143: Success is An Inside Job: Create and Promote Your Itty Bitty Book with Suzy Prudden

Robert Plank: We're here with Suzy Prudden who is a legend. She is an internationally acclaimed speaker and seminar leader. A New York Times best selling author from before the internet. A fitness expert, a body and mind pioneer. Hypnotherapist, success coach, radio host, publisher. She's been on Oprah, Good Morning America, and the Today Show. It sounds like there's nothing she can't do. How are things today, Suzy?

Suzy Prudden: Robert, they are fabulous. They just keep getting better. The older I get the better they get.

Robert Plank: That's what I like to hear. Everyday is the best day of your life because every day is better than before, right?

Suzy Prudden: Yes. I had a friend of mine say to me one time we were are a party. I said to him "I'm having the best time ever." With annoyance, he said "You always say that." I looked at him and I said "Yeah, I do." Then he realized that it was the best time ever. It didn't mean that the other days weren't any good, it just meant that this was the best. If every day is a best day, you're having a best life.

Robert Plank: That sounds like an amazing message. Can you tell me- You sound like an interesting person- Can you tell me about yourself and what it is you do? And what makes you different? Besides the obvious. Where to begin?

Suzy Prudden: Do we have an hour? Do we have three hours? Basically, I started my career when I was 22 in 1965. What happened was, my mother told me I couldn't date the boy I was dating, so I ran away and married him. That was when I was 19 and then I had to support him because he went back to school. At 22, then I decided to have a baby. Nothing made any sense, you have to realize.

I started a fitness school because my mother was the nation's foremost fitness authority. I became extremely successful and I've written nine books on fitness, two books on body/mind. I've done television, I had my own show on NBC in New York as fitness reporter for the Today Show. Had an amazing career. In '81, I divorced him. In '83, I sold my business and I retired at the age of 40. Then I had to figure out what to do with my life, but I didn't know who I was so I became a workshop junkie. Then I started making up new thoughts, programs, and body/mind programs. I just kept making stuff up and it kept working. Then I became a hypnotherapist and a body/mind technologist.

Everything kept leading me forward to the place where I am now, which is taking all of my skills and helping entrepreneurs create seven figure businesses starting with writing a small book which we call Itty Bitty Books. Which started with when my sister took my name off of a book that we were writing. When I saw that my name wasn't there, it meant that I didn't have to write the book anymore, but I could have authors write books and that's what I'm doing now.

An author writes an Itty Bitty book, which is the 15 steps to whatever their expertise is. Then we help them create a business which will help them make between six and seven figures within three to five years. It's exciting.

Robert Plank: It sounds like it. That's a pretty crazy story. I love how one thing kind of lead to the next logical step as opposed to not necessarily drifting around, but one kind of thing ran its course then it transitioned you into whatever this next stage was.

Suzy Prudden: Then I forgot to mention that eight months after doing Oprah, I ended up homeless because I didn't pay attention to my money. I spent it all. I took ten months- I never lived in my car, but it was a very educational experience. I knew it would change my life and it did. This was in the '90s, 1990. It caused me to have a different viewpoint on life and the importance of paying attention, of being present. The secret tells everybody you can ... There's a genie out there, wish for something and it will come to you. Yes, that's true and only if you take action. If you sit back and wait for it, it's not going to happen.

I am an action oriented person. I get an idea and I act on it and that's why I'm successful.

Robert Plank: I like it.

Suzy Prudden: That's why my authors are successful. The authors that I have that take action and do what I tell them make a lot of money.

Robert Plank: Imagine that.

Suzy Prudden: Exactly.

Robert Plank: They realize that they are an expert in a certain area, but their skills might be limited. They go to you as the expert, listen to what an expert says to do, it works. Pretty simple.

Suzy Prudden: Very simple. I have three coaches. I spent the morning with one coach- I'm so excited about the stuff that I'm doing with this particular coach. I believe in coaches. When I lost everything, I didn't have a coach. I didn't have a team. I was kind of winging it. I was successful, but I wasn't strategically successful. It was hit or miss. Now I am strategically successful. I have a team. I have coaches. I have people who keep me on track, who support me. I'm going to tell you something funny. I actually have someone who comes in once or twice a month and cleans my desk because I hate to do that. I'm looking at my desk right now and it's piled high with books, and tapes, and files. She's coming tomorrow and we're going to spend the whole morning cleaning my desk because I will not do it.

A lot of entrepreneurs believe they have to do everything themselves and they don't. I don't clean my house, I have somebody clean it. I change the cat box because it's kind of awful if you don't, but I do have someone who cleans my house. I have someone who cleans my desk. I have someone who makes my appointments because I don't have time because I'm doing the appointments. I'm out there getting authors, I don't have time to then hound people to say "You gave me your card, do you want to talk to me?" I have someone else do it.

Entrepreneurs, it is extremely important that you delegate because if you don't, you can't run your business in a way that's going to garner you the kind of income that you want. You'll be working. If you are an entrepreneur and you do everything yourself, you really just created yourself a job that has more hours than if you worked for somebody else.

Robert Plank: You just end up overworked and burned out. How do you tell the ... How do you, first of all, get the right people on your team, and how do you know when to do something yourself and when to delegate it? Like you said that you know to somewhat delegate cleaning of the desk, but then something simple you know to clean the cat box. How do you figure out those two things? Who to have and which to do yourself?

Suzy Prudden: It's very simple how I figured it out. I won't clean my desk. I have not been able to clean my desk since my very first career, that was in 1965. I have not changed. I am not going to change, I'm 73 years old today- Day before yesterday, a few days ago.

Robert Plank: Happy birthday.

Suzy Prudden: I won't do it. Thank you. I won't do it. If you have something that you won't do and you keep waiting to do it, it's not going to get done so just pick someone to do it. When it comes to the cat box, I could wait for my housekeeper to come, but that could be one or two weeks because she doesn't come every day. She comes once every week or once every two weeks depending how much time I'm spending in my house and how messy I make it. If I wait two days to clean the cat box, it stinks and I don't like the smell so I clean it. It's that simple.

Robert Plank: Why make it more complicated than it has to be?

Suzy Prudden: I do my dishes too because I don't like leaving them in the sink. The night before my housekeeper comes, I don't do my dishes because she's going to do them the next morning. That's strategic. That's so simple, it's ridiculous. I also have someone who makes my calls. She just had surgery this week, so she can't make my calls. I'm finding time to make those calls because she can't. That's just common sense. You've got to bring in a lot of common sense to business. You have to pick up the phone. If you're in business you have to pick up the phone. You cannot not pick up the phone, the money's in the phone.

When I'm talking to people, I find out what they need and then I strategize with them to help them get it. And because I'm a hypnotherapist, if someone has a phone phobia, I just hypnotize them to stop it.

I have a wonderful new company which is able to help people get in front of people, it's called Itty Bitty Publishing. You can go online and take a look at it, www.ittybittypublishing.com, Itty Bitty Publishing. We take experts and help them write a 15 step book on whatever their expertise is. Then we have a business builder program, that we just started recently, to help them turn their itty bitty book into a business that will give them six or seven figures depending on where they are in the moment. Some people are not at six figures, so we help them get to six figures. Some people are already at six figures, so why not make multiple six figures? If you're at multiple six figures, why not then make a million? It's all doable. It's all strategic. You have to keep it simple, but you need help.

How do I choose the people to work? If they're good at their job, I keep them. If they're not, I let them go.

Robert Plank: Once again, super simple advice. Why make it anymore complicated than it has to be? I guess you have these people that you work with and you have somewhat of a period of time when you're just trying them out and seeing how well they do.

Suzy Prudden: Yeah. You really have to look at if it's a fit, it's a fit. If it's not, it's not. Usually it takes about three months to know for sure. Be very careful hiring friends, very careful. Don't hire family.

Robert Plank: Good advice.

Suzy Prudden: My business partner happens to be my sister, but I can't do what she does and she can't do what I do. It's a perfect combination.

Robert Plank: Your sister is a partner, not an employee of yours.

Suzy Prudden: Not an employee. She was an employee in my other company, I had to fire her. It's much easier for her to be a partner.

Robert Plank: I like the idea of this itty bitty book and this 15 steps. I'm looking at the site and there's 15 steps to weight loss, 15 steps to traveling, cool stuff like that. Could you walk us through a case study of one of these clients you had, one of the books you-

Suzy Prudden: I'll give you my favorite. I have two favorites right now. Anthony who wrote a book the Little Black Book of Sales. I met him at a conference last year when we were only a year old, our company is only a year old. We have over a hundred authors so far. I met Anthony at a conference, I talked about Itty Bitty at lunch. He said "Let me have an application." He signed up a lunch, I never saw him before, he got the concept, he wrote the book, and he said to us over and over it changed his life. His book- He signed the contract in March. His book came out in June of last year. He's probably close to half a million dollars. Because of it, he uses his book as ... He's a sales coach for the automotive industry for car dealerships. He goes into car dealerships, he'll give a presentation. They hire him for a year to help their salesmen. He's gotten contracts anywhere from $18,000 for the year to $54,000 for the year. They send him to Dubai this year to speak for two weeks. He's probably close to half a million dollars because he has an itty bitty book. It's positioned him as an expert in his field and creates him as an automatic authority. That's one favorite.

The other one is [Cat Bonback 00:14:05] who wrote the book on marijuana. This is one of my favorite stories. When I spoke to her last year, last summer. I think it was in August. I met her at a conference. When I called her and spoke to her, I said "What do you do?" And she said "Well, I'm a full blooded gypsy." I went "Okay." She said "I'm a disabled vet." I said "Okay." She said "I'm a spiritual coach." I said "Okay." "And I'm a marijuana dispenser." I said "Okay." She lives up in Washington state. I said "What do you want to write about?" She said "I don't know, spiritual coaching?" I said "Cat, what's the low hanging fruit?" She said "I don't know." I said "It's pot." She said "Really?" She told me later she was afraid to tell me that she was a marijuana dispenser, but she took a chance.

I said "Yes. How about you write the book, you're amazing marijuana book, 15 ways to use cannabis for healing?" She said "How did you do that?" I said "That's what I do. Your next book is going to be 15 ways to talk to your children about cannabis. Your next book is going to be how to use edibles correctly. You're going to create a coaching program and you're going to teach people how to teach people how to use cannabis so they use it wisely. Go find out if cannabis coach is available," it wasn't. I said "How about the cannabis coach," it was. I said "buy it." I said "Buy the cannabis, US cannabis coach, national cannabis coach, and cannabis coaching certification program." She did. Then she said "What about Mary Jane?" I said "I had forgotten Mary Jane was a term for marijuana." She said "I want to do Mary Jane parties. I want to do them like Tupperware parties where we sell cannabis paraphernalia at parties." I said "Go buy Mary Jane parties." She did.

She started teaching her cannabis coaching certification program this past March. She was in a conference recently where she sold 61 places in her cannabis coaching certification program. In one day they made $92,000. That's a nice day.

I just got off the phone with her this morning. She's going to be doing one in Los Angeles either late this year or early next year. I told her she had to raise the prices because my coach told me I had to raise my prices, so I told her she had to raise her prices. Instead of $1,500 to become a cannabis coach, it's now $2,500 to become a cannabis coach.

Now she will take this business and there will be 50 cannabis coaches who are doing Mary Jane parties. They have to be licensed through her, they have to be certified through her, she gets money. They do the parties, she hooks them up with all the vendors. The vendors make money, the coaches make money, and she makes override.

Robert Plank: That's crazy. Your model works in just about any niche it sounds like.

When I'm hearing about the Itty Bitty Book and the 15 steps, how big of a book are we talking about? 15 steps comes out to how many pages in this model?

Suzy Prudden: Every chapter is one page.

Robert Plank: Super short.

Suzy Prudden: It's an itty bitty book. Here's how to look at it. Dummies came out in the '80s and they were the quintessential what you need to know book, but they're 350 pages. You have to read a Dummies book with a yellow highlighter. Itty Bitty Books are the yellow highlights. What we've done is taken the information that people need and simplified it so succinctly that it takes 20 minutes to read an itty bitty book and you can mark the pages you need to reference. On page one of each chapter, it's the information. Page two of each chapter is a bullet point to more information that you can then send them your website, "To reach more about this go to here." Then you can have a white paper on your website or a workshop that you're doing. You're sending people from your Itty Bitty Book back and forth to your website, to your book, to your website, to your book. You're constantly creating streams of income from your Itty Bitty Book to your website, from your website to your webinar, to your seminars, to your products (whatever it is you're selling). Or you can send them to somebody else, or some other information, depending on what the information is that they need.

Yes, it's an Itty Bitty Book so you can handle it, but it's much bigger if you choose to go further. In other words, you don't have to weed through a lot of information to get to the piece you need. You get the piece you need and then if you want to expand on it, it has a link. If it's a digital it goes right to their thing. It's paperback, on Amazon then you have to put the information into your computer. All the Itty Bitty Books are on Amazon and they're on the digitals.

We've done nine best selling campaigns so far and we have nine best sellers so far. We have another best seller- A best seller campaign every month. Every Itty Bitty author has the opportunity to become a best selling author. It's so exciting, I get speechless with excitement because it's giving so many people an opportunity to do so much more with what they had in the past. Now they have a further reach. They're all of a sudden international because they have a book on Amazon. That can operate on a lead generator to their business. We also have a whole thing on our website where we have a directory for anyone around the world can sign up in our directory. We send them leads when people click on their information and put in their information that they want to talk to this person about whatever product or whatever service, like Anthony has sales. If someone wants to learn from Anthony, they can contact Anthony. Then we send Anthony the lead. It's very exciting.

Robert Plank: That's pretty cool. I'm looking at your directory right now and I'm looking at Anthony's listing and that kind of stuff. What I like about the way that you've laid it out is that these people that you come in contact with who have a really good idea, they can get the book done quickly while also excited about it. Maybe before they met you, they've been struggling. Maybe some of them have half a book made and they thought it had to be 300 pages.

Suzy Prudden: So many of them have been writing their books for the last eight years. This is what we do. When you say yes and you give us some money, because we are a pay to play house, we send you a how to write an Itty Bitty Book book. We send you an Itty Bitty Book and we send you the template. If you read the how to write the Itty Bitty Book and you write it the way we tell you to write it, and you use the template, we've had people write their books in two afternoons. We also send you an agreement at that time. Then we have a long conversation about the agreement so you have a legitimate publishing agreement where you own the copyrights, we own the publishing rights. It's your material, you can do what you want with it, you just can't do it in the Itty Bitty format. It opens the door for you to do more.

Then we also have on our site, you'll see there's a thing there that says "Tell your story." Let's say you have a story. You can write your story, you'll send it to us, we'll put it up. We'll send your link to your story and we won't charge you. We'll put it up on our website. We will send you the link to your story so you send your story now to everybody you know. You ask them "Please send my story to every-" Then you have them link back to you. It's a way for you to get your stuff out there, it's not an Itty Bitty it's like a page. People have stories they want to tell.

I have a wonderful story that I tell about ... I can't tell it now, it's too long. It's about an experience I had during the days where I didn't have my own home. It's a great story. It takes three minutes to tell on stage, it would take a page and a half to tell in a written. It's not nearly as compelling written as it is when I speak it. I could put that story up, send it to everybody. People go "What a great story, I think I'll send this out to my friends." Then they contact Suzy if you want to write a story. I've got an opportunity for a million people to write their stories on my website.

Robert Plank: Cool. Why make it anymore complicated than it has to be?

Suzy Prudden: It's not complicated, that's correct. Then I can send them to, if they want a website like my website, it's a phenomenal website. There's an opportunity for them to contact my web person and say "I want to talk to you about a website." She's amazing and not at all expensive. I would highly recommend speaking to her. She's totally amazing. I don't know how this happened, I honestly don't. It's like magic happened when my sister showed me that cover, and after my ego got up off the floor because she took my name off it, I saw it as a multi million dollar business. Now working with my coach who is in Myrtle Beach and I'm in California. I go there, not every day, not every week. We talk mostly on the phone. I probably go there like three times a year. My company is growing exponentially. I saw that that would happen when I was at a conference last May in Las Vegas. I went "Whoa, this is the company that's going to grow my business." And it is.

Robert Plank: I don't want to keep you for too long. As we're winding this down, could you tell us out of all the clients you deal with and the people you work with to make their Itty Bitty Book and to get their coaching programs set up and stuff like that- What's the big number one mistake you see all these people making over and over again?

Suzy Prudden: Not finishing their books.

Robert Plank: Pretty simple. You're saying that these people who maybe if they've tried publishing in the past, or if they've gone through all the run around and all that stuff. What they should do is instead of trying to make it complicated, get an Itty Bitty Book, hire you for coaching, and make one of these 15 page things that has all their knowledge compressed and simplified so that people who want to know about whatever topic. About websites, or about marijuana type of stuff, they don't have to read the 600 page manual. They just get the condensed cliff notes version.

Suzy Prudden: Get the condensed version that will give them more information if they want it. If you've got an idea- I don't take every idea. I will tell you ... I don't take every idea that comes to me because know that some ideas would not fit into this format. That it would not serve the person. I only want to work with people that I know that I can help them really expand their careers. I will work with people to massage it into something that will expand their careers, but if I see that this book would not do that, I won't take them as an author. That's doing them a favor.

Robert Plank: That's cool. I've noticed especially lately as books have had the ... Since books are now on Kindle and a lot of books have had these internet resources where they say on such and such page, if you want to know more about that go over to this website. I like that a lot more as a reader because now it's more of a choose my own adventure. Now I don't have to only go with one chapter, I can pick- I can get the whole big picture really quickly. On let's say Chapter four or page four, if I want to go and take that deeper, now I have the choice to but I'm not forced to.

Suzy Prudden: It's up to you. The other thing, I had an idea just a second ago. You very often hear people say your book is your business card. It is not. It is absolutely not your business card. Your book is your business builder. We tell our authors to have business cards that are ... Just a second, what's the word that I'm looking for ... They're like bookmarks. Your bookmark is your business card, your book is your business builder. I don't like it when people give me a book that I don't want. I am very respectful of books, so I don't throw it away. Now I have to find it a home because it's cluttering up mine. I don't want it. Give me a business card, don't give me a book. I'm clear about that because people have tried to ... Please don't give me your book. But it's a good book, I'm sure it is. Please don't give it to me. If I want it, I'll buy it.

Robert Plank: I like that mentality behind that where it seems almost like everyone has it backwards. The average person says "I'm Robert or I'm Suzy, I do this stuff. Let me make a book about that." What you're saying is it's better to have this book that solves a problem so people are actually looking to solve that problem, looking for that book. They get it, they solve the problem as opposed to just reading it for the heck of it.

Suzy Prudden: People won't read it. I've been to seminars where the author, the seminar person, has done what I have done in 2006. Which was buy 2000 of my book, now I have to sell 2000 books. You end up giving them away. I walk into a seminar and especially with compilation books, and I'll see on every seat is a book. That author doesn't know what to do with them so he gives them away thinking it gives him credibility. In my mind, and I'm a snob because I was a best seller before the internet, that's when you actually had to buy the book. You don't have to buy books anymore to be a best seller. You can do a campaign on Amazon, be a best seller. You don't have to sell a lot of books to do that. If you want to be a best seller on the New York Times now you hire a company, you pay them $135,000 and they'll make you a best seller. When I was a best seller, you had to go into the book store and buy the book. I'm a snob.

You want to use your book, as I've always said, as a business builder. You don't want to put it on every chair in your seminar because what if somebody doesn't want it. Now they have to do something with it.

Robert Plank: How bad would that look or how bad does that look if all the books laid on all the chairs, and after you give your talk and everyone's on break all the books are left in the chairs. That sounds like a disaster.

Suzy Prudden: It's a little embarrassing. There are places where speakers speak where the person who hired them to speak wants to give the books to their participants. That's a whole different thing. Then that speaker sells the books to the person who is putting on the talk. That person gives them as a gift. It's different than if you "Take my book. Take my book. Take my book.." I don't want to take your book. I know it's a good book, but I'm not interest in your topic. Don't give it to me. Give me your business card.

Robert Plank: There is a much better way. I really like your thinking Suzy. I like your business model and your structure, your template. Could you tell us about where people can find Itty Bitty Publishing along with any other websites you want to mention here?

Suzy Prudden: The best way to do it is go to IttyBittyPublishing.com and get all the information. For your listeners, if you want to send in your stories, send in the story. Robert, why don't you send us a story? We'll put it up.

Robert Plank: About what? What do you want?

Suzy Prudden: You. How did you start this? How did you start doing these interviews? What's the story behind your interviews? How has it helped your career? How has it helped other people's careers? You see what happens then is you send it out and other people want to contact you and be interviewed by you. Now your business grows.

Robert Plank: Simple but it sounds very effective.

Suzy Prudden: Very effective and then you'll be part of the Itty Bitty family.

Robert Plank: IttyBittyPublishing.com. Thanks for being on the show, Suzy. Thanks for sharing your unique but clever, and at the same time simple, insight on how everyone can get that book finished that might have been on their back for five or ten years. Then also some of these cool strategies for getting these books sold. Getting it all promoted. Thanks for stopping by.

Suzy Prudden: Thank you for the opportunity.