Chandler Bolt [00:00:03] Hey, Chandler Bolt here. And joining me today is Amy Porterfield. I’ve been waiting for this interview for a long time. I’m so excited for today, Amy, if you haven’t heard of her, she’s next. Corporate girl turned online marketing expert. She’s the host of a wildly popular podcast. You’ve probably heard of it. It’s called the Online Marketing Made Easy Podcast. I feel like every time I go into the Top business podcast, Amy out there. She’s also the author of a new book, A New York Times best seller. It’s called Two Weeks Notice, and she’s the CEO of a multimillion dollar business. And back in her corporate days, she worked with big brands like Harley Davidson, Tony Robbins, a bunch of other cool brands. And now she’s teaching people how to make how to make online marketing easy. It can be really complicated. She does a great job of just making it as simple and painless as possible. Today, we’re going to talk about her new book, Two Weeks Notice Behind the Scenes of a New York Times best seller. We’re going to learn a lot. She’s in. She’s coming to speak at author events live. So this will be a tease for what you have to look forward to there as well. And I’m excited to. Amy, welcome.
Amy Porterfield [00:01:08] Well, thanks so much for having me. I’ve been looking forward to this.
Chandler Bolt [00:01:11] So I guess for starters, I mean, you’ve been teaching online marketing for for a while now. Why? Why a book? And what was kind of the spark to actually do a book? And how did you see this book kind of fitting in with your brand and with your business?
Amy Porterfield [00:01:25] So I’ve been doing this business I have today for 14 years, and about five or six years in, I thought I should write a book. I’ve seen all my other peers write books, and I feel like it gives them a lot of clout and puts them on the map and really allows people to know what they’re there for, how they add value, how you can work with them. So I saw the value of a book early on, but I just wasn’t sure what I would write this book about, and it very much intimidated me the whole process. I’m not a natural writer. I’ve never launched anything like a book before. So I kind of just kept pushing it off, pushing it off. And then finally, a few years ago, I thought, This is time because it’s time. And the reason I thought that is I got really clear on who I wanted to serve. So in my audience, I serve beginner entrepreneurs who are still in their 9 to 5 job wanting to leave, wanting to build a business. But I also serve those who have already done so and are looking to up level and scale. So I’ve got two different audiences, but the one that really speaks to me and I have a soft spot for are those beginners who are absolutely clueless on what the heck to do to start a business, because that’s exactly where I was. We don’t learn this stuff in school. And so I that I have a story that I could tell in terms of what my journey look like to build a multimillion dollar business when I was absolutely clueless and never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d be an entrepreneur. So and I thought, I want to start all the way back to you are still in your 9 to 5 job. How do you create a runway? How do you build that business? So when I got clear about that, it all just started to fall into place and I started to write code.
Chandler Bolt [00:02:58] And so do you see the book, I guess, as far as the business wise, is this kind of like the on ramp to your stuff where people read this, they say, hold up, maybe I should quit this corporate job. And now there’s other trainings and stuff I can do with Amy or how do you see it fitting in with kind of the business as a whole?
Amy Porterfield [00:03:13] Yes. So the customer journey is very, very important to me and my team members. And so we see it as the very, very top of the funnel and it actually is probably right beside my podcast. So you having a podcast, you know, the value of a podcast and it bringing in people that you normally would never have access to. And I was hoping my book would do the same. So a $27 book or a free podcast that usually they’re coming in from one of those and then yes, getting them into my world. And I have different courses depending on where you are in your journey. So I wanted an easy entry.
Chandler Bolt [00:03:47] Yeah, that makes sense. And I guess especially, I mean, going from free listener to book buyer, that’s not a big leap. And especially did you end up doing an book. It sounded generic. Did you narrated or did you hire an area?
Amy Porterfield [00:03:59] I narrated it, and I have to tell you, that was one of the most coolest things I’ve ever done. Valentine Caster I enjoy that kind of stuff. I live here in Nashville and I got to go into a studio where Dolly Parton and Johnny Cash have recorded and I’m like, Okay, that’s really cool. And so recording my book and just getting it back into my body, I think the best thing I did is I recorded it right before I started launching. So it was like really current in my body and I really felt connected to it because, you know, when you write a book, a lot of time goes by before that book is actually out in the world. So recording it was a great experience.
Chandler Bolt [00:04:34] And I mean, I know it’s only a couple of months in, but if you seen audiobook sales be on par with some of that, I don’t know if you have sales reports yet. Like have you really leaned into the audio book or are you leaning more into the physical and e-book? Like how have you kind of looked at which format to market and which formats really resonate with people?
Amy Porterfield [00:04:52] So I published through Hay House and they made a decision to not have my audiobook come out probably until about two weeks before my actual book came out, like the hardcover. And so what happened was I started launching my book in October, and it came out February 21st. So I pre launched for a long time and I only had the hard copy or the Kindle to go with. And I didn’t focus on the Kindle at all. And truth be told, to get on the New York Times bestseller list, you do have to sell a certain amount of hard copy. And so I really, really put my focus there since the audio wasn’t even available anyway. So my hard copy still is surpassing my audible. But I think it’s a timing thing. I think in a few months we’re going to see that audible take over the hard copy.
Chandler Bolt [00:05:40] It makes a lot of sense. And because is the is the audio book inside the deal with Hay House or that’s outside to deal with Hay house.
Amy Porterfield [00:05:47] They have an audio it’s inside the deal with Hay House. They also have an audio app that they use. So there’s a few different ways you can get the audio of my book. But yeah, it was inside the contract, which is funny that we’re talking about that because I have a really good friend who’s who. I won’t name names just because I don’t know if she says this publicly, but she’s a huge publisher, she has huge books and she said, Don’t put your audio book inside the contract. I didn’t know any better. So I put it right there in there and it’s worked out fine for me. But I’ve heard a lot of different things about that.
Chandler Bolt [00:06:17] Yeah, that is there’s, you know, there’s two or three. I feel like two or three important and not as difficult things to negotiate into a contract. I mean, negotiating your your your public or your audio book outside of the contract. Also, one thing that not a lot of people think about that’s super relevant to you and I is your author copy how much they sell them to you for. So if you want to use them in like free shipping funnels or and all that stuff, it’s a negligible thing that a lot of publishers like. I like Google. Not that big of a deal. How many author copies are you really going to buy? But I think a lot of people, they really focus on the advance. Like I just want the biggest advance possible like and maybe the highest royalty rate. But there’s those kind of little fringe items that can can, depending on your circumstances, can pay off pretty well long term.
Amy Porterfield [00:07:05] You know, I think it’s so important the work you do, because I was so clueless, like I should have gone through all your stuff first, to be quite honest, even though I wasn’t self-publishing. You teach some really key things that you don’t know, what you don’t know. I didn’t know to even ask about my copies. I didn’t even noted that they would negotiate the royalties like I knew nothing about stuff like that. And luckily I’ve been friends with Rick Tracey of Hay House. Our kids went to school together and so I’ve been friends with them for a long time and I knew he’d take great care of me. But, you know, if you don’t know your publisher at all, you don’t know if you’re being taken advantage or not. So. Right. The work you do, my friend, is very important, but you already know that.
Chandler Bolt [00:07:47] Yeah, that’s cool. Thanks for saying that. And it seems like they run a really cool business and a really cool publishing company. I know there’s a lot of unscrupulous kind of vanity or hybrid publishing companies or even just traditional publishers, and it seems like a lot of authors enjoy working with them. Let me let me ask. So it’s probably too early to tell and maybe you’re just still in recovery mode from this book launch. But when I when I heard you talking about kind of the okay, there’s the advanced marketer and then there’s the beginner that’s quitting their job and that sort of thing. Do you see is there a bigger picture with future books like do you want to write the advanced marketing book down the road? And this was the logical first book or first step or like, what do you see that looking like?
Amy Porterfield [00:08:27] Well, you’re getting me almost two months off of writing a book, but I know that’s not true, but I’ve never had a baby of my own. But if I gave birth, I think I know a lot of moms are like, Oh, never doing that again. And then a couple of years later, they’re like, I can’t wait to have another baby. I’m pretty sure that’s where I will be. But holy cow, that was the most intense thing I’ve ever gone through. And so I can’t even imagine ever write another book. But when or if I do it, definitely I would write to the more advanced student of mine because it was so tricky. I do have two very different audiences and I take my bread and butter is I teach people how to take their knowledge and turn it into a digital course and you can do that as a complete newbie. I’ve got people who’ve made amazing money as a newbie and you could absolutely crush it if you’re a little bit more advanced. So my program works for both and that’s why I have both audiences. But writing a book, I cut out a huge portion of my audience. I actually didn’t think I’d make the New York Times bestseller list because I knew that my book wasn’t for everybody in my audience or those of my peers as audiences when I asked him to promote. So my next book would definitely be for You’ve been in business for a few years, how to upscale or up level and scale your Business.
Chandler Bolt [00:09:50] That’s cool. I like the way you’re thinking about it too, because a lot of people make the big mistake. I mean, I think it’s one of the biggest mistakes in books, and you probably see this in digital products as well as they try to write for everyone and they try to write this conglomerate book of if you’re a beginner and you want a good corporate job, but also if you’re six figures in your recipe and then there is just this kind of jumbled book that isn’t really helpful for either audience. And so I think it’s really smart. The, you know, the riches are in the niches. And you really spoke to that niche with the two weeks notice title, with the subtitle, with the focus of the book. I want to talk about, you know, kind of behind the scenes of the New York Times bestseller list, all that stuff here in just a second. But can you give maybe the big picture of the two weeks notice philosophy that you talk about in the book and maybe how this philosophy can apply to authors?
Amy Porterfield [00:10:40] Yes. So in the book, I talk about having the courage to go after something really big when you don’t have a track record of doing so. We talk about courage, overconfidence, because courage comes way before competence. Competence is I have a proven track record. I know I can do this now. I’m going to do it even better. We don’t have that when we’re still in a 9 to 5 job and we want to start a business. And so I talk about building out a runway to leave your 9 to 5 job with full integrity and feel very grounded when you do in order to make whatever it is your next step work. And then what are the building blocks of the foundational pieces? You need to build a solid online business from scratch. So when I’m talking to. Authors like right now. The philosophy behind that is allow yourself the time to plan this out. You don’t need to write your book in one month and get it published and get it out there like that. Like, give yourself a little bit of time in terms of putting together your runway. What is this going to look like? And then building out the foundational pieces so it can be a success. So when I built out my book launch, I had never launched a book before. Some people will say, But Amy, I thought I heard you say you wrote a big Yellow Dummies book about Facebook marketing. I was a coauthor. I had nothing to do with marketing that book, and it feels like a joke compared to what I just went through with two weeks notice. So I don’t even count that. I never really launched a book, and it’s different than launching a digital course is what I learned. And so building out the plan, I did a four phased launch and building out those different phases is just like, if I were building out my business, how I would do it as well. So there’s a lot of overlap. And one thing in my book that will speak directly to authors is building your email list. I cannot imagine being successful with my book without my email list. It was a huge piece of the puzzle. So that’s something that I teach in the book that I think a lot of authors would find valuable.
Chandler Bolt [00:12:37] That’s really great and we’re very much in alignment on that. Can you talk to me about you talk about kind of building the courage and the confidence in and kind of building ahead and not just saying, hey, screw it, I’m going to do everything overnight. So are you a proponent of Right, build, build up and then put it in two weeks notice? Are you more of a proponent of like, hey, burn the burn the boats, Like jump all in and you’ll figure it out. Like, what’s your thought there as it relates to both business owners and authors who maybe want to use a book to start a business?
Amy Porterfield [00:13:12] I am absolutely a planner, so I am a proponent of let’s build this out properly so that we are here for the long haul. There’s a reason I’ve been here for 14 years. There’s a reason you’ve been How long have you been doing what you’re doing?
Chandler Bolt [00:13:27] Oh, gosh. Eight years. Eight going on.
Amy Porterfield [00:13:29] You look like you’re 16. So you’re like, there’s a reason you’ve been around that long. Because I believe putting the time to create the runway, planning this out strategically, I think it’s important. And listen, I want it yesterday, like, something just came up in my business two days ago where I want to work with a consultant to help with something in our business. And my team does not have the bandwidth and they’re like, we need to wait a few months. And I’m like, No, we need to have done it yesterday. But I respect, you know, having the time, the bandwidth, the planning, all of that. So I my book is not about pick up the book, put your two weeks notice in, and let’s figure it out. Then let’s plan this out and be methodical about it.
Chandler Bolt [00:14:11] Got it. That makes sense. Are you familiar with the Kobe test at all?
Amy Porterfield [00:14:15] Yes.
Chandler Bolt [00:14:15] Okay. So it’s so it’s so interesting, the dichotomy that I’m hearing you talk about here, because it sounds like the planner in you is maybe a high fact finder. But then there’s also a lot of elements of what they would call the quickstart, which is very much the same as well. This is, like I said, new idea, new thing. Let’s go.
Amy Porterfield [00:14:32] I totally want to do the Quickstart. But there’s I’m a little bit of a little hire of that fact finder.
Chandler Bolt [00:14:39] Though. Are those the two highest?
Amy Porterfield [00:14:41] I think so, yes. I’ve tried to think of the order, but absolutely, I think you’re right.
Chandler Bolt [00:14:45] It’s I’m the same because it gives fact finder follows through quickstart and implementer I think is the order of them. And I think I’m the same, which is like high on the high on the fact finder and then high on the the quick start.
Amy Porterfield [00:14:58] On is a world to live in. When you have those be really close to each other, they’re always in a battle.
Chandler Bolt [00:15:04] It was like, I’ve got really well researched in thought. I thought out ideas that I want to implement immediately.
Amy Porterfield [00:15:12] You get.
Chandler Bolt [00:15:13] It, which is kind of, I don’t know. It could be a lot for the people that you work with.
Amy Porterfield [00:15:19] For sure are poor teams.
Chandler Bolt [00:15:21] So yeah. So let’s talk about behind the scenes of this New York Times bestseller that launched. So you talk about one component, which I think is pretty smart, what Hay House did and what you did with Hay House, which is saying we’re going to focus on the print book and the e-book, but even more so than the e-book, mostly the print book, and we’re going to do that for months ahead. So October kind of day, February on the presales. And then they didn’t even allow or let the audiobook be purchased until it sounds like a couple of weeks before it launch. So you’re really focusing for the purposes of The New York Times. You know, it’s for people who don’t know, it’s about 10 to 12000 units that you need to move in in in week one to be able to hit the list. They need to be in some sort of, you know, some at local bookstores and the big bookstores spread across because Amazon, there’s this whole kind of algorithmic thing. And at the end of the day, just a disclaimer for everyone who has is pursuing this as a goal. It’s an editorial list. As some of our good friends know, one of our good friends, the mutual connection knows. I mean, he sold enough more than enough books to be on the list. New York Times kind of kept him off the list for whatever reason. So it’s totally.
Amy Porterfield [00:16:27] Editorial, maddening. I hear those stories all the time.
Chandler Bolt [00:16:31] They’re very frequent. Yeah. So I guess all those disclaimers out of the way. Yeah. Yeah. What how did you approach this and what are your thoughts? Like kind of reflecting back like what was the anatomy of that New York Times bestseller launch?
Amy Porterfield [00:16:45] So definitely I put like I mentioned, I push the hard copy. And what I mean by saying I push the hard copy is in these four phases that I did this book launch, I would give different bonuses away depending on what I was promoting. And to get the bonus you needed to buy the hard copy. And so of course they go to a page and other information and it was really I had to go on an honor system. I wouldn’t necessarily know if it’s the hard copy. So we just really went on an honor system and I feel like my audience is very honest, so I really appreciate them. So let me give you an example. One of the best things that I did, because this is my area of expertise, is that I created a digital course, I did a webinar, I sold I’m using air quotes, sold the digital course, like I gave it of value. If I ever sold this, this is how much I charge for it. And I sold the digital course, but then said, But you only need to pay $27, and by paying $27, what you’re really doing is you’re going to buy my hard copy of my book. Come back here, enter your information. I will give you this digital course for free or for $27. And so that’s what I did. And I did that three different times from October to February 21st. And every time I did it, every time I got closer to that pub date, it did better and better, which kind of blew my mind. So I don’t think everyone needs to do a digital course in a masterclass. I think anyone launching a book needs to ask yourself, Where are you your very best in when you live on stage? It might be live streams. You might have a really good chart, like if you do video sales letters, which I’ve never done in. My life. So if you do really great video sales or maybe it’s that find your core competencies and double down there, I think that’s the best advice I could give.
Chandler Bolt [00:18:37] I’m scrambling for the unmute button as I’m taking notes. So where are you your best? I love that. It’s such a great question. So when you did that digital course line, she said you did three leading up to the book. Was it the same course each time or was it a different course?
Amy Porterfield [00:18:52] The first two were. Now, here’s the crazy thing. In October I did it for the first time and we did like three or four live webinars, and I was only planning to do that one. That was phase one of my book launch. I was just going to do it once and it did so well that when we went into a November-December, we kind of slowed down a little bit with our marketing because the holidays and I went to dinner and Brendon Burchard, I went to Napa and happened to meet with Brendan and we were sitting at a table and my other friend Jasmine Starr was there and they were talking about my book launch and I told them what I did with the masterclass and they’re like, Do it again, Do it again. I’m like, Oh, okay. Like, I didn’t even think about doing it again. So in January, I did the exact same thing again. I did three more live webinars. It did even better than October. And remember, I’m going for the same list, my email list and then ads. But we have the same audiences that we always go through with ads. So they had most of these people. I’d seen it already. And so then we got close. It was almost pub time, and I knew I didn’t yet have the numbers. Like when you say between ten and 12, I heard 14 to 20 and I’m like, Oh my gosh, I do not have that many sales yet. And so we decided the day before my book came out, we did one more masterclass, but this time I did a different product. I had had a product that I had retired and wasn’t really selling, but it was really good and it aligned with what I was teaching. So I brought that out of retirement, did one more masterclass, sold more on that one masterclass than I did the other two. And I think the secret is the closer you get to pub date, everyone told me this and I didn’t know what to believe. You start to see the sales come in faster. So the day before my book published, we had like 2000 sales come in through one masterclass.
Chandler Bolt [00:20:44] Oh, my gosh.
Amy Porterfield [00:20:45] Yeah. So it works really, really well.
Chandler Bolt [00:20:48] And I love the bringing the old product out of retirement. It’s like Tom Brady or Michael Jordan. Like exactly how you got one more year that far. So what did you say? You said 2000 sales from that one masterclass. What was the structure of that? Was it okay, sign up for this on my training. It’s a webinar. You’re obviously really good at webinars, and then the call to action at the end was to purchase the the Tom Brady, the previously retired course and then you get the book for free or like how did that work?
Amy Porterfield [00:21:18] Good, good question. So it was a little tricky for me to like talk about. I had to get comfortable with it. I literally, like taught I delivered on the value. I wowed them and then I started to sell the digital course and it was a 297 value. I’d actually sold it for that. So like it really was to 97, actually, you could still buy it on my website. We just took all our funnels down so they could even see that I was selling it, which made it more valuable. So I said to 97, but then I said, But to get it, you do not need to pay to 97. All you need to do is go purchase the hard copy of my book, come back to this page and enter your information. So all so they need to buy the book. And then I would send them the digital course.
Chandler Bolt [00:22:02] Code and they’re just submitting like a screenshot or an order numbers.
Amy Porterfield [00:22:06] And order number. Yep.
Chandler Bolt [00:22:08] Cool. Nice. That’s awesome. And and so you mentioned earlier, I think if I heard it correctly, you said something about like four phases of pre-launch. Did I hear that right?
Amy Porterfield [00:22:18] Yep.
Chandler Bolt [00:22:18] Yep. So what were that were telling you that the next.
Amy Porterfield [00:22:23] Phase one was the digital course, the masterclass, and then phase two was a VIP ticket to a live virtual event. So what I did is my book came out on a Tuesday. I had a live virtual event on the following Saturday, and I did it up. I went to a studio in where’s where’s Charleston, South or North Carolina?
Chandler Bolt [00:22:48] That’s not old. So I’m going to school in Charleston. We’re running our author vintage live. We’re running probably out of the same studio with you Stage. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Amy Porterfield [00:22:57] That’s a funny experience ever. You’re awesome. The past for live events where I’ve actually had an audience, but isn’t the first time I went to their studios. We’ve got all of the screens behind you, but more so than anything, they’ve got that dialed in and it was the best experience I’ve ever had. And so I’m so glad you’re doing that. So I went to Charleston, did my event there, and so in order to get a VIP ticket to that, which meant you got a live Q&A with me at the end and you got different swag. That was a limited time. So we did like three weeks maybe of VIP tickets, and that was in November. And no, in December we went a little bit more quiet and then so that was face to face. Three, we brought back the digital course, but that wasn’t really part of our phasing. So another thing we did is called the off the record sessions, and I got this idea from Jenna Kutcher, but through Russell Brunson, where I got my friends involved, I interviewed them about leaving their 9 to 5 job becoming an entrepreneur, very relevant to the book. I interviewed five of my friends and then asked them to mail for me about the bonus. And so that way I was able to go beyond just me. Not all five were able to mail, but a few of them did, and it did make a difference. So the off the record sessions was the next phase. That would be phase three. And then phase four was just general admission tickets to my live event as we got closer. So those were the four phases. Each of them came with bonuses. Each of them promoted the hard copy of the book. And then in addition to that, I did over a hundred interviews that just about killed me. That was probably the hardest thing. I don’t know if I would be able to do that again. That was intense. I didn’t know that I would have to talk about the same thing. Right. So but here’s the thing. We did all these interviews, podcast interviews, and my request was, please have the podcast interview come out the week my book came out. Not everybody could do that, but as close as they could would be great. And the week my book came out, I was everywhere that week. And I don’t say that with an ego, I just say that strategically it actually worked. Where my PR was out, my podcasts were out. It was a really beautiful thing because I don’t know if your authors have experienced this, but I didn’t know what to do the week my book came out. Like, I’m like, What? I’ve been so busy for five months. What am I supposed to do this week? And I just was kind of I got to enjoy it, which is amazing.
Chandler Bolt [00:25:26] That’s cool. I mean, and that just also provides kind of social share content. Yeah. This interview drop, this thing dropped. And so just feels like there’s this echo chamber of so much stuff happening in the books everywhere and your to your ideal readers, they’re seeing the book on all their favorite podcasts and see on, on the podcast that kind of stuff that I really love that for Fey’s approach, you said I was going to ask you about this anyway because I was really curious. I feel like when I was interviewing you there, I was interviewing Jenna or she was interviewing me, I forget it was like the week of your your life. This is just like, Oh, I’m going to Charleston and doing this thing with Amy. And and I was like, Wow, that’s really intriguing, the whole virtual event for that. So you said you did it the Saturday after launch. It was just technically still during your launch week or after your last week.
Amy Porterfield [00:26:18] It technically is in the launch week, so I know I’m well aware and I’m sure that you can attest to this. I know that New York Times bestseller list is not the end all, be all. And I know that’s not why we write books, nor I didn’t get started on this journey because that was my only goal. It just became a goal that kind of became like I wanted it to. It drove a lot of decisions, but I have a lot of amazing friends that have launched books and they tell me, like Jenna, I mean that Jenna, Jamie, Karen Lima wrote the book, Believe It, And she did an event the day her book came out. And my let did the same thing the day his book came out or days before or something like that. And so there’s that type of an event where you get it, you come for free, and then you get to promote your book and you get a lot of book sales on that day. Or you could do the event as a delivery of a bonus. And I chose the delivery of the bonus because I wanted to get the books secured in time. And Jamie was telling me, God forbid something were to happen on that day that her book came out and she couldn’t do that event. She would have been in a pickle right there because she wouldn’t have gotten all those book sales. So she kind of warned me against that. She gave me the pros and cons. Yes. Yes. My book. So here’s the cool thing, though. The book comes out on a Tuesday. You have till Saturday night for them to record the first week of bestseller list. And so that Saturday was the last day. But remember, my book, my event was not selling a book and I want to talk to you. I’ll probably save a little bit about the event for when I’m at your event, but I’ll give you a little hint why it was so cool. But after the book came out Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, I got to say, okay, my event’s almost here. You got to get the book before you can come to the event. So we were heavily promoting the event the week my book came out, which I think was really valuable. So I didn’t sell the book at the event. Everyone who was there had the book, but I sold a $37 boot camp that the results of that were incredible. I will save it for when we’re at your event. I don’t want to give all the good stuff away, but I want to talk about that later because it was a really strategic move for the whole of the business.
Chandler Bolt [00:28:36] Oh shoot. Boot camp, show up to author, manage lives and what to be continued. On how that worked. Yeah. I want to ask you about reviews because you’ve already gotten 350 plus reviews and it hasn’t even been two months, which I think is pretty, pretty incredible how anything that’s worked well to get so many reviews. And did you do anything as part of the event to drive reviews?
Amy Porterfield [00:29:00] No question. You know, hindsight, like if I did this all over again, that would be a really great episode. If I were to do this all over again, what would I change? I’m not exactly sure yet, but there’s something to think about. I got to figure that out. One thing I would change, though, is I should have asked for testimonials at that event and we could have done some fun contest and randomly chose winners based on people. Do the testimonials. I wish I would have done that. So anyone listening that’s going to do an event, think about that. But the reason I have so many testimonials and we had like a hundred right away is because I also did a book launch team. And so back in I think November we invited only my Payne students, so we didn’t do it for everyone. We just invited my pain students to get into a private Facebook group with me up until the week my book launched and we promised I would do a Q&A. I did a training on how to plan your promotions, and my my community team was really engaged in the group, but in exchange, we asked them to promote my book, and because they were part of my community, they were just doing it as a favor. And one of the we had about a thousand people in that and you had to actually buy a book before you got into the book launch Facebook group. You had to show that you bought my book. So but then the first 500 people actually got a galley where they got a physical copy in the mail, which was kind of cool. But we asked them to write reviews and we. We gave them examples of reviews. We told them how to post the reviews. They could post the review and get some feedback from the community if they wanted it. So we made reviews, a huge part of it. We even asked them to do video reviews, which you could see on Amazon. They did. So the day my book came out, they had already read it and left very beautiful reviews, and that helped immensely.
Chandler Bolt [00:30:49] That’s really great. It’s awesome. One thing, just one tip here that we do that works pretty well that you might you might do as well as is a short link that goes directly to your review page. That’s easy to remember. And so for me, I think it’s like published book icon, forward slash review, whatever the URL is for your book. But it’s a two part piece is you can mention it on lives, on podcast episodes, any of that. But then also your team has it very easily to where if anyone ever comments or emails or whatever and they’re like raving about your book, we say, Hey, thank you so much. Would you mind copying and pasting that into a review here? And it’s just a short link that takes them directly to the Amazon review page. So you just reduce all the friction and okay.
Amy Porterfield [00:31:36] I am absolutely doing it.
Chandler Bolt [00:31:39] So that along with one thing that we do, I talk about I think I sent you this book, if not all. And in the review chapter, we have a review sweeper. It’s super simple, but basically.
Amy Porterfield [00:31:51] It isn’t.
Chandler Bolt [00:31:51] Related to anything related to your book where someone opts in 21 days later, they get an email. It’s like a three email sequence. It’s like, Hey, how are you? Like in the book reply and let me know. And then the team says, Hey, thank you so much. Would you mind copying and pasting that into a review here, this short link and then the final email to writing notes. Yeah, yeah. But that just I call it the review sweeper because it just keeps reviews coming in, you know, week after week, month after month. I was talking I was on James Artigas podcast yesterday and he, he, he quoted this stat which I never heard before, but I found interesting, he said the publisher told him, once you get to 1300 reviews, your book will sell forever. It’s it’s kind of in that perennial best. And I know that’s not like an exact science, but just how important reviews are for social proof and for ongoing rankings on Amazon. And so that’s why we focus on it so much. And anyways, those things might be helpful for you.
Amy Porterfield [00:32:50] Okay, good. Because our our next big goal is I want to get to 1000. And yes, this is going to help immensely. Okay. Thank you for that.
Chandler Bolt [00:32:57] I’ve got like two or three other recommendations on how to get to a thousand, but we’ll alternate your book and there’s one or two that are in the book that I actually they might all be in the book. But, hey, over time, I got a couple questions for you in the will wrap up. How is how is the book grown the business so far?
Amy Porterfield [00:33:20] Okay. So what we’ve seen is just a lot of new energy into the business. And I wrote the book to Grow the business. So that was literally my goal. And so what we’ve seen is that boot camp, without giving too much away, we saw a huge we sold 2000 more boot camps than we actually thought we would, even when we knew we would have new listeners like that exploded the excitement around my projects. And then in addition to that, we are seeing people that come into our communities with new excitement, new energy that’s kind of energizing my students who have been around for a long time. And that makes a difference because when I start to promote new things like a coaching program, more people are paying attention. So we’re seeing that. We’re seeing, of course, our list grow because of it. But I’ve seen it in my revenue and I’ve seen it in my list growth.
Chandler Bolt [00:34:11] Oh, that’s awesome. Well, any last couple questions I had for you? Is, number one, obviously, you’re speaking at our event. Arthur movies live for four alongside Michael Hyatt. How? Right. A bunch of awesome folks. For those who haven’t heard of the Yes three day virtual event. So funny running it out of the same studio there in Charleston. Obviously, everyone will be attending virtually. What’s one thing that people have to look forward to in that talk and why should they come?
Amy Porterfield [00:34:42] Well, I’ll say two things. Number one, we kind of scratched the surface about these four phases and what that look like. I’m really looking forward to drilling down a little bit more on the detail of how that came together. Also, we’re going to talk a little bit about planning ahead and how to get this kind of all dialed in, because that’s one thing that we knew what it all look like before we even started. And then also, I’ll give you lots more details of how I use the event to make over $1,000,000. So that’s that’s the punchline. So I’ll tell you kind of how that worked out. So those are just a few things to look forward to.
Chandler Bolt [00:35:17] Holy cow. That’s awesome. Well, that’s a lot to look forward to. You guys. Grab a ticket. Author, vanish, live icon. The event’s coming up real quick and prices on tickets are going up really soon. So grab a ticket author Venus live dot com. Amy. This is amazing. Where can people go? We’re getting a bunch of books for people who show up to author being is live but where can people go to buy a copy of your book to find out more about what you’re up to? All that good stuff.
Amy Porterfield [00:35:43] Well thank you so much. So you can buy two weeks notice wherever you buy books online or in bookstores. And then I’ve got a podcast called Online Marketing Made Easy that will kind of get you started and all the things list building and webinars and digital courses and growing your business. So thank you so much for asking.
Chandler Bolt [00:36:01] All right, guys, check out the book is called Two Weeks Notice. As you know, we talk about all the time. It’s a one year launch, not a one week launch. So and he’s obviously had a ton of success with the one week launch, but now is is participating in this one year launch and continuing to promote the book. So let’s help her out. Let’s grab a copy and it’ll help you out in the process. If you’re looking to put in a two week notice or maybe double down on your online business. Amy Can’t wait for the talk it out there, manage live. Thanks so much.
Amy Porterfield [00:36:28] Looking forward to, friend. Thanks again.