185: From Idea to Book: The Role of a Book Coach

 

If you've ever been curious what a book coach does, this episode goes into the role of a book coach, common misconceptions about book coaches, and more. 

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From Idea to Book: The Role of a Book Coach

Hello. Welcome back to your big creative life podcast. Thanks for being here. Before we get into the content for this week's episode, which is about book coaching, I wanted to announce that I switched something with my social media, and I wanted to give you all a heads up on the podcast, because I don't think I've mentioned it in previous episodes lately. I have been in this weird place with social media, where I've been debating, for myself, with myself, for months about how to handle author content. I do not have a book deal. I don't have any news there for you. I'm hoping soon I will, but, yeah, I just am thinking about this book that I've written, going on submission and like, even if nothing happens, I'm committed to publishing this book. Like, even if I don't get a traditional publishing book deal, like, this is the year I get, I at least have plans for a published book. I cannot keep going on submission and just things falling through. I can't keep doing it. So anyways, I was thinking about how to handle author content on my page, because so many people follow me for writing tips, for writing content, because I'm a book editor, this is what I talk about. This is my niche. I'm not an author. That's not why they followed me. And a lot of people are not interested in reading thrillers, which is what I write. And so I've been thinking about how to handle it, and initially I was like, telling myself, just get over it. Post on the same account. It's fine.

 

There's definitely overlap between those two things, but trying to adjust the video, and I can't, I'll just fix it later. The angle was weird. And I just, I don't know, I'm feeling all this resistance. And I just decided, You know what, fuck it. I'm gonna start a new account and have that be like personal content and author content. So if you'd like to follow my personal account and my author account, it's like a combined thing of the two of them, I'll be sharing a lot of author content, like when it gets to that point where I have a book to talk about that's being published, but right now, I'm just sharing about my writing process and also sharing some personal stuff, videos that are not related to writing. So that is @theKateWolf, which, if you have been following me for a while, you remember was my old handle. I just, like, kept it because I don't know, I just have been in a weird place with social media, thinking about, like, what, how I want to handle this transition. So personal account, author account is @theKatieWolf, and then @KatieWolfWrites will be the business account, so I'll have writing content, all the podcast content will go there, so you can still get all of that information and that content on the main account and things changing there. But yeah, I just want to throw that out there. So it's @theKatieWolf on Instagram and Tiktok.

 

So the topic for this episode is one that I talked about a couple of years ago in an episode I did. It was like a bonus episode, talking about, I had to refresh my memory of because I remember I touched on book coaching in an episode, but I didn't, I didn't remember what I talked about, and I didn't go back and listen to that episode, but I did look at the title, and it was something about scammers in the book world. So I clearly was talking about some kind of book coach, I don't know, maybe not a book coach who was a scammer. But I can think of two people in particular that I might have been talking about on that episode, but it came out a few years ago, and it wasn't really a deep dive into book coaching. So I wanted to just do an episode on that. It's not maybe you're encountering the term book coach for the first time, or you've heard it, you're not really sure what that means. So I want to dive into that and talk about the role of a book coach and how I see it anyways, because every book coach, every person who does this, might have a slightly different answer or slightly different way that they work with people.

 

I will say that my own experience with it, I really don't like the word coach, because I feel like it has some sleazy connotations, but it's just the best word to use that people kind of know. Like I've seen people use the term mentor, like book mentor, or like book doula. I even saw someone call themselves a book doula, because they help people birth their books into the world. And like, there are all these terms that I could use, but it just, I don't know. I didn't want to get too out there with it, so book coach just, it's what stuck. I did not start offering book coaching as a service in my business right away. This is something that I added on when I first started editing. It was a side hustle, and I started on Fiverr, working with with clients. I did copy editing and manuscript evaluation, which is my form of a developmental edit. And I had always like thought of coaching, because I'd done a little bit of coaching before when I had a different kind of business, and was like, well, maybe I could add that in, but I wanted to gain some experience as an editor first. I didn't. I just didn't feel confident that I would be able to really help people without the editing experience. And I was aware of some people who offered book coaching but didn't offer editing services, and that's perfectly fine that they do that, as long as they have experience working with people and know what they're talking about and know how to support them. But I just felt like for me, if I was going to collaborate with people and like, consult and give them feedback, I wanted it to be in a more editorial capacity, versus just cheering them on or supporting them in the process of writing a book.

 

Because, yes, that's important, but I don't know. I felt like that would be valuable, is having the editorial feedback for people. So yeah, I didn't start off offering it, and I had a lot of imposter syndrome when I first started coaching, because it felt like it was just a new service for me. It felt like a different way of working with people. I was in a group like I paid for this course that was for business owners, for like, women business owners, specifically, who have online businesses, and to help them scale their businesses and do the marketing and like talking about, like, positioning and offers and all this stuff. It was just tons of advice for for like, growing an online business. And there was someone in that group who was a non fiction book coach, and I'm not going to call her out specifically, but she was someone who had a business where she she was a non fiction book coach, but she didn't she had never written anything herself, and she had also had no experience as an editor. And I remember looking at her page. I looked at her website because I was doing some market research, initially, trying to figure out, like, how other book coaches were positioning themselves, how I wanted to think about it, not to copy, but just to get inspiration and kind of see prices too. I wanted to see, like, what should I be charging for this? So I was doing some market research, and I just remember thinking like I don't, I want to steer clear of that.

 

I don't know and that's not to say that I think that book coaches or book editors also have to be writers. A lot are, but that's not necessarily an asset. Like to that you are a writer yourself, but in this case, I don't know something about it just seems sort of odd to me, like, why would you why would you have a company where you're positioning yourself as a book coach, but you've never worked with authors in any capacity at all? So anyways, I wanted to just make sure, like I had built up some experience for myself as an editor first, and then I created this six month program where I was basically helping people through the process of writing their book. And initially, when I had the first iteration of this six month program, it was, it was a little bit too much that we were trying to accomplish in six months, because I would help people to write the first draft, help them, meaning support them. I didn't actually write any of the book for them, but my first version of the six month program was just too Yeah, it was too much, because I would do an evaluation, I would review their rough draft, they would make changes, and then I would copy edit the book. But a lot of times, after six months, people weren't necessarily done with it.

 

So I was copy editing something that was going to be changing again, and it just felt like a little too rushed. So what I landed on over the years that I've been doing this, I've always had, not always, I think I've added coaching in like 2022, maybe, maybe, yeah, maybe three years I've been doing coaching, I want to say, now it's a six month program, and the focus is just on getting the rough draft out. So there are coaching calls along the way over the six months, there are 25 page reviews where people can send me 25 pages of something that they're working on, like the draft, I mean, and then I'll give them feedback. There are Voxer check ins, which is this app that I use to check in with people outside of the coaching calls. I check out Monday through Friday, and then if there's time at the end of the six months, if we have time after I've done the evaluation, given the person feedback, then they can go through and make changes based off that feedback and send me a revised draft to review at the end of the six months. So the focus is just on having a draft done, and if there's time doing some editing on that draft, so that people are in a good position when the six months ends, they know what to work on, even if the book isn't, like, totally ready, in the sense that they can publish it or query it right that second it.

 

Least they're close, or they know what the plan is for editing and getting it there. So it's definitely evolved over over the few years that I've been offering coaching.But the way I want to talk about a couple misconceptions here that I think people have when it comes to coaching, because a lot of people just don't know what this means. And again, there's always the issue of, like, everyone who offers book coaching probably does it a slightly different way. They position it a slightly different way. But this is just how these are some misconceptions that I've seen so number. The first misconception is that book coaches are telling you what to write, or, like, essentially just writing it for you. That's a ghost writer. If, if someone is like, if you want someone to write for you, that's a ghost writer. That's a different kind of thing. A book coach also is not telling you what to write. I view my role as more of like a consultant and an editor, where I even have something my contract like, if I give you an idea for something you are free to use, that you don't have to, like, say that I gave you that idea, but I'm not telling you. Like, no, this is what you have to do in order to shape this book, in order to make the plot go this way and tell this type of story. I'm only ever there to offer guidance and give feedback and suggestions to the author.

 

But just like with editing, ultimately, the client is, the final gets the final say. They get to decide if they want to incorporate that suggestion and take it or not. I can't dictate what the final product looks like. I can suggest things again, but I'm not telling the person exactly what to write. Once I'm familiar with their story and their idea, I can, of course, consult and throw around some ideas. We can brainstorm together. And that's really valuable for people to have someone else who knows this world, who knows these characters and the plot and everything. But yeah, I'm never telling someone exactly how to write the book. That's not my job, and I'm definitely not writing it for them. That's something completely different. Um, another misconception is that book coaches are just there for moral support, like a kind of a cheerleader, or, like a, I don't know, a mentor, a mindset mentor through the process, and that's definitely a big part of it, especially for new writers who are doing this for the first time. I mean you, if you're listening to this and you're a new writer working on your foot first book. You know, it's hard, and there are some times where your mindset can be a big obstacle in the way. You've got self doubt, you got imposter syndrome, you're comparing yourself.

 

There's a lot that can come up with it, where your inner critic just starts screaming at you. So the coach can definitely help you through that, and that's part of what I do with clients. But I'm not just there for moral support again. I I have those 25 page reviews along the way, and I do the full editing pass, maybe multiple passes, if there are time, because I want to give that editorial feedback to the author. I want to give them actionable, actionable feedback on characters, plot pacing, conflict, world building, etc. It's not just like cheering them on. And then another, another misconception I see is like the book coaching or working with someone in this kind of capacity is just for new writers if you're just working on your first book, because you might not know like how to do it, and that's certainly true. I mean, again, if you're listening to this and you're working on your first book, you know that it can be difficult because you haven't done it before. You're kind of figuring it out as you go. But I have coaching clients who have I've worked with for three years at this point, and we've worked on like, four books together.

 

So they're not new, they're not working on their first book, but they just value having someone weigh in, having someone give them feedback along the way as they're writing to kind of course correct, so that they don't get to the end and do multiple rounds of revision and do BETA readers, and then I do my evaluation, and they realize they've got serious issues in the manuscript. It's really helpful to have someone kind of in your corner to help you course correct on those things as you're writing the book. And then also the moral support and the mindset coaching too. That's, that's, those are all pieces of it. So again, I think there's something, of course, the first book is the most difficult for most people, not for everyone. Most people, though, because it's new. You've never done it before, but that doesn't mean that you just, like, don't need someone. I had a client once we worked together on to she, it was, she was not a coaching client, she was just an editing client. And we worked on maybe three books together. She's a self published author, and we were, or we worked on two books, and we were discussing working together for the third book, and she I asked if she wanted, like, the manuscript evaluation or what? And she's like, Yeah, someday I'll probably get to the point where I don't need it, but I feel like I'm still learning, and I could really use that. And I was like, oh, wait a second, no, even, like, very prolific authors still need people to weigh in.

 

In their books. It's not a matter of like, oh, once you write four books, you no longer need feedback from people, or you no longer need an editor. That's not how it works, because we can't be objective about our own writing. We can't see things. We could have every intention of creating something, but it's just not showing up on the page, and you need someone to kind of spot that for you and flag those issues. So it's never a case of just not ever needing anyone to look at anything you write. Once you get to a certain point, you do get better, of course, and you're able to kind of spot things because you know your patterns as a writer, but it never you never stop needing a second set of eyes on something that you're writing, whether that's like a beta reader or, you know, it doesn't have to be a professional editor that you hire. It's certainly not a requirement. But I think that the so I shared a bit about the six month you know program and how I work with people last year, I also added, like, a one off coaching call that people can book.

 

Originally, I was resistant to it, and I didn't add it right away, because I just felt like, Okay, if someone books a 30 minute call with me, I don't want them to, I don't want to over promise what we can get done, because I can't, I can't fully know your story, and I'm not able to, like, give you actual feedback and read part of your work in a 30 minute call, like we're just so limited to what we can do. But I had someone who, I think I added it because someone reached out about querying support or something, so I put it on there, and I've had a, probably a dozen of them now, where people have just booked a one off call because they want to just discuss querying. They need advice on something. I had someone recently who was like, finishing her first draft, and she just needed some advice on genre and like, how to approach her edits. So even though I didn't know her story, I mean, she gave me the premise, and, you know, we talked a little bit about it, just so I had a kind of an idea of the story she was writing. But I was still able to guide her and, like, pose questions that made her reflect on her characters and think about the direction that she wanted to take the book in when she was going to edit. And I shared some strategies for her that could be helpful.

 

So she walked away with a lot of valuable information in the call, even if, like, I didn't actually review pages for her. So anyways, that's that's something that a book coach can do, too, is like just some brainstorming, support, pose some questions for you, or help you through mindset stuff on a smaller level. So I do have that available. I don't advertise that much just because, yeah, I don't know, but I'm not sure why I don't advertise that much, I guess more than the six month program. I guess the six month program just feels like that's really where I can help people, because, like, we get a chance to dive in and, like, you get feedback on your pages, but that's an option too, and you'll see that with some book coaches, where they have, like, an hour or a 30 minute session where you can just set up a zoom call and discuss something.

 

So it's a good option to like, I have ways that you can just ask me questions. You know, like the Q and A podcast. We have a Q and A podcast episode that comes out the last Tuesday of every month, so you get an opportunity to ask a question about something related to writing or querying or business or whatever social media. I don't know anything, but if you want more support, if you want something that's more personalized than coaching is an option. And I I vaguely remember touching on this in the last episode about coaching from a couple years ago. But I, I want to just put this out there that if you come across, well, okay, no book coach or editor for that matter, should ever be offering a a guarantee about anything. I'm not even sure why people do that, because I don't know how they would uphold it. I guess the point is that they can't uphold it. It's just like marketing stuff to get to try to, like, weasel, I don't know. You can't. There are no guarantees. Like, I don't have a guarantee in my coaching program. Like, Oh, if you pay this much and you work with me for six months, you will get an agent, or, Oh, if you work with me for six months and we work on your book, you're going to achieve, like this, many book sales in your first few months as an indie author.

 

There are so many things that are outside of our control as writers and authors and with the algorithms, and it's just impossible to offer any sort of guarantee like that. I can't, I would never do that. So if you do see someone online doing that, be very wary and ask them about that policy, about that guarantee, because that, to me, is like a big red flag. Yeah, there are no. Guarantees also, like, we're not agents. Book coaches are not agents. We can't, we can't be like, oh yeah, this was, this will, this is definitely going to be able to be like, sold and get a book deal. We can't know that for sure. Yeah. So I just say proceed with caution. If you do see someone offering some kind of guarantee, because I don't know how they would ever be able to do that ethically, unless they have some sort of insider something. They're higher they're paying someone I don't know. I don't want to speculate about that too much, but yeah, so that's, that's book coaching.

 

And again, I really to sum up. I really view this my role as a book coach, even though I'm saying that word so many times, and I really hate it, but I really view it as like a book consultant. I'm like consulting on the story and advising you and an editor. It's like a book editor slash consultant slash advisor. Maybe a role again. Yes, the cheerleading is important. Yes, the accountability is important. Like, that's another piece of it. With the six month clients like book coaches can offer that accountability for you to to make sure that you're on top of things. If you have deadlines, if you just want to have deadlines set for you, they can definitely help with that. But it's not just the moral support and the accountability. It's more than that. So, yeah, I book my book coaching clients I generally work with, like, no more than four people at a time, just because I want to make sure I have enough capacity for people.

 

Yeah, force probably max. And then also balancing that with editing clients and how it works is like, it's always a six month commitment, and then as soon as someone finishes their six months, I mean, of course, they have the option to renew and do another six months or add on another month or whatever. But once they're done, then I have an opening for someone new. So if you're interested in coaching and you want to get more information about it, oh, I'll share the price too, just in case you're curious, it's 750 a month. So I do payment plans, like almost all my coaching clients are on payment plans where it's 750 a month for six months, and so it's $4,500 for the six months. And I don't charge extra for a payment plan. So if you want to check that out, you can go to the link in the description of this episode. There's like a little link that shares more about the what's included. And then there's also, if you want my stand store and you're interested in that, just the one off coaching call, like a 30 minute call, you can book that as well to chat with me about whatever you want to chat with about, with me about, there's a little form where you can fill out like information about what you want to discuss on the call, just so I know ahead of time.

 

But yeah, that's book coaching. I do have one opening. This episode will come out in June. I'm recording this at the very end of May, and as of right now, I have one opening in June. So just as a heads up, you can always go to the coaching page, though, and once you click through, there's a little form that you'll fill out if you're interested in working together. There's a form where you tell me about the book you want to write or have started writing. Some of my clients have already started writing their books when they work with me, and I will reach out to you. We'll set up a little zoom call to chat about working together, and I can answer questions that you have, and then go from there if it seems like a good fit. So there's always on that page. I'll always let you know what month like I'm booking for if I have any spots open. So like I said, I'll have one spot open in June.

 

But yeah, so that's book coaching in a nutshell. Again, steer clear of anyone who has like, weird kind of guarantees I've talked already about steering clear of anyone, not in this episode, but in other places, um, steering clear of people who make kinds of like, like, who make promises or claims that Just feel too good to be true, I see ads on Instagram because I've watched the ads, and I'm clicked through because I'm so I'm just in disbelief that this exists, and so then the algorithm thinks that I'm interested in it and keeps showing me ads for this thing or stuff like this. It's like a querying course or class or something where it's like, hack your hack, the agent's brain, trick them into offering you representation with this one weird trick in your query letter, which makes me want to just throw my computer against the wall, because that's not how querying works. There is no hack. You write a good query letter, you write a good book. That's what gets you on offer like it's not. There is no one weird trick in your query letter that's going to manipulate an agent into giving you, into offering you representation.

 

That's not how it works, and anyone who is writing their marketing copy in that way is sleazy, and I will publicly say that until I'm blue in the face, I think that should be avoided at all costs. Anyways, that's a bit of a tangent, because that's not really a book coach, but I just want to put that out there too, while we're talking about what to avoid, there are also book coaches for nonfiction. That's definitely an area where, because a lot of people who are writing nonfiction, I mean, not always, sometimes it's like memoir authors or people who are writing, I don't know different kinds of nonfiction books outside of this, but a lot of people who write nonfiction are like business people, or they have a platform already. They have an established brand. They want to share something educational. It's self help. So there's some outcome that they're hoping to have from the book, and they just hire someone to help them through the process because they're not most of the time, these people who are writing these kinds of books, nonfiction authors, they're not they don't come at this from a writing background.

 

They come at it from some other kind of background. And so they need guidance and the process. The other benefit of having a book coach for nonfiction is the process is different. If you're trying to query if you're trying to query nonfiction, you need a proposal. So you have to write this document that basically outlines what the book is going to be, gives the agent a sample of what the book will will include, and then you pitch that query that. So the process just works differently for nonfiction. I That's not something I do. I don't know much about nonfiction, so I don't have the ability to help people. I'm just fiction. I just work with fiction authors. But that exists too. There are, there are book coaches for for nonfiction. So that's something you can look into if you are ever, ever wanting to write a nonfiction book. All right, I hope this was helpful. If you have any additional questions about book coaching or how it works, feel free to email me hello@KatieWolf.com, or you can always send me a DM on Instagram @KatieWolfWrites, thank you so much for listening.

Katie Wolf