Finding The Right Agent Key To Writing Successful Book
Sara Bliss, a New York Times best-selling author of 11 books, had always wanted to be a writer, even from a young age. She went for interviews right out of college and was turned down mainly due to shyness, but she pushed through and willed herself into being a writer.
Having written for magazines, and working for a freelance writer, Sara explains that she was just waiting for the opportunity and topic to write her own book. She got the chance with Exotic Style, and got $7,000 for her work. This may not sound like much, but Sara knew “you kind of do whatever you can to get your foot in the door.”
Sara is a New York Times bestselling author who has written eleven books including Take the Leap: Change Your Career, Change Your Life, which profiles more than 60 people who radically changed their careers. She also wrote Hotel Chic at Home and co-authored three bestselling books with beauty and wellness guru Bobbi Brown, including Beauty From The Inside Out.
TOP TAKEAWAY: IN-DEPTH PROPOSAL VASTLY INCREASES CHANCES OF GETTING A BOOK DEAL
Sara realized very early on that she needed to write an in-depth proposal for her books because “the stronger the proposal, the more likely [she] would get a deal”. With an in-depth proposal, about 40 to 50 pages for Sara, her agent was able to approach multiple editors and ended up having a bidding war for one of her books, which is something every writer dreams of.
Sara explains that the more you can give in the proposal to really entice the editors, the better chance you have of receiving a great book deal! With an incredible proposal, and an agent that you have a great working relationship with, there is nothing stopping you from succeeding.
Finding the Right Agent Key to Writing Successful Book
“Finding an agent is really like dating”, Sara explains, “you have to put yourself out there, be willing to be rejected, and see if it’s a kind of emotional fit”. This was the case with Sara’s search for the perfect agent, which took some time, but worked out in the end.
When you do find that agent you no longer have to be a career writer in order to write a book, “you just need a strong platform and a strong idea that stands out from the pack”.
In addition to her books, Sara has also published articles in the Wall Street Journal, Esquire, Town & Country, Oprah, Travel & Leisure, Refinery29, and Forbes.
Sara is also the Co-Founder of One Eleven Partners, a brand content, strategy and marketing firm based in NYC, and a public speaker.
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Josh Steimle
Welcome to the Published Author Podcast where we help entrepreneurs learn how to write a book and leverage it to grow their business and make an impact. I'm your host, Josh Steimle. Today our guest is Sara Bliss. Sara is a New York Times bestselling author who has written 11 books, including Take The Leap: Change Your Career, Change Your Life, which profiles over 60 people who radically changed their careers. She's also the author of Hotel Chic At Home and co-author of three bestselling books with beauty and wellness group Bobby Brown, including Beauty From The Inside Out. Her writing doesn't stop with her books, however. She's also published articles in the Wall Street Journal, Esquire, Town and Country, Oprah, Travel and Leisure, Refinery 29, and Forbes. She's also the co-founder of One Eleven Partners, a brand content strategy and marketing firm based in New York City, and she's a public speaker. Sara, welcome to the show.
Sara Bliss
Thank you for having me. I'm so happy to be here.
Josh Steimle
And she's redoing her house right now, while we record this.
Sara Bliss
I am I am the cameras hiding the dozens of IKEA boxes on the right and paint swatches above me.
Josh Steimle
So you're so busy, Sara, thank you for taking the time out to be with us here on the published author podcast. Tell us a little bit about your background, your history, who are you? How did you get to be who you are today, you've got this impressive pedigree and all this experience? How did all this come about? Where did it all start?
Sara Bliss
I kind of just willed myself into being a writer really, I'm not sure if I was necessarily the best writer. And, you know, I just from a young age always wanted to be a writer. And, you know, when I started out in magazines, you know, I had this idea of, of what I wanted to do, I wanted to go into women's magazines, and I had an interview at Town and Country that I completely failed. It was right out of college I I basically I think I was in there for 10 minutes. And the woman who interviewed me was just like, all right next to like, this is not gonna work because I was so shy, and awkward. And then in the elevator on the way down, I was all dressed up. And I met an assistant editor who was leaving and she was like, are you interviewing? And I said yes. And she said, Well, my position and House Beautiful is open. And she brought me to meet her bosses and I got the job. So I just kind of hustled my way into magazines, and then eventually kind of convinced editors to give me a shot at at writing. I went freelance a little earlier than I should have. In my career, I should have kind of spent more time in magazines getting writing under my belt, but I was just so eager. And just that, you know, desperation for a paycheck kept me very, very motivated the whole time. And I had a long magazine writing career and then in 2008, everything kind of crashed and, and I started going from getting paid, you know, $3,000 an article to $50. So I had to kind of think fast on my feet. And I switch to some ghostwriting and branding work and that's how I kind of got to where I am today.
Josh Steimle
So you said that you always wanted to be a writer? How old were you? Or how young were you when that idea? Hey, I could be a writer, I could write stuff. When did that first hit you. Do you remember?
Sara Bliss
Judy Blume came to my school. And it was I was in middle school and it was just so exciting to see her and I just thought you know, it was amazing to me that she was you know, like a real person and she seemed very like normal and accessible. And I just built her up in my head and I just thought Alright, well you know, this just seems like such a cool life and I loved the I love the idea of inspiring people to get completely lost in books or really transform how they think about something or make them want to do something different. There's such a power in books and I saw that from an early age and I was kind of a quiet like a lot of writers you know, a quiet girl with my nose in a book and I just saw the power and that kind of always wanted to do that.
Josh Steimle
So you evidently enjoyed reading Judy Blume books. What were some of the other books he loved as a kid.
Sara Bliss
As a kid, um, you know what, I just found this series of fairy books. They're called The Orange Fairy Book, The Blue Fairy book. They're just all I just used to love those. That's kind of where I feel like I first fell in love with books. There's that kind of whole fantasy world and then as I got older, I just really like realistic fiction and strong female voices. So Nora Ephron and Wendy Wasserstein those, you know those sharp New York writers, those were the voices I grew up with.
Josh Steimle
What do you see as the relationship between reading or loving reading and being a writer?
Sara Bliss
So I think a lot of people will tell you it's, it's crucial. And I do think the more you read, the better, the better your writing is. I don't think it I think it's really a skill, and there's so many different types of writing. And I'm not sure if they all translate. So. To me, I think it's more about learning the skill for the niche that you're in. So I actually, you know, really just out of sheer like hustling and, again, you know, needing to establish, establish this career as a writer, I've basically written about every kind of, in every genre I've written about gardening. And I think I started with like, gardening, and I covered like, the Hearth Expo and new building products, and all the kind of the unsexy stuff at the House Beautiful that no one else wanted to cover. And then I moved on to writing my design and profiles, and but I think really, it's just, it's just a matter of reading, a lot of whatever is in that genre, and kind of seeing what the tricks are. And then and then just practice, practice, practice and finding your own your own voice and your own stamp on it. I mean, I, I'm a very simple and direct writer, I try and simplify more complicated ideas. I think that that's what I'm good at. I used to get very intimidated by certain kinds of writing, because you know, you're more intellectual, I guess, kinds of writing. Because I just thought, oh, gosh, this is just so overwhelming, I could never do that. I don't like being like, super, super descriptive. So I kind of found my niche and just being very, like direct and getting really to the heart of things.
Josh Steimle
So tell us about your first book, where did the idea come from? And what was the motivation behind it?
Sara Bliss
So my first book was called Exotic Style. And it was design ideas from around the world. And it was, you know, so long ago, it was like in 19, no, it's like 2000, I think, or 2001. And it was kind of right when the internet, this idea of internet shopping was taking off. And the idea that you could actually buy things from around the world. You could buy things from the Paris flea market on 1stdibs, and even Pottery Barn. And all these more mass stores were being inspired by like Indian design or Chinese designer. So, and that book actually just landed in my lap, and an editor was looking for a writer that they didn't have to pay a lot. And I was recommended by someone that House Beautiful, and I was right when I went freelance. And so that was that was my first experience. You know, I think the these for most-first time authors, you know, they imagine that writing, you know, pays more than it does. I mean, it certainly doesn't reflect the amount of work or time that you put into it. I think I got paid $7,000 for my first book. And I thought that that was you know, really low, but you know, you just you kind of do whatever you can to get your foot in the door.
Josh Steimle
And what were you hoping would happen from that book, what was kind of your vision or your dream of what that was going to lead to?
Sara Bliss
You know, I have been kind of a short-term thinker with books, I feel like I find projects that I really like to work on. And I don't necessarily have a big master plan. I just was so excited to have the opportunity to write a book and have that experience. And obviously, I wanted to write more from there, I knew that I didn't want to stay just with you know, design books, because the sad reality of those books, and I've written a lot of them is nobody really reads those books. I mean, I've I, you know, you maybe skim some text here and there and read some captions, but you're mainly they're mainly image driven. So, you know, I knew I didn't want to do that forever. But I loved having that experience. And I loved kind of marrying the visual and the text and I'm not sure if anyone's you know, ever read that book cover to cover? I certainly haven't. But it was a good experience.
Josh Steimle
So take us through the history of your other books because you have a lot of them. Can you run us through each book and talk to us about why you did it, what the motivation was, what you learned from it, and then
Sara Bliss
take us up to over there so I've actually written 11 books so like I have to remember some of some of them I forgot.
Josh Steimle
So run us through those really quick bring us up to your latest and greatest.
Sara Bliss
Sure. After Exotic Style I wrote a book called The Thoroughly Modern Married girl. It was right when Sex And The City was big and was supposed to be kind of a the same way, Sex And The City kind of skewered and examined. single life, it was supposed to do that with married life, I was very nervous about writing about myself. And so I wrote it in second person, which I thought was really kind of clever and fun. And in retrospect, it was a way to kind of distance myself, I think. I think I wasn't really ready for the kind of exposure that writing a book brings. And that did not that did not sell very well. So, so that then let left me, I had a whole bunch of other ideas after that, but it just everything kind of stalled. I mean, the reality of writing a book, since we're, I'm always super candid about this, but you really, you're only as good as your last book. And, and it's sales. And if you want to write another book, your sales as you know, need to be really strong, and you need to have a strong platform. And if you don't have those, it doesn't matter how clever you are, or how good of a writer you are, you're not going to kind of get anywhere. So I ended up having an idea around 2008 for a book called, that ended up being called Take The Leap, which I published a year and a half ago, actually. But I had the idea in 2008. Because I just noticed so many people were changing, they're having to change their careers because of the the terrible financial circumstances we found ourselves in, I saw the magazine world, you know, imploding in front of me. And I found myself interviewing so many people, for my, you know, the journalism side of whether it was Wall Street Journal, or Esquire for my magazine writing, of people who had had these kind of really amazing transformations that maybe they had, and a lot of them came from, from encountering obstacles, you know, people were fired, or they got divorced, or they were really miserable at their job. And they kind of reinvented themselves and found the successful next act. And I just really love the stories and partly because I was really kind of feeling a little stuck in my own career. So but I had an agent at the time, who didn't be thought it was a magazine article, you know, didn't think my sales are strong enough in books, and, you know, just suggested that I go straight for other people. And that was where I was going to find my success. And I sadly actually listened to that, and I spent many, many years ghostwriting books for other people and, and I actually really enjoyed some of those experiences. You know, I've worked with some amazing women and and inspiring people I've written for Aerin Lauder, and I wrote a book with her called Aspen Style, that was fantastic. I wrote three books with Bobby Brown, and she has been a huge mentor of mine. And I adore her. And so the ghostwriting, the ghostwriting chapter led me I think I wrote seven books for other people. And then actually, it was Bobby, who inspired me to get take the leap back out into the world. And she was just like, you need to just find and I find a new agent, you know, find someone Well, that's a great idea, you just need to kind of find that person. And I think that's really good advice. In general, for anyone trying to get published, you can send an idea, as you know, to like five or 10 or 20 agents, and maybe, you know, you just need to find the one, the one that believes in it. And then, same with the publishing process. It's just, you know, finding that one person who it resonates with and that's, that's just so important. And sometimes, it's really just a matter of finding your person. And I have a fantastic agent now who I won't, you know, naturally. That's great, as long as she keeps me on.
Josh Steimle
Well Take The Leap that was timely in 2008. But perhaps it's even more timely Now, with this pandemic going on as bad as 2008 was the current financial crisis seems to be worse, or seems like it could get worse. And there are a lot of people being displaced. So it does seem like a topic that's needed right now. So
Sara Bliss
I definitely, definitely, I mean, I mean, I think, you know, I think a lot of people think it's a book about, you know, people who made switches to kind of cool careers. And while I think that's true, a lot of the stories in the book are people who found themselves having to change and not even necessarily wanting to change and, and I think collectively as a whole, we're all finding ourselves in that position. I mean, everybody has had to change it, you know, in some way, you know, their lives. You know what without wanting to I mean, we're all making all these, you know, new life choices and decisions, and we may not want it and, and we're all kind of figuring out how to make the best of it or, or you know really how to survive, a lot of people are just really trying to figure out how to survive now. And I find when you're in that position where you're not sure what's next, hearing those stories and listening to those voices of people who have also struggled and kind of found a happy ending, is is very, is very, very motivating.
Josh Steimle
Mm hmm. So talk to us a little bit about the process of finding your agent, you have an agent that you love, you're able to get a traditional publishing deal, how did that work for you? How did you find your agent in the first place, and then what was the process like of pitching publishers?
Sara Bliss
You know, finding an agent is really like dating, I mean, you have to, you know, put yourself out there, you have to be willing to be rejected, you have to, you know, see if it's a kind of an emotional fit, if, if they, you know, work in a way that that works for you. I mean, I have friends who are wildly successful, bestselling authors, and they have very fraught relationships with their agents. You know, if the, if you know, at the communication style isn't great, or, but you know, it's such a, it's such a symbiotic relationship, it's such an important relationship that you can always leave. So you want to, really, again, it's like a marriage, it's hard to get out of. So you want to make sure you really, you really connect. So my advice to anyone looking for an agent is to look at the back of books and authors that you like, who are writing similar books to yours. See, who the agencies and authors are that represent them, it often means that they represent several people in the kind of a similar category. And then, you know, reach out to them on LinkedIn on their websites, and then, you know, a very short pitch with your credentials and your idea, you don't have to, you no longer have to be a career writer, in order to write a book, as I'm sure you talk about a lot in this podcast, you just need to have a strong platform and a strong idea that stands out from the pack.
Josh Steimle
Now, when you say strong platform, what do you mean by strong platform, what's strong enough?
Sara Bliss
So strong enough is is good numbers on social media. And I, if you have any brand recognition with your, if you're running a brand, or a firm, any sort of brand recognition, press on yourself, that obviously helps if you can also get there with social media numbers. I mean, this is what the publishers are looking for. I'm not saying I believe in this, but this is the way they're looking. You know, if you have 10,000 plus followers on Instagram, that's something they like, honestly, the sad thing is, the more followers you have, the more publishers equate that to you being able to sell a book, it's not just your idea they're looking at, they are looking at your ability to sell. So again, strong social, if you're in any sort of high-profile position. If you've done something, you know, really interesting and kind of unique, and you have a unique perspective, all of those things are important. You don't if you've you know, if you've published other places, that's great, too. But again, it's honestly, your visibility is is an important piece of it. And it's not something I really kind of accepted for a long time, I kind of wanted to be a behind the scenes writer forever. And. And, you know, I also have a column in Forbes and I have a business myself, and it is important to put yourself out there.
Josh Steimle
And we all want our writing to kind of stand on its own and do the work for us. We all wish we could just write that great book, and it would just sell itself and we would never have to push it out there. But totally, it's just not the way it works, is it?
Sara Bliss
No, not at all. And I've had to really develop. And this might be helpful, too. I really had to develop a comfort around talking about myself, talking about my projects, giving advice. You know, I was just behind the scenes for so many years, and I had a lot of experience telling high-profile people how to do that. But I wasn't necessarily doing that for myself. And I realized, I mean, this book is just like I love it so much and I'm so proud of it. And I realized in order to get it, I knew it would help and inspire a lot of people. And so that really motivated me because I just thought you know, unless I am really passionate about this and really get myself out there and hustle and do TV and podcasts and you know, every opportunity, I mean, it's just it's not going to get out in the world, it's just going to sit on a shelf. And so and also, when you've had books that, that aren't huge sellers, like my married girl book, which is actually fine, because it wasn't that great, but I think when you've had that experience, you realize, like, you can leave like no stone unturned.
Josh Steimle
So of all the things that you did to promote, take the leap, what worked the best what was effective.
Sara Bliss
So, I mean, I leveraged a lot of my contacts from my media days, from my, you know, I have a lot of other writers and editors, and I pitched I sent a lot of personal pitches, I think the problem with in house publishing, market marketing, PR divisions is they, they have one way of doing it unless you are, you know, the top author, and even if you are, it's all the same formula, they basically send out 200 copies to like their list of editors, and they don't usually do any follow up, they just wait for them to, you know, call that. I think that that's a terrible way to sell books, I don't understand why publishers haven't figured that out. And even if you hire your own PR person, you know, there's just no guarantee, I found the best best way was for me to tailor every pitch to the publication I was writing I wanted it to be in. So I used my experience as a writer, you know, to craft a pitch in the same way I would if I was writing the article. You know, I got into the New York Times, in a column called wealth matters, because I reached out to that author, Paul Sullivan, who's a genius. And I said, you know, it turns out 70% of the people in my book are making the same or more money now than they were at jobs that they hated. And I think money is something that often holds people back when they're making a career switch. So having that that info was was really inspiring. And so you know, that's how I got in there. So, you know, it was just a matter of kind of crafting those personal pitches. And that's honestly so important. And I think I think people don't realize how far that goes.
Josh Steimle
Yes, you're giving the writer something that they really wanted. And having written for Forbes and these other publications like you, we get so many pitches as writers, I mean, there were months where it felt like I got 1000 pitches in a month from
Sara Bliss
And you don't know, you don't write you know, you can't even look at them, you don't even read half of them. So it's got to be like that compelling title. It's got to be personalized. I always use a name if someone sometimes I just say like, Okay, well, you know, who is your let's say, you know, who's your book editor, your PD, or whatever, if I maybe I know somebody or know somebody who knows somebody at a publication, and then I use their name, you know, so and so referral and in the subject line, you know, the more personal you can get, the better because, yeah, editors are overwhelmed. I've been on the other side of receiving that. And, you know, the sad thing is, they're not always going to open that email no matter how brilliant it is.
Josh Steimle
Right. But if you have something of value to offer, I mean, like you contacted Paul, and you said, I've got this thing that is relevant, specifically relevant to something that you've been writing about your column. Yeah. Whereas, I mean, I get a lot of pitches, and it's, hey, we see that you write about entrepreneurs, here's an entrepreneur that you could write about. It's like, well, that's a strong tie. And I don't just write about entrepreneurs, I write about a specific type of exact entrepreneur and a certain thing that they're doing. And I can tell when somebody's done the research, or they're just, they've looked at it for five seconds, and then they send me that pitch. A lot of the pitches I get, they don't even have the right name. It's addressed to somebody else. I'm like, Okay,
Sara Bliss
oh, yeah. Are they like, they don't even realize what you cover? Like, you know, I got pitches for, you know, things I don't I don't cover or write about it. I mean, sometimes I'll just be nice and respond and just let them know that this is not my, you know, be there never has been like, you know, I've never covered. I don't know what it is like hydroponic plants are. Sometimes I don't know how I get on these lists.
Josh Steimle
Yeah. So with your literary agent, then when you went out pitching publishers, what's that process? How do you work with a literary agent to construct those pitches and deliver those and how many pitches did you have to send out before you got the deal that you wanted?
Sara Bliss
So I had to write a book proposal and I was very in depth because I knew the stronger the proposal, the more likely I would get a deal. I interviewed people for the proposal. I think I interviewed five different people, and included their stories and their pictures. And having that image I thought was really key. And actually, that was something I wanted in the book, you know, for every, every person, there's an image, you know, it's just, I think it's just really important to have that. So I let them know the kind of the kind of book that also I set it up for the kind of book visually I wanted. And then I also spent a lot of time researching, I really outlined the entire book, and I found people, you know, and I think I did six different categories. And I found people. So I did a lot of work, you know, to prepare us and I think my proposal was probably about 40 to 50 pages long. And then had, you know, sample a sample chapter and outline and, you know, it explained what the other books were in this category, you always want to reference books that are similar to yours that have done well, that's all they want. And then she crafted the list, Alice and my agents name is Alison Fargis, she is at Stonesong, she is a genius and amazing. But she crafted a list of I think we went out to 15 editors that she thought would handle would be good, good for this. My book is a little bit of a hybrid because it's, you know, self-help, you know, and transformation meets career meets business. So we kind of we pitched editors in both in both categories. And then we ended up having a bidding war, there were three publishers interested in it.
Josh Steimle
That's a nice place to be
Sara Bliss
It's very exciting. And yeah, and we had a bidding war. And we ended up at, well, actually, my publisher ended up changing in the, in the middle, but we ended up at Gallery Kooks. And Cara Bedick was my editor at 11 books that I've written, she's hands down the best editor I've ever worked with. And she's a genius, as well, she's super smart and savvy. And she understood the book. So I you know, I think at the end, there were two publishers that were kind of similar in price. And I wanted to kind of go with Cara, I kind of hoped it would be Cara from the start again, because of that dating feel. And she just really understood what I wanted to do with the book. And she understood you know how to how to market it. And, you know, she just, I just felt like it would be a real collaboration and we did a kind of a dating phone call with three editors, or for me four or five editors. Before we sent it, we asked for final bids. And, you know, you get a sense of what their vision is for the book and how they're going to market it. And you know, what their timeline is and what they liked about it, and how they work with their authors. You know, a lot of editors, or some editors are very hands on. And some editors are very hands off. And that's something you should ideally find out before you team up with anybody.
Josh Steimle
So what were some of the other things that were? What were some of the things that went well, with the publisher, as you worked with them? You said the editing was great, what were some of the other things that made this publisher or made working with this publisher a great experience?
Sara Bliss
Well, for me, this experience was really all about my editor and that relationship, that strong relationship, I felt like, you know, a lot of times, you know, your editor is kind of there to guide you from a real distance. And I felt like with Cara like I would send her, she would send me ideas for people that could be in the book, I would send her ideas. You know, I would ask her questions about you know, tone and length and, and variation. We have 63 people in the books, we really wanted a range of stories, it was a little bit of an insane undertaking. But she really supported and understood that and, and that was really, really crucial to me. I mean, I think, you know, it's also really important how they're going to market the book. And, you know, I probably, you know, I think every author, you know, wants more attention, I guess from you know, marketing and the PR department and unfortunately, I think you just have to accept that the way they're structured. You know, I've had some amazing publicist at Gallery, who I worked with who are wonderful, but you know, it's a finite period of time, and then you're really on your own to hustle. I also I did put myself on book tour. You know, they don't this is the other thing a lot of first-time authors don't realize, and especially your authors, many of whom are entrepreneurs. You know, I think everyone has this glamorous idea that Your publisher is going to put you on a book tour. They don't do that unless you're, they're really anticipating very high sales. So I basically reached out to people in the book and in big cities or big publishing markets. And I reached out to bookstores, I did work with an outside publicist to help me with this. And I, we reached out to bookstores, and we said, we have this great book, and you know, I'd be willing to have a conversation with this inspiring person in your town, who's in the book, and, you know, between the two of us, we can probably, you know, get a handful of people there. And I used, my husband travels a lot for work. So we had a lot of mileage points, and I stayed in my friend's you know, guest rooms and basements. And in one lucky case, a guest house. And, and I went, I think to like, I did 11 events or something, it was a little bit crazy. But I thought it was very important, because then you get that local press, and you just kind of get yourself out in the world a little bit.
Josh Steimle
Now, your book followed in interview format, you interviewed a lot of people for your book, I interviewed for my first book, I interviewed 30 people, and it was a ton of work, I thought, Oh, this is just gonna write itself. I'm just interviewing these people, it's gonna be easy. And I found out that it's not easy to interview people, it's not easy to find them to get them to,
Sara Bliss
It's really a lot. I mean, I spent probably more time finding everyone that I did writing, and then getting them to agree.
Josh Steimle
Yeah. And then you have to corral everybody. And a question that comes up with some of the listeners of the podcast, when they we talk about doing interviews is they ask, Well, what do I have to do legally to use these people's interviews? Do I just get them to sign a little something saying it's okay, what was the technical process of how you got these people involved in the book? And did you use some sort of legal form to get a release? Or how did you handle that?
Sara Bliss
So the release kind of came at the end, you know, maybe it probably should have come earlier. But, you know, I did a lot of creative Googling, I did a lot of research, in some cases, I just kind of, you know, I think in DC, I, I don't know how I found this florist who used to be a prosecutor, who was really a fantastic person to interview because she was always in an angry state, and, you know, turned her life around, and now, you know, has this beautiful flower business and her out of her garage, and it makes more money and has, you know, two dogs that are feet all day long. But anyway, it was a lot of Googling to find them a lot of posting on social, a lot of reaching out to friends, a lot of cold calling. I wanted to have someone in law enforcement at one point and was, you know, cold calling random, you know, police departments across the country. So that was the beginning. And then there, you know, I had to develop a trust, I would send emails explaining, you know, who I was my experience. I mean, it did help that I've, you know, written for outlets, like the Wall Street Journal, and I have some credibility. And then I had a strong publisher. You know, I think that's, that's helpful, instead of self-publishing, somehow. You know, some people, you know, on the outside, see that, and they also get more comfort with that. And then, right before we publish the book, I sent everybody a release form, and I had the, the legal department at Simon and Schuster, write it out for me, we had to do one to get their images in the book, photography release form and want to share their stories. It all worked out well. There was one guy who I interviewed for the, the proposal. And so let's say it was like, two years or a year and a half before we got this. And he somehow had like, and I caught him. When we sent the release form email, it was my assistant, sending it to him. And we caught him, I think when he was like, on vacation, and he had had a cocktail, and he was like, I don't remember, I never agreed to be in any book. I just, I talked to someone for like five minutes. And I was like, No, actually. And I forwarded him the emails. And, you know, we did actually several interviews, and I forwarded the email, and I even you know, I shared the what I was publishing and everything, and he was like, Oh, my gosh, I'm so sorry. And, of course, you know, we'll do this but he just gets so many interview requests that he had kind of, you know, forgotten about it. So that was a process and luckily it worked. And then at the on the other side of it. A lot of the people in the book were very generous. about sharing the book on social media and talking about it and even agreeing to be interviewed for, for press and publicity for the book as well.
Josh Steimle
Great. So what's the reaction been? How's it done?
Sara Bliss
It's done really well. I've been really really happy with it. I've been really happy with it. I have loved it. It's inspired me to you know, take my own leap. And I've been doing branding and marketing for 10 years, but in the middle of this crazy pandemic I started. It was in the works before the pandemic started, but I teamed up with a partner and longtime friend Lisa Gooder. She is an amazing force of nature, especially in the digital marketing space. And she's also been on the editorial side she was most recently the editor in chief of brides and has worked at Conde Nast and worked closely with Anna Wintour, revamping some of the Conde Nast digital titles. And we teamed up and we've been working with a lot of small to midsize brands, and helping them through this pandemic and helping them you know, pivot and update and learn how to connect with people in a new way. Because as you know, if you're not strong on digital right now, and you have a business, you know that the traditional avenues are not working, or you know, not really as functional or as they should be. So everyone's had to be really, really creative. So it's actually been very rewarding work because I feel like we've helped. We've helped a lot of brands not only survive this, but thrive during this time. So it's been it's been exciting.
Josh Steimle
Exciting, for sure, exciting times. And again, such a timely time for your book, Take The Leap. Sara, thanks so much for being with us here today. If people want to track you down where's the best place for them to find you online?
Sara Bliss
So I have my own website sarabliss.com no h Sa ra. And I'm at SarablissNYC on Instagram. That's my most and i'm on LinkedIn and, and all of that good stuff. And my website for my business is 111partners.com.
Josh Steimle
Fantastic. Thank you so much, Sara, for being with us here today on the podcast,
Sara Bliss
Of course. So it was great. And I always love giving advice to other authors and it's a really exciting and rewarding journey and I always recommend it to everyone.
Josh Steimle
Great, thank you so much. If you enjoyed this episode, and don't forget to subscribe. And if you want to spread the word, please give us a five-star rating review and tell your friends to subscribe to. We're available on Apple podcasts, Spotify, and everywhere else you listen to podcasts. And if you're an entrepreneur interested in writing and publishing a nonfiction book to grow your business and make an impact, visit publishedauthor.com for show notes for this podcast and other free resources.
