Episode 181 The Power of Storytelling with Karen Anderson (Part 1)

John talks with Karen Anderson – strategic book advisor and coach, associate publisher at Morgan James Publishing, author of the Wall Street Journal and New York Times best-selling book The Bezos Letters: 14 Principles to Grow Your Business Like Amazon, ghostwriter, editor, and a devoted wife to Steve. Before Karen started working in the publishing world, she was a Marriage and Family Therapist. Listen to this episode to learn more: [00:00] - Intro [01:44] - The importance of story in non-fiction [04:40] - The backstory of The Bezos Letters [06:36] - Writing a book about Bezos' shareholder letters [10:19] - The idea of risk and successful failure [13:02] - Amazon's Fire Phone failure and the birth of Alexa [15:08] - Why you need to buy 2 copies of a book [19:18] - Karen's journey from therapist to publisher [20:55] - Getting into direct response marketing [22:46] - Becoming a juggernaut in the publishing world [26:47] - AI can't replace the creative aspect of writing [30:18] - John's upcoming book: The F6 Secrets of Relationships [31:22] - Writing with Scrivener [35:04] - Advice for hesitant writers with compelling stories [38:12] - The book editing process [43:01] - John's experience with correcting errors in a book NOTABLE QUOTES:  "I recommend to anybody in the non-fiction world to read fiction. And the reason I do that is because the thing that's most compelling and most powerful for people is story. And the best novels are really good with story." "No matter what you're doing in your message, whether it's via book or speaking, or whatever it is, it's always about story." "The most powerful non-fiction is what engages you, what's emotionally connected. And the reality is, if you eliminate story, you typically have a textbook, and most people don't like reading textbooks." "The biggest risk that businesses were taking was that they weren't taking enough risks." "Life is short, get up there." "AI doesn't have stories. AI doesn't know how to do the inspirational part yet. It can come up with ways that you can communicate better, but it doesn't know your experience." "The best writers have the best editors." "I wrote you a long letter because I didn't have time to write a short one." "It's a whole lot easier to just write lots of stuff than it is to really hone it down and get it in a way that can communicate well." BOOK MENTIONED: The Power of Moments: Why Certain Experiences Have Extraordinary Impact by Chip Heath and Dan Heath (https://a.co/d/8K2v28) APP MENTIONED: Scrivener https://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener/overview  USEFUL RESOURCES: https://www.strategicbookcoach.com https://www.strategicbookpartners.com/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/karen-anderson-bookcoach/ https://www.instagram.com/dearkaren/ https://www.facebook.com/dearkaren https://twitter.com/dearkaren CONNECT WITH JOHN Website - https://thejohnhulen.com     Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/johnhulen     Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/johnhulen     Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/johnhulen     LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnhulen     YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLX_NchE8lisC4NL2GciIWA     EPISODE CREDITS Intro and Outro music provided by Jeff Scheetz - https://jeffscheetz.com/