The Entrepreneur’s Honest Guide to Traditional Publishing (and Balancing Business Through It All)

You’ve scaled your creative business, built your email list, and optimized your funnels. Now, you’re looking at the next major authority builder and thinking... should I write a book?

In the latest episode of The Sustainable Creator Podcast, we sat down with our friend, attorney-turned-entrepreneur Sam Vander Wielen. Jo had the privilege of meeting Sam in person at the Craft and Commerce conference last year. She is seriously one of the most down-to-earth humans we have ever met. For the last decade, she has helped online creators legally protect their businesses, incredibly scaling her own digital product sales to over $10 million using just two products . She decided to write a book because she wanted one contained place to put all of her knowledge.

She recently celebrated the one-year anniversary of her incredible book, When I Start My Business, I'll Be Happy. Most people think getting a book deal means instant wealth and a team doing all the heavy lifting. Today, Sam is pulling back the curtain on the real timeline of a Big Five book deal, why an advance doesn't actually pay the bills, and exactly how to market a book as an entrepreneur while keeping your business thriving.

Want to hear the full conversation? Check out the episode here: Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube

Navigating the 4-Year Marathon of a Traditional Book Deal

Sam corrects a major misconception right out of the gate: if you want to write non-fiction, you don't write the book first. You write a proposal. For Sam, the process from the seed of an idea to a flourishing published book took four years.

But even before that seed was officially planted, she faced intense rejection. Years prior, a New York book agent told her she didn’t have a good idea, an interesting story, or a big enough audience. Sam adopted that story and battled imposter syndrome for years before trying again. Once she finally secured a Big Five deal, it took two more full years to write, edit, and publish the manuscript.

What exactly goes into a non-fiction book proposal? It’s not just a summary; it’s a comprehensive business pitch:

Book Outline & Chapter Summaries: You write out a structural skeleton, noting that in chapter one, you will discuss a specific topic, and the reader will walk away with a specific takeaway.
Sample Chapters: You draft a handful of sample chapters to give the publisher a flavor of your writing style.
A Robust Marketing Plan: You have to prove you can sell it. You must list out your network, podcasts you will pitch, and influencers you are connected with.
Audience Proof: You need concrete evidence that people will actually buy the book. Sam emailed her list, gave them prompts, and included thousands of screenshots of their enthusiastic replies directly in her proposal to prove her audience was ready to buy .

The editing process itself is an entirely different marathon. Sam worked in chunks, sending three or four chapters at a time to her editor. After a year of writing and revising, it went to a copy editor for grammar and redundancy checks. Then came typesetting revisions to check for visual formatting errors, and finally, Advanced Reader Copies (ARCs) to catch any last-minute mistakes .

Balancing a Business (and Profound Grief) While Writing

Writing a book is incredibly demanding, and it is very expensive to undertake. A traditional advance is usually split into thirds: you get paid upfront, on the day you turn in the full manuscript, and on the day of publication. Because it is spread out over years, it is simply not enough money to keep you afloat. Sam described feeling like she was running two equally heavy, separate businesses at once.

Adding to the immense pressure, Sam received her book deal on the same day her mother died. Navigating the profound grief of losing both of her parents back-to-back, she was forced into a tight writing contract right away. It was a brutal period. She had to ask her publisher for extensions, advocate for her boundaries, and accept that her initial drafts just needed to be "good enough". She even battled the constant fear that the publisher would realize they made a mistake and abandon her.

So, how did her business actually grow by several hundreds of thousands of dollars during this intensely difficult time? She leaned heavily on her established evergreen systems.

Running Ads: She used ads as a steady lead attractor while her capacity for producing organic content took a back seat.
Email Marketing: She relied on her email list as a reliable, steady backbone. Because she had built an audience of over 66,000 subscribers, she could send out emails and make sales on her digital legal templates with minimal daily effort.

(If you’re struggling to figure out how to structure your own marketing so you can spot actual buyers when your capacity is low, check out our guide on How to Tell if Someone Is a Lead (or Just a Lurker) + Hand-Raiser Content Examples).

100% of the Marketing is on You (Yes, Even With a Big Publisher)

Even with a top-tier publisher handling distribution to Target and Barnes & Noble, designing the cover, producing the audiobook, and managing PR (like securing a Forbes feature), Sam shared that 100% of the marketing execution still fell on her.

Because she genuinely loves marketing, Sam reverse-engineered her marketing into specific buckets: her own audience, guest podcasting, newsletter mentions, and influencers. We especially loved her custom book boxes for influencers. They included stickers, a mug, and tea to create a cozy vibe that matched the book. She also included a brilliant custom card with talking points and social media hooks to make sharing absolutely foolproof for those creators.

Because a book launch isn't just a one-day event, Sam treats it like her other business funnels and plans her marketing in strategic sprints. She targets specific seasons: the New Year for the "new you" energy, the holidays for gifting, and the back-to-school energy of September.

One of her absolute best evergreen marketing hacks? She carries her book everywhere she goes to capture B-roll in the wild. She even leaves copies in little libraries, coffee shops, and hotel rooms just for fun. She organizes her video clips into Dropbox folders by month, so she always has seasonally appropriate footage (like a winter coat vs. a tank top) for her marketing pushes without having to constantly film new content.

Building a Sustainable Creator Routine

Even with the chaos of a book launch and running a massive business, Sam is fiercely protective of her offline time and routines. She isn't a "roll out of bed at 5 a.m. and run a marathon" kind of morning person. She wakes up early but spends time reading Substack (focusing on food and travel, not business), making a high-protein breakfast, and walking before hitting her desk around 10:00 a.m. She takes a long, proper lunch break and wraps up her day with a two-hour dog walk through her neighborhood.

This level of boundary-setting extends to her mindset. Recently, at an intimate 18-person mastermind in Aspen, she realized how much she was holding herself back by waiting for permission. She learned the power of just going for what she wants without apologizing, rather than letting the fear of what others think dictate her path. Sometimes, as creators, we just need to let people be wrong about us, and instead focus on proving ourselves right.

Is Writing a Book Worth It for Creative Entrepreneurs?

When you go with a traditional publisher, you get an advance, and then you have to sell enough books to clear that advance before making pennies on the dollar in royalties. It takes a long time, and writing a book is not a thing to do if your primary goal is to make a quick profit. (Though Sam did get a fun bonus payment and got to be a "professional voice actor" by auditioning for and recording her own audiobook in New York!).

However, a book acts as an incredible top-of-funnel asset for your existing business. Sam regularly sees readers who buy her book, realize they are starting a business, and immediately purchase her $2,000 Ultimate Bundle. As she noted, how many books would you have to sell to make up for a $2,000 product sale?

Beyond the direct sales, a traditionally published book adds an air of legitimacy, opens doors that were previously slammed shut, and helps secure podcast features and speaking gigs. In fact, she loved the experience enough that for her next book, Sam plans to write something with broader positioning to reach a wider audience of people who aren't just entrepreneurs.

You don't have to do business alone.

Writing a book, scaling a business, and navigating life's unpredictable hurdles is a heavy load. As Sam's story proves, you can't always control the timeline or the obstacles. Looking back, she says she survived by leaning into the systems she built and giving herself permission to just let things be enough.

Are you looking for a safe space to connect with other creative service providers who actually get what you do? You don't have to navigate the marathon of entrepreneurship by yourself. Come join us in The Breakroom, our membership community where we actually read Sam's book together in our book club (and she even showed up to our call!). It’s a collaborative, no-fluff space designed for creatives who crave honest conversations and actionable strategy.

Be sure to grab a copy of Sam’s book, When I Start My Business, I'll Be Happy, wherever books are sold, and connect with her on Instagram at @SamVanderWielen