On this episode of Thrifty Titans, we explore the world of publishing business books. We discuss the two approaches to writing a book and why storytelling skills are necessary for founders. We also dive into the process of publishing, from literary agents and traditional publishing to self-publishing.
Our guest, Anish Chandy is the founder of the renowned Labyrinth Literary Agency. Whether you're an aspiring business book author or just curious about the book publishing industry, this episode has everything you need to know!
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Saikat Pyne: In today's episode, we have the privilege of welcoming Anish Chandi,
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Saikat Pyne: the founder of Labyrinth Literary Agency.
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Saikat Pyne: Ani's journey is nothing short of extraordinary. He has impacted
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Saikat Pyne: the way so many of the country's most reputed authors
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Saikat Pyne: tell their stories across mediums.
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Saikat Pyne: In this episode, Ani shared his thoughts and insights on
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Saikat Pyne: how to craft a best selling business book.
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Saikat Pyne: If you are a founder, a domain expert
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Saikat Pyne: or just another aspiring business book author,
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Saikat Pyne: this one is for you.
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Saikat Pyne: Let's dive in.
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Saikat Pyne: Hello, Hello, Welcome to the U Incorporated podcast with me,
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Saikat Pyne: your friendly neighbourhood part-time creator and full time media nude
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Saikat Pyne: On this show, I catch up with some of the
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Saikat Pyne: most bad ass founders, media, Mavericks and indie hackers in
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Saikat Pyne: the whole wide world. And we have some truly insightful
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Saikat Pyne: chats on startups, media and influence, the stuff that gets
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Saikat Pyne: left out of the media headlines.
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Saikat Pyne: Whether you're in a corporate, a startup, you own a
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Saikat Pyne: legacy brand, a scrappy side hustle or you're only a student.
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Saikat Pyne: If you are keen to build your brand, your voice
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Saikat Pyne: your way, you're in the right place. Here we come.
00:01:31
Saikat Pyne: We're speaking about business books that difference benefits and the
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Saikat Pyne: use cases of self publishing versus going with the traditional
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Anish Chandy: publishing house, traditional publishing and self publishing. There are a
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Anish Chandy: number of differences. The key difference is there is a
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Anish Chandy: system of gatekeeping in traditional publishing, gatekeeping or quality. Check
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Anish Chandy: where you have to. If the publisher deems that your
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Anish Chandy: work is of commercial and or critical value,
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Anish Chandy: they will take it on and then they will compensate
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Anish Chandy: you for it. They will pay you in the form
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Anish Chandy: of an advance and then royalties. Should the book recover
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Anish Chandy: that advance, and then on the sale of every book,
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Anish Chandy: you will get a certain percentage.
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Anish Chandy: They will incur all expenses of producing the book, designing
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Anish Chandy: the book, editing the book, promoting the book, selling the
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Anish Chandy: They will also be a part of should there be
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Anish Chandy: a lawsuit of some kind or a legal issue that
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Anish Chandy: might come up in the future? The publisher will be
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Anish Chandy: a part of
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Anish Chandy: self publishing. On the other hand is it is a
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Anish Chandy: service that the publisher that the self publisher offers a
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Anish Chandy: writer
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Anish Chandy: where oftentimes a writer does not want to go through
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Anish Chandy: this gatekeeping system and they say, Hey, you know what
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Anish Chandy: I want this book out really quickly.
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Anish Chandy: So what do I need to pay you? So the
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Anish Chandy: revenue model is reversed
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Anish Chandy: where the publisher is paid by the writer to publish
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Anish Chandy: the book so the publisher will offer some form of
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Anish Chandy: editorial service, depending on their capacity, and then they will
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Anish Chandy: go ahead and maybe design a basic cover, and then
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Anish Chandy: they will print. Now there are variations of this where
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Anish Chandy: some publishers will say that I'm offering a premium self
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Anish Chandy: publishing service. But instead of design designing a basic cover,
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Anish Chandy: I will design a more elaborate cover. Or you can
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Anish Chandy: design your own cover and you can upload it. And
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Anish Chandy: we'll use that
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Anish Chandy: and then self. Our self publisher will typically make the
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Anish Chandy: book available or for sale on Amazon or other E-commerce platforms.
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Anish Chandy: They tend to struggle to get into bookstores because bookstore
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Anish Chandy: space tends to be at a premium.
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Anish Chandy: And there's a perception that self published books have not
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Anish Chandy: gone through a quality process. So we so there. There
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Anish Chandy: tends to be a question mark on How good is that?
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Saikat Pyne: How do I judge if this book is likely to
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Saikat Pyne: be a better fit for a traditional publishing house? versus
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Saikat Pyne: Let's say something like self publishing. What
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Anish Chandy: most people actually do is they pitch it to the
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Anish Chandy: traditional publishing system.
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Anish Chandy: They would either pitch it to someone like me or
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Anish Chandy: they would pitch it to a publisher directly. And if
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Anish Chandy: they get a negative response or no response, which is
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Anish Chandy: often the case, they then go to self publishers because
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Anish Chandy: they then you pay a fee and you get it back.
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Anish Chandy: If you're in a super hurry, or sometimes ego becomes
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Anish Chandy: an issue that, hey, I don't want to go through
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Anish Chandy: the system where I could get rejected.
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Anish Chandy: So then you just go to the self publisher and say,
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Anish Chandy: Let's do this,
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Saikat Pyne: OK, got
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Anish Chandy: it. There are very few people who go through an
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Anish Chandy: elaborate system of feedback where they give the manuscript to
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Anish Chandy: friends and family and outsiders and ask for critiques and
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Anish Chandy: which is how it typically should be. But most people
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Anish Chandy: simply won't do.
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Saikat Pyne: Got it? How does approaching a literary agent or a
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Saikat Pyne: literary agency change things for me as a first time
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Saikat Pyne: a business book author,
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Anish Chandy: So a literary agent should be able to give you
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Anish Chandy: feedback OK now and some people will offer feedback. Some
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Anish Chandy: people won't offer feedback, but a literary agent is in
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Anish Chandy: a situation. He is in a position to offer feedback,
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Anish Chandy: telling the author that
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Anish Chandy: I think this works or this does not work for
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Anish Chandy: so and so reason. If you fix this, it could work.
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Anish Chandy: Or we could fix this for you. Or we could
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Anish Chandy: recommend someone who could fix this for you. So could
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Anish Chandy: offer a plethora of options that way. Or a literary
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Anish Chandy: agent could say that. Look, if you tweak this or
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Anish Chandy: if you promise to add a marketing budget to this
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Anish Chandy: from your end, I could get you a book deal
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Anish Chandy: with a traditional publisher. You do not need a literary
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Anish Chandy: agent if you're going to a self publishing company, because
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Anish Chandy: there you're paying a fee and that is it. End
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Anish Chandy: of story.
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Anish Chandy: A founder could come to a literary agent and ask him,
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Anish Chandy: Could you recommend a self publishing company? Sure, but beyond that,
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Anish Chandy: apart from actually editing the book, the literary agent cannot
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Anish Chandy: offer any value
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Anish Chandy: in the self publishing universe.
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Saikat Pyne: Got it?
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Saikat Pyne: So the other fundamental question, then, is in a world
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Saikat Pyne: where
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Saikat Pyne: money can get you a book
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Saikat Pyne: in six months or then sometimes even less. What is
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Saikat Pyne: the inherent value then of literary agents and literary agencies
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Saikat Pyne: and traditional publishing? The
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Anish Chandy: literary agent landscape in India has actually grown in the last.
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Anish Chandy: I would say, 50 years
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Anish Chandy: it wasn't really there before that
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Anish Chandy: in the US and the UK. If you don't go
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Anish Chandy: through a literary agent, the odds are your man will
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Anish Chandy: simply not be read.
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Anish Chandy: So what happens is the number of slots available with
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Anish Chandy: traditional publishers are limited.
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Anish Chandy: OK. Hm, I'm
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Anish Chandy: What do you mean by sloshing slots the number of
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Anish Chandy: books that they publish in a year? Let's say Penguin
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Anish Chandy: will publish X number of books in a year. A.
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Anish Chandy: Harper Collins will publish y number of books bloom to
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Anish Chandy: the published number of books.
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Anish Chandy: Now how do you get one of those limited slots?
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Anish Chandy: Because supply of manuscripts, out scripts demand by a multiple
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Anish Chandy: by many multiples.
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Anish Chandy: Now, either. If you're a founder and you go to
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Anish Chandy: a literary agent or a publisher and say, I'm willing
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Anish Chandy: to pay
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Anish Chandy: and I want to tell my company story, you could
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Anish Chandy: get published. But what a literary what a good literary
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Anish Chandy: agent should be able to guarantee you is that you
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Anish Chandy: get treated better when I say you get treated better
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Anish Chandy: across every function of publishing.
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Anish Chandy: It's edited better. It's designed better. It's produced better. It
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Anish Chandy: is marketed better. It's distributed better.
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Anish Chandy: And because publishing has historically been an opaque display,
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Anish Chandy: you typically need someone to help you navigate
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Anish Chandy: the labyrinth in Maze that it is. This is why
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Anish Chandy: my company is called. It's actually a business where, as
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Anish Chandy: the world has gotten increasingly digitised and the middle men
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Anish Chandy: have been cut out from various ecosystems, this is a
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Anish Chandy: business where the increasing digitization of the growth of the
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Anish Chandy: business has led to the introduction of what you would
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Anish Chandy: call a middle layer
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Saikat Pyne: because of there has to be a quality control, and
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Saikat Pyne: the publishers want to potentially outsource it. So how
00:08:24
Anish Chandy: does the publisher know that this is good? And how
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Anish Chandy: does the author know that I'm getting the best possibility?
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Anish Chandy: So the agent will typically run an auction and publishers
00:08:35
Anish Chandy: will bid for it. We'll get
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Saikat Pyne: to that. The other question I had was
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Saikat Pyne: What do you see as the inherent value of a
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Saikat Pyne: business book? So let's say the flip card book, Big
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Saikat Pyne: billion startup. What did it do for me or for
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Saikat Pyne: flip card that, let's say, advertising or LinkedIn content couldn't me.
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Anish Chandy: Here's book was actually an investigative account of flip Card.
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Anish Chandy: It wasn't APR, I s.
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Anish Chandy: So if you actually read the book, it is a
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Anish Chandy: deep dive into the origin story of flip card. What
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Anish Chandy: happened later, how the company grew, how did it get
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Anish Chandy: to where it did? At which point I think the
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Anish Chandy: book ends at the point where that was sold to
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Anish Chandy: Walmart
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Anish Chandy: and maybe a little. And I think he's doing another chapter,
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Anish Chandy: which is updating the book when the paperback version comes out. Now,
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Anish Chandy: what this does for someone like me here is that
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Anish Chandy: he ended up writing this definitive book, which got a
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Anish Chandy: lot of critical acclaim which banged on his 7 to
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Anish Chandy: 10 years of reporting experience.
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Anish Chandy: So it was not like he remember in in Interview
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Anish Chandy: five founding team members, and they're all telling nice things
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Anish Chandy: about right. It wasn't that subsequently he then got a
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Anish Chandy: very prestigious fellowship in New York the Night Fellowship for journalism,
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Anish Chandy: and and I'm sure the book had a part in it.
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Anish Chandy: He won the Capital Business Book of the Year award,
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Anish Chandy: which was a nice chunk of for him. And, uh,
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Anish Chandy: I sold movie rights for it.
00:10:09
Anish Chandy: Yeah, movie. So all of this happened because he wrote
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Anish Chandy: that book. So it a great book creates a little
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Anish Chandy: ecosystem around it,
00:10:17
Anish Chandy: and all parties benefit the number one party. Of course,
00:10:21
Anish Chandy: being the
00:10:24
Anish Chandy: got it. Could
00:10:25
Saikat Pyne: you tell me
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Saikat Pyne: this from, Let's say, a startup founder perspective. What can
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Saikat Pyne: it do for a founder? It
00:10:31
Anish Chandy: depends what you want. So if you instantly want to
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Anish Chandy: become a public figure, let's say you're a printer guy.
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Anish Chandy: You are well known within the print ecosystem,
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Anish Chandy: but the average Joe doesn't know the average Joe might
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Anish Chandy: see your ad coming during an IP l match, and
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Anish Chandy: he has no idea what this product is. You would
00:10:49
Anish Chandy: say it's a neo bank. He has no idea what
00:10:51
Anish Chandy: a Neo bank is. He's just waiting for the ad
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Anish Chandy: to move. But then, if you then put out your
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Anish Chandy: story and you say that I was this boy. I
00:10:57
Anish Chandy: grew up in small town India, and I barely had
00:11:00
Anish Chandy: food to eat, and then this happened, and then I
00:11:01
Anish Chandy: got a scholarship. And when I went to I T.
00:11:03
Anish Chandy: Or I didn't go to I t. And then I
00:11:05
Anish Chandy: struggled and
00:11:06
Anish Chandy: I became this person. Then what basically happens is you
00:11:10
Anish Chandy: become a public figure,
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Anish Chandy: and once you become a public figure, you're a platform.
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Anish Chandy: And then on that platform, you do whatever you want.
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Anish Chandy: You want to become some self help guru out. You
00:11:21
Anish Chandy: want to be on TV. It's totally up to you,
00:11:23
Anish Chandy: or you feel that you don't want to do that.
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Anish Chandy: You only want to talk about your company and you
00:11:27
Anish Chandy: want your company to be humanised or more well known,
00:11:31
Anish Chandy: then that story. That narrative story then goes in the book,
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Anish Chandy: so it really depends what you want and you got
00:11:37
Anish Chandy: to be pretty clear on what you want.
00:11:41
Saikat Pyne: Got it. Let's dive into the time when let's say
00:11:45
Saikat Pyne: somebody is, let's say, 10 or 15 person through. They
00:11:47
Saikat Pyne: have a basic semblance of an idea about what they
00:11:51
Saikat Pyne: want to write about. Often with business people, they are
00:11:55
Saikat Pyne: short on time. Or at least they feel that they're
00:11:57
Saikat Pyne: short on time, and the choice for them is between
00:12:00
Saikat Pyne: writing the book themselves, which they feel might take longer
00:12:03
Saikat Pyne: because they want everything done yesterday.
00:12:05
Saikat Pyne: The second is they hire somebody like an editor to
00:12:08
Saikat Pyne: fix their book after they have written it. But that
00:12:10
Saikat Pyne: still takes some time. The third is completely outsourcing it
00:12:14
Saikat Pyne: to a most writer. If I am a first time
00:12:17
Saikat Pyne: business book author, I let's say I'm a tech guy.
00:12:20
Saikat Pyne: Really Don't have good writing jobs. What is a good
00:12:23
Saikat Pyne: way for me to go about this?
00:12:25
Anish Chandy: So I think the first thing you should get it
00:12:27
Anish Chandy: two ways, right? So one is if you're like a
00:12:29
Anish Chandy: super convinced guy that every idea you're going to come
00:12:32
Anish Chandy: up with is going to be a hit. Then you
00:12:34
Anish Chandy: just start writing,
00:12:35
Anish Chandy: OK? You don't ask at all.
00:12:37
Anish Chandy: If you're the type who wants certain validation before you
00:12:40
Anish Chandy: move forward. Then you ask around right within your network,
00:12:44
Anish Chandy: you will find someone who knows someone like me, and
00:12:48
Anish Chandy: you come and you ask for an opinion. You're like, Hey,
00:12:50
Anish Chandy: here's my story. This is my story in rough. What
00:12:53
Anish Chandy: do you think? Do you think this is worth doing?
00:12:57
Anish Chandy: Then if the answer to that is, yes, then how
00:12:59
Anish Chandy: do you do it? do you want to write it
00:13:00
Anish Chandy: yourself when you don't need writing jobs, you need storytelling jobs,
00:13:03
Anish Chandy: and I don't know a single founder who doesn't have
00:13:05
Anish Chandy: storytelling jobs. They are selling their story 24% either either
00:13:10
Anish Chandy: either on social media or to investors or to their
00:13:12
Anish Chandy: employees or to their co-founders or to customers. Right So
00:13:16
Anish Chandy: they all can tell stories, right? Whether you can tell
00:13:18
Anish Chandy: your story in Hindi or English, that actually doesn't matter
00:13:21
Anish Chandy: as long as you can tell that story. You can
00:13:22
Anish Chandy: write that
00:13:23
Anish Chandy: now, whether you want to write whether you want to
00:13:25
Anish Chandy: do a first draught yourself and then have it edited
00:13:28
Anish Chandy: by someone that is possible. Whether you want a straight
00:13:32
Anish Chandy: up ghostwriter to do all of it. You don't recommend
00:13:34
Anish Chandy: that in a country like India, because ghostwriters the work
00:13:37
Anish Chandy: could be polished. But it takes away all kinds of
00:13:40
Anish Chandy: individual flair that the founder will have
00:13:43
Anish Chandy: that becomes. What is the individual has to sound like
00:13:46
Anish Chandy: someone is talking to you that this guy is talking
00:13:48
Anish Chandy: to you
00:13:49
Anish Chandy: that if this guy said, if you heard this guy speak,
00:13:52
Anish Chandy: let's say on a Ted talk or something like that
00:13:54
Anish Chandy: and that Ted talk. Let's have let's say it has
00:13:55
Anish Chandy: millions of views. You suddenly don't want an extremely polished
00:13:59
Anish Chandy: version
00:14:00
Anish Chandy: where the individual does not come through and the individual
00:14:04
Anish Chandy: is muted. It's like having a spokesperson speaking on your behalf.
00:14:08
Anish Chandy: So I don't recommend the use of ghostwriters for books
00:14:13
Anish Chandy: like the
00:14:16
Anish Chandy: I recommend the use of an editor, but not a
00:14:20
Saikat Pyne: got it. Let's say I have three business book ideas.
00:14:24
Saikat Pyne: How do I judge this book could sell? Or if
00:14:27
Saikat Pyne: this idea would make for a good business book, a
00:14:31
Saikat Pyne: good business
00:14:32
Anish Chandy: book could be either a new voice or when I
00:14:36
Anish Chandy: say you're saying something, that is. Either you're saying something
00:14:38
Anish Chandy: that's new or you're saying something in a new way
00:14:41
Anish Chandy: or you could your company story so compelling or you
00:14:45
Anish Chandy: have a way to make it compelling. You know that
00:14:48
Anish Chandy: people are interested
00:14:49
Anish Chandy: or you have a business model or a lifestyle philosophy
00:14:53
Anish Chandy: that you're pushing
00:14:55
Anish Chandy: right now, The way you can validate this, there are
00:14:57
Anish Chandy: multiple ways to validate it if you are. Let's say
00:14:59
Anish Chandy: you have no access to industry expertise, OK, and your
00:15:03
Anish Chandy: friends and family are also people who don't want you
00:15:06
Anish Chandy: to feel bad, and they're not going to give you
00:15:07
Anish Chandy: negative feedback. Then you start posting on social media. You
00:15:11
Anish Chandy: start posting in public
00:15:12
Anish Chandy: because then it is instead. Then, if people start throwing
00:15:16
Anish Chandy: you or if people are not responding to you, then
00:15:18
Anish Chandy: you know that there is something wrong here,
00:15:21
Anish Chandy: whether it is LinkedIn or Instagram or Twitter or Facebook
00:15:23
Anish Chandy: or whatever that platform. So that is public validation. Or
00:15:26
Anish Chandy: if you feel that, hey, you know what What I'm
00:15:28
Anish Chandy: posting seem to be hitting a striking a chord. And
00:15:32
Anish Chandy: because of this now I suddenly have 50 followers or
00:15:35
Anish Chandy: a million followers. Then clearly there is some value, whether
00:15:39
Anish Chandy: that is practical value or emotional value, that I'm or businessman,
00:15:42
Anish Chandy: that I'm offering my audience, which is, I have an audience.
00:15:45
Anish Chandy: But what you should not do is go and buy
00:15:48
Anish Chandy: a bunch of audience and say, I just bought 10 followers,
00:15:51
Anish Chandy: and then I should write a book. So that is
00:15:53
Anish Chandy: just self defeating.
00:15:56
Saikat Pyne: Of course, when it comes to biographies, many of the
00:15:59
Saikat Pyne: books you mentioned the flip card one, of course, get
00:16:02
Saikat Pyne: made into Web series. Let's say I am a founder,
00:16:06
Saikat Pyne: and I feel that this could potentially become a Web series.
00:16:09
Anish Chandy: Same thing. You have to go through the same process
00:16:11
Anish Chandy: of pitching
00:16:12
Anish Chandy: because India the way it is, people tend to not follow.
00:16:17
Anish Chandy: Let's say pitching hierarchies. Ideally, what you to do is right.
00:16:21
Anish Chandy: You should pitch it to either a lit agent or
00:16:23
Anish Chandy: a film agent, or your publisher should pitch it.
00:16:26
Anish Chandy: But what people do is they will find through an
00:16:30
Anish Chandy: informal network. They will find a clinic somewhere, and then
00:16:33
Anish Chandy: they will pitch it right. And they'll either find an
00:16:36
Anish Chandy: actor or a director or a producer or a writer.
00:16:39
Anish Chandy: But as long as and what happens in our universe
00:16:42
Anish Chandy: and culturally also, we are not attuned to offer criticism.
00:16:47
Anish Chandy: Everyone said awesome. OK,
00:16:55
Anish Chandy: but if someone's not putting skin in the game,
00:16:59
Anish Chandy: if someone saying that you bought your hair to then
00:17:03
Anish Chandy: are you buying this from not buying it from Remember,
00:17:07
Anish Chandy: right then it means nothing.
00:17:11
Anish Chandy: See, now, how do you build that circle of trust?
00:17:15
Anish Chandy: Who do you go to first? Those are decisions that
00:17:18
Anish Chandy: typically that individual will have to make now if he's
00:17:21
Anish Chandy: going through a traditional publishing So they are here. It's important.
00:17:24
Anish Chandy: If you don't go through a traditional publisher here, it
00:17:27
Anish Chandy: gets a little difficult.
00:17:28
Anish Chandy: If you're going from the book to screen journey, then
00:17:34
Anish Chandy: the filmmakers also know the producers know the money or
00:17:36
Anish Chandy: the finances in Bollywood or wherever. Whichever it South Industry
00:17:40
Anish Chandy: Hollywood They know what is self publishing and what is
00:17:42
Anish Chandy: traditional publishing. So they're like If you're coming to self publishing,
00:17:46
Anish Chandy: then it I don't know what it is. It is
00:17:50
Anish Chandy: hard to determine. Maybe it's evaluated, but how do I know?
00:17:54
Anish Chandy: But if you come to traditional publishing and somebody is
00:17:56
Anish Chandy: putting a logo on it,
00:17:57
Anish Chandy: apart from whatever expense they're like, OK, here there is
00:18:01
Anish Chandy: skin in the game.
00:18:02
Anish Chandy: So the other way to do it it's
00:18:04
Saikat Pyne: like startups hiring. Yeah, I and I
00:18:08
Anish Chandy: sort of all the other way to do it is
00:18:10
Anish Chandy: completely avoid the book thing, and you hire a screenwriter
00:18:15
Anish Chandy: and you. So now you are to the screenwriter.
00:18:18
Anish Chandy: You pay that day and that guy will keep ready
00:18:21
Anish Chandy: for you and then you have a story and then
00:18:23
Anish Chandy: you see whether you can pitch it because the world
00:18:25
Anish Chandy: is open and there's it's not like something cannot be pitched.
00:18:30
Anish Chandy: That so right? If anyone is selling access, I think
00:18:35
Anish Chandy: that's not valid.
00:18:37
Anish Chandy: OK,
00:18:38
Anish Chandy: every is sitting on on social media. That's OK. That's
00:18:43
Anish Chandy: what you're selling is Can I offer you the best
00:18:46
Anish Chandy: possible experience for your book and for you in terms
00:18:50
Anish Chandy: of sales and critical acclaim and quality and blah, blah blah.
00:18:54
Saikat Pyne: Got it for somebody who's a first time business book author.
00:18:58
Saikat Pyne: How can they find and shortlist the right literary agent
00:19:03
Saikat Pyne: or the right literary
00:19:04
Anish Chandy: agency? So there aren't there aren't too many. You go
00:19:07
Anish Chandy: to Google and whatever you do that or you go
00:19:10
Anish Chandy: through an informal network and you find references or you
00:19:13
Anish Chandy: look at the acknowledgement pages of books that you've liked
00:19:16
Anish Chandy: that have come in India and you look at the
00:19:17
Anish Chandy: agent's name written there. OK, now the thing is that
00:19:20
Anish Chandy: most agents are inundated with people
00:19:24
Anish Chandy: do
00:19:25
Anish Chandy: right. It is possible that you may not even get
00:19:27
Anish Chandy: a response
00:19:29
Anish Chandy: unless obviously you are somebody. Then it's a different matter,
00:19:32
Anish Chandy: but a weird thing that happens a lot of startup founders,
00:19:36
Anish Chandy: for the reasons I'm unsure about they pitch fiction. They
00:19:40
Anish Chandy: pitch college romance and they're like, This is my passion.
00:19:43
Anish Chandy: My company is the banana. But those guys I am
00:19:48
Anish Chandy: like there is almost all of it that is submitted
00:19:51
Anish Chandy: is trash because you put no effort in this. Your
00:19:55
Anish Chandy: effort is going to making the company right millionaire or whatever.
00:20:00
Anish Chandy: Yeah, so a lot of those guys, they don't get
00:20:02
Anish Chandy: responses and they get disgruntled as well.
00:20:04
Saikat Pyne: Got it? How can I pitch to a in a
00:20:07
Saikat Pyne: way
00:20:08
Saikat Pyne: that it's not exasperating for him.
00:20:11
Anish Chandy: You go to the literary agents website. They will typically
00:20:14
Anish Chandy: have a submissions link there, and you click on the
00:20:17
Anish Chandy: link and it will tell you how to pitch. So
00:20:19
Anish Chandy: either it could be like just send an email to
00:20:21
Anish Chandy: this email ID, and then you will receive submission guidelines.
00:20:24
Anish Chandy: Or there could be a form or they'll say that.
00:20:26
Anish Chandy: Write a synopsis, write two chapters then. So what I
00:20:30
Anish Chandy: What we've realised over the years is that we now
00:20:35
Anish Chandy: don't do a standard pitch
00:20:37
Anish Chandy: format because genres are so different. Someone's pitching a love story.
00:20:41
Anish Chandy: Someone's switching a business book. Someone's pitching a military memoir.
00:20:44
Anish Chandy: Someone's pitching a historical so depending on right, so someone
00:20:48
Anish Chandy: will just so we just ask you, Send an email. Boss,
00:20:50
Anish Chandy: just send an email thing. I'm writing this, OK, this
00:20:54
Anish Chandy: is my idea. That could be a one liner or
00:20:56
Anish Chandy: two liner based on that. Then we tell you, Oh,
00:20:59
Anish Chandy: you're writing this so your pitch should be your pitch
00:21:02
Anish Chandy: to us. Should be in this form.
00:21:05
Saikat Pyne: So what would that be for? Let's say, a business
00:21:07
Anish Chandy: book for a business book. It will be a synopsis
00:21:10
Anish Chandy: of your idea. It could be one or two chapters,
00:21:14
Anish Chandy: but more than the chapters, your synopsis is really important.
00:21:17
Anish Chandy: If you have a great synopsis and if your chapters
00:21:20
Anish Chandy: are not great, it pick a book. But great synopsis
00:21:25
Anish Chandy: and some tell us something about yourself.
00:21:28
Anish Chandy: Are you a public person? Are you a Do you
00:21:32
Anish Chandy: have a large network? Is can this network be tapped
00:21:35
Anish Chandy: into to support your book later? So it's mostly for
00:21:38
Anish Chandy: a business book. It will be a synopsis, which could
00:21:39
Anish Chandy: be a one page document, two page a three page
00:21:41
Anish Chandy: document and tell me about you.
00:21:46
Anish Chandy: I'm not assessing your book against some great literary married
00:21:50
Anish Chandy: against some great Charles Dickens or Russian writer or whatever.
00:21:54
Anish Chandy: I'm not expecting that from
00:21:57
Saikat Pyne: Got it, Could you break down each of the things
00:22:01
Saikat Pyne: a literary agent would do that would help in enhancing
00:22:04
Saikat Pyne: the business book draught from start to
00:22:06
Anish Chandy: finish? So first of all, uh, there are different models here.
00:22:10
Anish Chandy: Let's say the most well accepted model across the world,
00:22:13
Anish Chandy: where a literary agent I will will typically charge a
00:22:17
Anish Chandy: commission
00:22:19
Anish Chandy: on whatever income the book can raise. OK,
00:22:22
Anish Chandy: that commission could be 15% 20% 25. I don't know
00:22:27
Anish Chandy: of anybody who charges more than that.
00:22:30
Anish Chandy: What the literary agent essentially becomes, he becomes a minor
00:22:33
Anish Chandy: partner in this venture. You call the book a venture?
00:22:37
Anish Chandy: The Ma Majority partner of the author minor partner is
00:22:39
Anish Chandy: a literary.
00:22:41
Anish Chandy: Now, if the literary agent has been pitched and the
00:22:43
Anish Chandy: literary agent has come to the conclusion that this book
00:22:47
Anish Chandy: will be a great addition to that literary agent's portfolio,
00:22:51
Anish Chandy: plus the book will make money. OK, then the literary
00:22:55
Anish Chandy: agent's job starts. So the litre and the first thing
00:22:57
Anish Chandy: the agent has to determine is the writing good? Is
00:23:00
Anish Chandy: the idea good? Is the writing good? If the writing
00:23:02
Anish Chandy: is not good, the writing has to be fixed.
00:23:05
Anish Chandy: Yeah. Does the author have the ability to fix the
00:23:06
Anish Chandy: writing or we an editor has to be brought on board.
00:23:10
Anish Chandy: Is the editor in house, or is the editor from outside?
00:23:13
Anish Chandy: What is the cost of the editor? And the author
00:23:15
Anish Chandy: has to pay the cost.
00:23:17
Anish Chandy: If the writing is clean and then it does not record,
00:23:19
Anish Chandy: then it does not require. Then the literary agent's job
00:23:22
Anish Chandy: is to craft a proposal and auction that proposal amongst
00:23:26
Anish Chandy: all the top publishing house, the top M N C
00:23:28
Anish Chandy: publishing houses and some Indian publishing houses who are traditional
00:23:32
Anish Chandy: publishers so they will pay an advantage. They will say that. OK,
00:23:35
Anish Chandy: so let's say the auction is between six publishers or
00:23:38
Anish Chandy: seven publishers.
00:23:39
Anish Chandy: The publisher, E might say, I'll pay this. Publisher B
00:23:42
Anish Chandy: might say, I'll pay that. Publisher C might say, I
00:23:44
Anish Chandy: don't like it. Publisher D might say Like it. Publisher
00:23:46
Anish Chandy: E might say, I'll pay some. Then if I have
00:23:50
Anish Chandy: four or five publishers buying for it, I might. And
00:23:52
Anish Chandy: if they're in the same ballpark in terms of numbers,
00:23:54
Anish Chandy: then I might say, OK, offer me something more. What
00:23:57
Anish Chandy: is your marketing plan? What is your design plan. What
00:23:59
Anish Chandy: is your distribution plan? How are you positioning the book?
00:24:02
Anish Chandy: Do you have new editorial feedback
00:24:05
Anish Chandy: to offer this particular? If if there's a tie even
00:24:08
Anish Chandy: there and let's say it comes down to two publishers,
00:24:11
Anish Chandy: then what we do is we organise a phone call
00:24:13
Anish Chandy: and the phone call where both publishers will chat with
00:24:16
Anish Chandy: the author and they'll be like, I'm offering this. And
00:24:18
Anish Chandy: then that's a question of chemist. Like a tiebreaker. I
00:24:21
Anish Chandy: think once that is done and the publisher is chosen,
00:24:24
Anish Chandy: then an announcement is made. We can make it public
00:24:26
Anish Chandy: to the author people. They all know that this book
00:24:28
Anish Chandy: is coming out. Then you work with the author in
00:24:31
Anish Chandy: the writing process. Keep giving feedback that this is good.
00:24:34
Anish Chandy: This is bad. This is good. This is bad. And
00:24:36
Anish Chandy: then finally, you work on a promotion plan with the
00:24:39
Anish Chandy: author and the publisher.
00:24:41
Anish Chandy: What is the best way to leverage the authors? Banks.
00:24:44
Anish Chandy: Some of these people are great offline speakers. Some of
00:24:47
Anish Chandy: them are great online. Some of them have absolutely no network.
00:24:50
Anish Chandy: Some of them are willing to do stuff in America,
00:24:52
Anish Chandy: then figure out a distribution plan all over the world.
00:24:55
Anish Chandy: Will they sell in America? Will they sell in the UK?
00:24:57
Anish Chandy: Will they sell in translated languages? And then, finally, are
00:25:02
Anish Chandy: there other formats in which this book can be sold?
00:25:04
Anish Chandy: So can the agent sell rights to audiobook companies?
00:25:07
Anish Chandy: And it's Can you sell right to film companies to
00:25:10
Anish Chandy: translation companies? So it's all of it,
00:25:12
Anish Chandy: like in
00:25:13
Saikat Pyne: a
00:25:16
Saikat Pyne: Got it. Let's say somebody is a first time business
00:25:19
Saikat Pyne: book author. Let's say he is a small time you
00:25:22
Saikat Pyne: spoke about the auction. Somebody in that position might think
00:25:26
Saikat Pyne: that he doesn't have the star power to get
00:25:29
Saikat Pyne: the biggest publisher salivating over his book idea. So is
00:25:33
Saikat Pyne: that down then, to the calibre and the influence of
00:25:37
Saikat Pyne: the literary agent? What are the determining factors behind how
00:25:40
Saikat Pyne: many publishers are buying? Or is it purely on the
00:25:42
Saikat Pyne: quality of the idea? The
00:25:43
Anish Chandy: agent should be in a position to tell that founder
00:25:47
Anish Chandy: that first of all, the agent should be in a
00:25:48
Anish Chandy: position to have an in depth conversation with the founder. OK,
00:25:51
Anish Chandy: get to know the guy a bit and then tell
00:25:54
Anish Chandy: him that you pitched me this. But you know what
00:25:57
Anish Chandy: your idea. The better idea is this. You've pitched me
00:26:00
Anish Chandy: a but B could work
00:26:03
Anish Chandy: or you're telling me in such a manner, you tell
00:26:06
Anish Chandy: me a in a different way.
00:26:09
Anish Chandy: That could make out the proposal more exciting because the
00:26:12
Anish Chandy: agent and the author need to move instead like the
00:26:15
Anish Chandy: agent has to have skin in the game, the agent says.
00:26:18
Anish Chandy: You know what you pay me 1.5 likes, and I
00:26:22
Anish Chandy: will tell you what to do
00:26:25
Anish Chandy: Then there is no skin in the game. There are
00:26:27
Anish Chandy: some authors who will do that. Some authors who say
00:26:29
Anish Chandy: that Look, I am confident I want to hold all
00:26:32
Anish Chandy: equity in this project. I don't want to give you
00:26:34
Anish Chandy: any equity. So you quote me a fee upfront. I
00:26:38
Anish Chandy: will pay you that fee and you just tell me
00:26:40
Anish Chandy: what to do.
00:26:41
Anish Chandy: That's fine. What happens as well.
00:26:45
Saikat Pyne: Got it Once. Let's say the deal is struck between
00:26:49
Saikat Pyne: the publisher and and the author. When it comes to,
00:26:52
Saikat Pyne: let's say, the marketing part of it, what are the
00:26:55
Saikat Pyne: time commitments that are generally required? And what sort of
00:26:58
Saikat Pyne: marketing do traditional publishing houses generally do for
00:27:01
Anish Chandy: a book so traditional publishing houses have access to traditional media,
00:27:06
Anish Chandy: which is for publishing. Kara does not have access. So
00:27:09
Anish Chandy: when a traditional publisher sends a book to, let's say,
00:27:12
Anish Chandy: H P or Indian Express, he knows exactly who to
00:27:16
Anish Chandy: send it
00:27:17
Anish Chandy: and what that pitches.
00:27:20
Anish Chandy: It is possible and what, and it is interesting. The
00:27:24
Anish Chandy: sales needle in India is still moved by traditional media
00:27:29
Anish Chandy: rather than online because there's a trust deficit because in
00:27:33
Anish Chandy: online you can make whatever claim you want.
00:27:36
Anish Chandy: I Yeah, switch off this camera and I it up,
00:27:40
Anish Chandy: but you need a validation system out there. That's where
00:27:44
Anish Chandy: it starts, but the A, especially in business books. The
00:27:47
Anish Chandy: author is super key
00:27:49
Anish Chandy: because the literary value of the book is going to
00:27:52
Anish Chandy: be limited because he's not a writer. But he's offering
00:27:55
Anish Chandy: me something new, whether it's a practical piece of advice
00:27:58
Anish Chandy: or life philosophy. So that guy has to have the
00:28:00
Anish Chandy: ability to activate the entire article
00:28:03
Anish Chandy: and then go from place to place, giving G and
00:28:06
Anish Chandy: almost be like a Pied piper of that book.
00:28:09
Anish Chandy: The publisher will support those efforts by pitching to traditional
00:28:11
Anish Chandy: media by doing digital campaigns and all of that and potentially,
00:28:15
Anish Chandy: you can do a book launch and invite tonnes of
00:28:17
Anish Chandy: people invite celebrities, get the book endorsed by tonnes of
00:28:19
Anish Chandy: famous people. All of that you can do. But that guy,
00:28:23
Anish Chandy: the founder, has to be super in,
00:28:26
Anish Chandy: and and it's It's almost like a full time vocation
00:28:29
Anish Chandy: for 2 to 3 months. So it's not like he
00:28:33
Anish Chandy: will sit at home. And the publisher will be like, Sir,
00:28:36
Anish Chandy: do you have for 20 minutes today to give an interview?
00:28:39
Anish Chandy: That's not gonna happen
00:28:41
Anish Chandy: unless you are got, like, a titan of industry and
00:28:45
Anish Chandy: old school work. But if you're a founder, new startup founder,
00:28:49
Anish Chandy: you have to be out there.
00:28:52
Saikat Pyne: Got it? Could you break down the timelines? Let's start
00:28:55
Saikat Pyne: from when the manuscript is up.
00:28:57
Saikat Pyne: You submit the manuscript with the publisher or whoever is
00:29:00
Saikat Pyne: the at the until, let's say, the last day of
00:29:04
Saikat Pyne: a promotion for the book. Could you break down the timeline?
00:29:07
Saikat Pyne: So
00:29:07
Anish Chandy: again? Now we are only sticking to business book, right
00:29:10
Anish Chandy: in terms of time, because so for business books, it
00:29:12
Anish Chandy: could It could be relatively quicker as long as you're
00:29:15
Anish Chandy: submitting a clean manuscript.
00:29:17
Anish Chandy: If you submit a clean manuscript. A traditional publisher could
00:29:20
Anish Chandy: be in a position to publish that book anywhere between
00:29:23
Anish Chandy: 4 to 8 months.
00:29:25
Anish Chandy: Now 4 to 8 months. It's not like the traditional
00:29:28
Anish Chandy: publisher is actually actively working on the book for 4
00:29:30
Anish Chandy: to 8 months, But there is a publishing schedule in
00:29:32
Anish Chandy: place where books have to be pre pitched to this
00:29:35
Anish Chandy: to the distribution network. That has to happen six months
00:29:38
Anish Chandy: in advance.
00:29:39
Anish Chandy: Unless you say that my company has its 10th year anniversary,
00:29:43
Anish Chandy: and if it comes out on so and so date,
00:29:45
Anish Chandy: it will give you a sales to let us crash
00:29:48
Anish Chandy: this project then, sure, but otherwise 4 to 8 months
00:29:51
Anish Chandy: is relatively OK. They will incorporate the tend to commit
00:29:56
Anish Chandy: 12 to 18 months. But you can do it in
00:29:59
Anish Chandy: 4 to 8 months, provided you have a team,
00:30:03
Saikat Pyne: Got it, got it. And how much of this would
00:30:06
Saikat Pyne: be just taken up by internal processes at the publisher end?
00:30:10
Saikat Pyne: And how much of this would be? Let's say, promotions
00:30:13
Saikat Pyne: and like 44 to 8 months
00:30:14
Anish Chandy: for the book to hit the market. Promotion will start
00:30:16
Anish Chandy: after that, typically closer to the time the book is
00:30:19
Anish Chandy: hitting the market. That is when promotions start, unless you're
00:30:22
Anish Chandy: a super famous guy and you can build a long
00:30:24
Anish Chandy: promotional period
00:30:26
Anish Chandy: like a Salman Khan movie where he says, Next year
00:30:29
Anish Chandy: is I have a movie coming out and this is
00:30:30
Anish Chandy: the name of the movie. But most people don't have
00:30:32
Anish Chandy: that level of clout, so you are typically going to
00:30:36
Anish Chandy: start promoting the book a few weeks before the book
00:30:38
Anish Chandy: is out and you promote it in the first three months.
00:30:41
Anish Chandy: You actively promote it in the first three months after
00:30:43
Anish Chandy: the book is out. After that, if the book takes off,
00:30:45
Anish Chandy: then automatically you keep getting invited to various and forums
00:30:49
Anish Chandy: and business talks and colleges and lectures, and that that
00:30:53
Anish Chandy: process can pretty much go on forever if you want.
00:30:56
Anish Chandy: Because once the book is in a bookstore or on Amazon,
00:31:00
Anish Chandy: the book is there forever. It might. It might exit
00:31:02
Anish Chandy: the bookstore if it's not selling, but it's going to
00:31:04
Anish Chandy: be on Amazon forever.
00:31:06
Saikat Pyne: Could you break down lit fests for business book authors?
00:31:11
Anish Chandy: There's a hierarchy of lit fest as well, where there
00:31:13
Anish Chandy: are some very big lit fest number one being the
00:31:16
Anish Chandy: OK and Then there are tonnes and tonnes of smaller litres. Now,
00:31:19
Anish Chandy: typically these smaller lit. They are hungry for authors because
00:31:23
Anish Chandy: there's a business model behind this lit where the government
00:31:26
Anish Chandy: might give you a little bit of a subsidy. You're
00:31:28
Anish Chandy: a local person here to India that local M PM L. A.
00:31:33
Anish Chandy: Will want some action happening there.
00:31:36
Anish Chandy: Local companies will sponsor it, so there's a business model
00:31:38
Anish Chandy: to that those they constantly want authors,
00:31:42
Anish Chandy: and they'll invite whoever you know. As long as you
00:31:45
Anish Chandy: are published by a decent publisher, they'll invite you. And
00:31:49
Anish Chandy: if you are a fairly influential person in the self
00:31:51
Anish Chandy: publishing universe, also, they will invite you. No problem.
00:31:54
Anish Chandy: The challenge is to get into the top tier of
00:31:56
Anish Chandy: Lit fest, which are typically two or three lifa.
00:32:00
Anish Chandy: So there your book. Either you need to know somebody important.
00:32:04
Anish Chandy: You're like a bit of a Nepo kid, or your
00:32:07
Anish Chandy: book has to have done really well and your publisher
00:32:11
Anish Chandy: has pushed you. Your publisher has pitched you to these
00:32:14
Anish Chandy: lit fest and made a case for. And even in
00:32:17
Anish Chandy: these big lit fest, there typically will be some panel,
00:32:21
Anish Chandy: which deals with business book startups
00:32:23
Anish Chandy: because that is such an essential part of conversations that
00:32:26
Anish Chandy: are happening in India. It's not like the old days
00:32:29
Anish Chandy: where people used to look down on business books or
00:32:31
Anish Chandy: self help books and only do like books of poetry
00:32:35
Anish Chandy: and books of great literary. So that change has begun
00:32:39
Anish Chandy: to happen in
00:32:41
Saikat Pyne: Got It in terms of the promotions. Is it going
00:32:44
Saikat Pyne: to be totally taken care of by the publisher? Because,
00:32:46
Saikat Pyne: let's say the book comes out. There are so many
00:32:49
Saikat Pyne: podcasts that review books. The publicists from the publisher are
00:32:52
Saikat Pyne: going to pitch me or the literary agent also has
00:32:55
Saikat Pyne: a dog in the race. The publisher
00:32:57
Anish Chandy: is going to be the primary pitcher. The literary agent
00:32:59
Anish Chandy: could nudge the publisher say, Hey, pitch this person pitch
00:33:01
Anish Chandy: that person or the literary agent would say that I
00:33:04
Anish Chandy: know these people don't worry about it. I'll take care
00:33:07
Anish Chandy: of this side of the pitch
00:33:08
Anish Chandy: but the A. But it's not like the author is
00:33:11
Anish Chandy: a passive participant here. The author has to also be
00:33:14
Anish Chandy: involved in the pitching group,
00:33:17
Anish Chandy: or the author could say, or the author could say,
00:33:19
Anish Chandy: I know these people in these companies. Please pitch me
00:33:23
Anish Chandy: to them.
00:33:26
Saikat Pyne: Got it. So in some ways the it's a symbolic
00:33:28
Saikat Pyne: relationship where the publisher is also chipping off some of
00:33:31
Saikat Pyne: the description that you have and the interest that you have.
00:33:35
Saikat Pyne: And that sort of brings me on to the phenomena,
00:33:40
Saikat Pyne: which is this huge barrage of cotton creators who are
00:33:44
Saikat Pyne: publishing business books. Merit not merit that for you to judge.
00:33:48
Saikat Pyne: But I'm saying, Could you break it down for us?
00:33:51
Saikat Pyne: What do you think happened with AU's book? Smashing all records?
00:33:57
Anish Chandy: I think it was. It is similar to what happened
00:33:59
Anish Chandy: with many years ago,
00:34:01
Anish Chandy: where came in with a fresh voice really took off.
00:34:05
Anish Chandy: He had a really sharp marketing plan distribution plan. He
00:34:08
Anish Chandy: executed well on it. The books took off like nothing. Actually,
00:34:12
Anish Chandy: nothing has taken off like that subsequent to that or
00:34:15
Anish Chandy: before that. So really milestone there. A lot of people
00:34:19
Anish Chandy: criticised that kind of writing, saying, This is not real writing.
00:34:22
Anish Chandy: What is this? This has no literary merit, all of that.
00:34:25
Anish Chandy: But sales numbers are sales at the end of the
00:34:28
Anish Chandy: day
00:34:29
Anish Chandy: now, similarly, kuru. I think he's what he's probably done.
00:34:32
Anish Chandy: I think his first book has probably sold close to
00:34:35
Anish Chandy: three LAC copies now, which is just incredible number. But
00:34:39
Anish Chandy: he's been building his brand as a content creator slash
00:34:44
Anish Chandy: mentor slash human guide for a long time before the
00:34:48
Anish Chandy: book was written.
00:34:50
Anish Chandy: Now, whether he actively thought about that, this is what
00:34:54
Anish Chandy: his journey is going to be. I don't know him personally,
00:34:56
Anish Chandy: so I can't comment.
00:34:58
Anish Chandy: But he was building an audience that was very clear.
00:35:01
Anish Chandy: He was building an audience. I know he was building
00:35:02
Anish Chandy: an audience on LinkedIn for sure, where he was doing
00:35:05
Anish Chandy: these brown bag lunches with employees and he was boasting
00:35:08
Anish Chandy: letters and that was sent to employee parents. It was new,
00:35:12
Anish Chandy: and it gave us sense of accessibility to him, irrespective
00:35:16
Anish Chandy: of how the company that he ran actually did.
00:35:19
Anish Chandy: That actually doesn't matter. So he did a very good
00:35:22
Anish Chandy: job of that. It felt authentic.
00:35:25
Anish Chandy: Like I said, I don't know him. So I don't
00:35:26
Anish Chandy: know if there was like, some master plan or he
00:35:29
Anish Chandy: was playing it by I don't know that
00:35:31
Anish Chandy: and that. But then very importantly, he wrote the right book.
00:35:37
Anish Chandy: So if that book was some serious gang giving or
00:35:41
Anish Chandy: if it was a big heavy book. If it was
00:35:43
Anish Chandy: a big hardback, if it was an ego project, it
00:35:46
Anish Chandy: would not have worked. His book tied in beautifully with
00:35:51
Anish Chandy: the messaging that he was doing pre and the person
00:35:55
Anish Chandy: who runs juggernaut Chiki Sakar. I actually started my publishing
00:35:58
Anish Chandy: career under her I lord
00:36:00
Anish Chandy: a lot from her. She's amazing. She's amazing at
00:36:05
Anish Chandy: finding the right tone and the right position or this
00:36:08
Anish Chandy: kind of book.
00:36:10
Anish Chandy: So it's multiple things that played into it. And at
00:36:13
Anish Chandy: the same time, India was also changing where shark tank happened. Obviously,
00:36:17
Anish Chandy: Ankur Wau did not plan for Shark Tank to happen, right?
00:36:19
Anish Chandy: So Shark Tank brought this kind of genre or book
00:36:23
Anish Chandy: into the forefront or into the living room. Where that
00:36:26
Anish Chandy: housewife is now talking about is the So those conversations
00:36:33
Anish Chandy: became super mainstream, which offered a tail wind to that
00:36:38
Anish Chandy: book
00:36:39
Anish Chandy: subsequent to that, or you had other content creators also
00:36:43
Anish Chandy: writing books. But now then you have a bit of
00:36:46
Anish Chandy: a me to effect
00:36:48
Anish Chandy: where it looks. Some of them will look like old beings,
00:36:51
Anish Chandy: you know that. Oh, I've I've been through this process once,
00:36:55
Anish Chandy: so it's gonna be harder for them to replicate the
00:36:58
Anish Chandy: kind of numbers that he's had.
00:37:01
Anish Chandy: His own second book has not sold as much as
00:37:03
Anish Chandy: his first book. Unless he does something totally different or
00:37:07
Anish Chandy: I don't know what he'll do next.
00:37:10
Saikat Pyne: Got it? But do you see this as an increasing
00:37:13
Saikat Pyne: trend with content creators who have settled distribution via podcast
00:37:17
Saikat Pyne: or via YouTube landing increasingly more juicier brand deals? Or
00:37:22
Saikat Pyne: do you think this is a bit of a high
00:37:24
Saikat Pyne: train that's going to fade out? Very hard to
00:37:26
Anish Chandy: say.
00:37:27
Anish Chandy: I don't think it's a high plane that will fade,
00:37:30
Anish Chandy: but all industries, eventually some rules will emerge
00:37:34
Anish Chandy: that this kind of person can push this kind of
00:37:37
Anish Chandy: product and this kind of services. But he can't push
00:37:40
Anish Chandy: that today. What's happening is right. I'm selling this. I'm
00:37:43
Anish Chandy: selling that. I'm selling this. I'm selling that because you're
00:37:45
Anish Chandy: the human platform.
00:37:46
Anish Chandy: Now, I even as regulation comes in,
00:37:49
Anish Chandy: especially in Fintech, a lot of regulation is coming right.
00:37:51
Anish Chandy: You can't just push stock. There was someone in our shop.
00:37:54
Anish Chandy: She actually said, I'm going to teach you how to
00:37:56
Anish Chandy: pick a stock in one minute, right? That probably broke
00:38:01
Anish Chandy: the camel's back. Yeah, so that bubble there will be
00:38:05
Anish Chandy: a deflation of the bubble is what I feel, and
00:38:07
Anish Chandy: it will become like lots of smaller bubbles all over
00:38:10
Anish Chandy: the place. But are influencers here to say Yes, we will.
00:38:14
Anish Chandy: A lot of them get book deals. Will all of
00:38:16
Anish Chandy: them will all of them need book deals? I don't
00:38:18
Anish Chandy: think so.
00:38:18
Anish Chandy: Will some of them get to deal for sure? Some
00:38:21
Anish Chandy: of them should actually go and self publish. If they
00:38:23
Anish Chandy: are targeting a very narrow segment,
00:38:27
Anish Chandy: you should just follow me. It's fine.
00:38:30
Saikat Pyne: Got it? Is there really a right time to publish
00:38:34
Saikat Pyne: a business
00:38:34
Anish Chandy: book? I think the right time is after one stage
00:38:37
Anish Chandy: of a journey is over.
00:38:39
Anish Chandy: So whether you've sold a company or you hit a
00:38:42
Anish Chandy: certain revenue number or a certain profitability number or
00:38:47
Anish Chandy: something has happened, you've completed something. You are not in
00:38:50
Anish Chandy: prison in your steps
00:38:52
Anish Chandy: that you'll always be in present, continuous, and you'll always
00:38:55
Anish Chandy: be working on something. You always have a dream or whatever, right.
00:38:57
Anish Chandy: But when you've completed one cycle and you've seen boom
00:39:01
Anish Chandy: bust in your personal sphere in that cycle that you
00:39:06
Anish Chandy: all that your company almost died But then you survived
00:39:08
Anish Chandy: and then you this thing, and then you finally either
00:39:10
Anish Chandy: sold it or whatever that is the right thing to do.
00:39:16
Saikat Pyne: Got, got it? And is there a wrong time? Particularly,
00:39:20
Saikat Pyne: Let's say, not a time when I should just absolutely
00:39:23
Saikat Pyne: avoid writing about anything at all. Wrong
00:39:24
Anish Chandy: time is typically if you're in deep conflict, either with
00:39:29
Anish Chandy: co-founders or your company is in trouble with some regulator.
00:39:35
Anish Chandy: Or there is something that is going terribly wrong in
00:39:38
Anish Chandy: terms of market perception of the company and you firefighting
00:39:41
Anish Chandy: some crazy. But
00:39:43
Anish Chandy: because then your attention, the thing that people don't understand
00:39:47
Anish Chandy: about books, is once you've written the book, it's there forever.
00:39:51
Anish Chandy: Your fire fight might end after two months, but if
00:39:54
Anish Chandy: that has influenced you to write something in the book,
00:39:57
Anish Chandy: which you might regret later,
00:39:59
Anish Chandy: it's not going here. You can update the book. You
00:40:01
Anish Chandy: can delete it from future versions, but once it's printed
00:40:05
Anish Chandy: a little bit there in someone's house, someone's library appears
00:40:08
Anish Chandy: from
00:40:09
Anish Chandy: It's not the it's not the alternator. You can scrub
00:40:12
Anish Chandy: it if it's lying in someone's house, you can't scrub it,
00:40:17
Saikat Pyne: got it, and I forgot to ask you this one question,
00:40:19
Saikat Pyne: I think it will be defining, given that we have
00:40:21
Saikat Pyne: been speaking about business, folks.
00:40:25
Anish Chandy: Totally depends on who you are at and what your
00:40:30
Anish Chandy: story is and what your reach is.
00:40:33
Anish Chandy: So
00:40:35
Anish Chandy: because typically you will not make more from the book
00:40:40
Anish Chandy: than what you're making from your business. Assuming you have
00:40:43
Anish Chandy: a assuming you have a successful business, right? In fact,
00:40:47
Anish Chandy: most startup founders
00:40:49
Anish Chandy: they don't bring up money
00:40:52
Anish Chandy: at all. In fact, the smart ones don't bring up
00:40:53
Anish Chandy: on the ones who are not that smart or who
00:40:56
Anish Chandy: are constantly not that smart, but or just by reflects action.
00:41:00
Anish Chandy: They are like, let me negotiate at every step of
00:41:02
Anish Chandy: this process.
00:41:03
Anish Chandy: What happens is, then their collaborators
00:41:06
Saikat Pyne: draw.
00:41:09
Saikat Pyne: Got it. So basically, you don't write a book to
00:41:11
Saikat Pyne: make money. If you're a startup founder,
00:41:12
Anish Chandy: you don't
00:41:14
Anish Chandy: If you're in some other genre, sure you can, because
00:41:17
Anish Chandy: I'm just saying your time value of money is much
00:41:19
Anish Chandy: higher here.
00:41:20
Anish Chandy: If you are a full-time author and you're a professional writer,
00:41:23
Anish Chandy: your time value, you're not able to make as much
00:41:25
Anish Chandy: money as a start account,
00:41:27
Anish Chandy: right? As a startup founder might say this year. I'm
00:41:30
Anish Chandy: gonna make 30 s. A book is not gonna like
00:41:33
Anish Chandy: the 44 months you spend on the book. You're not
00:41:35
Anish Chandy: gonna to make seven. No, No chance. So you
00:41:38
Saikat Pyne: got it. And on that insightful note, guys, it's a wrap.
00:41:41
Saikat Pyne: Thank you so much for being on the show. I
00:41:43
Saikat Pyne: really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you so much, guys.
00:41:46
Saikat Pyne: Please do tune in next week for the next episode
00:41:48
Saikat Pyne: of the U Incorporated.
00:41:55
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