In this strategic episode, Ally Machate, Founder and CEO of The Writer's Ally, shares how to write the right book that actually grows your business instead of one that just looks good. If you’re a stage 2 founder considering a book but unsure what it should achieve or who it’s for, you won’t want to miss it.

You will discover:

- Why clarifying your book’s business goal is more important than writing a “good” book

- How to reverse-engineer the right book from your desired outcome and ideal reader

- What turns a book into a marketable tool rather than a Field of Dreams project

This episode is ideal for for Founders, Owners, and CEOs in stage 2 of The Founder's Evolution. Not sure which stage you're in? Find out for free in less than 10 minutes at https://www.scalearchitects.com/founders/quiz

Ally Machate is a publishing strategist, author services expert, and founder of The Writer’s Ally. A former Simon & Schuster editor with 25+ years in the industry, she helps authors write, publish, and sell high-quality books that fuel business growth, attract ideal clients, and boost authority. Known for her honest, strategic approach, Ally helps authors cut through the noise, avoid costly mistakes, and turn their books into real engines of visibility and results.

Want to learn more about Ally Machate's work at The Writer's Ally? Check out her website at https://www.thewritersally.com/

Connect with Ally through her LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/allysonemachate

Hello, hello, and welcome, welcome once again

to the Start, Scale, and Succeed podcast-the only podcast that

grows with you through all seven levels of your journey as a

founder. I'm your host Scott Ritzheimer, and today we're

going to talk about that moment when you realize you're losing

to people that aren't better at whatever it is that you do,

they're just better known, and especially for those of you who

are in that startup entrepreneur stage, pursuing life as a

successful solopreneur, you might find yourself with the

desire or even the decision to write a book. But here's the

I don't think we talk about enough is you can't know

what the right book is until you actually know what you want to

do with it. And being in the midst of my own first book

release myself, I can tell you that starting out a book project

with a goal is probably not what most of us do. At least it's not

what I do. And the moment that I I was able to develop that goal,

it really made everything else fall into line. My guest today

is going to help us do that just right. And my guest is Ali

Machate, who's a publishing strategist, author, services

expert, and founder of the Writers Ally. A former Simon and

Schuster editor with over 25 years of experience in the

industry, she helps authors write, publish, and sell

high-quality books that fuel business growth, attract ideal

clients, and boost authority. Known for her honest and

strategic approach, Ali helps authors cut through the noise,

avoid costly mistakes, and turn their books into real engines of

visibility and results. Ali, so excited you're here. This is

again, as you might guess from the intro, something that's near

and dear to my heart because it is right in the center of my

world right now. But for founders out there who are

listening and are thinking about, or have even decided to

write a book for their business, how you bring up this idea of

writing the right book, R I G H T. How do you know if you're

writing the right or correct book?

Well, the first question I would ask myself, or

I would encourage someone to ask themselves, is: Did you actually

think about what you wanted this book to do for you out in the

world? And are you really clear on who this book is for, you

know. As you mentioned, most people when they start writing a

book, especially in the very early stages, they're motivated

by passion, right? There's an idea they really want to share,

a message they really want to get out there, something they

really think is going to help people, and that's a great way

to get started. There's nothing wrong with that, but at some

point you have to stop thinking about you, right? What you want

to say, what's important to you to put into the book, and start

thinking about the person on the other end, right? On the

receiving end, who is it that's going to buy this book? What

exactly is it that they're looking for that's going to lead

them to get your book, right? So if you haven't asked yourself

those questions, that's probably the first red flag that you may

not actually be writing the right book, and the risk there

is falling into something I call the good book wrong book trap,

which is that it is possible, very possible, to write an

objectively good book, something well written, interesting to

read, got a professional cover on it, but if it isn't

strategically dialed into your goals, if it isn't clear who the

book is for, you can end up with this book that, by all objective

measures, is a good book that does absolutely nothing for your

business and just sits there looking pretty in your Zoom

background. And that's not really what most people want at

the end of the process.

Yeah, yeah, it's fascinating. So when we

think about this, who I think most folks would say either some

version of it's for everybody, everyone can benefit from this,

or maybe even a little bit dialed in, like my existing

client. How is your book reader different from your ideal, let's

say, coaching client or consulting client or your your

typical profile.

Well, they may not be different. It really depends on

those goals. You know, if you have a business that's

successful, and you know, as you mentioned in your introduction,

the problem is really visibility. You're just not, you

know, being considered because people don't know that you're in

the mix. Then your target reader may be exactly the same as your

ideal client because your book is going to be designed to

attract more of those types of people, but that again goes

speaks to the importance of knowing what exactly you want

your book to do for you. I've had clients, for example, who

are ready to make a shift in their business. They're pivoting

into a slightly different but adjacent niche, or they're

trying to change how they're perceived, you know what they're

being perceived as the expert on. If you're writing that kind

of book, well, the people you're targeting are going to be

different than the pool that you've been speaking to. So then

you'll know that your ideal reader is going to be a little

bit different than your current ideal client.

So I think it's pretty safe to say that.

There are that no goals is not as good as a goal, but is there

such a thing as a wrong goal? Like, are some goals for a book

better than others?

Yeah, absolutely. So I definitely don't think any goal

is wrong per se, but when you are a business owner, when you

are an expert, and you're thinking about that book in

terms of how it can help your business, you really want to

think of that book as a tool, right? It's a tool in your

toolbox. It's a lever that you're going to pull on to get

certain benefits and certain results. So when you think of it

that way, just like in any other scenario, you have to have the

right tool for the job. Sometimes the thing you're

trying to achieve in your business, you think, oh, I'm

going to write a book because that's going to help me do that.

But maybe the book isn't actually the right lever to

pull. It may not be the right tool for that job. You know, I

go on a lot of these podcasts, and people are always surprised

because I'm probably one of the few people who work with authors

out there saying not everyone should write a book. I actually

don't think it's right for everybody for exactly this

reason. I met a woman not too long ago, had been in corporate

America, been working for a really long time in the C-suite,

tons of great experience, tons of wisdom to share. Was just

leaving her office job, wanted to start a coaching and

consulting business, and was thinking about writing a book.

But the more we dug into what she wanted to do with the book.

We realized that what she really needed was a client base and an

income flow. And a book will eventually bring you

opportunities and bring more income into your business, but

it's certainly not the shortest, most direct path to generating

income in a new business. So you know that's just an example of

where her goal to bring in clients and bring in money

didn't 100% align with her initial plan of writing a book.

Yeah, I like that. So this might not be the

fairest way to ask the question, but I think it might be helpful

when you talk to a new author, you know, new to you at least.

Maybe they've done it before, and they start. You ask, "What

are your goals for the book? And they start sharing some of those

goals. Which are the ones that excite you the most, or or maybe

even just feel the most achievable and realistic?

I love it when an author comes to me with a very

clear business growth goal. So they know I want to start

getting on stages and speaking, and I want this book to help me,

you know, get up on stage. Whether that's for promotional

purposes or to actually be a paid speaker, you know, keynote

speaker, it's a slightly different business model, or

someone who comes in and says, you know, I'm I've got online

courses, I need to create a better pipeline of people to

come in for my online courses. The more clear a client is about

what they want in their business, the easier it is for

me to help them figure out precisely what book is going to

be really dialed into. Not only what they want to achieve, but

like we keep talking about with that reader, what exactly is the

journey, right? What are they looking for that brings them to

the book in the first place? What do they need to see there

to really know? Like, yeah, this is the book I'm looking for.

This is the thing that's right for me. And how do we bring them

on that transformative journey so that when they end up, they

feel both that they've gotten real value and also they've

gotten enough of a taste of this author of this expert to feel

ready to take the next step and motivated to take the next step,

whatever that looks like. Because that's ultimately what

most people are writing a book for. Whatever that next step is

might vary, but that's the whole point, right? We want people to

read it, get a taste, get hooked, get into it, and then

want to hire you, attend your class, whatever.

Yeah. So let's say we have a goal for our book,

and let's use the example you gave of being invited to more

stages. How do you know if the idea in your head will lead to

the right book for that goal?

So, a simple process. We've already sort of you know

touched on it, but asking yourself those questions so that

you kind of backwards engineer things, kind of the same way you

would any product or any offer in your business really does

work for a book as well. So you know, starting with that end

goal in mind, I want to get on stages. I want to do more

speaking. All right, great. Well, what kind of people do you

want to be speaking to? You know, is this a situation where

you just want to be paid for speaking, or is this a situation

where you want to be in front of the room of ideal clients and

prospects, people that you might actually you know bring into

your business in some way. You're not going to give exactly

the same talk, right? It's going to be designed a little bit

differently. You also might not be attending the same kind of

events. You know, large large conferences typically will have

you know maybe one or two really great keynote speakers who are

inspirational and exciting and motivational, but the people who

at the conference who are usually giving the talks that

lead to work, those are usually the breakout sessions, right?

They're the people who are teaching something, a specific

topic or on a specific track. So even those kinds of details will

change the book that you're writing and how you market it.

And I'll give you an. Another quick example: I had a client

once who had been very successful running corporate

workshops, like retreats, weekend retreats, and had been

running these retreats for years and years. Didn't want to be in

the room anymore. Basically, just wanted to get up on stage

and be paid to be a keynote speaker, and that was great.

Except he forgot that when he was taking all his material from

all of his retreats and putting them together in a book. That

ultimately there was another factor. He wasn't just writing

that book for the people in the room. He was writing it for the

people who were hiring the keynote speakers, right? He was

writing it for the conference organizers, and he had this book

that was truly a great book with lots of great information. But

it was so deeply rooted in the workshop that he wasn't getting

any results. And when he came to me, that was the question: like,

what's wrong here? What's not happening? I pointed out to him

that nothing about his book was allowing those organizers to see

him as a keynote speaker. They were seeing him as a workshop

leader. They were seeing him as an instructor. So the book

itself was not positioned to achieve the goal he actually

wanted.

So once folks have dialed in on, they've got a

clear goal. They've structured the book so that it aligns with

that goal. What are some of the mistakes that you see folks make

from that point onward?

Well, one of the mistakes, one of the really

common mistakes, and we touched on it again earlier, was along

the path of writing being so focused and so narrowly focused

on writing a good book, which is not a dumb thing, right? Of

course, you want your book to be good. Of course, it's important

that you're conscientious about what you're creating, but again,

at the end of the day, a good book is not necessarily a

marketable book. So one of the biggest mistakes is being so

focused on just making sure the book is good, whatever that

means to you, looks good, reads well, whatever. They take sort

of a field of dreams mentality. If the book is just really,

really good, then people will discover it, right? And things

will blow up, and I'll get those benefits. But that's not really

how it works. Your book has to actually be marketable as well,

and it needs to be the right book, as we've been talking

about. So you have to pick your head up out of the sand

somewhere in the process and make that shift to start

thinking about it differently, and sort of hold those two ideas

in your head at the same time to create a book that is both good

and marketable.

Yeah, when you talked about getting on stage,

you talked about kind of the the dual dynamic of speaking to your

ultimate audience and then kind of the gatekeepers, the the

folks who are organizing. When you talk about making a

marketable book, is there a similar dynamic there as well?

Yeah, absolutely. So it's it's always really kind of

comes down to those things. What do you want the book to do out

in the world? You know, you said something earlier about people

think like, oh, well, anybody can enjoy my book, or anybody

could benefit from my book. Excuse me. When you ask about

goals, their goals are often things like, well, I just want

people to like it, right? I just want people to read it. I want

people to benefit from it. I'm trying to help people. Really

common, really wonderful. You know, really worthwhile

heart-centered goal. It's a great motivation for writing it.

But you you really do have to understand and make that shift.

Otherwise, it's like the tree that fell in the woods. Nobody

will ever know about your book, right?

Yeah, Ally. There's this question that I

have that I ask all my guests. I'm very interested to to hear

what you'd have to say. But the question is this: What would you

say is the biggest secret that you wish wasn't a secret at all?

What's that one thing you wish every founder watching or

listening today knew?

Oh, that's such a juicy question. Well, to keep it

specific to books, I would say the one secret I really want

people to know is that your job is not to sell books.

A lot of people, when they write a book, again, especially with a

business goal in mind, they're consciously or unconsciously

working with this model that they've probably seen in pop

culture, they've seen it in the media, and it's the traditional

book publishing model. You get a book deal, you get a publisher,

you sell this book, it becomes a New York Times bestseller, and

all of these wonderful things happen. But book publishers are

in the business of selling books. That's how they make

money. Every copy they sell is where their income is from. But

you, as a business owner, you're not in the business of selling

books. You're in the business of selling whatever it is that you

sell, and the book is a tool to help you do that. So the secret

is not to focus on book sales really at all, because that's

not where the value of that book really lies for you when you

have a business and you're selling services or products or

other types of things, and I have known clients who have had

a book that didn't sell very many copies. I even know one guy

who's never sold a copy ever, and he's been leveraging that

book for 20 years. He's made millions of dollars because of

the book, but not in book sales.

Wow! Wow! Fascinating. What a fascinating

conversation and a timely one, at least for me. And I know for

others listening today. So, Allie, there there are some

folks that are listening to this. They're in that process,

or maybe they've got a dream of writing a book and they really

want it to serve their business and their clients well. Where

can they reach out to you? What would be a next step be? How can

they move from here?

So, if you come to our [email protected], we have

a library full of free resources. Is in one, in fact,

called "Don't Write the Wrong Book. It's a 25 minute webinar

training, sort of along the lines we've been talking about.

It walks you through exactly what it means to write the right

book, how to avoid writing the wrong one, and a simple

five-step process you can apply to any ideas you're currently

working with, whether you started writing or you just have

a bunch of ideas and you're trying to pick one, I highly

recommend you check it out. If you're already drafting or close

to finish and you're ready to actually talk to somebody about

your book, we've got a contact form there you can fill out to

get a free book strategy call.

Excellent, excellent. I highly recommend

it. Do not try to publish a book on your own, bring in some some

qualified help, and Allie is certainly there to help.

Fascinating conversation again, and and a privilege, Ali, and

honor having you on the show. Thank you so much for spending

some time with us today, and for those of you watching and

listening, you know that your time and attention mean the

world to us. I hope you got as much out of this conversation as

I know I did, and I cannot wait to see you next time. Take care.

Hey everyone, Scott Ritzheimer here. Thank you so much for

listening to the Start Scale and Succeed podcast. I hope this

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