Matt Shoup: How One Book Unlocked Five-Figure Speaking Gigs

Transcript

Matt Shoup: When I landed and did Painted Baby with you guys, I remember that was published. It was in hand. It was, you know, best content I've ever put out. That was when I pitched my first five figure gig and landed it. And then landed another one and then another one. So the book really helped elevate the speaking. Everybody in life has a book. There's a million ways to write a book. And I think it's one of the few things in the world where that energy that you invest, I mean, it is a permanent thing that is there forever. It continues beyond you and you don't know how that path and that journey is going to go. No, I love these. Yeah. No, I love these nights and I'm excited to hang with you, man. It's been, been talking about this for a number of months.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah. Many months. And I know you've got some like amazing stories actually about books and about scribe and about all this. So yeah, I'm really excited to have you here. And I know that you've been a huge influence on people in your life to get them to write books. Give us the like. context into which you started writing books, because you've been writing for a long time. You're up to three books now. Three.

Matt Shoup: Yeah. And I have a fourth in process, in process, just on pause right now. And that's totally okay. I mean, a little, little bit of backstory. I am the typical serial entrepreneur found out at a pretty young age. I'm unemployable and had to be like, had to be doing something. I'm very, just very active. My mind goes a million miles a minute. I found out I was unemployable in my adult life. After graduating college, I got fired from a corporate banking job. And I had some experience in college working with a college painting company. So I came home that day and I'm like, I got to figure something out pretty quick. That turns into launching what I thought would be just a temporary holdover, like a painting company to not drown financially. And it took off like really quickly. And then all of a sudden, I mean, I'm just a nobody college kid knocking on doors, painting houses, and a group of business guys asked me to come speak at a little business networking event. I'm like, speak. I'm deathly afraid of public speaking. And I got up there and fumbled around, you know, a couple of notes about some aggressive marketing that we did. So speaking was actually what led me to writing. I am actually like physically, technically not a great sit down and write English words on paper. I started a lot with speaking, but my inspiration for the first book that I wrote was totally not from a context of thinking that I was an author or getting into the mindset of like, you can sell books and make a living and have this grow you in lots of different ways. I got a speaking engagement opportunity. I had one talk that I did and the gal said, well, I need two. go, well, I have one. And she said, Matt, if you want to speak and get paid. And we're paying at the time was like 1500 bucks. I thought that was a lot of money then for first week. I said, well, I'll come up with a second one. We had just won a bunch of business awards. And I said, you know, I'll do, I'll do a keynote about how to win business awards, right? Just thinking that that would be the filler. And she would pick this one because she actually saw me present this one. And what does she pick? Right. What does she pick? how to win business awards. I'm like, shoot, now I need to actually produce this. What I found is as long as you're one step ahead of wherever you need to be in business life, that's okay. And I show up and I present this and it was great. And somebody came up and said, this would be a really cool book. So my first book was in 2011, become an award winning company. And it was just a process of how a business can go through whether they've got money time, anything brand new, here's the business award industry and world and how you can crack into it, win awards, and then use that to leverage your name, your brand, gain leads, gain client base. It was the POD days, print on demand. I sat at Starbucks, wrote it out, hired who I thought was a great editor, laid it out like crap, cover looked like crap. I mean, looking back with what I know now, didn't know how to write a book. And I thought magically, Eric, like you write a book and it will sell. Like feel the dream style, right? If you build it or whatever it is, right? And no, so it's, uh, it was just a nice business card, but it, it pinned me as an author. But then that's when I started really digging into that space of like, what does it mean to really write a great book? How do you write a great book? And came across you guys about a decade later.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah. And did you enjoy that process? Like having, having written that book, were you like,

Matt Shoup: Yeah, absolutely.

Eric Jorgenson: It was fun.

Matt Shoup: You know, it just started and it's okay. I mean, I'm not advising against it. I think everybody in life has a book. There's a million ways to write a book. Scribe works well for some. It might not be a good fit for some. That's okay. But just start writing. You know, just start getting those ideas out. But if you want to be serious about it, you've got to understand why you want to write it. What is the why behind it? How do you want it to position you? because it could actually do a little bit of detriment if you don't do it well, in my opinion and experience.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah. Did that first book do any, that's a great point. Did it do any harm? Did it set you back? Did it confuse your brand? Did anything like that?

Matt Shoup: No. No. Cause I was like M&E, right? So M&E painting is the, is the company we started. So I was M&E Matt, the painter guy and now had a book. So I think it positioned me as, Hey, Matt wrote a book. I had a lot of people reach out, ask advice about it, which love helping people. So that was cool. I don't think it devalued my brand as an entrepreneur. When I, when I did get into the, you know, more serious speaking realms and meeting other speakers who were also authors, they're like, Hey, Matt, who, who did that cover? You know, Mike McCallogh is a great friend of mine. He's a huge mentor. And he's like, yeah, you, you created a, or you, what did he say? You, you hit some major sins of authorship, you know, when he was like super loving about it. But as I started spending more time about with serious authors, I learned a lot more.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah, design is one of those things that's very, everybody's sort of aware of it at a subconscious level, but not everyone is able to sort of evaluate good design. And it's very difficult, you know, when some designer starts you a thousand bucks and some starts you 10,000, you're like, I don't know, I'm gonna end up with a book cover at the end of the day, but the nuance between like, what is really a great design and what that says to people about you and your book and the idea and how seriously to take it. Like that's, you know, there's a meaningful difference, but it's hard to get everybody to see that.

Matt Shoup: There is. And now that I've gone through this, you know, a number of times, you know, meet a speaker and author and they go, here's my book. And as soon as I grab it, and maybe I'm judgmental call it that if you want, but I mean, I make a judgment about that book and I may not even open it based on the cover, right? The cover should entice you to turn it over and read the description, which should entice you to then open it and a good cover and a good flow of that psychology and text does that is what I've learned really from you guys.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, a line that I really like is you can only conceive of the level of excellence you've seen before. And so experiencing having gone through that once or twice, or just really being detailed and critical about what you want to have happen there. So you become a huge speaker. It's a big part of your life and career now. Is this a surprise to you as somebody that, as you said, had great fear and hatred of public speaking?

Matt Shoup: It's, it's funny. So I still keep in touch with my second grade teacher from elementary school. So shout out to Ruth Renney and she's not watching the podcast because she doesn't have the technology to do that. But she lives, she lives in New Jersey. I went to elementary school there. I, dude, I should be dead in prison or disappeared. Like that's where all the kids I ran around with. ended up that the majority of them so I mean just the fact that I'm here and alive and successful and have just that story is amazing but no growing up as a kid like I could not sit down I could not shut up and I had a teacher this is Jersey in the 80s right so you had to remember the context she said sit down and shut the f up like you you are going to end up in prison one day for all the talking you do and And so to get paid to speak, I just think is kind of fun and funny. Yeah. And speaking is something that I, that I love to do. It's such a, it's such a craft. It's such a responsibility to stand there in a room, whether it's two, three people, 300, 3000, whatever that is, and have something to say that can, that can impact their lives. And I've learned so much from great speakers about, about how to do that.

Eric Jorgenson: Do you feel like the speaking career drove the author career vice versa? Like, how did they sort of they co-evolve? It seems like pretty commonly, but I'm everybody seems to have a different version of how it happens for them.

Matt Shoup: Yeah, for me, I was I was already speaking and just starting to get paid because for any speakers out there, you know, the minute somebody asks you your fee and you can't just shoot it out like that with confidence. That's like one of the Mike is like, that's one of the sins. If you can't say that, they're going to know that you're not there yet. So that I had to get over. Then I start getting paid, you know, little bits here and there to speak. And I had my first book and I think they were coinciding together. Where the real big jump was for me is I just couldn't crack that. You know, I had never received a five figure engagement, right? And I'm not doing this as like a main first place profession. I'm still running my other companies. And I said, that's going to be a cool goal. When I landed and did painted baby with you guys, I remember that was, that was published. It was in hand. It was best content I've ever put out. That was when I pitched my first five figure gig. And landed it and then landed another one and then another one so the book really helped elevate the speaking. I do lead more with i'm a speaker author then author speaker like this might my heart and my passion is speaking that message.

Eric Jorgenson: super interesting did you know was that like why you set off to write and publish painted baby to try to clear that threshold or did you just want to write a book and it happened to work out that way.

Matt Shoup: I wanted to write a better a better book and I was really intrigued by the scribe process so painted baby. started in 2015 and I started pick it up right go to the coffee shop a little bit here a little bit there it was messy and I just put it down and I didn't finish it and I said this is such a great story it's actually become one of the foundational components of how we do business. Cause it's all about just being vulnerable and real about you're human and you mess up. And if you actually share one of those like train wreck stories, you'll actually build more trust with people and they'll engage with you at a higher level. And I said, you know, my, my buddy, Mike, he's like, you've got to get this book out, but it can't suck. Like the first one that then I did. So it was a 10 year nine year journey. of starting it, picking it up, putting it down, but it wasn't the primary goal, no, to answer the question like, hey, I want to be a five figure speaker. It was, I want to get out a great book. This message needs to come out because I knew what it would do for our painting company and had just had a lot of encouragement. It felt like it just an under finished, like, you know, like I can't, I can't leave this earth without getting this message out.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah, that is a powerful motivator actually, you know, when, when you have those kind of like, If I died tomorrow, what projects do I wish I'd finished? I've definitely had chapters where a book was one of those like, damn, I will haunt myself if I don't finish that one. That is super interesting. I often say books create these unexplained good things that happen. The fact that you set off with a business case and it had this impact on your speaking career is a really interesting one. So how did it fit into the business? Because this is not a business book, really. It's, it's a business audience, right?

Matt Shoup: I think there's a, you know, there's a professional personal development, but definitely a business enhancement component to it. So it's a lot of business and personal stories of me and others that have made mistakes. So the premise of the book is right. Painting a picture of perfection prevents true connection. And I, and I talk about it in the business and the sales sense, but then it also really translates over to, to life, you know, like we live in this culture of. Everybody's putting their best moments online and on their billboards and on their market, their shiny marketing brochure. So I, I angle it as a business book, but the feedback that I've received has been just as equal of, man, this helps me overcome an addiction or just present my real self to the world as an employee in a business. So it's, it's hit lots of different ways, some that were unexpected, which was really cool.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah. Did you mention that you're like giving this to customers? Like how do you use it in your business day to day?

Matt Shoup: Yeah. So I mean, for any business owner, right, you have your story, right? Whether it's, you know, your origin story, your like hook the customer show where you're unique. And every business does this that understands marketing. They have some kind of like tangible. We have a little, I call it a shiny marketing brochure. And I actually tell the customer when I'm with them and we've trained the team, here's our shiny marketing brochure. Look at all the awards that we've won. Here's all of the credibility, our Google reviews, our A star five plus. Here's some jobs we did. And then I actually turn, there's a whole page in the brochure. should grab it with me. And it has the cover of the book with little painted, like my daughter painted. I say, we're not perfect. You know, like this is everything that we intend to do. But if something, we screw something up, we're going to take accountability for it. Hey, we painted a baby once on a job site. Do you want to hear about it? Nobody says no to that. It's just this amazing hook. They're like, you did what? You know, so we share the story, paint sprayer explodes right, right by the mom holding her baby, you know, in the back of the house and that they're just immediately engaged. So it creates engagement with clients, but it's just, Hey, we're, we're not a perfect company. And it lowers their guard shows that we're human. And then they just know, Hey, like something doesn't go right. M&E will fix it. And then we'll actually show them some, some testimonials like, Hey, talk to this client. Like things didn't start off well. And they're one of our number one fans right now.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah, that's such a powerful thing. I want to say it's disarming, but it's actually just trust building. I feel like everybody's worst fear is that they're going to be stuck in this kind of dead end situation. They're going to be powerless. They're going to be in a bad situation and the company is not going to care. There's not a human on the other side who's going to be reasonable and rational and actually take care of them. to have a story that great but then have invested so much in the telling of that story at such a high level and really making it like part of your process and part of your culture and then of course your whole company knows that story and it like yeah it infuses probably their attitude and how they approach customers like That's a really, it's a really powerful way to kind of bake an idea into a culture because then it forces everybody to be like talking about it and have shared language for it. And they're making commitments to people externally about this sort of this way that they're going to be treated all the time. Like that's incredible.

Matt Shoup: And then if something does not go according to plan. I mean, the customers don't, don't come at you with as much anxiety. They're like, Hey, you remember that? I had one like a couple months ago. Hey, you remember that painted baby situation? I think we've got a little, a little painted baby situation. He goes, Matt, it's not that bad, but I know you'll take care of it. You know, whatever the issue was, I don't even remember, but it just, it just makes life and business a lot easier. And then, you know, as I'm talking to business owners or just coaching like young men, I've got a passion to help, you know, men become better men and hey, like, start sharing some of this stuff, you know. I'm not connecting. I'm not landing where I want to land in life. And I go, well, let's maybe build a story around some of these moments that you think are actually detriments, right, that you think are going to devalue you, actually have that elevate you.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah, it's like that paradox of embarrassment. Like if you try to hide something embarrassing, it becomes more embarrassing. And if you just throw it out on the table, it becomes, you know, a funny, vulnerable sort of shared appreciation with somebody which is bonding. Yeah. So did you I mean, you had this conversation with kind of Mike, your mentor, and he urged you to sort of publish your your third book, then I believe at, you know, painted baby was your third. That was the second. OK, so there's that was number two. Yeah. And like a higher level of professionalism and polish. Was that a hard decision for you to do, having been through it all before you'd done the DIY approach, which is much lower cost? And you'd seen some results with that, but was that a tough leap to make?

Matt Shoup: No, no, because at that point it had been so long. I already had so much of the content and idea. I was just, I was ready. Right. And for an author, like you have to be ready. You have to commit whatever the process, whoever the company, you have to build a team, right? To do this. You don't do this alone. However, that is you've got to be committed. So no, I had no issue. Like as soon as we signed, we jumped into it. Like we hit all the deadlines. It was, it was amazing. Yeah.

Eric Jorgenson: That's awesome. Since the book has been out, have there been any fun surprises, things you couldn't have predicted, doors that open that you never would have expected as a result of the book?

Matt Shoup: It's really interesting. I'll just get a random email from somebody. anywhere in the country or even like out of the country. I got my hands on this book from so and so in this channel and I'm like, this is crazy. Somebody that I've never met in the world has this message and there's not like one specific one that really, you know, hits really hard, but it's just these little messages. Hey, it came across this. I thought it was a great story. We shared it, you know, we shared it with our sales team or we shared it with the men's Bible study or a men's group, something like that. So I just think that's really cool that you can put content. I actually have, we were talking maybe before we officially started recording, I put some coaching content out like 10 years ago, kind of walked away. Didn't do much with it since then. It lives online somewhere. And I just got a letter from an inmate in a correctional facility in Florida. He's been there 35 years. He's going to be there for a long time. And he goes, Hey, this was really valuable for us. And I want you to jump on a zoom call and teach this to some juveniles in the correctional facility. So like that kind of stuff, this was like something that was in your brain. that everybody and everything's telling you maybe not to create, because authors get that too. And then you put it out there, right? And then this happens 12 years later, 15 years later, it's crazy.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah, these are such surprising things that happen when you have that more surface area in the world. And I think that's a good, like you mentioned at the top, bringing, not really setting out to become an author. You were just kind of writing. You were just externalizing this thing. You were just trying to share and teach. And I think some people kind of build up this They get stuck on an identity. They're like, I'm not an author, so I can't write. Everybody can express themselves. Everybody has a natural way to do it. And even if you're not necessarily a comfortable, confident writer, you can speak, you can work with somebody, especially with AI and transcription tools. it just as long as you have the energy to kind of keep talking and you never know who who you're gonna help your story is unique no matter who you are and you know it's not up to you to judge like whether your story is gonna be helpful for somebody or whether what you can teach just put it out there and trust that the right people will find their way to it. And I've seen that over and over again. That is an amazing story of it. And the fact that it happens, not always in year one, but sometimes in year 10, 15, 20, is unbelievable. The impact just compounds.

Matt Shoup: Yeah. And I think it's one of the, one of the few things in the world where that, that energy that you invest, I mean, it is a permanent thing that is there forever. It continues beyond you and you don't know how that path and that journey is going to go.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah. What did you do differently when you were marketing and setting out this second book? I imagine you learned a lot, but it's a bigger investment. You were in a whole different strata as a speaker and an author and presumably had some audience and influence by then. How did you take this book out into the world? What did you do to promote it?

Matt Shoup: Yeah. So I mean, the, my, my marketing plan was, was pretty simple. I mean, I've got a kind of a local sphere from, from the other businesses that I've been in. So we've got multiple companies. So cross promoting was always a really big thing. So you've got your, you know, your, your main sphere, like, you know, hopefully your friends and family are going to buy it, but then your business connections. So we were cross marketing and then we were just, we were just doing outreach actually ended up landing and working with a speaking agent who it was funny when I was, she was booking me kind of these small gigs, kind of testing me out. Before I had painted Baby the Book, I was speaking about it and she's like, Matt, you know, once you land this book and it looks good and it did, because I'm going to put you out there more. So landing that and then each one of those, each event that I do, I try to turn that into something new. I'm very relational. I don't do big like funnels or online. I don't think there's anything wrong with that, but I'm just more of a, you know, personal connection networking referral kind of a guy. And that's been great for how I want to have the book land out there and what I want it to do for me in the businesses.

Eric Jorgenson: I think people really underestimate the impact that a book can have even with small numbers of readers relatively, right? Like going in understanding that it's really rare to have a book, you know, sell 10,000 copies or have it spread and go viral like wildflower, but even 500 or 1,000 or 2,000 copies out in the world. I don't know your number, so I'm not projecting, but the impact on a local basis and moving through those personal networks can still have a huge impact on your business, your culture, your community. Was there anything else you did? Speaking agent, second book, done at a higher level of polish, and you'd been getting a bunch of reps at the four figures speaking. Was there anything else you did to break through that? four to five figure threshold. I feel like that's a huge goal for people.

Matt Shoup: Oh, on the speaking side. Yeah. Just believe you're worth it. And that's just, it's the way, it's the way you say it. I don't know if you've ever been there in life, right? Like how much is the scribe professional package? You're like, uh, now hold on. It's, it's, it's 50,000, but let me tell you versus like it's, it's, it's only 50,000. And this, you are going to have the most impactful, amazing book out there in the world. Just, just the way, just the way you say it. And some speakers don't believe they are. And they're caught in this trap. Well, I can't believe I am until somebody's willing to pay it, but you can't even state it with confidence. And that was part of maybe more so than paying a baby, right? That landed me that first gig. It was right, right alongside, you know, they're holding the book on the zoom call. Boom. It's this price. Okay. Come on out.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah.

Matt Shoup: So I think, I think there's, I think there's that. And then once you land that, you know, if you're a speaker. you know, increase, you know, maybe you start just being thankful you can even get paid. And $500 is a lot. Great. You did, you did one for 500, go to a thousand. You know, I'm working with, with Rick on this right now. Like I told him on a, on a previous gig, I said, Hey, you need to, you need to put this number out there. He goes, that's so high. I said, just, just shut up and do it, man. Cause if you undervalue yourself. that they might not think you're going to bring value because you're less than what they're willing to pay or have having the budget and just start ticking it up, you know, connecting with other speakers too. Right. So meeting other speakers on that circuit, having them see your content, maybe you can't land a gig. So you refer. Dave Sanderson, right? Miracle on the Hudson. He was a huge mentor of mine. And then he sends something to you. So there's, there's that and just getting into that space and that world is, is huge. I also, another thing would just go hand out books. You know, I have a certain amount of books where like, I don't care if you buy it or not. I meet you. I have a great conversation. I'm gonna sign a book for you and hope it lands somewhere in the future. And it will. And it does.

Eric Jorgenson: That long game, having a habit around just keeping it sort of present and keeping using it for years and years is so powerful. Again, just like thinking about the surface area. You just want thousands of these books out there in the world. Thinking back to where you were maybe You were just first starting Painted Baby. Let's do that. You had your first book out, but you were really at the crux of the decision to kind of make a big swing at a big next book. What is the most important advice you'd give to somebody in that situation?

Matt Shoup: Yeah, is remember why you're doing this and who it's going to impact. But, but if that message doesn't get out, how are you letting the world down? Right. And that's a very like negative takeaway, whatever kind of approach you want to call it. But like, what if you, what if you don't write this book? and somebody's not holding it. Think of some of the most impactful books that you've read that have changed your life. What if that guy was just having a bad day or was scared or whatever the excuses are that you have, write them down and say, what if Dave Ramsey or Mike McCallewicks or whoever's impacted your life just took that advice and didn't do that, right? Where would you be? And you can't do that. You can't do that.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah, I think that's a, that's a really good way to visualize it. Like there's, there's always somebody, and we've all had that experience of changing somebody's life, sort of one-on-one sitting across the table. And a book is just a really powerful way to do that at scale. And yeah, I think people are afraid to be, be preachy or put themselves out there or something like that. But you know, everybody who opens your book wants to open your book and nobody, it's not assigned reading. So you never know who you, who you're going to help.

Matt Shoup: And there will be people that hate it and talk shit about it. Like, and that's, and that's fine. And that hurts. Like, oh, paint it, baby. I did paint a baby was the worst message. That was stupid. Okay. Like didn't land with you. That's okay. And you can't, and you can't focus on that. Like what you do, you put yourself out there and there's like a nakedness right of a speaker author. Like you're, you're putting out your story and it's going to land how it lands with people and not, not, not everybody is your people.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah. And I think it's so funny. Like I, I cured myself of that fear in like one epiphany, which is if you don't like it, I didn't make it for you. You should have put it down. I don't know. I don't know why you think I needed to make it for you. If you don't like it, like there's lots of things that are made for us.

Matt Shoup: And you're, and you're sure spending a hell of a lot of time talking about how much you hate it when you could be bringing value to other people or doing other things you love. So go do that.

Eric Jorgenson: Yeah, exactly. All right, Matt, that's an amazing place to leave it. Thank you so much for putting yourself out there, for taking the time, for sharing with authors, for staying on the journey that you're on, for choosing Scribe. We've been really honored to play a part in your journey and thank you for continuing to bring other folks our way too. It means a lot. Now, love and appreciate you guys. Thank you so much for everything you're doing for Scribe and everything Scribe is doing for the world.