Melanie Herschorn: Book Writing and Publishing for Branding and Growth

In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Melanie Herschorn discuss:

• Book writing for lawyers
• Challenges in book publishing
• Books as marketing tools
• Role of technology and AI in publishing

Key Takeaways:

• Lawyers can streamline book creation by repurposing existing content instead of writing new material daily.
• Carefully vet publishers to avoid rights loss or financial exploitation by selecting those with transparency and industry expertise.
• Successful book marketing involves pre-launch planning, continual promotion, and leveraging various channels like media and podcasts.
• AI can assist with editing and formatting but should not be heavily relied upon for writing due to potential quality and copyright issues.

“You just want to remember that it isn’t about book sales. It’s really about leveraging the book for client retention, client acquisition, and visibility opportunities.” —  Melanie Herschorn

Read more from Steve at Above the Law: AboveTheLaw.com/tag/Steve-Fretzin/

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Episode References:

The Jamie Kern Lima Show: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-jamie-kern-lima-show/id1728723635

About Melanie Herschorn: Melanie Herschorn is dedicated to helping you step into the spotlight as an authority. As a publisher and book marketing expert for attorneys and business owners worldwide, she empowers authors to share their message with the world while leveraging their book for impact, influence, and income. With over 20 years of experience as a celebrity publicist, award-winning journalist in radio, print, and TV, as well as a clothing designer and entrepreneur, Melanie is uniquely positioned to support authors in becoming thought leaders and making a significant impact with their books. Her latest book, Make a Big Impact with Your Book, is now available.

Transform your expertise into a powerful book—download The Ultimate Publishing Guide now: https://yourbigimpactbook.info/attorneyguide

Connect with Melanie Herschorn:  

Website: https://vipbookmarketing.com/

Books: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Melanie-Herschorn/author/B09X9HQXLT

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melanie-herschorn/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/melherschorn

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bigimpactbooks/

Connect with Steve Fretzin:

LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin

Twitter: @stevefretzin

Instagram: @fretzinsteve

Facebook: Fretzin, Inc.

Website: Fretzin.com

Email: Steve@Fretzin.com

Book: Legal Business Development Isn’t Rocket Science and more!

YouTube: Steve Fretzin

Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911

Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You’re the expert. Your podcast will prove it.

FULL TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] Steve Fretzin: Hey everybody, before we get to the show, I just want to share that I’m now writing for Above the Law. If you enjoy this podcast, you might also enjoy my monthly columns. You can go to Above the Law and type my name into the magnifying glass in the top right corner to read my latest articles. Thanks and enjoy the show.

[00:00:21] Narrator: You’re listening to be that lawyer life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice Each episode your host author and lawyer coach steve Fretzin We’ll take a deeper dive helping you grow your law practice in less time with greater results Now here’s your host steve Fretzin 

[00:00:42] Steve Fretzin: Hey everybody, it’s steve Fretzin and welcome back to the be that lawyer with Fretzin podcast.

[00:00:47] Steve Fretzin: We are ready to rock and roll today You I don’t know. We’ve got like 425 shows we’ve done at this point. Melanie, what do you think about that? It’s not a bad, not a bad start. 

[00:00:57] Melanie Herschorn: That is a fantastic start. It’s all about the journey, right? Anyway, so 

[00:01:01] Steve Fretzin: yeah, it’s all about the journey and we are making a journey of it.

[00:01:03] Steve Fretzin: And you guys all know that the, the goal of the show is to help you live your best lawyer’s life to be that lawyer. And really it involves looking at all the different ways that you can develop business. It’s all the different ways you can. Find time and make time to live your best lawyer life and you know, I’ve I’ve written a number of books I’ve written four and the fifth one is in the works and I’m announcing that I think for the first time here I’ve got a whole plan of how I’m gonna do this and Maybe I’ll get into that a little bit later because it’s an interesting and unique angle that I have but that being said Melanie you are here today and we’ve got a lot to cover and we’re gonna start as we’d like to do with our quote of the show Jack Canfield he is Just an amazing writer one of the first books i read on just marketing and just like how to get it going is was jack canfield and his quote is everything you want is on the other side of fear and that is so true like i’m afraid of roller coasters but then i go on one and then i go on two and all of a sudden i want to go on them all and that could be writing a book that could be launching a business so talk to us about why you love that quote and welcome to the show.

[00:02:11] Melanie Herschorn: Thank 

[00:02:11] Steve Fretzin: you. 

[00:02:11] Melanie Herschorn: Everything I want is on the other side of fear. Sometimes fear shows up as imposter syndrome. Sometimes fear shows up as, I don’t think I can actually do that. But if I push through, I do it and I’m happy that I did. But 

[00:02:27] Steve Fretzin: I do love roller coasters. Can I tell you where that hasn’t worked out for me?

[00:02:31] Steve Fretzin: The other side of fear. It’s really about not my own fear, but my wife’s fear. So we used to go on these adventure vacations. Like we’d go to Hawaii, not to, for an adventure, but you know, whatever. And we’d be like, okay, now we’re going to go ride a bicycle down a volcano. And sure enough, five minutes in someone goes off the side.

[00:02:49] Steve Fretzin: And my wife’s like, I’m done. And then we did it again in Colorado on snowmobiles. And sure enough, someone in the group in front of us went over the side. My wife’s like, can I get off this thing? So, she has the fear, I work her through it, and then someone like, gets hurt, and then it blows up in my face that I’m this, this tyrant who’s doing this.

[00:03:06] Steve Fretzin: Making her do things she doesn’t want to do. There’s a little personal information there about my life as a married man. But, Melanie Hirshhorn, you are the founder and publisher of Big M Pet Books. You’ve worked with tons of lawyers on their books, and we’re going to get into the weeds about it. But let’s get into your background a little bit about how you got into marketing and publishing and helping lawyers write and publish books.

[00:03:28] Melanie Herschorn: Well, I would love to tell you it was linear, but it was totally circuitous. I’ll take you super fast because I really want to get into the meat of today’s show. Of course, I started out in celebrity PR and then I got a master’s in journalism and I worked as a journalist on the radio and then in newspapers.

[00:03:47] Melanie Herschorn: Then I moved across the country and decided that I had to design and manufacture breastfeeding clothing. Which is 

[00:03:53] Steve Fretzin: sort of a left turn. I wasn’t expecting that, but all right. 

[00:03:56] Melanie Herschorn: I know, but I did that, and I sold my clothes on Nordstrom. com and on Amazon and boutiques nationwide. And then I hired somebody to help me with my marketing, and that was the beginning of the end of my business.

[00:04:08] Melanie Herschorn: Also the beginning and the end of my self esteem. So it was a very toxic relationship and I learned so much about marketing and so much about myself and also about what I can do to support people in business and what I don’t like. So closed the business after a bit, about a year, I’d been doing it for about eight years.

[00:04:29] Melanie Herschorn: And then I pivoted to helping people with their marketing. And publishers and book marketers kind of go together. And I realized that I could really help authors from start to finish instead of just coming with the marketing piece at the end. What if I helped them write, publish and market the book? So it really does something for their business.

[00:04:51] Melanie Herschorn: And for me, attorneys was such a natural niche. Because I’ve always secretly wanted to be an attorney and then my I had a family member go through a really messy divorce and I realized that everything I’d been watching on television was not actually reality. And, and that, you know, the, the bad guy doesn’t always, doesn’t always have to pay.

[00:05:23] Melanie Herschorn: And I realized, you know, there’s just attorneys are gatekeepers to information that we lay people don’t have. And I can help them leverage that information to grow their brands. 

[00:05:34] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Have you ever done any voice over work? Your voice is very easy to listen to. I was going to say like a professional voice.

[00:05:40] Melanie Herschorn: Yes, 

[00:05:40] Steve Fretzin: we were talking earlier about voices like podcasts where the voices are really easy. Yeah. Like draining, you can’t listen to them very long because, but I think you’ve got, you’ve definitely have a, a voice that that would, I could listen, I could listen to a book on tape with, with your voice.

[00:05:53] Steve Fretzin: And I don’t say that very, I don’t give out compliments very easily, but I, in this case, there you go. Well well, very cool. So I know, you know, why attorneys don’t write books from my perspective, because I’m the one in business development with them in the trenches and, and. It seems like they they want to do it but then they start looking at the bill while they start looking at all their you know they’re on a board they’re doing this they’re doing their legs they’re running in a hundred different directions and then say hey let’s just take a book and plop it on top of your head and get on that and they’re like man that’s not gonna happen.

[00:06:25] Steve Fretzin: So what’s, is that what you’re seeing? What, what’s the reason that, that lawyers struggle to, to, to knock out a book when they may have a tremendous amount to share? 

[00:06:33] Melanie Herschorn: I agree with that. I mean, if I was in that position, I too would feel like my hair was on fire and I would not be able to add one more thing into my life.

[00:06:44] Melanie Herschorn: So for me, I think it’s a bit of a mindset shift that has to take place because you really can write a book in 30 minutes a day. Okay. It doesn’t have to take all of your life and all of your brainpower to do chances are you probably have a lot of it actually written. You just don’t even realize it.

[00:07:04] Melanie Herschorn: And then there’s that other piece of, you know, there’s a lot of predatory behavior in the publishing industry. Because the playing field is leveled, people can publish their own books. They don’t have to wait for the big five to pluck them out of obscurity. And so there are a lot of people that want to take money.

[00:07:23] Melanie Herschorn: And unfortunately, I’ve talked to a number of attorneys who said, you know, I paid all this money and nothing happened. And so knowing my background of how I paid a lot of money and nothing happened, I would never do that. Haha. 

[00:07:38] Steve Fretzin: Personal experience. And And then what that means when things don’t go right, but I think that is probably the biggest concern.

[00:07:46] Steve Fretzin: I wouldn’t say the challenge to writing it, but I would say the biggest concern is that I spend all this time writing it and then it just sits on a shelf or now I’ve got a hundred books in my garage or whatever the situation is. But the advantage is like, there’s never been an easier time to write a book, whether that’s getting assistance from someone like you, self publishing, and not having to wait for those big five.

[00:08:06] Steve Fretzin: But if you’re gonna do a book, like, do it now versus 20 years ago, for sure. 

[00:08:11] Melanie Herschorn: Oh, absolutely. Because we didn’t have all this online marketing available to us 20 years ago. I mean, Instagram didn’t exist for goodness sake. And so there are so many things that you can do with your book to grow your brand. You just want to remember that it isn’t about book sales.

[00:08:28] Melanie Herschorn: And I think people get stuck on that. It’s like, how am I going to sell a book? You know, I remember talking to somebody about an author who only published 13 copies of her book. She sent them to all the prospective clients that she wanted to reach, and she got business. And that’s really what it’s about.

[00:08:50] Melanie Herschorn: It’s really about leveraging the book for, you know, client retention, client acquisition, visibility opportunities, and, you know, speaking, if that’s something that you want to do, speaking on stages or getting media opportunities, those kinds of things. Are a natural outgrowth of publishing a book when you have a plan in place.

[00:09:13] Steve Fretzin: Okay, so there’s, there’s a lot of ways to, to work it. The question I want to go back to is, all right, so you’re, you’ve got an attorney that has. You know, has the book in the head and there’s a lot of different reasons why publishing that book would make sense. But when you say, you know, 30 minutes a day, they’re like, where am I going to find 30 minutes a day?

[00:09:32] Steve Fretzin: What are the various ways people can create a book without it being 30 minutes a day or without it being intensive? Maybe that’s, you know, again, I’m not going to give you the answers, you get the answers, but like you get, but you get where I’m coming from. 

[00:09:46] Melanie Herschorn: Well, it all starts with an outline. Yeah. I think that that’s the biggest piece of that.

[00:09:51] Melanie Herschorn: If you just go in like a deer in headlights, where do you even begin? Right. And it’s that whole, how do you eat an elephant? Although I wish they would use a different So it’s, it’s having that broad outline that, that I, I will take somebody through, well, first of all, why are you writing a book? Because honestly, like I, Steve, everybody should not write a book.

[00:10:16] Melanie Herschorn: I’m not here to say you have to write a book. You know, if it doesn’t gel with you, then, then don’t do it. But if it’s been, you know, ever crossed your mind or people are saying to you. You know, you should really write a book. Then let’s talk about that. So you come up with an outline and I’m going to help with that piece because it’s really hard to see the label from inside the bottle.

[00:10:40] Melanie Herschorn: And you might have all these ideas, but you don’t know what’s going to make it a good book. And then once you have an outline, it is so much easier to log in the information because Lord knows you’ve been saying it to potential clients 

[00:10:54] Steve Fretzin: for years. And the thing I would add is that, and I did this with my most recent book, The Legal Business Developmentism Rocket Science, and I don’t publicize this much, but it’s eight years of my article writing for the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin, right?

[00:11:10] Steve Fretzin: I had 51 articles that I had written. And guess what that’s a book right i just had to take them and categorize them so it it flowed and make sense but every articles a quality article each one’s gonna give you two three takeaways on. I’m on legal business development marketing networking you know cross marketing whatever it might be.

[00:11:31] Steve Fretzin: And so I didn’t have to literally sit down and write a book. I wrote it over time, but it’s the idea of repurposing content that you already have that attracted me to that book and, and being able to create it. And, and, and, you know, and it’s been great. And by the way, it’s available on Amazon, everybody.

[00:11:46] Steve Fretzin: So there you have it. But what are some other interesting ways that you’ve seen people create books where they, where they have a limited amount of time? Well, if there’s a podcast that 

[00:11:55] Melanie Herschorn: you are, that you host or you co host, you can take a lot of that content and repurpose it. Articles are great. Blog posts are great.

[00:12:04] Melanie Herschorn: Social media posts are great. Even your sales script, if you have one, can be repurposed to be part of a book because you’re sharing the same things. Over and over again. This is the low hanging fruit that works in a book really beautifully. 

[00:12:22] Steve Fretzin: The other thing I was thinking is interviews. So let’s say that you’re a busy lawyer, but you can do a third, you know, how much can be, can be laid down in a 30 minute interview, maybe once a week or once every other week where you get interviewed and they, you answer the top, top questions that you want to be placed in the book.

[00:12:40] Steve Fretzin: Then the editor, the writer, whomever, the co whatever, the ghost writer can take your words and what you’re saying and put that into a usable format. I, I like that option as well because sometimes saying things and like you interviewing me and me giving you great ideas and you’re taking that and putting it, it’s still my words, it’s still my angle, but I’m not sitting and writing it and physically typing it out, which is maybe something that’s holding someone back.

[00:13:03] Melanie Herschorn: Absolutely. And that’s why we partner with ghost writers because those people who really say, you know, I’m willing to pay the ghostwriter, which can go anywhere from, you know, 15, 000 to 60, 000 and up. If that’s, you know, within your budget and that’s something that you want to do, then I say absolutely go for it.

[00:13:22] Melanie Herschorn: Some people say, well, you know, I really want it to be mine. And if there’s a ghostwriter, then it doesn’t feel like mine. And that’s fine. But ultimately as long as you’re not using a I 

[00:13:33] Steve Fretzin: it’s your so what’s the downside of a I let’s say I have a conversation I have from like say my one of my training classes okay and I want to use that for an article or for a book or take multiple classes and I run that through a I then what’s the downside of that.

[00:13:51] Steve Fretzin: Well, that’s not the same thing as asking AI to write the book. Oh, I see what you’re saying. It’s like, hey, AI, write a book for me. Here’s what I can do. I’m in divorce and just want to get the book. No, okay, I see what you’re saying. So it’s okay to have AI clean up something that you’ve written or that you’ve said, but not, like, to tell AI to actually write the book for you and just pull, because it’s all it’s going to do is take other people’s content.

[00:14:12] Steve Fretzin: That you don’t have the rights to and steal it. And then you’re going to basically be in trouble. 

[00:14:16] Melanie Herschorn: Yes, you will be in trouble. I think you can have max 10 percent of the content can be AI. Also, there’s this really fun scam going on right now, which I’ll share. Audiobooks are a wonderful piece to not only let people, a different audience know about your book, but also to, you know, speak your book and add credibility and all this fun stuff.

[00:14:37] Melanie Herschorn: And there are companies that say, Oh, you only have to spend 30 minutes with us. We’ll record your voice and then use what we’ve recorded to have AI regenerate your entire book. And that doesn’t really, and they’ll say, you know, here’s tens of thousands of dollars and we’ll do it for you. I would caution you against that because again, It’s AI and it’s not your actual 

[00:15:02] Steve Fretzin: voice.

[00:15:03] Steve Fretzin: Okay, but it’s not a scam in the sense of like they’re taking your money and not giving you something. They are doing it. It’s just not going to come out very good. So it’s, it’s skammish in that way. 

[00:15:11] Melanie Herschorn: It’s skammish in that you can’t actually sell that book on the platforms where you would want to sell it.

[00:15:16] Melanie Herschorn: I won’t 

[00:15:17] Steve Fretzin: allow you to sell AI generated voice on a platform for audiobooks. I see. So it’s 

[00:15:21] Melanie Herschorn: a scam in that you’ll have a, your voice sort of, and you won’t be able to sell it. So that is not. An audio book, an audio book is done either on zoom or in person in a studio. 

[00:15:35] Steve Fretzin: Okay. Got it. Got it. Got it. Ready to take your law firm from good to goat.

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[00:16:58] Steve Fretzin: Man, I thought I was a good marketer, but maybe not. Lawyers have been approaching me asking, what’s the Rainmakers Roundtable? Well, I tell them this is a special place created exclusively for rainmaking lawyers to continue their journey of prosperity. Our program is unique as every member has A significant book of business and is motivated to grow it year after year.

[00:17:18] Steve Fretzin: Where else does this exist? If you’re a managing partner, who’s looking to get off your lonely Island and talk shop with America’s top rainmakers, please go to my website, Fretzin. com and apply for membership today. So one of the things that I brought up earlier, and I want to come back to is. It’s one thing to take the time to write a book and you put out something really great and maybe it’s not about selling a million copies, but let’s say there’s some really good content in there.

[00:17:45] Steve Fretzin: It would help your audience with a problem, right? So let’s say it’s a, it’s a book on divorce law and I don’t know why we’re picking on divorce because you brought it up earlier, probably, but the but it’s, it’s basically telling lay people, you know, how to position themselves to best handle a divorce and, and, you know, part of it’s suggesting get a lawyer or whatever, but that, that, attorney wants them, hey, you know what?

[00:18:07] Steve Fretzin: I read your book on divorce. I want you. So, but, but how do they market it? Like, how do they actually get the book out to the people that could actually use it for their own good? Mm. Okay. 

[00:18:18] Melanie Herschorn: So leveraging other people’s audiences is a great way to do that. Okay. Talking on podcasts and sharing about the book, but not necessarily podcasts about divorce.

[00:18:29] Melanie Herschorn: Maybe it’s podcasts about relationships and somebody who’s contemplating divorce, but they haven’t gotten there yet. They would hear you and they would hear about your book and then they say, okay, well now I’m ready and I’m, I’m going to hire you. So being on, on the news, you know, your local news, they are always looking for experts.

[00:18:51] Melanie Herschorn: I believe it’s May 1st is an important day in law. I remember writing a whole blog post about that. And so maybe you can tie a national day. Maybe it’s national divorce day. I don’t know what day that is. Still married. So so maybe national divorce day you, you have a pitch and you say, you know, I wrote a book about divorce.

[00:19:09] Melanie Herschorn: I’d love to come on and talk about the three things that, you know, people going through a divorce really don’t know. And you as a, an author expert are going to get chosen by the media over somebody without a book. 

[00:19:24] Steve Fretzin: It’s just, it’s, yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s instant credibility. I have to tell you i’ve i did try working with the publisher once it was a bit of a disaster and i ended up taking the book back from them because they didn’t market it at all and i was very disappointed because that you know they were taking a percentage for what you know basically they typed it out and and threw it into a you know you right exactly so.

[00:19:47] Steve Fretzin: Are people asking who your publisher is? Does it matter if it’s through a main publisher or on your own? Are people even caring about that at all? 

[00:19:54] Melanie Herschorn: No, people don’t care anymore. The stigma of vanity publishing when, when I was a kid, that’s gone. That’s gone. People, I mean, think about what you, how YouTube changed society.

[00:20:08] Melanie Herschorn: People uploaded videos of themselves singing in a car and end up with multi million dollar record deals. Yeah. So it doesn’t matter how you publish. Also, if your book is so sensational, a traditional publisher might come to you and say, you know what? We want to publish this for you. Okay. But the kind of publishing that I do is independent publishing.

[00:20:30] Melanie Herschorn: So the client, the attorney, the writer. They have all the rights, they, they maintain everything. I am the, the facilitator, but it is yours. You have complete creative control. You get all the royalties. It is your IP. I’m just here to help you take it and make it something really worthwhile for your 

[00:20:53] Steve Fretzin: business.

[00:20:54] Steve Fretzin: Do you engage in online marketing? So let’s say, you know, through was a KDP and Amazon and, and, and Google to try to help people post ads, to get traction on books in addition to podcasting and other ways, you know, you know, PR works. 

[00:21:12] Melanie Herschorn: Okay. What I’m going to do to you right now is I’m going to go back and I’m going to explain the letters that you just threw out there because I have a feeling people might not know what we’re talking about.

[00:21:22] Melanie Herschorn: Okay. So KDP is Kindle direct publishing. So you can publish your book on Kindle, which will make it a Kindle book. It’ll be on Amazon. There’s also another platform called Ingram spark. And when you publish your book to that, so we do both. When you publish your book to that. That’s where other bookstores can pull your book.

[00:21:42] Melanie Herschorn: Your book will be available on barnesandnoble. com and target. com and walmart. com. Okay, then there’s the whole ads piece. And here’s, I’m pulling off back the curtain. I have partners who do the ads piece that I recommend to clients. Here is when you want to do ads. You want to do ads when you have 50 reviews, at least of your book.

[00:22:12] Melanie Herschorn: You have sort of a machine built in terms of get it, you know, give your marketing foundation in place and. It’s worth your while because if you’re looking at this book as a way to, to build credibility to, to, you know, get more clients, you having personal outreach to prospective clients that you already know are, you know, warm leads, it’s going to have a much higher return rate.

[00:22:40] Melanie Herschorn: That if you are just paying for Amazon ads and hoping for the 

[00:22:45] Steve Fretzin: best or just selling books to just sell the books and you’re making, you know, 10 a book and you sell a hundred, great. You made, you know, the money there, but it’s not going to give you anywhere near the return on investment. It would, if you get new clients.

[00:22:57] Steve Fretzin: Right. Absolutely. 

[00:22:58] Melanie Herschorn: And so that’s how I always view the book. When we sit down to even prepare the outline, I’m looking way into the future and saying, what is the return you are going to get on this book? How are we going to create a book so that it’s going to market your business and grow your visibility and your expertise as opposed to you just being like, I’m an author now, which is not a bad thing to be, I’ll tell you, it’s, it’s really cool to be an author.

[00:23:24] Melanie Herschorn: My daughter was sitting there yesterday. She’s. He’s almost a teenager, and she’s going, it’s really 

[00:23:29] Steve Fretzin: cool that you wrote a book, mommy. Thanks. It is funny, my son could care less. He’s like, you know, how many of your friends are, you know, have parents that are authors and have podcasts and do all the stuff your dad does?

[00:23:41] Steve Fretzin: And he’d be like, Yeah. Yeah. I don’t care, you know, whatever he, he, he, he, he, he’ll figure it out later on if he ever gets into business that I actually did some good things, but as you know, right now, just taking him fishing into rock concert seems to be more interesting to, to him than than hearing about his old man.

[00:23:56] Steve Fretzin: Maybe if you write a book about Van Halen, I’ll change. Okay. I get some interviews lined up for that. So the other thing I want to ask you, you mentioned Ingram, is it Ingram Publishing? So Ingram Spark is the name of the platform. Yes. All right. And can you do that as well as Amazon and Kindle or can you just have to pick one side or the other?

[00:24:15] Steve Fretzin: No, it’s recommended, I recommend you do both. 

[00:24:17] Melanie Herschorn: Okay. Do both. Because then your book is in all the places on the interwebs that it can be available. Got it. Got it. Because a lot of people make a mistake where they’ll. Only published through Amazon and use I don’t want to get too much in the weeds, but they only use Amazon barcodes and things like that.

[00:24:35] Melanie Herschorn: And then they can’t sell elsewhere. So there’s, you know, one of the biggest things that people say to me is I don’t know what I don’t know. And then I say, I’m glad you’re here 

[00:24:46] Steve Fretzin: because I want to share the knowledge. Yeah. Well, that’s why we bring in experts for things that we’re not expert in. Right. So, I mean, I.

[00:24:53] Steve Fretzin: I had some work done on my home over the weekend to straighten out the level of my roof and yeah, I didn’t think that for a second that I was going to do it myself, right? I’m not a carpenter. I don’t know the first thing about jacking up, you know, a roof to adjust the post and all that and the guy did it in no time flat and, and it looks great.

[00:25:11] Steve Fretzin: So. You know, lawyers, I get it that you are very smart and I get it that you’re very successful in the law, but I think it’s also important to know, you know, where your time is best spent and to know your limitations and to be okay to outsource things or to learn new things through other people, you know, business development, marketing, books.

[00:25:30] Steve Fretzin: Podcasts, right? Like I, I, I don’t want to have to learn all the different ins and outs of, of editing and publishing podcasts. Right. I just want to hire someone that kicks ass at it. Let me do this with you and then hand it off. Like that’s, that’s the play everybody. It re it really is. And anyway, that’s me on a, on a pedestal, a soapbox, not a pedestal.

[00:25:51] Steve Fretzin: All right. Let’s maybe both. Okay. So here we go. So. What’s, what are the top, then, what are the, let’s wrap it up with, what are like the top two or three mistakes that lawyers make? When they do write a book, I think we’ve kind of covered them, but let’s just kind of give a recap on that. 

[00:26:08] Melanie Herschorn: Okay, so hiring the first shiny publisher that suggests that you work with them.

[00:26:14] Melanie Herschorn: Okay. I’ve seen big problems there, and there was one publisher that then shut their doors in the middle of the night and left people hanging, and that was very bad. 

[00:26:25] Steve Fretzin: Okay. 

[00:26:25] Melanie Herschorn: So, 

[00:26:26] Steve Fretzin: not doing your homework. Interview them, right? Interview them, maybe talk with their clients, maybe, like, think about, you know, how, how credible they are, okay?

[00:26:35] Steve Fretzin: Absolutely. 

[00:26:37] Melanie Herschorn: Not coming in with a, with an idea, you know, just saying, Oh yeah, I think I should write a book, but why I’m going to question you, why should you, and if there is a good reason that’s going to benefit your business, I’m going to say yes, go all the way. Yeah. And then I would say the third one is not doing the marketing.

[00:26:57] Melanie Herschorn: And that’s why what sets us at Big Impact Books apart from other publishers is that the marketing is built in, you know, I don’t say, okay, you’re, you know, your book’s published to have a great day. It’s not. Okay. Your book is published and we have a plan. We are sending out press releases to the media. We are getting you we’re working on getting you a bestseller campaign on Amazon so that your book can be a bestseller.

[00:27:24] Melanie Herschorn: We’re coming up with ways that you can get on podcasts, get on media opportunities, get on stages. So that you’re leveraging this book and making a difference with it for your business. 

[00:27:38] Steve Fretzin: Yeah, that’s, that’s so great. And and I love that you’re, that you’re in it to handle the beginning, middle and end of this, of this, you know, life cycle of, of writing and publishing and marketing a book.

[00:27:49] Steve Fretzin: And that’s, that’s, that’s, you know, worth its weight in gold for the folks who Who haven’t written a book, but are thinking about it that that’s really, that’s really what you want is someone that’s going to handle all the aspects, not just, hey, I’m going to help you produce a book and then hand it to you and say good luck to you, right?

[00:28:06] Steve Fretzin: There’s, there, that’s not the package you guys should want. Melody, let me ask you you had mentioned in your, in kind of the pre interview about your game changing podcast and it’s Jamie Kern Lima show, the Jamie Kern Lima show. So tell us, you know, what, what that’s about and why you love that show.

[00:28:24] Steve Fretzin: So 

[00:28:24] Melanie Herschorn: I had an opportunity to watch her speak live in person a couple of weeks ago. She is a powerhouse woman. She started a makeup brand in her apartment. And after years of hard work and really walking the walk and talking the talk, she sold it to L’Oreal for 1. 2 billion. And now she, and I mean, it’s amazing to hear how she’s so humble and, and her humility just shines through and she interviews others in the personal development space.

[00:29:00] Melanie Herschorn: And it’s just such an empowering podcast and I highly recommend it. 

[00:29:05] Steve Fretzin: That’s awesome. Check that out, everybody. And as we wrap up, I want to thank our wonderful sponsors, of course, PymCon. Last chance to sign up for that. So check that out, PymCon. And, of course, Get Staffed Up helping you to bring in those virtual assistants and getting things done so you don’t have to do it yourself.

[00:29:21] Steve Fretzin: You’re also Melanie, giving my audience something. I think we’re going to have it in the show notes. It’s some kind of an attorney guide, so can you just take a moment on that? 

[00:29:28] Melanie Herschorn: Absolutely. 

[00:29:29] Steve Fretzin: So 

[00:29:29] Melanie Herschorn: it’s a publishing guide for attorneys, and it takes you through all the things about writing a book, publishing a book, and marketing a book.

[00:29:37] Melanie Herschorn: So you can have a lot of information and make some great decisions for your own book. The link to grab it is, I just have to have it memorized here, yourbigimpactbookdoc. info. Slash attorney guide. That is a big 

[00:29:55] Steve Fretzin: mouthful. That’s going on. That’s going on the show notes though. So no, no stress Everybody just just scroll down But know that it’s in the show notes so that if you want to take advantage of you know The attorney guide to sort of figuring out the book the process melanie’s so kindly offered So thank you.

[00:30:11] Steve Fretzin: And if people want to get in touch with you directly to Evaluate you or to to meet with you to talk about a book. What what’s the best digits there? You 

[00:30:19] Melanie Herschorn: Oh it’s just meet Melanie dot VIP. That’s a link to my calendar and we can chat and outline a book for you. 

[00:30:26] Steve Fretzin: All right. Very cool. Very cool. Well, thank you so much.

[00:30:28] Steve Fretzin: This has been great. I mean, I’ve, I’ve interviewed a lot of book publishers for attorneys and I think you have a unique angle and and I think it’s well thought out and, and, you know, being someone that has published books for better or for worse, right. Made my mistakes along the way. I wish I had had you in my corner on that first one.

[00:30:45] Steve Fretzin: That’s for sure. So really good stuff. So thank you. And let’s let’s keep in touch because I think there’s a lot of a lot of value in us, you know, continuing it to, to discuss how we help attorneys. Absolutely. Thank you so much. Yeah, absolutely. My pleasure. And hey, everybody, hopefully you got a couple of good ideas.

[00:31:01] Steve Fretzin: I mean, it may not be for you this year, but if it is, you know, talk to Melanie. And if it’s something that you’ve really been thinking about, maybe just write out that write out that outline and get it together. And then, you know take Melanie up on her offer to meet with you and discuss it and And see if it’s something that, that makes sense for your business.

[00:31:16] Steve Fretzin: I think we all need to look at all the different avenues for marketing, branding, PR, and do one that’s gonna, that’s gonna really take us to the next level. So, that is the, the, the deal for today, everybody. Take care, everybody. Be safe, be well. We will talk again soon.

[00:31:34] Narrator: Thanks for listening to Be That Loyal, life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Visit Steve’s website, Fretzin. com, for additional information and to stay up to date on the Transcripts provided by Transcripts, LLC.