In this episode of Don’t Write That Book, Mike and AJ focus on nonfiction second editions. What are they? What warrants the need for one? How the heck do you go about revamping a book for its second edition? They’ll share personal stories from creating revised and expanded editions of Mike’s books Profit First and Clockwork, including their “from the ground up” process. And as is often the case in their conversations, Mike and AJ stumble upon ideas for new books. (They’re up to three new books they need to write based off their podcast conversations, for those keeping track!)
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Books/Resources Mentioned:
Not Your Sidekick, C.B. Lee: https://a.co/d/33ijgHz
Atomic Habits, by James Clear: https://a.co/d/fWdXTwS
Traction, by Gino Wickman: https://a.co/d/c9CgXqt
The Entrepreneurial Leap, by Gino Wickman: https://a.co/d/bDTUYIt
Connect with AJ & Mike:
AJ Harper: https://ajharper.com
Write A Must-Read: https://a.co/d/4H0xQ7G
Free resources: https://writeamustread.com
Socials:
FB: https://www.facebook.com/AJHarperAuthors
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anjanetteharper/
Mike Michalowicz: https://mikemichalowicz.com
All books: https://mikemichalowicz.com/books/
Socials:
IG: https://www.instagram.com/mikemichalowicz/
FB: https://www.facebook.com/MikeMichalowiczFanPage/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemichalowicz/
Mike Michalowicz (00:01):
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. Thanks for joining us. Today, we're going to be talking about that second edition of a book. You already have a book out there. And what about making a new version of it? Should you do it? Should you not? How do you go about it? All that stuff. I'm joined in the studio with my co-host, AJ Harper.
One thing I admire about you, AJ, that uh, maybe I've never shared with you before, is that we dislike the same people.
AJ Harper (01:15):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (01:16):
It's like.. Oh! What I like about that, too, is we have a common enemy. I'm not saying they're bad people, I just think they're going about it in a bad way, at least for how we approach things.
AJ Harper (01:27):
And, and I mean, not really enemy, just, we don't want to, uh, we don't want to behave like them. Correct. We're not out to get them.
Mike Michalowicz (01:38):
No, no, no, no.
AJ Harper (01:38):
No. There's no active attempts toward anything.
Mike Michalowicz (01:41):
No, no, no, no.
AJ Harper (01:42):
But you know, you're saying that, and you don't actually know my stories.
Mike Michalowicz (01:45):
What do you mean?
AJ Harper (01:46):
So, we dislike the same people, but you, I don't tell you why I dislike them.
Mike Michalowicz (01:50):
Oh no, no. Because you have some personal experiences with those folks.
AJ Harper (01:54):
Mm-hmm.
Mike Michalowicz (01:55):
And I admire that so much about you, that you have a relationship that that's inspired. But you honor the agreements of those relationships.
AJ Harper (02:04):
Yes.
Mike Michalowicz (02:05):
Into perpetuity.
AJ Harper (02:05):
Correct.
Mike Michalowicz (02:06):
Yeah. So, I, I do not know the stories.
AJ Harper (02:09):
I think, I think it's good if you, if something, if an author rubs you the wrong way, thought leader, whomever, you don't feel like they're being genuine or, you know something else, to use that as a fuel, you know? Like you talk about in Get Different and having the power of a nemesis.
Mike Michalowicz (02:30):
Yes. That's the word, not enemy, nemesis. And it's an ideology sometimes most of the time. Or it's a personification of that ideology. I've been at conferences and events where people come up and say, “Hey man, I know who your nemesis is. It's blah, blah, blah.” And like, is that it?
AJ Harper (02:47):
Not telling.
Mike Michalowicz (02:49):
I'm not telling. Yeah. I'm not. No. And that's not the game. And some of these other individuals in these ideologies collect a massive gathering of followers and constituency. They are being of service to a group of people. It's just not the people that I want to serve.
AJ Harper (03:03):
That's it right there. Yeah. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (03:06):
So that's your introduction.
AJ Harper (03:07):
I mean, your introduction would just be, I'm just going to riff on it. That's what happens, you introduce me and I say, “Okay, let's talk about that.” This is what happens to me, everybody. I quit ghostwriting. I was a ghost writer for 10 years. I quit. It's like 2015 maybe. Yeah. It takes about a year and a half to two years to get out of it. We’re kind of like the mob,
Mike Michalowicz (03:31):
They keep pulling you back.
AJ Harper (03:32):
Actually, I don't know too much about the mob. I hope because you're in writing contracts, right?
Mike Michalowicz (03:37):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (03:37):
So, it's not like you can just say, “See ya!” You kind of just don't accept new work, and then you finish your existing contracts.
Mike Michalowicz (03:42):
Mm-hmm.
AJ Harper (03:43):
Mike is the only person I continue to work with. Our relationship is less ghost. I mean, in the beginning it was like ghostwriting. But we've evolved into this creative partnership, which we do talk about it in a different episode, so I don't qualify it as the same. But I re-- I called you up and I said, I'm retiring. And there was a little bit of nervousness on your part.
Mike Michalowicz (04:03):
Yes, yes.
AJ Harper (04:03):
But then I said, and by the way, I'm not at retirement age just letting you know
Mike Michalowicz (04:11):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (04:11):
What happens to me though is people come up and say, still to this day, I, I, I would like to hire you even though I don't take private clients.
Mike Michalowicz (04:20):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (04:20):
And I don't ghostwrite.
Mike Michalowicz (04:22):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (04:23):
Because they want to have some duplicate arrangement. But the reason I quit was because of all of that integrity. And the reason I kept working with you is because you have integrity.
Mike Michalowicz (04:34):
Thank you.
AJ Harper (04:34):
And that's where I'm going with this story. I actually had one person just say, “Why Mike?”
Mike Michalowicz (04:46):
Yeah. Yeah. Like,
AJ Harper (04:46):
Look, okay. Um, I not going to list all the reasons, but really inside, that's what, first of all, there's a great partnership. Yeah. But it's mostly the integrity piece that disliking the same people just because of our value. We have a shared value system.
Mike Michalowicz (05:01):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (05:02):
Is really, I think probably a more positive way to say it.
Mike Michalowicz (05:05):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (05:05):
We agree on the things that matter. We have the same ethical code, and then also we, I think, bring each other up in our values.
Mike Michalowicz (05:13):
You know, one thing that's interesting about us, and I'm, I'm welling up now remembering this as I was reading All In, we rally against this concept of culture as a top down. This is the way we act.
AJ Harper (05:24):
Mm-hmm.
Mike Michalowicz (05:25):
Uh, inspire, we're hoping to inspire community, community being a collective of people. And there's a common value system that gets created from that. But you're picking very different people.
AJ Harper (05:39):
You and I, we would not have been friends in high school, I don't think, like—I mean, no, man. I was like—
Mike Michalowicz (05:40):
Right?
AJ Harper (05:41):
I was like a goth girl.
Mike Michalowicz (05:42):
We would never have seen each other.
AJ Harper (05:43):
I never went to a football game. What are you talking about?
Mike Michalowicz (05:45):
Right. Exactly.
AJ Harper (05:52):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (05:52):
We've created this common value system that it's so rooted in who we are, but we're… we're very different people. Yeah. And man does it freaking work.
AJ Harper (06:01):
It works. And I think that's what you talk about in All In is so beautiful, is culture is not this to down mandate.
Mike Michalowicz (06:07):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (06:07):
Yeah. It's, it's born of the community. And that's when it's beautiful. Yeah. Yay.
Mike Michalowicz (06:12):
Yay. Yeah, it’s working. Yay. Well, let's talk about second editions. Um, there are three books I want to bring up in this conversation. Stories or Experiences. One is Profit First. And Profit First came about, because originally it was a self-published book. It was rejected by the publisher house, which was Penguin at the time, who had just had Pumpkin Plan.
AJ Harper (06:34):
They passed!
Mike Michalowicz (06:35):
They passed. And I didn't, I said, eff it, I'm not going to shop it out. Um, I was—
AJ Harper (06:39):
No, but we were working on it.
Mike Michalowicz (06:41):
We, we did our proposal.
AJ Harper (06:43):
Yep. We—
Mike Michalowicz (06:43):
And we were connected with Lisa Dimona.
AJ Harper (06:45):
At the time.
Mike Michalowicz (06:46):
Yep. Who was a very famous agent.
AJ Harper (06:47):
Nobody was enthused.
Mike Michalowicz (06:48):
Including Lisa. Yeah. No one really got it. And I'm like, this is the biggest thing. I don't get it. Um, which actually speaks to when a community, um, established, uh, organization perhaps is a better word, like traditional publishers and stuff don't get it. It's because they are in their routine. This is something that's breaking the norm. So that's… could be not always, but could be an indicator of something great. Because they don't get it. Um, so. We self-published, Penguin came back and said, “Hey, we really actually think we should've published this.”
AJ Harper (07:21):
Oops. Oops.
Mike Michalowicz (07:22):
Here's, here's some money.
AJ Harper (07:26):
Right. We had to.
Mike Michalowicz (07:27):
It was necess— Yeah. We had to.
AJ Harper (07:30):
By the contract.
Mike Michalowicz (07:31):
And the sales, uh, almost quadrupled when that second edition came out.
AJ Harper (07:36):
But we took it as an opportunity to just build it, rebuild it from the studs. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (07:40):
And we're going to talk about that. Like, that's a true second edition. It was a, a breakdown buildup. Again, it was a demo of the original and a rebuild of a far superior structure. We did the same thing with Clockwork. Now, Clockwork was different in that it was already with Penguin Random House. It was already selling well. We determined, I determined that there's an opportunity to make this even better. There were some missing components, and I'm going to tell you how you find the missing components and so forth. And, uh, same thing. Tore it down to the studs. So much so that Penguin, Noah didn't get it. He's like, oh, you know, can you get the manuscript in two months or something?
AJ Harper (08:15):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (08:16):
But he was expecting just a little—
AJ Harper (08:19):
Some updates.
Mike Michalowicz (08:19):
Fresh paint. Yeah.
AJ Harper (08:21):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (08:21):
You know, um, like, no, no. This is a brand-new book. And it was writing a brand-new book. Uh, perhaps harder in certain ways, too.
AJ Harper (08:28):
We might have made it harder on ourselves, but it's a better book in the end.
Mike Michalowicz (08:31):
It's hands down a better book. The interesting thing is the sales impact wasn't there in this one. It didn't four times. My best estimate is it's a break even. It's selling just as well. Maybe a little bit better, but it's hard to attribute it to a rewrite.
AJ Harper (08:44):
That said, you have other positives that came out of that.
Mike Michalowicz (08:47):
And that's the biggest benefit. So, we have a derivative company, that's not the right word. We have a company that represents it called Run Like Clockwork. It's a better tool set. The people who read the new version of Clockwork get the system better. So, it's working better. It's a better system. It just isn't selling on a volume basis better.
AJ Harper (09:05):
The book.
Mike Michalowicz (09:06):
Yeah. And then the last book is The Pumpkin Plan. And why I wanted to bring it up is that doesn't, hasn't been revised and expanded. I approached Penguin saying, I think I want to do this. Um, I've softly approached them, and they've softly said, “No.” And the reasoning is it's selling too well, if that's the right words, it's a great backlist book and just keeps chugging along. So, they are hesitant, in my opinion, to put the resources in from their side of doing a, a revised and expand edition. But you brought up an interesting point, if you don't mind sharing that again.
AJ Harper (09:38):
About Pumpkin Plan?
Mike Michalowicz (09:39):
Yeah, yeah. Uh, specifically that at certain point, if something's selling well, you need to refresh it least that's what I interpreted. Right?
AJ Harper (09:45):
Yeah. So, you know, all of this is a case-by-case basis. There's no, you know, there's no set, “Here's exactly when you do your second edition.” But if you've got a book that's starting to fade, because it needs updates, right. It's been selling well. Right. But now it can't compete anymore because it, it seems dated. If it seems dated, then you've got to do a refresh to keep the sales going.
Mike Michalowicz (10:09):
Yeah. And we do a good job of ensuring that books don't get dated.
AJ Harper (10:13):
But there are some books that can't help but be dated just because of the nature of the topic.
Mike Michalowicz (10:16):
Exactly. Or the industry changes. Like Profit First at certain point, banks will be different than they are today. Just like they change over 50 years. It may change again. So, uh, let's talk about what's significant about a sig uh, a second edition. Why is it important?
AJ Harper (10:30):
So, if you just have minor changes, so let's say you got a couple things wrong and you want to fix them, or—
Mike Michalowicz (10:36):
You mean like typos and stuff?
AJ Harper (10:37):
Typos, or if you just want to add a couple little, just small little things that's barely noticeable. Unless somebody memorized your whole book, they would never know you're not going to do a second edition. And a second edition doesn't mean a new print run. Right. So, there's some confusion around that.
Mike Michalowicz (10:54):
Mm-hmm.
AJ Harper (10:54):
You might have, that's not the same thing as a second printing or a third printing. That's how many books are printed, but it's still the same first edition.
Mike Michalowicz (11:02):
And let me add to that, in a new print run, it's not just the physical print book, it's the audiobook that can change and the eBook. And I can share a piece of this—
AJ Harper (11:12):
In a new edition, not a print run.
Mike Michalowicz (11:15):
Uh, it's a new edition. It's not a— No, no. If you make some minor changes, like you would need to change some words or something. That's called a new print run. Right.
AJ Harper (11:23):
Let's back up.
Mike Michalowicz (11:23):
Yeah. Now just explain it.
AJ Harper (11:26):
So, here's the thing. A print run is how many books are printed the first time.
Mike Michalowicz (11:30):
Okay.
AJ Harper (11:31):
It has nothing to do with if you're going to make changes.
Mike Michalowicz (11:33):
Okay.
AJ Harper (11:34):
And sometimes people confuse a second printing with a second edition.
Mike Michalowicz (11:37):
Okay.
AJ Harper (11:38):
A second printing might just be, this is, we're going to do a big, big print run again.
Mike Michalowicz (11:44):
Okay. But what if I make a couple minor word changes? What's that called? Is, is—
AJ Harper (11:48):
Nothing?
Mike Michalowicz (11:49):
Nothing. Okay.
AJ Harper (11:51):
There's, yeah. You're just updating it based on the, the, there, there's no nothing to note there. There's nothing that has to be announced.
Mike Michalowicz (11:56):
Right. Okay. Um, thanks for clearing that up in my head. So, with Fix This Next, we had an opportunity to change a term to the business priority pyramid and the power of this new term. As it invokes a better understanding of the method. At any given time in a business, there is a singular priority. And the former term, which used the word hierarchy, people were interpreting as a ladder. So, we changed it, but we changed it in the print book, in the Kindle, the eBooks, and in the, uh, audio books. What's interesting is Fix This Next has had a bump in sales. Um, and it's sustained now since the—
AJ Harper (12:33):
But you just changed the term.
Mike Michalowicz (12:34):
We just changed term a month and a half ago.
AJ Harper (12:36):
So that is not a second edition.
Mike Michalowicz (12:38):
Yeah. No, it's not.
AJ Harper (12:40):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (12:40):
It’s just a correction. And what's in the book, you'll see the, those numbers on the, um, I don't know what they call that page where it says the printing publisher and the, the, some of the copyright material. And the legal words are in there. It says 10, 8, 6, whatever. Now you'll see the numbers removed. And every time they make those type of edits, they will actually remove one of those numbers so that you can compare an original print run with whatever context was in there. Content and the new one that has new content changed, like these terms and so forth. You can tell the books are actually different in some minor way.
AJ Harper (13:13):
Right. So, for a second, second edition, you want the significant changes. And often you'll see it, it won't say second edition, it might just say, for our books, for example, it says revised and expanded. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (13:24):
Yeah. Okay. So, and, and what are the other terms you can use besides revise and expanded? Updated, I see. New and improved.
AJ Harper (13:32):
Yeah. I mean, whatever.
Mike Michalowicz (13:33):
You can choose any terms you want.
AJ Harper (13:35):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (13:36):
Um, and I invite when someone does that, to put that in the title. So, it's not just a flag on the book cover itself, but in the title, if you go to Amazon for a period of time, it'll say, Clockwork Revised and Expanded. Because what happens is when you release the new revised and expanded edition, it gets a new ISBN. Yep. It's, it's a new book. Yep. It just has the same title. So, for the consumer, they may confuse it if they see the same book, same title, which one's the newer one. And so if you put it in the actual text title, revised and expanded, they can identify it immediately.
AJ Harper (14:11):
It can also backfire on you if you just have a small amount. So with my, when I had my publishing house and we published fiction, we had a really popular title, Not Your Sidekick. And then we created an anniversary edition. And the anniversary edition had additional content from the author.
Mike Michalowicz (14:29):
Hmm.
AJ Harper (14:29):
Those changes were so significant that they would dig, get a new ISBN. But the problem is then you're wiping out the old—
Mike Michalowicz (14:38):
Reviews.
AJ Harper (14:39):
Yes. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (14:40):
Yeah. That is a gut punch.
AJ Harper (14:41):
It was sad
Mike Michalowicz (14:43):
With Profit First we lost and we, we tried so hard. Thousands of reviews with the self-published book. Yeah.
AJ Harper (14:52):
Because you get, because the first one's gone. That's, you know, you're not leaving them both up. Yeah. And oh man, that's tragic. So sometimes you get an idea, I'm going to do this new thing, but you need to consider the consequences.
Mike Michalowicz (15:03):
Yep. But you can link the books. Amazon provides this, I don't know on other portals, but if you go to Profit First, if you search Profit First in Amazon and look for the original book, which is now hard to find, because it uses a algorithm, it has its own search engine optimization, if you will. But if you can find the old book, which was that piggy bank, you click on it, it says A new version is available, and it has a picture of the new book, right. Under the original book.
AJ Harper (15:30):
Hmm.
Mike Michalowicz (15:30):
So, the one kind of saving grace here is those reviews still stay with the original book, but this is a distinct and new book. So, you are going to lose those reviews.
AJ Harper (15:41):
But sometimes you have to pull down originals. So, then you still lose them.
Mike Michalowicz (15:45):
Oh. I've never had it pull down original Clockwork. Originals still out there. Profit First. The original's still out there. How, how do you pull down an original?
AJ Harper (15:51):
If a publisher decides they don't want to have both?
Mike Michalowicz (15:53):
But what about used books? Because that's the problem with Profit First. The, the, you can't get 'em, but used books are still circulating.
AJ Harper (15:59):
Yeah. But that has something to do with the publisher.
Mike Michalowicz (16:02):
But still list on Amazon.
AJ Harper (16:03):
They can list it.
Mike Michalowicz (16:04):
They, okay. That's how they're doing it. They're listing it.
AJ Harper (16:06):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (16:06):
Yeah. Okay. Um, you also get a new cover, or at least you should do a new cover.
AJ Harper (16:11):
You should.
Mike Michalowicz (16:11):
Yeah. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (16:12):
How we do it is we make it a, there's a congruency to the original. So, the design has similarities, but usually we use stark colors. Clockwork's a great example. We changed the, the colors, so it looks distinctly different. Profit First was a radical change. It went from, uh, a green and blue book to a white book. It went from, uh, uh, the core hero image being a piggy bank kind of cut up into pieces to, uh, a income statement with the words Profit First in huge text circled. Um, it worked extremely well. And I don't, I can't attribute to, to changing a book cover radically to having kind of this fluid, but distinct difference makes a difference in sales. I, I can't determine that.
AJ Harper (17:01):
Well, because we changed so many other things, it's hard to determine which was the, which was the factor.
Mike Michalowicz (17:05):
Right. But definitely have a new cover so you don't confuse users. Another thing that was interesting too is past, um, readers of the book often seem, at least in our cases, to buy the new book, there are a huge source for it. There's a fear saying, well, if I come out to a revised, expanded edition, there's all these people that have the original, why would they want the new one? A good portion of them want the new one. Yeah.
AJ Harper (17:26):
They want the update. They want the update. If it's a popular book and people want the update, they'll just get it.
Mike Michalowicz (17:32):
When do you feel is the time to approach a revised and expanded edition?
AJ Harper (17:36):
Mean, that just what I said, if content needs to be updated—
Mike Michalowicz (17:40):
But what determines that? Can you dig in?
AJ Harper (17:42):
Yeah. So, it's outdated, number one. It no longer holds true.
Mike Michalowicz (17:48):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (17:48):
Facts have changed. Perspectives have changed. Um, that's an out, that's outdated content. So then the whole book feels dated. If you're starting to hear from people, “it doesn't really apply anymore.” That's not what's happening.
Mike Michalowicz (18:01):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (18:02):
Everything’s changed. Right? Yeah. So, you know, if you've got a book that's talking about teams and you aren't, and the book just assumes everybody's in the office.
Mike Michalowicz (18:12):
Mm-hmm.
AJ Harper (18:13):
It's a little bit dated. We don't operate like that anymore. Covid changed it forever. There's hybrid work environments. More people are working from home. That's just how it is. You're going to be able to tell a book is dated. You know, there's cultural shifts, there's technology shifts, there's all sorts of things that make a book dated. Or if content needs to be improved is another reason. And so it's more useful for readers. Now, small improvements are always going to happen, but in the case of Clockwork, you knew through Run Like Clockwork with Adrian Doreen that there would be really helpful improvements. Yes. That would make it easier. So, you know, it's not about little tweaks. I would make the change. I would go ahead and do a second edition. If you realize we really got to streamline this and be… Because ultimately, you're trying to create a useful book for readers.
Mike Michalowicz (19:04):
That was, uh, such helpful feedback because we have a service company behind the book. We have people actively doing the book. We get critical feedback on what's working, what's not working. And with Clockwork, the most common feedback that I recall was business owners saying, I like the system, but (I listen to the but part.) Uh, and in this case, the but was, I don't want my employees reading this because I'm taking a for vacation. Or they'll see that I'm taking advantage of them. Or they're running a sweatshop. “I'm running a sweatshop here.” That was the exact opposite. It was an empowerment book for employees. Um, and in the process, the owner was, was demonstrating their trust for employees by turning the business over to them, by taking a, for vacation, removing themselves from the business so the business owners could, um, not so the employees could show their propensity to expand and grow. And, uh, when we learned that, um, that dictated, we need to write the book to be inclusive of employees. So, every single chapter now had an employee section. It was a massive improvement.
AJ Harper (20:08):
That was a big change. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (20:09):
A massive improvement.
AJ Harper (20:10):
But also the steps were streamlined. We have fewer steps. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (20:13):
That's true. In Profit First, too.
AJ Harper (20:15):
Mm-hmm.
Mike Michalowicz (20:15):
That’s true in everything we do. Uh, not just in, in doing revising expanded, but whenever we're going through the editorial process, we're saying, how, how can we make this simpler, easier, more accessible? So it's kind of a similar process, but just on a grand scale, when you do….
AJ Harper (20:27):
Well, it's based on, on what is actually happening with readers. And so, if you know this is going to make a huge difference for future readers.
Mike Michalowicz (20:33):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (20:34):
That might be a reason to do a second edition.
Mike Michalowicz (20:36):
Yeah. So, and let's talk about proof from readers. Um, how do you collect that? Like, how do you get the feedback from people who are using your first version of the book so that you can integrate them into their stories into a second book?
AJ Harper (20:49):
Well, you have it built in and with every book where you ask readers to reach out to you. In the first chapter. Yeah. I think that's an effective way. Most, if you make it easy for people to contact you, you don't have to use that same method. But if you make it easy for people, then they will, they'll let you know.
Mike Michalowicz (21:06):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (21:07):
Uh, you can also, you know, put stuff out on social and in your marketing where you're collecting stories and actively looking for that. People tend to follow authors they love. So even if they haven't emailed you, if you ask them to, they will.
Mike Michalowicz (21:21):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (21:21):
You know, so I think you can request stories, but that's another reason to do the second edition is let's say you wrote a book, you know, it works, but you don't have a ton of evidence. You have a little bit, right?
Mike Michalowicz (21:34):
Mm-hmm
AJ Harper (21:35):
Now the book is out. Now, you know, it works because you've been hearing from readers, now you have a way more.
Mike Michalowicz (21:41):
Yes.
AJ Harper (21:42):
Yes. Big old pot of gold there. Now you can weave in those stories. I think that straightens the book overall, we didn't update Profit First for that reason. We had to contractually, but we did take it as an opportunity to throw in a bunch of stories of people who had been using Profit First that came after reading the book.
Mike Michalowicz (22:01):
Yeah. We, we think with Profit First, specifically, there's over 700,000 implementations of Profit First. It's probably more, it's hard to gauge, but that's what we're estimating. But when we wrote the very first book, the first day, it was just people who had read that Wall Street Journal article. It was people we tested out with. It was maybe a hundred, you know. Um, and so the perspective changes. One of the great awarenesses that didn't even make it into the second revising expanded edition, but now could make it into a third edition if we want to do it, is the celebration around tax distributions. It's greater than profit, which I could have never anticipated. In the book, the, the method is, you know, on a quarterly basis, there's this money reserved for your profit. You use it to celebrate. There's also money reserved on a quarterly basis to pay your taxes. And I was like, okay, that's mandatory, but who's going to celebrate that? What's interesting is there's that people are, for the first time ever, I'm not worrying about my tax bill. I get more relief about not worrying than getting extra money to, to do something.
AJ Harper (23:00):
Yeah. For sure.
Mike Michalowicz (23:00):
Yeah. Which I never, for every reason didn't think about it. But every, at the end of every quarter, the emails pour in saying, “Hey, I just pay my taxes. I'm so excited.”
AJ Harper (23:17):
Mike Michalowicz (23:18):
You know—
AJ Harper (23:18):
I still wouldn't put it in.
Mike Michalowicz (23:19):
AJ Harper (23:22):
Mike Michalowicz (23:22):
Thanks for sharing that. Um, can, can you reinvigorate a, a book that's dying? Or is the, the brand the title? Is it too late to save a book? That's kind of fizzling out, man.
AJ Harper (23:34):
I think if you never really sold a lot of copies, I don't think a second edition is necessarily going to save you. I think you need to.
Mike Michalowicz (23:41):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (23:42):
You know, there's a lot of introspection and reflection that has to happen.
Mike Michalowicz (23:45):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (23:45):
Was that the right book? Is it truly of service? Do I need to up my marketing game? Those are the questions you need to ask. Just throwing another version out into the void, I don't think is the solution.
Mike Michalowicz (23:56):
What about, um, doing… But, the belief that a second edition is an easier process? I, that's what I believed. You're you an opinion?
AJ Harper (24:04):
I mean, I guess it is. Maybe we're just weirdos.
Mike Michalowicz (24:07):
Do you think it is easier?
AJ Harper (24:09):
No, I think well, okay. You know, I think it a second edition is an opportunity to look at every aspect of the book. Do I think people do that? I think a lot of times they don't.
Mike Michalowicz (24:21):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (24:22):
And that's why I think it's not easier. So, we're back to: don't write that book.
Mike Michalowicz (24:26):
Yeah. Yeah.
AJ Harper (24:27):
Right. Yeah. Don't take the easy way out with a second edition. Do your due diligence. If you're really going to do it, do it. Don't just say, well, let me just scuff this off. Buff and Polish. Add a couple things. Here's an author's note, here's an extra chapter.
Mike Michalowicz (24:43):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (24:44):
Really does this still work for readers at the, in the same way? What can you do better?
Mike Michalowicz (24:49):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (24:50):
So that's my view. But again, I'm, I'm probably a weirdo. I just, I hold people…
Mike Michalowicz (24:59)
Weirdos rule. Weirdos rule!
AJ Harper (25:00)
Listen, I feel like, let's be excellent in all things. Yeah. That's my view.
Mike Michalowicz (25:02):
Yeah. That's, I think that's the key. Clockwork, I believe is 50% new text, like literal text like this.
AJ Harper (25:10):
I can vouch for that, man.
Mike Michalowicz (25:12):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (25:12):
That book was rough.
Mike Michalowicz (25:13):
That was a monster. So when people ask me like, how much is new, I say it's 50% or more new text and a hundred percent simplified because it's a reorganization of the existing stuff. You know, I, I read some from some other authors with popular books. They're revised and expanded. And to your point, it's like, I dunno if you've ever seen this in a movie. You watch a movie and then they come out and they say cut scenes, they kinda put the scenes in. My wife and I are huge fans of, uh, Young Frankenstein.
AJ Harper (25:43):
Oh, yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (25:44):
So, there was a re-release of it where they had these scenes that ultimately got cut. The movie runs 10 minutes longer. Um, and it's kind of cool seeing these little scenes but it actually starts hurting the story. And you understand why they cut it.
AJ Harper (25:58):
Yeah. Because they made a right decision in the first place.
Mike Michalowicz (26:00):
Yeah. And that's why some of these revised and expanded books I've read, um, it seems, sounds like they simply add back in stuff that they cut and shouldn't have been put back in.
AJ Harper (26:09):
Or sometimes it's a note from the author since I published this book, this is the experience, you know?
Mike Michalowicz (26:15):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (26:15):
Look, if that's what you want to do, it's cool that I think it's a worthy practice to consider. How can we make this book better? What happens though,
Mike Michalowicz (26:33):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (26:34):
And then throwing away the picture.
Mike Michalowicz (26:36):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (26:36):
It’s like, it's actually harder. I think it's harder the way we do it to do revised and expanded because it's a brand-new book, but it, you're also dealing with the old book. And so to me, it just takes more thinking.
Mike Michalowicz (26:53):
Yeah. Yeah. I, I agree. Um, because… Right, there's consideration of, and you also have to pay homage to what you have. Um, I think you got to be very careful about throwing out concepts. One of the things we did with Profit First and the revised-expanded edition is we removed the advanced level of Profit First.
AJ Harper (27:15):
Mike Michalowicz (27:15):
So, in the original, there was a simple and advanced version. Um, and by doing that modification, the system became much more accessible. But also, there's the challenge of explaining to people that, you know, there's no such thing as advancing yourself or being advanced, which was a, a attractive label for when someone got to that level. So, you have to have those kind of dynamics and those considerations.
AJ Harper (27:36):
Do you want to talk about how we did, how we did what our process was?
Mike Michalowicz (27:40):
Yeah, of course. Yeah. Lay it on me.
AJ Harper (27:42):
Well, first we both read for each of these. Yeah. The very first step we took was to both read the book again.
Mike Michalowicz (27:49):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (27:49):
Which might sound funny. Yeah. Uh, for me, I definitely needed to read it again. But you, you're talking about it constantly when you're, as you're marketing it. But I, we both had to read again.
Mike Michalowicz (28:00):
So, I already—already want to address this point. So, you're right. I reread it again, how I did it was through Audio
AJ Harper (28:06):
Mike Michalowicz (28:09):
Yeah, I know, I know. But I do have an additional perspective is I'm actively speaking on this. So Clockwork, I've delivered hundreds of presentations on Profit First, probably over a thousand now from, from virtual interviews. And also, you know, on stage, what's interesting is, particularly the on-stage presentations, is I start seeing how people respond in the moment to certain concepts. So when I come back to you, I say, here's some of the key observations I'm having, um, The Pumpkin Plan. Should we, I kind want to redo it now.
AJ Harper (28:53):
You know what I'd rather do? I'm just saying this to you now. I've never said this to you. I'd rather since, since Penguin like says, Hey, no, we love our little golden… golden goose backlist of Pumpkin Plan. Not touching it.
Mike Michalowicz (29:05):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (29:06):
I'd rather take a core concept.
Mike Michalowicz (29:08):
Ohh.
AJ Harper (29:09):
And Pumpkin Plan. Something that's, and then—
Mike Michalowicz (29:12):
Oh yeah.
AJ Harper (29:12):
Sexy.
Mike Michalowicz (29:13):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (29:14):
And expand on that, because that just let Pumpkin Plan be what it's—
Mike Michalowicz (29:19):
I got the concept.
AJ Harper (29:19):
What is it?
Mike Michalowicz (29:20):
Client cloning. People wet their pants. Because how I set it on the stage, I say right now, think of your best client that you actively have. Who is it? Just imagine it. I say imagine now having 10 of those exact clients, or a hundred, how does that affect your business? And people are like, “My life is forever served. You know, my company's exploding and growth.”
AJ Harper (29:39):
It'd be, yeah. So let's do it. Do a deep dive. Everybody. We're just talk. This is the first time we're talking about it.
Mike Michalowicz (29:45):
Yeah. Yeah.
AJ Harper (29:46):
Deep dive on client cloning.
Mike Michalowicz (29:48):
I love that.
AJ Harper (29:49):
You know why that would work. That's what Profit First was. That's—
Mike Michalowicz (29:52):
That’s what Profit First—
AJ Harper (29:53):
Profit First was one tiny section in—
Mike Michalowicz (29:55):
Toilet Paper Entrepreneur!
AJ Harper (29:56):
In Toilet Paper Entrepreneur. And there was so much feedback about it. We knew it had, and even when a publisher rejected it, a famous agent didn't want to wrap it. You still said, I think it's the one. And we self-published. I don't know, man. I think instead of revamping pick a core concept, that's like the main thing.
Mike Michalowicz (30:15):
Yes.
AJ Harper (30:15):
And go deep on it. And it can even be a shorter book.
Mike Michalowicz (30:18):
Yeah. Oh my God. All right. Let's stop recording.
AJ Harper (30:21):
Client cloning. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (30:21):
Let's go, client cloning. Think of a good title. Don't—
AJ Harper (30:23):
We’ll think about it. But now we've outlined three books right now.
Mike Michalowicz (30:26):
I know, but oh my God, this one's so good, too. But we have, we have another book to take care of first.
AJ Harper (30:30):
But hey, everybody who's listening, you just heard me say that you can do that for your own book. Maybe you're thinking, “I want to revamp it.” But what if there's one idea or one framework or one chapter that everyone talks to you about?
Mike Michalowicz (30:41):
Yes.
AJ Harper (30:42):
Could you go deeper on it? Maybe not, maybe not a 70,000-word book, but maybe a shorter book, but still just as valuable and you get to say more about it.
Mike Michalowicz (30:52):
I love it. Of course. Yeah.
AJ Harper (30:53):
Do a deep dive. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (30:54):
You know, the best books, in my opinion, the ones that you should write, write that book is the book that, um, deep dives on a subject and is the authoritative source on it.
AJ Harper (31:04):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (31:05):
Atomic Habits is simply about habits, but it is a masterful, uh, education on mastering habits. And therefore, it's the authoritative book.
AJ Harper (31:17):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (31:17):
Love it. Love it. Um, that's a cool alternative to an r-and-e.
AJ Harper (31:22):
So, let's, let's continue. So back to the process. We read it, we've collected reader feedback.
Mike Michalowicz (31:25):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (31:26):
We also read three-star reviews, which are usually the reasonable reviews.
Mike Michalowicz (31:33):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (31:33):
Where people liked it, but something wasn't working. And that way you can see, okay, what do we, what are some commonalities and patterns in these three stars?
Mike Michalowicz (31:42):
I will tell you the reviews you can throw out immediately, which are usually the one stars, are, uh, this book could have been condensed to a simple blog post or a long book.
AJ Harper (31:49):
I have to tell you something. Yeah. I, I got my first one star.
Mike Michalowicz
Hey, congratulations!
AJ Harper
I'm so excited.
Mike Michalowicz (31:55):
Is it like a good one? Is it a total—
AJ Harper (31:57):
Oh, my God, I, I don't even, I, they for sure
Mike Michalowicz (32:01):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (32:02):
Absolutely didn't get it at all.
Mike Michalowicz (32:04):
What'd they say? Do you remember?
AJ Harper (32:06):
Um, that I was just, I didn't have anything useful.
Mike Michalowicz (32:11):
That’s amazing.
AJ Harper (32:11):
And they didn't get my Call to Greatness at the end about what was even the point of it. And it's probably what people, people come to me crying over that call to greatness. I take no offense, I was excited. I mentioned it to Laura Stone, and I said, “Do you see that one star?” She's, I think, afraid to even point it out to me.
Mike Michalowicz (32:28):
Oh my God.
AJ Harper (32:29):
Like, the best. It's good. They're the best. Because I was getting so many five stars that people start thinking… this happens with your books. Uh, and they even, even mentioned it in the one star. “Well, clearly she just has all these raving fans that are deluded and…”
Mike Michalowicz (32:42):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
AJ Harper (32:43):
I don't have control over that.
Mike Michalowicz (32:44):
I love it.
AJ Harper (32:45):
I was like, “Yes, finally.”
Mike Michalowicz (32:47):
I love it.
AJ Harper (32:48):
Mm-hmm
Mike Michalowicz (32:48):
Yeah. You need to get that one star. And do, um, has any of your fans actually responded to that?
AJ Harper (32:54):
Oh, no, I said nothing.
Mike Michalowicz (32:55):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (32:56):
So, don't send the troops, everybody. Yeah. I'll make, I will say one time I did get, before my book came out, I probably shouldn't say this on here,
Mike Michalowicz (33:07):
Say it.
AJ Harper (33:08):
Really?
Mike Michalowicz (33:09):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (33:09):
The story. No one knows this.
Mike Michalowicz (33:11):
Say it. That's what's so juicy. Now you have a cliffhanger. Okay. You're really concerned.
AJ Harper (33:16):
Oh, and I'm really worried. I don't know. Alright.
Mike Michalowicz (33:18):
Skip it.
AJ Harper (33:19):
All right. I'll tell you
Mike Michalowicz (33:46):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (33:47):
Um, and I had a feeling it was someone who knows me. Oh—
Mike Michalowicz (33:53):
Someone through your network.
AJ Harper (33:54):
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Mike Michalowicz (33:56):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (33:57):
And I had a feeling it was someone who knew it would stick, because here's his little trick. No one, hardly anyone leaves reviews on Barnes and Noble.
Mike Michalowicz (34:03):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (34:04):
You go to your Amazon page, you got a lot of reviews.
Mike Michalowicz (34:06):
Yeah. They get buried.
AJ Harper (34:07):
You go to Barnes and Noble, it's like, you could have, I bet you should. If you check after this podcast, you'll see almost no reviews. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (34:14):
Except for this one star,
AJ Harper (34:15):
For your big no—for your big books, Mike.
Mike Michalowicz (34:18):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I know.
AJ Harper (34:18):
No one checks it there. No one cares.
Mike Michalowicz (34:20):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (34:21):
It was someone who knew if they put it there, it would stay.
Mike Michalowicz (34:25):
Oh, dirty, dirty.
AJ Harper (34:27):
Dirty.
Mike Michalowicz (34:27):
Dirty!
AJ Harper (34:28):
I did actually mention that to my community, but not to have them rally.
Mike Michalowicz (34:33):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
AJ Harper (34:34):
Just to say, “Hey, you know, when this happens, here's what you can do.” Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (34:37):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (34:37):
To serve my authors. Well, my authors are super protective of me.
Mike Michalowicz (34:41):
Yeah. Yeah.
AJ Harper (34:42):
So they were like, we're doing—
Mike Michalowicz (34:45):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (34:45):
—torches. So, it's buried now. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (34:48):
Right.
AJ Harper (34:49):
Whatever. It's fine. It's not true about me. It's okay. I, but I was like, Ugh, this person knows me. This is like an attack. So not because, none of it's true, but just like, got me in all the ways that it would really be like, that's the opposite of me.
Mike Michalowicz (35:01):
I always feel so sorry for people like that, that attack to attack. It just shows that they don't have a self-confidence in themselves, and they try to pull someone else down as opposed to listening to themselves.
AJ Harper (35:11):
And I could be wrong, just so you know.
Mike Michalowicz (35:13):
Oh yeah. Who knows? Who knows?
AJ Harper (35:14):
I don't know. But anyway, whatever the point being, I can't believe I shared that story.
Mike Michalowicz
That was a great story.
AJ Harper
You think so?
Mike Michalowicz (35:20):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (35:21):
All right. Everybody's going to go looking for it now.
Mike Michalowicz (35:25):
Yeah. Yeah. “She is a charlatan, it’s true.”
AJ Harper (35:26):
But I, I, I, you need to have, you know, accept the fact that people aren't always going to get you. And you shouldn't assemble anybody. You should not be like, “Everybody go.”
Mike Michalowicz (35:39):
Correct. No.
AJ Harper (35:40):
You should just let it be and let it live. And don't, and actually do not respond at all.
Mike Michalowicz (35:46):
Or, okay. So I want to give you the counterpoint. And we, we did do an episode about ratings do not respond at all or respond, but respond professionally and, um, from your own, uh, perspective. So saying, Hey, um, th this, I saw Gary Vaynerchuk do this. And I was very impressed. Someone gave him a one star and said, “Hey, first of all, this hurts. Um, secondly, um, I appreciate honesty and candor, but I also don't think you actually read my book or whatever.” He said, this is my interpretation because of this point. So it just went through the points and it's like, wow, here's an author responding, saying their emotion about it. It hurts. But then also being very integral in the response. I was pretty impressed.
AJ Harper (36:25):
So you were impressed as an author. But I'm going to tell you a counterpoint. I'm… You and I are going to be opposite on this.
Mike Michalowicz (36:30):
I, I like it. I like this. Okay. I left a one star on Barnes & Noble! You want to talk trash? It was me, it was me. It was me. It was me. What's, what's your counterpoint?
AJ Harper (36:39):
Do not mess with reviewers.
Mike Michalowicz (36:42):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (36:43):
Reviews are not for authors. We think they are because we check them all the time. Reviews are for readers.
Mike Michalowicz (36:49):
For sure.
AJ Harper (36:50):
Leave it alone. I've seen too many people who even with the measured response, like the one you're sharing, then ended up with a bunch of one stars from other reviewers.
Mike Michalowicz (37:02):
Oh Interesting.
AJ Harper (37:03):
Because they rallied their troops to come in and just attack, they call it “badly behaving authors.” Yeah. So, you got to just, it hurts sometimes, but you just got to leave it.
Mike Michalowicz (37:12):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (37:13):
You just got to let it go.
Mike Michalowicz (37:15):
You know, a technique Seth Godin uses that he's, he's shared is, uh, he doesn't read any of his reviews. And his reason is he said, “I'm never going to write the book again.” That was his justification. Interesting.
AJ Harper (37:27):
I don't know, I think if you're going to read the write another book, it's good to know. Yeah,
Mike Michalowicz (37:30):
I agree. I agree. But that's just his justification.
AJ Harper (37:32):
But he can.
Mike Michalowicz (37:33):
He can.
AJ Harper (37:33):
He can. Alright.
Mike Michalowicz (37:34):
Let's continue our process here. So we—
AJ Harper (37:36):
We went off the rails.
Mike Michalowicz (37:37):
In a good way. In a good way. So, um, read the three-star reviews. What needs to be streamlined or improved.
AJ Harper (37:45):
I, that's what, that's what we did next. What do we need to make better?
Mike Michalowicz (37:49):
Exactly. And I think part of that is, is cutting is saying, you know, what does not need to be included too, as part of the streamlining.
AJ Harper (37:56):
But I think first, what's the, what are the frameworks or processes that need to be streamlined?
Mike Michalowicz (38:01):
Yep. At the end of the day, in a prescriptive book, can we get the, uh, reader to the core promise, the, the promise more efficiently, more effectively with less effort or, uh, less pain. So, I have this formula. We use the S-times… I can't remember, uh, oh my God. I, I, uh, it's the simplicity, the ease of implementation, uh, and the size of the outcome. So maybe it is s times e times o I can't remember the thing. But basically, the simpler it is to do, the less effort is required to do it, and the greater the impact.
AJ Harper (38:38):
Mike Michalowicz (38:38):
The more people want to consume it.
AJ Harper (38:40):
So, yeah. And then you have to consider what needs to be updated, as we talked about before, what's just out of date. Yep. Um, and then you get to, uh, also think about inappropriate content. This is really a topic that's near and dear to my heart. Yeah. Sometimes you use language unintentionally that can be offensive or hurtful to people. Language evolves.
Mike Michalowicz (39:02):
Sure.
AJ Harper (39:03):
It's not a bad thing. It's always evolved. It's not new. It's not a new thing to be respectful of how people feel, or that lang—words change. That's not, it's always changing. Yeah. Um, so there's content that you might want to say, you know what? I regret that I used that term. I didn't know better at the time. Let me fix that. And I think that's an important part of an update.
Mike Michalowicz (39:24):
That's great. I've been reading some books, some historical books, and, you know, they can go back as short as 50 years ago or longer. And it's like, oh my God, I can't believe they said that.
AJ Harper (39:33):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (39:34):
So, we have the same opportunity to update our books. Um, what about, uh, Clockwork? Uh, is there anything after we finish the revised and expanded edition, I think you're not content with it.
AJ Harper (39:46):
Well, that's the other thing is, uh, what I also, in our process, we also look at what are the things we wish we could have in retrospect. In hindsight.
Mike Michalowicz (39:55):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (39:55):
We could have changed from you in Profit First. You mentioned earlier it was that advanced system.
Mike Michalowicz (40:00):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (40:01):
For me, in Clockwork, we have this at the Call to Greatness, which is the close at the end. And it's a specific way that I write closes. Yeah. And I, it just wasn't the greatest. I didn't love it. I wanted to update it and change it, and we did.
Mike Michalowicz (40:16):
I can't actually, I don't even remember the original close.
AJ Harper (40:18):
Because it wasn't the greatest.
Mike Michalowicz (40:19):
Oh, okay.
AJ Harper (40:20):
It just…
Mike Michalowicz (40:20):
Do you remember what it was you do?
AJ Harper (40:23):
I can't even recall exactly the story right now, which is part of the problem.
Mike Michalowicz (40:27):
I remember the close. It said—
AJ Harper (40:28):
No.
Mike Michalowicz (40:29):
I am, uh, “My name's AJ Harper. I'm writing this with Mike. Someone gave me a one star in Barnes and Nobles That's—"
AJ Harper (40:36):
Okay. Now we have to cut that part out of this podcast.
Mike Michalowicz (40:40):
I know, I know you don't.
AJ Harper (40:41):
Uh, but the—
Mike Michalowicz (40:42):
New Clockwork close is phenomenal. It’s phenomenal.
AJ Harper (40:45):
And it was down to the studs. Complete rewrite.
Mike Michalowicz (40:48):
Yeah. Lin-Manuel Miranda, um, his transformation through a four-week vacation. How did you, you, you're the one who found that story. I remember a, a call or a text or something. It's, you know, some crazy hour saying, I got it. And, and then you said, and it's hot. And I was like, okay, this is going to be amazing.
AJ Harper (41:08):
It took me a long time to find it. We were almost done. It was just hovering there. We were almost done and ready to turn in. And I still didn't have a story and just, it just clicked for me.
Mike Michalowicz (41:16):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (41:17):
I just remembered hearing this story about how Lin-Manuel Miranda went on vacation after In The Heights. In between In The Heights. So In The Heights was his first breakout musical. Yep. Before it moved to Broadway, he went on vacation. And during that time, uh, during that vacation, he brought along this mongo biography
Mike Michalowicz (42:05):
Yes.
AJ Harper (42:06):
In, you know, palm trees and stuff (it) can open your mind to opportunities and ideas that you actually are closed off from because you're so busy in the grind. It was the perfect story, but I hadn't thought of it before that.
Mike Michalowicz (42:20):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (42:21):
Um, and that Call to Greatness is calling the reader to a higher purpose than when they come in and Clockwork, they come in with wanting to free up their time and stop drowning and run their business better. And they can't think about getting a big idea like Hamilton.
Mike Michalowicz (42:34):
Yes.
AJ Harper (42:35):
By the end of the book, they can, they can see, oh, wait,
Mike Michalowicz (43:02):
I thought there was another opportunity that didn't share yet that I thought was cool. We did with Clockwork, and it's the only time we've ever done it, is have a forward. And this case it was Gino Wickman. Oh yeah. A piece of feedback we got often on Clockwork was how is this different than Traction? Or how do I work this with Traction? In what sequence do I do Clockwork first or Traction first? Traction, if you're not familiar with that book, is the authoritative book for, uh, mid-size small business on, on binging about efficiency and, and, uh, having the business run on automatic. So, I called Gino and asked him if he'd do it, he said, absolutely. And, uh, he wrote this, this forward, and in his words, he shows how Clockwork precedes Traction based upon the size of business you have. And, uh, he wrote another book for the, the day you start a business called The Entrepreneurial Leap. And he's put, he shows that Clockwork's kind of the bridge between his two pieces of work. Well, what's powerful now, as the book sells and as we provide our services there, isn't this, is it Traction or is it Clockwork? Oh, we see how they work collectively. So, it's been a powerful positioning tool. I think it's served Gino too. It's absolutely served us.
AJ Harper (44:14):
Yeah, that's a great point. So, then we also look to see how can we update the stories? And a lot of authors don't realize they can go back to their original stories and get an update from them.
Mike Michalowicz (44:25):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (44:26):
What's different now? What else has happened now? And we were surprised to hear some really good news from folks, especially with Profit First.
Mike Michalowicz (44:33):
For sure.
AJ Harper (44:34):
Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (44:35):
For sure. So new stories, social proof, um, I'm just wondering if there's anything else, uh, in that space that we got new stuff.
AJ Harper (44:44):
Well, new stuff and updates to old stories.
Mike Michalowicz (44:47):
Yeah. But I'm— Oh, you know what, this is what came to mind is I also found, because we have multiple titles that some readers were now bridging books. Like they were implementing parts of Clockwork and it was serving them in Profit First, and that helped them through with The Pumpkin Plan. And so now the books can be a little more cohesive. Yeah. Because, and we started bridging people in multiple books. Like, I can't think of a name now, but—
AJ Harper (45:11):
Cyndi Thomason.
Mike Michalowicz (45:13):
Cyndi Thomason. Maybe Andrew Borg now has been in a couple, but you see these names as pop up—
AJ Harper (45:17):
Jose and Jorge.
Mike Michalowicz (45:17):
Oh yeah. They're in a lot of books.
AJ Harper (45:19):
They are.
Mike Michalowicz (45:20):
I'm, I tried to reach out to them recently. I haven't heard from them.
AJ Harper (45:23):
Oh, you know who else who—
Mike Michalowicz (45:24):
Who?
AJ Harper (45:25):
What's his name? He does the—
Mike Michalowicz (45:27):
Paul Schneider. Oh, Paul Schneider.
AJ Harper (45:29):
Schneider, yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (45:29):
He's great.
AJ Harper (45:29):
He's, he's a, he's a frequent, frequent guest.
Mike Michalowicz (45:32):
Frequent guest, yeah.
AJ Harper (45:37):
Yeah. I mean, how, how do you market a second edition?
Mike Michalowicz (45:39):
You launch it in part like, as a new book, but you use the momentum in the past. I think for us, the easiest way to build a street team is with a revised and expanded edition. Because now you have people that have experienced it. So instead of just reaching out saying, I have a new book who wants to support it? I say, I have a new book, a new version of an existing book, who's had success with it? And when you hear these hands raised saying, “Hey, would you be interested in becoming part of the street team and helping me promote the word?” So they have some more enthusiasm, I found that's key. Um, on the downside is it's not a new book, so it's kind of hard. It can be hard to say, uh, there's a brand-new book out for me, and build this enthusiasm around the unknown. Tell us about the new release. What's this, what's this new movie going to be like? But what is interesting is, um, if, and I'm very deliberate about this, if you document all the updates, now you show how it's new. So, we create usually a one sheet that says, uh, Profit First before had two systems, basic in advance. Now it has a singular system. You get results. 30% faster. Um, new ways to handle tax. And we listed all these bullet points. I was surprised and quickly adapted or adopted, or I guess adapted to it, that people, uh, when they heard their new book was coming out, they said, oh, I don't know if I'm going to need that. And they asked me, how's it different?
AJ Harper (46:58):
Mm-hmm.
Mike Michalowicz (46:58):
And having this one sheet was a big deal in marketing.
AJ Harper (47:00):
That's great. Yeah.
Mike Michalowicz (47:02):
Yeah.
AJ Harper (47:02):
But do you invest as many resources in the launch of the second edition as you would in a brand-new book?
Mike Michalowicz (47:08):
We have not. And I don't know if that's, that's not a smart thing. And maybe that hurt Clockwork too. You, you know, a launch is a big deal because that first group that purchased the books on their own accord, you, you motivated them through your marketing. If they enjoy the book, they're going to be the, the word-of-mouth folks. They're going to start that cascade effect and Clockwork. We, we didn't make that big push. We sold thousands of new copies, but not tens of thousands of new copies of the launch.
AJ Harper (47:37):
That's a big difference.
Mike Michalowicz (47:37):
Yeah, that's a big difference. So, I want to say the jury's out a little bit, but, uh, honestly, it's in self-reflection right now. It's got to be treated like a new book launch. And we haven't done that. We, we did with Profit First. We didn't do Clockwork. And now, now I'm wondering, oh, maybe, maybe this is the difference. Oh, maybe this is the difference. Yeah.
AJ Harper (47:56):
Yeah. We're, we're— Yeah. Realizing a lot of things on this episode.
Mike Michalowicz (47:59):
Yeah. Well, gosh, I got cloning clients. We got to work on that.
AJ Harper (48:03):
Cloning clients.
Mike Michalowicz (48:03):
So, we better get out of here. We got books to write.
AJ Harper (48:06):
Mike Michalowicz (48:06):
Books to work on. Um, hey, I want to remind you, our dear friends to visit our website, DWTB.com. Don't write
that
book podcast.com. So go to dwtb podcast.com. We have free materials for you. We'd be honored if you joined our email list. We'll share some current up-to-date stuff, new releases, stuff you can't get on the podcast. Additionally, we want to hear your stories. So, uh, share those with us by emailing me and AJ at hello@dwbpodcast.com. And the last thing is, uh, in addition to thanking you for listening to the episode, I just want to remind you, don't write that book. Write this one.