Mitchell Levy, the publisher at Happy About, asked me over a year ago if I was interested in being the Executive Editor of the Now What??? series. I had written I’m on LinkedIn — Now What??? and didn’t know that it was a series yet!
My response was “no way.” I did not want to worry about making sure that other people’s books would fit within my brand, that the quality would be good enough, and coddle authors along (aka, babysit people). I know there was a fair amount of coddling me when I was doing my books, and I couldn’t imagine having to do that with others while I was trying to build my JibberJobber business.
The first few ideas he pitched at me for Now What??? books seemed to be completely out of my brand, and it just made sense to focus on what I was doing.
And then, one day, I got a royalty check.
You may have heard that there is no money in writing a book. I kind of somewhat believed that, until I got that one royalty check. I thought ” geesh, if I can get this from one book… what could I get from more?”
I called Mitchell and told him that I was ready to talk about what it meant to be the Executive Editor of the Now What??? series. And then I started to think what my vision for the Now What??? series was:
What if the Now What??? series had 100 titles, and because of the value/power of the series, they could all help one another sell? What if they could be branded to some fraction of the Dummies or Idiots books, and companies or career centers would love to have them in stock? What if we could sell… say… 1,000 of each title each year?
There would be benefits: financial and brand awareness (for JibberJobber) might be two of the biggest benefits.
I approached a number of people who had knowledge or expertise in a certain area and have started down the road with a number books (about 20 titles). I am not ready to announce any of them yet, but am excited to see this stream move forward and mature.
Who’d-a-thunk: Me, and executive editor.
Has this series been helpful to you, as you figure out your other revenue streams?
Here is a breakdown of the revenue streams I’ve shared so far:
- Revenue Stream 1: JibberJobber User Upgrades
- Revenue Stream 2: JibberJobber Partnership Program
- Revenue Stream 3: Books I write
- Revenue Stream 4: Now What??? Executive Editor
- Revenue Stream 5: Professional Speaking
- Revenue Stream 6: Consulting
- Revenue Stream 7: (not announced yet)
- Revenue Stream 8: (not announced yet)
- Revenue Stream 9: Information Products
- Revenue Stream 10: Miscellaneous
I’m a friend of Jason Alba ! Now What?