Exactly how I self-published my book, sold 180,000 copies, and nearly doubled my revenue

Exactly how I self-published my book, sold 180,000 copies, and nearly doubled my revenue

The Coaching Habit was published on February 29, 2016. (Leap Day! Why wouldn’t you take advantage of that?)

In the year since, it’s sold nearly 200,000 copies, including 8,000 ebooks in one week in May. It made the Wall Street Journal bestseller list “organically” (which is to say, accidentally). It received more than 500 reviews on Amazon, 450 of which are five-star. And it’s been the number one book in the business/coaching category for about 95 percent of the year.

More importantly, it’s also tripled the number of sales inquiries for my training company, Box of Crayons — we give busy managers the practical tools so they can coach in 10 minutes or less — and as a result, our revenue is up 82 percent from this time last year. All from one book.

So perhaps you’re considering writing a book yourself, or you’ve gone as far as to have a first draft in a digital drawer somewhere. We’ve all seen our marketing heroes grow a base of fans, then customers, then empires through “content marketing.” And the big kahuna in content marketing is the book. This is how you officially rise to “Thought Leader” status, it’s how you differentiate yourself from your competitors, you drive revenue, you launch your speaking career, you start hanging out with other cool authors. Easy enough, right?

As with most things involving your business, it’s a bit more complicated than it seems. Writing a book is a long, lonely, and oftentimes unsuccessful endeavor. My “instant success” was anything but. The Coaching Habit was the result of four years of floundering, rejection, and toil. So you don’t make my mistakes, allow me to share everything I used to vault my book from idea to bestseller (with a table of contents to skip to what you’d like to know).

Read 'Exactly how I self-published my book, sold 180,000 copies, and nearly doubled my revenue' on GrowthLab.


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ABOUT MICHAEL BUNGAY STANIER & BOX OF CRAYONS

Michael Bungay Stanier is the Senior Partner and Founder of Box of Crayons, a company that helps people and organizations do less Good Work and more Great Work. It's best known from its coaching programs that give busy managers the tools to coach in 10 minutes or less.

Download free chapters of Michael's latest book The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever here.

Already read it? Fantastic! If you felt so moved, an Amazon rating/review is always greatly appreciated.

Micheleina Charles-Hazelle

Award-winning teacher and helper sharing stories that teach kindness.

1 年

This is a brilliantly generous article. Thank you

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Scott Reid

Vice President, Global Learning Services

7 年

Congrats Michael! 5 stars indeed.

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Vanessa Judelman

Author. Leadership Coach. Executive Leadership Advisor. Leadership Trainer. President at Mosaic People Development

7 年

This is a brilliant article. Thanks so much for sharing. I am about to self publish my first book and I really appreciate that you have shared your best practices! HUGE! MERCI!

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Arupa Tesolin

CEO | Speaker | Author | Performance Transformation Leader

7 年

That's pretty cool Michael! I remember when I contacted you about your book being endorsed in Germany & you didnt even know about it. Hard work + surprises + success = Great Book. Selling 200k books in this day is more than many publishers can do. Thanks for sharing your experience.

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Thank you for sharing, very inspiring. And the book is absolutely fantastic, everybody should read "The Coaching Habit".

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