The Modern Author
🚀 Want to write like Adam Grant or Brene Brown? The Modern Author gives you weekly templates, prompts & proven frameworks to turn your ideas into books, articles & authority. No fluff—just tactical steps to write with confidence. Subscribe now!
Hey There Modern Authors,I launched my first, traditionally published book in 2008. Like most people, I thought a successful book looks like this: I'd launch. The problem for authors -- myself included -- is what if that doesn’t happen? It feels like the book didn’t work. But here’s what I’ve seen over and over again, working with hundreds of authors: The books that change careers… Don’t look successful at first. They look quiet... Then something strange starts happening. An email comes in: A conference reaches out: A company asks: None of that shows up on Amazon. None of it has anything to do with book sales. But it’s exactly where the value is. Because the best books don’t just create readers. They create leverage. I'll show you how I turned my books into a crowbar... yep, that's exactly right. If you design a book correctly, your book can become the wedge to break into all the places you'd like to be. The problem I learned -- the hard way -- is most people keep score by counting readers. But the leveraged authors realizes there are actually five ways your book can create leverage. And interestingly enough, nearly all of them take longer than launch week to show up. If you want to create leverage from your book -- the kind that leads to those emails, conferences, and companies, you'll need to be patient and create the right leverage. This article show you exactly how I learned to think way differently about creating the Five Types of Leverage for my books. Here's how to turn your knowledge into a Crowbar: The Moment I Learned This For MyselfEarlier in 2008, I done a call with my publisher. I asked her what she thought about the book. "I think we have a chance to really succeed with your book," she replied. "I do." I smiled, happy at what she'd said. The problem was I didn't ask her what it actually meant to "succeed with your book." I thought success meant one thing: Sell books. A lot of them.. That was my scoreboard. And I did... I sold books... thousands, not tens of thousands. My scoreboard didn't match my expectations. In 2010, I got hired to teach at Georgetown. Not because of a degree. Because of the books. They weren’t asking how many copies I sold. They were asking: What do you believe? That’s when it clicked. The book sales weren't the right scoreboard. This wasn't a sprint I was trying to win. It was a marathon. Turns out most modern authors need to start look at this as a leverage marathon. The Mistake Almost Every Author MakesMost authors follow the same plan: Write the book And when nothing explodes? They assume it didn’t work. But that model is broken... or better said, it's impatient. Because it assumes the book is the product. It’s not. The book is the signal. And signals don’t create value instantly. The real value of the book isn’t the copies sold. It’s the leverage created by the ideas inside it. Simon Sinek spoke to our author community and said something I'll never forget: Don't design your book to win launch week, design it to win the next 10 years. And boy was he right about that... The way you do that is designing for leverage... not looking at a reader as a single "point" on your scoreboard.
None of those outcomes come from the launch itself or are necessarily about book sales. They come from the leverage the book creates. But here’s the problem. Most authors don’t design for this outcome. They discover it accidentally. They start with an old mental model. They need the crowbar model. Where Leverage Actually Shows UpWhen a book works, it doesn’t show up in royalties or book sales. It shows up in moments like:
None of that shows up on your Amazon dashboard. But that’s the real scoreboard. Across hundreds of authors, I’ve seen the same pattern: A book creates leverage in five predictable ways (none of these typically happen in launch week):
Most authors only track one of these. The best authors design for all five. And that's when that crowbar really becomes powerful. You create momentum, rather than waiting for it. The Question That Changed EverythingFor me, with book 1 I asked: “Will people read my book?” I know now that’s the wrong question. The better question is: “What do I want this book to unlock?” Because once you answer that, everything changes:
My second book looked wildly different... I didn't wait for my publisher to lead, I didn't stop promoting it after launch week, I didn't actually care about sales, I gave away lots of copies for free (even though my publisher wasn't super happy about that), and I tried to create opportunities for me. That book actually sold fewer copies... but it led to hundreds of thousands of more dollars for me in my law practice, speaking, consulting, and startup investments. I stopped keeping score of sales, and started playing for the five types of leverage. My book designed to sell copies looks very different than my book designed to: → get you on stage Modern authors don’t write books and hope they work. They design books to do specific jobs. The Five Types of Leverage a Book CreatesOnce you start looking at books through a leverage lens, a pattern becomes clear. Across hundreds of authors, the same forms of leverage appear again and again. Different topics. But the outcomes tend to cluster in the same places. A serious book creates five types of leverage. 1. Visibility LeverageA book moves ideas beyond the author’s normal channels. Posts reach followers. They get recommended. The book carries your thinking into rooms you’re not in. 2. Credibility LeverageAuthorship signals seriousness. Anyone can share opinions. A book requires structure, argument, and commitment to a point of view. That signal changes how people interpret your ideas. The author isn’t just participating in the conversation. They’re shaping it. 3. Relationship LeverageBooks create reasons for new conversations. A reader reaches out. The book becomes the starting point. Ideas turn into introductions. 4. Intellectual LeverageA book organizes thinking into usable form. Ideas become:
Once structured, others begin using them. Inside teams. Your thinking becomes portable. 5. Economic LeverageThe financial value of a book rarely comes from the book itself. It comes from what the book unlocks. • speaking The book signals how you think. And that signal attracts opportunity. This is the shift many authors miss. They measure success by copies sold. Experienced authors measure leverage created. What Modern Authors Understand About BooksModern authors think about books differently. They don’t see a book as a product. They see it as a platform for their thinking. Which changes how success is measured. Traditional publishing tends to focus on one metric: copies sold. Modern authors pay attention to something broader. They measure the leverage created by the book. That leverage often shows up in ways that have little to do with book sales. Modern authors look for signals like:
These are the outcomes that matter. A book that sparks new conversations may travel further than one that briefly tops a sales chart. A book that amplifies a clear idea may shape a category for years. A book that creates opportunities may influence a career long after the launch window closes. This is the shift. Modern authors don’t measure their books only by how many copies are sold. They measure them by the leverage the ideas create. The Final ReframeSomeone recently said to me... "I heard a book is basically an expensive business card." I smiled and said, "I think it's a very cheap crowbar. The kind that'll open doors you've struggled to get into for years." And for me that's been exactly the case. I didn't go to prestigious schools, have access to fancy networks, or work at companies that people had heard of. But I created leverage with these trust paper-bound crowbars. A book can do one of two things: Sit on a shelf… Most authors accidentally design for the first. They publish, promote, and move on. Then wonder why nothing changes. But the authors who understand this… They don’t just ask: They ask: It's at this point you realize you have a crowbar in your hands. Because when your thinking becomes visible… The right people find it. And when the right people find it… Here's to finding your crowbar (and putting it to work) my writing friends! Eric |
The Modern Author
🚀 Want to write like Adam Grant or Brene Brown? The Modern Author gives you weekly templates, prompts & proven frameworks to turn your ideas into books, articles & authority. No fluff—just tactical steps to write with confidence. Subscribe now!