3 secrets
2 links
1 quote

September 2026 My team says these need a format upgrade. Let me know what you think! This week on the pod, we had Mark Wolynn talking about how he sold 3 million copies of It Didn’t Start With You. He left us with so many book-marketing gems that it was hard to pick just 3… 3 | Book-marketing secrets 1. “I wrote the book as a manual for my students” “I lived and breathed and sat in the ditches with this material.” Time and time again, this is what I hear from top selling self-help…

September 2026 My team says these need a format upgrade. Let me know what you think! This week on the pod, we had Mark Wolynn talking about how he sold 3 million copies of It Didn’t Start With You. He left us with so many book-marketing gems that it was hard to pick just 3… 3 | Book-marketing secrets 1. “I wrote the book as a manual for my students” “I lived and breathed and sat in the ditches with this material.” Time and time again, this is what I hear from top selling self-help…

Reader,little ShelfLife team co-working in San Diego today 🙂 Left to Right: Founding engineer Reed Kellett, Director of Author Success Steve Sarner, and me! 3 Secrets1. Your book may be eligible for an award. Even if it was published years ago. Everyone and their mom is now a “bestselling author.” Not everyone has award-type accolades for their book There are more than 10,000 quality book awards given to English-language books every year. More than 2,000 of those awards don’t care when your…

Reader, I guess those communal library boxes where people can pick up or leave a book do work… no idea how it got there other than as the result of getting almost 5,000 copies into the wild. “stumbled upon this at a park in Ohio…drop box” 3 Secrets1. Goodreads Giveaways continue to be one of the cheapest ways to seed copies right now to real people. Like clockwork, we’ve been running a standard ebook giveaway every 2 weeks – 200 free ebooks given away every month. At first, I was…

Reader, each year I might be lucky enough to have a top 10 life moment… this past week included at least 3 of the top 10 moments of my entire life. That’s because last week our Chief Marketing Scientist, Laura Russom, and I traveled to Franklin, TN to present about Amazon Ads to many of our lifelong heroes. The requirement to be in that room is to have sold over a million copies of your books. We’re pretty happy just to be at around 4,000 for Before The Bestseller. That said, we HAVE sold…

Reader,Just 3 secrets today 🙂 3 Secrets 1. Just make the ask already! A BIG thank you to world-renowned violinist and newsletter reader Anthea Kreston for sharing her story with me. After mentioning to me that she’d toured with Yo-Yo Ma, I asked her if it was worth asking him for a blurb. She wrote back that she wasn’t sure he’d go for it, but that she’d send him a galley and make the ask anyway. “I took your advice and reached out to Yo-Yo and he gave me a terrific quote for the cover!…

Reader,every year a group of friends gets together on Garbage Beach (the locals call it that to keep people away) in San Diego to play a day-long version of the TV show Survivor. Garbage Beach, San Diego If you don’t know the show, feel free to skip to the secrets. Well, 28 people started at 11 on Saturday morning. 12 hours of puzzles, physical endeavors, and complex social schemes later, I had, for the first time ever, made it to the final 3. For those who know the show, it all comes down to…

Reader,It’s summertime! Let’s make this quick so we can all go hit the beach 🙂 3 Secrets1. Bestselling non-fiction authors read more fiction What makes people keep reading is a good story. Fiction writers are the best storytellers in the world. They know how to start a scene you can’t stop reading and keep you excited all the way to the end. When you read their books, you learn their tricks. Then you can use those same tricks to make your true stories just as fun to read. Now more important…

Reader,Apparently y’all didn’t hate last week’s rant. I’ve never heard from so many readers in one week – thank you! I loved every response I got. Based on what I’m personally seeing in the industry, I’m thinking of ranting about whether AI will kill books or not in an upcoming newsletter. Let me know if you’d like that? 3 Secrets1. What AI doesn’t do well (and can’t replace) Stories to teach. Think about a recent memory of yours. Was it something dull and mundane? Or was there something…

Reader, I’m currently on a flight from San Diego, CA to Leesburg, VA to celebrate my adorable niece’s one-year birthday. Happy birthday Elouise 🙂 I just woke up from a quick nap…. (don’t tell my team as I told them I’d be working the whole flight but there’s something about an airplane seat that puts me out before we’re even in the sky) and for some reason the following (hopefully useful) rant popped into my head which I’m going to share with you now. It’s a rant the summarizes the most…

Reader, Today, we’re focusing on the relationship side of being an author. 3 Secrets 1. The Giving Hour The two biggest sales days for Before The Bestseller (so far) came from 2 book marketing influencers endorsing my book in their newsletters (Ricardo Fayet, and Dave Chesson). 300 sales in one day. $0 in ad spend, $0 admin fees paid, $0 in any type of payment to either of them… In fact I made money that day. Yes, no money was exchanged to make it happen… It was paid for with 5 years of…

Reader, Any other serious Catan players out there? A quick shot of how I spent my Saturday with my good friends Kate and Jonathan. 3 Secrets1. Let’s get real about Editorial Reviews For those that are newer to the publishing world, here’s a secret (is it really a secret?): most editorial reviews are written by the author of the book being reviewed. We don’t have to pretend that’s not what’s happening. An author reaches out to a notable friend or colleague and asks for a review. The bigger the…