A chance roadblock in a regular career tipped the scales for Jyotsna Ramachandran. When a regular career in the Retail industry refused to move upwards because of geographical constraints, Jyostna decided to completely call it quits.

Refusing to take this setback quietly, Jyotsna started researching for the best home-based ideas for moms. As a young mother, she knew time was a constraint. After a couple of failed ventures, Jyotsna founded Happy Self-Publishing- a boutique agency that helps self-published authors hit bestseller status on Amazon.

The venture blossomed into a successful home business, allowing her complete flexibility and autonomy. Jyotsna says the best part of her job is that it offers the opportunity to connect with tons of other inspiring people along the way.

Her book “Job Escape Plan” became a bestseller on Amazon, and since then, Jyotsna has inspired several other people to start home business ideas with low startup costs and take their vision to the next level. Jyotsna is also a huge believer in the positive mindset theory and has a secret daily ritual that helps her with her success!

Read on to know about her journey:-

Thank you for being with us here today, Jyotsna. 

It’s wonderful to talk to you as well, Devishobha 🙂

You run a successful home business called “Happy Self-publishing” and a best-selling author of “Job Escape Plan”. Tell us a little bit about your background.

I worked at different companies in the retail industry for 5 years before I decided to finally quit my job. I felt that I was not using my potential to the fullest and if I had to continue growing in the corporate ladder, I was asked to move to another city, which I didn’t want. Therefore, I decided to try my hand at starting my own business. My first business was a staff recruitment agency. After becoming a mom, I couldn’t run it efficiently. Then after several failed experiments, I got into online book publishing. For the last 6 years, I’ve been running my businesses from home. Many of my friends wanted to know how I manage to do all this from home. Therefore, I wrote ‘Job Escape Plan‘ to help all those people who want to quit their boring jobs to run a home-based business.

What is the one habit of yours that you think every entrepreneur should pick up?

Journalling is one habit which makes me a more productive person and I would recommend it to everyone. Every morning, on one side of my journal, I write down 3 points about what am I grateful for that day, what’s my top priority task for the day and I also write down one powerful affirmation about myself.

On the opposite page,  I write down my things to do under different categories like income generation, customer service, content creation, health, relationship, etc. At the end of the day, I write down the answer to these 3 questions:

  • What did I achieve today?
  • What did I learn today?
  • Whom did I help today?

This habit puts me in the right frame of mind to be happy for what I have and work towards what I want to achieve.

Your business, Happy Self Publishing helps new authors get published. Can you tell us a little bit about how this works?

Sure! We are not a traditional publishing house. We, in fact, help authors to self-publish their work. Therefore, authors get to keep the rights and royalties of the book. Once they finish writing their manuscript, we ask them to choose one of our publishing packages which will help them with cover designing, editing, formatting, logo designing, website designing, book trailer, uploading the book on Amazon, making it a bestseller, etc. If an author is stuck with the manuscript and needs guidance to finish it, we have an 8-week book coaching program where the author gets to work one-on-one with a book coach. If an author is too busy to write his/her book but has the knowledge in their head, we help them through our angel writing services. Our experienced writers interview the author and use that content to write the book for the author. So, in short, we have something for every aspiring author to become a published author.

If an author is stuck with the manuscript and needs guidance to finish it, we have an 8-week book coaching program where the author gets to work one-on-one with a book coach. If an author is too busy to write his/her book but has the knowledge in their head, we help them through our angel writing services. Our experienced writers interview the author and use that content to write the book for the author. So, in short, we have something for every aspiring author to become a published author.

Do you also help your clients leverage their books to further their businesses?

Yes, we do. We encourage all our clients to give away a free bonus inside their books like an action guide or checklist. This is a great way for our clients to increase subscription from their readers.  We help them set up a landing page and email autoresponder for this. They can later use this data to add value to the readers, engage with them and eventually sell their products/services to them.

Simultaneously, we also help our clients with branding and website as many of them are first-time authors without a strong online presence. A good website with details of what the author has to offer and some testimonials can definitely improve the author’s credibility. Once this foundation is set properly, we work on a 2-week book launch plan and execute the promotions to make the book reach the #1 position under a couple of categories on Amazon. We also create an interesting animated book trailer video to help the author create a buzz about the book.

Your book ‘Job Escape Plan: The 7 Steps to Build a Home Business, Quit Your Job & Enjoy the Freedom’ has achieved best seller status already. Tell us more about it.

I initially wrote the book to just help a few friends and they ended up getting a free copy of the book from me 🙂 The real sale started happening when the book went on to become a bestseller on Amazon. I did a bunch of things to promote the book.

I had interviewed 7 influential people in my book. These people were kind enough to share my book with their audience, which really helped in boosting the sales. I also offered myself as a guest on dozens of podcasts where I get the opportunity to add value to a new audience and also promote my book in a subtle way.

All the noise I created around the book also helped it get listed by Inc.com as one of the Top 10 Start Your Business Books of 2015.

How do you balance your work and responsibilities at home?

I’ve become a master at outsourcing. I would go crazy if I try doing everything myself. So, I hire the right people for the right job in both my business and home. I used to be skeptical about recruiting people before, as I used to think that no one can do it better than me (superhero syndrome). But, after becoming a mom of 2 kids, I’ve accepted the fact that I need help. There are 15 people working with me at Happy Self Publishing. At home, I have a staff to cook, clean, drive and babysit. This helps me save a ton of time every day which I use for higher quality activities like building my brand or playing with my children.

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How does your typical day look?

I wake up at 5 am on most days. I have calls scheduled with prospective clients or with podcast guests at 5.30 am as most of them live in the US time zone. Once I wind that up and while my kids are still asleep, I write in my journal, read a book, pray, go for a quick stroll and plan my day. My husband and I then have our breakfast together (we follow the rule of having one meal at least together). I then get my daughter ready for school and get started with my work day by 9 am as soon as she leaves. I have multiple work slots spread across the day as I get restless to sit at a place for hours together. So in between 2 work slots, I make time for my yoga class, lunch with my mom or parent-teacher meeting. My husband and I make sure our laptops are shut by 6 pm, after which it is dedicated family time at the park, beach or a cafe. We ensure we hit the bed by 10 pm after some cuddle time with the kids.      

What tools, practices do you recommend for women(and men) who are looking to start out on their own?

I would highly recommend a book called Will It Fly? by Pat Flynn which will help aspiring entrepreneurs to test their business idea before they take the big leap from an employee to a full-time entrepreneur. I would also suggest people get into the habit of saving. It is important to save up at least 6 months worth of living expenses before you start something on your own.

What are your plans for the future? How do you see yourself in future roles?

We are planning to launch a new division in our company that’ll publish children’s books written by children. Our bigger vision is to help 5000 people publish their books by 2020.

 

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Raising Leaders All Along The Way: Meet Kiran Bir Sethi

If you know a momspiration, we would love to hear! Write to us contributions@kidskintha.com.