Episode 145
Tim Lewis: In this interview, I talk again to May King about how she’s getting along with her book writing project, but we also go on a number of interesting tangents for the conversation, one of which is how we actually define success for a book, which is towards the end of the interview. Anyway, now over to the interview. Hello, May King. Welcome to the interview.
May King Tsang: Well, hello, Tim. How are you?
Tim Lewis: I’m not too bad. So, let’s get straight into it, because it’s quite late at night, for reasons that you seemed to be in an echo chamber the last time I tried to interview you. So, now you’re not, for a change. So, how have you been doing with your great book? How have you been proceeding?
May King Tsang: Well, so give me five gold stars, because I’ve written two chapter. Woo hoo hoo! I aim to write four. I tell you, in a week I had a bit of a disaster with one of my potential clients, so that was an emergency. And that took longer than expected. But I managed to put out the fires and so, that’s why I wasn’t able to write the other two chapters. But, at least I have done 9,000 words, which I’m proper, proper excited about.
Tim Lewis: That’s impressive. So, how many chapters, remind me how many chapter are you envisaging going to be in the whole book?
May King Tsang: I am aiming to do 15.
Tim Lewis: Yeah.
May King Tsang: So, I’ve got 13 to go. And I have deliberately booked a couple hotels here and there to lock myself away. Maya Angelou used to do that when she was writing books, and I thought well I would try the same thing. So, I’m up in Newcastle next month for a day or two. Then I’ve got San Diego Social Media Marketing World. So I decided to book a few days after the conference and do some writing there. I’m also going to London, I think it’s late March, so I’m going to book a couple of hotel stays there and do that. So, I’m really, really my internal goal is to get it finished before the end of April. It might stretch out a little bit more, but that’s what I’m really, really aiming for.
Tim Lewis: Okay. Because the last time, we talked about the fifth of April. So, it’s now the end of April.
May King Tsang: Oh, sorry. Okay. All right, then. Let’s rewind that back. My aim is to finish it by the fifth of April.
Tim Lewis: Yeah.
May King Tsang: That’s right, Tim.
Tim Lewis: Well, when we say finishing, this is the first draught, so.
May King Tsang: Yes. That’s right.
Tim Lewis: That may not be, yeah. That may not be as difficult as you think, so.
May King Tsang: That’s right. Well, I hope so. And again, I said this in a previous podcast. This has just been so much fun, to be accountable to somebody else has just basically forced me to get on with it and give me a deadline to get on with it. And I’ve absolutely thoroughly enjoyed the process to reminisce and to reflect on what has happened and so on. It’s been absolutely cathartic and beautiful, and has enabled me to relive some of my successful moments and some of the learning lessons as well. So, thank you once again, Tim.
Tim Lewis: Yeah. Well, I mean that’s you internal process with the book. I mean, it’s worth, I think, describing to people. I mean your book’s, a large chunk of it is kind of autobiographical in a way, isn’t it?
May King Tsang: Yes.
Tim Lewis: So-
May King Tsang: Yeah, it is autobiographical, and I had hoped that, with a lot of business books out there, you tend to hear from entrepreneurs who are serial entrepreneurs. They write the books after they’ve been successful and so on. And I just thought I think there is possibly a calling for a book from an author who has not quite made it yet. Whatever made it means.
Tim Lewis: Yeah.
May King Tsang: But a least I have started. And I had hoped that that would encourage other people to start. Because when I first went into business, and I read a lot of business books, there just seemed to be a plethora of authors who had left school when they’re 15 and that’s when they started to be an entrepreneur, and I thought gosh well, I went through the college uni life and had an amazing career, enjoyed my IT career, and I’m going to start a business in my mid-30s. Is that at all possible? And I was really encouraged when I did some research that actually there’s quite a few successful entrepreneurs out there who did start in their 40s, their 30s. Colonel Sanders in his 80s. And so, I just thought that, yeah, for those people who have either had a career, want to start something new, have had children and maybe want to start something new, are bored with their jobs and want a career change, it is absolutely possible. You don’t need to have left school at 15.
May King Tsang: And so, that’s what drove me to write this book. And I really wanted to lay out the realities of life. I think now it’s rock ‘n roll to be an entrepreneur. Just like in the 90s comedy was the new rock n’ roll, being an entrepreneur is the new rock ‘n roll now. And so, unfortunately, you get lots of people posing pictures beside Lamborghinis and Ferraris and pretend they’ve got loads of money, or they’re sleeping in a bed of dollar bills and that kind of stuff, when in reality you don’t have all of that.
May King Tsang: And so, I want to lay out my successes, of course I do, but I also want to lay out my mistakes so that hopefully people will learn from my mistakes and avoid them, which is, but the, my title of my book is From Making Mistakes to Making it Happen. I would rather hope that people would learn something from it.
Tim Lewis: Okay. So, this interviews going to take a different tone to what I was originally thinking. But then, I’m thinking why not? What would you feel that in the process of what you’ve written so far and thinking about your book, have you learned anything about yourself in terms of when you’re thinking back on your business experiences for the book? Has that made you rethink or realise anything about yourself that you didn’t necessarily realise before you started this creation process?
May King Tsang: The biggest that I’ve learned is the power of the mindset. I always thought I was never good enough.
Tim Lewis: Yeah.
May King Tsang: I had all these people that would offer their help to me, from ex rugby players, successful serial entrepreneurs, and they somehow came into my life and they would say to me, “May King, give us a ring if you need my help.” And I never wanted to call them because I didn’t want to bother them, why are they going to want to bother with someone like me who’s just starting out in her business life? You’ve got a business, it’s global, why do you want to help me? And so, I never wanted to bother anybody. So, for several years, one chap in particular, I actually wrote my Oscars speech at the start of the book where I dedicated it to many people in my life.
May King Tsang: And one of them is an ex-professional rugby player in Australia. He rebranded himself as a business coach. He is now a master franchise that is running throughout Australia and New Zealand. And through my turbulent times and my times of success, he has always been there for me. Always sends a message, motivation message now and again saying, “I’m here if you need me.” And I would say thank you, but I would never ask for his help.
May King Tsang: This year, I changed all of that and I decided to ask for help. So, for those people who lent their help, I thought, know what? I’m going to ask. And what’s the worst that can happen? So, that’s what I realised that all the years that I’ve been in business, so many people came into my life saying, “Give me a shout if you need any help,” and I just didn’t think I was good enough. And if they didn’t want to help you, they wouldn’t have asked you, right? So, that’s definitely something I learned about myself.
Tim Lewis: Yeah. But they say, and it’s kind of true, for a lot of people, in that a lot of people like helping people. I mean, if somebody continuously asks for help every five seconds, then that’s one thing. But if it’s like somebody asks you for help, most people are happy to help people and they get pleasure from helping people. But so many of us have this mindset of like oh well, we can’t ask for help, or we can’t sort of, we can’t communicate with people. And I’m now of the time where I think communication is so important in general with people. And it’s one of those things that if I knew when I was 20 what I know now with communication and networking and the rest of it, it would have made just such a massive difference in my life.
May King Tsang: Do you know that, and you’re absolutely right there, Tim. I got addicted to helping people. I created a Facebook group before it was a thing several years ago.
Tim Lewis: Yeah.
May King Tsang: And I got addicted to helping people, because the first few networking events I went to in Australia, it was hilarious because I would say, “Hi, my name is May King, as in making tea. Ha ha ha.” And then I’d say, “How can I help? How’s your business? What’s happening? What’s going on?” And you could see their fake it until you make it face on. And they’re pretending that they would do real well, this, that and the other. And in my head I was thinking, I’m sure I can help them in some way or other. But they didn’t want help because they said, “No, everything’s fine. It’s going great. Ra ra ra.” And then when I went to a London networking event, a lot of business owners I met said they use Facebook for business. Well, I’ve always been a Twitter girl. That’s where I started. And I had a personal account on Facebook, but I proper didn’t understand it. Why were people putting pictures of their dinner when they were going to meet their mates at the weekend? I just didn’t understand it.
May King Tsang: So, when a lot of business owners said they use Facebook, I thought well, I better learn about this Facebook lark. Went on a course, learned about Facebook groups. And I thought, know what? Because I have to prove myself, because I’m an Aussie, I need to really work really hard to gain the trust of people. I will create a Facebook group. And when I created a Facebook group and said that we’re here to help each other. Help build and support each other. It was just so powerful. People let their hair down and they asked for help, which was just absolutely phenomenal. And I got addicted to helping people to the point where QBG, Queensland Business Group was the first place I would go to. I’d spend a good three, four hours answering ever call, every comment, networking, putting people together, this, that and the other, before helping my own business.
May King Tsang: And because it was a voluntary role, of course that meant that I wasn’t paying bills. I was too busy helping people. And it gave me a massive buzz when people said thank you. And that’s all I needed. I didn’t even ask for money. Didn’t even put any call to action. Didn’t even promote my business. Plenty of people, within the space of a month, I think, there were over 150 members and they were all promoting each other and this, that and the other. And I didn’t even promote my own business. So, got addicted to it. And of course that was my downfall.
May King Tsang: And now, when I came back to the U.K. I thought, well know what? I’m going to have to help myself before I help other people. And that’s what I did differently. So, that was another lesson that I learned, too. So yeah, you’re right? I was quite happy to give so much help to other people, but then when people said to me, “Give us a shout if you need any help, May King.” I couldn’t pick up the phone. I just didn’t think I deserved it. It was ridiculous.
Tim Lewis: Yeah. Anyway, let’s get back to the more mundane stuff. I suddenly remembered, are you handwriting your book as you threatened to do in the last episode?
May King Tsang: Wow, just because a couple of times you mentioned that, it’s going to take quite a while. And I thought about it and I thought, know what? You’re absolutely right, Tim. And you’ve been right so far with each of our interviews, giving me some great advice in writing books. So, actually I’ve ditched the book. I’ve kept it with me with my handbag just in case I might need to write an idea or two. But I’ve gone back to the computer and started tap tap tapping away, which has obviously allowed my book to progress more quickly than it did before.
Tim Lewis: Yeah. I mean, this is the thing. It’s not that it’s a bad way to do it. And it’s certainly a great way to have ideas. And there is something about physically writing things that makes a difference. But I think that’s more to do with ideas and goals and things like that, where it’s more bullet pointy. I’m not sure that long hand writing a book is necessarily, I mean, you could do it when you’ve done a few other books to see how much longer it’s going to take you. But I think yeah, for a first book I think yeah, you want to be typing really if you possibly can, so.
May King Tsang: Yeah. One thing that I have kind of failed a little bit on I’m afraid, Tim, is the temptation to go back and make changes. So, I’ve kind of been doing that, which is I know a little bit naughty. And I’ve also, I also haven’t really prioritised in the fight. But I just had lots of ideas of how I wanted the book to look like. So, the cosmetic stuff. So, I’ve been spending a lot of time on the prettiness.
Tim Lewis: Yeah.
May King Tsang: The layout of the book as opposed to the content. And it’s been a whole lot of fun doing it. But I do need to get back to the writing. But I am, like I said, I had aimed to do four chapters. Managed to do two, and I’m very pleased with that. And they’re both quite lengthy. It’s 9,000 words that I’ve written. So, and it’s not just 9,000 words of the word tea either, so very proud of that.
Tim Lewis: Yeah. To be honest, I wouldn’t bother with layout at all at this stage. Simply because it almost certainly becomes a challenge. I mean, the way that like e-pubs the electronic books, which is where most of us make their money from, they’re almost like reflow able sort of webpage-like, in terms of their design. So, if you’re worried about the layout for them, then that doesn’t make sense.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: And for the printed book, a lot of that makes way more sense to do when you’ve finished it. Because there’s a lot constraints to do with the size of the book and everything, that means that it’s easier to do, worry about the layout right at the end. So, if it makes you feel better from a psychological point of view, then yeah, by all means worry about the layout. It’s almost certainly going to be thrown out of the window and changed at the end.
May King Tsang: Well, yeah. I mean, and there were a few times where I had writer’s block.
Tim Lewis: Yeah.
May King Tsang: Naturally you get that. So, I figured well, I want to do something. So, I just want to just force myself to do something. So, rather than step away, have a cup of tea and come back, I just thought, oh well I’ll have a bit of a tinker of the design of it. And I’ve had a bit of fun with it as well. But no, I completely take your point on board, but I will stop doing that, Sir. So, I’ll just write, write, write and stop worrying about the layout. So, thank you.
Tim Lewis: Yeah. I mean, it’s one of those things. It’s a procrastination technique in writing is like worrying about the layout. And maybe even spending mistakes and things. Obviously you’ve got to correct them at some point. But if you just worry, if you’re re-reading everything all the time, I’m mean there’s nothing that is to say, if you suddenly have a big idea and you need to go back and change something fundamentally, then yeah, by all means do that.
Tim Lewis: But yeah, say don’t get dragged back into just so you’re going over and over and over the same things all the time. Yeah, the main thing is to get the crux of the message out and the book finished in its first draught, and then you worry about all these other things later on.
May King Tsang: Okie dokie. So, what advice would you give to me? I’ve written two chapters now. I’ve got the end date of fifth of April. How do I, do I need to do anything differently from now until April with regards to writing? I know I’m not going to worry about structure. I’ve just got to get a first draught out there. Is there anything that you would do differently now?
Tim Lewis: No, not especially. The main thing’s just to get it done.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: It’s, I mean there’s various ancillary things you could worry about. I mean, I think a cover you don’t really need to worry about getting a cover done until you’ve finished the first draught.
May King Tsang: Okay.
Tim Lewis: Now, in terms of editing and hiring an editor, you might want to start to look at trying to find one, and then having them available sometime in April to work on it or you.
May King Tsang: Okay. Now, can you explain to me the different types of editors? I’m sure your readers might be at that stage where they’re nearing the end of writing their books, so this is the next stage that they all want to look at. So, there’s different types of editors, isn’t there?
Tim Lewis: Yeah. I mean there’s actually, if you want to blog to a former guest on the show, is somebody called Louise Harnby, and she writes a whole massive blog about editing. So, from a kind of like going to it further from an editor’s point of view, she’s probably a good place to go. She’s going to be at Atomicon actually. You can talk to her there.
May King Tsang: Oh, great.
Tim Lewis: But this is my kind of rough and ready assessment of the different kinds of editing. I mean, it’s not just about people correcting typos. That is traditionally what’d be called the proofreading role involved correcting typos and small errors in the work. And also proofreading also involved the layout of the book. So, when they say proof, it’s actually, I think it’s those metal plates they used to have on the old print machines.
May King Tsang: Oh yes.
Tim Lewis: But they’ve been moving the things around, and that way, like you were checking those proofs were actually right, so that you didn’t have just one word at the top of a book. So, that’s kind like of what a lot of people think editing is.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: And so, a lot of the editing I’ve had done on my books is kind of of that level. Then beyond it is kind of what’s called copy editing. Now, or content editing. There’s all kinds of different terms, depending what country in the world you’re in. So, but that’s kind of like where somebody reads through the sentences and makes sure that the grammar is correct and it’s not, there can be like repeat, if you keep repeating the same word over over, it can be unsettling. There’s that kind of level of editing as well.
Tim Lewis: Then further up, kind of, you’re getting almost towards book coaching kind of people. So, for example, if you pay what’s called a developmental editor, and it can be structural edit and things like that, there can be people who actually go through and look at the content of your book and sort of say, “You don’t want to have that section here,” or “You want to move this around here.” Those are typically people who know the kind of format of book that your book is about. So, somebody whose edited autobiographies, read a lot of autobiographies, and/or tea books and business books. They could come in and they could make suggestions about, “Well, you don’t want this section. This section’s too long,” or “I don’t understand it.” Traditionally, this kind of books has this section in it here. That kind of thing.
Tim Lewis: So, that’s a much more high level kind of editing.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: I mean, I’ve had arguments with people. But you could almost say that there’s almost a level of editing goes beyond that, which is almost into ghostwriting, which is where you’ve got your book, the editor will rewrite large chunks of it. And the thing is that editors are human being like everybody else. And it may be the case that there are editors who will destroy your manuscript and want to write it their way.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: Just because there are humans who are very sort of bossy and controlling. And for some authors, those may be exactly the editors they need, because they’re just not really good at writing.
May King Tsang: Yes.
Tim Lewis: But on the other hand, I think most of us are looking for somebody who we have some sort of click with in terms of friendships, and they can communicate to you in a way that makes you make the changes that are needed, but not upset you in that stage. So.
May King Tsang: Well, I have actually had the offer from two, three friends. Two from the business community, and then a dear old friend of mine. And they offered to read it. So, I think my friend’s in the teaching profession, so she’ll probably capture the sort of proofreading bits and pieces. And I don’t know the experience of the other two from a business community. But it was very kind of them, and I’ve graciously said yes. So, yeah, it was lovely of them to offer that.
Tim Lewis: Yeah.
May King Tsang: And of course on top of that, then I’ll need another editor when time.
Tim Lewis: Yeah, probably. I mean, you’ll almost certainly need some sort of proof readers/content editor.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: Now, one thing, I mean, the term that’s used to describe these people who are going to read your book is basically either street team or a kind of beta tester kind of, I want to say, what is the term in sort of publishing circles? Something like, yeah. Something along those lines where you basically, you send out your book to people and then they come back with comments because they understand the subject matter.
Tim Lewis: But I mean, yeah, it’s an argument I’ve had with editors about how much experience. I think properly trained editors are going to be better.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: Because they will know more, and especially if somebody edited loads of books in your genre, then that’s probably the sort of person you would be looking for, ideally.
May King Tsang: Yes.
Tim Lewis: And obviously money is always an issue, so. But that’s why I have been told by people, by Louise Harnby that you do need to make sure that you have enough time period ahead so that if you finish your book, and then you want somebody to edit the book in the next week, you’re not going to get, you have to get the same quality of editor as somebody who like, you ask two months ahead.
May King Tsang: Yes.
Tim Lewis: So, that’s something to look at.
May King Tsang: Okay.
Tim Lewis: And I think it’s like the Society for Editors and Proofreaders is probably best place to start. And/or recommendations from people. If you’ve got particularly favourite books, some of them will say who the editor is, and you can probably email the author or publisher and find out who the editor is.
May King Tsang: Okay.
Tim Lewis: Because there’s a lot of actual traditionally published authors who use services like reedsy.com, and they’re available for hire on a freelance basis.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: So, there’s no reason why the editor you get, your book couldn’t be as good or better than a traditionally published one.
May King Tsang: Yeah. Lovely. And you’ll be sharing the links in the transcript presumably.
Tim Lewis: Yeah.
May King Tsang: The association that you’ve mentioned earlier and so on.
Tim Lewis: Yeah, I mean now, I’ve got an old show, well a couple of old shows about editing.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: And I mentioned this quite a few times, but yeah. They’ll be in this show as well.
May King Tsang: Fabulous.
Tim Lewis: Okay. So, have you got any other questions about the book writing process?
May King Tsang: So, yeah. So, it’s really funny, because I think in the last interview, I had a bit of a mental block. I was thinking who’s going to read this? And I kind of tweeted it out there. And I actually had lots of lovely messages from a few people who’ve said, “Yeah, I want to pre-order the book.” So, I’ve got two questions: The pre-ordering, at what stage would I be thinking about doing that? So, you mentioned about the editor, depending on the quality of editor, I may be looking at that right now two months ahead if I aim to finish in April. What stage do I look at the, what did I just say?
Tim Lewis: Pre order.
May King Tsang: The pre order, yes.
Tim Lewis: Well-
May King Tsang: Sorry, listeners. So, I had a pretty hard week this week. I’ve had six hours sleep in five days. So, I’m really ready for my bed now. And the second question is, one lovely follower of mine said, “You’ve got such a,” she’s American, “You’ve got such a rich voice, kind of like the female Stephen Fry. Very, very nice. Are you going to be recording your book in audio?” And I thought, gosh, I hadn’t even thought that far yet. So yes, that would be my second question.
Tim Lewis: Okay. Well, you didn’t listen to my last show with Ben, did you?
May King Tsang: I told you, I’ve had six hours sleep this week.
Tim Lewis: Yeah, and you’re sitting there and in this corner of your room, you see this massive bright orange elephant sitting there and you’re like, is it really serious?
May King Tsang: That’s right. I can say, “Come to Mummy. Come to sleep. Sleep with me now.”
Tim Lewis: Anyway, to recapitulate, always forget that recap is supposed to mean recapitulate. A pre-order on Amazon is you do the book exactly the same as you would if you were publishing it then, except there’s an option at the end where you click a thing and say, it’s going to be available in 90 days.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: And that’s for the e-book. It’s possible to do the paperback book on pre-order. But I wouldn’t touch that with a bargepole because it’s quite complicated.
May King Tsang: Okie dokie.
Tim Lewis: Because you can do, well I’m saying that I have merged together KDP Print and KPP e-books. But I thought I’m aware you can’t do pre-order on KDP print. You can from the e-book. Now, the reason I tried to talk Ben out of the idea of printing his book on pre-order.
May King Tsang: So, Ben was another guest whose at a later stage of his writing.
Tim Lewis: Yeah. Now, even though I put my own book on pre-order, I put it on pre-order to force myself to finish the book.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: So, it was kind of like a way to force me to get the book done.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: Now the problem with pre-order on Amazon, as opposed to some of the other platforms, there is reason if you were going to be concentrating on Apple iBooks, pre-orders might make more sense. Because on Apple or iBooks, all your sales on pre order thing, all count towards the chart placing on Apple when the book’s actually released. So, if you’ve got a long pre order period, you could have 100s of sales and then your book could jump into the charts instantly.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: Now for Amazon, that isn’t the case. Amazon your book will chart potentially in the pre-order period. But you’re not getting that big spike of sales when your book’s available that you would do if it’s not available for sale on pre-order.
May King Tsang: Right. Yeah.
Tim Lewis: Now, that’s only really true for the e-book. And it may be the case that your book is like my social media networking book. It seems to sell a lot better as a paperback book than it does as an e-book.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: In which case, it doesn’t really matter if it’s available in pre order.
May King Tsang: Okay.
Tim Lewis: Now, to answer your question regarding audio books.
May King Tsang: Yes.
Tim Lewis: Bearing in mind that I’ve got a longstanding project to create an audio book for my self-publishing course, which I still haven’t yet done, I’ve got on my list of things to do. It’s possible, and it’s a lot more easy than doing a pre-order for a paperback. But it is going to be a lot of work. It’s, I mean I know from recording like 100-odd podcasts, that it’s okay if you’re starting and you’re just talking like this, and you’re making that. But even with that, I mean even getting the transcriptions done for the social media networking book, there’s a lot of work going between one format to another. And it would take you a lot of time to read your book effectively, because you’d have to keep going back correcting it all the time.
Tim Lewis: It’s actually quite a skill to be able to read text and then record it. Now, you could work with somebody in a recording studio, or you could do it yourself on your, like with podcasting equipment style stuff.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: But there is a service called ACX, which is Audiobook Community Exchange, or something. It’s another Amazon service.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: Where you can self-publish your audiobook. They also to a scheme there for letting you hook up with narrators of the book.
May King Tsang: Okay.
Tim Lewis: And if your book has done well as an e-book, or as paperback, okay and like it’s charted and it’s done reasonably well, there is an option to do royalty share with a narrator. So, this is somebody who’s going to read the book for you, somebody who’s actually skilled as a voice reader.
May King Tsang: Okay.
Tim Lewis: So, that’s one option with the audio books. Or where you do all the recording yourself.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: Which will take a long time. I mean it’s not, there are plenty of people who have done their own. I think Mark Schaefer does his own audio book recordings, for example.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: But a lot of people don’t bother, because it’s a big time commitment to do an audio book version of your book. So, yeah. You can do it, and it’s not that difficult. But I would suggest probably your best bet is to worry about the paperback and e-book version first.
May King Tsang: Okie dokie.
Tim Lewis: See if it’s successful. And then maybe think of doing the audio book version, and I certainly can, I know a lot about recording audio. By that time hopefully I will have done my own audio books. It’s me getting over the fear of something new.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: Yeah, I know everything that needs to be done for audio book recording. And it is a very lucrative area of self-publishing, audio books.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: There are differences though in that you can’t generally set your prices on audio books. And also, the royalty rates are a lot lower.
May King Tsang: Okay.
Tim Lewis: So, for example on Audible, you get paid 40% royalties rather than the 70% you would get for an e-book.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: So, that’s something to consider as well.
May King Tsang: Okay.
Tim Lewis: And also the costs. You have the costs. If you get paying a narrator, that’s going to be quite expensive.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: So, yeah. The costs in either time or actual monetary for paying the narrator’s going to be a lot of money. But then a lot of self-published authors make a lot of money from audiobooks.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: So, there’s certainly something worth considering.
May King Tsang: You actually prompted another question in me just as you explaining the audio process. You said you recommended, only considering the audio option, following the success of your e-book or published book. So, my question to you is, what is success for you? What does that actually mean for you? I have no idea what that means for me. I’d be pleased as punch if one person bought my book. What does success mean to you?
Tim Lewis: Well, I think that’s a good level of success to have for a book, quite honestly, because-
May King Tsang: got it right there.
Tim Lewis: Well, no. I mean, for a lot of people, that’s going to be the case. I mean, there is a very, it’s like with podcasting, actually. There’s an awful lots of books out there that sell very, very few copies. If at all, ever.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: And I’ve written quite a lot of them. Now, for me, success for a book is that you get something from it, either in terms of opportunities, or authority. Ideally, you want to be getting sales as well.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: Like a trickle of sales, I think more.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: So, yeah for a successful book, I would say it’s one that, but I have seen it like for my first ever book which was too cheap, and I made free, and it’s still people pick up the free copy of it. That did well and it charted in the U.K. time travel chart, number ten.
May King Tsang: Fantastic.
Tim Lewis: In the U.K. And that still, that produced a lot of sales for that book. But it was like 99p.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: And so, I didn’t make a vast amount of money. But that book actually made a profit. So, that kind of, the first book I wrote made a profit. My whole series-
May King Tsang: Awesome. What was the book about, Tim?
Tim Lewis: Was time travel. It was a time travel novella.
May King Tsang: Right. Nice.
Tim Lewis: I’m actually going to re-issue and redo those as a paperback book, all three of them together. It’s the first thing I’m going to do in my list of things that I’ve have outstanding to do forever. But I’ve never really had that level of success since.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: And because, I mean, this is what I say to people: The ideal is that you, Amazon and these book marketplaces, which are kind of forced to have to sell into really, because of tax rules and the rest of it. I’ve changed slightly recently. But it’s actually selling stuff on your own website and selling direct can work for some people. And it’s more likely to work with a business book than it is for like fiction.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: But if you get success on a platform like Amazon, so let’s say you release your book and it gets into one of the autobiographical charts, a really big one.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: People will see your book with say, I don’t know, Ant and Dec’s latest autobiographical book. Like they’re number one and you’re number six.
May King Tsang: That’d be lovely.
Tim Lewis: Well, it’s that exposure. And that is going to thrust your book into almost like a huge marketplace.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: And that would be the real hyper success level.
May King Tsang: Right.
Tim Lewis: Because that would just be so, now you almost certainly wouldn’t get into like the U.K. autobiographical chart. I mean, I don’t know what the categories are in the U.K. for autobiography. But you might get into like a business chart, which will get less sales. But people will, because there are people who are looking for books, they look in the chart or they will see somebody bought Ant and Dec’s autobiography also bought your autobiography. There’s like the also bought link. If you can get to the situation where Amazon is selling your book for you because of it’s previous success, that is what I would classify as real book success.
May King Tsang: Great.
Tim Lewis: Now, you’re right as in like, if one person buys it and if you change one person’s life with your book, you can argue that is success.
May King Tsang: Yes.
Tim Lewis: But if you was talking about like the extreme success, and which what I try to push people towards, at least having the chance of it. I mean, it’s all a betting game really at the end of the day. But you do want to be, you want to have a chance that your book will really take off and that Amazon or Apple or somewhere else will pick it up and it will explode. Because it’s almost like this chain reaction that you can get on these ecosystems of marketplaces where books are sold.
May King Tsang: Yeah.
Tim Lewis: That is the ideal level of success. It’s not a necessity at all. And lots of people, I mean I’ve had, I think my last book was successful because I’ve got speaking gigs out of it, I’ve sold quite a lot of copies, hand sold them in conferences. I’m sure I’ll sell more at Social Media Marketing World.
May King Tsang: Yes.
Tim Lewis: And I think it’s influenced people. And a lot of people have come back to me and tweeted at me saying how much they really enjoyed the book and they liked the lessons that I drew from it. So, I think the book has been successful based not like charted hugely anywhere. So, yeah. It’s an interesting question what success is.
May King Tsang: Yeah. I mean, absolutely your book is really timely. We’ve had this conversation before on LinkedIn and on Facebook how this week actually, it was a topic of discussion on Question Time where unfortunately a young girl took her own life because of the pressures of cyber bullying, and her father had said, “Instagram killed my daughter.” And it’s a horrific, horrific story. And of course, there were calls for the big social media platforms to really raise again to call these people out, because it’s absolutely horrendous. What your book does is talks about the positive aspects of social media, because there are too many headline-grabbing titles of the negativity behind social media. And I’m not taking anything away from the horrible stuff. I’ve been subject to bullying and trolls. I’ve been scuppered and all sorts of things. When I’m brave enough to talk about it, I will do in the future.
May King Tsang: But there are so many positive aspects of social media that we need to champion as well. People found love on social media in your book. People changed laws in your book. Someone talked about their success in your book as well. And so, I think that your book has come yeah, as I say, it’s really timely. Social media would not have existed, my business would not have existed had it not been for social media. And you were talking earlier about how if my book has changed one person’s life, then my job is done. And there are times where I have self-doubt about my business. Why am I doing this? Ra ra ra. And then I get a message in my inbox saying, “You are an inspiration. You changed my outlook.” And they express their gratitude. And that is just fabulous.
May King Tsang: So, in the conversation we’ve just had, I know now what my definition of success is, which is closure. When I finish the book, it will be the end of that particular chapter. And I will be able to look forward to the next chapter and my next book, and my next book. I already know what I’m going to write. It’s going to be a tea book. It’s going to be a book of tea recipes, and I’m really looking forward to going into that, because I’ve been away from the tea industry for a while, and I’m absolutely dying to get back into it.
Tim Lewis: Okay. So, sounds like you’re kind of on a winner, whatever happens anyway.
May King Tsang: Yeah. That’s right. Yeah.
Tim Lewis: Anyway, I think we’re done for this occasion. So, I’m not entirely sure when I’ll get you on the show next. Probably sometime towards the end of mid or end of February. So, good luck, and we shall talk again then.
May King Tsang: Thank you so much for having me, Tim. It’s been fun, as usual. And I will see you at the Atomicon and Social Media Marketing World in San Diego.
Tim Lewis: Yes, indeed. Well, thanks a lot for being on the show. Hey!
May King Tsang: Thank you. See you now. Bye!
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