Author: John Briggs, Incite Tax
Why would anyone want to write a book?
It can be such a long and stressful process. Way too much information to organize and turn into something coherent. Questions if you really know what you’re talking about begin to arise. Then all the rewrites, the editing, the cover. It’s a ton of work, but you get through it.
From my experience… it’s well worth it!
As a business owner, you’d generally only write a book for marketing reasons. It’s basically an elaborate advertisement for your services. Not a source of revenue in itself. The sales just aren’t enough.
But when viewed as advertising, you begin to see its potential.
Why in the world did I write a book?
Incite is the largest tax and accounting firm serving micro gym owners in the country.
I was looking for a way to better serve our clients and increase the value of our services. Eventually, my team and I came to the idea of writing a book. We found that with our Profit First service, we tweaked some of the specifics from the original system to fit the needs of small gym owners. So, Profit First for Microgyms became a great way to get that information out to our specific target market on more of a mass scale.
What they get directly from the purchase of the book is a proven cash flow management system specifically tailored to small boutique gyms. If actually used it will literally increase their profit. Not a bad value.
As far as what we get directly from printing and selling of the book is a small portion of the expense and the satisfaction that I am better serving a community of business owners that need it. It’s great and I’d do it again in a heartbeat, but not really a direct impact on my bottom line.
However, indirectly, the book has the potential to significantly increase the value of your services. Which will indirectly impact your bottom line.
From that perspective, the book is a “loss leader”. Not a source of revenue like typical products or goods sold. It’s a marketing tool. Just like any other advertising purchase, the book is an investment in advertising with the hope that new clients brought in as a result of that advertising will bring in more revenue than the cost of the investment.
You go into it knowing you are losing money, but like any other investment, or advertising purchase, it will pay off in other indirect ways that will more than make up for the upfront loss.
There’s also something about being the author of a book that grants you an automatic level of trust. This significantly increases your influence within the community you are serving.
Can I write it off?
On top of the benefits of using your book for marketing and advertising, it has tax benefits as well. Any costs associated with creating the book is tax deductible. That’s everything from writing, to publishing, to printing and selling costs.
Even if we view the book as a loss leader and not a revenue source, it’s still technically a good you are selling, so the printing costs should be categorized as cost of goods sold in your books. Say you traveled somewhere to do some research for the book or to visit your publisher. All those costs are deductible as well. All business travel costs should be put as travel expenses. Any other cost that has to do with your book is considered an advertising expense. It’s all deductible and will decrease your taxes.
Writing a book is a great business strategy.
- Advertising your name and company everywhere the book is seen.
- Marketing to the audience you wrote the book for.
- Credibility as an “expert” in your field.
- More leads and more clients, because people will have more questions and they will go to you because they’ve seen your name and you already know a lot about the subject.
- More content to continually draw from and reuse in other marketing efforts.
- And the expenses to achieve all this are tax-deductible!
Want to know what else you can deduct? Check out our blog on Incite Tax Website.
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