Episode 29: How writing a book can change your story - with Lucy McCarraher MBE

00:00 Hey, Susan here. Before we jump into the episode I wanted to let you know that i'm running a free storytelling masterclass on zoom on Friday the 18th of September at 12 noon UK time We'll start in a thrift shop in New York we'll talk about James Bond and you'll see that you have so many stories that you could be sharing in your business You'll see how to break them down into short, easy-to-share stories and we'll work on one of them on the call. To join me simply register at thebusinessofstories.com slash free masterclass then look out for the zoom link that you will get sent by email put Friday 18th September at 12 noon in your diary and I'll see ya there!

00:54 You're listening to The Business of Stories with Susan Paton, showing you how to share stories that do the selling in your business so you don't have to. I talked in episode 26 about how writing and publishing my book was a key moment on my business journey that not only helped me to refine and shape the unique storytelling process that now sits at the heart of what I do But also pivot from working one-to-one with clients to reaching way more business owners, with courses and programs that people can do on their own or with me from anywhere in the world. It also opened so many opportunities for me including speaking on stages from London and Brighton to Ireland and Barcelona

01:47 So, I asked my publisher Lucy McCarraher MBE to come onto the podcast to talk about how writing a book can change your story and your business. And really position you as the guide in your customer's story like nothing else can! Thankfully Lucy agreed to come and share lots of great tips & insights on how to write the book that builds your business Here's my chat with Lucy. So, welcome to The Business of Stories podcast, Lucy! It is so lovely to have you here

02:26 And I have to start by saying a huge congratulations because you have just been awarded an MBE for your services to publishing and diversity, is that right? That's right. Yes yes so my work with women and books. Yeah which is so fabulous and so well deserved because I know it's been your mission for some time to get more women and more diverse voices writing business books so that is an incredible achievement. Congratulations! I thought it would be great to get you on the podcast now because in a recent episode, I spoke about how I transitioned from working one-to-one to working with groups and creating courses and programmes. And how a really key part of being able to do that was getting my process out of my head

03:18 And then actually how writing my book helped me refine and crystallise and bring that process to life. And then a funny thing happened, I looked at the schedule and saw that this episode will be going out on 11th March and that date is actually very significant! But the 11th of March is the date that my book was published, so four years ago. Can you believe that? I can't believe it's been out for that long! It's still very fresh in my mind and your book still feels very fresh and wonderful. So no congratulations happy fourth book birthday! Thank you thank you very much um...so there are lots of things that i want to talk to you about today

04:06 In a business book and how a book positions you as the guide in your customer's story. And how your own story can change when you become an author, mine certainly did was definitely a pivotal piece in my journey that I'm so glad you encouraged me to do. So lots of talk about but firstly do you want to just introduce yourself? Let everybody know who you are and what you do Sure. Well, I am the co-founder and CEO of BookMagic AI which is an app that helps you write specifically your business book. And when I say business, I mean the book that will build your business. It's both a coaching platform and a writing platform so it helps you get through the whole process

04:52 So I hope you've found this podcast helpful. I've been a book mentor for the Key Person of Influence program, particularly for the last 12 years. So I have taken well over 1,000 entrepreneurs through the process of positioning planning and writing their books And through that time I've developed a process that makes it much easier. It's a very daunting process to begin with, especially if its your first book and writing is not necessarily your thing so thats what BookMagic is about. It uses AI, the absolute best of AI

05:46 Use AI to write your book for you. I have to say that up front, but use this AI to help you position, to plan structure, to ideate, to create, to work too, to create an ideal reader avatar all that sort of thing and then to promote your book afterwards as well it's brilliant! But anyway that's my main job if you like at the moment but i've also been...I'm the founder of Rethink Press, founder of The Business Book Awards And I'm an author myself, so I've written 14 books as well. The

06:52 I Because you don't want to send the finished article, you want to get input now that's going to help you. And I'm so glad I did because that feedback I got was so helpful and definitely the book is better for having done that at that stage So...I know it's a phenomenal process! So yes lots of things i wanna talk about The first thing is

07:29 How a business book positions you as the guide in your customer's story. And this is, I talk about this all the time is that your job is to show people that you are the person that gets them, that understands where they're at, understands where they want to go and has the plan, the process, the map to help them get there and a book does that brilliantly right? A book is an absolutely iconic format in my view. I mean, it's classic it goes back centuries but it's also incredibly modern. There's still an awful lot of kudos in the format of a printed book you know a nicely printed book people will say there's all sorts of rubbish out there and indeed there is but well published, well edited beautifully written books

08:21 I think it does say absolutely guide. I am here, I have expertise, I have filled a whole book with my knowledge And, you know, you can see it visibly here. You can turn the pages and read my words and I think that is something really special. And nobody throws away a book if you send somebody a book or gift somebody a book If they buy a book it has an actual tangible monetary value so its...it's special in that sense as well It's not a business card, it's not a marketing brochure

09:06 It is, you know an item of value. So it's different in that sense I always call it your undercover sales agent because you know, it's none of those overt marketing tools but it is a brilliant marketing tool It's valuable and that is how a book works. Yeah, definitely! And what about how it positions you? You know like you said that credibility... I've been introduced on various podcasts and speaking at events and without fail they always say published author and immediately that level of credibility goes up a notch right

09:46 Absolutely. It really changes how the world sees you and the way to make sure that you have a book that does position you correctly is to start right at the beginning with, we have our positioning tool which I don't know if you remember Susan, that I took you through and it's called The Three Ps of Position and it's where you define really clearly who Pain and Promise

10:28 And the pain bit is about where the person, your ideal prospect finds themselves when they come looking for your help either your services or your book. But you need to show them right away Right at the start of the book that you understand where they're at and in many cases that you've been there yourself. And, that you are going to show them how to get to the stage that your promise is basically the content of your book it's how you solve the problem soothe the pain answer the question that they have when they come looking for you and your expertise. So it's really identifying that person, pain and promise at the start and making sure you are writing exactly that book that then makes your book the perfect tool for talking to your ideal prospects. Yeah such a good point! And I talk about this a lot inside Storytelling Mastery when i'm talking about creating content...writing anything really

11:28 is switching that light around. It's not about you showing off or worrying about what people will think, the minute you turn that focus to the person that you're writing this for and this really helped me when I was writing my book because like everybody else, you know, I went through those moments of is anybody going to read this? Does anybody want this? Have I got anything unique to say But I just kept bringing myself back to the person I was writing it for and I knew it would help them. Like, I actually had a specific person in my head – it was a client that I'd just finished working with

12:05 And I wrote the book that if she hadn't come and worked with me, what was the book that would have helped her anyway? What's the book... Perfect. Yeah! How would I have taken her through that process if I wasn't doing it one-to-one? That really really helped me so anytime that I started to wobble or you know imposter syndrome came in or any of those things I just thought about Marian. It was Marian and I just thought, I'm writing this book for her and she needs...I know this will help her! And that's what kept me going so i think it's the same with anything that you're creating whether it's blogs whether it's a YouTube channel whether it's podcast or whether it's a book

12:46 When you have those moments of worrying about, well anything. I mean there's all sorts of internal stories isn't there that can get in the way when people are writing their book but i definitely think that one of the ways to manage that is to remember who you're writing it for Do you find that a lot of authors get in there? Yes, absolutely. I mean and ultimately it's all about value what you have to say and the fact that you have the experience and you've done this work You've worked with clients over years however long or short that is but you know that you can bring value to people so that's what you're doing in your book you're showing people you're not necessarily giving them

13:27 Every little detail of what you do, you're not writing a manual in your business book so people can go away and try it out on themselves because that's not the point. And they don't have your expertise but you are demonstrating to them your value and if I think as you're absolutely right if you bear that in mind...and it's about…I think in so many ways I like to think of your book is your gift to the world You know, it may be a big world in terms of you may have a very wide market or it may be a very niche world and you may literally just have a few potential clients. But that's fine! I think one of the stories that people tell themselves that stop them writing their book is, I need to come up with some amazing unique original idea that's going to be a bestseller and change the world and people are going to be amazed by it...

14:18 That's not the book that will build your business and no, you don't need to do that. And there are very few books really that actually do that and then work for the author. Your book is your gift to those people who you can help, who you can offer your promise to. Even just by reading your book they will get so much out of it but the ones who you can really then help are the ones I understand what you do. I get the value of what you do, and would now like to come and work with you for the implementation of this. And if you are delivering that in your book then you are delivering value – you have no reason to have imposter syndrome because you're talking about what you know, how you do it, why you do it… How can that not be valuable to people who need to hear it? Yeah absolutely!

15:09 And like I said at the beginning, one of the reasons that I did it was because I wanted to work out how I could reach more people. Up to that point, I'd been working one-to-one very much done for you mostly so it was really me doing the work for them and obviously I could only work with a handful of people doing that It was quite intense, it was quite exhausting and I was very limited. I could only do a couple at a time So this really was my way of creating something that I could then, because I guess the first thing I had to do was is this something I can show other people how to do? You know is this something that I can I

16:14 A lot of people were making storytelling very complicated. I've read books that talked about the hero's journey and all the nuances and all the different steps, and I just thought most business owners just want it to be really simple like that's a lot for people with everything else they're doing in their business they just want something really simple so i wanted to make it simple for people also Create my own IP, right? I wanted to have something that was mine. People can still copy it but I wanted to have something that I could really own and take ownership of and I think that's an important part of the process too isn't it? It is a very important part of becoming a published author. People often say to me – again this is one of those stories people tell themselves about why they shouldn't write their books

17:08 I'll show everybody what I do. My competitors will steal my material, my clients will go off and do this on their own." None of that is true! If you put your process out into a published book as you have very clearly, that process that you own, that you guide people through it is your IP and public Publish is exactly what you're doing. You're making it publish, you're saying this is mine your book has a copyright notice in it which says this is your IP and that is laying claim to your expertise and your specific way of doing things so for both of us there are lots of books out there about how to write books for you there are lots of books out there about how to tell stories

17:50 But my specific way and your specific way, which we know helps other people and resonates with people and has great outcomes for people is there in our books. And it is ours! So I think that's another great reason... People might steal your ideas or borrow from them. I mean, if they're good that's inevitably going to happen but ultimately they cannot use your process using the same terminology or the same steps as you because it's out there in your book! Everybody will know if they've taken it from you. Yes and also... They won't have done The 10,000 Hours that I did first right? I did seven years of working one-to-one with clients

18:35 Before I even thought about, okay how can i now take this all this work that I've done and how I've honed my craft and developed. Really important outcome that they will get from their book is absolute clarity. They will get clarity about their own process because yes, you work through it with people and you've gone through it and your experience in the years that you've been doing it are really really important as you say in honing your craft and what you do But when you write it down, when you actually have to divide it up into a structure, a learning journey for your readers. You have to put it in the right words. You have to keep it sufficiently simple but give them enough detail that they really understand what you do that's unique to you. You get massive clarity and I don't know about you but a lot of people when they write their book

19:32 And then actually create the IP. So, the steps that they go through – they might give it a name or an acronym which also creates the structure of the book but then you know… They have that from the book and when you've written 30 to 40 thousand words you have this amazing archive of repurposable content And any time you want to create a new course or write a keynote speech, or even use it for blog posting or social media posting. It's already written! You've just got to take it and use it. Also, it goes into the archive of your head as well when you write something down and go through it into first, second, third drafts...you are clarifying and clarifying and its there then held in your mind anytime somebody asks you question or you're going to give talk

20:23 I was talking to somebody about this the other day. I think the very act of writing, and this is one of the reasons why we'll talk maybe a little bit about AI in a minute but one of the reason that I don't use AI to write my content because I want to keep my voice But also because the very act of writing helps me so much to, like you say, crystallise my thinking. Get my ideas down into something that's going to flow and make sense for people and refine it as I go. And I was listening to somebody on a podcast the other day and he said the reason he can come onto any podcasts

21:08 Everything that he does and pull examples out of thin air, all of those things is because he's spent hours and hours writing. Because he writes every day right? He actually sends an email every day but it's that process of writing which really helps you to become the expert right? I mean, neurologically speaking writing is a very positive process. It helps you create it's creative but it's also as you say refining so it gets it right as you write. I will say though that some people really don't enjoy writing and writing is not their thing and it may be because they're dyslexic or it maybe because English for instance is not their first language and that's fine

21:54 You can speak your book as well and that's why in BookMagic we have a really good voice to text function too so you can speak but it will then appear on the screen. So, the written element is there so you could see it and edit it down. And so, I mean, I think writing can cover different ways of creating words but it is that process of putting things into words that is really really important Yes absolutely just thinking it through you know logically and then how do I actually share this with people in a way that's going to make sense to them? Position me the one way I want to be positioned

22:38 And you're right, that process I really cemented when I wrote the book has become the foundations of everything I've done since. Including the podcast! All my courses, my program. Even my one-to-one coaching packages I... people know the process that i'm going to be taking them through so it really sits at the heart of everything that I do. Fantastic! Well in my book you are my case study that goes through..I have lots of kind of individual case studies of things that people have achieved through writing and publishing their books. I follow you in my book or readers will follow you from the very start

23:17 Yes, I completely had forgotten that. What's the book? Is that The Book Magic? That's Book Magic yes! Amazing and I love that your book is littered with stories including my story as mine is too And that's something that I think that maybe people who are approaching writing a business book don't necessarily know. Like, how much story do I put in? You know does story fit in a business book and how much of it should be my story and yeah what what's the kind of tips that you give people around that? Yeah well the tips I would give people are on the whole

24:10 Don't make it all about you. So I think people are often tempted to think that they must explain themselves at the beginning of the book and tell their entire story in chapter one, yeah actually that's not that's kind of delaying what your reader actually wants they don't necessarily need to know your entire backstory so i wouldn't start with that but what i would do is to dot anecdotes of your story, whether it's your life story or your business journey and whichever is relevant to your readers through the book. So you are being open with them. You are engaging with them in a personal way but the stories you should tell are about how how you learnt what you know

24:54 So that often is telling stories of failure, of where things went wrong and then you know where you learn to do it better. Because that really helps people to engage with you and understand why you are now the expert And it helps them know like and trust you so don't fill your book with your entire story but take little interesting moments from your story and sort of regularly intersperse them through your book And then the other kind of story that I think is really important, that we've kind of touched on is having case studies. Yeah and the important thing to do is again not to have great long case studies where you go into detail but little short interludes where it's almost like a little sort of illustration, a little piece of fiction that people are...I mean it's not, its factual even if you have to anonymise but they're stories as opposed to information

25:45 And if you set up the subject, whether it's a business or person. It is good to make it personal so that people can visualize who you're working with and their problem your intervention and the outcome If you do that in about 250-300 words and put quite a lot of those in as illustrations More informational content. It's a lovely way of getting people to see what you actually do with your clients on the ground and what successes you have, but it's also the more variety of case studies you can put in, the more of your ideal prospects will be able to go, ah that's what I need! That's me i'm in that position so give tell those stories make people feel

26:34 They relate to these and then you will get people coming back to say, look what you did with that person or that business there. That is what I need now so how can we work with you? And that's what your showing the implementation. In fiction there is a sort of adage that you need to show not tell Now in business books, obviously you have to tell. You have to tell them what your process is but if you show as well and that's storytelling... That brings it to life doesn't it? Exactly! Yeah absolutely and I've had people say to me exactly that, you know, I was reading your book and I read that story and that really resonated with me, you know, that's me, that's where I am so they can be really powerful, I agree

27:18 And yeah, that's exactly what I did with my story was I just weaved moments along the way. You know probably no more than eight or nine little moments along the way but it just helped again to just...the reader to feel like they're getting to know you as the book goes on and they're starting to trust you and build a relationship with you I do wonder what you say to people who ask when is the best time to write a book because i remember you asking me quite a few times, reaching out to me and saying are you ready to write your book? And i kept saying no no no i'm not ready.

27:55 And then I remember, I said to you, oh God it would have been sometime in 2021 and you said to me are you ready? And I said Oh no! I'm only just putting my process together. And you said well then it's the perfect time so write your book So what is your kind of tip around when is the best time to write a business book That's a really good question. I think my generally, my tip is if you have been working in your business in whatever it is you do for a minimum of two years and you have clients who've had outcomes

28:30 Even if you haven't got a very kind of worked out process, there is a process that you take people through and it works. Then you are in the right place to write your book if you've been doing it longer You're definitely in the right place to write your book If you've got a process that has a clear sort of structure maybe a name then absolutely definitely I think if you haven't been doing it that long and you don't have case studies, for example. And you know, you can't kind of prove your outcomes, I suppose then maybe you're not quite ready to write it but I will just caveat that by saying some people have actually

29:09 I actually start a business by writing a book even before they've got the business going. Some people have such a clear idea of what they're going to do and how they're going to take it forward, and what process that they are going to use or maybe it's based on something they've done before then you know...I do know people who have written the book and made that kind of jumping off point for whole new business so I wouldn't like to discourage anyone who feels like that but I think most people feel that it's never quite the right time to write the book. It's like having a baby, nothing is ever perfectly aligned but actually getting started is the thing and if you say oh I haven't got my structure worked out yet or I don't know enough about writing a book, I'm going to wait till the time is right then you'll probably never get it written and

30:04 You really need to jump in and I'm sure you found as well that you get inspired not by waiting for inspiration to come and then writing. You get inspired by writing, and then inspiration comes the act of writing is what gets you going is what gets you fired up is what starts assembling your ideas and putting them into shapes and structures so it's kind I'd actually been writing a blog for a couple of years.

30:52 And I think that was really helpful as well because, and you mentioned earlier about kind of repurposing stuff. When I was writing my book, I went back and read through my two years of blogs and there were so much in there that I pulled out and thought oh! I'm gonna put that in the book, I'm gonna put that in the book...and then I wrote the book and then when I was doing the podcast I went back to my book and I was pulling out things and some of those things I pulled out the book I had pulled up the blog So actually this goes back to years Absolutely. So if you've been creating content of any kind over time, and blogs are obviously a great example of that because you can repurpose them get ideas from them. And even things you've been writing like talks or workshops or courses they can form the basis of a book as well so if you've got lots of content in other formats

31:46 I really enjoyed the process. It was a process of ups and downs, moments when I just thought I can't wait to get this out in the world and moments that Maybe this isn't as good as I think it is or maybe nobody's going to read this book, which luckily wasn't the case. No and actually that's a really important point because what I want to say is that if you feel like that when you're writing your book Everybody goes through that process. It is something I've noticed over the years, there's an actual sort of up and down emotional involvement with your book Usually you start off and it feels good, it's easy, you're getting stuff out Then you get about a third of the way through and suddenly it's like oh god this is hard

32:44 Yes, exactly. And then if you just keep writing and ignore those imposter syndrome voices, you'll get to about two thirds of the way through and you suddenly realize that you've got an awful lot of content out there you've written most of a book and actually well it's really not bad I've noticed that is a typical kind of emotional journey that people go on. And it's really important not to get sort of stopped by it or, you know, to give into those sorts of feelings at all nobody's going to read it so I'm gonna be really embarrassed when it comes out because it's not original enough for

33:20 It's no, this is not. This is not the case what you're writing is good and just keep going. Yes that's the story of writing your book yes and that's a good point I shared that daily when I was writing my book. I share that story That is so important as well. It's amazing, as I'm sure you found how people love the story of the book Journey and you and other authors that I've worked with have said they just talked about writing their books on social media and got clients because already they saw me as an author because I was in the writing process

33:59 Yeah, absolutely. And I did the same with my podcast. I talked about the journey how i was putting it all together you know from the images to the structure to everything and people were engaging with that and waiting for the podcast to come compared to somebody who does it all quite I I've missed out on that opportunity to invite people into that journey that they've been on. Yes, telling that story. Yeah yeah completely so any of the listeners that are thinking okay you're right you've got me i would like to start thinking about writing my business book? So tell them a little bit about Book Magic and how that can help them.

34:50 Well, if you go to BookMagic it takes you through the whole process from a really early start. So we start with something called the values exercise where your AI coach will ask you what your values are And then we go through the positioning, the person pain and promise. And again, the more you

35:30 So, we go through that process and then it's a question of you must do very detailed planning before you start writing. If you don't plan your book in detail before you start writing, you are almost certainly going to get stuck somewhere and it will all start to kind of become like some big amorphous Taskware, you don't know what comes next. You get writer's block because you haven't worked out what goes where so we go through a very... it's rigorous but again I think it's very unthreatening because in the first place we just go through just think about 30 or 40 topics just name them that you could talk to your reader about in your book. You don't have to write them or anything just you don't have to find an order for them just put them out there then come up with some stories

36:23 Then come up with some supporting evidence, some data points maybe. Some quotes and you know so you've got all this material out there and then you start to structure it then you turn it into a journey of chapters and you put it in... You create a journey for your reader And then you've got such a detailed outline that when you start writing, all you're doing basically is picking one topic or one story a day. Writing that – that's done! Tick it off and BookMagic has lots of nice rewards for you so it will tell you how many words you've written, it tells you how far through the book you are, you can do your scheduling, your writing habit with Book Magic

37:30 Create social media posts out of your book, blog posts. That's where the AI really kind of comes into its own. So that's... you know, Book Magic is a hold your hand It's what you went through in a group book writing support group it's exactly the process you went through but you can do it at your own pace You could do it online and it's more accessible and frankly cheaper Yes Well, I loved going through the process that you took us through and it was such an important thing for me to do.

38:08 So, people who are just thinking about it but But maybe not ready to commit and jump in and bite it. Is there anything? I mean, you've got your book haven't you your Book Magic book would that be a good place for them to start? Yes absolutely! You can get Book Magic the book on Amazon or if you sign up to Bookmagic AI, the app you get a free e-copy of it. But yeah have a look at that and see if it feels right you can also go into book magic and do the first few steps like the values exercise and positioning without signing up or paying anything just to see if it feels right for you. See if it gets you inspired I'd like to think it would be sort of the first step so being able to think yeah actually I can do this

39:10 Lovely. Thank you so much, Lucy for all your support over the last few years and also for coming onto the podcast it's been lovely chatting to you Oh thank you having me Susan it's a joy to talk to you and I hope we have inspired some people to write their books! I loved how Lucy talked about your book being your gift to the people you can help I think when you change the story in your head from one that's making you doubt yourself or worry that you're not good enough to one where you're simply sharing what you know will help and make a difference to your ideal clients, then it feels less about proving yourself and more about being of service.

39:57 So if my conversation with Lucy has inspired you to write your business book, do message me and let me know. I'd love to hear about it because as I've heard Lucy say before and was definitely true for me the book that changes your life and your story is not the one you read It's the one you write And i'll see you next time for more stories that do this selling for you so you don't have too Thank you so much for being here. I love that we get to do this together! Would you do me a huge favour and please rate, review and follow this podcast in Apple Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts? And i'll see you next time for more honest conversations meaningful connections and of course stories