Navigating Heart-Led Publishing with Michele DeFilippo

What does it really take to build a business that’s not just successful — but truly heart-led? ❤️

In this powerful episode, I sit down with Michelle DeFilippo, founder of 1106 Design, who’s spent over 50 years revolutionizing the publishing industry. 📚 Michelle shares the evolution of independent publishing, the pitfalls of traditional routes, and why keeping creative control is essential for authors who want to maximize revenue and impact.

We dive deep into what it means to lead with integrity, the importance of quality in book production, and how heart-led businesses can thrive by putting service and passion first. If you’re an aspiring author or entrepreneur, this episode is packed with wisdom you won’t want to miss!

✨ Ready to be inspired and take your business to the next level? Hit play and join the conversation!🎧 

Key Takeaways from this Episode

• Defining a heart-led business in the publishing world
• The shift from traditional to independent publishing
• The pitfalls of self-publishing companies and how to avoid them
• The importance of maintaining control and revenue as an author
• The journey from typesetting businesses to embracing digital publishing
• Tips for running a successful heart-led business without compromising quality

About the Guest

Michelle DeFilippo is a true champion for independent authors! With over 50 years of experience in publishing, she founded 1106 Design to help writers release top-quality books — while keeping creative control and maximizing their earnings. Michelle’s on a mission to help authors ask the right questions, avoid scams, and make smart, empowered publishing decisions.

Additional Resources

• Website: www.1106design.com
• Free book: Enter your email on the website and get your FREE copy of Publish Like the Pros!
• LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/1106-design-llc
• Podcast: https://1106design.com/podcasts/
• X: https://x.com/1106Design
• Pinterest: www.pinterest.com/1106design/1106-design-book-covers

Explore the Dialogue’s Treasures: Tap here to delve into our conversation: https://bit.ly/micheledi 

Up Next…
Explore the heart of business with Richard Parker’s humor, professionalism, and 30+ years of wisdom from 13 successful acquisitions and a best-selling program that’s helped 100,000+ entrepreneurs.

Transcript

Speaker 0:01

Welcome to the Heart-Led Business Show, where compassion meets commerce and leaders lead with love. Join your host, Tom Jackobs, as he delves into the insightful conversations with visionary business leaders who defy the status quo, putting humanity first and profit second. From heartfelt strategies to inspiring stories, this podcast is your compass in the world of conscious capitalism. So buckle up and let's go. Let your heart guide your business journey.

Meet Michelle DeFilippo: Publishing Expert

Tom Jackobs 0:38

Ladies and gents, pop open the Prosecco because today's show is a primo page turner. We're pursuing the publishing panorama with Michelle DeFilippo. With half a century of chapter turning cred, her company, 1106 Design, is the stuff scribes dream of. She's built a heart-led hub that helps authors avoid the pitfalls of publishing. And bag more bank with every book. So get ready to rock the realm of writing because today we're unlocking the captivating chat on this Heart-Led Business Show. Welcome to the show, Michelle.

Michele DeFilippo 1:13

Thanks so much, Tom. It's a pleasure to be here with you. I hope I can help your audience.

Defining a Heart-Led Business

Tom Jackobs 1:17

I know a lot of my audience has published books before and, or want to publish a book as well. And, most of them are afraid. I'm excited to get into this chat and unlock the ups and downs of publishing with you. First question, which is, what's your definition of a heart-led business?

Michele DeFilippo 1:38

My definition is a business that does right by its customers, always provides a good product or a good service, whatever it is they happen to be selling, and always takes care of the customer first. In my opinion, you always get that back because customers recognize it and appreciate it and then they don't go out and tell bad stories about you. To me, it's strategy.

Tom Jackobs 2:01

Yeah, no, that's great. And it's funny anytime that you start off with a really good onboarding process of a new client, even if there's little hiccups along the way, it's not a problem. They got it. But I tell you what, the opposite is tenfold worse because if you just have some, Main thing that goes wrong, then every little thing becomes a nitpicky thing with the client. And it's so hard to undo that. So I like that definition of just doing right by the client. that's awesome. So tell us a little bit about your business and what inspired you to have a heart-led business?

Michele DeFilippo 2:35

We work for independent publishers, self publishers, but we're not a publishing company. And that's the distinction that I spend a lot of time describing. If authors work with a publisher or a self publishing company, they lose control of their book and they also lose a great deal of money on the back end every time they sell a book. So my narrative is for authors to understand that there's an alternative to that, and that is an author services company like ours. there are many where you pay for the services that you need to prepare a good book, but that you keep 100 percent of the revenue from sales. And so it's a remarkably difficult message to get across because these publishing companies dominate the search engines and authors are more likely to find them first.

Tom Jackobs 3:24

Oh yeah. Yeah, definitely. But isn't the process of going through a publishing house pretty difficult for authors or want to be authors?

The Evolution of Publishing

Michele DeFilippo 3:33

Back in the day, there was only traditional publishing and it still exists, right? Traditional publishers would pay all the expenses to produce the book, the author would pay nothing, and then the publisher would take control of the book, shape it according to their sensibilities, and keep most of the revenue from sales. in They would pay the author what they called a royalty, and it was just a tiny percentage of the cover price, maybe 10%. That model still exists. when Amazon came to be, It was an earthquake in the publishing industry because all of a sudden authors did not need to go to a publisher in order to obtain distribution to the public for their book. So that's when independent publishing was born. The original idea was that The author would be the publisher. The author would pay for the services to produce the book, and the author would keep all of the net revenue from sales. Great idea, right? In the last 20 years, everything's gotten very complicated. We now have self publishing companies, hybrid publishers. Now some companies are just calling themselves publishers, but they're really self publishing companies in disguise. And what they charge the author to produce the book, and they also take Most of the revenue from sales on the back end. And so with authors need to ask better questions, right? And that's why I'm here. So the bottom line is in many cases, the publishing company is making more for every copy sold than the author is. And that's just not right.

Tom Jackobs 5:05

Yeah. Especially the intellectual capacity to actually put together a book and get it shaped the way that, it takes a lot of time I don't know, my book it's only a hundred pages and it took eight months of just pre publishing to get it to at a point where I want to publish it.

Michele DeFilippo 5:21

Yeah, and your book is great. I love the compact way you provide your information in chapter by chapter. And I think that's a perfect size book for today's marketplace. Not too many people have the patience to read a long book anymore. Um, but yes, it is a lot of work and even the authors who come to us, we know that they've worked months or years to produce that manuscript. I'm working for an author right now who has written a 500 page poetry book, and on it for 40 years. yes, I know, I know authors put their heart and soul into a book.

Challenges and Rewards of Heart-Led Businesses

Tom Jackobs 5:55

Yeah, absolutely. So why did you go down this route of basically you're basically a consultant to authors to get it self published? Is that characteristic?

Michele DeFilippo 6:05

Not just the consultants, where you could think of us as project managers. I have the team in place. That can deliver all the services that are needed, editing, design, and so forth. And then we show the author how to open up their own print on demand accounts, and then at the end of the job, we upload the files we've created to the author's own print on demand accounts and in that way, they get all the sales reports. They get all the revenue to their bank account. We don't take a penny of it. So they're in charge. They remain in charge.

Tom Jackobs 6:38

Oh, that's awesome. So why did you go down that route versus the traditional publishing?

Michele DeFilippo 6:43

I, my first job was at Crown Publishing in New York City in 1972. So I actually did start in traditional publishing, then my husband and I got the bright idea to move to Phoenix, where I found out I couldn't make more than minimum wage. Um, and So that's how I wound up opening my first business, which was a typesetting business. And that lasted for 13 years until Steve Jobs put every typesetting business in the world out of business.

Tom Jackobs 7:09

Back when you were doing it, was it the pressing type setting or like on machines that you were doing?

Michele DeFilippo 7:15

When I opened my business, computerized typesetting was first coming into being, but the machines were as big as a refrigerator and cost 35, 000 dollars which was as much as a house at that time.

Tom Jackobs 7:26

Yeah. Oh

Michele DeFilippo 7:28

But that, that lasted for 13 years and it, that was great. We did magazines, we did books, we did car ads, we did annual reports for corporations. It was a blast.

Tom Jackobs 7:39

Oh, that's really cool. And then what transferred you into what you're doing now?

Michele DeFilippo 7:43

Like I said, Steve Jobs put us out of business, so I went back to freelancing for a while. and then about four or five years after that is when indie publishing came into being. And I recognized that. Gosh, I know how to type. I know how to design. I can start taking advantage of this. And so I opened 1106 design.

Tom Jackobs 8:02

And how did the name come about?

Michele DeFilippo 8:04

By that time, that was 2001. There were no domain names left for graphics companies. So I used my birthday.

Tom Jackobs 8:11

That's great. That's a new way of finding a name And then you do the secretary of state named search, that name is registered. Oh, that's funny. Yeah. How things have changed.

Michele DeFilippo 8:23

It had an unintended consequence of listing me first in every database. I didn't know that was going to happen.

Tom Jackobs 8:29

Yeah, that's great. Oh, that's awesome. So what was the difference? Let's go back to your typesetting business. Would you consider that a heart-led business that you started?

Michele DeFilippo 8:40

Yeah, I can't say that I ever had one inspirational moment where I decided to run a heart-led business. I was just raised that way, that you should do the right thing. And that was also backed up in school, I went to Catholic school. So it was just natural to me that you're supposed to do the right thing.

Tom Jackobs 8:58

Oh, that's great. So even when, like, when you first had the job at Crown Publishing, what was that like versus now what you're doing in terms of the heart-led, working for a corporation versus working for yourself?

Michele DeFilippo 9:11

only a crown for about a year and a half or so. And that was they were just a baby company then they were just getting started. So they weren't too well organized. But I think I realized even then that a corporation was not going to be the route for me because. It was just big and nobody really had anything to say about how things were operating. You just had to listen to whatever your immediate supervisor told you to do. So that was frustrating.

Tom Jackobs 9:38

Yeah. I can imagine. And so now with your own businesses obviously there's been ups and downs with business that just is business in general. So have there been moments where you're like, gosh, I want to do right by the customer, but I need to pay my bills. And then what was the thought process that may have gone through your mind?

Michele DeFilippo 9:56

Of course, every business has good times and slower times, but again, just because of my upbringing, I never cheat the customer and do less than we should. Sometimes that means in a down economy that I don't get the job because customers are looking for lower prices, but I will never cut corners and put out a bad book for anybody.

Tom Jackobs 10:16

Yeah, that's great. And. Even if so you were keeping your prices away that you were feeling good about the prices when in a down economy, and it was okay to lose a customer because on price for you.

Michele DeFilippo 10:30

Creating a good book takes a lot of hours and I paid people who are talented and experienced and can do that. none of us want to do less than we're capable of doing. So sometimes, like maybe in the last year or two you get less business because you're not the cheapest.

Tom Jackobs 10:46

Okay. Yeah. But you're not willing, doesn't now he's, or sometimes means lesser than.

Michele DeFilippo 10:52

lesser quality. Yeah, I can't do that.

Tom Jackobs 10:55

That's good because a lot of heart-led businesses that I speak to, they will still do the same amount of work, but then discount their business just to get the business.

Michele DeFilippo 11:04

That, that's hard for me. We, I, I hire good people, so I don't have big margins.

Tom Jackobs 11:10

Yeah. Okay.

Michele DeFilippo 11:11

And I'm not gonna tell them I can't pay them what they're worth.

Tom Jackobs 11:14

Okay. Yeah. No, that makes sense.

Michele DeFilippo 11:16

that's not being a very good businesswoman.

Tom Jackobs 11:18

Actually it's been a very good business one because you're keeping your margins because that at the end of the day, it's only the margins that really matter.

Michele DeFilippo 11:25

That's right.

Tom Jackobs 11:26

And I had to learn that the hard way I was chasing after the gross revenue and the net revenue kept shrinking as I was approaching, a million dollars a year. And like, why is this happening? Like, why am I making this much money and nothing's left over at the end of the month?

Michele DeFilippo 11:42

That's I did experience that the typesetting business. I couldn't believe that people would want to use a Macintosh for their typesetting. and so the typesetting business declined steadily, but I wasn't really watching enough until it got critical. And it's like, why is there no money in the checking account?

Tom Jackobs 11:58

Oh,

Michele DeFilippo 11:58

And then, and then of course I had to make the decision to close it.

Tom Jackobs 12:01

What was that decision?

Michele DeFilippo 12:02

Terrible. it was even worse when I had to take apart the typesetting machine and throw it in the dumpster because I was leasing it and the industry was dying. The leasing company didn't even want it back.

Tom Jackobs 12:16

what are we going to do with it?

Michele DeFilippo 12:17

there was no market for it.

Tom Jackobs 12:19

Yeah.

Michele DeFilippo 12:20

so that was interesting.

Tom Jackobs 12:21

How long of a process was that for you to recognize that the business needed to close it ultimately closing?

Michele DeFilippo 12:29

it was years, right? Because it's so easy to deny what's happening and oh it'll pick up. it's got to pick up.

Tom Jackobs 12:35

Yeah.

Michele DeFilippo 12:35

And then one by one, I would call customers that I hadn't heard from in a while. And I would say, how have you been? And they would say, I bought a Macintosh, so we won't be back.

Tom Jackobs 12:45

Boy, it's so much easier now with this Mac. I can do it myself.

Michele DeFilippo 12:49

Yeah. And yeah the savings for them were, significant, right? In those days, we used to pay 125 to buy one font

Tom Jackobs 12:58

Oh, wow.

Michele DeFilippo 12:59

it was all to the company. Yeah. So we had a lot of expenses.

The Business Side of Heart-Led Ventures

Tom Jackobs 13:04

yeah, that's crazy. Cool. So let's shift to the business side of running a heart-led business. Cause a lot of heart-led business owners that are listening to the show, they struggle with Being okay with making a profit and being heartled at the same time. And like I said earlier, a lot of them like to give away their stuff. What words of advice would you give to some burgeoning heart-led business owners out there?

Michele DeFilippo 13:30

I would say that being heart-led is great. it's. a beautiful value, right? But you also have a responsibility to stay in business, to support yourself and your family. And if you price your product or service accordingly, then you will have extra money to donate to other heart-led businesses that you want to support. Don't cut off that process, because it really is a circle that you can complete by earning a good living.

Tom Jackobs 13:56

Yeah. And that's a great message to remind people of as well, is that the more you make, the more you can give as well.

Michele DeFilippo 14:03

the more people you can serve, because if you're not there, you can't serve anybody.

Tom Jackobs 14:07

yeah, I think that's probably the most important message too, is, as the flight attendants tell us, put our oxygen mask on first before. Helping others and we can't help people. Now, what kind of like really cool surprises have come up from being a heart-led business?

Michele DeFilippo 14:22

we get lots of kudos from authors and I love that that just makes our day, to, for somebody to recognize that they were treated right and that they got a good book at the end of the process, that's always gratifying. And as it would be for any heart-led business, I think, because sometimes You're not sure that it's recognized and you're not sure if you're just being someone who's naive and idealistic. Yeah. So the recognition is nice.

Tom Jackobs 14:47

that's great. And have you ever noticed like what happens to the books after you've helped the author? Do you keep track of their bestsellers or like what goes on after the fact?

Michele DeFilippo 14:58

No, I will say that this whole bestseller thing has become a scam that people are beginning to catch on to. Uh, it's usually someone who's tricking Amazon's computer. To put up a bestseller swatch when it's not really true. It's a bestseller for 45 minutes or and that's it. What was the question again?

Tom Jackobs 15:17

Yeah. If you keep track of your authors after they've published a book and see how their book does in

Michele DeFilippo 15:23

No, only indirectly because we don't participate in their revenue. I have no idea. really, whether they're selling the books well or not. But I can tell you that people come back and they do another book. So that's indirect evidence that it must have worked well enough for them to do it again. And we get tons of referrals from people.

Tom Jackobs 15:41

Oh, yeah. That's always the best way of determining customer satisfaction as well. Do you have any one author that kind of stands out as somebody that, was. Really a joy to work with, but the book was great, and it was just a good partnership between you and your client.

Michele DeFilippo 15:57

Oh, so many. We worked for a retired attorney here in Phoenix who wrote five Western novels

Tom Jackobs 16:04

Oh, wow. Really?

Michele DeFilippo 16:06

yeah, and he was great to work with every step of the way. We worked for a dentist, did basically a dental textbook with 150 charts and graphs. It was his life's work that he wanted to. get out there and put in tangible form. We just finished a book about Winston Churchill, 850 pages and thousands of footnotes.

Tom Jackobs 16:27

my gosh.

Michele DeFilippo 16:28

So yeah, and all of, I really don't have trouble with authors for the most part. The serious authors are usually business people and professionals themselves who understand that professional help is necessary, and there's that civility, that back and forth civility, which is important.

Tom Jackobs 16:48

So what does that process look like from when you get involved in the book process?

Michele DeFilippo 16:54

We will get involved when the author has a completed manuscript that they think is done to the best of their ability. And we'll start with an editorial evaluation to determine what level of editing it might need. Then we'll move on to editing and cover design. Then we'll do interior page design and typesetting, which is another being forgotten now. When a major publisher produces a book, they design the pages first and then they typeset the pages. And it's a complicated process. It's not what you hear now online where you should format your book word and just throw it together. that's not how a real book is done.

Tom Jackobs 17:31

Yeah. I had to hire a designer to do the interior. I was like, why? I don't know. I guess that makes sense.

Michele DeFilippo 17:37

Yeah. There's more to it than people think, but the reason for it, it's not just to spend money frivolously. It's because a well typeset book, people. access the information, they comprehend the information better because they're not distracted by poor spacing or poor line breaks or a hundred other things that typesetters think about.

Tom Jackobs 17:58

Oh yeah.

Michele DeFilippo 17:59

So then after that's done, we'll proofread to make sure we catch everything that everybody missed along the way. And there's always things to find.

Tom Jackobs 18:07

How many different people do the proofreading?

Michele DeFilippo 18:10

Just one after layout but the editor has also worked on the book before layout, and the author presumably has proofread many times. There's no such thing as too much proofreading. There's a joke in the publishing industry that when you open the first copy of your book, it will automatically open to the page with the typo.

Tom Jackobs 18:28

Yes, exactly. It did.

Michele DeFilippo 18:30

It just happens. You can't be helped. But the great thing about print on demand now is you can just correct it and upload a new file.

Tom Jackobs 18:36

Exactly. I did have to do that.

Michele DeFilippo 18:40

Yeah, it's not uncommon because everybody's human. So after the proofreading and several, usually several rounds of revisions, we'll make the ebook and then we'll upload all of the files to two accounts for our clients, kdp. com and ingramspark. com. And by using those two platforms together, you can get the widest distribution at the lowest cost and make the most money.

Tom Jackobs 19:04

Oh, okay. So it's Ingram press.

Michele DeFilippo 19:08

Ingram is the largest book wholesaler in the world, and they've been in business for a hundred years. And then they probably 15 years ago, 20 years ago, they opened up a print on demand division. And so they, Ingram will feed Books a million Barnes and Noble, libraries, other retailers and other distributors. That's about 20 percent of the market. Kdp. com is owned by Amazon. It's their print on demand division and they will feed all of the Amazon channels worldwide.

Tom Jackobs 19:42

Okay. And that's 80%.

Michele DeFilippo 19:44

That's 80%. 80 percent of books are sold on Amazon now.

Tom Jackobs 19:48

Oh, that's crazy.

Michele DeFilippo 19:49

Oh, I forgot to say Ingram also feeds the physical bookstores.

Tom Jackobs 19:53

Okay. Oh yeah. Both of them left. That's so sad. Do you ever get involved in the Audible creation?

Michele DeFilippo 20:01

yes, we do audiobooks for authors who want them, and those are selling like hot kicks.

Tom Jackobs 20:08

Yeah. I've noticed I did an audio version of mine as well, and those sales are doing much better than the print version and

Michele DeFilippo 20:15

Yeah,

Tom Jackobs 20:15

version too.

Michele DeFilippo 20:16

I love audiobooks even though I typeset print books, but I like them because I'm looking at a screen all day, and it's just nice to kick back and close my eyes and listen.

Tom Jackobs 20:25

Yeah, exactly. And you can be doing other things at the same time. Now my book is like an hour and 30 minutes, maybe at 1. 5. So it's like really easy to just go through a workout or something like that and listen, a good short book. Yeah. Cool. Awesome. That's interesting. Just the whole process. And I like how you broke that down. And cause I think a lot of authors don't really understand how much different things that they have to think about after writing the book.

Michele DeFilippo 20:56

yes. And that's where we come in, because we can facilitate that whole process for them. They don't have to hire seven freelancers and, wonder whether the person's going to actually complete the job. We get calls every week from authors who say, my designer disappeared, or they gave me files that won't upload. There's a lot of pitfalls out there. Can be avoided if you hire the right people.

Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Tom Jackobs 21:19

exactly. You get what you pay for. But cool. Michelle, how can people learn a little bit more about you and your company?

Michele DeFilippo 21:25

My website is 1106design. com and people can go there. I post all of my prices online. I believe in complete transparency in that regard. I have blog posts. I have design samples. You can click a button to request a consultation or you can use the little chat bot, uh, that's there. And I promise you that the way we work here is we will have a respectful conversation with you. If you want a consultation, I won't start sending you five emails a day to pressure you to do the next step. I just don't believe in doing business that way. If it's a good fit, we'll work together. And if it's not, we will wish you the best. And if you go to my website, you can download my free book called Published Like the Prose.

Tom Jackobs 22:11

Yes.

Michele DeFilippo 22:11

in PDF form, mine's only 88 pages, but it's a quick read. It will educate you on the steps to independently publishing the way it should be so you stay in control. And it'll even have the calculation in there so that you can figure out how much money you should be making every time you sell a book. And that way you can verify for yourself whether some publishing company is treating you right.

Tom Jackobs 22:34

Cool. Michelle, this was just a fascinating conversation today, and I'd love to pick your brain for hours, but we only have the 30 minutes for the show. So thank you so much for sharing your wisdom and sharing your heart-led business with our listeners.

Michele DeFilippo 22:50

Thank you, Tom. heart-led businesses are the way to go.

Tom Jackobs 22:53

They certainly are. And thank you listeners for checking out the show today or watching the show, if you're on YouTube, I certainly do appreciate it. I know Michelle appreciates it as well. And everything that Michelle is doing, we've linked up into the show notes as well, so it'll be just easy to click on there and go to her website and definitely download that PDF that, I wish I would have had when I was writing my book it probably would have saved me hours of time Until next time, lead with your heart.

Speaker 2 23:23

You've been listening to the heart-led Business Show, hosted by Tom Jackobs. Join us next time for another inspiring journey into the heart of business.