In this episode of The Book More Show, I’m joined by Roger Jones, who transitioned from a corporate consultant to a successful entrepreneur. Roger shares his journey of overcoming early challenges and how he found his niche in helping solo consultants and executive coaches develop their authority in the market.
We discuss the evolution of his approach, starting with a focus on establishing a trusted pipeline for clients. Roger emphasizes the importance of understanding client problems and delivering solutions rather than just showcasing expertise. This mindset shift has allowed him to create a more effective consulting practice.
Roger provides practical insights on how to structure a business framework that resonates with potential clients. He highlights the significance of testing ideas and titles, leveraging feedback to refine offerings, and maintaining a personal connection with clients. This approach not only enhances engagement but also fosters long-term relationships.
SHOW HIGHLIGHTS
In this episode, I discuss with Roger Jones his transition from a corporate executive role to becoming a solo consultant, highlighting the challenges he faced and how he overcame them.
Roger emphasizes the importance of solving client problems rather than merely offering expertise, and how this approach helped him establish authority in his market without relying on traditional sales tactics.
We explore the concept of visual storytelling and unique frameworks, with Roger sharing how these tools can effectively capture client attention and make complex ideas more accessible.
The episode delves into the process of developing Roger's book, "The Trusted Pipeline," and how testing different elements such as book titles and chapter names can align with audience preferences.
Roger discusses the advantages of writing through dictation, infusing a conversational tone into his work to make it more engaging and accessible for readers.
We talk about the strategy of sending physical copies of books with handwritten notes as a method to build stronger client relationships and increase return on investment.
The conversation wraps up with insights into how having real conversations and feedback from clients can improve the overall experience and content quality.
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TRANSCRIPT
(AI transcript provided as supporting material and may contain errors)
Stuart: Everyone, welcome back to another episode of the book. More show. It's Stuart Bell, here and today, joined by my good friend, roger jones. Roger, how's it going?
Rojer: buddy, it's going really well, thank you. I'm really pleased to uh to be on the show today. Thank you for inviting me stewart pleasure.
Stuart: I'm excited. As always, there's a bit of a two ends of the spectrum when we're doing shows. It's either people who I haven't spoken before or people I know quite well and you I know quite well. So this is going to be an interesting one. I think we'll go deep into deep into your business, probably a bit deeper than I do with some other people, because I know the background a little bit more. So, for the sake of everyone else, why don't we do the quick intro and share with everyone the kind of Roger Jones story?
Rojer: Okay, well, the Roger Jones story in summary is I was a corporate consultant. Well, I used to have a corporate executive role. Got a bit bored doing that, I must confess, and decided to take the entrepreneurial route. I became a very unsuccessful consultant for a few years until I worked out what someone should do to be a successful consultant and then, after I turned my business around, I did the things that consultants should do. I got published in Harvard Business Review, wrote things in knowledgeable articles and I focused on helping CEOs particularly new CEOs, in their roles and in top teams. But then during the last five, six years of that, consultants solo consultants, coaches started to ask me well, roger, how do you get in to see chief executives of big companies so relatively easily? How do you charge premium fees? And I happily shared that knowledge easily. How do you charge premium fees? And I happily shared that knowledge, and so in 2020, which was, you know, that famous lockdown year.
I just, yeah, I decided to pivot my business and focus on helping solo consultants, executive coaches, build a trusted pipeline and become the recognized authority in their market with zero selling. So I've got two groups of clients now those who are like me in the beginning they just left the corporate world and they want to set up on their own. So I guide them through a formula to do that. And those who have had their business for a few years or they may have had their business for a couple of decades and want a complete refresh of their business and to be more successful. Avoid that. What I always remember, and would never really talk about to clients for sure, was feast and famine, because in front of a client you always had to look confident and successful and I'll be thinking, oh god, I hope they say yes, because I was thinking about my bank balance, particularly in the early years. So the main thing I do is I aim to help clients have less stress in their life by having that, getting rid of that frustration.
Stuart: Yeah, it's such a common story, I think. Isn't it so that transition from the job to going solo how much of a crossover was there in what you were doing before to when you stepped out by yourself? Was that very clearly the same group of people or was it a loose crossover, but some transferable skills?
Rojer: oh no, I I did everything the wrong way, totally I would. I would, you know, take what I did in my early years, do the opposite and you'd be successful. I was living in Spain and working internationally around the world for you know, five, six years, not long before I set up so, and I moved back to London and I had no real network here. So you know, that's not a way to start a business. So I started with, with no network.
I mean, it's all in it's in course, yeah, it's all in and you know, okay, fine, I didn't have responsibilities, I didn't have children, and you know I wasn't living. You know, coming back I didn't have a big mortgage or things like that, so I wasn't taking huge risks on a family. But I was taking a bit of a business risk. And I can certainly remember in the early years, you know, looking at the job adverts which were still in newspapers at that time, thinking, oh, should I apply for that? Should I update my, my resume, my CV, for that?
Stuart: it's so funny you mentioned that. So I had the same experience like going from a corporate job which was, I mean, we're relatively I mean we're a professional team and, uh, relatively high performing, but but somewhat relaxed because we all knew what we were doing into the stress of being out by yourself and for the next three years you're getting very large agencies reaching out with what then was relatively large salaries. I think kind of tempt you back and tempt you back and it's, I think, once that switch is flipped in your head, it is. It would be difficult to go back, I imagine. But but yeah, as a reminder of what you could, what's behind the other door, it's there in your face all the time but what totally and particularly you know, I'm sure you probably experienced the same.
Rojer: You had friends who were in their corporate jobs having that nice steady salary, having the bonus and things like that, and you're thinking, well, I hope I get this piece of work and it's not that big. Yeah, back to the original question. Was there a transfer and sort of expertise to what I started off doing? There was, but as I sort of recommend to clients or you know my clients now, your clients don't want your expertise. They do, but they don't they. They want a problem solved it's a bit like you.
When I came to you to have the book published, you know I had a problem and you helped me with that problem to get my message out into the world. So you're going to be far more problem focused in your approach to looking at clients and, you know, looking at what value you can deliver to clients.
Stuart: It's actually interesting, isn't it? When you think about that in terms of the specific deliverables. It's easy, particularly, I think, in a consulting role, rather than something that's very product focused, like a HVAC engineer or someone who's going in to build a fence. I'm just looking out the window and our fence has got some wind damage, so I need to sort that out. But yeah, building something where there's a specific set of deliverables, very scope constrained, as a consultant, it can really be quite big and broad and you can get into kind of flimflammy type words and miss on those very specific deliverables. So that advice of being very outcomes oriented and really tie in what you're able to do and deliver, yeah, that really resonates as making sense and from the book perspective, it's easy from that principle because the book is the outcome.
There's many other things that could come downstream, but the book is the book. This the thing when you were moving from going through that pain and working out the pieces that do work and refining those we'll get into the book specifically in a moment, which does bring together a number of those pieces into the framework. But as you were going through that, was it obvious, the pieces that did work, that became the framework, or was it only kind of in retrospect, a couple of years later? Then the pieces started to fall together into a framework. How structured was that framework?
Rojer: It was unstructured, well, totally unstructured, to start off with, because I was coming from a corporate environment where I was sort of a corporate marketeer and business developer, where I was sort of a corporate marketeer and business developer and if you're a corporate marketeer it really doesn't align with that of an entrepreneurial marketing as such. So it took a bit of time to sink in. So what I did do to start off with I did, you know, in those early days, when it truly was feast and famine, I actually started to look at what successful professionals were doing and what were they doing in that sort of that early part of the journey. And I did reach out to a few of them and a few of them were very kind and had a chat with me and gave me some mentoring advice and that was really helpful to just get a view. And I can just remember one of them just saying you know, the key thing is mindset, which it clearly is.
You need to change from that corporate mindset where you know you've got a sense of identity in your job, everything's dished out to you each. You know each week what your work is, you know what you're going to be doing to more you know, to an entrepreneurial mindset which I really hadn't thought of, and it was all about you know someone saying, you know, focus on the problem that you're delivering, and on that, that note of you know being being the entrepreneur. It was only then, you know, I I really sort of switched what I was doing, sort of how I was seeing that feast and famine, thinking about opportunities I could go for, rather than just sort of sitting down feeling a bit down or what am I going to do next?
Stuart: right, it gave me a bit of drive to do things it's kind of like that e-myth problem of moving from the kind of professional expert out to start by yourself. There's all of the unexpected elements that kind of can throw you off off center. So anything around a framework that helps people give them some steps and something tangible that they can do, whether it's the e-myth in terms of kind of those initial steps or the trusted framework that we're talking about here. What I love about frameworks is it just gives those. Well, two things.
I guess one is for readers. It gives people a very kind of formulaic or roadmap way of thinking about things, so, as someone's reading something for the first time and really trying to get onto those anchor points, that they can jump their thinking from one step to the next. It helps from that perspective and then from the writing perspective as well. It just makes it so much easier to create because it gives you that natural scope constraint, because it reflects a framework you've already got. So why don't we talk about the book particularly then? So the trusted advisor, tell me a little bit about the genesis of the idea, for the information, for the content, and then we can talk about how we actually created it, because that was a little bit different this time around as well yeah, no, it certainly was.
Rojer: It was great to do that. I look forward to talking about that in a few minutes. So the book how did it evolve? Well, first of all, how did the structure of the book evolve? I developed a program for solo consultants, solo coaches, to to actually start that journey to become recognized authorities in their markets. So it's going around what you could call the basic elements how to remove your competition, how to stop being perceived as a commodity and how to feel more confident in your growth. So I had that as a nine module program and I still have it. I've played around with the titles of a few of the modules since, working with you and other team members in the program Right.
So that was the basis and the framework for the book and you so rightly say it just made things a lot simpler to have a framework, and I think having a visual framework is something I touch on in the book. The trusted pipeline just helps so much. It helps not just in book writing, but if you're with a client, if you can always tell a it's almost telling a visual story of the problems that there are in the market, how they can be solved, and if you do it in a visual manner and if you can actually draw your visual model in front of a client, you're literally drawing them in. As you're drawing the model and you know most people write a value proposition or a positioning statement paragraphs yeah, paragraphs of text they expect people to draw through and send people off to sleep.
Basically, I think you could do it visually. You got far more of a chance of engaging people. So the the genesis of the idea of the book came from the program. Interesting, the title which we did test, and I'm sure we talk about that in a in a few moments. That process we tested a number of titles but the title ended up with. The trusted pipeline is something a client said to me, or what was it? Probably two years ago when I first had that first initial sort of you know strategy session with them. Right, I said, well, I really need in my business is a trusted pipeline. I thought, oh, that's a great name. However, she is a testimonial in the book and I have told her she's aware that there was no trademark implied when she said it.
Hopefully not I'll wait for her lawyers in germany to come and approach me right.
Stuart: So this is one of the things I try and get across to people a lot. I mean, some people come to us with I want to write a book and I've got a pretty clear idea of what I want to write about, and then it's just a case of refining it. But I think for the majority of people whether you're a coach or a consultant in a particular business, or a fence builder or a HVAC engineer or a vet or any business type a florist we just passed Valentine's Day as we record this whatever, whatever you've got, there's the opportunity to framework it and just talk about the way that you do things in the particular way that you do them. It doesn't have to be unique. You're not reinventing the wheel. A florist, there's only so many unique things you can do.
If you're doing a floral arrangement, I would imagine not my expertise, but there's only so many variations but the way that you talk about it and the way that you structure it and any ability that you've got to diagram it or flow chart it again, it's just sharing your knowledge in a very accessible way with readers and when you think about who the readers are, we're trying to start a conversation with potential clients.
So with the florist example, we're not necessarily trying to train people how to do it, we're not necessarily trying to give them all of the horticultural background on the flowers and what a difference is, but structuring why a bouquet or a floral arrangement looks good in this way and drawing a triangle because it should be this shape or a rectangle, represents this other type of type of arrangement, simply putting things that move that conversation forward. I think no matter what business you're in, there's the opportunity to create a framework for you and the way that you do things that will resonate with people and move that conversation on to the next step. Is that what you found as you kind of brought those nine things together, it was easy for people to then see how they all stitched together and what the first jumping off point was and where it led to the next step.
Rojer: You know, I think that's very true what you say, because I think. Well, first of all, I think people like the simplicity of a good framework and you can choose, choose. The key is to make it unique to you. Just don't go around on, I don't know, copy simon's golden circles or, you know, the boston matrix. Two by two, like two by twos, are very good, right, but yeah, it does. I think. Also, the key thing people love a process. They like to know that they're starting at this point and they're going to end up over here, and if you can show them diagrammatically what that process is and how their business can transform along the routes and those major milestones. That's basically what you're doing in a formula. So with mine, I called it the recognized authority formula. I use a triangle, there are three key elements of it and each of those three key elements is divided into three. So there's nine and that represents the nine chapters in the book. So it slowly builds to that, creating your own visual representation of what you do.
I think one of the useful things is to start thinking about the problems that your clients face so just literally brainstorm them and write them all down, the problems clearly that you can solve, but then categorize them in two, three, four, max three. Three is absolutely ideal and they could be the three major problems and then there's probably subsets of those and that can be the basis of a framework. So I've had clients use a mountain very effectively. They were into more the outdoor leadership. I've had someone who's into scale-ups of tech firms use a rocket and it works really well for the proposition they have. I've had a lawyer use something a bit more complex. We actually simplified it. I think it was complex law, but we managed to simplify what they were doing as well.
So the key is make it unique, be creative. So take off that normal logical consultant's or know. Make it unique, be creative. So take off that sort of that normal logical consultants or coaches hat and be creative and and get a form that feels natural for you and it's something that feels unique to you in form, even if you so, as you so rightly say, what they're actually doing isn't maybe tremendously different to someone else, but you can make the form of it quite original and that's actually a great way of thinking about it which I don't think I've thought about before the idea that the information is the same, but the way that you share it and what you anchor it to.
Stuart: Actually, we did a podcast with someone a couple of months ago where we were talking. They were an iron man triathlete, a female in, I think, the over 40s category, but was an iron man triathlete and had been a semi-professionally I think before. So her whole framework was anchored around some of those training principles from iron man and the language that she used, described it in that language and again, not that the fundamentals were particularly unique or different from anything else, but the positioning and the anchor points and the passion at which she could talk about it and the descriptive elements to kind of illustrate it. All of that, because it was a subject she was passionate about all of that helped again start this conversation in an interesting way, in a way that kind of stands out in someone's head, I think as well, which is often overlooked. It's this idea of how best to describe it, kind of the commitment threshold of the reader If they're entering into a conversation with you and it's a very unknown end point.
It's okay. Well, let's start doing some work or let's start doing a programme and at some point, somewhere, maybe something will happen, but it could be one week or 10 years. That enters. That brings up some some anxiety. But if people can clearly see okay, here are the steps, and I can, rightly or wrongly, assign a period of time to each of those steps, so there's a no and end point. I think that also removes some of that friction and helps people jump on the phone to start the conversation because they can see or get a feel at least for where it's going to end, which I think that helps a lot.
Rojer: They can see that transformation that's going to happen and they know that, in whatever it is you're doing that consultancy project, that coaching project, whatever your area of expertise is, whatever your professional service is they can see the beginning. Whatever your area of expertise is, whatever your professional service is, they can see the beginning. They can see these let's say these mini transformations along the route to get to the end point because that's what people want.
They want the end point and they know the time as well. So you can make it time defined as well. So I have a 90 day program. You can also say the outcomes within that framework you're going to get. So I guarantee that my clients are going to meet seven to ten of their ideal corporate C-level decision makers, whether they're chief execs or another C-level title. So you can frame everything within the model, which is, I think, a reassurance for people as well. Plus, you can also be a little bit creative. Although what you do may not be totally unique, you can call elements of your model, you can give names to elements of your model to make them sound unique and create some intrigue. So in my model I have one section called insight authority. So people think what's insight authority? Tell me more about that. And I have another, uh called market echo. So you know what's all that about. Why is it? Why is that relevant? So it tends to spark the conversation so you can be creative as you produce it.
Yeah, and you know, when you create one, it will evolve over time.
Stuart: So, whatever you create on day one with customer client feedback, customer feedback, it will change that actually evolving over time, right, exactly, yeah, you get feedback from the, from actual clients, and that is hugely valuable. I mean, the whole benefit of, or one of the big benefits of, conversation starting book approach rather than a traditional book is that you're really trying to create something, get it out there and get feedback and iterate on it, rather than put all your eggs in one basket and spend all the time and money on something that you hope is successful and publish it in a traditional sense, having something that's much more lean and iterative. The purpose is to start a conversation and not to have words printed on dead trees again. It just makes it much more dynamic. That's probably a good bridge into the way that we're testing yours so for your book.
We had a cohort earlier last year where we were doing some testing first with a good friend of ours, andrew james from cerebro. So they run for everyone else. They run a ad testing platform and have a very comprehensive analytics tool in the background that picks up on sentiment. So, rather than writing the book in this efficient way and getting out there and then waiting for feedback, we actually, with you and this group, tested first. So we tested the title and the chapter titles to see which of those words resonated. And then the content was still broadly the same, but it was these kind of anchor labels of the titles that changed. So let's talk a little bit about that process, because there were a few options that we tested, and we were tested on linkedin, I think, primarily with you. But talk a little bit about what the.
Rojer: Let's start with the book title, how that evolved well, I start with the book title and then we're, yeah, the title and the sort of subtitle, and then we can go down to sort of parts of the model which are my chapter titles as well. So with the title, I had a number that I thought would work. Unfortunately, my favorite did work there. I think that was my only favorite that worked. Actually, one other, one other work as well, the others I edited. So so literally we put ads on LinkedIn, my market, although I'm based here in London and the UK, my market is my or my clients are in the states, north America, so the LinkedIn ads were targeted over there and it was simply getting responses to the various titles. I had Right, and that was how we sort of calibrated and prioritized them. So with the title, I was quite pleased. It came out as my favorite. The subtitle did as well, and there was also the bit on the subtitle. You know the subtitle is how you can become the recognized authority in your market, which we tested at various iterations of that. And then there was a without, without selling, without, I don't know, without hawking your wares. You know various options after that and the without selling proved to be the most popular, which in some ways was surprising but in some ways suits my program. Popular, which in some ways was surprising but in some ways suits my program, because in my program you do zero selling to C-level execs to actually get the appointments and the meetings with them, the conversation flow, as I call it.
And then from that point, as I say, we went to the chapter titles, which are points around my model, and I can't, you know, the first one part of my model is mindset, because if you start out on your own, the most important thing is actually adapting your mindset to the new reality of, you know, not having that corporate structure, to being an entrepreneur. And I cannot remember exactly what it was. I think it was a mindset, something like solid mindset, something like this. But the one that came out was future proof, was the most popular. I had one on I called it before precise problems, something like that, and it was focused profit and focused profit. The second chapter could be different to what I had before, was all about finding the acute problem you solve or how you do it, and identifying your personal, your professional genius and aligning it with the problem and the market need. So that came out as focus profit. So we went through this process, which took a number of weeks.
Stuart: It wasn't unduly expensive, oh you know, but it's worthwhile doing, because I now know that the model I have actually aligns with what my clients click into most readily so there were, as I say, there were a few surprises on route, and that's the really interesting thing about actually testing is it gives you very specific feedback on who that target audience is. So again, just to dive into in a little bit more detail so people can think about it not that this is the right fit for everyone, this testing, but just to think about it conceptually because I think the idea is useful whether you actually test or not. But it's this idea of selecting the audience type, that avatar you're going to run the ads to. So, of all of the people out there, linkedin is a great professional channel because you can tie into jobs and roles and interests that way around. Facebook is a great channel geographically you could test in. What people respond to in florida is probably going to be somewhat different from what they respond to in in oregon.
So picking that audience of your ideal candidates and then, within the group of ads, just testing the different words the meaning is still the same, the chapter is still the same. You're not rewriting the whole thing as something completely different. It's just whether people respond to future problems versus problem aware or the other tests that were in there. So I really love this idea. In the book blueprint school card, we really talk about this idea of using the language, of understanding the who you're writing the book for and using their language. So from a non-testing perspective, we make suggestions of reaching out to the support team or looking back through support emails and see the words that are clicked on there, going to google and doing the autocomplete thing in google and seeing what people are typically searching for and the words they use. But this whole idea of you've got a framework. You know what you ultimately want them to need them to do. You know what the problems are because you've been in the industry for a while. But just the semantics of whether it's this word or that word.
Rojer: Testing is such a great way of getting some real world feedback on which words resonate no, totally so, and, and I think you know, building what you're saying, really understanding your avatar and how to find them Because I, you know, sure I use LinkedIn. I'm not a, you know, into geographies, into interests, into experiences was really helpful, and it's also helpful now in follow-up advertising on the platform as well. But you're right, you know there's other platforms. I know someone else in the group was more into Facebook, which was more appropriate for their book. I know someone else was also into Facebook, which was more appropriate for their book, and someone else was also into LinkedIn. So it's wherever you're going to find your ideal clients. That's the key. It could be Facebook, could be LinkedIn I'm sure it can be both of them, but you probably don't need to use every platform to do the testing.
You get special responses and you're not looking for something that's completely statistically accurate. You're looking for key trends and indication. Right, yeah, key indication. But be prepared to chuck out those titles you've fallen in love with, because the market knows better than you do unfortunately.
Stuart: Yeah Well, and that's actually an interesting point as well. I mean, it's easy to. You can justify yourself or convince yourself of anything. Sat in a in an isolated bubble in the office by yourself with a pen and paper, you can justify either any answer, but actually to have empirical data coming back, that is, you know. This is what actually clicked through. It makes it harder to justify a decision that didn't test well, regardless of what your personal opinion is to begin with, yeah, and also one thing we didn't mention we've tested titles and words.
Rojer: We can also test the cover as well, which was really interesting to see what covers were, what colours, what sort of even fonts and positioning of text, background colour. And there was a clear difference as we went through. And you know, put it up here you're not going to see it, but you know that was the final winner, which in some ways surprised me, but hey-ho, it worked. That's what the target market particularly liked.
Stuart: And I know Andrew.
Rojer: King was really going more precisely on even shades of colour for one of his books.
Stuart: Yeah, actually, that's a great point as well, because it's not only split-testing ads, I mean. There's a whole industry around microscopically split-testing absolutely everything, and Facebook and, and to a lesser degree, linkedin. But Facebook particularly, I think a lot of people have got familiarization with 10 years ago. You could pick any number of individual elements and do it yourself. Give them $10 and they'll find the right people for you, because the breadth and scope of their algorithm is so much more than we can comprehend as individuals just trying to do all of those tests. So I think testing some of the variables that we're talking about can seem a little bit intimidating, because it's an ever ending hole of statistically significant numbers, but that's not what we do. Statistically significant numbers, but that's not what we're doing we're talking about. Option one is, with your own experience, stick a finger in the air and pick something. Or option two, spend a little bit of budget on testing and get some real world feedback. It's not that we're trying to test with millions of impressions and thousands of different variations. It's just a reasonably small amount of effort to get a reasonably better version, one outcome, rather than just a finger in the air, which your finger in the air is probably better than someone else's within your own expertise, but if you can just take that extra step and test a little and get those indications again, we're not writing a traditional book, we're not carving it in stone.
We can make changes at any point in the future. If we've got this is our first avatar, our first group, that we're going afterwards, but then maybe there's a second group and testing in north america. The purple and yellow colors or the blue and yellow colors worked well. Maybe the next test would be into the uk or into france well, maybe not France, but into Spain and I say, yes, minister, joke there. So, but yeah, so test into a different avatar. These things are easily tweakable. So again, it's all incremental changes and small amounts of additional effort that we can do just to move that needle in small percentages, rather than the big huge win of one effort that we can do just to move that needle in small percentages, rather than the big huge win of one thing that makes a difference, which I imagine is reflected actually in the content of your book. You're talking about nine incremental levers that can be pulled.
Rojer: It's not just one magic trick that changes absolutely everything you know everything you're right is an incremental change with a few transformations along the route. So, yeah, what you say is so true. It is getting that feedback and then allowing you then to put the book together so relatively easily. That sort of thinking back to the process that I was so pleasantly surprised with was actually to put the book together, which is whatever it is, I don't know. 19,000 words in here takes 90 minutes to read, I presume.
I think it does. It literally took an hour and a half two hours to actually dictate it. I didn't have to write it. Obviously, after that process there was editing it's so much easier to edit something rather than yeah, start afresh. And you know because, okay, you know I'm a brit and brits are traditionally really slow typists you know about one word every two weeks.
I get a word out, but to do it by dictation was just so much easier yeah sure I say it took two hours, but it took, you know, quite a bit of prep time to put the bullets down, know what I was going to cover and then the other key thing, I think the other thing because you know the bottom line for the book is to generate leads for the book.
It's to add value to those who read it so they get something, they understand, a process that they can follow. There's usable information they can implement in their businesses. However, you know I want leads as well, good quality lead. So you know, having the freedom to put testimonials in there at the right place, have bring things to life with real-life case stories of clients, whether those clients are in the States, in Brazil, across Europe, australia or Middle East. For me, because I know the key target is the States, I also have clients sprinkled around the world. You can bring that dimension in as well. But I really was pleasantly surprised with the. To get version one out I thought would be not like pulling teeth that's not the right expression but a lot more.
Stuart: Basically what's slow and more painful.
Exactly the thing most of us try and avoid, which is hard work sitting down at keyboard, and it wasn't like that at all yeah, that's why I really like the model that sharing with people now the example that the to get people to think about writing something in a different way, because whenever you say book, people have a, an expectation or an image in their mind of a traditional book, because for all of our life, that's what when you say book, that's what you see, something like it's on the shelf behind you there and that's the benefit that we have, as, having authored an idea and given it to someone, the recipient also sees it as book and never, ever throws away a book as opposed to a business card or other marketing material that gets ends up in the trash the most of the time.
But the thing that trips us up is that when we think about then writing or creating, we also think about the traditional route, which is doing some homework, giving it to a teacher, get it handed back with some red marks or at least that was my experience for the most part and then sometimes having to, or oftentimes having to to do it again, whereas that's not the case.
What we're talking about here is effectively a written version of a presentation, and I think for the vast majority of business owners, if you were invited to speak in front of a room of 100 ideal clients next week. We could sit down today, outline some slides, give it it some bullets, make the story of that presentation easy to understand, give people a motivation that there's a next step at the end of the talk. And then if on the day we were to sit down and interview you, to that outline to help you bring out all of the talking points, to make sure that you covered it in the way that you wanted to cover it, then for most people that's very accessible as opposed to giving them the job of, okay, now go away and write down those same 10 000 words by starting looking at a blank page. So yeah, this presentation approach to capture the content is a much easier way, I think, of thinking about it and if I could add this one for me, what's important elements to add to that?
Rojer: as I was dictating, I felt I was talking and I hopefully that style comes across in the book. So it's. You know it's not me having a conversation with the reader, but it's not a formal business book style. You can see lots of business books behind me, probably mostly unread, but however, you know, lots of them aren't necessarily in such an accessible style and I think if you do dictate a book, it's going to come out more in your style of words, yeah, your style of rhythm of conversation as well, and your language too, because you've probably got ways you talk yeah, and that those elements I think as well yeah, exactly that fingerprint and that connection that someone feels with you.
Stuart: Because, like we say all the time, the job of work isn't to sell books and make money from the cover price of a book. It's to get into a conversation with the perfect client and if someone can have had that first experience with you, that then translates into that conversation and as you're actually talking to them, you're using the same phrases and tones and examples that they've already read. It's a stacking effect in terms of the credibility and the memory that they've got and the belief that they're already in the same place. The job of work of the book is to get to the conversation. The conversation is the important thing and if the conversational style of the book reinforces that conversation in person, then again it's another point of amplification, rather than writing some cold and technical and traditional which doesn't really communicate any of that no, totally because, you know it, as you're so rightly indicating.
Rojer: I think if someone feels they know you before they meet you, right, that's you know that, that you sort of melt away that initial getting to know you element. Yeah, and I, you know there's other ways to do it as well. You can, you know, post on LinkedIn. You can do loads of videos on YouTube All good things to do.
I think if someone actually reads a book and has it accessible and can actually read it in 90 minutes, they're going to get to know you. You know, simply reading about the author, so you're coming off the author, so you're coming off the page. You're not just as whoever you are, you know, corporate freelancer, corporate consultant there's a bit of life, there's a bit of depth to you within there as well. They understand your thinking, they understand the types of clients you work with and there's probably been, as they've read the book or hopefully there's been, a series of mini light bulb moments for them as they went through the pages. Yeah, so I thought all these you know key elements, as you're indicating, are so vital when you're building up a relationship, and it does, you know, from the conversations I've had with those who have had the book and hopefully they've read it. I'm pretty sure they have read it afterwards. That certainly is true, as yeah, as a result that follow-up afterwards.
Stuart: I mean the opportunities.
People often say, okay, I've got this material, I've got these additional things I want to put in the book, and sometimes that's the right answer, but oftentimes it's people are would be better served by using those people, those, those pieces in the follow up rather than in the book itself.
So I think yours is a perfect example of the size of the book, is perfect to introduce the nine elements of the framework. It introduces it in a way that's accessible and easily read within a reasonable period of time. But you've also now got the opportunity to, as someone joins the list on day one over the next months into years, of following up with them with regular additional supporting material that all falls within one of those nine elements. There is always then an opportunity to ask people hey, it's today the day you ready to raise your hand. It just anchors it back to that initial piece, but it keeps the conversation going over the long run. Yeah right, it anchors it back to that initial piece, but it keeps the conversation going over the long run yeah right, it anchors it back, keeps the conversation going.
Rojer: And what I also liked was your idea, which I put in the book, which you know is on the back cover, where there's three steps that people can follow up with, you know. You know just one of them simply to watch some videos. So they go to my website, rogeriejonescom forward slash watch and they discover the story of the book. They can then find out where they are on their journey by completing a scorecard, by going to rogeriejones forward slash scorecard and get some personal feedback. And then, obviously, there's the once they've done that, hopefully there's a temptation. Then, if they the once they've done that hopefully there's a temptation, that if they feel it's going to be a benefit, they can have a conversation with me and have a call. So I think those three elements of follow up import are important. In fact, just before you know, we got on zoom for this podcast, I noticed an email coming that someone who I know, who recently received the book, had actually completed the scorecard.
So it does work but you are right, you know, as you know, as dean says, you know there's going to be a small percentage of people who want to sort of buy now. So you know, the majority not saying that they're not lurkers, they, they, you know they're not. It's just not right today's not the day yeah many reasons.
So they could come in a month, they could come in six months, they could come in a year. You know, I've had people I had one after my weekly newsletter this sunday say, you know, I'd like to have a conversation with you, roger, and I thought, yeah, so vaguely recognize the name because I'm sure I've seen it before. But then when I looked at my crm, he joined my world two and a half years ago and has just been around, so you just don't know when it's the right time for that person.
Stuart: Yeah, past podcasts. There's endless stories of people purging lists only to find clients jumping, or potential clients jumping through hoops to try and get back in touch with people because they thought our dead leads purged the list, or I mean even with us. We've been doing this for 11 years now and there's people who've joined our list right back in the beginning, whereas they've just finally got around to it now for whatever reason, and I'm sure if you'd have asked them when they joined the list in the first place when do you think you're going to do this none of them would have said oh, oh well, give me seven years and I'll get round to it. I mean, everyone thinks it's tomorrow, but it's surprising how much life gets in the way and just a year disappears.
Rojer: Yeah, totally, and I'm sure you know I've done the same with things.
Stuart: I've done. That's the funny thing, isn't it?
Rojer: You've done the same too.
Stuart: It's exactly the same with books, books on the shelf behind you. There's no way you bought any of those books thinking, oh, this, the gold on the end there will go red, will go nice with the red on the right. So I'm going to buy it because it's gold. You buy it because you want the information. But then life gets in the way and something happens. The amount of times that were, if you check your amazon or maybe mine, at least check your amazon card the number of things that are saved to later. Sometimes I'll go back through and I can't even remember why I put that in there in the first place, but I had some reason at some point. And then the other side end of the spectrum, when I'm looking for something oh, actually it's been in the shopping cart for months, I just hadn't got around to buying it.
So the the likelihood of, or the thing that needs to happen in order for someone to execute is intention and timing, and both of them need to match.
And you can do something around the intention and share with people useful information that tells them you're the right person, but you can't do anything about the timing and you just have to be there regularly enough so that, when timing is right, hopefully intersects with something that you've recently sent them, like the newsletter. Time always flies on the podcast, I think I say it every show. One thing that I did want to quickly touch on and I don't know that you've had opportunity to do it yet because the book's only recently finished but one of the things that we were talking about. We often talk about the idea of using it as digital lead generation, so on the website or in an ad, and allow people to sign in for a digital version. But we were talking about using the physical versions as well to go out to that selected group of people, the visible prospects rather than the invisible prospects. Have you done anything yet with the physical versions of the book?
Rojer: right, yeah, you can't see here, but on the floor of my office I got two boxes a box of books and a box of envelopes. I have been sending them out. So what I did and again you're right, it's only recently been launched. I'm doing some experimentation at the moment. So I've done it with some warmer materials potential clients and I've also done it with some colder potential clients, ie their new connections on linkedin, and I said you know. Then I sent them another message. You know, a day later, we know would you like a copy? It may be of value to you? And a percentage of people said yes and I've sent them off and one piece of business has come from it.
So that was that was in the first batch of. I think the first batch was 24. So if you do an roi on what the book costs to buy from amazon, yeah, postage to the states, I think the total is about eight quid each, eight pounds each. Do that for 20, that's I don't know.
Stuart: Whatever 20 times eight is, that's a pretty good roi, yeah so and that's on the immediate return, the long-term return of those people who've received the physical copies and the relationship status. The intention is increased a little bit but again it's just the timing that's off. I mean, the roi can only go up, it can't go down. Who else is physically?
Rojer: which other author out there is physically mailing a copy of the book, saying I really think you'll get some value, that more than happy to send you a copy like no one else is doing you know, and I don't know about you, but although I love all the digital stuff, I lose things on my laptop or I think, oh, I'm, you know, I'm not going to get around to that, but if you've got something you know you can hold in your hands and you can put it down. You visually see it.
So I think to have a physical copy that you then mail out. It's always around and maybe nothing's going to happen with some of them, which is fine, but all you need is a couple of them or a small percentage to come through, and that's a fantastic ROI.
Stuart: And that book, a fantastic ROI, and that book is going to live on their shelves and their desks and in their offices for way longer than their email is. So the likelihood of it being stumbled upon or shared or used in a kind of a second and third and fourth tier factor again way greater than just the digital version and again there's use cases for both. But I really like the physical version for that.
Rojer: I think. Yeah, it's definitely a case for digital versions. Yeah, I've been experimenting giving those to people who have joined my new LinkedIn newsletter, but I'll see. You know. The statistical sample is too small at the moment to judge, but business has come through from the physical copy and it's just so easy to to get it, you know, down to the post office and get it sent off. So I'm going to keep this experimentation going right and circle back you know from others in your ecosystem who have done the same yeah, yeah, definitely.
Stuart: Are you putting a little note in the book as well when you send it out, or are you just sending it by itself?
Rojer: Yeah, what I do, do I have any here? I do not immediately have. What I do is I get a. It's actually a yellow post-it, okay, yeah. And I say I turn to chapter five, which is here in the book, and on the post-it I write it would be Stuart the magic here in the book. Yeah, on the post that I write it will be Stuart the magic happens in chapter five.
Stuart: Ah, other thing I do. Wait for me for one more.
Rojer: There's more and in each book I've just gone on Canva.
Stuart: Okay, yeah.
Rojer: Oh, that's to cover which is. And there's a nice sort of endorsement of the book from Dr Marshall Goldsmith and on the back my name, address, contact details and I write a note here which would be stewart. Hope you find value in the book. Let me know what elements of it resonate with you most. Yeah, yeah, all the best, roger so just makes it a bit more personal yeah, again, that's the whole point that we're trying to do.
Stuart: We're trying to start conversations with ideal prospects, and all of these little things are just elements and levers to kind of increase the likelihood of that conversation starts, and starts in a more meaningful way than it would just by running an ad yeah, no, I think.
Rojer: Yeah, I thought it made me. I just, you know, for folks in the states I'll just go on amazoncom and get them to send them out. But you know, there's nothing personal about that you know, to get something that you know you get the head of the queen on. I said, queen, I don't have the king on the envelope. I'm living in the past. It's a little bit different when it arrives in their mailbox.
Stuart: Yeah, yeah yeah, unique, fantastic. Well, we should definitely circle back in later on in the year and then see how things are going and share some more ideas with people. I want to make sure that people can get a copy of the book there and find out more about what you're doing. So where's a good place for people to go to find out more about you and what you're up to?
Rojer: The easiest place is my website, which is rogerejonescom, and that's the place to find out more, and you can find out more about the book when you go there, and you can explore a scorecard there as well to see where you are in your business and any tweaks you may need to make.
Stuart: Yeah, perfect. I highly recommend people checking it out because the book itself is great as well. There a lot of whether, I think, whether you're a consultant, I mean obviously it's perfectly tuned to that group of people, but I think some of the things that it talks about are universally applicable across all business types. So, yeah, highly worth well recommend getting a copy of the book just for just for that alone. Whether, as I say, whether or not you're a consultant or in that that particular space, I'll make sure as always, make sure you put those links in the show notes so, as people are listening on the podcast player or in the car, just scroll down and tap the link now and then fill out the details later. So make it super easy for people to get through.
Well, time goes fast, as always. Let's definitely circle back again. Just want to say thanks for the time today, really excited to see the book come together. I love the fact that we got to test some of the things first, but whether or not that's the approach that everyone takes, the fact that the book's out there and it's easily updatable from that real world feedback you get an actually conversations with real people going on yeah, it makes such a big difference. So thanks again, roger. Conversations with real people going on.
Rojer: Yeah makes such a big difference. So thanks again, roger. Thank you, stew, I really enjoyed uh our time together this afternoon.
Stuart: Much appreciated thank you, our pleasure everyone. Thanks again for tuning in. We will catch you in the next one. In the meantime, we mentioned the testing, the testing approach to some of the summaries. We do run cohorts every so often for that approach, so if you're particularly interested in testing a book first, then just reach out to me, stuart at 90minutebookscom, and we can follow up with some details and tell you when the next cohort is all right, thanks again and we will catch everyone in the next one.