Janine Bolon: Hi, this is Janine Bolon with The Writers Hour Creative Conversations. And today I have with me not only a friend but a fellow author and business owner. Her name is Katrina Sawa. And she is known as the Jumpstart Your Biz Coach because she helps entrepreneurs make more money doing what they love and fast. So you may be thinking, “Well, why is she on the show?” I mean, if it’s all about business, and all that sort of stuff, she just so happens to be the creator of jumpstart your marketing system, and tell it like it is. She’s a speaker, that is a seven-time international best-selling author. She has 11 books to her credit. She has a compilation series, she has a no-nonsense approach to showing not only authors but entrepreneurs how to develop consistently profitable, proven marketing and business strategies. And this is something you definitely want to be involved in.

She’s been featured on Oprah and Friends, XM Radio Network, ABC, the CW, and dozens of influential podcasts, like this one, and radio show. So Katrina was awarded the National Collaborator of the Year Award by the Public Speakers Association, and she’s a two-time nominee for the wise woman award by the National Association of women business owners. She speaks to groups like large and small, she has live training events annually. She’s the founder of the International speaker network. And to get more from her and her free training, you can go to www.jumpstartyourbiznow.com/freetrainings, welcome so much to the show. It’s wonderful to have you, Katrina.

Katrina Sawa: Thanks, Janine, I’m excited to be here. I love talking to you and your peaks.

Janine: Yeah, I have to admit that every time I get to see you, it’s always very exciting. Katrina and I have been working together probably for two years now on various and sundry projects. And so one of the things that I really wanted her on the show for was because of the way she builds her books. She has books that she’s written herself, such as Love Yourself Successful, but then she also has her other books, which are almost compilations and all kinds of different businesses. So if you don’t mind Katrina, first start telling us, when did you consider yourself an author?

Katrina: Well, it’s funny, because I started my business back in 2002, I never would have thought that I would be an author, I had no aspirations of being an author whatsoever. I just wanted to build a business, right. And I was doing marketing, coaching, and all that. And then three years into my business, I got into the world of the coaches and authors and speakers kind of world which I didn’t know anything about until I was there, right? And then within a year or two of that, I noticed all these people popping up as authors and how people would put them on this huge pedestal because, wow, they’re an author. This was back in 2005-6-7 So I’m like, “Hmm, maybe there’s something that this author thing”, but I still didn’t focus on it, because I needed to get clients right, I needed to build the business and have consistent revenue coming in. That’s the most important thing when you’re a business owner. So by the first time, I became an author was a compilation book with Ali Brown way back in 2016. She was one of my coaches at the time. It’s called Power and Soul. It’s actually that Green Book. And it was 20 authors, I think that was us. And we paid to be in the book. And I wrote a chapter called this, “It’ll all work out in the end”, which has actually been my motto ever since. But it’s funny. That’s how I got started. And then I was in two more compilations. And then then I wrote my own book, it’s easier to write a chapter than it is to go write a whole book, right. So that’s how I got started, because I was still building the business, I don’t have time to write a book.

Janine: And one of the things that I love about you, as an author will kind of take the business hat off for a minute. But the author, part of it is you knew what you had time to do. And so you crafted chapters first and got into compilation books, and then you moved into love yourself successful and that sort of thing where you actually started. So what was your very first book where you wrote it all yourself?

Katrina: Love Yourself Successful was my first book. And that’s where I felt I felt like I had my story that I wanted to tell, right. And that’s what most people… I would say most entrepreneurs want to write versus using their story. It’s either their story or their system book. And now I have both so my storybook was more loves love yourself successful, where I told about my divorce and unsupportive people in my life and how I had to change my mindset around getting more confident and staying motivated as an entrepreneur and all that and those four types of love you need in order to make more money. And so all of that was in there. So those tips are in there too, because I’m a practical tactical world. So I couldn’t just tell the story. I had to give some advice. And then a few years later, I wrote The System Book, which is the jumpstart your new business, now, it’s this one and that one was more like the, “here’s all the different things you need to do.” So it’s all the system the training that I did that I had, I had a paid training that I actually transcribed. And voila, there was the book, I just had to cut out all the fluff. So that was a pretty easy book to write because I already had recordings of myself teaching the stuff I want to teach.

Janine: That is wonderful stuff. And so then you started the jumpstart your and then you have all these compilation books where you’ve helped. You brought together people like myself and others who have been in business for 20 or 30 years, and they had ideas and suggestions for people. So that was another way that you did your own compilation books. Any advice you’d like to give people on how to be an author or how to work those sorts of business books out?

Katrina: Yeah, so here’s many different kinds of books you can write, right? Some authors want to write memoirs, or children’s books, or fiction. And those are all great too. And we but as an author, any kind of author, you’re a business owner, so you have to treat it like you’re a business and how you’re going to sell the books and all that and market them. The compilation book model is very interesting. I have 12 books now, you can see I’m on my shelves, right? 12 total, my husband, in fact, is going to Home Depot to get me more shelves because I have four more launchings this year. Seriously, it’s crazy. And the compilation book is such an easy book to be in. And it’s not just about being in the book, but it’s about the collaboration of other authors. And then on launch day, or as these other authors get the books, they’re promoted by all these other people. So you’re getting in front of so many people you would never get in front of when you’re in a compilation book. So I’ve been in 10 compilation books, okay, right up to date, and two of my own books and three of the compilations are ones that I’ve published. So they’re the jumpstart your blank books on jumpstart your blank, and then the authors fill in the blank with their expertise. Like, if they’re a sales trainer, they do jumpstart your sales, or if they’re a health coach, they do jumpstart your health or nutrition. And so I came up with that four years ago to do that. And so now I do a series every year, I do a new book different color. But what I found was that it’s not only a great thing to help authors get published in the compilation book model. When you have a community, yourself and your business, or a lot of followers or people who aren’t authors yet, you could take you can have a collaboration book with your brand and your message or your theme or your whatever, and get people to pay you. And then you put the book out with some help or whatever publishing. And you can make 20 to $40,000 as a compiler of a compilation book yourself. So lots of ideas I’ve got.

Janine: And that’s one of the things that I love about Katrina is she has gobs of ideas. And she knows she doesn’t have enough life to make all those happen. So she’s more than willing to share. The other thing was the very, very first time I ever saw her at a conference, she was in the backroom. And she would hand out these leaflets. And I went to the website where she was taking us and could not believe all the free materials that she is willing to just give away. This is long before this was a marketing technique or a way to get your email, she didn’t even do that. She just gave you a web page. And then you could have anywhere from I think it was 25-27 different free things, templates and scripts, and everything just because of her giving heart. So that’s one of the things I wanted to say she speaks fast, she talks fast, but it’s just because there’s so much she wants to do. And she doesn’t have all the time to do them all in. So you have this third book that you’re doing now you finally decided, “Okay, I’m going to do my own publishing company.” What? You were telling me about that I’m like, “Whoa, I don’t know about this.” So talk to us about that a bit.

Katrina: So last year, I helped one of my clients, my coaching clients do her own compilation book with there were six authors total and five of them were actually in my coaching program, five others. So I said, “Well, of course, I’m gonna help you guys publish this book.” So I helped them with the cover and the layout and all this stuff and all the how to get it on KDP and do the Amazon launch and I did the Amazon launch for them. And so I thought, “Hmm, I could do this for other people, and why not?” It’s time, right? Of course, I have business coaching over here. But yes, I started jumpstartpublishing.net and that’s a website that has opportunities for authors to get help. And it’s not a one size fits all a lot of publishers that are hybrid like this or self-published publishers are very expensive, frankly, I mean, anywhere from 6 to $40,000, I’ve seen people charge to help you get a book done. So I’m happy to just do a couple of calls with you and teach you what you need to do. And you can do it yourself, I don’t care. Like I don’t need to take on everybody, as a publishing client, I want to help the authors with whatever piece is missing, whatever you need to get done. Whatever you need to do, or learn or implement so that you get your book done because you have to get your book done. That’s the key.

Janine: The key is completion. So let’s talk about the actual writing process. So you were writing under deadlines. You’re an extremely busy businesswoman, you’ve gone through a divorce, it’s not like life held still for you while you’re writing books. So how did you set up a time to do this? I mean, how did you do it?

Katrina: Well, this is why I write a lot of chapters for compilations because you could literally have another book on your shelf by writing one chapter, which is a long blog post, it’s not that difficult. And so, sometimes I’m recording it in the bathroom, as I’m putting makeup on with my phone, sometimes I just have a spurt of energy like, well, I haven’t done deadlines for sure, pushed me. I had a book that I had to write the chapter for like three weeks ago, right before I went on vacation. And I had to get a gun before vacation because I was gone for a week. And then I was coming back and I had surgery. And I was gonna be out for a couple of weeks. So I just had to get it done. And when I have to get it done, sometimes it just comes out. But I know some people that don’t work for a lot of times when you’re trying too hard, the content doesn’t come. So you have to be prepared to record whenever possible. Whenever that content does come to you, I think.

Janine: I think that was one of the best things for audio learners was the ability to have the talk and type aspects of life, because some of us are moving so quickly. It’s like when an idea hits, I just want to talk it out. You asked me to test it on a phone. I’ll go crazy. So let’s back up a little bit. Let’s go back to love yourself successfully. So put yourself where you were at that point. Okay, you’re having to write your very own first book. So you’re full-on first book, what did you do so that you were going to be successful with that process?

Katrina: Well, the first thing I did was, well, I knew I needed to write a book. I’ve been thinking about it. But it wasn’t coming to me the content. I knew it was something to do with love and money and making money but having love in your life or something. And so I did two things. I was at one of my friend’s conferences with 125 people in the room, including Marianne Williamson, who was one of the speakers, mind you, and I stood up, they were doing like q&a. And the and I stood up in the middle of the room. And I had the mic and I said, ‘I’m having my first live event in November.” And this was in January of one of the years. And I said, “I’m having my first live event in November, it’s got something to do with love and money, if anybody’s interested, come and see me.” And as soon as I proclaimed that to this huge group of people, literally, I sat down, and boom, the floodgates open with content into my head. So as people were talking and they were going on with the event, I was sitting with my notebook madly writing out the content for this event and or book, right. So I thought by doing an event that was going to be around the topic and the content of my book, that by figuring out the content for the event, obviously the training, I’m gonna have training on this that, that that would then be something I could transcribe or use as the model for the book. But it didn’t quite work out that way. Because then I had the event which was successful. And I made good money had some coaching clients, and I created this seven-step loving money business system, which I thought, “Okay, well, that maybe is the book.” But then the book was like “No, it needs to be more story wasn’t is too practical and la-la-la.” So that didn’t even make it into the book. So those are just a couple of things I did to help me on that path of creation, content creation. But honestly, that whole content creation piece took three years for it to come to me I didn’t force it. It was my first book. Of course, I want it to be perfect. I’m like, “Oh, it has to be like perfect.” Everybody thinks that. And if I could just go back and tell myself then I would have just written the damn, the seven steps 11 money business system, I would have just written that. And then written another book later. And so I just overthought it I over you overthink it.

Janine: Yeah, that happens to so many of us there where we overthink the book and don’t realize that people just want the content. People just want to know about you as an individual. So when you were actually physically writing the book, so you had to proclaim the event. Now you mentioned something I think is very important for writers to know. And that is, the book starts talking back at you like a three-year-old child. And some people kind of feel like they’re almost possessed. I mean, I’ve heard horror writers talk about, I really only talked to other writers about this, because like, my characters wake me up at the moment I and start talking to me, these are our fictional writers, right? Well, nonfiction writers have the same thing happened, because we have to build a story, whether you call yourself fiction or nonfiction, it’s like, you still have to build a story. And so you were starting to wiggle around a little bit about that. So talk to us about that discomfort you had when you were trying to drive the book one way. And the book was arguing with you. Talk to us about that.

Katrina: Yeah, honestly, after the event, I decided that that wasn’t going to be the content, I don’t really even remember, I think I must have just set it aside for a little bit. And then a year or something passed by, and I’m like, “Oh, I’m gonna write this book.” But then in the process, I was in this mastermind with a coach and I had some friends in there. One of my friends started a book coaching business. And she’s actually still doing it today. And so in the process of her creating her book coaching business, I got some book coaching, right, because I was in our mastermind. So that sparked it again. And I think I went through her I don’t know that I actually went through officially her program, but I just learned a lot from her in that year. And so did everybody in the mastermind. And then probably the following. I know it was springtime when finally it opened up. And the book came in, right. I mean, I had an outline I had like the key things I wanted to talk about. And that was the thing with me, I needed an outline. So I had an outline of the different sections that I wanted in the book. But the filling of the sections came in spring of, was it 2012? That’s when I published the bug. It could have come that year. But I felt like it took a long time to publish them I probably dead common in the spring of 2012. And in four days, I wrote that book, when it finally came to me two weekends in a row. And they were super sunny. I wanted to go outside and play on weekends. And I didn’t and I just sat here and thought about getting this done.

Janine: We were talking about the future. In the future, we have several podcasts coming up where we were talking about, there are different types of writers. And there are some writers that are very scheduled, like they write for an hour every day, blah, blah, blah, that’s their mode. Then you have the other writers, they’re like, I’m gonna write three times a week, or I’m gonna write 1000 words this week, or whatever. And then you have the all-or-nothing kind of writers. And those are people that are like yourself, they’re like, you’re all in your writing this weekend. It’s sunny outside, you don’t want to be inside, but here you are. It’s all or nothing, it’s almost a fight or flight. Kind of all the things I’ve written for sure. Yeah, it’s been fight or flight mode of I have to get this done. So thank you for being the epitome of the stereotype of that all-or-nothing writer because some people get locked into a view of what writers are. So based on what you’ve already shared with us and all, can you give us some advice for somebody who may be struggling with their book or struggling in the writing process? What are things that you do that kind of help pop you where you need to be?

Katrina: Well, I would say don’t overthink it. First of all, don’t overthink the content, number one. Number two more books are better than one. So if you’re really waiting for that perfect one book, stop it, just get something out and then get another book out and then get another book out. And it’s better to have multiple books, especially as a business owner, because you look more like an expert and an influencer, when you have that. So more books are better than one, you’re not just going to write one if you write one, most people don’t. And so don’t try to put everything in that one book. And you want to write the book that is the easiest one to publish first. So if it’s a tip book or quote book, before, it’s your story or your system, then get the tips to book out quickly, and just get something so you can promote it get exposure, get some publicity while you’re writing the other one and just maybe have a goal of every year or every other year, punch out another book, but make it easy and simple and fast.

Janine: Well, thank you so much for helping me with my book at your program. Katrina, I’ll pay you later.

Katrina: I thought hard when you make it simple. You have more to share than you think you do. And all of us probably have done speaking presentations or recordings or this or that are taught something and boom, it can be a book and you fluff it up with some you know some line pages for journaling and stuff and boom, you got a 100-page book. I mean, it doesn’t have to be rocket science, the more book, the better.

Janine: Right. I like what you say it doesn’t have to be rocket science. And it can be quite easy. So hey, this is what we’re recording in July, but this will be posting in August. So tell us about your August event, because that kind of popped for you. And let’s celebrate this.

Katrina: Yeah, so I have a lot of clients that are in the works of writing their book, and they’re not moving quickly. So I put this event together mostly for my clients, some of my clients, but also I’ll take a handful, I really only want like a 15 person thing event, it’s just a one day, and it’s virtual on zoom. So it’s about getting it done. It’s about finishing the book, it’s about getting over the hurdles, the wherever hurdles you have. So if your manuscript’s done, but you have the hurdle of the cover, or the how-to get it on KDP, or how to launch it, or what kind of, it’s whatever hurt, let’s just get all of that, like outlined or laid out or decided on or let me help you with what content might be missing in your book, I’m really good at identifying the missing content and how to make sure there’s marketing in your book. So people can take go to your website from there. There’s a lot of things we can cover in one day. And it’s just about getting more stuff done.

Janine: So basically, if you need help finishing your book, on August 30th, Katrina is going to be hosting an online event, she’s only taking a handful. So that’s why we’re promoting this right now. And then when you sign up for that, she will have it in the show notes for us. And we’ll make sure we get it out to you. So where can people go to look for this, my friend?

Katrina: Yeah, if you go to jumpstartpublishing.net and scroll down, it’s on the homepage, and you can click to get more information there. It’s a few 100 bucks to attend. And if your listeners are paying attention, and they really want to go, they can get $200 off. If they use a coupon code 200OFF, all one word, six digits, 200OFF, use it and attend and let’s get that book done.

Janine: And that’s the point that I wanted to share with you. I have worked with Katrina. She is fascinatingly well educated, she’s a school of hard knocks, kind of business owner scrappy, some people referred to as very scrappy, but at the same time, if you’re stuck, she’s not she’s gonna project to you get unstuck. She’s not gonna leave you stuck. So thank you so much for being with us, giving us your time, and also giving us an opportunity to kind of see you for what you do, which is so good with this program on August 30th.

Katrina: Yes, and if you’re not ready for that, that’s okay. There’s the free stuff on that website too. So get the free audio but do something because we need to help you move this along a little quicker. All right, guys. It comes once you are the author and you’re selling books and speaking and selling other things. So that’s when the money comes. So don’t wait too long to get this done.

Janine: And this is Janine Bolon with The Writers Hour Creative Conversations with Katrina Sawa and we both wish you much success in your authoring and on your books. Please look us both up because we are here to help you and we both are here to help you write a book a year. Alright. Take care. Have a great day.

Check out Katrina’s One Day Book Writing & Planning Get It Done Event

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