The emPOWERed Half Hour

Turn Your Story Into Impact: A Self-Publishing Journey with Founder of Book Launchers, Julie Broad

• Becca Powers / Julie Broad • Season 1 • Episode 68

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Have you ever felt that a story inside you could inspire and transform others?

In today’s episode of The EmPOWERed Half Hour, Becca welcomes Julie Broad, founder of Book Launchers and a self-publishing expert. Together, they discuss the powerful impact of self-publishing, navigating challenges, and how to leverage your unique story for personal growth and professional success. Julie’s journey of turning rejection into resilience is packed with insights on creating a book that doesn’t just sell but serves as a platform to expand your brand, empower others, and fulfill your purpose.


Key Moments You Won't Want to Miss:

  • Turning Rejection into Resilience - Julie Broad shares how traditional publishing rejections led her to self-publish and create Book Launchers, showing how setbacks can open new doors.
  • Building a Brand Through a Book - Discover Julie’s insights on leveraging a book as a personal brand tool, allowing authors to expand their influence and reach new audiences.
  • Curiosity as a Core Value - Learn how Julie’s approach to leading with curiosity has helped her team at Book Launchers embrace challenges and maintain a culture of continuous growth.


About Julie

Julie Broad is the founder of Book Launchers, an Amazon Overall #1 Best Selling Author, and the winner of 15 different book awards, including a Gold Medal in the Indie Book Awards. Her most recent books, Self-Publish and Succeed and Self-Promote and Succeed help non-fiction authors write and sell a book to grow a brand and a business. 


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Note: We use AI transcription so there may be some inaccuracies

Becca Powers: Welcome to another episode of the empowered half hour. And I am so excited about today's guests. I know I say it a lot that I'm excited about today's guests, but today I bring you Julie broad. She is the founder of book launchers. And if you don't know, you need to know that that is where harness your inner CEO got birth.

And I worked with Julie and her team, have sent some referrals her way. There are, whole production is just amazing. So I had to do that little plug because Julie, without you and your team, I know I've gotten emotional on you before. I don't know that I would have launched into this new part of my career.

So thank you for being a guest and thank you for the work that you do. 

Julie Broad: Oh, Thank you for having me and thank you for being a fantastic person for us to work with. I always value the people. My team loves working with and you were 1 of them. So, 

Becca Powers: yeah, we love you.

Your team was the best. all right, so let's get into some questions. Very curious. So you founded book launchers. You obviously have been doing this for quite a few years. I would be like curious too. Like, do you even know how many books you guys have published at this point? 

Julie Broad: No, we have a running author count.

So we've worked with over 550 authors now. but not everybody publishes a book and some people come to us, with the book published and we market it. So, you know, we don't have a great running number, but it's in the hundreds. For sure. 

Becca Powers: Yeah, that's awesome. And I can tell, I mean, my book looks.

Absolutely amazing. But what's, the backstory to book launchers? What encouraged you to start it and found it? 

Julie Broad: Yeah, it's, this is always a funny question because like when I was a little kid, I always thought I'd be a writer.but then, you know, I had a grade 10 teacher that marked me hard and I thought, Oh, I'm a terrible writer.

I better not be a writer. And people told me writers didn't make money. So I went to business school, like the opposite of a creative. Yeah. But it was kind of like over time. I eventually started investing in real estate. I read rich dad, poor dad, and I was like, I buy some property. And it's kind of a long journey, but I hit this point.

Where I started investing full time and I started a real estate training and education company. And for that, you know, I started a YouTube channel and I started a newsletter and I started to build this thing called a platform. And got approached by an acquisitions editor at Wiley. And all of a sudden I was like this little girl that thought she was going to be a writer, just like exploded inside of me.

And I was like, Oh my gosh, I can write a book. And, you know, as, life. has other intentions for you, I think, I got this. I said, Oh yes, I've got this idea. And I told him and he was like, no, no, no, we don't want a general real estate investing book. then he said, but you know, we're interested in you.

So here's an idea, go off, write a proposal, bring it back to me. so I spent three months working on this proposal, sent it back and forth with him, hired some people, and in the end they said, yeah, no, we don't think you have a strong enough platform to sell books. So they rejected me, right? And I was devastated because again, it wasn't just about a book for me.

It was like this little girl inside of me. that had this dream, all of a sudden I thought this dream could actually be real. And then they were, completely crushing me saying my idea wasn't good. And then they said I wasn't good enough. and I had friends that got book deals around the same time, so I had to contend with that, but like I said, life always has different intentions for you.

and it took about six months, but I eventually kind of recovered. And said, you know what? No, you're wrong. Like that book idea I had is something that will help people and I'm going to go publish it. And I'll self publish it since you don't want to do it. and then I'll, you know what?

I'll do it better than if you did it. Yeah. So I dove in and this was in 2011. So there wasn't that. That much on self publishing out in the marketplace. but I dove into everything I could find on marketing books and writing books and publishing books. And did do it better than if Wiley had published my book.

I took it to number one in print books on Amazon in Canada. And, and it was in the top 100 print books for almost 200 days. And still to this day, it outsells sometimes my more recent books. So it does well. Awesome. Yeah. And for me, this, so it wasn't like, Oh, this is great. Now I'm going to launch book launchers.

But it opened my eyes to a few challenges. One is the challenges with traditional publishing. There's benefits, and there's great opportunities for some people in that space, but for a lot of people, self publishing is actually a better path. 

And 

Julie Broad: for me, it was. I made way more money. I got to publish the book that I really knew needed to be written, and clearly it did, because it still sells.

And, and I was able to kind of do whatever I wanted with that book, whereas when you get a traditional deal, you know, there's limitations on what you have rights to do and what you can use that material for. So for me, it opened my eyes to that and my businesses exploded. So I also saw this like, wow, this book, yeah, not only did I make a little money from the book, but my businesses are growing and little bit by bit, I started to see a tremendous opportunity to help people self publish at the quality of a traditional publisher.

because that was part of the secret to my success. That's, 

Becca Powers: that's the part that I want to emphasize for the listeners. So, if you're listening to this you're like, Oh, a little intrigued, maybe I do want to self publish a book or you've had that thought go. So I have a lot of, corporate folks and entrepreneurs and everybody, I would say I have a lot of like a personalities who want to produce.

something that would be reflective of a traditional publisher. And that's how I ended up finding you guys is that I found your YouTube channel, but I just wanted to pause you there because There is a way to self publish. Even your books behind you is like self published and succeed. Like, because there is a way to self publish and get the quality that you want.

So I just wanted to pause because I appreciate that you went there because I got to benefit from it. 

Julie Broad: Thank you. And itI'm glad you emphasize it. Cause there was two pieces to the vision that kept coming back to of like, I wish there was a company that would do it like a traditional publisher, but I still own everything.

I'm still the CEO. But the other side of this too is the marketing, because when I hired all the people, the editors, the book cover designers, none of them are thinking marketing, even the book cover person, you know, they're just thinking good design, they're not thinking about the category you're in, they're not looking at it, like, how is this book going to sell and who's the reader?

So I, I just kept thinking that marketing, that's why my book succeeded was because I was thinking about, I'm never going to sell a book, so let's try to figure out how we might sell one or two. And so I was thinking marketing through the whole journey. And so that's why I started book launchers was because I saw this need.

For traditional level quality in self publishing with marketing integrated. And then also, the other side of it too, is we're monthly. So it allows people who, you know, when I was pricing it out, people were quoting me 30, 40, 000. And I was like, I don't want to put that kind of thing. Yeah.

I don't want to put that out. So having a monthly, it gives you more flexibility. It allows you to manage your cashflow. So yeah, those were all the things. 

Becca Powers: And that was another,Well, I would say three things that really led me to book launchers was the quality, the end to end process.

Because as a salesperson, I knew there would be a marketing piece and you guys were really the only company that I found that embraced the marketing and had like that as part of my yeah, so quality marketing, and then there was something else, but anyway. The monthly membership probably.

Yeah, the monthly membership. That was it. And then I ended up staying with you guys. So I was only going to come on for. the post marketing of Harness Your Inner CEO, but your team did such a great job. I continued just and stayed in the marketing phase for like 18 months after the book was released.

Yeah, that's part of our, that's part of our charm. We, bring you in the family and you never want to leave. So let's fast forward a little bit to today. where's your vision for book launchers? Is it just to, kind of continue on the same? Are you finding new trends in the market?

And we talked about this a little earlier, but I know people are always like what's going on in the book world, you know? 

Julie Broad: Yeah. I mean, there's, lots, it's actually hard to kind of hone in, but the two things that I'm really got my eye on you. It's more like the book is a tool to grow your brand and your business.

And so we help you produce this fantastic tool and we, do help people turn their book into courses, online courses, but I'm really focusing now in on the pieces of platform building and even speaking engagements and things like that. And so we're adding people to the team and we're finding partners and we're got a couple other things cooking that I haven't quite disclosed yet to just really help people not just look at this as like, here's my book, But now what?

And so we're really trying to support that next level. Once you have the book, let's help you use it as a tool to get where you want to go. Yeah, I like that a lot. Yeah. And I think it's really important because a lot of people get the book and then they don't utilize it to its full potential.

And I mean, I'm guilty of that too. I always joke that I'm like that shoemaker whose shoes aren't fixed. Like my books are often the last thing we think about when we're thinking about marketing. so I really have been trying to put my books at the center of more marketing efforts, but, but that's one piece, but AI is also big, big thing and you can't ignore it.

 even though there's some challenges with it, it's something that I'm really, you know, I've got the team every Tuesday. We have AI Tuesday now. So we've got tips and tools. Oh, 

Becca Powers: that's awesome. 

Julie Broad: Yeah. And we're, also building a few things. So we're building a piece of software that has AI underneath and there's a few other things that we're doing with AI.

We're not writing books with AI. But it's speeding up the process and on the marketing side, it's such a great 

Becca Powers: tool. I could only imagine. You know, you said one thing that I thought was really interesting and I get asked all the time, like, did I make my money back is a question that I get.

And I certainly did. but I didn't do it through book sales. had a successful launch. my readership between ebook and, I do a lot of corporate gigs and then traditional selling, I think my readership is around 5, 000 for harness year under CEO, which is. Amazing. But you mentioned the piece, the speaking.

Now, not everybody wants to speak, but I am so happy to hear you say that you're adding in more resources there because that's where I made all my money back, 

 and I don't know if you just want to talk about. That platform piece. Cause people are always like, well, how do I make my money back? I'm like, you speak or you train or you do something.

Julie Broad: Yeah. And that's exactly it. It's kind of, the book sales it's rare. Like of my four books, the first book is the only one that made it like, I don't know, 20 times over. Like it just sold. It's old and sold. That's old. But most of the books, the money comes from the platform building and then what you do with that platform.

And for a lot of our authors, that speaking is the exact way. And sometimes they can make their entire investment back into speaking gigs. So, that is a powerful way, but a lot of people haven't done enough of it to land the speaking gigs that, create those kinds of paybacks. And so that's where we're kind of looking at, because paid speaking gigs are, you're typically going to land something that's, you know, 5, 000 or more.

If somebody's seen you speak and they refer you or you have a killer speaker reel with and you solve a problem that they want in there, you know, for the people in their audience and a lot of our clients have a great, story slash, solution. But they don't have that referral or that speaker reel.

And so for us, it's kind of, okay, we got to help get them on some smaller stages so they can build up both of those pieces. so that's some of the stuff that we're starting to work on. That's awesome. Cause 

Becca Powers: it all does start somewhere, right? I mean. My first gigs were free. I mean, I'm like, Hey, can I at least talk about the book?

I don't care. You know, like, yeah, come speak at this women's chapter, this thing. And then it just evolves from there. So that's really cool. so another question I want to ask, what, lessons are up for you right now? mean, I learn lessons every day. I know it's like a big question. Which one do you want me to share?

But 

Julie Broad: I always like to hear what people answer. let's see. that's a good one. I'm trying to think because there have been so many, I think that's one thing in itself is that there's always a lesson. you know, one of our philosophies, that I've instilled in the company is, to lead with curiosity.

So one of the challenges we've had lately has been glitches with Amazon and they've suspended a few accounts and we had actually one client have their account terminated and it's really easy to just get mad and like blame Amazon or blame other, Somebody doing something, although the frustrating part, actually, is that we didn't do anything wrong.

It would be a little easier if we had actually messed up. You'd be like, I can take accountability. and then we could know how to not have this happen again in the future. so with all of those things, I think. it's a lesson, but also something I'm proud of is we all went into it with curiosity, kind of like, okay, how did this happen?

What can we do? And there wasn't any of that, like, oh, this is your fault, or this is their fault, or, any of that kind of stuff. And I think That has helped me learn a lot of lessons with a little less pain because that curiosity piece really just allows lessons to flow without it being, you know, so emotional and like such a, you know, up and down kind of journey.

But yeah, I that's the big thing for me is I keep relearning the value of curiosity, especially in challenging times. 

Becca Powers: Yeah, I like that. And I think that's a good message for the listeners too, because  in our everyday life, whether it's our home life or our work life or whatever.

I mean, things go wrong all the time. Right? And if you approach it with that level of curiosity, you might also find some magic in things like that's one of the philosophies I live by too, but I have approached both problems and new things with curiosity because new things bring on a lot of big scaries.

 

Becca Powers:  you just stay curious, you get through the things and then you gain more tools and, find new avenues and all that stuff. So I really like that. You said that. Yeah. Thank you. Curiosity is powerful. Uh huh. It really is. all right. So now I want to go into, the more positive side, because I was just talking about lessons and challenges, but what's a current aha moment?

Julie Broad: I mean, you're, really only as good as your team. And I say this even as anybody else, you know, you might think you don't have a team, but you do like, there's people that you are relying on, even if you don't have, hired full time people around you. There's people that you're working with and, you're only as good as your team.

And, it, shows up where, you know, we're fairly small, there's 15 full time employees and we have a whole bunch of contractors, but you see it. If, one person is just a little on the weak side, the whole team starts to feel it. And so it's really important to just constantly be monitoring.

you know, is everybody doing okay? But also, do you have the right people for the jobs that you need done? And, that's just something it's again, 1 of those things I keep learning, but. It's been an aha lately. Cause we've moved some people and we've, you know, we've kind of identified some places where this isn't going well.

And as soon as you make the change, it's like, Oh my God, like everything's going so good again. It's, funny. 

Becca Powers: I had something similar in my own company and kind of more in my wheelhouse cause I'm like the sales person, right. But we're a super small team. It's me, Lenay. We have my daughter and her boyfriend.

They are in college or just graduated. So they're like doing a little paid internship this summer and we have an executive assistant. So we're a team of five. But the sales are down and I'm like, what the heck guys, you know, like in my head, I'm like, we got to get this under control. And then I really realized that like, Oh, that's like my wheelhouse.

And I've been out of my role as sales because I've been writing and I still work full time. So it's like, I can only do so many things. So then I had to like, really do like some self evaluation and be like, well, if I want these results, I'm holding the team back. So then I could either, complain about it or say, I don't have more time.

Or what I ended up doing in that sense was I've started training the team how to sell. But my point is, is that when something's not working, the faster you can address it, you get back to working. And I really liked that. That was kind of one of the points that you talked about. So big question, how can writing a book empower somebody?

Julie Broad: Oh, my gosh. you know this better than anyone, but it's, every phase has different lessons and will give you confidence as you get through that phase. And so I think it's kind of like, equate it to running a marathon because you've got to, you know, in the beginning, you got to just get out there and walk and then in the middle is like, When everything comes in and it seems totally logical, all the reasons you should quit, they're really good reasons, you know, but at the same time, if you just push through and you get to the very end, you get the satisfaction of completion.

But the big difference with books and marathons is that after the book is out, now you're actually helping other people. Now you're having a massive impact on other people's lives versus a marathon. Well, you did it. Maybe your family is now proud and maybe inspired to do something, but it's not the same kind of lasting impact.

But I think as you explore your stories and your expertise and you get that down on paper, And then you ride that roller coaster of this is the greatest book in the world down to this is the worst thing. Like everybody's going to think this is dumb. And you finally, you finally realize it's somewhere in the middle.

Like you've been there before. Were you in my head? Yeah, it's very normal. It's the people who don't go through that roller coaster that I worry about. 

Yeah. 

Julie Broad: so that's how it's empowering because I think anytime you take yourself through an emotional roller coaster journey, but you see yourself through to the end.

And now you're confident that you can tackle something else big and probably even bigger than that. and that empowers you, but it also, I think, empowers and impacts everybody around you. 

Becca Powers: Yeah. I like both sides of that answer is like what it does to yourself because yeah, I mean, now that I've been able to successfully write a book, launch a book.

Survive all of it and then see, like, I still remember the very first time I got a LinkedIn message from someone I didn't know that read the book that said, your book changed my life. I quit my job. I got a new one. Like, my life's so much better and all these ways. I was just Oh my God.

Like my book didn't suck it's out there helping people, but it also, saw the impact start coming back and then for myself too, it just really boosted my confidence in being able to help people.

when use your frameworks and like, you know, I worked with you guys on like how the teaching is going to come out of my head, how it's going to land. And so when you do all the upfront work and it lands, right. You're like, holy shit. Like, not only did I write this, but now there's this tool out there that helps people.

So it's really cool what you guys do. 

Julie Broad: Yeah, and I love that you share that because I tell people this all the time. I always get, when people are thinking about working with us, they're always like, who's your most successful author? and I'm always go to them. Well, first of all, success is, you know, relevant to each individual.

I'm like, that's a very hard question. Second of all, we're never responsible for somebody's success. It's always coming back to the author. you know, we facilitate, we open doors, but at the end of the day, if you don't step through the door or you don't shine when you step through that door, there's, it doesn't matter what we do.

but  those same people who are so like, well, what are you going to do for me? When the book comes out, they're always like, Oh, this stranger. They loved my book. They, it changed their life. And they're not telling me how much money they made. They're always telling me about how, this person's life was changed by my book.

And so I think people underestimate how valuable that is for you, but also for the other people that are going to read your book. 

Yeah. 

Julie Broad: So cool. So why are you passionate about this work? Well, we kind of just talked about it. Yesterday I did our client town hall and one of our clients just launched his book.

And he just, in front of everybody, he just thanked me for making his dream come true and tell him. And he's like, I didn't actually think this was ever possible. He goes, but we just did it. And so, for me, it's those dreams coming true. Because I had the same thing, I was rejected.

It's just that, when somebody rejects me, my reaction isn't to hide, it's to go like, Oh yeah, that's right. that's not a normal reaction. That's, you know, I've lived a very challenging, exciting life, but challenging because every time somebody tells me I can't do something, I am bound to determine I'm going to go do it.

Awesome. 

Julie Broad: but yeah, that for me, It's I know how powerful books are and I know how powerful they are for the author, but also for the lives that can be changed by them because my life was changed by a book. You know, at the beginning, I said, I read rich dad, poor dad, and it completely changed what I was doing in my life and I am here today because of that book.

And then because I wrote a book. And so writing a book is as powerful to a life as reading a book. And so, you know, I just got the goosebumps on 

Becca Powers: that. That's like a mic drop right there. Yeah, that's really cool. well, that brings me to like a little message of encouragement.

If there's a listener, that is on the verge of writing a book, if they're like me and like, I want to have been wanting to write a book since I was a kid. I've been journaling, doodling, writing for ever since I can remember. And I never thought that I could actually do it until one day I did it.

And I know as I'm out there in the corporate world, talking to people, especially a lot of people who are on the backside of their career, they're like, Oh, I've always wanted to write a book on this or always wanted to write a book on that, and they just don't do it. What would you say to the person that says I've always wanted to do it, but.

Just 

Julie Broad: hasn't. Yeah, well first it's a phenomenal tool for career changes. So just putting that out there, but the book that's in your head It'll never have any impact. So it's not going to impact yourself and it's not going to impact anybody else So as long as that book is in your head, it's really not going to have any sort of impact so get it out of your head and onto a page and Then you'll start feeling the impact and then when you publish it, you'll have the impact 

Becca Powers: Absolutely.

And that brings me a little bit to like, starting to wind down, but maybe we can get into a tactical piece of what you guys do at book launchers, because I know I have like a lot of like process. people that listen to this podcast. And, you know, one of the things that you guys do at book launchers is you do the end to end process, which I think is really awesome because I came to you guys kind of like mid process cause I was finding resources as I went, but what I learned once I got to you guys is that you could have helped me write the.

Outline I could have had a writing coach the entire time. So why don't we talk a little bit about the beginning that like nurturing part of the process for anybody that might be on the fence about writing a book? 

Julie Broad: Yeah, for sure. So we do love working. If you don't have an idea.

You're probably not in a good place to come to us because you'll spend more money than you need to just finding your idea. But if you have an idea, we have a process to kind of turn that into a book and even just verify that it's a viable thing, given your goals, because, most of the time it is.

But sometimes what you think your book's going to do doesn't match with the topic that you want to write about. and so we have writers. We have writing coaches and we have a course. So there's three different ways that we can help you get the book written. It just depends on some people like the group atmosphere of a course because it gives them more accountability.

Like I have to show up and tell them I didn't do my writing and so they get the writing done. Other people, the coach is enough. Having that one on one accountability and support and somebody to bounce ideas off. So it's not so lonely. And then other people just want to talk it out or even just hand them their podcast episodes and get somebody else to write it.

And so there's really no excuse because you don't have to write it. we've had clients that have voice noted it, transcribed it, then the writer's gone through, or we've just, it's been good enough to edit it from there. So. There's lots of ways. The primary way people work with us for that is for writing coaches.

So they get a writing coach and the coach, coaches them through, what's the hook? What's the outline? And then what's a chapter look like? You know, this one needs more stories. This one needs less stories. And you kind of build the book together through that, through that process. That's 

Becca Powers: awesome.

And so for listeners, if you have a book in your mind and you have that idea, I highly encourage you to reach out to book launchers. Julie's going to give all the information here in a minute, but I have to like shamelessly plug them because you guys, you help dreams come true. And it's such a beautiful thing.

Julie Broad: Thank you. Yeah. it's why I get up, even if there's been a bad day, I'm like, I'm ready to do it again. 

Becca Powers: Yeah. I mean, I feel it. I'm like, my life has changed, so I'm grateful I found you. And yet, you know, you have a platform. You're unapologetic about it. I found you on YouTube. So like I found you just very organically, like any listener can create a platform and you never know who's going to tune in and find you.

all right. So last question. What is a book that you're reading or recently read that has inspired you that you would like 

Julie Broad: to share with the audience? Oh, there's a book that I've been using the story from it over and over again. It's Price Pritchett. It's an older book. what is it actually called?

I don't even know. He has a bunch of books, so I have one sitting over here, but it's not the one. So this is one of his other books, 16X. Okay. but it's one of his earlier books, but I've been going back to it over and over and over again. And there's a story in the beginning about a fly.

I won't spoil it. You guys can go and read it, but I, bought copies for everybody in one of my business groups. Cause I'm like, it's a short little read, so you can get through it in under an hour. Oh, that's 

Becca Powers: awesome. 

Julie Broad: And I love it. Yeah. 

Becca Powers: Yeah. That's so cool. all right, well, we are at time. So 30 minutes always goes by so fast.

Thank you for coming on. But I would love for you to share with the listeners how to stay in touch with you. 

Julie Broad: Yeah. The easiest thing is to, and it'll help you get started writing your book too, is to just go to booklaunchers. com forward slash the number seven. Steps. So seven steps and you'll get a workbook to, you know, for the seven steps to start writing your book.

And that gets you my email address and my website and all the things. So that 

Becca Powers: is awesome. Well, once again, Julie, thank you for coming on the show and thank you for all the work that you do. 

Julie Broad: Oh, thank you for having me. And thank you for just being you. You're awesome.