Speaker First, Author Second

Chris Salem joins Bonnie Dillabough, the Web Woman, on Author Talks for a conversation aimed at anyone who has thought about writing a book but worries they are not a writer.

An award-winning author who calls himself a speaker first, Chris makes the case that the message matters more than the prose, and shares how promoting outcomes, not the book, drove his title to international bestseller.

Chris Salem is an award-winning author, life and business strategist, world-class speaker, and radio host who helps entrepreneurs and leaders achieve sustainable success by resolving limiting beliefs. He founded the nonprofit Empowered Fathers in Action.

For more conversations with authors about craft and the business of books, see Author Talks with Richard Lowe.

DISCUSS YOUR BOOK

Full transcript of the interview follows.

Bonnie Dillabough: Bonnie Guillebeau, aka the web woman here, and I have so much excitement about my next guest, Chris Salem, and I have been corresponding for quite a while. And I’ve been following his career, and he’s been following mine. And I am really, really happy today, to have him with us to talk about the writer’s life.

For those of you who’ve always thought about writing that book, or who are authors, and would like maybe some tips from somebody who’s doing really well, this is the place to do it. Hey, Chris, how you doing,

Chris Salem: Barney? It’s pleasure to be here today.

Bonnie: I’m so glad to have you. So what I want to do first is just introduce you to my peeps, you want to tell us a little bit about yourself and what you do?

Life and Business Strategy

Chris: Sure, well, I may, besides being an award winning author, I’m a life and business strategist, and a world class speaker, and also a radio show host and personality. So what I do is I work with entrepreneurs, business leaders, and sales professionals, this desire to have sustainable success at the next level, by helping them to resolve the root cause to limited beliefs.

So I’m a big proponent that limited beliefs work behind the scenes, subconsciously, that hold us back from playing at a bigger level, and whatever success means to us. And this doesn’t only pertain to business, but also our personal wellness, as well as our personal and business relationships. So when I say a life and business strategy, I’m that term means that life affects business business effects like that look at both as one to address the root cause of the problem. So you can operate within the solution. So that’s what I do.

Bonnie: Cool. And you have a number of best selling books out there that I’m happy to say, really get to the nitty gritty of all of this, but you also are a public speaker. And most of the authors that I interview, have a tendency to be somewhat introverted. And so you’re kind of the opposite of that. Yeah. First, the the speaking or the writing,

Speaker First, Writer Second

Chris: while the speaking first. So I always classified myself as a speaker, I wouldn’t say that I am I like a great writer, absolutely not. But what I was able to do, was to take the thing that I know best in speaking, and then to put it on paper, to be able to tickle my throat.

But I say for anybody that you know, that’s looking to that, you know, has some you know, a good story has content that can really make a difference or your message that can actually help someone don’t allow something that well, I’m not a good writer to hold you back.

There are many people that have written books that are technically not great writers, it was really the message because you could always get help in helping people to, you know, fine tune and change a few things around to edit to what you what you have written, but it’s really comes down to the content, the message itself, and the impact that it has over someone. Okay, so

Bonnie: when you finally said, Okay, I’m gonna do it, I’m gonna write this book, what are some of the challenges you faced? And how did you overcome those?

Getting the Message Onto Paper

Chris: Well, as I mentioned, again, I always classify myself as a speaker or writer is second, you know, I won that award based upon the content and the message, I wouldn’t say that it’s the writing. I’m not like a writer, writer. But it was, again, the challenges of saying that, Hey, Chris, you know, it’s hard for me to take information up here that I speak to very easily then to write that down.

So it took some time. But I would say for someone that is, you know, in that same area that I was, was to not let that hold you back, just, you know, go out there and write in your pockets of time just to get your information down on paper, it doesn’t have to be perfect in terms of the sentence structure, the grammar, just put it out there, that stuff that can you could go back and edit it many times, or have someone you know, look at it for you, that can make it flow better.

So the key is, is you know, don’t allow that to hold you back. You know, if you have writer’s block, again, figure out ways that you can kind of be in the moment present through meditation and journaling. That’s what helped me to kind of get those ideas out of here onto the paper and to do it in pockets of time that allowed me to get the book done over a period of time.

Bonnie: And and see that time is definitely an issue for all of us. Do you schedule time to ride or you just kind of let them use hit you?

Scheduling Time to Write

Chris: Well, it can go either way. But I like to schedule time I you know, what I what I coach on is on habits and disciplines and structure, because that’s what I believe leads to sustainable success. That’s what I coach people want and what I lecture companies on so it’s better that you scheduled periods of time where you know that you’re going to just be focused on that particular area.

However That being said, there are going to be case Sometimes where something comes to your mind that you might be doing something else. So if it’s really important, then you know, take the time to put it down on paper or put it you know, put the notes into your phone that you could go back later, when you have already scheduled that time to take that information, and then begin to expand on it.

So again, you know, you want to pick those times that you feel work really well, where you’d have your creative juices flowing. It could be early in the morning, it could be in the early late evening, depending on you know, people are different, but schedule the times where you feel that you’re most creative to get that information on paper.

05:36 Absolutely. And I think it like anything else in our life has to be balanced, right? Yes. So one of the things about you that a lot of our either current authors or off people who want to be authors, the thing that they’re the most afraid of is marketing your book.

And you have been quite successful in doing that. Would you like to give us some tips? Yeah, I mean, there, there are a lot of different ways to do it. But I always feel that the authentic way is to do it organically, again, just putting it out there on social media, and not just promoting you and the book itself.

But really the message. Again, you know, because people want to buy the book because they want it unless they know you, they’ll buy the book to support you. But if people don’t know you, they want to know what the book can do to help them in their given situation.

So again, when you’re promoting the book, it’s promoting the message, what is what are the outcomes, or the deliverables that this book can provide to help somebody depending upon what that is. So if it’s personal development, so you want to focus on the message, and that’s what I did in which led my book going to international best seller in a very short period of time, but it was also promoting the book ahead of time, before it actually came out.

So it’s not that you wait for the book come out, you begin to promote the concept in the message ahead of time, and kind of just dripping information. So people can get really excited when it actually comes out to buy. 07:03 So did you build a list before your book came out, then?

Yeah, I also, in addition to social media, I also use email for my email list. You know, I also strategically placed the content in certain groups and areas where I know there would be people that could benefit from this message. And, you know, again, if you wanted to go a step further, I mean, you can, you can create funnels, you know, different ways to get people to, you know, to reach your audience, to also promote your book, I didn’t take that route, because I went the organic way, because I felt with what my message, I felt that I wanted to keep it very authentic, where it came just for me that I wasn’t using marketing funnels, to, to attract, but you did not have to say that you shouldn’t do that should you absolutely should expense on what your goal is.

So again, there’s always going to be an objective or main goal behind the book itself. It’s not the book you could have, you could be promoting your workshops, you could be promoting your coaching, there’s many things that could go behind the book itself. So it really, you really want to know what what the overall goal is, before you start implementing a marketing strategy behind it.

Bonnie: And, and that’s really true. And I think probably one of the things that people miss out on is, they get all excited, they write their book, they’ve got their book, it’s published on Amazon, and it just sits there just sits there, because people are gonna find it, because they don’t put marketing as part of their plan in terms of the book.

So it’s like, get the book done, get the book done, get the book done. Haha, it’s done. Now, nobody wants to buy my book. Well, it’s not that nobody wants to buy your book. It’s nobody knows it’s there. Right?

Be Proactive, Not Passive

Chris: Exactly. I mean, like I said, if you, if you’ve written something that’s very common, and there’s a lot of books about that, they’re gonna see those books. And you know, you have to take you got to be proactive you can’t rely upon if you even if you have a publisher, or somebody who maybe had a hybrid publisher, you can expect that they’re going to be doing the legwork for you, you have to do the work, you’ve got to figure out again, what your ultimate goal is your objective for this book, including everything else behind it, and to look for the channels that are going to best position it to that audience.

So again, you want to you definitely want to be proactive and do that upfront, you know, anywhere from six months, or three months before the book comes out to kind of start prepping people and preparing them. What’s what when it comes out to buy it. And so that’s so important.

09:30 And I know that you’re a networker, do you use a lot of influencers to help promote your book? I do. I mean, I am an influencer. I also have a radio show that that’s on the influencer channel versus voice America. But yes, absolutely. Because these are people that are gonna provide credibility.

In addition to these are people that other people look up to. So when they validate your book and say, You know what a great book it is and how it’s helped. That’s going to get off to their audience. So it’s a great way to leverage it through other people.

Well, as long as you’re doing the same for them, because that’s really what it’s about what networks is about is finding those people where your beliefs and values and your objectives are very similar. You feel good about those people. So you’re giving as well as taking simultaneously. So I think it’s a great way to find the right people that you feel really good about that you feel yet you want to associate your book around.

And absolutely take advantage of leveraging book through them as you would do for them. 10:27 Great. So Chris, do you have any other books in the works? Are we looking forward to something new here soon? Yeah, I do have we, I just started a nonprofit called empowered fathers in action.

So this is going to be aimed at providing solutions to eradicate the problems with the Father Son bonding process. And we’ve also partnered with parent meet up and mommy master. So we’re gonna be looking to provide curriculum in the school systems, as well as community centers, throughout corporations, even even law enforcement, where we want to provide curriculum that are going to help parents and children to improve upon their communication, to learn how to empower and be the example of the right habits and disciplines to show children, we’re going to teach them leadership.

So we want to be able to have these kids to be able to learn these things early. So as they go into adulthood, they could start off on the right foot, that we don’t have to undo the damage later. And we find that a lot of times where this dysfunction takes place, it leads to a lot of people that don’t know what to do, they kind of just shoot from the hip, they kind of drift through life.

And then it can be extreme, you know, in cases where you know, people, you know, especially when there’s no father present, men that have gone to prison, if you look in prisons, that a lot of times these, these men have had no connections with their father, or their serial killers, or school shootings, bullying, whatever the case, we want to undo that.

So the book, the next book that’s going to come out is going to speak to that. And I’ll be co authoring that with another gentleman named Joseph Cohen, who wrote, right father writes son, a book about the journey of the Father Son bonding process, and providing, you know, examples of real life, what they did what other fathers and sons can model their relationships after.

So that would be the next book. And I do have another book that I’m looking to maybe put out maybe sometime next year as well, if not, will be the year after that will relate to what sustainable successes, and then talk about the different types of habits and disciplines that will that are necessary to achieve sustainable success, whatever that means to you.

12:42 Oh, I’m looking forward to that. That’s an amazing project. Chris, I am very impressed. And I’m sure you’re in the process right now of gathering those influencers that can help move that forward. Absolutely. We are looking at different people that especially that are dads, in this case, you know, so we’ll be looking at, you know, athletes, because a lot of times boys can identify with athletes, we’ll be looking at celebrities as well.

So I know, you know, when I attended city gala summit last, or actually this year, was this March, early March of this year, you know, Ashton Kushner was one of the speakers now he is someone who is a father, very active in the fall, you know, the parenting process.

So somebody like that could be a good spokesperson. And so we want role models that people can look at and say, Well, hey, I know you as a celebrity, but I really want to know you even more as what you really do behind the scenes and making a difference in the world.

And so we really want to, you know, kind of leverage those types of people that are committed to this process to get that that message out to parents, you know, globally, so we can start solving problems rather than managing problems. 13:53 That’s awesome. So for those who are interested in your project, and would potentially like to get involved, how do they contact you?

So I mean, for the nonprofit for the Empowered fathers are still the father power fathers in action, our website will be launching very soon, it’s going to be WWW dot E, F, A movement.org. So that’s E, F, A movement.org. And then for anything personal with people, I work with individuals, groups, companies, that would be Christopher CHR is so Christopher salem.com.

14:31 Cool. That’s awesome. Thank you so much. So if there was one thing that you could advise some now you know, I deal with fiction and nonfiction, obviously, you’re not considered doing a fiction book. You know, it’s crossed my mind it made it I think it’d be something that I would say that I’m going to be looking to once I’m able to have these, the nonprofit and my other business kind of where we got it to where we You want to be?

And and then from there, I want to kind of look at fiction because I think even though the fiction, I’m going to have some messages are going to apply to a lot of things I do now. But it’ll be done more in a story format, like where it’s could be, could be a drama could be, you know, something mystery, those types of things.

So it’s something that is on my mind that could come out in the next five or 10 years. Perfect. 15:24 So do you have some tips of something you discovered in your writing process that really helped you stay on task and get the job done? Well, again, it’s always just scheduling, you know, putting it down on paper and following your schedule for Batum.

Every day unless, you know, some kind of life changing event takes place. But, but again, you got to be very, you’ve got to have discipline. And so because I’ve been practicing discipline, with my organizational scheduling and all that for many years, I’m able to be focused in that moment.

So it’s a key of getting to writing it down. And then when, when you when that time comes up, that you are committed during that time to do whatever you can to write and put something down on paper. Don’t try to overthink, don’t try to overanalyze, just write from the heart, you can always go back and change it and correct it later.

Just get the message, the message is most important. Get it on paper. Perfect. 16:20 Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Chris. I really appreciate it. I always love getting an opportunity to talk with you. You have also you have a Facebook page, you want to tell us about your Facebook page.

Sure. I mean, I have a personal page, just Chris Salem, you can find me there. I also have my public figure page, Christopher Salem. So it’s my full name. You can also find me there we have great content on both pages. My job is to always put up stuff that helps people on a daily basis.

So feel free to come by make my personal pages filled up, but you can follow me there. But the best the public page you can follow as well. We have great content every day that will at least help you in some way in your daily life and your sustainable success.

And sustainable success as well. We that’s our it’s called sustainable success. 2017 That’s the Facebook page for the radio show, which is out every Thursday at 12 noon, East Coast time. 9am Pacific Standard Time. You could also find it on the voice America influencers channel at voice america.com

Bonnie: Awesome. Awesome. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Have a fabulous day.

Chris: Thank you so much for having me. 17:33 All right, and all of our watchers viewers today. I just want you to know that Chris is very open for receiving contacts and questions about the things that he’s doing. He’s a really nice guy to hang out with on his Facebook page.

There’s always something amazing and interesting there. So we’ll see you next time. We’ve got another really great interview coming up with a fiction author that does amazing fantasy so we’ll take take care. Don’t forget to like subscribe and comment down below. Thanks a lot.

Quotable moments

Frequently asked questions

Who is Chris Salem?

An award-winning author, life and business strategist, world-class speaker, and radio host. He works with entrepreneurs, business leaders, and sales professionals to resolve the limiting beliefs that hold them back from sustainable success, treating life and business as one system.

How did a speaker become an author?

Chris classifies himself as a speaker first. He took the material he knows best from speaking and put it on paper, writing in pockets of time and not letting the fear of not being a great writer stop him, because, he argues, the message matters more than the prose.

What is his approach to marketing a book?

Promote the message and outcomes, not just the book, and start three to six months before launch. He built international-bestseller momentum organically through social media and email, placing content where the right audience would find it, and leveraging influencers who lend credibility.

What is Empowered Fathers in Action?

A nonprofit Chris founded to address the father-son bonding process, aiming to bring curriculum into schools, community centers, and beyond. His next book, co-authored with Joseph Cohen, supports that mission.