Q&A: "Should I self-publish a mental health guidebook on Kindle?"

What comes first — the followers or the work? Today's listener, from Mexico, is creating a lot, and wants to publish a book.

Hi, Chris, this is Eugenia from Mexico. Thanks for all the generous work you're putting out there. As a former reporter, one of the things I'm good at and actually love is creating content and doing in-depth research. I'm passionate about human behavior and mental health topics. I just started, two months ago, a trauma-informed, interview-based podcast, so I don't want to use that platform to make an offer now. But I want to capitalize on my research skills to write a nonfiction e-book guide with curated mental health tools. So my question is, is self-publishing on Kindle a smart move? What would you suggest I do if I don't have a huge following — not even an email list to promote this guide?

Here's the thing: the point of Amazon isn't to sell to your existing followers — it's to introduce your work to new people. If you already had a warm audience, you wouldn't need to send them to Amazon. What Amazon can do, when it works, is reach readers you couldn't otherwise.

That said, Eugenia has an actual message she wants to share, so building a community over time matters. Even if she doesn't want to pitch a paid product on her new podcast yet, she should use it to promote the platform — start that email list and invite people to join. And on Kindle: it's worth a try, as long as she doesn't expect it to be a runaway success right away.

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