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It’s already the last week of Q1? Unbelievable.

We spent an extra long weekend with family and friends celebrating my parents 63rd anniversary. It was great being together, but 1500 miles of road trip kept me from writing, so instead, I am highlighting subscriber writing this week.

Before newsletters or podcasts or LinkedIn posts, books were the only way to present your content. They still represent one of the best ways to get your ideas out in to the world. Half of the new books each year are self-published removing one more obstacle to that book you’ve been ‘thinking’ about.

And they can lead to unexpected career portfolio additions.

What is your topic?

Let's get into it.

Comment below and let me know if we’re on the right track.

Table of Contents

• Pull to Eject

  • How to Succeed in Evil

  • Silence the Imposter: 7 Weapons to Silence Imposte …

  • 2% Chance: A Journey In Resilience, Recovery, And …

• Recommendations

• Visual Crapshoot

Pull to Eject

4 million new books are published every year. And with billions in annual book sales, getting your unique idea into print might be worth pursuit.

I haven’t written a book. This weekly newsletter cadence fits me so far. But we do have a lot of writers in our midst.

We have dozens of books written by Launch Key subscribers - and more that I know of in development. We have professors who’ve written textbooks and retired executives working on screen plays. We’ve written fiction and non-fiction, consulting advice, business insight, hard-to-believe true life and include many authors who have published multiple titles.

But we have a number of subscribers who have turned their ideas into books that have spawned late-career income-adjacent opportunities.

The following are just 3 examples of how you can turn a book into a new highlight of your own career portfolio.

How to Succeed in Evil

Patrick McLean was so tired of clients not taking consulting advice that he created a character (Edwin Windsor) who uses nothing more than his intelligence to help supervillains be more profitable and sensible about the business side of Evil. But his clients are too egomaniacal to listen!

The work showcased McLean’s talent so much that he turned it into a 7 book series. The Parsec-Award Winning How to Succeed in Evil series has sold over 10,000 copies, garnered 300+ positive reviews on Amazon and had over 53,000+ audiobook downloads.

And it led to more work for McLean.

An Amazon executive who laughed out loud while reading the book hired McLean to help their senior execs improve their own writing. And Microsoft gaming has him creating titles now.

Not bad for just blowing off steam because clients didn’t really listen. 😉 

Silence the Imposter: 7 Weapons to Silence Imposter Syndrome

Gary Frey wrote his book on Silencing the Imposter just to get it out of his system. And it sat unpublished until he learned from CEO’s and other business leaders that they also felt like imposters. When he told them about his 7 weapons, they pushed him to publish his book.

And that has turned into a number of speaking engagements - outside of his day job. But those in turn have generated additional clients for BGW. A great fit for all parties and a side hustle that Gary plans to do more of.

2% Chance: A Journey In Resilience, Recovery, And Rebirth

Dean Otto is literally living the hero’s journey.

In the depths of his devastating accident, he defined forgiveness and grace that propelled him toward new audiences.

His story led Stryker - the medical technology company that made the parts needed in his spine surgery - to ask him to speak at a corporate meeting. That first speech was so good that it led to a number of public speaking opportunities. And what started as a way to raise funding for spinal cord injuries has become a full fledged calling.

Dean recently quit his day job and committed to telling the forgiveness story full time.

No one wants their defining moment to be a 2% chance to walk again. But Dean Otto did exactly that. And if your group needs a motivational speaker, you won’t find a more genuine one.

There you have it.

3 distinct ways to create something new from a book that only you can write. Not the only ways. Just 3 examples.

And the world has more than 8 billion books just like that.

Now go launch something 🚀 

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Visual Crapshoot