Yesterday, I shared something with my accomplices inside the Brave Group. It won’t be public knowledge for months to come.

I make no secret of the fact that my newsletter is my favorite way to connect and communicate and that I share my best stuff there and not here on this blog. In fact, I’m thinking of taking down the RSS feed for this blog at some point. Not because I don’t want to interact with you. But because the blog is the fake storefront. This here? This is where Google sniffs around to see if I’m worthy.

What’s going on, though? The cool stuff? The real stuff? That’s happening in the secret lairs and hideouts.…

Brilliant ally Hugh McGuire and I sat down recently on my podcast to talk about his company, Pressbooks. It’s basically WordPress with all kinds of powerful book-making goodness developed into it, so if you’ve ever written a blog post, you know roughly how to use most of the features already. Brilliant, right?

I want to give you that interview here, too, so you can listen to it. This came from my radio show, and I’d LOVE for you to subscribe via iTunes or via Stitcher radio (my favorite). But for now? Let’s listen to Hugh:

Those Are The Tools. You Need The Support

I’ve already got 30 really dedicated students in my course, Write Your Book, Already!…

I used to hate to sell. Until I learned what it meant to do so. Or at least what it means when you do it well.

Selling is helping someone acquire something of value to them and capturing some part of that value for yourself in return. S. Anthony Iannarino has a much better definition, but that’s what I’ll use for now. Why? Because it’s easiest for me to get my head around it. Because that’s the best kind of selling. One of us has something useful. The other of us needs that useful thing. We exchange some kind of value. The transaction is made.

The Evolution of “Pitchy Pitch, Selly Sell.”

On my beloved newsletter, the best thing I do all week, if I’m going to sell to you, I’ll tell you right up front.…

It’s great that you participate. Now, create.

Start something. Who cares what? The other day, on a whim, I started a group to talk about health and fitness. I did it because I wanted some place to post what I’m learning about food and nutrition and fitness and motivation and the like. I’m not qualified. I’m not an expert. Hell, Jacqueline, my girlfriend, has her masters in Nutrition, is working on her PhD, and has more certifications than I can shake a stick at when it comes to all this. I’m so unqualified it’s silly.

So why did I dare to start a group to talk about health and fitness?…

I love writing posts that you don’t believe. But it’s true. I don’t really care much about social media. I used to. But it’s just not the most amazing thing in the world to me.

So What?

I think pretty much everyone’s getting tired of social media for social media’s sake. Have you read the front page of Mashable lately? I just did. There’s a post about Lady Gaga, Barack Obama, an owl, and a story about Comcast buying out GE’s share of NBC Universal. And I think that’s cool. I’m not even trashing it. But a few years ago, every single post would be about some arcane tool with a “tw” in the name and pronouncements of the “death of Facebook or Foursquare or …whatever.”

The tools for tools’ sake posts are just not that interesting to most folks any more.…

I am not much of a fan of Will.i.am ‘s music. He’s the guy behind the Black Eyed Peas and several other bits of dance magic. I appreciate that he hits his target perfectly. I’m just not his audience. But I now respect the man immensely.

Thanks to this article in Fortune, I’ve come to realize just how bright a lad he is. He’s not only doing great work in marketing his own products and services, but he’s helping corporate America figure out some of their challenges as well. What’s most interesting to me, however, is that what he’s doing is coming to the picnic with ideas.…

You can write for your idea-spreaders, and you can write for your buyers.

One gets you seen and the other gets you business. I say do both. Here’s a post about content marketing with the mindset of ways to get you buyers.

How Do You Appeal to a Buyer?

Why would someone come to your blog or newsletter in the first place? Precious few of your buyers are thinking, “I’m bored. Entertain me.” They’re thinking, “I’ve really gotta up my game. I wonder what ______ has for me that will improve my universe.” And that’s what you’re writing towards.

Make Your Buyer the Hero

If you’re writing to try and do business with banks, write a post that would help them understand their processes better.…

Content marketing is all the rage, but it’s also confusing.

When talking with plenty businesses (or their marketing teams), what I hear most is “so, this content marketing thing is great, but my CEO demands leads, and sales!” And sure. If you’re not creating content that leads to a potential business transaction, then it’s not content marketing. It’s writing. But how does one create content that’s worth sharing?

People Share Entertainment

Look at the picture that starts off this post. It’s kinda small so I’ll show it to you again:

(Can’t see an image?…

My podcast, The Human Business Way is exploding!

I’m really thrilled with how people are responding to The Human Business Way, my more-than-weekly radio show about business and the bigger stories it takes to make your life amazing. What’s great is that I’m able to share a different side of all this human business stuff by putting it in audio form. And what works well for you is that I do it in around 20 minutes or so every episode, so that you can listen on the way back and forth to work, or while you’re vacuuming, or on the treadmill. Whatever works for you.

My most recent guest was Guy Kawasaki, talking about what it takes to be an author.…