How to Get a Book Deal

Richard Lowe: Good morning. This is Richard Lowe with Leaders and Their Stories podcast. I’m here with Randy Peyser, and she’s the founder of AuthorOneStop.com. She edits books, ghostwrites books, and helps people get book deals with New York publishers. She works primarily with first time authors. Her author’s books have been featured in Oprah Magazine and Time magazine. And on the Wall Street Journal and US Day Today bestseller list. They’ve also been on Hallmark TV, in airport bookstores, and big box stores, and option for Hollywood films. Randy is the author of the Write a Book Program, Crappy to Happy, as featured in the movie Eat Pray Love and The Power of Miracle Thinking. Today she’s going to help you understand what publishers look for and what readers buy so that you can position your book to get a book deal. Randy, welcome to the show.

Randy Peyser: Very happy to be here, Richard.

Richard Lowe: Yeah, thank you for coming on. so before we get into the how, how does someone end up as the person publishers and authors both trust as the matchmaker?

Randy Peyser: Well, I’ll only speak from my own experience. And my experience is very organic. And what I mean by that is that my life completely fell apart in the 90s when I had been working as editor-in-chief of a very large New Age magazine in the Bay Area. And this is at a time when you could say the word new age and people weren’t yet rolling their eyes. And the magazine got sold. And I was my whole identity was attached to that. being this voice for the for the whole San Francisco Bay Area at a time when the new age was hot and happening. And so I went into a period that I call the dark night of the soul. You may have heard that term. I have. And I say, can we have a little bit of truth? Because isn’t it more like the dark year and a half of the soul? And and you know, and I s I just sat by and just asked myself the question over and over again, which came from a music partner of mine, because I’m a guitarist among I play many instruments. And she said, whenever she was in crisis, her name is Deborah LaFarris, she said, What’s the most loving thing I can do for me right now? And I wound up just living by the answer to that. For anyone in crisis, it’s a great question. What’s the most loving thing I can do for me right now? And one day I heard just sit. So I sat and not when I asked again, I heard do nothing. And these stories came to mind. And eventually after about two weeks, I’d gotten so quiet inside, I felt like I could hear the silence of a flame. It was so quiet. Then I started thinking just different parts of my life, just started writing them at that time on my Mac Junior classic. Remember that with the screen that was like about six inches by six, you know, it was like a post. And I did not know I was writing a book that would lead to my entire career, but that’s where it started. I wound up writing.

Richard Lowe: Like a post-it stamp.

Randy Peyser: And within the first month I had a hundred pages and I thought, hmm, I think I’m writing a book, but if I’m writing a book, what book is it? And it became ultimately became Crappy to Happy. okay. My first book that Julia Roberts holds up in the movie Eat Pray Love and buys in a bookstore scene. And so it took me some years to find a publisher. And I was going to New York to the at the time, the big feeding frenzy in the entire publishing industry in the United States was called Book Expo America. And it went out with COVID, but that’s where it started for me many, many years ago. And I wound up doing a one woman show and publisher loved that I had the great visibility because visibility has always mattered. And I was doing a show, and this was like basically pre Facebook, pre streaming everything, pre social media, but I had visibility. And my show was called Comic Intervention for Closet Visionaries and almost manifestors. And and it was I had a subtitle, a one woman show, except for the other people. And the other people was the audience. And I played with audiences in very funny and fun ways. And because I had visibility, I got my book, my first book deal. Then I decided I’m going to help other people get book deals. So this was over about 25 years ago. 26 years ago as I think about it.

Richard Lowe: Okay.

Randy Peyser: And just over the years and going to this giant book expo and making connection after connection after connection, I’m now in a place where I have about sixty publishers that I can pitch to on a first name basis. Nice. So I’m able to open doors for people that they typically cannot open for themselves and often to do so very quickly.

Richard Lowe: Very cool. So if I had a book that I wanted to or ev let’s go backwards, if I had a book idea that I wanted to get traditionally published at some point and I came to you, how would you help me?

Randy Peyser: So the first thing is to talk about your positioning, because there’s so many books out on almost every prod pro topic under the sun. And so we have to find the unique positioning for your book. And what I mean by that is for all nonfiction, let’s just talk about nonfiction for now. For all nonfiction, a business plan is required. You can’t I just can’t just send a book in and say, hey, do you like it? We do a book proposal, which is about twenty to thirty pages long, which I’m proving the sale of the book in different categories. And I’d love to be able to start the overview section, which is what is this book about and why does a publisher care? Why will their audience care? I like to start it, and this is part of the secret sauce I’m going to share with you because listeners need to know this. Start it with your title, is the first book. Two and then fill in the blank because what I want is for you to own a lane that is uniquely yours.

Richard Lowe: Okay.

Randy Peyser: So title is the first book two. you know, so did you notice my eyebrows went up when I went, I want a publisher’s eyebrows to hit the top of their hairline. Okay. And, you know, so that’s just one little tip to start that process. So the first process is get the positioning right. And, you know, I I love to help people do that, you know, especially when they’re in the idea phase.

Richard Lowe: Yeah, that has that’s that has to be something they do early. What I tell my clients when we start ghostwriting is pretty much the same thing. We start with the goal. What is your book? What do you want your book to accomplish for you? And then we work backwards from that. Because if you don’t know what your book’s gonna do, well, I just want to write a book. That’s that’s cool. And I’ll write your book. But you’d want to you want to achieve something with it. Like you want to get noticed, you want to Become famous, you want to make money somehow. What do you want to do with it? And then we work backwards from that. And we also want to position that book, much the way you said it’s it’s the first book too is a great positioning because then you don’t have any competition. Or it’s the best book too, who might be another one. It’s better than every other book on this subject because because the you know it might be a competitive field. I would imagine those also work.

Randy Peyser: And I actually have to prove that it’s a better book because there is a section in that book proposal, that big business plan called about the competition. And I have to do the research on that to know what books are competitive titles, what they’re talking about, and how your book differs and is therefore better. So and that’s my fun. I I you know, I I love getting people book deals. I love it because what I’m doing is that I’m allowing people to make a greater impact.

Richard Lowe: Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. That I always ask them what’s your audience? Who are you writing this book to? I’m sure you write asked that too. Well, who’s it for? If it’s a science fiction book, who who’s your audience? You know, is that military science fiction? That’s a particular audience or is it romance? You know?

Randy Peyser: Yes. You know what I tell people, I give people homework. I can put that in air quotes, homework. Go to a Barnes and Noble or a large bookstore and find the exact shelf your book sits on. Why? Because the book buyers at Barnes and Noble only buy for their own shelves. And you have to be very, very clear. So once you find the shelf your book sits on, your next step is to think about who is the person who exactly the exact person who’s going to pick up your book versus the book right next to yours because that is your target market. So for example, in a book proposal, I have to do a section called about the market. And I have to identify your primary, your secondary, and your tertiary markets for the book and show statistics that prove that. And fortunately, all the AI stuff that’s happening now makes this a much easier process than it was for me twenty or twenty five years ago.

Richard Lowe: huh. I can only imagine. Yeah. Speaking of AI, how does that fit into the picture? Just a quick side of side note.

Randy Peyser: Yeah. Publishers hate it. And we don’t use it. You know, if a if a publisher’s gonna reject a book because they’re finding AI in it, you know, I don’t we don’t really well, first of all, we don’t need to do that. And because, you know, like you, I mean the quality of the of the professionalism and writing you’re doing doesn’t require AI, you know, to write the book.

Richard Lowe: I don’t use AI to write the book. I do use it to help with outlining and going through the forty hours of interviews that I do with somebody ’cause and and boil it down to talk talking points, but never for the writing of the book.

Randy Peyser: Yeah. Yeah. Not if you want a traditional book deal. You know, and I tell people I have no attachment and no agenda when I speak with anyone. I want what is highest and best for each person. It’s like, you know, you referenced goals, like what is the goal of the book? What do you want? And then I can hear that and kind of reverse engineer the process. So I like traditional publishing as much as I like self-publishing or hybrid publishing. But for different reasons. And what I typically tell people is if you want to get your book out quickly, you want to control your cover art and every word in your book. And you want to make typically more, typically more money per book self-published. If you’re using your book for your career, definitely try for a traditional publisher. Because the publishers that I’m able to bring people open the doors to higher publicity. So my first time authors in Time magazine, Oprah magazine, airport book stores, FedEx Office stores, all these places, you know, option for Hollywood film, all these opportunities opened up because the book came out through a traditional publisher. You know, it was vetted. And so public pub publicists take it more seriously.

Richard Lowe: That makes sense because you’re in you’re in traditional magazines like Oprah magazine or whatever that they’re gonna see you more. They’re gonna teach you s you might even get some celebrities to pick pitch your book in that case.

Randy Peyser: Well, I don’t know about that. I think it could be really, really difficult to get celebrities involved in a in a book project.

Richard Lowe: Yeah, suppose it would say I suppose it would depend on the book.

Randy Peyser: Yeah. They have to be so careful and a lot of times their attorneys won’t even allow it.

Richard Lowe: I see. Interesting. Yeah. Interesting. So what topics are hot right now and what’s not hot?

Randy Peyser: So typically well, okay, you think about what’s trending in the media. You know, there’s been such an uptick over the last couple of years about human trafficking. Like, you know, one of the books I sold is called Slave, a human trafficking survivor finds life. Emotionally, it was the hardest book that I ever edited. But, you know, I found a publisher for it and it’s been option for Hollywood film. It’s a very powerful movie. so like, you know, just look at what is trending in the media. Because that’s where, you know, that’s where you’re gonna find what’s really hot. You know, I have an agent who did some six figure deals for some of my clients, some very large bidding wars. Like if I see a book that has the potential for a large bidding war, I’m gonna take it to the agents who can do that. I’ve had multiple agents do that for clients. And I asked her, you know, like, you know, how do you know what’s really selling? She goes, just follow the New York Times list, you know, the best seller list. I thought, okay. Okay, so you know, just kind of look and see what’s there. I mean, you know, business books, I sell a lot of business books. A couple of years ago, this is kind of a really fun fact, Richard. A couple of years ago, I sold 16 books in one year. I mean, that’s a huge amount, huge amount of books for anyone to be selling to publishers these days with all the competition there is. And six of them were business books. There were two whistleblower books.

Richard Lowe: Right.

Randy Peyser: There was a memoir, a political book, a guidebook, two novels, a self-help book, and some mind, body, spirit books. So I sell a lot of a lot.

Richard Lowe: Interesting, interesting.

Randy Peyser: When you said, like, you know, I I would I think maybe I’ll rephrase the question when you said like what’s not selling, but I’ll say what’s a much harder sell let me phrase it like that, would be memoir. Like, yes, I did get a memoir under contract with an agent. She hasn’t been able to sell it yet. Most publishers want celebrity memoir. And so many people write their stories as I did in Crappy to Happy, when you’re gone through a very horrible or horrendous experience. And you want to help other people get through it. So a lot of people write a memoir just for that reason to help others because they’ve overcome something. But it’s a difficult, a very, very difficult sell. One of the things that makes those books more sellable is to write what I call prescriptive memoir, which is what I did with Crappy to Happy, which helped get the sale. In prescriptive memoir, you’re writing the stories, but after each story, you’re writing steps or tips. That would help people in a similar circumstance. So my first book, Crappy to Happy, my original subtitle was A Journey Out of the Pits and Into the Fruit of Life. And I thought, gee, that’s witty. Publishers will love that. No, their marketing department changed it to crappy to happy, small steps to big happiness now, which answers the question in the reader’s mind, which is, what’s in it for me? And allowed my book to be a seasonal bestseller for that publisher. Also the most frequently stolen book at expos that they attended where they were, you know, showcasing products.

Richard Lowe: Wow, that’s a good stat to have. Yes. Yes. Well I you you the you are talking is the same way I talk to my ghostwriting clients. Actually, we’re talking about their memoir. We change it into something that that will help people. somehow. Just just finish one that’s gonna go to publish soon, self published pretty soon. That is in story brand form. And if you’re familiar with that and it goes it follows the story of these three kids through

Randy Peyser: Yes. Wait.

Richard Lowe: being mentored in their in their careers at all all different ages. And it came out really good. He likes it a lot. He’s publishing it next week out of the week after, I think. And we started with the same thing. What’s your goal? What do you want to achieve? Yeah. Work work what who’s your audience? And at first he didn’t understand why I was asking all these questions. He just wanted to write the book. But I said, you know, you want the book to actually sell be interesting to people, we need to ask these questions.

Randy Peyser: Ha. Yep.

Richard Lowe: Next question. What is the most essential sales tool you y you need to sell a manuscript to a publisher?

Randy Peyser: The most essential sales tool that every publisher takes very seriously and every department is going to take very seriously because decisions are not made by one person. a manuscript will go from department to department. But the book proposal that I mentioned, that business plan, that is the gold. It is the ticket to the sale. And it’s the reason, like a couple of years ago, as I mentioned, sixteen books sold, fourteen were nonfiction, and I polished or wrote all those book proposals. Wow. So You know, there’s a lot of secret sauce that goes into those proposals too too, because I have to tip the sal in the in your favor. And so of course, of course. You know, there’s there’s so many things that I do to make that happen.

Richard Lowe: Yeah. Yeah. So a book proposal sounds more like a marketing plan than anything else.

Randy Peyser: Yes. Well, it’s everything. It’s it’s everything. It’s about this is what the book is about. we’re gonna put in cover back cover endorsements, you know, getting people to sign off on cover endorsements. I mean, there’s just the the the competitive analysis, the market analysis, chapter summaries, an overview. I mean, there’s a lot of sections, you know, sample appearances about promotions. There it’s it’s a big package that gets put together and believe me, it’s taken very seriously.

Richard Lowe: Yeah, I I think it also includes what the author’s going to do to help promote this book.

Randy Peyser: That’s part of the about promotions section. Yes. We also like you know, I I give all my authors a templated letter to send out to everyone they know who will support the book launch so that we can leverage other people’s social media list numbers. And have that in the promotions section as their launch campaign partners. And it’s a very simple letter, but it’s so important, you know, leading towards the sale of the book.

Richard Lowe: Yeah, so they’re The I would like to see a copy of that myself, if you don’t mind.

Randy Peyser: I will send it to you. I have to make myself a note to do it so I remember.

Richard Lowe: Don’t worry, I’ll nudge you.

Randy Peyser: Okay, okay, good.

Richard Lowe: What’s the quickest way to get an agent or a publisher to stop in their tracks?

Randy Peyser: The quickest way is to have the largest following you can build. And that’s really the truth. So for example, maybe two or three years ago, if if a business author, let’s just take a business author as an example. So a business author has to be very strong on LinkedIn. If a person, a business author who had had 10,000 people on LinkedIn, I could get them a book deal. Now, publishers like Penguin Random House, Penguin Random House Portfolio. HarperCollins leadership, HarperCollins business, and Wiley, all of whom are like, you know, top business publishers, all of whom I know on a first name basis and all of whom I pitched to, they want to see someone who minimally, and I’m talking about minimally has a hundred thousand people in their personal network between their newsletter and LinkedIn. You know, there are mid-range publishers where those numbers are won’t matter quite as much, not those as at that level, but The larger the numbers you can build, the better your chances. And so in a query letter, like when I query, most people they only get part of the equation in the query. So they talk about, you know, the their subject matter, they talk about their credentials to write the book, but they never mention anything about numbers. And those numbers truly matter. So I was all I will always make sure if I’m pitching anything, that the numbers are present in right in the query letter because again that’s gonna get publishers’ eyebrow eye you know eyebrows to go up to here. And so

Richard Lowe: sorry, go ahead.

Randy Peyser: I was gonna say a mid-range publisher wants to sell thirty five hundred to five thousand books in the first year. Penguin Random House and Simon and Schuster publishers in that league, they want to sell 10,000 books in the first year. So in that book proposal, especially in the promotion section, we have to show the potential based on the author’s numbers to hit big, big goals like that. Like there’s a page that’s not mandatory.

Richard Lowe: Okay.

Randy Peyser: in a book proposal, but I will always include it if we can. And I like to include a page called Sample Appearances and Media, because publishers are looking for go-getters who are already go-getting. And I’ll give you a specific example. Wiley came back on a book project, and this was about 2007, but it still holds true all these 20 years, almost 20 years later, because I’ve recently sold two books to Wiley. And they said, Where is the author spoken in the last year? What was the size of each audience? Where is the author speaking in the next six to twelve months? What is the projected size of each audience? They are looking for real numbers. And those numbers, truthfully, they matter because the first person who will typically interact with a book that I send is an acquisitions editor. They have to fall in love with it. Then they’re going to bring it to their team of editors. And then let’s say they have they have twenty-five slots for books that quarter, except they have 57 books in and they have to choose. So they’re choosing primarily based on subject matter. Not entirely, but primarily. But then the book goes to the committee that I call the bean counters. And they’re gonna be counting those beans. So the numbers have to be there because if the numbers are aren’t there, I’m not gonna pitch the project. I can’t.

Richard Lowe: Course. Sure. And that’s where you recommend self publishing, I would imagine, or hybrid publishing.

Randy Peyser: Yes.

Richard Lowe: Yes. Yep. Which is its own journey. I’ve gone through that one many, many times.

Randy Peyser: Yeah, I mean, one of the self-publisher self-publishers I refer people to, I I do so because every month she does a marketing mastermind. So her authors keep selling their books. So it’s just doesn’t, you know, it’s like, I’m an international bestseller for one day, for two days on Amazon, you know, they do and then nothing happens after that. The book just dies or tanks. It’s like, no. she has sold over a million copies of her books, and so she just constantly is You know, doing hot seat coaching and just keeping authors selling their books for a whole year. And that’s pretty cool.

Richard Lowe: Interesting. Interesting. well, you you mentioned on this and you’ve already answered it. I think what’s the quickest way to get an agent or publisher to stop in their tracks? I think you answered that.

Randy Peyser: Build numbers. Build your numbers like crazy. And if you’re not the person who knows how to do it or wants to do it, delegate. Just hire, you know, and find somebody. And please do it ethically. You’re not just going to buy followers. That that just doesn’t work. Publishers will look up the amount of engagement you have. And how do I know this? I was speaking with a publisher one time who had bought a number of books for me. And they said that they went to a website. I’m going to give you the website and you should be writing this down. Because you can look yourself up on it. Because it’s a website that shows how much engagement you have with your audience online. And apparently it rates people in an A B C D kind of rating. So you want to be high in the ratings. And the website is called socialblade.com. Socialblade.com. Look yourself up. Just see, you know, yeah, see where you’re we see where you’re falling. So it’s important.

Richard Lowe: I am right now.

Randy Peyser: Like, you know, I was sitting with Angelina Jolie’s literary agent in New York. I was having twenty five meetings in two and a half days, pitching twenty-two publishers, three top literary agents, pitching 16 projects. And I’m at the Javits Conference Center with this particular agent. And we’re sitting at a Starbucks table, and I’m just sitting there and I’m pitching a project to him. And I see him do this. He’s picking up his phone and he starts typing. And I’m I’m busy judging the guy and I’m thinking, God, that’s rude. I’m pitching him. Well, it turned out he was looking up my author on YouTube and said, not enough engagement. Who else you got? And he is not an isolated case. He’s not an isolated case.

Richard Lowe: Interesting. Interesting.

Randy Peyser: It matters, it you know, because it’s it’s business and these are corporations making business decisions.

Richard Lowe: they’re going to invest in the author. They want to get a return on their investment. It’s a simple way to look at it. That’s what all this is for. Is how are you going to get a return from investing in me, the author? It’s a very simple equation. And you have to prove it to them. I’m going to put in this much effort. I already have this following. Send that’s what what shouldn’t you do if you’re serious about a publishing contract?

Randy Peyser: Truthfully, one of the worst things that most people can do is self-publish anything first. Because as soon as anything is self-published and it’s up on Amazon, you now have a track record of sales. And I was on a Zoom call one time with a a publisher. And she and I was pitching a project to her, and the author had a previous book. And she turned and she got on a another screen and she looked up the author in that book on Amazon. And within two one second of being on Amazon, she had the sales numbers. And the numbers weren’t high enough. They weren’t in that thirty five hundred to five thousand book range for this mid-range publisher to say, I’ll take your next book. And almost no almost no publisher will ever take any book that’s already up on Amazon because now you’re in competition with the publisher. And if even if you say, I’ll pull it off of Amazon, all of a sudden,

Richard Lowe: Mm-hmm.

Randy Peyser: used copies start showing up and popping up all over the place.

Richard Lowe: And and scam copies too, of course.

Randy Peyser: Yeah, there’s all there’s all that kind of stuff. So So it’s it’s very, very tough.

Richard Lowe: Unless your book sells really well and as a as a self published you shouldn’t do that.

Randy Peyser: Then they’ll say, Who do you have left to sell it to?

Richard Lowe: Well I if you’re s you’re going for your second book or your third book.

Randy Peyser: Yes, yes. If the first book has sold well, the and especially if you’ve built even more numbers since that book, which I’m assuming most people will, then yeah, then you’re in a much better position.

Richard Lowe: Okay. Okay. what are the biggest mistakes an author makes?

Randy Peyser: Doing things out of sequence. And so and and what I mean by the sequence is, as you would probably know, Richard, like you know, people will write a letter to an agent, really not knowing what they’re doing to begin with, and just send off the the letter, and then you know, they get rejected, and then they don’t even understand what they did wrong. But then I’ll say, Well, was your book analyzed? Was it read and analyzed by a professional editor? no. was it edited? well I edited it myself. It’s like, no. You know, you need to be working like working with you, Richard, working, you know, working with you, working with me. You have to work with someone who’s professional who understands publishing industry standards.

Richard Lowe: In other words, pretend like you’re a professional and act like one.

Randy Peyser: Yeah. So you know, like typically let’s say somebody has written the book, our first step would be analyze it, get it back to the author to input changes, and also in that reading realm, discerning is this a book that we believe is commercially viable? You know, for all the different reasons that I already spoke about. You know, the is the positioning correct? Is is are the numbers there? Because, you know, I was sitting with an agent one time who said, Randy, I’m getting and this was some years ago, she and she said I’m getting a thousand submissions a month on my email. I don’t even open them. When you have something for me, text me. That is a whole other level of relationship than I’m talking about.

Richard Lowe: Or DM me on Instagram or something like that. Yeah.

Randy Peyser: Or like, you know, I tell people, if you’re sending anything to an agent or publisher, make sure that book is absolutely pristine. It is ready to go. The reason being is that there’s thousands of other people bringing their books who are ready to go. Right. And like, you know, I’ve heard people say, well, you know, don’t the editors at the publishers, won’t they handle that? I’m like, good luck with that. You want to present your absolute best work.

Richard Lowe: Yeah.

Randy Peyser: First. That’s right. That’s right. If you’re a first time author without you don’t have the leverage. You just don’t have the leverage. So make sure everything is ready. And some people say, Well, I just want to write sample chapters. I’ve heard you could do like the book proposal and sample chapters. And I’m going to say it again. Good luck with that. You know, you’re a first time author. you don’t have as much leverage as you think you do. unless you’re a celebrity or someone with hundreds of thousands of people on your network already.

Richard Lowe: Right. That’s that’s what I tell my my clients too is you need to have the book there first. Well all of my clients except for three, out of the fifty four clients who wrote books, three of them got traditional and the rest are self published. And the three that were traditional actually knew somebody at the publisher who they could talk to direct. So they actually skipped the agent. They knew

Randy Peyser: Uh-huh. Well, you know, it’s funny because I typically typically take fiction to agents and nonfiction directly to publishers because I just based on what connections I have and who I know will actually consider the projects. So that’s that’s typically the way I work. Unless I see the potential for the six figure deal, then I’m gonna go to, you know, the bidding war agents who I work with.

Richard Lowe: Right. Yeah, these were all nonfiction, so it kind of made sense. Yeah. I think it was Wiley was one of them. So, but I’m not sure. What are the biggest what are the biggest questions publishers ask before they make a buying decision?

Randy Peyser: Well, I would say again the numbers, my God, those numbers really, really matter. The numbers. It’s gonna come the conversation ultimately is gonna come down to the numbers. It just will. And I actually had an agent I was on the phone with about three months ago and she was kind of, you know, complaining to me saying, Randy, I used to be able to get, you know, people book deals just based on the content because they had great content. But now if they don’t have the numbers, no publisher will touch it. And that’s, you know, it’s a shame, but it I’m just talking about the the experiences I’ve had and the truth as I know it to be. That’s all I can do is share my own experience.

Richard Lowe: Hm. Sounds to me like a successful way to get a second book published would be to publish the first book yourself and make sure that it sells like gangbusters. Like you you know, you sell fifty thousand copies or something.

Randy Peyser: Or you know, or or you know, or s I I think it’s actually easier to get a a book deal for a first time author who has no track record of sales. Okay. Because it can be hard to make all those big sales. It just can.

Richard Lowe: Yeah, it’s a lot of work selling books. it

Randy Peyser: It can be. It certainly can be.

Richard Lowe: Yeah, most of my authors are executives so they they sell it through they don’t wanna sell copies. They wanna get speaking engagements and things like that.

Randy Peyser: Sure. I mean, I mean that that’s, you know, a perfect thing to do. I mean, I’m doing something completely different with the book I’m writing. I I just finished writing right now and I’m pursuing a sponsorship model, which is a very, very different model than traditional publishing. So you know, I’ll hold up. Just happen to have a copy right here. I wrote a little book. It’s just a little five by seven. it’s a tiny book, it’s only a hundred pages, and it has a tip per page. And what it is, it’s called Bald Courage, Gentle Wisdom on the Cancer Journey. And it’s for chemo patients to get through each day going through chemo. Just turn to any page and find one little piece of wisdom that’ll help somebody get through the day. And I want this book gifted to chemo patients. It’s not sold to chemo patients. And so I’m pursuing the sponsorship model. And I’m learning it as I go. I it’s not like it’s like it’s not like I came in with all this knowledge. I You know, I work with a number of people who teach the sponsorship model so I can learn it and do this. And what it what it means is finding a fiscal sponsor, which is a nonprofit, that’ll basically sponsor the project so that I can go to corporations, to individual donors, to philanthropists, to hospitals, to chemo wards, and I can get I can get corporate sponsorship so that the corporations pay to the nonprofit as the fiscal sponsor, then the fiscal sponsor can send them the letter, you know, that their their tax write-off information, and then the book can be gifted. And so yeah, it’s it’s a completely different model, but there’s actually a huge amount of money that can potentially be made in it because the books will be printed and sold in bulk.

Richard Lowe: Interesting.

Randy Peyser: And the larger the bulk printing, the more the printing cost goes down.

Richard Lowe: I actually had one of my authors who did went that route. Haven’t talked to her in years. It was one of my f early books for children’s books for people at children like at children’s hospitals who had some kind of disease that they were going to die from, terminal disease. And she made these children’s books that that she passed out to them and she got loads of money getting sponsors for that. And then she’d print more. And she did very well.

Randy Peyser: Yeah, it’s it’s it’s a great model. It’s actually just really a great model. And I went through the lovely experience of chemo for breast cancer back in twenty twelve. And I went through chemo radiation, and chemo was the hardest thing I’ve ever been through. And I’ve wanted to write the book since then because there were so many things I did that other people often don’t think to do. And it made such a difference in the quality of care I received. You know, so for example. before any any medical professional touched my body the day of surgery, I thanked each person for saving my life. And it made a difference in the quality of care I received. You know, one one nurse got teary and she said, No one’s ever thanked me. I’m like, my God, you are saving my life.

Richard Lowe: I can see it. Yeah. That’s an amazing story.

Randy Peyser: lives every day. Amazing story. And I have a lot of humor in the book too. Like I say, you know, the two best things about chemo, better parking spaces and my thighs no longer rub together when I walk. I mean, you know, so and it always gets a laugh. So, you know, there’s there’s like comfort. There’s comfort in this book. It’s a really pretty book, and and inspiration and some tips and and it’s easy. It’s just an easy pick me up read, find one thing that’ll help you get through the day.

Richard Lowe: Interesting. Interesting. Well how speaking of stuff like that, how do you get cover endorsements when you don’t know anybody famous?

Randy Peyser: You know, I tell people the formula, it’s actually a question is what can I give rather than what can I get? So famous people in particular, everyone is like me, me, help me, help me, help me, help me coming at them. And think about how much time you don’t have in your day. And then you think about all these famous people and and how, you know, if they’re going at a hundred miles an hour, they don’t have time to be reading your book. They just don’t. Right. So I I tell people if you can get on someone’s volunteer for someone’s event, if you can have s any quite kind of liver leverage to give to someone as a volunteer or however you can do it. If you have a podcast, is it appropriate for that person to be on your podcast? You know, things like that. Anything you can do to give something, because then when you’re asking, there’s like an equal energy exchange. So what can you? give. Another thing you can do is reach out to other authors who are working on books, you know, people within your own network. And and so on the even if their books aren’t out yet, you can still get cover endorsements and they can be listed as as author of the upcoming book.

Richard Lowe: that’s a good idea.

Randy Peyser: Yeah. And then what’s typical, I mean, it’s it’s all over the publishing industry, is for the author or the editor or ghostwriter who worked with them to write out potential cover endorsements themselves and ask people to sign off on them. You know, maybe you’re gonna send your introduction, maybe one chapter. They might not even read it, but they might be willing or they might, but they might be willing to sign off, you know, or say, you know, would you be willing to use this endorsement or you know tweak it you know to something that that you’d like. so that those are just different, but I tell people, you know, write out seven to ten endorsements, two to three sentences. One of the sentences can just be like highly recommended exclamation point. You know, not so not long. You’re not writing paragraphs there.

Richard Lowe: When I when my authors need a forward, I tell them, write it yourself and send it to the people you want to do a forward. They’ll edit it and send it back. But if you send it if you send it to people without doing that, they won’t ever get back to you.

Randy Peyser: Yeah. I mean and as a ghost ghostwriter, I know that, you know, ghostwriters that I work with as well, we often will write the forward and then, you know, have it sent to the you know, sent to the person and and then they can tweak it or just sign off on it.

Richard Lowe: Yeah, and that works really well because now they don’t have to spend loads of time and energy coming up with something ’cause they’re busy people. And remember my authors are are tend to be high level execs. So they don’t have time. all right. you said you’re working on a book.

Randy Peyser: Well, yeah, I mean the the book that I’m that I’m working on right now is bald coverage. I just had I just printed my first hundred copies and I’ve been sending them out as little seedlings to different people and places and seeing what will come back. I mean the way to make these things happen, I really believe, is is just to stay in action. You know, just have a passion for something. Have a passion for whatever it is you’re working on.

Richard Lowe: Nice.

Randy Peyser: really strong passion and stay implementing every day. Okay, what’s what’s a baby step? What can I do today? And I just do that every day. Okay, what’s what’s what am I doing today? What do I need to write? What do I need to send? You know, who do I need to contact? But every day, you know, I just and so I’m not flooding my day the entire day doing it, but every single day, more action, more action. So, you know, I had a couple of phone calls today, this morning, and I’m going to the post office after our podcast, you know, to send out some more books.

Richard Lowe: Nice. So Sounds like you’re a busy person.

Randy Peyser: In act. Yeah. In in fun ways.

Richard Lowe: Is there anything else you want to talk to us about?

Randy Peyser: Let’s see. You know, one of the ways, one of the things there’s a couple things I’d actually like to talk about. Okay. And it’s one thing that no one ever addresses in a publishing conversation, but it’s so critical to the author’s success. No one addresses it, as far as I know, except me, truthfully. And it has to do with fear. Because, especially as a first time author, if you haven’t been in front of people, If you haven’t been in front of the media, if you haven’t been in front of TV cameras or interviewers or reporters, it’s a it can be very, very intimidating. It can be very, very scary. And I don’t care how famous a person is, everyone has their ceiling, their limit. And I want to share how I overcame that for myself because this is really h helpful information. So when I was first pitching Crappy to Happy, my first book.

Richard Lowe: Okay.

Randy Peyser: When I was first pitching that book, I was in New York at this book expo at that time, 40,000 people running around. Everybody’s trying to make the really fast connection. Everybody’s looking for the right connection. And I was a deer in the headlights. That’s the way most people will experience it, you know, if you’re not really used to it. Yep. And I’m with a very dear friend of mine, Jill Loublin, who’s a national publicity strategist. So she’s very comfortable in the publicity lane because that’s her lane. And we’re walking along, everybody has a name tag, and she sees CNN and she goes, CNN. She’s running after them. And I’m like, CNN. And I follow her. And then she makes the connection. We move along. She’s running after USA Today. And I’m like, USA Today. And I and I’m following her. And I realized I had what I call the hiccup of hesitation. And the hiccup of hesitation is when we’re going for our dream, the book or whatever it is. But there are those little back steps of fear, of intimidation, of anything that’s holding us back. And what I realized from that is that it’s it’s not like I won’t create my dream, but it’s going to take me longer as long as I have hiccups. So I was on the show floor with my friend Jill Lublin, and I decided in that moment I want to overcome the hiccup of hesitation. So I decided I would physically model.

Richard Lowe: Right.

Randy Peyser: My friend Jill on the show floor and we’re walking along, all of a sudden I went, Ladies Home Journal. And we went right for that person, made a connection, got the card. And so what I tell people is whenever you find those those places where you feel those hiccups in your life, and they can occur anywhere in your life with your book or whatever or relationship, anything, what I say to myself is, go.

Richard Lowe: Mm. Good advice.

Randy Peyser: Yeah. And I think that’s just so important to share. You know? It’s critical to all of us, for all of us for our success.

Richard Lowe: It is We are our own worst enemy sometimes because we get in our own way.

Randy Peyser: Well, and and and it’s usually from a just a lack of experience. The more you do it, the easier it gets. And like, you know, I remember I remember being I was down in Santa Cruz. I I live in the Reno area now, but I was in Santa Cruz at the time. And my friend Jill, who I mentioned, was visiting me. And we were attending a local parade downtown at night in Santa Cruz. And all of a sudden there’s a big TV camera there. And Jill goes running to it and gets into gets herself interviewed on the local news. I was at that time, this is years ago, petrified. It was like, there’s no way I would go running up to a TV camera and you know, just da da da da da I’ll put myself out there. However, a few weeks ago, I attended a planning commission meeting in Reno and I spoke out at that meeting. And then as I was leaving the building I was leaving the building, I saw a TV reporter there. He was putting his camera away and I said, Are you open to Public opinion, he goes, Yeah, and he pulled his camera out, set up the lights, interviewed me. And it turned out I was on the local news and that night. Wow. I mean But that’s because it’s been years, years and years of you know, giving talks. I’ve given over five hundred talks now. You know, and so there’s that sense of such comfortability, but certainly not at first. And so, like what I tell people when you’re starting out, when you’re getting your first book going, you want to write. You know, a blurb. This is what you can send to people to the media. Write a blurb, a paragraph or two, what your topic is, and then readers or listeners will learn and then put a list. And that list can also be your questions that someone could ask, an interviewer could ask you. But here’s part of my secret, and this is what I did when I was starting. Make two lists, make an identical list for yourself, but on your list, put your answers.

Richard Lowe: Uh-huh.

Randy Peyser: So and it could just be a bullet point or like, you know, tell this particular story in regards to this or whatever. Just bullet points or whatever you need. You’re not gonna be reading off of it. You’re not reading word for word, but just something that’s gonna trigger your memories you get used to telling your stories and making your points. And this is the way that, you know, I developed myself as a speaker. Just repetition.

Richard Lowe: Interesting. Go out there and get it. Yes. Without hesitation.

Randy Peyser: Yeah, that’s right. That’s right.

Richard Lowe: ‘Cause what are they gonna do? You know? Yeah.

Randy Peyser: You know, the the last piece of advice I really love to give people, I always I usually conclude by saying, you know, your book is either priority or an option. If it’s an option, it will never get done. If it’s your priority, you absolutely will make it happen and nothing will stop you. Be that person.

Richard Lowe: That’s exactly what I tell my pre sales close writing clients. This is either important to you or it’s not. If it’s not important, that’s fine. If it’s important, you’ll make it happen. You made that new car happen. You didn’t have seventy five thousand dollars for that new Tesla, but you made it happen. Make the book happen. Yeah. Good stuff. Good stuff. Well, thank you for appearing on the podcast. Appreciate it. It’s been fun. where can people find you?

Randy Peyser: www.dot author one stop dot com and the one is spelled out o-ne-e author one stop dot com.

Richard Lowe: Excellent. Excellent. Well, thank you for appearing and we’ll talk some more.

Randy Peyser: Good. Thank you, Richard.

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