← The Creative Penn Podcast For Writers
The Creative Penn Podcast For Writers
Aristotle for Novelists, And A Strategy For Selling More Books With Douglas Vigliotti
00:57:05
Why is ‘story' more important than ‘writing'? How can you write characters that engage the reader? And how can you sell more books by connecting authentically? Douglas Vigliotti shares his tips. In the intro, Bookshop.
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- [00:01]
Joanna Penn
Welcome to the Creative Penn Podcast. I'm Joanna Penn, thriller author and creative entrepreneur, bringing you interviews, inspiration and information on writing, craft and creative business. You can find the episode show notes, your free author blueprint and lots more@thecreativepenn.com and that's Pen with a double n. And here's the show hello creatives, I'm Joanna Penn and this is episode number 793 of the podcast and it is Sunday 2nd February 2025. As I record this in today's show I'm talking to Douglas Figliotti about Aristotle for novelists and a strategy for selling more books. We discuss creating characters that resonate with readers and the four important elements to keep in mind why story is more important than writing, the intersection of commerce and art, tips for pitching for podcast interviews, relevant whether you write fiction or non fiction and more. So that's coming up in the Interview section in Writing and publishing things, bookshop.org will start selling ebooks where customers can support local bookstores with a percentage of purchase and if you publish through Ingram or Drafted digital you may get access there. More details to come on that, but good to see a new wide option for ebooks. The Self Publishing with Ally podcast has an episode on LinkedIn for book promotion which I wanted to mention as it is so good for non fiction authors and often gets ignored in favour of people talking about TikTok or Instagram. So the episode has lots of tips for your LinkedIn profile and how to shape it as well as why building your network there is important. You can list your publications, although I have tried doing that and the interface is not particularly suited to books. But you can blog there, you can share articles on topics to help you rank for keywords and I'll just add from a personal perspective that my husband Jonathan and I we often talk about things we find on social and I will share things I find on X which is my primary network and he will be scrolling LinkedIn. He has a corporate job and that's where he discovers stuff and often finds book recommendations from LinkedIn. So it's certainly don't ignore it if you write non fiction. Also it is a professional network so there is none of the hate and negativity and trolling that you might find on other social platforms. So that makes a nice change. You can also do a newsletter there and much more. So that's the Self Publishing with Ally Podcast link in the show notes. Also on other useful podcast interviews, I wanted to recommend an interview with Daniel Priestley on The Diary of a CEO Podcast with Stephen Stephen Bartlett and this is more about marketing. The episode is called the Money Making Expert. But I think around branding and marketing, it's really useful and it ties into one of Daniel's books that I've recommended before and I'll recommend again, which is 24 assets. It's a great book, really a different way to think about your business. So that's 24 assets. But in the interview, the Money Making Expert, he says on Marketing understand the 7114 rule to be remembered, Aim for your audience to spend seven hours engaging with your content across 11 interactions on four platforms. 7114 so have a think about that for your author business. Is there enough content for that amount of engagement? And I guess many of us have more than seven hours of book book kind of content. But he also says across 11 interactions on four platforms. He also talks about parasocial relationships where it feels like you know someone because you consume their content but they might not know you. For example, you might have been listening to this show for a long time and in which case you know me pretty well, but I have never met you and I potentially might not know you. Maybe we've met, maybe we haven't, but it's definitely one of those type of relationships. And this got me thinking about how I keep selling books by my Joanna Penn brand and every day in all formats with practically no ads from my own store, Creative Pen books and elsewhere. It's because every week we connect here and I keep putting out content and it means that people certainly can spend seven hours plus engaging with me in some way and I really don't do this for my fiction and I've been thinking about this for a while but this episode tipped me over and I will be bringing back my books and travel podcast in the next month or so. I've been thinking about it a lot and the downloads are actually growing as the episodes are evergreen and even though it's been two years since the last episode, booksandtravel page, the website has gets traffic every day so I wanted to give you a heads up as I want to be strategic about my interviews. If you've written travel books or memoir related to travel or use a specific place in your fiction, then consider pitching me for the show. I will prioritize places that feature in my books so we can have more of a conversation. There is a book locations page now on Book and booksandtravel page. I'll put a link in the show notes or just go on over there and I will be doing a Pitch Me page with more directions. But yes, that will be coming sometime, definitely March. It will probably launch in March. And going back to Daniel's interview, he also talks about the importance of publishing your ideas in many forms, embracing the power of repetition and repeating your core ideas in different formats rather than being worried that you've said this before. And the idea that marketing is no longer a funnel, it's a random journey, a playground where people explore and evaluate, create various pieces of content for people to interact with rather than forcing them down a set sales path. I love that. I love that marketing can be a random journey. And that's pretty much how I've always done my marketing and my content is pretty messy. But it's good to hear that from Daniel. So that is Diary of a CEO podcast with Daniel Priestley and for Business things, his book 24 assets so in AI things this week, thankfully the US Copyright Office has issued their report on copyright and artificial intelligence. It is extensive, so there are links in the show notes, but essentially the previous guidance remains, and that guidance has been out for like 18 months. A human may select or arrange AI generated material in a sufficiently creative way that the resulting work as a whole constitutes an original work of authorship. So just one prompt and then publishing the book that comes out is not copyrightable. But if you have a sort of back and forth process, if you add, if you change, if you select and edit elements and then put it all together and then edit it again and all of that, the work is copyrightable. So remember, this is the US in the UK, it's been clear since 1988. Section 9 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents act says in the case of a literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work which is computer generated, the author shall be taken to be the person by whom the arrangements necessary for the creation of the work are undertaken. So very clear here in the uk, but hopefully that makes it clearer in the us. And please check your jurisdiction since copyright is not the same across all territories. And as Alicia said last week, it's likely going to change over time as well. I also wanted to recommend this book. I'm listening to it, but you could read it. What could possibly go right with our AI future by Reid Hoffman and Greg Beato So I prefer to stay on the side of techno optimism. I know bad things can happen, but I'd rather live with the happy mind of someone who stays positive around technology. And so far this book is offsetting the doomers, so I thought I'd recommend it. That is super agency. In personal news, how to Write Non Fiction is now out everywhere on all platforms in all formats, and the hardback and the bundles and the workbooks are still@creativepenbooks.com along with everything else. Reviews would be much appreciated on your favourite store or Goodreads, which always helps a lot. So yes, how to Write Nonfiction is out everywhere. Also, I was on the Indie Author podcast with Mattie Dalrymple talking about second editions, when it's worth doing them and how to do them, why personal elements are so important in any kind of nonfiction, and how writing memoir changed my writing process, audiobooks and narrating your own and much more. That is me on the Indie Author podcast and indie spelt Indy on current writing things. I am late recording this because I've been working super, super hard this week. I'm actually really tired. It's been hardcore and people are like, why are you working so hard? You're an indie author, you don't have a contract. And I'm like, well, I have a contract with my editor Kristen, and I promised it to Kristen tomorrow as I record this. And Death Valley, a thriller, is now over there. So I'm really pleased with that. I have been working. I basically just. I've cancelled loads of things out of my diary and this sometimes just needs to happen and which is why I wanted to mention it. When you are your own boss, when you have your own deadlines, you have to put something in there. And back in the day when I had a day job, I would go seriously hardcore. I would work all weekend, I would cancel things in order to work. And I do love my job as a writer, but I also run a business and when I set deadlines for things, I need it to happen. So I worked super, super hard and my brain has officially exploded. But Death Valleys with Kristen and I'm really thrilled about it. I wrote the author's note or finished the author's note yesterday as well. And I will be certainly doing a books and travel episode on deserts, because as I reflected on it, deserts have been played a really interesting part in my life. So yeah, I'll be talking more about that on books and travel in March. But in the meantime, if you want to check out Death Valley, you can go to jfpenn.com death valley and that redirects to the kit Kickstarter pre launch as I record this this week I will be getting back to the adaptation of Day of the Vikings in preparation for the Berlin film market, which is at the end of next week. As this goes out. I'll also be doing all the admin and business stuff and all the catch up stuff I just literally stopped doing for the last couple of weeks. Thank you for all your emails and comments and photos. This week Janet sent a photo from her camper van on a Greek beach watching and listening to the waves crashing on the sh, which was lovely. Jennifer sent a photo of trees and the moon and the clouds. The view from my house early this morning in the mountains of northern Idaho near Coeur de L if you're familiar. That sounds lovely. Sounds very French. I thought the moon and the low slung clouds gave it a folk horror ish vibe and thought of you. Thank you. Nikki sent a photo on X the duck hole near my home on the lunchtime walk and I'm buckling down to edit novel number four. This is the year I transition from hobby to business. And then Nina sent a photo of The Annan Friedhof St. Anne Cemetery in Dresden, which I visited with my Kindle in tow last year in February, as I walked into the ceremonial entrance lodger to the cemetery, I thought of you and that is just wonderful. I do love some cemeteries and where you are listening and then finally a says I've been following your podcast for quite some time before the pandemic and I have to say the latest with Alicia Wright is one of the best I've heard. I too have embraced Generative AI and I often feel I have to hide any mention of using it. But your the talk really resonated about prompts. It takes a lot of work to build prompts to get what's envisioned, and even then requires intervention. But it's so worth it when you've influenced it and shaped it into something decent. Fantastic. Glad you enjoyed that, eh? So please leave a comment on the podcast Show Notes at the creative pen.com or on the YouTube channel, or message me on X at the Creative Pen. Or email me send me pictures of where you're listening joanna@thecreativepenn.com I love to hear from you. It makes this more of a conversation. So today's show is sponsored by Kobo Writing Life, Kobo's free, fast and easy self publishing platform favoured by independent authors all over the world. KWL was built by authors for authors, and their mission is to help you reach digital readers wherever they are, however they want to read. Looking for a way to get your books into the hands of more readers? Kobo plus is the answer. As a subscription service, koboplus allows readers to discover and enjoy unlimited books for a monthly fee and as an author, there's no exclusivity or time limitation. It's a win win. Just to be clear, there is no exclusivity. By enrolling your titles in Kobo plus through Kobo Writing Life, you can increase your earnings by reaching a whole new audience of avid readers who are eager to discover their next favourite book. Sign up today at thecreativepenn.com kwl and see your readership grow. And remember, if you use the Promotions tab on kwl, you can submit your Kobo plus books for promotions as well. It is not exclusive. So that's thecreativepen.com kWL so this type of corporate sponsorship pays for the hosting, transcription and editing, but my time in creating the show is sponsored by my community@patreon.com TheCreativePen thanks to the 18 new patrons who've joined this week. It's been a bumper week and thanks to everyone who's been supporting for months and years. If you join the community you get access to all my backlist videos and audio covering topics on writing, craft and author business, as well as tutorials and demos on AI tools and my patron only Q and A solo episodes and live office hours and the recordings. So I did my last office hours on Friday and talked about Deep Seek and the reasoning models 01 and which got launched. But I did a demo of outlining with 01 for fiction and non fiction and how to Expand Beats with Claude and answered lots of questions. The recording is up now. If you are a patron or if you join, you will get access. The Patreon is a monthly subscription, the equivalent of buying me a black coffee a month or a couple of coffees if you're feeling generous. You get access to everything. So if you get value from the show and you want more, come on over and join us at patreon.com P-A-T-R-E-O-N.com Right, let's get into the interview.
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Douglas Figliotti
Douglas Figliotti is the author of four books, a poet and podcaster. His latest book is Aristotle for 14 timeless principles on the Art of Story. So welcome to the show, Doug.
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Thank you so much for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.
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Oh no, it's great to have you on the show. So first up, just tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing.
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My journey is long and winding, but that's probably similar to most writers. I grew up as a pretty, I would say average or normal American childhood, youngest of five Boys played hockey, played sports, and believe it or not, writing and books and all of that was not even a thought in my mind until I reached probably my 20s, early 20s, mid-20s, and then kind of a light switch turned on. The first book that I ever wrote in, the first writing that I ever did publicly, was actually a derivative of my business career. And it took me, following my interest and growing as a writer and as an artist to start. Get to start exploring that more creative side of writing. And then that's how I ended up writing novels and poetry and all that good stuff.
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What was that business?
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My professional career. I started, let's see, 19, 20 years ago, and it was sales. Selling. I've sold everything from financial services to medical devices to payroll and tax filing to myself. And then I wrote a business book called the Salesperson Paradox. And it was in conjunction with my sales consulting company at the time. And that was how I started into my creative career. So it was totally, totally orthogonal to where I ended up.
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Well, or not. And we're going to come back to that because I love this. I love that you have a salesperson background. And just so you know, I'm actually the eldest of five children, obviously not all boys, but so being in five siblings I completely get. Which is very cool. But let's get into the book itself in case people don't know who was Aristotle and why write a book based on his work?
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So I think in modern day, we throw around the name Aristotle quite a bit because it's referenced a lot in pop culture. And I think it's one of those things where you hear the name and you assume. I don't know what you assume. You assume smart, you assume historic, you assume legendary. People probably don't know who he is. Right. And that is, that's always an interesting thing. But the fact that he's lasted over 2,300 years is something of a testament to itself. And so he was around. He was a philosopher and a polymath, really. I think his Life, it was 384B.C. To 322B. And he studied under Plato, and Plato studied under Socrates before him. And when I said he was a polymath, that's really essential to understanding who he is because he wrote over 200 works that spanned across a plethora of topics from politics to economics to poetics and all of these different subject matters that ended up becoming, in some cases, the outright foundational material for many of these disciplines in universities across the world, really. And so the fact that his ideas and his philosophies and concepts have stood the test of time is sort of a testament in itself, as I alluded to. And one of the interesting things about those 200 works is that many of them call it 80%. So I think we've only recovered 30 something of his works. I mean, the number is kind of debated. I don't know how they quantify this, because if they're lost, how do we know how many we. How many we recovered? But they've only recovered 30 something of his works. And one of those is poetics. And so that is actually the nature of tragedies, but more broadly, storytelling. And one of the major reasons why I ended up writing this book, obviously.
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You didn't say there that we're talking about ancient Greece, so we're in Europe. I often think Americans forget that it all started over here in Europe.
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Sorry, I tend to skip over things sometimes. But you are correct, ancient Greece.
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Joanna Penn
Yeah. And it's funny because we seem to.
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Douglas Figliotti
Be at this period in history, in literature, when people just refer a lot to, I mean, obviously the Stoic movement and a lot about Marcus Aurelius, obviously Roman emperor, but the empire that came after the Greeks. But a lot of this is resurfacing.
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Joanna Penn
Isn'T it, in culture?
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Douglas Figliotti
Do you think there's some kind of zeitgeist where this is all coming back?
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So in a general sense and in. Or in a broad sense, I think it's more comfortable for people to reference people who are already gone, so to speak. I don't think it's as easy for people to credit living legends or living thinkers as it is to credit people who are gone. So I think there's something to that. I also think that there's something to the idea of grabbing onto something that gives people a framework to think that they know, even though they might not really know. Like foundational philosophical thinkers, they were at some of these topics first. And so they have some really strong ideas around a plethora of things. And so I think when we bring them to life, to this day and age, we realize, wow, there's really. And I'm going to use a biblical quote here, not to be religious, but it's nothing new under the sun. And we are living the same, these same issues over and over and over again. And I just think that there's a lot of resonance for that. And I do think there's also, look, we. I think there's a certain. There's a certain thing to nostalgia that we have as a society. Right. It's a saleable commodity. And I do. And I didn't write this book because I was trying to fill a void with Aristotle and his ideas and storytelling. To me, when I started to research story as a concept, everything started funneling back to Aristotle. And then I realized, wow, like this is. Everything is there. You know, it was how I learned about story. And so the, the fact that Aristotle was his ideas and this book came to fruition was more of a function of me realizing that all the theorists in modern day, whether they are, or practitioners for that matter, so people in. In the dramatic world, like Aaron Sorkin or David Mame of these people, they'll often reference Aristotle. Or if you thought, if you read theorists like Robert McKee, they'll often reference Aristotle. So for me, it was only natural to then double down on Aristotle and read Poetics and read multiple translations of Poetics and really understand the text. And then what I quickly realized was how resonant these ideas were in modern storytelling on both the screen, the page, and in our lives. And I think that that's one of the big things that drew Aristotle to storytelling in general was this, of how intrinsically linked it is to living, because we live stories. And so I think that the principles that we'll talk about or some of these ideas that we'll talk about, they are applicable to our life as well as they are applicable on the page and on the screen.
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Yes. And of course, that quote you mentioned from the book of Ecclesiastes. And I quote that in a number of my novels, actually, it's probably my favorite book of the Bible, Ecclesiastes. And I think part of that is what you're talking about is that there are principles in human nature as well as principles in story that don't change, regardless of how many millennia go past. And I was thinking, as you were talking, like, maybe part of the reason we're relatching onto this now, because there's so much change in the world, even with AI and technology and social media and all this just constant stream of stuff that there is. And maybe we're sort of harking back to things that that don't change. And that perhaps helps a little.
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I think when we're talking. I totally agree with you. And I think about when we're talking about stories specifically, there are a couple fundamental elements that are there in almost every story that we tell, at least in Western society. In Western society, the stories we tell, almost all of them, even in sprawling epics or multiple storyline plots. And all this Stuff, they have three characteristics that are always there. And that's a protagonist who wants something, and there's obstacles standing in their way. And that protagonist and those obstacles come both externally and internally. And I think if we zoom out, right, and we look at our lives, Joanna Penn's life, Douglas Vigliotti's life. I'm a protagonist who wants something, and I have obstacles standing in my way that are both internal and external. Do I overcome those obstacles? Well, then we end up with an Aristotelian comedy. I end up better off at the end, even if it's only temporarily. Do I succumb to those obstacles, both internal and external? Well, then we have an Aristotelian tragedy because I end up worse off. And so these ideas are baked right into our lives. And you can see story everywhere, like the framework for story everywhere as you walk through life, if you understand these core components of what makes up a story. Again, like I said, at least in a Western sense.
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Yes. Well, since we're on characters, then a.
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Joanna Penn
Quote from the book.
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Douglas Figliotti
You say novels should contain true characters. And now I find this word true extremely difficult because fiction, you know, it's fiction, in fact, memoir, I find true. True in general is very hard. So what do you mean by this? And how can we create characters that resonate?
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So I think that you hit the nail on the head. True has multiple meanings to multiple people. I'm speaking specifically in the sense of what would Aristotle would say would be true. And to Aristotle, there's four elements to characters in general, and they are goodness. So it's your characters are good if their choices are good. Appropriateness would be, are they acting appropriately? Not right or wrong, but. But based on who they are, are they acting truly to who they are? So are they acting appropriately? So that directly links to this trueness of character In. Are you writing characters that are true to who that character is, not true to real life, true to who that character is. And there's a big difference there. It's not about fact and fiction. And the third element is relatability. That has more to do with are you making the character relatable? So are you making. Giving them characteristics that embody human characteristics? And the best way to do that is through imperfection. Despite what our world wants to try to convince us every day, we are relatable because of our imperfections, not because of our perfections. Right. And so there's this big chasm between what we see every day and what we should be depicting in our stories or on the page. And what we actually relate to. Like if we sat down and had a conversation, we're probably going to relate based on some of our struggles more than we're going to relate on some more of our successes. And then the fourth piece is consistency. And that's if you. Even if you were to write a character, a true character who is inconsistent, Aristotle would say, by nature they should be consistently inconsistent. And we see this all the time in storytelling with unreliable narrators. Right? They are consistently inconsistent. But what ends up happening with those unreliable narrators is this ties into something else that Aristotle talks about or that you can observe in stories. But eventually what they say doesn't line up with what they do. And it's always what a character does. It's always what we show. It's always about action that is the more important piece. And so we can get into trouble in life or in stories if we're only listening to what characters are saying. Because I could say one thing and do another, and doing is more important than saying. But to answer that question and peel back to it, those are the four characteristics that would make up a true character in an Aristotelian sense.
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Yeah, I think it's an interesting way forward. I like the relatability because people often, if you're writing, let's say, sci fi and you have aliens there, or you're writing something literary and writing from the perspective of like a plant or an.
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Joanna Penn
Animal or something, you still have to.
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Douglas Figliotti
Have relatability to the human who is reading the book. So that kind of comes across, whatever type of character you're writing, essentially 100%.
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And Aristotle is very specific in poetic, saying that he believes that the two reasons why storytelling began for us humans, one is because of imitation. And so we learn how to imitate, to live. So as young kids, we imitate the world around us, the people around us, our parents, and that's how we learn how to actually live. And so storytelling is a derivative of that. And so we should be imitating what is happening in the real world, not writing realist fiction or realist work, but we should be embracing all of human nature has to offer. Because that is why, according to Aristotle, storytelling actually began. And it's what's relatable to humans. So we should be reflecting all of those qualities in our work. And for anyone who's interested, the second reason is rhythm. And so he thinks we have a natural. And I tend to agree with him, because even if you are writing, all writers know voice, they know pacing, they know tone, rhythm to your Prose, just like rhythm in music is really, really important. Right. And I think this is one of the big reasons why as a writer, you don't even need to know grammar to be able to write. Because if you have rhythm, it's going to work on the page. You have editors for that stuff. And I think musicians are great examples of this because so many of them don't learn how to, you know, top level musicians, I mean, people who are iconic. In the book, I used to talk about some examples of Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen and American musicians who. They didn't know how to read music. And things turned out pretty well for them. Not to say that that's the benchmark, but it's countless. The amount of I don't know how to read music, I learned how to play the guitar. All of that's based off of rhythm. And writing and voice on the page is no different. Really. Aristotle would call that your meter, your poetic meter.
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Yeah, that's interesting. And actually you do say this in the introduction. Writing is not story. And I guess there you mentioned you don't have to know grammar to write story. And this is attention. And of course, you're a poet as well. And people often, well, writers often prioritize the intricacies of language before the story. And I feel like, especially in the sort of age of AI, when word generation, however you generate words, whether you're writing them by hand or you're generating them with AI, that doesn't matter so much. So how can we prioritize story over the intricacies of writing? I guess. Yes.
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Yeah. So for me, this is a really important distinction because I think oftentimes writers, at least through conversations that I have with, with them, we confuse writing and story. And to me, there's a very, very clear distinction in that. Story is governed by what I would call principles, whereas writing is governed by style. And I really have no interest in. In telling someone how I think they should write their story. Right. Like, I don't even believe that you can even the best prose, and I'm using air quotes because best is so subjective. It takes me. It could take me 15, 20 pages to get used to that writing. I could never get used to that writing. Writing is that different from person to person, writer to writer. And I have this funny saying where it's. Story is why they come, writing is why they stay. Writing is the tool that writers utilize to tell their story. Story is the foundational component of what you are trying to achieve. That's why you can watch movies, you can listen to audiobooks, you can engage with all these other forms of media and learn how to tell story. That doesn't mean you're going to learn how to write, because writing is a different thing. And Aristotle does have some ideas on what he thinks around style, of course, and I have my own opinions on that as well. But ultimately, what I'm trying to achieve with Aristotle for novelist, let's say, is more of a foundational education on the principles of what makes up a story. And so there is a difference between the two, at least in my view.
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So I guess one of the other things, we talked a bit about character there, but we should also talk about plot. And you say novels have a complication and a resolution. So what are complications? And how can we create those that fascinate readers and make them want to read on, even though they may or sometimes we feel like maybe they've heard this before or read this before?
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Right. So my favorite Aristotle quote is many poets tie the knot well, but unravel it ill. And what he's talking about there. And when he says poets, he's talking about something much wider in scope than literally poets. And the same could be said, by the way, for poetics in general. What he meant by poetics is something much larger in scope than poetry. So for anybody who's wondering that. But what he's talking about there is the difference between a complication and a resolution. And so we all know that when we come to our stories, we come because we have an idea for the complication of that story. We have a character who is put in a situation or. And we wind that up. But what he's saying is that it takes the truly great writers the ability to unwind that, to untie the, you know, to unravel that knot. And there's so many ways that we could go wrong when we're doing that. Whether it's lack of believability, lack of cohesion, illogical impossibility, irrationality. There's so many different ways that we could falter as we try to resolve the complication that we depicted in the early part of our story. I find it helpful to, when I read books and when I watch movies, a bit of a story junkie. So I do both quite a bit. I look particularly for when does that writer or when does that story begin to unravel the nod? And some would say in a traditional three act structure sense, you begin to unravel the knot. And Aristotle would say this when that change of fortune actually happens. So if it's at a tragedy, it would be when that character is at the ultimate high before they fall, or if it was in a comedy, it would be at that ultimate low before they rise. You start to unravel that knot a little bit. I find it helpful to start thinking about and answering little questions that you propose earlier in your novel. Half, you know, somewhere around the midway point, never actually answering that big question. Right. You want to keep that tension for as long as possible. And then there's other people who would suggest you keep that tension as taut as possible all the way through until you get to the very, very end. And so what you'll find is there's a lot of differences in how people achieve this. But I think one of the things that you will see consistently is there is a complication and there is a resolution. And one of the things that Aristotle is really, really insistent about is he calls it avoiding deuce ex machina. So things coming from outside of your plot to solve plot problems. And I see this all the time, I'm going to be honest, in stories where it's like, solve the plot problems with the existing within the existing world that you depicted. Now obviously you can introduce new characters and all of that stuff, but when stuff comes out of left field to solve a prop plot problem, you're not unraveling the not well, so to speak. He has a great quote and he says the solution to a plot problem should come from the story itself. And I find that to be a really informative quote and also a benchmark to try to hit every time you write a story, whether that story is short as a poem in five sentences, or whether it's extrapolated out to an 80,000 word novel.
- [38:14]
That's actually great. And people are like, oh, but how do I do that? And I'm like, well, that's why we do self editing. Because if you get to a point in your book and you finish your book, you just go back and edit in something earlier on in the process. So understand how people can't figure that out later on. As you say, you can just put in things earlier on that will help you resolve it later. That's why we edit. So I think that's, that's quite cool. But I want to come back to something you said earlier about your previous career, which your book, the Salesperson Paradox. Because I feel like this is a problem for most authors. So if you're a poet, you've got this book Aristotle for Novelists, you've got other books and you also Come from sales. So how are you marketing your books? How are you selling your books? And how can authors who care about the craft also care about sales?
- [39:10]
Right. I do think that they are driven by two completely different motors. Have this conversation. Since I have my toe in both worlds and I have for a long time now, the creative side is run by a different engine than the business side is, at least for me. But I do think one informs the other. When you start thinking about what it's like when your actual work hits the real world and becomes a commercial entity and just because you have, you're near and dear to it and it's so close to you and believe me, I write super personal stuff, so I totally, totally get it. It. For anybody who's out there saying, I'm an artist and I write from the heart, the intersection of commerce still exists. If you want to have your. If you want to sell your work to people, you want your work to be seen and it's for sales. There's one thing that the salesperson paradox hits on and that has been the bedrock for my success in that world. And it's simply helping people get what they already want. We lose sight of there's people out there that already want what you have. You have to find them and give it to them. That's it. It's that simple. You're never going to force somebody to want something that they don't want. But if you find the people who want the thing that you provide, you will be able to sell much more of whatever you're selling. It's a matter of helping, not selling. You're helping somebody get what they want, not selling them a good or a service. And it's face to face, over the phone, on a zoom anywhere. That distinction is critical. And if we look at books in general, I often say that there's four elements to value. And that value framework is time, status, ease, and money. So we all want things that save us time or increase the speed of things. Apps do that. You mentioned AI before. All of that hits on time value. Time. We are. It's a. It's a value driver. Innate value driver for humans. Ease. Am I making it easy for the person to say yes or am I making it hard? The easier I make for someone to easier I make it for someone to say yes, the more likely they're going to say yes. You can infuse that into when you're doing outreach via email or outreach via phone, how easy are you making it for people to say yes? Come, come have this conversation with me about your book or whatever. There's multiple ways that you could go about something. Are you making it easy for someone to say yes? That's a big driver for us. It's a big driver for me. It's a big driver for most people. Status is another huge innate human driver. It's we all have people we want to look good toward and can I help that person look good towards those people? That is a huge, huge value driver. It happens in a micro sense when you're dealing with people on a one off level, like a one on one level. So it's like, I don't know, maybe that person wants to look good to their mother. Maybe this person wants to look good to an audience. Maybe this person wants to look good to their boss. Can you help that person look good to that individual? That's a huge innate value driver because we are all status creatures, whether we want to admit it or not. And the fifth and the fourth piece is money. If you can make someone money or save them money, that's a huge value driver. So I always look at when I'm trying to sell things on a commercial aspect, how could I fit it into that value equation, whether it's on a microsense or a macro sense? Because I know that if I'm able to create some kind of value proposition around that, at least I'm going to have a story that I'm going to be able to communicate and it's going to put me in a better position to actually sell things. I don't hope that's helpful.
- [43:21]
Well, it's helpful as a framework, but a lot of those things, I mean, like, so someone has a thriller novel or a sci fi novel. How does that fit into that framework? When there are lots of other thriller novels and sci fi novels out there.
- [43:38]
100% agree with you. It becomes really hard when you're talking about fiction. I have a podcast, it's called Books for Men. And when I have conversations with other men about books, because the podcast is designed to inspire men to read, the number one thing is that most of them aren't reading fiction and they're reading nonfiction. And the reason why they're reading nonfiction is because of it has a higher value proposition. And so when we're looking at the bigger picture, fiction struggles to sell consistently for a lot of people because it doesn't fit into the value framework. And the only way that you're going to be able to get people to consistently buy your products is by developing your own relationship with them and creating things like creating a podcast, having a blog, doing. You have to do that. If you don't do that, you're never going to sell the thing consistently because it doesn't fit into unless you just want to roll the dice and hope for luck. And I think that in a world of AI, what that personal connection as creators, writers, filmmakers is going to be even more important because people are going to want to buy from people that they know like and trust. And so the more you could build that personal connection with people, the better off I think you're going to be in the long term. And so while people are all concerned about the craft element of writing a thriller novel, or believe me, I'm a craft junkie and I totally empathize with that, but you should also be thinking about, how am I going to create a personal connection with my readers? Do they know what Joanna Penn's about? Do they know what Douglas Vigliotti is about? If they do, they're going to be more likely to buy from you. And if it's in an art sense, it's really the only strategy that you have moving forward, unless you're lucky enough where you're that one in a million shot where your work just shoots up the charts and everything now you become, become, after that becomes saleable. But you hit on something very, very important. Fiction and art doesn't necessarily fit into that framework. And that's what makes it such a challenge to sell it.
- [46:10]
Yeah. And. Or you pay a ton for Amazon and Facebook ads. That's another way.
- [46:17]
But to me, that's a tactic, it's not a strategy. Right. Like, so, like, that's a great tactic. But to me, tactics are endless. Right. Like they're endless. And what works for some people might not work for somebody else. But strategically, I think the better bet is to try to create something where people can find you. Being you goes back to that whole help people get what they already want. Do your best to create the thing and draw people that would like that thing into it. Not try to create the thing for people, but just create the art, create the thing and then try to build the framework around your creative career that people come in and they engage with you because they're interested in you. And because to me, that's like the only sale selling point that we're going to have as we move forward into this new world. 10, 20, 30 year. I mean, I mean, people have a really myopic view about what is happening with AI. I think right now it's not meant to scare people. It's just how crowded and how cloudy the content and art and creation aspect already is. It's going to get 10 times worse. And so the only thing that I think is worth investing in from a sales standpoint point is individuality and building something that is personally who you are, and so people can engage with that. And I know that's scary for a lot of writers, but like it to me, it's inevitable. The only thing that we have, the only selling point we have moving forward.
- [48:12]
Yeah, I often say double down on being human and your voice. Yeah, and your voice and your face. And I say an author's note in the back of. Of fiction kind of grounds your story and why you care as a person. But on this, you have a podcast, Books for Men, as you mentioned. Obviously, I have this podcast. I've had other podcasts, and I think voice is a big thing. And as you say, people can get to know you, like you, and trust you. So I'd say podcasting is a great way to do book marketing. And obviously you think the same thing, but just as tips for people listening. If people listening want to pitch a podcast, not you or me, obviously, but other podcasts, because I get terrible pitches every single day. Your pitch was very good. So what are your tips for people who want to pitch for podcast interviews around their books?
- [49:04]
Get to the point. Not you. That's the tip. Get to the point. The briefer you can make it, and the more pointed that you could make it, the better off you are. And I tend to believe that the shorter. If I could do the email in three sentences, I would do it. If it has to be 5, then I'll do it in 5. If it has to be 10, then I'll do it in 10. I want to make the email as short as I possibly need to make it. So you understand why I'm emailing you, what where the benefit is and what I'm asking you to do in as short as words as possible. Even when I had my own podcast where I was doing a lot of interviewing, I was reaching out to a lot of really big names in the space, trying to get them to come onto the show, because that's how I thought I was going to be able to drive audience. And even in that sense, I was doing extremely short emails. So most people, when they email somebody, they think that telling them everything they need to know because they don't want to miss a possible, like a little possible thing that could spark Joanna or Doug or somebody, whoever to say, oh, I like that. But the reality is, is if as soon as you get an email from somebody that is a chunk of text, you don't read any of it, it. The shorter that you can make it, the more prone that person is to actually reading it and being super, super pointed. And the other rule is, if you wouldn't say it in real life, don't say it in an email. I think emails live forever and we lose. We forget that when you press send, that email is going to sit there. And I've sent a lot of bad emails over the years to learn this lesson. And me thinking to myself, wow, I should. How did I say that in an email? But now one of the biggest things that I focus on, aside from brevity, is would I say this to this person face to face? And if I wouldn't say it face to face, then I wouldn't put it in an email. And it turns out that those two things go hand in hand. Because how often am I, when or do you go up to somebody and read them three pages of material about who you are, what you're doing, what your books is, what your books are about? Never. What you do is you get right to the point. Hey, I'm Doug. Hey, I'm Doug. I'm a writer. X, you know, X, Y and Z, blah, blah, blah, whatever. You know, I mean, that's not what I would say in an email, but you do it short and brief and let the person respond just to come.
- [51:56]
Back there, you said what the benefit is, and you said that quite quickly. But just to be clear, it's the benefit to the podcaster, not the benefit to the author. I get so many pitches that say I, I'm blah, blah, blah, author. I've written this book. When can I schedule myself onto your show for my book tour?
- [52:14]
Well, here's the thing is, like with books specifically, you know this better than anybody. You probably get tons and tons. It's almost become like, podcasts have almost become an adjunct of the publishing industry where a book, a new book comes out, and now this the best way to sell this. It's the same method that was utilized forever, right, where you'd go on a radio, you go on radio talk shows, you'd go on Johnny Carson, I don't know, like all these talk shows. But now that there's podcast and there's. Because of technology, there's so many of them. What the publishing initially realized is the best way to sell books is the same way there's. It's Always been to sell books, which is get people on shows and get people in front of audiences that they don't already have. And so now people like yourself and all of these podcast hosts are getting hundreds and hundreds of pitches, especially if the show is popular, getting so many of these on. So what could you do to stand out from that? Get it so someone would actually read it. And how they people read things is if it's short and to the point at why it would be beneficial for that person to have you on the show, then you're. In my world, you're more prone to. And again, this is not something that I've just utilized in outreach with podcast pitching. I have 20 years of sales experience where I've utilized this in other aspects, too, to get in front of prospective buyers and whatnot. And it's short. And it goes back to what I was saying before. You want good guests. I don't have guests on my show anymore, but. But if I had it, I would want good guests on my show. But what I don't want is a long, extended email about all these different things. What I do want is why are you. A short, polite, direct email of telling me why you're emailing me and why it would benefit me to have you on the show in a short as possible. And I found that people in general, they respond well to that, that strategy over the span of, like, life, not just in the podcast world, because you're putting it in their world. Like, I'm having respect for you. I'm having empathy for you. You're reading a million emails. How could I make it easy for you to say yes to me? Something that I was talking about before, Am I saving you time and status? Am I making that person look good if they have me on the show? Right. Like, these are all things that a human would innately consider, even if they're not consciously considering them. And so you could sell something yourself in this situation via email by utilizing that value framework that I was referencing before.
- [55:17]
Fantastic. So lots of tips there. Where can people find you and your books and everything you do online?
- [55:23]
Yeah, so it's very, very easy for me. You just go to my website, douglasvigliotti.com and if you want to know more about the podcast, booksformen.org is the best place to check that out. And again, that's a podcast to inspire more men to read. And then for the book, it's Aristotlefornovelists.com.
- [55:40]
Well, thanks so much for your time, Doug. That was great.
- [55:43]
Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it.
- [55:49]
Joanna Penn
So I hope you found this episode interesting and that Douglas gave you some ideas for both writing craft and the business and marketing side. Let me know what you think. Please leave a comment on the podcast Show Notes at the creative pen.com or on the YouTube channel. Comment on X at the Creative Pen or email me joannathecreativepenn.com Send me pictures of where you're listening or your favourite cemetery or churchyard. Next week I have another Douglas on the show as Douglas Smith talks about writing and selling short stories, how to structure a collection, how to get paid for short stories and more. In the meantime, happy writing and I'll see you next time. Thanks for listening today. I hope you found it helpful. You can find the backlist episodes and show notes@thecreativepen.com podcast and you can get your free author blueprint@thecreativepen.com blueprint.
- [56:46]
Douglas Figliotti
If you'd like to connect, you can.
- [56:48]
Joanna Penn
Find me on Facebook and X at the Creative Pen or on Instagram and Facebook. Fpenauthor Happy writing and I'll see you next time.