Thursday, June 3, 2010

Gini Graham Scott, Ph.D.



GINI GRAHAM SCOTT, Ph.D., J.D., has taught at California State University, East Bay, Notre Dame de Namur University, and the Investigative Career Program in San Francisco. She writes nonfiction, scripts and has published over 50 books. Her latest books on business relationships and professional development include: WANT IT, SEE IT, GET IT; DISAGREEMENTS, DISPUTES AND ALL OUT WAR; 30 DAYS TO A MORE POWERFUL MEMORY; A SURVIVAL GUIDE TO MANAGING EMPLOYEES FROM HELL; A SURVIVAL GUIDE FOR WORKING WITH BAD BOSSES; and A SURVIVAL GUIDE FOR WORKING WITH HUMANS (all from AMACOM 2004-2009), AMERICAN MURDER (Greenwood 2007), others such as HOMICIDE BY THE RICH AND FAMOUS (Berkley 2006, Greenwood 2005); HOMICIDE: 100 YEARS OF MURDER IN AMERICA (Contemporary 1998), YOU THE JURY (Seven Locks 1997), CAN WE TALK? THE POWER AND INFLUENCE OF TALK SHOWS (Plenum 1996), MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS: THE BATTLE FOR PERSONAL PRIVACY (Plenum 1995), THE TRUTH ABOUT LYING (Smart Books 1994), POWER OF FANTASY (Citadel 1994), and PRIVATE EYES (Paladin 1994, with Sam Brown).

She has received national media exposure for her books, has hosted a weekly radio talk show series, CHANGEMAKERS, featuring interviews on various topics, which aired from 1991 to 1993 to 2 million listeners in over 70 countries. Scott has written over 100 songs, featured at http://www.songworks.net/ , and has cuts on several records. She has won awards for her photography, featured at www.artsandphotos.com. She has designed several lines of dolls and character licenses and writes children's books....and this isn't all, check out her websites (she has many more accomplishments!!)

Let me start by stating when I ‘googled’ you, there were 36,000 results! I also discovered you have 4-5 separate websites on very diverse topics such as music-as you’ve written over one hundred songs, books-on almost every topic one could write on, AND you have a few consultant companies and not to mention you’ve taught at several universities all over the U.S! And…every book you’ve written has its own site! It must be REALLY good to be Gini Graham Scott.

Oh, thank you.

And….you’ve been on several talk shows like Montel Williams and Oprah…. And what other shows were you on?

I was also a guest on CNN, Good Morning America…The O’Reily Factor …to talk about topics I’m an expert on….

Which seems to be EVERYTHING...

…I could get calls on the topic of crime for example because I’m considered an expert…. I’ve written many books on crimes ….

Right now as you know I’m writing a blog. Most people blog for many reasons…one of the reasons I blog is because I’m a scatter brain and I just don’t want to lose what I’m writing. However, the overall goal for my blog is to write a book…do you think this is a good way to do that?

I think most definitely. I also started using a blog…I have this book called Playing the Lying Game and the original book, was from a blog…

Really? Christian Lander did that…wrote a blog as kind of like a joke and it became a huge success...the book is Stuff White People Like. That’s good to know it’s also worked for you. So what’s that book mostly about…about lying?

Well there are different categories of liars and….there’s this continuum. I had a lie quiz at the end of the blog and many people wanted to know about it so a lot of the information is the same in the book. And after the book came out, I started posting articles and posting them on EZINE an articles.com site where there are about 250,000 articles in return for links to their websites…

That’s a smart way to promote what you write!

And I also have a service that sends out quires and press releases so I have a data base and from time to time I will send out postings…it’s a PR and networking connection…

So, if someone wanted to consult with you…

Well, there’s a fee. I subscribe to a number of queries…I’ve used it for myself and the business which connects writers to publishers…then there are other categories like film festivals…I also tie into what I’m currently doing...

Which is?

The next thing is how to write and produce your own short film. It’s useful to people doing these short films…for someone who just wants to just take a camera out with them… that’s fine. But for someone who is really serious, this book is informative for them.

Wow, so it seems to me that whatever you’re doing in your life…becomes a book?

Yes! Thankfully whatever I do, I write about (it).

You’re a great promoter for all these projects. What’s a good tool one can use to self promote?

One is Linked-In to promote your business or yourself….

My boss uses that and it certainly has helped her obtain clients. I have to get an account now. What about for book promotions?

You know the book business have changed so much and it’s very much celebrity driven…

It really is!

The mainstream publishers have had these blockbusters, celebrity- books AND people are reading less or in different ways…so now there are e-books and packaging blogs into e-books…

Hmmm, I guess it’s true the ‘old way’ is no longer the most effective, it seems.

It’s something like 500,000 books getting published each year and 350,000 of them are self- published.

So you think that’s the way for writers to go then?

It certainly is one way, yes, that’s something I’m doing now for clients…

Can you give me an example of how that’s worked for one of them?

Well, for example I have a self-published client who’s published and has had great success. She’s managed to sell thousands of copies and that’s a lot even for books that have been published by reputable book companies!

That is! How long did that take for her to do?

Only about six months.

Wow! What are some difficulties people face when looking for a book company to publish their work?

Well, what publishers want these days is someone who already has a platform. Like I said before, books are more celebrity driven and if you aren’t famous or well-known they may not represent you and if they do, the advance for a book these days compared to in the past is about half. If a self published book becomes successful and I help my clients make this happen…then they can build a platform…

And then they can get bigger advances from those reputable book companies like Random House!

Exactly…things are vastly changing for ALL writers including those who have been represented and published by major book companies many times like myself. I’m doing other things to promote my work myself now.

Like what specifically?

Well one very basic and simple way to self promote your work is through FaceBook.

I’m doing that for this blog too. And I've seen musicians do this...and comics. One comic posted a link on my wall to promote himself. His name is Luke Francis actually and now I’m buying his DVD...he's very funny! So, that promotion strategy can work.

Yeah…I’ve been building up my face book account and I think at some point I’ll write a book about this process also…

Big surprise there (laughing).

Well, it’s whatever I’m doing, you know if I know a lot of these things it becomes possible…it’s just very easy to publish books these days….the average book is for people looking for quick reads.

And ‘Quick reads’ would be considered… how long exactly?

Oh, only about…50, 000 words and some publishes will only want to work with those types of books because they sell a lot quicker. I have a few books like this ….they’re substantially shorter…

Wow, I always thought the book writing process was LONG and it took years to publish a single book.

Everything in this business is changing…now I think you must have an ability to market your book where you have an audience for a particular niche like you have someone who’s looking to mortgage and you have some information on that…there’s a book for that purpose. So, for a lot of people with all these formats, you can cut out the’ middle man’ or if it’s not really for the purpose of making money although that’s also nice…you may just want to have more marketability… to get hired for companies….

The e-book and self publishing thing is starting to sound like a good idea to me now.

Print-on-demand is another way and I have a book on network marketing and another one on party planning…which at one point was published by The Idiots Guide for a few years and then I got the rights back.

You can get the rights back for books you’ve published for companies? I never knew that.

Yeah. I have 20 books that were published by major book companies and I got the rights back for them years later and by dividing them up into sections with let’s say 90 pages, it makes it easier so people can still buy the book but there are also ways they can just buy a section so that’s another way to sell it for much less…

That’s smart. I always wondered about that…what happens to books when they stop selling at stores?

I help my clients with all these things and I also tell clients how to pitch film rights for their scripts….there’s just a number of things I do consulting for with my PR firm.

And you have a …PHD in…

Sociology... I just found that there was less interest in that and there was a cut back in this at the time and so I sort of shifted myself and I ended up writing a lot of books about businesses.

So what was your first book then?

Well my first book was my dissertation for my doctorate but it was shortly after this I wrote Working with Humans and then I wrote Working with Bad Bosses as a follow up which I wrote next when I was commissioned by a book company to write it.

Where did you get your research? These must have been fun to write. I can’t think of anyone not having had a ‘bad boss’ it’s just such a common thing…unfortunately.

Yes, at one point I had one…and I’ve interviewed people and I did the same for the book on ethic s and lying…they’re based on interviewing… and some of these recent books are from PR and discovering what other people do.

What about that funny photo book I used to always see in Barnes and Noble…the dog one? That was a HUGE book, it was everywhere at one point….who published it?

Random House published that…it was Do You Look like your Dog

It was brilliant…what made you think of it?

I was just testing a data base and put up some pictures and little comments and I was contacted to make an entire book out of it so you just never know what people are finding interesting.

Is it still out there?

No, not in stores no...but you can still buy it of course. After a couple of years I got the rights back from Random House for that one also.

How can this happen? I should have asked you that before.

Oh, that's okay (laughing)...when the book goes off the market….after sales go below a certain number or point, you write a letter stating that you want the rights back and sometimes they’ll tell you to purchase the unsold books for a fee…..it’s not a big deal with most publishers.

Was that book your most money making book?

No, Want it ,See It, Get it...which uses manifesting techniques was more popular and sold more…and Playing the Lying Game was very big also a lot of people took an interest to it.

Wow, and how do you come up these ideas…how did you obtain the knowledge for the manifestation books which I mean are HUGE now, The Secret for example sold millions of copies.

It’s like The Secret in a way but…I think my book is more of a methodology that can be applied to any technique.

What kind of technique?

Well, I would consider it a compliment to this book…it’s how you can apply it… mine is more you want to express your gratitude; here are some ways you can do this...

So, what’ll your next book be about?

I think the Linked-in book that’s getting finalized as we speak, is going to be very popular….it’s a comprehensive guide and gets more involved with all the different capacities of this network strategy.

Oh, I see. So what else can you tell me about yourself?

Well, if anyone has a book, film, song or idea they’d like to promote, they can reach me at http://www.ginigrahamscott.com/ or changemakers@pacbell.net or http://www.publishersandagents.net/ or info@changemakerspublishandwriting.com or http://www.e-bookpublishing.com/ or http://www.changemakersproductions.com/ some of these are my own sites and others I sold but I still do consulting with them.

I was going to just ask you about that! That's a lot for one person...well, thank you so much Gini for sharing all your pearls of wisdom…I want to be like you when I grow up and publish fifty books and be a guest on Oprah and Montel Williams and Bill O’Reily …even though he can be mean…

And you can….and you will! (laughing).

Hope so! Think I’ll need to read Want it, See it, Get it to learn tips from you first...

It’ll help you manifest anything you want and bring it to life!

That's so awesome….I’m so excited…thanks again.

You are VERY welcome Phil!