Book as startup; Meta’s Streisand Effect; AI antimarketing: Newsletter 12 March 2025

Newsletter 85: Questions to ask when you treat your book as a startup venture. Plus paperbacks in decline, authors reveal their secrets, three people to follow, and three books to read.

A book is a startup venture

I help authors with nonfiction books. I’ve also been studying the principles and culture of startups of late. And I’m struck by how similar the two types of ventures look.

You wouldn’t start a company just for the thrill of it — it’s way too much work for that. And the same ought to be true of your book of advice or insight.

Startups need strategy. So do books. If you go forward with a thoughtfully developed plan, you have a far better chance of success.

Thinking as an entrepreneur would, what’s important to get right in your book project? (I’ve lovingly ripped off a bunch of these principles from Michael Skok’s Startup Secrets Sandbox, an incredible startup resource). Answer these questions, which apply to both startups and books:

• Who is your clearly defined target market? What group of people will say, “Ah, this is just what I was looking for?”
• What problem are you solving for them? Define the problem from your reader’s point of view, not yours.
• Have you talked to a bunch of people in the target market? Why aren’t they satisfied with existing books or resources?
• How big a deal is this problem? Is it a severe and urgent issue for them?
• How hard is it to adopt your proposed solution? Do people need to read 300 pages to get your concept? Have you designed the book to be approachable, engaging, and easy to navigate?
• What is your differentiation? What makes your approach unique, different, and better?
• How’s your timing? Have external factors made this the perfect moment for the solution you propose?
• What’s your business model? How will your book help you and your organization to make money?
• Who’s your team? Have you found the right editors, illustrators, and publisher to help you successfully launch your book into the world?
• How will you test your early product? Do you have beta readers? How will you embrace and adapt to their feedback?
• How will you create awareness? What have you done to publicize your book? Who will adopt and promote it first? Have you made it easy for those who love it to be able to share it?
• Where will the funding come from? Where will your investments in editorial help, marketing, promotion come from? How will you, the author, get paid while you work on the book?
• What’s your pitch? How will you assemble all the insights from asking yourselves these questions into a proposal that would impress a publisher?
• Are you the right person to do this? What qualities do you have that make you a good author, idea generator, problem solver, storyteller, or thought leader?

Once you start thinking of your book as a startup venture, it begins to seem like a really big deal. You start to realize how much effort you should invest in getting it right. And you see how you can take steps to maximize your chances for success.

If this seems intimidating, maybe you shouldn’t write the book. There’s no point in doing a half-assed job that won’t make an impact. Treat it like a well-planned venture — including planning for how it will pay off — and you’ll be starting on the right track.

News for writers and others who think

As Anne Janzer explains (on Jane Friedman‘s blog), hoarding the idea behind your book and keeping it secret is a terrible way for authors to think. Share early and often, because the risk of being unknown is far greater than the risk of someone stealing your idea.

An explosive new book, Careless People, describes a toxic environment and highly questionable behavior at the tech giant Meta. Meta has mounted a massive legal and PR counter-campaign against the book that will certainly ensure that it sells like mad. Decades later, the Streisand Effect still applies.

Popular books used to come out in paperback a year or so after the hardcover was published. That’s now becoming less and less common (WSJ, gift link). Your publisher will make this decision (and your preference will make very little difference).

If you include the words “artificial intelligence” in your product description, people are significantly less likely to trust it or buy it. File under “trough of disillusionment.”

Three people to follow

🥐 Robbie Samuels, MSW 🏳️🌈 🏳️⚧️ , book launch strategist and proprietor of the Biz Book Pub Hub.

Diego Lo Giudice , Forrester analyst who writes about how AI is transforming software development.

Gigi Sohn , veteran thinker working at the intersection of government, law, and telecom.

Three books to read

When the Light Finds Us: From a Life Sentence to a Life Transformed by Judy A. Henderson with Jimmy Soni (Worthy Books, 2025). Incredible story of a wrongly convicted woman’s fight for freedom.

Supershifts: Transforming How We Live, Learn, and Work in the Age of Intelligence by Steve Fisher and Ja-Nae Duane. We’re on the verge of a new 200-year-arc of human experience; this book explains why and how to make the most of it.

Dear Graduate: A Book for When We Take a Step Forward by Charles McEnerney and Adam Larson (Clarkson Potter, 2025). 30 questions to inspire humans on the verge a big change.