From Corporate Darling to Entrepreneurial Author with Jamie Trull
If you’re an entrepreneur dreaming of a traditional nonfiction book deal, the single most important thing you can do is stop treating your book as a “nice-to-have someday” and start building the platform, proposal, and patience that make a publisher say yes.
In this episode of Kind of a Big Book Deal, hosted by traditional publishing expert Meghan Stevenson, the journey to landing a nonfiction deal is shown step-by-step through the story of CPA and profit strategist Jamie Trull, whose book Hidden Profit comes out with Simon & Schuster in 2025.
The path they illustrate has three pillars — Meghan’s 3P Framework™:
Potential: A needed, differentiated idea that can sit in a crowded category and still stand out.
Platform: Real people who show up for you — email subscribers, social followers, community members, buyers — not just vanity metrics.
Proposal: A substantial, structured document that proves your concept, voice, and business case to agents and publishers.
When you combine a category-worthy idea, a loyal audience, and a strong proposal — and you’re willing to play the long game — traditional deals become achievable instead of mythical.
Potential: Positioning Your Idea So A Publisher Cares
Meghan didn’t just see a “finance book” in Jamie’s work; she saw a chance to challenge a behemoth in the category — Profit First — by offering something more nuanced and effective for today’s small business owners.
Key aspects of Jamie’s potential:
She’s a CPA and profit strategist with deep real-world experience, including corporate work for a major Coca-Cola bottler.
She spotted a gap: existing small-business finance books were either too simplistic, too frugal, or too sleep-inducing to be genuinely useful for entrepreneurs above roughly $200k in revenue or with more complex businesses.
Her content already reframed money management as something accessible, customizable, and strategy-driven, not just about cutting expenses or following rigid formulas.
Meghan explicitly pitched Hidden Profit as a kind, evidence-based “takedown” and upgrade to Profit First, even sending the proposal to the same imprint that publishes Profit First. That’s what strong potential looks like: a book that can sit beside the leader on the shelf and convincingly answer, “What’s better about this?”
Platform: Why Loyalty Beats “Big Follower” Numbers
Traditional publishers care less about how many people follow you and more about whether those people take action when you show up. Jamie’s platform illustrates that perfectly.
Her audience story:
She built a free Facebook group, Financial Literacy for Women Business Owners, which grew to about 41,000 members — initially through weekly live trainings, later exploding during COVID when she showed up daily to help people navigate PPP loans and unfolding rules.
She ran zero ads to grow the group; the growth came from service-first leadership and organic invitations.
She later shifted focus to YouTube, where content lives longer, but that Facebook group remains her “original tribe” and core loyalty base.
Meghan and Jamie emphasize that:
Jamie didn’t build a platform just to get a book deal; she showed up to serve, and the deal became the fruit of that work.
Loyal followers who trust you because you’ve helped them — sometimes for free, years ago — are far more powerful than a million passive followers on TikTok.
In the proposal, they leaned hard on this loyalty and engagement, not just raw numbers, to show publishers that Jamie’s people “crossed the Rubicon into fandom” and would show up for preorders and launches.
For your own path: publishers want platforms that demonstrate consistent service, clear niche, and real reciprocity. Fandom and trust are more persuasive than sheer scale.
Proposal: The Real Work Behind “Getting A Deal”
If you think a proposal is a 10‑page pitch deck, this episode will lovingly disabuse you of that notion.
Jamie’s experience:
She initially imagined the proposal as something short and simple; in reality, hers ran around 90 pages, including detailed chapter summaries and substantial sample material.
Writing the proposal felt, in many ways, like writing a big chunk of the book, which later made the manuscript phase easier because they had so much content and structure already mapped out.
Meghan’s biggest value-add was not merely editing sentences, but structuring ideas: mining Jamie’s existing content, spotting patterns, and shaping the book’s flow so the concepts made sense and built on each other.
The proposal did double duty:
It convinced agents and editors that Hidden Profit had a clear market, a strong voice, and a distinct position relative to Profit First and other finance books.
It served as a blueprint for the eventual book, making the drafting phase more focused and less overwhelming.
Meghan also leveraged her industry relationships to introduce Jamie to agents, resulting in multiple interested parties and the chance to choose an agent and editor who felt like the right long‑term fit.
Landing The Deal: Submission, Fit, And Simon & Schuster
Getting an agent and going on submission is exhilarating and vulnerable at the same time. Jamie’s journey shows both sides.
They did two rounds of submission to editors before landing multiple offers, which is exciting but also emotionally intense — each meeting involves some level of judgment and potential rejection.
Some editors passed for various reasons (platform questions, list needs, timing), which is hard but part of the process.
Ultimately, Jamie signed with Simon & Schuster, specifically the Simon Element/Simon Acumen imprint, with an editor she absolutely loves and describes as a perfect fit.
What stood out to Jamie:
Visiting the Simon & Schuster offices in New York and seeing herself as “a Simon & Schuster published author” carried real gravitas and made the long journey feel very tangible.
The editorial process significantly improved the book, making it “a million times better” than if she’d tried to write and polish it alone.
It’s a reminder that the right publisher and editor aren’t just a logo — they’re partners who help your book become its best possible self.
Money, Advances, And ROI For Entrepreneur Authors
Entrepreneurs tend to see everything through ROI. Traditional book deals complicate that instinct, and this episode addresses it head‑on.
Jamie’s situation:
She signed her deal during a period when publishers were generally tightening budgets, so her advance landed just under six figures — lower than some Meghan clients, but with a higher likelihood of “earning out” and moving into royalties.
She had to uncouple her sense of worth from the size of the advance. Advances reflect many factors, most of which an author can’t control (timing, list needs, macroeconomics), and they are not a direct measure of your value.
Her goal is not to become rich from royalties alone. Instead, she sees the advance as a way to cover upfront costs (team, marketing, hiring), and the book itself as a long‑term asset that drives:
New audience discovery
Speaking opportunities
Back‑end business growth
Meghan adds that oversized advances often create debilitating pressure, especially for authors whose money stories make large sums feel overwhelming or “loaded.” A right‑sized advance can actually be healthier and more aligned.
Expectations, Timelines, And The Long Game
Traditional publishing operates on multi‑year timelines that clash with the “launch in one quarter” tempo of online entrepreneurship.
Jamie’s timeline:
First serious “Is it time?” email from Meghan: late 2022.
Proposal work, submission, deal, editing, and production stretch across three years.
From her perspective, the book journey is a “birthing process” with many milestones spread far apart: finishing the proposal, getting agent interest, landing the deal, completing revisions, entering preorders, and finally launching.
She emphasizes:
You need patience and a willingness to invest upfront — time, energy, money — without immediate payoff.
The ROI is more like a long, gentle slope than a single launch spike; the book becomes part of your backlist and continues to sell and attract people over years, not weeks.
As a numbers person, she intentionally reframed success: publishing the book itself is success, regardless of list placement or exact sales numbers. Impact on readers and business is the deeper metric.
Meghan echoes that entrepreneurs must adjust to “hurry up and wait” dynamics, limited visibility (e.g., monthly preorder updates instead of real-time dashboards), and the reality that for the publisher, your book is one product among many — while for you, it’s life‑changing.
The Big Advice: What Would Jamie Tell An Entrepreneur Considering A Book?
Asked what she’d say to another entrepreneur or expert thinking about this grand adventure, Jamie distills her experience into a few core pieces of advice:
Be patient. Traditional publishing is slow, and the payoff is spread out over time, not a single launch moment.
Adjust your ROI expectations. This is not a quick funnel experiment; it’s a long‑term asset that will quietly work for your brand, business, and opportunities for years.
Don’t tie your self‑worth to the advance. Focus on impact, reach, and strategic alignment, not just the size of the initial check.
Get help. Having a guide like Meghan who understands the process, structure, and relationships makes an overwhelming journey navigable — and makes your book better.
And beneath all of that: know yourself and what you want. In money, in business, and in publishing, clarity about your goals and values makes it much easier to choose the right path — traditional, indie, or something in between.
Questions Answered In This Episode
How did Jamie Trull go from corporate CPA to entrepreneur and author?
What is Meghan Stevenson’s 3P Framework™ for landing a traditional book deal?
What does a full nonfiction proposal actually involve and why is it so extensive?
How did Jamie land her agent and ultimately choose Simon & Schuster as her publisher?
What surprised her most about writing and revising the book?
How do advances work, and why shouldn’t authors tie their worth to the advance amount?
How can entrepreneurs think about ROI and long-term payoff for a traditional book?
Why is patience essential for business owners entering the traditional publishing world?
How can authors emotionally sustain themselves through a multi-year process with slow feedback?
What would Jamie say to entrepreneurs considering traditional publishing vs. self-publishing?
This week’s guest is Jamie Trull. Jamie Trull, CPA, is a Financial Literacy Coach and Profit Strategist dedicated to empowering small business owners to maximize profitability and grow sustainably. With a background as a Finance Leader at Coca-Cola, Jamie transitioned from the corporate world to serve women-owned businesses as a Virtual CFO. Observing a critical gap in accessible financial resources for small business owners, she shifted her focus to financial education, using her CPA designation to break down complex financial topics into easy-to-understand strategies. Jamie has built a following of over 100,000 small business owners on YouTube and social media, where her guidance helps entrepreneurs achieve strategic growth and retain more profit. Her upcoming book, Hidden Profit, will be published by Simon & Schuster in October 2025, providing readers with essential tools to unlock their businesses’ financial potential.
Preorder Jamie’s new book, Hidden Profit, and receive $300+ in free gifts! Find more information and links to preorder the book at https://jamietrull.com/book.
