Author Watch – Ryan Mendenhall – Helping Authors In a Unique Way

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Some people come into your life and are thought changers.  Ryan is one of them.  This is something all authors should know about, take advantage of and share.

 

Ryan Mendenhall Interview

At what point did you realize you had a desire to go into business?

I would say it started in my early 20’s. I really wanted to set up a business where people would come to me instead of me having to go to them, to put myself in a place that people, when searching for what I had to offer, would find me…when they were in the right frame of mind rather than me trying to convince them. That led me to take a class in Internet marketing at our local stat college. Paul Allen taught the course (a co-founder of Ancestory.com). I learned there how to do what I wanted with pay-per-click. Soon I was working at another company he started that serviced clients for search engine optimization, pay-per-click, and affiliate marketing management. I worked there for a couple of years and then I started my own business doing the same thing for my own clients. That was a very rewarding time for me. I often look back on that experience and it keeps me wanting to create and build a better world.

You’ve worked with companies such as 3M, Disney, ADP in the area of digital marketing. They have teams and experts. How do you help authors to progress up the digital marketing scale without the same advantage of large corporations?

Our focus with authors is mainly educational. We also teach coaches, speakers & bloggers, those that have a powerful message to share with the world, how to do the same thing that these large companies would do. This “coaching” approach makes it very affordable for authors to do it for themselves. We also offer the opportunity for authors to hire us to do those things for them when they reach a certain level of income. We have solutions both in education and group coaching programs, as well as individual consulting.

What was the “AHA” moment that originated the development of Author’s Catapult?

Let’s see. Before I went out to California to work with Disney, I found a blogger in a health and wellness space. She was blogging about natural remedies and organic living and overall health. She had been blogging about 2 years. She invited me to come on as her SEO guy, someone to help her rank in the search engines.

She was also getting ready that to launch her second e-book. It was a significant thing for her. She wasn’t planning on doing a whole lot of marketing for it (from my perspective). And just based on what I knew from my digital background, I knew that if she created an event around the launch that she would do really well.

So we put together an event, 21 days of giveaways; she gave something away for 21 days to build excitement and anticipation for her book release. She gave away bonuses on the day of her launch and for about a week after that. Her book did really well. Her sales did really well. The launch event more than quadrupled what she had been doing month after month and it also tripled what her stretch goal was for that book launch.

It was at that moment that I decided I like working not only with authors, but also with small business owners; those that are directly responsible for succeeding and failing in the endeavors they are engaged in.

However, it wasn’t until a few years later when I was in a position to start a new business of my own again, and I deciding on the market I wanted to work with that that memory came up. I choose now to use my skill set in digital marketing to work with passionate and action oriented authors, bloggers, coaches, & speakers; people who have a message.

So that was where the “AHA” moment came from.

Tell us about the upcoming summit on October 6.

So we have assembled a dream team of book marketing experts, bestselling authors and savvy digital marketers. They will be coming together to teach, over the course of 21 days, how to market your book more effectively. Collectively, this group has sold or helped to sell millions of books. They know how to do what they are going to tell you how to do. It’s a very valuable experience for any self-published author or traditionally published author who is expected to help sell his or her own book.

It’s a really amazing opportunity for that group of authors who want to take ownership their own future and how their book will impact the lives of others. We provide an awesome an chance to learn from some of the top marketers in the world – people who have worked with amazing authors that you have all heard of. We are so excited to share that with you.

Those interested can register for a free Daily Guest Pass to the Summit. Each Expert will be giving away prizes on their interview day. Prizes total well into the thousands of dollars, all designed to help you sell more books. We will also be giving away some grand prizes for those that jump in and are engaged in the Summit. And don’t be surprised if there are there are some surprises along the way. 🙂

How does the group success program work?

We will be launching a group success program after the Summit is over with a select group of authors. We’ll detail for them the process that we took that wellness author I mentioned through; it is a book launching process.

In the process of doing that book launch, that new author also doubled her audience, which catapulted her into a coaching and speaking career. So we will be teaching you how to do just what we did for that book launch.

We will have weekly group coaching calls where we’ll be training and answering questions. This will help the students put the pieces in place to do what we did. They’ll also get a chance to learn from, mingle with and team up the other students.

This group coaching success program is for motivated individuals, authors, or those preparing to become authors. This will be our first time taking a group through this process so it will be at a discounted price. Everyone that signs up for a free Guest Pass at the Book Marketing Summit will get to learn more information about that program after the Summit.

How can your services help authors sell lots of books?

We have one main service, aside from the group coaching & individual consulting: we team up with you to help you sell your book. It focuses on creating a powerful platform, finding your target audience, and teaching that audience, and learning from them as well.

The other component is to help you launch a book with an event instead of just putting it up on the sales page or Amazon. The way we help you sell more books is teaching you how to partner with the right people, the right target audience, and teach you how to give that audience what they are looking for. We teach you how to build an email list and how to bring your audience together in one place so you can speak to them whenever you need. This includes blogging, social media, conversion on your website, list building and more.

We may add at a later time a “how to build coaching programs” that support those that want to go deeper into the topic of your book. Some other things for speakers are also on our radar, but we’ll wait to hear what our students and clients want us to create.

Will you offer classes and have assignments with deadlines?

Our Coaching program is an online class. You will be able to go at your pace but we do have assignments and put a strong focus on accountability. You will be reporting to the group on how you are doing, partially to help keep you on task and partially so we can help you when you get stuck. There will be high expectations for sure, but an atmosphere of acceptance where mistakes are precious and valuable to us. We may also decide to drop students who are not taking action because we know our process works and we want every student who goes through our program to become a powerful success story.

What is the cost of the program and how can an author join?

The cost is to be announced. We are still deciding on that. We’ll be accepting students by application only because we know this isn’t for everyone. We want to make sure we are a good fit for the student and that we are a good fit for them.

We will take applications after the Summit is over. Again, if you get your Free Daily Guest Pass you will be notified as to how to get involved with the program when the time comes, and you will also be given a discount for being in the group of first time students going through this process. And our goal is to have EVERY student sell a minimum of 1,000 books in 21 days.

What is your long-term goal with this program?

Our long-term goal with this program is to help authors, coaches, speakers; bloggers really believe that their product can change lives. When they see that there are specific things they can do to not only sell more of their books and products, but that those things also reach a wider audience and touching lives, and they DO those things, we have achieved our goal. Our students will get positive feedback from their audience and begin to believe a lot more in what they are preaching. For us, we want to work with passionate people that want to change people’s lives.

What are the reasonable expectations that an author should have to join you?

Our goal is to double your audience whether it’s through facebook, twitter, subscribers, email lists, etc, and to double your sales. Actual result will vary depending on what you already have in place and how closely you adhere to the program. But that is our goal, to at least double the audience and sales in the 90 days we are working together. For our group-coaching program you should be ready to sell your book. It would also be appropriate to create an event and relaunch your book that is already out.

What is unique about your program?

It’s unique because it works. 🙂 No, but really, I think the way we’re going to structure accountability and require participation will definitely set us apart. This isn’t a “get the program, watch it, not do anything and then go onto the next program to do the same.” This course is ACTION. And it’s the only thing that produces results. And the results will be good!

What else would you like the audience to know about Summit and Author’s Catapult?

We are just really excited to work with authors to help them spread their message far and wide. We really believe in helping people step up to that next level and maintain both momentum and excitement for what they’re working on. Our experience can help authors step to the next level in terms of audience, in terms of traffic, subscribers, sales and connection with their audience. Enough said.

How would you like to be contacted?

Just go grab your Free Daily Guest Pass at Linda’s Authors Catapult  link.

I give plenty of ways to connect with my team and me for all attendees. Come and learn at the feet of giants. I’ll see you at the Summit!

Biography:

Hi! I’m Ryan, Author’s Digital Marketing Coach. I’ve done SEO+ for 12 years. I’ve trained teams. We’ve gotten 100’s of top-10 rankings. I’ve more than 3x’ed revenues. I’ve started, grown & sold my own Internet marketing biz. I’ve marketed for Disney and now. I’m here for YOU.

 

 

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