Today I’m with Lisa Jones, president and CEO of Financially Awaken, LLC, who hit Amazon's #1 bestseller list in just six days with her book Financial Seasons: Daily Inspiration About Finance and Our Emotions.

What makes Lisa's story impressive is that she accomplished this without a huge social media following, publishing company backing, or extensive marketing team. 

Lisa shares the journey that led to writing a 366-day devotional about the emotional side of personal finance, sparked by her and her husband's five-year journey to pay off $300,000 in debt. When she couldn't find a devotional to help her cope with the emotions of their debt payoff journey, she made one herself.

She hit publish Monday evening at 8:15 PM, terrified and crying. The book went live and within hours she earned her first #1 new release banner. By day six, she achieved #1 bestseller status. The book stayed at #1 for nearly three weeks and remained in the top 100 for over two years, with one unforgettable moment when her book appeared right next to Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover.

Lisa created "Road to Bestseller," a weekend course designed specifically for busy professionals. This course is structured for people who are willing to get into the trenches and do the work themselves. Her book, Financial Seasons, became a powerful teaching tool in her wealth strategy coaching sessions, allowing her to connect with clients by saying "I know how you feel" and directing them to relevant stories that show they're not alone in their struggles.

Ready to embark on your publishing adventure? Schedule a discovery call and take the next step to moving one step closer to writing and publishing your book!

Until next time, keep writing, dreaming, and creating—your book is waiting to be born!

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Episode 45: How to Become a Bestseller in Six Days with Lisa Jones

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LYNN: Hey, friends and future authors, this is Lynn Liquity Smarges back with another episode of Publishing for Professionals. Today we have an awesome guest expert who is coming on here, and I know you're going to want to hear everything she has to say. But before we introduce our guest today, I just want to thank my guests for listening to today's episode on book marketing and welcome to anyone who is new who's listening to the show. I'm so glad you stopped by to check out my podcast. Please make sure to hit the follow button to get writing and publishing information dropped straight to your podcast player every week.

Today I have an incredible lineup for you. I am joined by Lisa Jones, who is the president and CEO of Financially Awaken, LLC, a financial consulting firm and wealth strategy firm. She empowers high earning professionals to create lasting wealth with confidence. She's best known for her signature 12 month coaching program called Project Fierce, where clients gain clarity, avoid costly mistakes, which we are all about on this podcast, and implement customized wealth strategies designed for long term results. So Lisa, welcome to Publishing for Professionals.

LISA: Yay, thanks so much. It's so great to be here. I appreciate the invite.

LYNN: I'm really excited because Lisa and I met at FinCon.

LISA: We did.

LYNN: Yeah, we were talking about books and she's like, I made bestseller in six days. And I was like, what?

LISA: [LAUGH]

LYNN: So Lisa is here not to talk about finances, but to talk about how she got her book called "Financial Seasons: Daily Inspiration About Finance and Our Emotions," which is a very cool daily devotional with a story arc in it. It talks about how we intertwine our emotions and our finances and why it's so hard to get out of financial issues when we are so emotionally attached to different things, especially our money.

LISA: Yeah.

LYNN: And especially about being in America, because we're all about buying the stuff.

LISA: Yes, we are.

LYNN: So Lisa, before we actually jump into talking about how you got on the bestseller list, what made you decide to write your book? How long did it take you to write your book? What inspired you to do it?

LISA: Yeah, so my husband and I paid off $300,000 in five years.

LYNN: Whoa.

LISA: And I'm just gonna be honest, if I had known that it was gonna take five years, there's no way I would have signed up for it. It's a long time, it's a lot of money, it just is. And so in year one and a half, I went looking for a devotional. My faith is very important, and so I went looking for a devotional to help me cope with all the frustration, the drama, the emotion that we were experiencing as we were getting started, still trying to figure out how to do it. Back then, we didn't know what the heck we were doing. And honestly, Liquity, I couldn't find it. I could not find it. There were 20 day, 10 day, I even found a 40 day, but it talked about using your credit card. And I'm like, I don't wanna use my credit card. I want something that's gonna help me deal with the emotional part of why we're in this situation, how to not repeat these mistakes, things of that nature.

And so I was in the shower one day, thinking, trying to figure out how to get my mind into the game. And I felt the Holy Spirit say, I need you to write it. And I panicked because unlike most of the people who hang out with you, it was never my desire to be an author. And I certainly did not want to write a book on my dirty financial laundry for the world to then read and critique and just judge.

LYNN: Good as eyes.

LISA: Yeah, all my stuff. And so I avoided it for weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks. I was just like, I am not doing this. And finally my husband called me out in the kitchen one day and he said, look, you're either going to be woefully disobedient to what you know you have been called to do, or you're going to jump in and recognize that God will show you how to do it. So make a decision.

LYNN: Right.

LISA: And so I did. And when I did "Financial Seasons," I tell you a story every day. So there are literally 366 stories in "Financial Seasons." And so once I made the decision that this is what I'm gonna do, all of a sudden these ideas, these glimpses of the past, started coming to my remembrance. And I started writing them down. And each one of those glimpses became a story.

LYNN: That's amazing. Another one of my guests I had last year on my show, his name is Larry. He also talked about working as a professional in time blocking. And it's so necessary to make sure that you get the time you need to write your book. Okay, so you took the time to write your book. And by the way, Lisa, I love that it's 366 days and not 365 because you got the leap year in there.

LISA: Absolutely, somebody's gonna need it.

LYNN: Right? One person buys the book during the leap year, they'll be like wait a minute, where's my day?

LISA: [LAUGH]

LYNN: So I love this, six days. And so let's fast forward. So you got it edited, formatted, and you're ready to launch it. So what were your thoughts like when you were originally launching your book? Did you originally want to have the goal of hitting the best seller list or did that kind of almost accidentally happen for you?

So I was just like, I need to find how to do this. So I started researching on how to have a launch team. And I bought this quick course. And I say quick because it really was all about starting from the beginning. And I was almost ready to launch the book. So I didn't use 90% of what was in the course. I was like, just show me how to do a launch team, that's all I need. And so, but that was like a thread. And it was like, well, if you need that, then you need this and you need that. And you need this. And I was like, what's a category? What's a keyword? Where do you find keywords? I mean, yeah.

So I'm panicking, my head is exploding. And I am just like, oh my gosh, I really, really, really want to get this out in time for Black Friday so that we can take advantage of everybody buying stuff for Christmas, whole nine yards. And I'm freaking out. So I took days off from work. I'm just combing through the internet, trying to find stuff. How do I do this? How do I do this?

And so I stumbled on a path. And the big secret in my mind to becoming a number one bestseller is launching on one platform first. Now, I didn't do that intentionally. I sent my paperback and my hardcover to Ingram Spark. And they are obviously supposed to send the metadata to Amazon and Barnes and Nobles and everywhere that books are sold. I don't know that it takes weeks for that to happen.

LYNN: You're like 99% of my clients. Most people or new authors don't know because you're just not in the business. You said write it. You didn't say market it.

And what does Amazon tell you? It'll take three to five business days for your book to be live. It's live the next morning.

LYNN: They don't do that anymore.

LISA: Oh good. There you go. So it was live the next morning. A few hours later, number one new release banner, number one.

LYNN: Amazing.

LISA: Okay. Four or five hours after that, number one new release banner, number two. And then the next day, number one new release banner, number three, four, five, I'm freaking out. Oh my gosh. And then the next day, number one new release banner, number six. And so things calm down just a little bit. And so it takes like two more days to get to the number one new release banner, number eight. And on day number six at 6:30 in the morning, as I'm driving into the office on Friday, remember Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, number one best selling.

LYNN: Amazing.

LISA: And so did you, when you have this, actually we're going to take a quick break right here. Can we go back? I'm going to ask you some questions about that. All right. So hang tight friends, we'll be back in just a minute.

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All right. We are back with Lisa Jones and her website. You definitely want to visit her at roadtobestseller.com. We're talking about how she got to Amazon best seller in six days after launching her book on a weekend, which is absolutely incredible. So when you got, I know to see the Amazon best seller banner is really hard because you have to literally be on Amazon 24/7 and screenshot it just as it pops up. So when you first started seeing it, did you think like, Oh no, this can't be my banner or they must have something wrong? Or were you just completely freaking out, showing your husband like, Oh my gosh, I can't believe it's a best seller? And was it your launch team that was buying your book or was it just people coming across it on Amazon?

LISA: It was all of the above. And we didn't just get to number one best seller for a moment because you're right. You better be taking those screenshots. We stayed at number one for almost three weeks.

LYNN: Wow.

LISA: So there was no question that this is not a fluke. This is one of the coolest things. And I missed this one when we think about taking the screenshots. This is the one screenshot that I wish I had remembered to take. But one of the coolest things for me was the fact that as I'm climbing up the chart to get to number one and we've got all these number one new releases that are coming, there's a moment where Dave Ramsey's "Total Money Makeover" and Lisa Jones' "Financial Seasons" are right next to each other.

LYNN: Oh my gosh.

LISA: I missed the screenshot. But I was just like, Oh my gosh. At least I know that and nobody can ever take that away from me.

LYNN: That's amazing. That's amazing to be up there with Ramsey.

LISA: I know. And it's one of those things, I mentioned earlier, my faith is incredibly important. There is no way I would have done this on my own. It was never my desire. I do feel a calling to do this work in the financial coaching realm, wealth strategy realm in the beginning. And then to have this as an arsenal, a part of the arsenal, if you will, I just, I feel incredibly blessed to have it. But I feel like it needed to be solidified so that there is no question. So this wasn't a five minute number one bestseller. It literally hung out and it stayed on the top 100 for over two years.

LYNN: Two years. Yep.

LISA: And by now the paperback is out. The hard cover is out. Those came several weeks later. But it's been the Kindle version that got us to number one. That was just consistently number one. The others climbed into the top 100 a few times, but it was always the Kindle version that did it.

LYNN: Awesome. Well, clearly a few things, right? One, this was a book people wanted and needed because if there wouldn't be so many people buying it. The second thing is I love that you have your faith to lean back on, because you always need that support, whether it's your faith, whether it's your inner voice, whether it's your, you also had your partner who was your cheerleader pushing you to do this.

LISA: Cheerleader.

LYNN: Love is being your cheerleader and pushing you to grow, because you didn't want to do it. And when we get in those uncomfortable spaces, that's the time that we grow and growth is good for us personally. We don't always like it. It's painful.

LISA: It's painful. Very painful.

LYNN: While we're going through it, on the other side, then you feel so much stronger because of it.

LISA: Yes. Yeah.

LYNN: Because once you overcome that challenge, you're like, yes. So most people obviously have an extensive marketing plan. Some people hire a whole team for the marketing. You achieved all this without a marketing team. And so tell us about on your website, the road to bestseller, what kind of pieces of the puzzle do you have in that just so people know what you did to make your book a bestseller.

LISA: Yeah. So the first thing it points out, first of all, it's a weekend course. So it is better for people that are, and everybody writes differently. I'm going to say if you're at the 75% mark. It's designed to pick up there. So you're beginning to think about what the end looks like. It doesn't mean you can't purchase the course if you are at the outline stage and still thinking through, because there are many pieces that will help you. But it is designed for, okay, I'm almost done. Now what do I do?

It's also designed for the person who doesn't have this huge following. I have a very good friend who has like 80,000 people who follow her on Instagram. She's number one bestseller for two books. And she's like, people ask me all the time how I did it. Well, she has a publishing company that pays. And so she and I were talking, we go to church together and we were talking and she said, people ask me all the time how I did it. And my road is different because she has a publishing company as a backer and they have all their marketing mechanisms in place. This is not meant for that. This is meant for the person who's an indie writer who doesn't have this huge following who is willing to get into the trenches.

It is not done for you, but Liquity, what it does have, it has all the steps necessary to get you there. It has AI built in, yes, to help with some of that heavy lifting, the research. It's not meant to replace your final review, but it's going to help you in figuring out all of the nuances associated with specifically your categories and your keywords.

And so we start on Friday night. It's designed for a weekend. You do it whenever it's not like we're looking at you when you do it. But the point is you made it for people who are busy, especially busy professionals, like everyone who listens to this show.

LYNN: Yeah. Absolutely.

LISA: So what you're doing is you're watching this podcast, you hear about the road to bestseller, you go to the website, you purchase it. Very first thing you're going to do is block out your weekend. What weekend are you going to do this? And then on Friday night, not Friday morning, because we're working. So Friday night, you're going to come home. You're going to get into your safe space and it's going to tell you, you've got workbooks. You've got downloads. You've got fill in the blanks. You've got thought provoking exercises. And that's what we do for Friday night.

LYNN: So you can get those people from your social media. They say, Hey, I'm starting a newsletter list about the topic of your book. Do you want to join just, so that's how you start that. And it's actually really easy to do that just with a Google form. You can do that just to collect the email addresses. And I know Kit, which used to be Convert Kit.

LISA: Yep. That's what I use on the free version. You can get one landing page for free, which is enough to get people into your newsletter.

LYNN: Absolutely. And I use Kit when it was Convert Kit.

LISA: I know everybody still calls it Convert Kit.

LYNN: I know why they changed their name.

LISA: I still don't know why they changed it. I'm like, why the heck did you change?

LYNN: I think it was a legal thing. I really do. Why else would you go through the hassle of changing your name?

LISA: Right. When everybody liked it.

LYNN: Yeah. So that was the only thing I knew I was supposed to do ahead of time. But these days, that's so much easier because we have all these new tools that we didn't have back then that make it so much faster for you to do that. And we just walk you through all of those things. If you have the core version and you have the pro version in the pro version, we actually give you the swipe copy for your launch team.

LYNN: Oh, cool. So you actually give people the actual automation piece where they can just copy the link and use the automation on Kit?

LISA: No. So the automation is for that's your AI. That is your keywords and your categories helping to because that's hard.

LYNN: Right. I just helped a client with that and we actually did that with AI. I found keywords because the other thing you can do obviously is use Publisher Rocket, which is a really great tool. So either one and or combination of both, if you want to access all of the features.

LISA: Right. So in the swipe copy, all you have to do is copy and paste, copy it and then paste it into your Kit newsletter template and add your little, the little elements that personalize it, you know, use first name here type thing and it's ready to go. Put in your signature and it's ready to go. And we do that for all of your launch team. We do that for those that are on your newsletter list leading up to the launch because your launch team is a much smaller subset.

So then we also give you the swipe copy for the newsletters or emails that go out to your full audience leading up to, after and coming down. And so it's, I think it's 10 emails on that one and then the launch team is even more. So all those are included in the pro version. There's an extra workbook on the pro side so that you have a place to pull everything together. And then this is all, we're still talking about Saturday.

And then on Sunday, it's all about what do you do now that you are, we don't know where you're going to land. It really depends on your audience, the fervor with which they want and need your product, things of that nature. Now that you are an author, whether you get to say bestselling author or not, those things are up to you. But now what are you going to do with this platform?

And so one of the things that I do with "Financial Seasons," it has become a teaching tool in my wealth strategy classes and in coaching sessions. So when I'm with a client and they stumble into an area, I literally can say, I know how you feel. And then I send them to the book so that they can see and read the story themselves. So they know they're not alone. So what is it that you're going to do with this book? We don't just write just because. Now it needs to be a banner for us in whatever thing we are representing. And so we go through that pretty heavily on Sunday and that's your course.

LYNN: I absolutely love that. You covered everything. This is great. And there's a tool because that's always what I saw people like. If you're using as a tool that's fine, but you don't want to use it to create everything because then it's going to sound like a robot.

LISA: And what does it say all over day two? Do not rely on this solely. This is just the starting point. This is just to get the heavy lift out of the way so that you can get out into the open water and begin to actually figure out which ones work for you. So yeah, very important.

LYNN: Yeah. Extremely important. I think Lisa, this has been so great. I know all the people listening, all the professionals listening have gotten so much value out of this. So again, people want to find you. They can definitely go to roadtobestseller.com. And so yeah, so tell us how do they find your book marketing course?

LISA: Yep. So roadtobestseller.com is the book marketing course. And so when you go there, that's the sales page. It'll tell you all about the course itself, how to use it, the two different paths, things of that nature. And hello@financiallyawakened.co is my email. Feel free to send me an email. And then I'm also, I am Lisa Y. Jones, L-Y-J. Lisa Y. Jones, L-Y-J on all social.

LYNN: Perfect. Awesome. So great, Lisa. Again, for coming on today and sharing your expertise on how you became a bestseller in six days on Amazon.

LISA: Yes.

LYNN: All right, friends. You know, I love working with new and repeat authors to write and edit their nonfiction books. So instead of using your time to write your book, you can do what you do best, and that's being a thought leader. So definitely hop on write4u.me to join me on a Discovery Call. Until next week, this is Lynn Liquity, reminding you to keep writing, keep dreaming, and keep creating. Your book is waiting to be born.

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