As we’ll talk about in this video, Derek and I have been working relentlessly on our product publishing company, Dangerous Publishing. In our constant conversations with authors and experts, we’re getting endless insight into the author mindset and pre-conceived notions towards publishers. It’s a nuanced negotiation around each side’s value and contribution to the potential product, and inevitably, the currency is control.

No, you should not self-publish. You’re expertise is bigger than that.

The entire notion of self-publishing is doing a massive disservice to people that won’t realize it until it’s too late. In the same way that open-source tools like Wordpress have turned plenty of damn good content-creators into mediocre code-tinkerers (”Oh, I’ll write more later… I need to go tweak my theme again first…”), self-publishing is convincing otherwise smart people that they should take on every aspect of the publishing workflow.

If you think, inside your mind and on the tips of your fingers, you have brilliance that will make you rich, you may be right. You may have the sort of expertise that will set you up for years of strong, product-based income. We meet people constantly that have that.

Your brilliance means nothing if you can’t let go of control, and you’ll be forever beneath your potential if you can’t get out of your own way, and refuse to stop doing things that don’t matter.

If you want to be small and disrespect your core contribution to the world, go ahead: self-publish your heart out. Spend your time fighting with Microsoft Word page margins, hacking together a shopping cart, learning Photoshop to make mediocre ads, and figuring out how to get your book on the iBookstore. All of these things have nothing to do with your being ridiculously knowledgeable about what you know, and you’ll realize the one thing you don’t have energy left to do is the thing that matters most: create pure content.

As a publisher, we’re concerned with your doing one thing: flowing forth raw, uncut brilliance. We want to see you step into the recording booth, stand in front of the cameras, or sit in a simple text document – and be absolutely world-class. Everything else is production, and if you are truly world-class, you shouldn’t be bothered with the minutiae. The willingness and ability to let yourself be produced is what separates the big players from the little tinkerers that never took themselves seriously.

Muselife is back in action, baby. C’mon, somebody pop a bottle and pour it on the floor.

It’s been ages. I know it, you know it – there’s just no denying it. I guess I’ve just been too busy “lifestyle designing”, huh? No, that can’t be it. If it were, I’d be blogging every 3 hours. So, why the disappearing act? What have I been doing? In short: hustling. Creating, learning, writing, studying, failing, building. I’ve been in Bangkok for 7 months, living and scheming with dangerous minds. We have a lot of catching up to do, and we’ll be doing it with fresh videos. Let’s get started.

In this video, joined by Derek Johanson (@djohanson) of Live Uncomfortably, we talk about a phrase I consciously avoid using: internet marketing and its proper place in building a business. We hit on the importance of the product, and make an insultingly obvious distinction between the getting of money vs. the keeping of money.

Next up…

In the next day or two, we’ll be rolling out another conversation focused on digital publishing, product creation & the neurotic obsession with control that will keep you broke and insignificant if you don’t change your attitude.

Until then, coming to you from the island of Koh Tao … it’s good to be back.

We’re releasing a product called M6 Method on May 28th, 2010. There’s a detailed explanation at the new blog we just launched, and you’ll see a complete overview of the Method rolled out there over the next 6 days. Read this post, then go there, get on the notification list, and see what Method is all about this week. Follow@muselife for updates.

Go to the M6 Blog ›

Now, the longer version…

It’s no secret that muse is a loanword from Tim Ferriss. Predictably enough, it’s gotten tainted over time by aspiring “lifestyle designers” lacking followthrough and shifting blame away from themselves. The hard truth is that creating a business is not something everyone is cut out to do, and if you think publishing & marketing products is any exception – you’re delusional. I’ll say this now and I’ll say it later: It’s not easy, but it’s simple.

Let’s start with some clarification…

muse (bastardized):

A half-hearted, disorganized, bullshit business targeting an unvalidated market, which never actually goes live or generates revenue due to it’s originator quitting the moment it becomes difficult or requires more than two weeks of sustained effort.

Synonym(s): side-project, dream, buzzword

muse (proper):

A well-architected, low-input, process-driven business which produces stable income without demanding constant attention or intervention.

Synonym(s): business

That said, I need to answer a question I hear constantly (and with good reason): “Why don’t you post more often?” It’s true. Sometimes there’s over a month between, and sometimes we drop off the grid entirely. It’s time to explain why, and talk about something that’s going to help you immensely.

To know me is to realize that I’m obsessive. I deconstruct everything until I grasp the underlying frameworks and systems that aren’t clear on the surface. I see through the content to the structure and sequence that enabled it to produce an impact, or understand why it failed to. Years ago, I began studying NLP – and never stopped. The concepts of modeling, strategies & unpacking impact everything I do, and will explain what I’m about to introduce. Before that, a few loose definitions…

• Strategies represent a specific order and sequence of internal and external processes or experiences that consistently produce a specific outcome.
• Unpacking is a process to logically deconstruct a strategy into distinct actions, sequences, or elements.
• Modeling is a means of unpacking a strategy in order to achieve the same outcome for yourself.

You should be wondering why I’m giving a pseudo-psych lecture. It’s simple: nearly everyone is screwing up or getting stuck, and I don’t want you to be one of them. When it comes to creating, distributing and monetizing products, you must be methodical and model a solid strategy. As I move through different projects and work with entrepreneurs, I’ve seen countless parallels and recurrences. Creating businesses and products is about as formulaic as creating boy bands. The bulk of it all is generic and unremarkable, and too many smart people ar getting caught up on things that don’t account for the value of their idea – things that have already been figured out.

Method to the madness

When you crave an optimal way of doing something – and you know you’re not doing it that way – it’s time to stop, step back, and zoom out. When I can’t find something that meets my criteria, and all I can find are mediocre, half-assed efforts by questionable marketers – it’s a cue to create it myself. I needed to deconstruct and systematize it all. Now it’s time to share that. The result is M6 Method.

I’m going to point you to a new blog about this, but here’s an excerpt:

M6 Method is a 6-phase, systematic, process-driven framework for developing and launching product-based businesses, with a focus on low-input operation and distributed marketing effort. It is a logically assembled, reusable, scalable collection of processes and resources supporting the rapid creation of digital products.

From here, keep an eye on the M6 blog for the details over the course of the week and beyond. We’re excited for this, and for what you’ll be able to do with it.

Drop a comment if there’s anything you want to know, or questions about all of this.

Go to the M6 Blog ›

Benny Lewis is one of those guys you’ll eventually meet – in some absolutely random spot on the globe – and immediately take a liking to. For me, that particular meeting spot was near Khao San Road here in Thailand – appropriately enough, in an Irish pub named Shamrock. Here’s what’s remarkable about this chap: at any given moment, you can hear him shift between any of 7 languages in casual conversation. Benny Lewis has the type of linguistic skills that make me feel like a low-functioning autistic by comparison. Fortunately he has that disarming Irish charm to spare the fragile, unilingual ego of the average American.

After hearing him speaking Esperanto (seriously), I was fascinated. After hearing more than a wee’ bit o’Gaelic, I felt an Irish camaraderie with him. Having heard no mention of Elvish or Klingon, I knew he wasn’t just some lonely language nerd (though he did deconstruct Na’vi). After listening to him charm a Parisian model to the point of melting – in fluent French – I was straight-up jealous of him. I recall Sean Ogle and myself were about ready to bow at his feet after we witnessed that moment.

So, how is this relevant? Aside from being fascinating, what does this have to do with turning passion into passive income, product creation, and mobility? Everything.

Mobility

First off, Benny is entirely location independent. He’s lived all over this fine globe, supporting his travels as a language consultant and translator. He has the workflow and toolkit to a science, and this work also develops and maintains his core language skills. He is not crunching spreadsheets in a cube, hating his life, dreaming of a someday that will never come. He’s found a way to fuel his lifestyle doing what he loves.

Check out this post on Fluent In 3 Months for more on going freelance: How To Become A Location-Independent Freelance Translator

Product Creation: Content is king. You are nothing without content.

I don’t speak 7 languages, and I never will. That’s not my passion. However, I could make Benny relatively rich by helping him beautifully package everything he knows into something marketable. Nothing is possible without the content.

At present, you can’t buy anything from Benny. When you go to his sites, you aren’t hammered with promotions for an e-book or a course he’s selling. Everything he’s doing is 100% pure content emerging from his own learning process. This is the foundation for what will become a seriously profitable product/course. Content is all you need. If you are cranking out content around the thing you know best, you can create income. Packaging knowledge is formulaic – possessing the knowledge and sharing it liberally is what counts. Go buy yourself a $500 package from Rosetta Stone or Berlitz. By the time you’re thoroughly frustrated and regretting your decision, Benny will have something out there worth buying. He’s setup a mailing list to keep everyone updated on the status of his Language Hacking course, so I highly recommend you jump on that here.

Proving it

Benny doesn’t flaunt his language chops. He won’t bust into a language for the “Oohs!” and “Ahhs!” it surely gets. Instead, Benny blogs, tweets & films in all 7 languages – every time. Want proof?

• Twitter: English, Irish, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Esperanto
• IrishPolyglot (Blog): English, Irish, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Esperanto
• Video: He re-dubs every video in each language too. Below is a compilation. Check out his YouTube Channel for more.

Wrapping it up

There’s a lot to digest here, but the simple point is this: share as much as you can about the thing you absolutely love, and do so with the realization that you can monetize it. You cannot monetize an intention. You need substance, you need remarkable content. It costs nothing and there are no excuses. Start consolidating, structuring and focusing what you know best, and leave it to guys like me to show you how to turn it into income – fuel for your lifestyle.

Want more on the actual language hacking process?

• Cody McKibben also sat down to talk with Benny, where he goes much further into his specific language hacking techniques and concepts – highly recommend that you check it out over at Thrilling Heroics.
• Check out FluentIn3Months.com

Sam Carpenter (@workthesystem / Blog) is a consummate entrepreneur, business owner, and author of Work the System: The Simple Mechanics of Making More and Working Less, winner of the prestigious Best Non-Fiction of 2009 award at the New York Book Festival. As a huge fan of The E-Myth by Michael Gerber, discovering Sam’s story and process-driven approach to business was a godsend.

We took a trip to meet Sam earlier this month. In addition to inviting us into his home in beautiful Bend, Oregon, he took the time to walk us through Centratel , the highest quality answering service in the United States. After only a short time there, it’s clear why. There is positively zero disparity between the words of his book and the person he is, or the business he’s built. It supports the lifestyle he demands and deserves, and is built on sound principles that you can absolutely replicate for the venture that will fuel your lifestyle.

Before you hit play on these videos, let me be blunt: If you…

• have to show up somewhere to earn your income
• consider yourself invaluable or irreplaceable (and view that as a good thing)
• rely on people instead of systems
• have little or no cashflow
• are working day and night to invent the next big thing
• think service-based businesses can’t be automated and provide passive income

…then you need to listen with keen ear and open mind to this interview series.

Part 1: The Systems Mindset

Part 2: An Eye for Opportunity

Part 3: The Fundamentals

Get your FREE copy of Work The System

Sam Carpenter has generously extended a free book offer to everyone reading Muselife. To immediately receive your full PDF copy of Work The System, simply send an email to pdf@workthesystem.com with the word muselife in the subject line. The actual email can be blank. You’ll receive an auto-response with the PDF attached. Simple!

This offer will expire on March 31st, 2010 so get your copy while you can!