Transcript

Bryan Hyde
Welcome to the Janine Bolon show, where we share tips from around the globe. As we guide practical people with their finances using money tips, increase their incomes through side businesses, and maintain their sanity by staying in their creative zone.

Janine Bolon
Hello, Janine Bolon here and welcome to today’s show, which is loaded with quality content on not only saving your knowledge, but your money. The Janine Bolon Show, as you may or may not know, is a syndicated program of four different podcast shows that were combined in October of 2021. Up to that point, my team and I had been running four separate podcasts called Three Minute Money tips, The Thriving Solopreneur, The Writers Hour Creative Conversations and The Practical Mystic Show. Today, we will be highlighting a financial forecaster and author that really encapsulates what we mean by the servant leader. You may already know that I am interviewing 99 authors this year to receive not only their guidance, but their perspective on how you can get your message, your story or your memoir out into the world. So our upcoming guest is James H. Lee, who is the author of his latest book Foresight, Investing: A Complete Guide to Finding Your Next Great Trade. So just in case you haven’t heard of James before, he is an award winning financial advisor with over 30 years of experience. He’s also the founder of StratFi, which is a boutique investment advisory firm that focuses on what happens next. In forecast investing, Jim explains how fortunes can be made by finding the next big thing and seize big opportunities arising from the Internet of things, augmented reality, cryptocurrencies, automation, artificial intelligence, longevity, science and new sources of energy. He is a popular keynote speaker on trends, and he has presented to U.S. and audiences abroad for quite a while on the topics related to the future. Not only does he hold a Bachelor of Arts and Economics from the College of William and Mary, he also has a Master’s in Studies of the Future from the University of Houston Clear Lake. Basically, in this free time, Jim enjoys biking and cooking with his wife Stephanie. Welcome to the show, Jim.

James H. Lee
Happy to be here. Thanks so much.

Janine Bolon
So what I like to talk to authors about is whether or not they use their real name because this is the first area that number one, it’s very difficult and challenging to call yourself an author, some people really struggle like, you know, they’re getting ready to put their book out there and it’s very vulnerable place for them to be. So what made you choose your full name?

James H. Lee
So this is really about building my reputation and my own audience for my work as a financial futurist. But there’s a challenge that I have in that my name may be the most common name in the world, it’s popular on several continents and even within my neighborhood, I think there are six Jim Lee’s in the city of Wilmington two of which go to the same dry cleaner. And I found out that you really can’t walk in someone else’s shoes, and you certainly can’t wear their shirts either.

Janine Bolon
And, and you’re one of the few authors I’ve ever interviewed, you’re the first one I’ve ever interviewed, that actually can say that very literally, because of your dry cleaning experience with your name.

James H. Lee
And I’m six foot three, yeah, I’m a big guy.

Janine Bolon
And that doesn’t necessarily come through the microphone. Thank you for that, too. So you decided to go ahead and write under your own name. And you also mentioned to me that you used an initial as well. And that kind of helped differentiate it a little bit for you on top of that, but you were mentioning the tribe that it was really important that you focus on the tribe, rather than what name you use. Share with us a little bit about that?

James H. Lee
Yeah, well, the name is what goes on the cover of the book, it’s how people find you so it’s important to be consistent on your messaging, in your media kits, in your press releases, in your book, in the articles that you write. For me, it’s always James H. Lee, and then Jim Lee per for people who know me well.

James H. Lee
But meaning your tribe and knowing your tribe, I think is important part in terms of getting recognition, getting critical mass getting momentum for your work. And my tribe happens to be other futurists, people who are forward looking thinkers, people who are curious about what happens next. I begin to belong to a group called the A.P.F, or the Association of Professional Futurists, a lot of people don’t know that it’s a thing. But there are about 600 of us worldwide and when we get together at meetings, sometimes you wake up at three o’clock in the morning, to wake up and catch up with your friends. But it’s a great group of people. And we’re in an industry that’s literally making it up as we move along. Right? You have an ability to make a contribution to an industry because nobody knows all the rules yet. And we’re still figuring it out.

James H. Lee
I think also part of that with finding your tribe, is that you’re really just hanging out with people you already know and appreciate. So any any marketing, any contacts and leads that comes on top of that, it’s really just icing on the top of the cake, because you’d want to be doing this stuff anyway.

Janine Bolon
I agree. So with this Certified Financial Planner thing you have going on in the financial work, did you have any kind of a marketing background before you started writing your book?

James H. Lee
No. And and that’s something that you always have to learn. So when I started out in the 1990s, I think 1991 is coming right out of college and being a financial planner at the terrible first career. I think it’s a wonderful second career and a bad first career. Because you have nothing, you know nothing and you’re trying to convince people that you know, something, and that’s, that’s hard, okay.

James H. Lee
But marketing back in those days was smiling and dialing. It was cold calling, it was doing seminars and workshops. And it was very thought to me mechanical, may be a little forced, and super repetitive and ultimately kind of boring. So what I’ve done with my own marketing is really focused on being less of a hook and being more of a magnet. And what that means is that instead of trying to drag people in or trying to book appointments, I just tried to do things that are interesting and helpful to people. And if it’s interesting and helpful, then people will track you down. And you’ll get phone calls from nowhere you’ll have no idea where these people are coming from, but that ultimately is the best way to market.

Janine Bolon
It’s one of those things that you learn because of your Certified Financial practice and what I learned as a college professor, and that was, if I was passionate, then people wanted to learn from you because you were passionate. And that’s what you had to be for your own industry, as well. You have to be passionate about wanting to be a person that is a servant leader and you definitely managed to get there after your, after your experience of this, as you say, smiling and dialing that aspect of it. So what would you say was the biggest surprise about the whole book publishing or the book marketing process? You pick which area you want to move into with that,

James H. Lee
Yeah, yeah. So you know, there’s really no secret recipe to marketing a book, regardless of whether you’re self published, or you have a mainstream publisher. And that ultimately is an opportunity to do more writing, whether it’s in the form of blogs, or press releases, or social media posts. And because you’re an author, you should already be comfortable with this. In my case, it also involves podcasting, doing workshops and public speaking. Because in the gig economy, pretty much everyone is responsible for their own personal branding.

Janine Bolon
You mentioned it as the gig economy. Talk to us a little bit more about that.

James H. Lee
Yeah. So a few years ago, I did this thing on the future of work. And I think the metaphor for work has been changing over the course over the last two decades. Where, in my father’s days, it was the career ladder, and you would start at the bottom, and then you would work your way up to the top of a single organization. And he spent 35 years just working for the DuPont Company. And then I would say back in the 1990s, maybe the 2000s, that paradigm shifted from the career ladder to the career lattice, where you would work your way up for a few years, then you would go sideways somewhere else, and then you’d continue to climb your way up on the top. The paradigm now is not so much a ladder or a lattice, but it’s kind of a patchwork, crazy quilt, okay. And that’s where you’re stitching together a bunch of different opportunities in a way that’s flexible, and keeps you covered. And that’s where we are right now where you got to be comfortable wearing a whole lot of different hats, getting a bunch of different skills, and seeing what works.

Janine Bolon
And one of the things that I find fascinating with that paradigm is it this was a term that was used back in the early 2000s, which was authorpreneurs. And a lot of authors don’t realize you literally kind of have to become that entrepreneur when you do this. And some of them may not even know that that’s kind of what they’re signing up for. So with that in mind with what you brought to us with the gig economy, what would you change if you started marketing your books today, relative to what you did in the past? What are some things that you personally would do for your own books?

James H. Lee
Yeah, so social media is key. That’s been helpful for me originally is doing blogging and blogging is a little bit less common than it was, say 10 years ago, I think podcasting has gained a lot of momentum. More recently, I’ve been doing a lot of work in terms of media outreach, just getting known for what I talk about, it’s been quite helpful. But my advice for new authors is to be fairly on top of the game in terms of getting reviews, whether it’s from friends and family that have read your book, or even professional reviewers, such as clarius, and for Clarion in for reviews. Because it’s really nice to have a professional review under your belt, to see what the pros think about it. And then use that repackage that for your own material going forward. That was a big win for me.

Janine Bolon
And when you mentioned the reviews, that’s a wonderful tip, thank you that those are little gold nuggets that each of these authors that we’ve been interviewing this year are each giving us their own focus, and all of it is good. So I tell authors or authorpreneurs just pick what works for your personality and move forward with that. So I’d love to learn from you. What worked best for you when it came to selling your books? What was the best thing you did for yourself?

James H. Lee
Yeah, so so one of the things that I did is I entered a number of competitions for my book within my category, which technically I think is speculative nonfiction, because I’m a futurist. I’m never quite sure if what I’m writing is real or not. So it’s kind of in that gray zone between speculation and fiction. But yeah, yeah, I entered in some contests with Kirkus, also with Clarion, and also the Association’s Professional Futurists, and competition for money managers as well. And in its own way, each of those things, create a little bit more notoriety, as it were, and respect among my peers. So being willing to put yourself out and to be evaluated, I think has the potential to be a big win. And to help get the word out.

Janine Bolon
I think that’s lovely, especially when you call yourself a futurist. And you don’t know if what you’re writing is real. We used to call those theoretical physicists in my area of expertise.

James H. Lee
I have a degree in foresight. And the question is, is how do you footnote something that hasn’t happened yet?What do you do? What do you do?

Janine Bolon
They have a specific, yeah, they have a specific journal called the Journal of Irreproducible Results, because of people like you who are able to kind of do that forecasting.

James H. Lee
We do our best, we do our best, but in hindsight, you know, the joke is, is that everything in hindsight may appear to be obvious, may appear to be wrong, or worse, yet appear to be obviously wrong. So obvious is good. Not so obvious, incorrect is better. So Right.

Janine Bolon
Yeah, that’s what we’re going for. So what story about yourself? Do you like to tell your target audience that gets the most laughs?

James H. Lee
Yeah, well, you know, this, this book, took about five years to put together, right, and I’m kind of like a magpie of ideas, I just keep collecting these bright, shiny objects, and, you know, try to put together something worthwhile out of it. And COVID was really a good opportunity to focus. When COVID hit, I had a choice between finishing my book and starting a drinking habit, because there was like nothing else to do. And I thought about it for a while, I decided to finish the book. So choose wisely, you know, sometimes the worst times of your life can be the most productive. And what you can do, ultimately, is to ask yourself the following question, and that is, what can I do now to make this look worthwhile, in hindsight?

Janine Bolon
And then, see what and then see what you do. Yeah, see what happens after that point. So based on those type of questions that you were sitting there asking yourself, and you decided to choose wisely, you pick the good choice, you finished the book, well done. Bravo, round of applause, because not everybody finishes their book that they’re working on. So what are the top five tips that you would give authors about selling their books?

James H. Lee
That’s selling the book, well, first of all, get a newsletter or blog. Okay, so I would say even now, my greatest source of new customers is a newsletter that I send out, I use Constant Contact, as the vehicle for that. I have about 1000 people on my list, which isn’t huge by any means. But it’s just a way of keeping in touch with folks over 5, 10, even 20 years. I mean, I had a conversation with a woman about a month ago, who I hadn’t spoken to in 10 years. But I had been keeping in touch with her through my newsletter all along. And that’s just kind of amazing. The second is to be sure to get some kind of professional reviews from Kirkus and Clarion. One of the advantages of getting a professional review with those two organizations is that you also get to show up in their magazines as well. So that’s publicity that you’re not even paying for. At that point. That’s just that’s just a freebie. Okay? Although I think that you may need to pay for the initial review. The third thing is to have a media kit ready. And that is have a box that you can refer people to, to get pictures, to get biographies, to get book reviews, get links to awards and recognition, other articles that you’ve written. And that’s something that reporters in particular, will look for, in vetting out your authenticity. That that sort of separates the pros from the amateurs as it were, and can be very helpful. And then finally, if you’re comfortable with being in public, then be sure to get out and do some speaking. Rotary Clubs, university classes, professional organizations, they’re almost always looking for guests and you help.

Janine Bolon
And thank you very much, because that’s one of the big things that helped me. I was such an introvert that the very first thing I did was run out and I joined a Toastmasters organization just so I could get into the habit of speaking. And then I had people who wanted me to succeed, that were doing the constructive criticisms, right. And that’s the thing is finding those groups of people who do want you to succeed. And that was something that I had never been taught before I had Toastmasters was that everyone sitting in the chair that’s listening to you. They really want you to succeed, they do not want you to be a failure and that was incredibly helpful. What was something that you learned from your speaking?

James H. Lee
Yeah, so I took a master class on online and one thing that one of the teachers was talking about is to pretend that everyone already loves you. Okay, like, you’re not even sure. Okay. But if they love you, you love them back. It just feels better. And it gets things kind of moving in the right direction.

Janine Bolon
Yep, I liked that one even better than the one I was given. That’s excellent. So what’s the biggest change that you’ve seen in yourself, Jim? I mean, since you started marketing this book, I mean, I know you had the first book, but 2020 kind of wiped the board clean for all of us, right? We kind of had to start this whole new lifetime over. And it’s like, what what do you see as the biggest change for yourself since you started marketing book number two?

James H. Lee
I have been super busy. It’s all good. I’ve been getting opportunities to speak for just some amazing Office meeting it’s amazing audiences on on both coasts. And then it was just a matter of just sort of staying awake and not getting too tired out and too fatigued. I accidentally booked a trip to the wrong city. I had a conference in Tampa that I was supposed to go to book the flight to Fort Lauderdale. Oh, no, let me tell you, there’s a four hour trip. That’s nothing but alligators in the middle of Florida. Yes, I did that tour. So that’s the downside of being successful, is sometimes you get a little bit more on your plate than you could actually handle. And then at that point, you start looking at systems and automation, and all of that just to be sure that you don’t show up in the wrong place too often.

Janine Bolon
That’s exactly right. And I have been there where you were and ended up having to, in a panic, call the airlines and say, I can post a run down, I need to go somewhere else. There was a lot of laughter, you know, when you own it, you just own it go oh, it’s totally me. It is, this is me being me. And it’s a 24/7 job.

James H. Lee
I’ll keep you busy.

Janine Bolon
Well say somebody is like, “Hey, this is the guy I want to talk to you about finances. This is the guy that I want to chat with about his book.” Where can people find you?

James H. Lee
Yeah, so I am on Amazon. I’m also on bookbaby.com. They’re, they’re my publishers. Okay. And this is my second self-published book. And it’s the investment book that I always wanted, but it simply didn’t exist, so I had to write it. And it integrates my work as a futurist, as a financial analyst, as a market technician, as a portfolio manager. It may be the last book about investing that you’ll ever need. And it’s almost like a textbook, but it is full color. So if you read it on a Kindle, be sure to get a color Kindle or like an iPad or something like that, because it will make no sense in black and white. Okay, it also makes no sense as an audio book, which is why it’s both on Kindle version and also in hardback. So you’ll find it in Barnes and Noble, maybe in your local bookstore. But check it out. It’s called Foresight, Investing: a Complete Guide to Finding Your Next Great Trade.

Janine Bolon
Your complete guide to finding your next great trade. Yep, that is something a lot of us are looking forward to. Because once you get out of debt, and once you start accruing cash, you start saving and you become that habitual saver that we talked about all the time on the show. Then comes the investing side of things. And if you’re not working for someone else, and you’re an entrepreneur, then there’s all kinds of options to open up. But the more successful you become, the more you need to diversify and figure out different ways of moving through investments and definitely check out our man, Jim H. Lee, because he has the book on the topic. Any last pieces of advice or words of wisdom for us?

James H. Lee
You know, you brought up a great point Janine and that ultimately it starts out by getting control of your cash flow and wealth accumulation is a function of time and effort. The earlier you start, the bigger a difference it’ll make in the long run. By just having these little micro habits, like putting all of your change into a piggy bank or rounding up, or putting money into a 401 K plan or a Roth account on a regular basis, that’ll pay big dividends for you down the road. So you need to have something to invest something in in order to have something you need to save something.

Janine Bolon
And there you go, folks, that is some of the most sound wisdom that you’re going to get. And I just wanted to say thank you so much to Jim for being our spotlighted author today, I really appreciate you taking the time out of your day to share this with us.

James H. Lee
Oh, absolutely. My pleasure. Thank you.

Janine Bolon
And if you are an author or you know of an author who would like to join us and be in the spotlight, please visit our website, authorpodcasting.com where you will find the 99 Author Project listed. We talk to all authors from all walks of life as we build out book number 12 which is the advice from authors to authors that will happen in 2023 and this is Janine Bolon signing off with you today and all of us here at the 8 Gates that produces the Janine Bolon show. We wish you a wonderful weekend encourage you to get your message, your story, or your knowledge out into the world. Make it a better place, just like these authors are doing that we’re interviewing this year. Now we’ll see you again next week and until then, you keep sharing what you know with others. You keep shining that light that you and don’t forget to go out today and just do something with those plain fun for yourself.

Bryan Hyde
Thank you for listening to the Janine Bolon show. Be sure to subscribe to our show notes by going to www.theJanineBolonshow.com, where you’ll find additional resources as well as the opportunity to sign up to receive our program in your email each week. Be sure to visit our sponsor at www.the8gates.com.