so I'm, anyway, I'm going on her side and I'm going, oh, how cool, how cool. And then I see My Money bunnies and I was like, wait a minute. Yeah, the two of us are in. I didn't even know about her. And we ended up in the same pod, which is probably on purpose for Selena, um, connecting us in that way. But isn't that funny that we met that way? And we, um, she's the only other person who's worked with you on a book like that.
Mike Michalowicz:
Correct. So
AJ Harper:
She is so awesome. I just love her.
Mike Michalowicz:
She's amazing. I I want to give her a what
AJ Harper:
A sweetheart too.
Mike Michalowicz:
And she's sweet. So it's Eevi, is spelled EEVI. Last name's Jones. So Eevijones.com. And she specializes in children's books and, uh, she gets all the illustrations, the structure, uh. She'll, even if you want do ghost writing or co-writing. And, uh, I told her I, we gotta do co-writing 'cause I don't really understand the flow of a book. And, um, I was the first person to do a co-write with her. So she said, oh, this is, this is what it should be as a ghost. And I said, oh, that's not my voice. I said, it's got to be my voice. And so I rewrote sections. And so some of the rhymes are imperfect, but it's the, the word, the exact words I would use. And she's like, okay, let's do it. And, uh, out came the book.
AJ Harper:
She's wonderful. So if you have a business book or a personal growth book and you want a children's, you know, kind of offshoot of it, she's a really good resource.
Mike Michalowicz:
One last little related thing, but this isn't Author Bios yet, is, uh, the most challenging keynote of my life was in front of like a third grade class reading that book. 'cause I'm, I'm going, I'm like, you know, I read the first page and I'm kind of acting out. And then, uh, when the hands goes up and I go, oh, question. He goes, yeah, why is your nose so big?
AJ Harper:
Was that a real question?
Mike Michalowicz:
Yeah. I'm like, I genetics. You know, my dad had a big nose, um, and my mom's nose a little pointier, so I got a pointy big nose. And he is like, thank you. I'm like, that was a good question. Any other questions? You know.
AJ Harper:
Just facts. Why do you get so listen, you've, you've been showing, um, you've been showing. Well, we didn't do our intros. Sorry, I'm getting off track.
Mike Michalowicz:
AJ Harper, I love your nose. You got a nice nose.
AJ Harper:
Okay,
Mike Michalowicz:
What about you, Mike Michalowicz.
AJ Harper:
Um, well, what I admire about you is that you're gonna take that stuff in stride.
Mike Michalowicz:
I think it's great.
AJ Harper:
Yeah. I love that about you. I love that about you.
Mike Michalowicz:
I, you know, what I found, and I think why I don't get phased by much at all is life is so precious because none of it matters. Like a hundred years from now, I don't think anyone's gonna remember my name. Uh, my books may be long gone. Maybe that's true for you, too. But I know it's true for most of us. I, I'm not a history buff and therefore I'm reading history books to see if I can become buffed on it. And I don't remember any of the names. There's a couple key names, like throughout life's histories that stick around. Um, but, but for 99.99999% of us will be forgotten. So I said, okay, so nothing really matters and therefore everything matters in the moment because it's of the one little flash that I'm able to observe. So when he's like, you got a big nose, I'm like, that's awesome. I do.
AJ Harper:
But that's part of the reason why you can get out there. I mean, in our last episode, we talked about the last two episodes we talked about what keeps us from finishing and perfectionism and how do you know you're done. And I think that that's because you're not really concerned. You're willing to do more things, try more things.
Mike Michalowicz:
Yeah. That, yeah, that could be it.
AJ Harper:
Um, I really believe that. So you've been doing show and tell for the last couple episodes because we got instructions from AADE that we need to do more show things on. 'cause we're on YouTube now.
Mike Michalowicz:
She's just waiting how you wait when we do that? Yeah. So our YouTube,
AJ Harper:
YouTube channel. So I'm gonna, I have show and tell.
Mike Michalowicz:
Our YouTube channel. Just go to, don't write that book on YouTube and please, uh, follow and subscribe. Oh, what is that show and tell.
AJ Harper:
Okay. So this is what I, I'm holding up a, uh, a troll doll. But I call him King Troll because he's painted gold and he also has a diamond belly ring. And he's glued to this like, piece of mirror. I bought it on Etsy for 30 bucks. King troll. And those of you who follow me know, oh, it says, oh, I never read the bottom. It says, your gold anniversary Troll doll is a limited edition collector's item
Mike Michalowicz:
Oh, that's awesome.
AJ Harper:
And to make sure that I keep it silly because it's not personal as Steve Pressfield says. And so since it's not personal, I try to just like be, you know, this epic king troll right here reminds me that, uh, that's not anything to do with me, really. It's just, um, it's just what happens when you
make stuff. And I think if we try to avoid the inner critic or affirm our way outta the inner critic, it actually gets worse. Hmm. So it's better to just embrace it, be like, you know, great reporting for duty. That means I'm making something, all good. So since you were doing a show and tell earlier, I was like, what do I have? Yeah,
Mike Michalowicz:
You got something cool there.
AJ Harper:
I got king troll.
Mike Michalowicz:
So follow us on the YouTube channel. Don't write that book and please do hit the notification bell and the subscription option. Um, as you were saying that, I got an order in for the collector's edition. So you said that was a collector's edition troll. The Money Habit, a marketing technique that you can use for your own book as the arcs, which stands for Advanced Reader Copy, which is typically distributed exclusively to media outlets, can also be distributed to early readers, early adopters. And so we have, um, a collector's edition we did did 250 units and Anju from Liberty Hill, Texas just picked up a copy. So Anju, if you're listening, thank you. I doubt you are. Um, but, uh, I want encourage people to do that. That's been significant for us, um, in raising awareness for the book, getting content out there early, and also using the funds that we're generating to support subsequent marketing of the book. So
AJ Harper:
I put it in my newsletter and I think it's a really cool thing that other authors can go look at the offer and see if you can also emulate that for yourself.
Mike Michalowicz:
Yeah, R and d
AJ Harper:
The offer's really good. there's a lot of good juice in there, not just the book itself. That's
Mike Michalowicz:
Right. So why do authors struggle with bios in the first place? AJ?
AJ Harper:
I mean, I think it's probably more about the perfectionism. They aren't sure what's, uh, what's different about an author bio versus the bio that they might have professionally. They just aren't sure, well, what are the rules? What am I supposed to do? And so it's intimidating.
Mike Michalowicz:
Should we start off with the rules or do you want to, what, how do you wanna tackle today's episode?
AJ Harper:
Um, I wanna start with my pet peeves.
Mike Michalowicz:
Okay. Then lay, lay, lay those on me.
AJ Harper:
I'm feeling pet peeves right now. Especially because although my wife just delivered coffee to me, uh, in between recording these episodes, there's oat milk in it.
Mike Michalowicz:
Oh, come on. She's better than that.
AJ Harper:
I mean, I don't, I don't think it's her fault because we are closing up and I imagine we probably ran out and so we're not gonna get new half and half. Okay. Because we leave tomorrow. But that's a pet peeve is oat milk, but I'm drinking it anyway. This caffeine is good.
Mike Michalowicz:
So what--
AJ Harper:
Pet peeves? Yeah. About bios number one, uh, holding back because you're afraid of your bragging. So not listing really relevant things that would help people understand why you are a credible person or an awesome person or whatever. They need to believe that you absolutely should listen to you and, and read the book you wrote, leaving stuff out. You know, I've had authors who are afraid of that and so they leave out important things. And then the opposite side of that, which is deliberately bragging. So leaving stuff out 'cause you're afraid, you're bragging. That's a pet peeve. And then actually bragging is a pet peeve, boasting. Um, and usually it's where you see adjectives and superlatives. Oh. So one of my favorite pet, my not favorite, one of my most common, uh, slash and burns is so and so is a sought after something. Usually sought after speaker.
Mike Michalowicz:
Speaker, Yeah.
AJ Harper:
Take "sought after" out, people. Take it out, scratch it, scratch it, scratch it. Um, most popular. I actually, you rewrote your bio and I did this. I went through and pulled out... You had the word popular in there three times
Mike Michalowicz:
Because I, I wanna be popular.
AJ Harper:
You ain't popular in there. Three. Times!
Mike Michalowicz:
Did I really? Oh, so to your point, uh, an author writes their own bio. So you don't I didn't go to an external party. I write my own bio 'cause I know my story. The best and then went to you for critical feedback.
AJ Harper:
A race? Not instead.
Mike Michalowicz:
So instead, instead of it saying Mike is a popular speaker, Mike is a speaker, as an example. AJ Harper:
Um, I think we ended up with internationally international, no. Um, main, no Main-stage keynoter. That's way more significant than popular. You had popular main-stage keynoter. Just erase the adjectives. People just go through and take them out. Do not replace them with anything.
Mike Michalowicz:
Yeah. So what I'm hearing is make it factual. 'cause I am a main-stage keynote, but don't make it, um, I guess with superlatives or objective or, or, or, or trying to
AJ Harper:
Pick out all the adjectives.
Mike Michalowicz:
If you're trying to trigger an emotion or persuade, that's it. Make it as factual. Don't try to persuade the reader into getting a, a sense of, or a feeling that you're a big deal, maybe.
AJ Harper:
Yes.
Mike Michalowicz:
And we did an episode on back covers and you went into bios on back covers, particularly on the difference between hardcover and soft cover. And I challenged you in the episode, I didn't challenge you. I asked you, I said, how do we make my bio one sentence? And you you did one sentence.
AJ Harper:
I did?
Mike Michalowicz:
Yeah. Mike is an author of multiple entrepreneurial books, including Profit First and as a main stage speaker.
AJ Harper:
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz:
I was like,
AJ Harper:
Here's, here's the thing. If you, if you're a really successful person, one, one or two sentences is enough. So if you're not quite where you wanna be successfully, one and two sentence is also enough. Yeah. But the problem is we try to make bios that sound impressive. And all we end up sounding is, you know, bloated and insecure.
Mike Michalowicz:
Why is a author bio different than other forms of bios?
AJ Harper:
We're persuading a reader to read something we wrote that we have a perspective and life or work experience that is relevant, um, or if it's fiction that again, life or work experience, but also point of view. So in fiction, you're, you're, you want a little personality in your bio. You wanna feel like the kind of like flavor of this author in the bio, which you can also adopt for nonfiction.
Mike Michalowicz:
Would you give me an example of that flavor for a non, for a fiction author?
AJ Harper:
Um, like if you started with a belief, right? Like, like AJ Harper does not believe in ghosts, but she does believe in demons.
Mike Michalowicz:
Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. That
AJ Harper:
Not true by the way. Neither of those things are true. But you know, what would that teach you? If I said a if you read AJ Harper does not believe in ghosts, but she does believe in demons.
Mike Michalowicz:
So I could put a AJ Harper knows it's a fact that oat milk and coffee do not belong together.
AJ Harper:
Right. Both of those things. What do they tell you though? It gives you like a flavor of, Ooh, if I was a, if I was like, if I wrote fantasy, if mystery thriller horror, like if I was a horror writer, then you might want, you might like does not believe in ghosts, but she does believe in demons. But also, even if I wasn't, like, if I was writing, say, essays. Um, you would be intrigued by me if, if you, if you would get kinda like my vibe, if that was my vibe. That's not my vibe. My vibe is I, aj does not believe in oat milk. Um, that's more my vibe. It's a little cheeky. Right. Um, if I want a cheeky vibe, you'd have to first decide what's your vibe? What's your deal? How do you wanna sound I call it immutable characteristics. It's a play off of immutable laws.
Mike Michalowicz:
I like that. I like that.
AJ Harper:
Um, so first you have to decide what that is, and then you can tweak your bio. So it's less relevant for nonfiction, although you could, you could deploy that if you're, if that's what you wanna do. But for fiction is important.
Mike Michalowicz:
Other things that separate author bios from like a standard bio,
AJ Harper:
Well, you are not trying to get hired for a job or to get business, you know?
Mike Michalowicz:
Right.
AJ Harper:
So you don't have to put a lot of the stuff in that you think you need to put in
Mike Michalowicz:
AJ Harper:
Oh, did you? You I knew you were going to
Mike Michalowicz:
My It is so
AJ Harper:
You love it?
Mike Michalowicz:
Good.
AJ Harper:
Okay.
Mike Michalowicz:
It it, it matches Spinal Tap one. It is. So
AJ Harper:
I didn't even know it came out yet.
Mike Michalowicz:
Oh yeah. It just came out. It's so connected. It just, it flows. So it came out in October and it just, it just flows. Um, and it's to me just as funny. Um, it is such memorable moments. But here's the thing, my point is, for even a movie, I love that much. I'm not looking into the actor's backgrounds. I'm not like, what, what is, I can't, I don't even know Christopher Guest. Tell me all about Christopher Guest.
AJ Harper:
Oh, a genius.
Mike Michalowicz:
He's a genius. But I'm not researching all out about Christopher Guest. Um, I know he exists. I know it was a, a one line bio. He acted in Spinal Tap and a couple other great movies. Um, but I do have the freedom if I want to immerse myself to learn all about his history. And I think that's like an author too, is your, your book is the performance and you effectively are one of the characters not in the book, but the creator of this. You may, the producer of the movie is the better choice of words. People won't be compelled to learn that much about you. It's the book they're interested in, not you. And I think we have to go with that understanding and, and give people the outlet if they wanna learn about us. There's other media platforms for that.
AJ Harper:
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz:
Um, are there different types of author bios or is it just, you know, one and done?
AJ Harper:
Um, yeah, I mean, there's the bio that you put in your proposal, which is gonna be longer and it's gonna sh-, the goal is they're not, that's not for the reader. I mean, the proposal is for agents and publishers to decide if they wanna sign you. And so your bio is gonna be more, uh, it's gonna be longer. It's gonna encompass more of your relevant experience, but also show them your sphere
of influence so that they are sure that not only are you credible to write this, but that you actually have the ability to sell it. Hmm. And so, yeah, that's a different kind of bio than you might put anywhere else. Your proposal bio might be the, the only one that exists just like that because of the purpose of it. I mean, that's the thing. You have to think about the purpose.
Mike Michalowicz:
Yes. That's gold. The proposal bias, I think what I'm trying to do, and we still write proposals. We wrote one, do we write one for The Money Habit? Now? I actually don't.
AJ Harper:
No, No.
Mike Michalowicz:
But dude,
AJ Harper:
No, you don't still write proposals. You do not. You write an, uh, a fundamentals basically what you wanna do. And we, we give an outline and then a little bit about your marketing planner, how it fits with the business.
Mike Michalowicz:
That's absolutely true. Right?
AJ Harper:
We don't write the full, not a 60 page proposal.
Mike Michalowicz:
No, You're totally right. We, that's, that's totally right. So, um, as a new author, um, we wrote proposals that, that deeply went into my background to, to show my credibility and abil credibility. Yes. And a future ability. We, through the simplified imprint, but also through the work we're doing, uh, like agency work, penned with purpose, we represent other authors. And I remember Dr. Amy Apigian, her book's out now, it's called The Biology of Trauma. It's a amazing read. It's a t it's a continual top selling book because I think it's like overall BSR bestselling ranking on Amazon is I think like 3000 to 2000. Like consistently. It's like, like profit first and, and getting better. Um, when we did her proposal, we detailed out all of her reasons why she's credibility and ability with this book. The other thing is, and the publishing house for this is Ben Bella, they said, we've never seen this in a proposal, is a letter from the author. So it wasn't just, you know, Dr. Amy Apigian's great at this and has this experience background. She wrote a letter of why this was important to her, and this book must be successful. How it's a furtherance of a mission she's on to serve people. They're stuck in trauma. And, uh, they said, we've never seen that. So that's part of your bio is actually, it's not part of your bio. Part of the opportunity in a proposal is to extend on your bio with your almost personal plea.
AJ Harper:
I think mission is an easy way to do it. I mean, one of the things I tell authors is, let's rewrite your bio from scratch, but instead of saying you are five different things, which is another pet peeve. Another pet peeve is when it says Mike Michalowicz is an author, speaker, business owner, coach, teacher, massage therapist, like, and
Mike Michalowicz:
Good father, everyone always ends that one and great dad.
AJ Harper:
Well, yeah, but I mean, it's like you having five jobs does not, you think adding the job adds gravitas. It actually takes away,
Mike Michalowicz:
Hmm.
AJ Harper:
It takes away, y'all, nobody wants to work with somebody or believes you can handle this when you are five different things. And if you are a speaker, you don't have to say speaker, you can just reference that you keynote on a main stage. I don't need to first say speaker in the first line of the bio if I'm going to reference that, you know, you're an internationally renowned speaker, which I would probably never say renowned, but is a, a main stage keynoter or is a, has, you know, speaks at corporate audiences such as, right, yeah. Kraft, Disney, whatever. Right? A Fortune 500 speaker, whatever you wanna say. You don't need to also say it in the open. You do not need to say author if you are putting it, if you are the author of the book.
Mike Michalowicz:
AJ Harper:
You don't. Mike Michalowicz is an author. Duh. Yeah. You're holding the book. Yeah. You know, you don't have to say coach and consultant and this and that. Yeah. One thing. Okay. Or maybe two tops. Okay. If they're really distinctive, like for instance, in mine, I am an editor and a publishing strategist. And the reason I added publishing strategist is because editors are not always
AJ Harper:
Start there. And if you're not gonna at least start with who you are now or where you are going, right? Don't do all the things from the past. It, it's just, and so you can do the first paragraph with where you're going and now who you serve, which, what are you doing, what's going on? And then second paragraph, if you need to go back up to the past and show that you do have a degree to support that, and you have helped a thousand people do this or whatever, right? You did have this big corporate job that helped you with X, Y, Z or you were part of this big research project. I don't know, whatever it is. That second paragraph, not first. Don't start, don't be linear. Start with now and future, and then do back, do the backstory.
Mike Michalowicz:
Let, let's go into additional things. We talked about the proposal. Um, where, where are other variants of bios that you use? Like where are the, the outlets for this? Your
AJ Harper:
Website's gonna be different. Okay. 'cause again, you don't want that kind of corporate-y bio. You, you could have one on there for download. You could have a couple different prof. I recommend you do have a couple different length and style bios that are available for download. But write a personal bio that's a little bit more of your story. I
Mike Michalowicz:
Would argue to use your marquee pieces if you do multiple. So I have 10 book titles and uh, I don't say Mike is author of Toilet Paper Entrepreneur, the Pumpkin Plan, Surge. Uh, I would say, what is your one or two marquee pieces? Profit First?
AJ Harper:
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz:
The Pumpkin Plan.
AJ Harper:
Yeah. Because in my bio it says I'm co-writer to Mike Michalowicz. It's author of Profit First, Clockwork and other books.
Mike Michalowicz:
Yeah. That, that's how you do it for some reason. Um, when I go on stage. So another place to use your bio is for speaking. So, um, when you go on stage, give the person introducing you a printed introduction and keep it to two, three sentences max. And sometimes they don't take that PDF that we send to them and they just read it off the website and they're not reading the speaker bio, they're reading a bio that just identifies all the different things. So on the website, we do say Michael, uh, Mike is the author of the following books, Colin Toilet paper, entrepreneur link, uh, surge the link, uh, the pumpkin plan link. So it goes through all of 'em. So some people actually read that off on stage. And I'll tell you, my eyes start bleeding
AJ Harper:
So what do you do? You just hand it, make sure you hand it to 'em.
Mike Michalowicz:
Well, yeah. Make sure I hand it to 'em. Sometimes they mess it up. So then you gotta have a response to that. So I'll go on stage and say, um, that bio, that guy sounds like a total jerk.
AJ Harper:
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz:
Okay.
AJ Harper:
Social media. You only have sometimes a few characters.
Mike Michalowicz:
Good point.
AJ Harper:
Yeah. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz:
It could just be, and you're not kidding, like LinkedIn is a good example. Like your bio is like a subtitle, author, speaker, and maybe one other thing you can squeeze in there.
AJ Harper:
Yeah. So are you ready for that? And, uh, what's your, you know, if you're, if you're still on X, which I'm not anymore, you know, you have a certain number of characters. What's your bio on Instagram? What's your bio on TikTok? Those are shorter. Are you ready to go with that stuff? Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz:
Yeah.
AJ Harper:
Um, then there's, then if you've got, they've got your bio on your book itself. This is a major pet peeve. I see this with self-published authors all the time. The back cover, it's a paperback. Yeah. Whole bio.
Mike Michalowicz:
I know.
AJ Harper:
Whole dang freaking bio.
Mike Michalowicz:
I think it was episode.
AJ Harper:
What are you doing?
Mike Michalowicz:
Episode 90 something? I think we do, we talk about back covers. You go on this rant, you get so fired up about these,
AJ Harper:
what are you doing?
Mike Michalowicz:
Yeah,
AJ Harper:
Yeah. Listen, there is only so much space that is precious, precious space on the back cover of a, especially a paperback where you don't have a dust, uh, dust jacket with flaps. You have readers do not want a bunch of dense words when they've turned the cover over to read the back. And then you're wasting your precious space on putting your whole dang bio. Do one to two sentences, and I mean short, not with a lot of commas and semicolons. Just do a really short bio on the back and then do your interior bio longer. So you obviously need those. However, if you do have a hardcover with a dust jacket, that's fine. Then you can do a longer ish bio on the, on the flat. That was the one that had popular, popular, popular
Mike Michalowicz:
Uh, other locations, well, I guess the interior.
AJ Harper:
Yeah. We just mentioned interior pages. You could go longer on the interior page, you can do what you want there. That's fine. If anyone's actually reading it at that point, quite frankly, they're done with the book.
Mike Michalowicz:
And then any other locations for bios.
AJ Harper:
I mean yeah, there's always a, a place for a bio. So my advice is to always do different length bios and have them kind of at the ready. Yeah. So that it, you can adjust quickly when someone needs it. For example, when I was a publisher, when we would submit, um, for, you know, different distribution channels, we would have character limits on bios.So now I'm going back and adjusting and tweaking this dang bio. Um, so just get it ready. If you're self-publishing, just get these different lengths ready so that you are not delaying things because you are nervous about adjusting your bio.
Mike Michalowicz:
I wanna give a little shout to Sandy Watt. She's the one who, uh, she, I talked about a couple episodes back, um, who does website branding and so forth for authors. And she listens to our show and she found a couple links in our show that was not working and gave us a heads up so that we could activate those. So I know, not related to bios, but I just didn't wanna forget it. Um, anything else on bio front?
AJ Harper:
I mean, it's an, it's ever evolving. So yeah, there's no, there's no perfect. But I think if you follow some of these rules, you know, like take out those adjectives and superlatives, start with who you are now. Start with mission. Start with who you are and where you're going. And don't start with
the past. Um, yeah. Make sure that you're including big accomplishments that are relevant. The other thing is relevant experience for authorship. A bunch of stuff is not relevant. If you're writing a memoir about a personal experience, your corporate bio does not fit, you know, it's not relevant. And it's also life experience for authors. Authors life experience is relevant, just like professional experience.
Mike Michalowicz:
Got it. Love it. Um, you, if you get a chance, you can go to mike micalowicz.com or mike motorbike.com and check out the speaking page, like a media page. And you can get, uh, samples of all the bios, the variants, we have the different lengths. And an infiniteuse.com is Sandy's website where she's ai izing, uh, authors. So you have, uh, a way to put your content out there. Um, reminder the money habit is out there. So go to your favorite retail platform. I'd be honored for you to pick up a copy. Um, it serves me 'cause you get a copy, but I'll tell you, I think it's the best. I always think it's our best work. I think this is our
AJ Harper:
Best work. Better be. I mean, that's the goal, right?
Mike Michalowicz:
That's the goal. Every book should be the best. And, um, this will transform you. I truly believe within 24 hours of how you experience money, and I know this because I am doing live readings, which is a new marketing for me method. So, uh, for three consecutive weeks I'm reading the book live, um, and answering questions and stuff. And so I did a reading last night and I asked people about the first step, which I took only the day prior. And the feedback in the chat was, I feel lighter, I feel in control, I feel better. So they're, they're not, they're not, um, rich as a result. That's not the goal of this book book. This isn't like, you know, rich overnight. What the book is, is to get this confidence overnight and put control around your money. And, uh, that's the feedback. So I think if you get the money habit, you'll experience that. And gosh, every author, every person needs to control their income. 'cause you can only perform, perform outwardly effectively if you don't have fully, if you don't have stress over money. And there's other components too. But money is such a common stressor. Aj, is your workshop that January workshop still available or is it too late?
AJ Harper:
Yeah, January 16th and 17th, the authorship planning workshop. And it's to help authors plan 2026 to meet their goals in terms of thinking about all the different aspects of authorship and how do you fit it in, in a way that makes sense for you in a custom way. All the different things are developing your book, writing it, editing it, getting it published, marketing it, launching it, monetizing it. Those are all different lanes and we have to figure out how to navigate and when to get in and outta those lanes. So you can go to, um, aj harper.com and you can use the code DW TB to get $50 off that event. But wait a minute, now you're about to close. You know, I do readings, right? I do Monday night readings. So I'm excited that you're doing readings as well. Yeah, I have figured out a perfect system for readings that also generates massive reviews in sales. Oh. So I've been perfecting this for years now, and now every time we have a a a Monday night reading, we're getting big bumps in sales, but we're getting insane numbers of reviews. Okay. Because I have a system. So if you, if you want I could, we could do an episode on how do you do it?
Mike Michalowicz:
I want, I want
AJ Harper:
It's a big question. A lot of people ask us about this actually. How
Mike Michalowicz:
Could just give, build out the frame a little bit? What is, what is supportive content Exactly.
AJ Harper:
Articles, columns, newsletters, like what else are you writing? Maybe also, um, bonus material. So what else do you need to write besides the book? Hmm. To support the book?
Mike Michalowicz:
Hmm. Um, talking about the book, the book in this space is called Write a Must read. I, I spoke to an author. I, you,
AJ Harper:
You every c you say this every single episode. What? And I appreciate You
Mike Michalowicz:
Because, because it is, I was speaking with an author who I won't disclose their name. And I said, uh, well, what'd you think about writing must read. I, I didn't even like say, have you read it? What do you think about it? They're like, um, I didn't read it. I'm like, what? What? I made the biggest scene, hamming it up a little bit,
AJ Harper:
Mike Michalowicz:
And I'm like, you haven't read. It's like, we cannot talk any further. And I had 'em, I front of me open up their preferred platform, the retail. Really? Yeah. I was like, buy this book. And then I said, let's talk. Um, so, um, his, his initials are Rd. So Rd, if you're listening in, um, we're meeting up pretty soon, you better have got that book and be reading it. Um, also, you know this, we have website resources for you, but have you visited our website yet? It's d wtb podcast.com. Tons of content for you. Plus you can get on our subscriber or email list where AJ will send you a ton of stuff she's prepared. It'll keep you posted what's going on. We have some kind of cool sizzle coming down the road. And if you questions, comments, if you wanna check out our imprint with, uh, for entrepreneurial authors called simplified, just emails at hello@dwbpodcast.com. A is on top of those emails like, uh, a fly on honey or whatever flies, it flies around anything. So a fly on a dead carcass on
AJ Harper:
Anything
Mike Michalowicz:
Like a fly on a dead carcass as opposed to a living, as opposed to a living carcass. That was kind of redundant. You would've cut that out. You would said, Mike, this is a fly on a carcass, not a dead carcass.
AJ Harper:
Let's just, let's just go on, let's just go on from the carcass.
Mike Michalowicz:
Please don't write that book.
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