021: Publishing Isn’t What It Used to Be - and That’s Actually Good News

Publishing has changed dramatically, and for most people, that’s a gift - not a loss. 

In this episode, we unpack how self-publishing and Amazon KDP have reshaped the book industry and removed many of the barriers that used to keep meaningful books hidden. 

We talk honestly about fear, overwhelm, and the myth that “anyone can publish now, so does it even matter?” If publishing feels intimidating or risky, this conversation brings some honest relief.

In this episode, we talk about:

• How the publishing industry has shifted from gatekeeping to access
• Why self-publishing isn’t second-rate (it’s strategic)
• What still makes a book meaningful in a crowded market
• Why Amazon KDP lowers risk without lowering impact

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE

• This Week's Free Action Guide: The Calm Publishing Reality Check
• The Smart Soulful Business Facebook Community: smartbusiness.thrivecart.com/soulful-strategy-community

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🎙 Thanks for tuning in to Smart Soulful Business Podcast! See you next week!

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Transcript

Becky Brown  0:01 
If you're a Christian woman, building a business and want it to be purposeful and profitable, we've got you covered. I'm Becky.

Laurie Graham  0:08 
And I'm Laurie. We have both built successful businesses that we love without losing our faith, humor or our sanity. This is Smart Soulful Business.

Becky Brown  0:17 
Real conversations to help your business fit your life and not the other way around. Welcome back to Smart Soulful Business with Becky and Laurie.

Laurie Graham  0:30 
We are excited to be helping people build businesses that are soulful, strategic and grounded.

Becky Brown  0:36 
Yes, so last week, we started a really cool four-part series around writing a book. And we began with the idea around making the decision to actually do the thing. You've dreamed about this your whole life. You've kind of held it. We talked about the word, you know, it's kind of been lingering in the back of your mind your whole life. And last week, we talked about making the decision, giving yourself permission to actually do the thing. We talked about why so many people want to write a book, why that desire matters, and why finishing something meaningful and purposeful is a really powerful thing to do, and we believe everybody should write a book.

Laurie Graham  1:14 
Awesome. Today, we're talking about kind of a next step, but even a little broader, like step back, because we're gonna look honestly at the publishing side of things, because publishing has changed in the last decade, like tremendously. Like the whole industry of putting out a book is completely different than it used to be.

Becky Brown  1:33 
Yes, absolutely. So I'm gonna assume that you listened to last week's episode and you have gone through last week's episode and you have decided that you are going to move forward and write this book, whatever that meaningful thing is to you, you're going to write this book. And you've gone through the Action Guide, and you've named your big insurmountable obstacle already. But now, let's go to the next obstacle that may be in your mind, because it was in both of our minds, is okay, but like, do I have to find a publisher? How do I even do that? How do I get this book into people's hands once I write it? What does this even look like? And that part of the process can feel so unknown and intimidating and confusing and loaded with old assumptions, like Laurie said, this whole industry has drastically changed recently, and so we are going to catch you up and come join us.

Laurie Graham  2:24 
Yeah, and by the end of this episode, our goal, because we always talk about that, Becky and I talk about, like, what do we want people to feel like, by the end, what do we you know, why are we even doing this episode? One of our goals is that you would just feel relieved. Like this would take a lot of pressure off that, that we would all just be a little more informed, you know, and that we would know that we're not as behind as we think we might be, whether it's about how old we are, how long this idea is set, talent, skill, money, anything that this is doable and we're going to get some information. So for a long time, publishing felt like something that only a small group of people got into, like you had to be chosen to have your book out there. There were pitch, there's pitching. Like you'd have to pitch something to a publisher. And by the way, that is a huge, crazy process. Books came from publishers. Publishers chose the author. Like, think about the power balance, or the, you know, who gets to choose who. It was about the publishers, and being published meant that someone else said yes to you. Like, that's such a different feeling than today. We're going to unpack this. But what do you think that a lot of us learned along the way? Becky, just by watching just in our culture, growing up, even in schools, elementary school, junior high, senior high. What do you think we learned about who gets to publish a book?

Becky Brown  3:47 
Yeah, well, I can definitely speak for myself here and just say I absolutely believed that to write a book you have to be somebody. You had to be somebody famous. You had to be somebody who's already known. You had to be somebody who had already done something notable, big, important, and made a name for yourself already. And like, you had to be somebody who understands, or was connected to that whole publishing side of the business, where to even start in the publishing world, like I was just plain Jane girl, you know, like behind my computer. What did I know about any of that? And it felt like, oh, that's, that's a different world. That's not my world. That's what it felt like to me. What do you think you felt that same way?

Laurie Graham  4:29 
Oh, totally. And, and it was the truth, like 10, 20, 30 years ago, it was the truth. You could not self-publish. You couldn't publish your own book. You had to be picked. Like this is giving me flashbacks of junior high gym class, because I was never picked. Like people talk about being picked last like, I was never picked at all, you know, like I was like slim pickings back here, you know, but, but the truth is, is that's one of the things that's changed. Like, if we tried to publish back, there we were. And I also will say that I think, you know, when you're asking about like, what did we believe back then about who got to publish a book? I think I also had a picture in my head of somebody who had the time and the wherewithal, or, like, you know, you think about the old, I don't know. I'm thinking about somebody in England or Scotland, like, sitting in a dusty little room in an attic, who, like, was just writing and writing and writing for their whole life, and they either had a lot of money and had the luxury of sitting there, or they didn't have money, and they were, you know, eating bread and water because of the effort and the process being so slow and so taxing. Like, I thought that was how hard it was,

Laurie Graham  5:40 
like, only the few would even finish the book, right? You know, because it was

Laurie Graham  5:44 
so hard. But that feeling about being picked is a big one too.

Becky Brown  5:49 
Well and I'm actually going to throw a different perspective out there too, because I, as you were talking, I had this memory pop up that I haven't thought about in ages, because this, this happened right before I wrote my first book, my first Devotional. So there was a woman that I followed on Instagram, or whoever, wherever I followed her back then she wrote a book, and she was young and single, but she went to some other country. She was living on a beach for like six months, and she basically left her life behind. So that's what the perspective I want to throw out there is if you think that you have to remove yourself from your life to be able to write a book, we want to just like, pop that false assumption today, because that sounds really beautiful to me, to only have one job in life, to focus on writing a book and live on a beach and be like quiet without, you know, kids in the background, interrupting and stuff, and you can still write a book present in your life as it is right now.

Laurie Graham  6:51 
It sounds beautiful, but how not realistic, right? And the last thing I want to throw into here is that I think, you know, as we talk about the story we were taught about publishing or becoming an author. I think one of those other things, it's related to getting picked, but getting published was that stamp of worth. Getting published meant you are worthy. And we know that's not what makes us worthy, but I think that's part of that piece too, right?

Becky Brown  7:15 
Yeah, absolutely. And so we, we wanted to just start this episode by acknowledging those, by naming, by naming and recognizing what was true and what is no longer true. And so if you're still carrying that assumption in your head, we just wanted to pop that bubble for you today. So if you have been unintentionally taught who publishing was for or not for, we want to redefine that for you today.

Laurie Graham  7:44 
Yeah, yeah, it's just not the same as it was before. That version of publishing just is not the only version anymore, right?

Becky Brown  7:55 
So one of the biggest challenges is just this. You no longer need a publisher to put a book into the world anymore. I know. So self-publishing is no longer this backup plan, like small thing that wasn't really an option. It is a legitimate and a common path now. So what does it change, Laurie, when people realize that they don't need to go through the old channels anymore, that they can do this on their own, self-publishing, without publishers, what does that change?

Laurie Graham  8:32 
You know, I think the first thing is, the thought of self-publishing for some people is really daunting, and we're going to simplify that, because when you understand that this actually is doable, like the thought that I can self-publish and it's doable, like for the normal, every, average, everyday person, right? I want to say it demystify is not the right word. I'm thinking of the people in the castle. And I'm like, it brings it down to the common people. You know, I'm thinking of Cinderella like it's not just for it's the Cinderella picture, where the prince comes and says, You can be my bride, right? Like every day, just down to an everyday, I'm gonna say peasant, an everyday peasant, person who has been overlooked, who has been I'm literally picturing Cinderella right now. I just love that, that version that came out in 2016 like I'm picturing her with the cinder marks on her face and being called a nickname, like that person every one of us, because I put myself in that place, like it's becoming normal. It's not fringe anymore. This is what is happening as we realize we don't need publishers anymore. Tons of people are writing books now.

Becky Brown  9:47 
Yeah, yeah, and Print on Demand is opening up a whole new ease for us common folk, because they're printed as they're ordered and it's not the traditional publishing route anymore. It's just not the process anymore.

Laurie Graham  10:06 
And the Print on Demand means you don't need money to do this, everybody. That's what Print on Demand means. So we're going to talk more in upcoming episodes. We talk a lot about it in a course. We have a whole course that unpacks how to do this, basically with no money. Print on Demand is what Amazon KDP is, it means that you don't have a storage room in your garage with books. When people order it, it gets printed. I think you know, the other thing it means, or the other thing that changes is, is we realize that there's a process that we can do. Right? Like, oh, it's just doable.

Becky Brown  10:37 
Well, and in the last episode, when you were talking about the things that were holding you back from even starting writing your book. You had said talking to me about it, I made it sound more simple, more approachable, more doable. And that is what we hope that you listening today walk away with, is feeling like, Okay, this is approachable, this is doable. I can do that thing.

Laurie Graham  10:58 
Yeah and I think this is why almost anyone can have a book now, and I think this is so important to say, it's not because the standards have disappeared, it's not because the bar has been raised. It's because the system has changed. The system is accessible, and it also means today that publishing is far more flexible than people realize. Books aren't a one-shot high-risk moment anymore. It's very, very doable.

Becky Brown  11:30 
Yeah, yeah. And you know, the kind of the underlying thing that we're talking about is, what are the fears that we need to kind of troubleshoot along the way, as we're considering, what does this look like to write a book? So a fear of, oh no, I have to find a publisher and go that old, traditional route, and that's overwhelming. Okay, we addressed that one. Let's move on to another really common fear that a lot of people, us, included, have had when it comes to writing a book as a blogger, as a content creator, as whatever you are, as a fill in the blank.

Laurie Graham  12:04 
Yeah, I think one of the big fears that you and I have heard from a lot of people, from friends, from people in our communities and our businesses, is like, well, if everybody can have a book now, if it's so easy, does mine matter? You know, the truth is, we live in a world full of content. There's blogs, there's podcasts, there's videos, there's courses, there's social posts. It makes sense that many of us wonder, does another book even matter? Because it feels so the world feels so oversaturated with ideas and information and content. So let's unpack this, because we Becky and I, we believe that it does matter. We believe your voice matters. We believe your message matters. We believe what God has put uniquely in you matters a lot. So Becky, why does the idea that anybody can publish now make people feel uneasy?

Becky Brown  12:53 
Yeah, well, and like you said, like we live in this world full of content, right? So I feel like I can speak to this pretty confidently, because this is a fear I've had to continually address over and over again, and in just in writing a book, but also in just creating my blog content, my social media content, well, somebody else has shared this Bible verse before. Why do they need to hear it from me? Somebody else has written on this topic before. Why should I write about this? And what I want to continually remind you out there listening of is, yeah, the topics been written about, but not by you. They want to hear your voice. They want to hear your perspective. They want to hear your insights. What? What has the Lord's been speaking to you about in that area? How has he changed your life? What? What is your unique experience that you bring to the table that nobody else has, or if they have, they haven't written about it. And so I guess that is the reminder that I have to come back to myself a lot, is that, yeah, the topics out there, like, you know, maybe there's nothing new under the sun, but your perspective on it is and it's needed, and it's meaningful and it's purposeful, right?

Laurie Graham  14:00 
Yeah, you know, I think too, like, as we're talking about, you know, how the publishing industry has changed, right? It has brought up a lot of different things, but as you were talking about, like, your voice matters and how you say it is different from somebody else, I am reminded in college, I had a professor that just made such a difference in my life, and his name was John Gibe, and I remember going home and telling my mom, Well, John said this, and John said that, and John said that, and at one point she looked at me and said, Yes, it was years later. She said, Yeah. I was just like, I've said those things to you your whole life, and now you hear it from him, and you're just like, This guy is amazing. And my kids have done that to me, right? Your little ones have! Okay, because I'm like, as your kids get older, it's like, okay, they're so impressed by this person who said the same thing you said when they were eight. But I think this is like, this is like, humanity, and I think it goes back to how God has built us for connection, for learning and community, and during different seasons or different times, different voices who could say the same thing, maybe in a different way, or maybe saying something new, like way back when. I don't know who the big business management guru guy was, but it was a man, and everybody said, Oh, this is how we do business management. And then other voices came up, and other voices, oh, it doesn't have to be just that one way. So I think we need to just make sure that in this age of publishing shifts where everybody can have a book, that we remind ourselves that, yeah, mine does matter.

Becky Brown  15:28 
Yeah. And the other thing to remember now is that, you know, these are different mediums that you're working with. You might be a blogger or a content creator or a podcaster. I don't know what you do, but what you do all those other things, podcasts and social media and blogs, they kind of accomplish different purposes than a book does, you know, like when I am sitting down at my quiet time in the morning, I don't want to open my computer, but I absolutely will crack open a Devotional or a journal, and so just keep that in mind that a book isn't competing. It's not trying to replace or do the same thing as social media. It does something different. And yeah, it's something more tangible. People get to hold on to this resource, they get to reuse and reread this resource, and it feels different. It feels different. So yeah, just again, the reminder that, if everyone can have a book, does mine even matter? Yeah, yours matters. Your people, especially if you have any kind of an audience right now, in whatever you're doing, podcasting, blogging, whatever, then do the thing.

Laurie Graham  16:44 
Okay, so Becky, we've been talking about how publishing has changed. Let's give some real life examples, because what we're basically saying is you don't have to be the princess in the castle anymore to write a book. You don't have to be chosen by a publisher. You don't have to go through a long, arduous time of pitching an idea to a publisher. If anybody's looked into this, it's insane. Like pitching an idea, hearing back and working with contracts, and it takes like five years for your book even to come out, and then you have no control over it. By the way, we haven't really talked about that publishing edge, but we are big self-publishing promoters, and not that the publishing industry is not worthy, because it totally is. And I'd love to also have a book published by a publishing company, because it carries a little something with it differently, right? But when you publish a book with a company, you also don't own it, like, there's some hybrid approaches now too. But like in the old days, publishing a book, like, after a couple years, they literally removed it from the shelf so nobody could buy it. So in today's world, when you self-publish, you can be getting residual income off that for as long as you want. You're in control of it when you self-publish. So there's so many differences. But let's, let's just take it back to our experience. Becky, can you do you want to share a little bit just about your experience? I know, for people who are really looking for the step-by-steps, we have a whole course. The show will be, the link will be in the show notes about how to literally take your book and publish it on KDP, taking you through step-by-step. But just for some overalls of like, what does this look like? What can it look like? Do you want to share your experience of, actually, if you could do a little bit of both books, like your first book, and then, I mean, I know there's been, how many books have you written that are published right now?

Becky Brown  18:23 
Oh, I don't what do you count a few. I have a lot of low-content books, right?

Laurie Graham  18:27 
Let's talk about your Devotional book. And then the one you just put out, the Big Bible Study, because I think those are so different.

Becky Brown  18:32 
So different. Oh, my goodness, yeah. And just my knowledge and experience between those two, it was years different. So, yeah, very different. Okay, so first go around, had no idea what I was doing. I was like, piecemealing it together with random Google searches. And you know when we're talking about this unspoken expectation of, oh, I need a publisher. Well, I had a ton more of those than just that. I thought, Okay, I need an editor. I need a formatter. I need like my list was long, and so I actually had a woman from my Small Group, who was an English teacher and so, she was really kind and offered to edit the whole thing for me. And here's what I learned from that. I needed her editing. I had some grammatical mistakes and wording that needed tweaked and stuff along the way, but her editing also removed a little bit of my voice. So some of her edits I chose not to even accept, because I was like, oh, but that's not me anymore, and this whole point is, for me to write this thing. So just something that I learned along the way that may be helpful for you, too, is that following rigidly might not be the best way to get you, your perspective out into the world, that you get to retain some of you, even if it's not the form perfect way. I don't even know how to say that, like even if it's not what's expected.

Laurie Graham  19:54 
So from start to finish, your first book that you put out, which I know you still make money off of today, and you don't spend a lot of time marketing or anything. How much time did it take you from when you started writing to getting it up? It's okay if it's longer than it should be.

Becky Brown  20:08 
It was longer. It was longer than it should be. I kept writing and rewriting and deleting and rewriting and and it took me probably, probably three months to write the 30-Day Devotional, and then another month or so going back and forth on the editing, and then maybe a couple more weeks to do the formatting and stuff.

Laurie Graham  20:26 
So six months out, you had a book that was published on Amazon. Okay, I thought it was gonna be a whole lot longer, because when you, well, when you told me, like you can do this, like, I would say it was probably, probably four months. So I probably skimmed it down to four, but I could have done it in three easily. Like, when I think back now, I'm like, oh, that could have been a little shorter, too. And then I know this last book project for you was a heartfelt research, beautiful Bible study. Like, it's so different. How long did that take you? Do you think from start to end,

Becky Brown  20:58 
that one probably took me six, well, maybe even longer than six months. But here's what was different about that process. The Bible study was so integrated in what I was already doing. So this Bible study came from what I was already learning from the Lord in my quiet times, anyways. And so it was almost like I was transferring my Bible study notes into a format so that people could actually use it. And it felt so different. Like, I think before it was like, Okay, I'm writing blog posts, and then I've got to set this whole separate thing. And this, like, this writing the devotional, is a whole separate world of things. And this time, it wasn't separate. It was very integrated into this is what's real for me right now. This is what's important for me right now. And that was a really cool shift. Now I'm not going to try to minimize it and say it wasn't still a ton of work. Writing for somebody else is a whole lot different. Walking somebody else through the process is a whole lot different than just being led by the Lord and doing it yourself. That's a whole lot different, my scribbled notes and making it legible for somebody else and sensical for somebody else. But it was really cool the second time around that it just felt like, Oh, this is just such a natural overflow of what I'm already doing here.

Laurie Graham  22:08 
And I'm so laughing that you and I are like, Oh, it took four months. It took six months. It could have been shorter, like, for most people, if you could write a book in six months, you'd be like, Oh, hey, that was amazing, because we make it so much different than it is. And so we're just excited, you all, to help you do this because it is not, it doesn't have to be overwhelming. And by the way, Becky, neither time she wrote a book was she holed up in a monastery by herself with everybody else, watching her kids and taking you know, you've lived a full life in the middle of this. And so I really I'm grateful that you shared that, because I wanted everybody just to hear like, this is doable, if this is doable, for a woman with two littles, who also runs a business, struggles with insomnia, is involved in her church without losing your sanity, because I just want to say, Becky is my friend. She has great boundaries, like, as soon as we're done recording this, she's going to go back to parenting, and she's not working for the rest of the day. Because I know what your day is today. Your kids had a snow day. They're off school. You're not working around the clock, yeah, not on your business. And so I think, I think this the way publishing is now, the way we can do it is flexible, and we can fit it around our lives, right?

Becky Brown  23:17 
Yeah, and the other thing is that you can also fit it around your strengths and weaknesses. I wouldn't have said that, like editing necessarily was a weakness of mine, but it's okay to ask for help. It's okay to ask for help from your friends. You ask your sister to help you edit things like, it is okay to ask for help when you need it. And I kind of want to say that out loud to you, because that was, again, an unspoken, unconscious expectation that I had, is if I'm choosing to do this, I just need to figure it out and do it all myself, and I need to learn formatting, and I need to learn editing, and I need to learn KDP all myself. And that, again, is a big reason why we created these courses, because you don't have to do all of that. You don't have to, and we're just going to give you really practical, specific tips for each step of this. So yeah.

Laurie Graham  24:02 
Before we wrap up, because you brought this up, Becky, I just want to let everybody know you don't have to hire any professionals to help you. When you talked about editing, I two friends at church helped me edit my book. You and I have both designed our own book covers, which I probably won't do in the future, but we did it like it's totally fine. And you have, you know, there's a high school kid who could help you design your book cover. My books, I did pay for formatting for my books. I did find somebody on Fiverr to format my books, and they were less than 50 bucks to have them formatted. And I was like, Oh, 50 bucks for my first one. I was like, if I don't make at least 50 bucks on publishing a book, there's something wrong with me anyway, you know what I mean. So I was like, I did pay for formatting. And, yeah. So anyway, we're just excited to be sharing these things with you, you know, let's just talk about how the story, the old story of publishing, you know, we talked about what's changed. We talked about why self-publishing matters. It is not less than I just want to say that. Having access doesn't make books meaningless, like being able to do it ourselves, you know, let's take the Cinderella picture again from the commoner. It doesn't make books less meaningful. It makes them more possible, yeah. And, you know, just a little simple step, you know, write down what you think publishing requires, like, right now, just write down, unless you're driving around a treadmill, because it's dangerous. But like, write down, what do you think publishing requires? And then ask yourself, Is this still true, or is this something I learned years ago that no longer fits? And this week's free Action Guide is going to help you too. It's called the Calm Publishing Reality Check. I know, and it's true, the Calm Publishing Reality Check, you can just grab it in the show notes. It's a free little Action Guide. It may help you sort out what's required, what's optional, what you can change later. The link is in the show notes. So if this episode brought up a sense of relief to you that is not accidental, that was what we wanted to do. That's part of why this series, why we're creating it. We want to take the fear away before it turns into avoidance we have created, or we are creating, two different courses that we're going to help you bring your book into reality.

Becky Brown  26:12 
Yeah, and just in this series, we we talked in the last episode about the decision. The decision comes first making the decision, I'm taking this from just a pipe dream, and I am deciding I will actually take action and do this thing. Okay, so it becomes a reality. And then today we have moved into, okay, let's understand what does publishing look like? What are my options here? And that permission of self-publishing opens up this whole world of freedom. So what's coming in the next episode, Laurie.

Laurie Graham  26:40 
Yep, and the next episode, we're going to talk about something closely connected to this. It's a pressure that we unknowingly put on the first book. The first book has to be everything. For those of you who are listening, who, if you already wrote your first book, that pressure can continue to our second book, to our third book. So just that pressure we put on a book to be everything, or say everything or be good enough?

Becky Brown  27:03 
Yeah. So we're going to unpack that in the next episode, Why Your First Book Doesn't Need To Be A Best Seller, legacy piece or a once in a lifetime statement that you hold to forever, and why releasing that expectation often creates momentum instead of resistance.

Laurie Graham  27:18 
Yeah. And if you want to write a book, I'm going to tell you right now, we are going to lower the fear, and we're going to make going to make it easy. All right, if you want steady support while you are building something meaningful, we want you to come back and join us in the Soulful Strategy Community. Again, anytime we mention links, they are in the show notes. We have an ongoing community where we show up every week and every day just helping people put into emotion what we're talking about in this podcast, we keep it super affordable, super light. It's literally $9 a month. I've never seen a membership that involves real people, that's slow, because we want you to be successful. Okay, we don't want you to do this alone. So thank you for spending time with us today and ongoing. For those of you in our community, let's keep growing it because we are just we're doing our dreams. We're leading it. We're leading the way of our own lives, which is one of the things that I love. So we are cheering you on as you take your next step. So until next week, go team.