The Publishing Performance Show

Daniel Hurst - From Office Worker to 75+ Books: The Ultimate Author Success Blueprint

• Teddy Smith • Episode 97

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Daniel Hurst is a bestselling author with over 75 published books, primarily in the psychological thriller genre. Known for his rapid writing pace and prolific output, Daniel successfully transitioned from a procurement officer to a full-time author within just a few years. His breakthrough book "Till Death Do Us Part" allowed him to quit his day job, and he later achieved UK number one bestseller status with "The Doctor's Wife" through his publisher Bookouture. As a hybrid author, Daniel balances both self-publishing and traditional publishing, consistently delivering psychological thrillers that keep readers hooked with unexpected twists and compelling characters.

In this episode:

  • Journey from childhood writing dreams to becoming a full-time author
  • Transitioning from office work as a procurement officer to writing
  • Writing process: from "pantsing" to structured outlining
  • Achieving rapid writing speeds of 5,000-10,000 words per day
  • The breakthrough success of "Till Death Do Us Part" that replaced his salary
  • Marketing strategies that worked: Facebook ads and consistent newsletters
  • Balancing self-publishing with traditional publishing as a hybrid author
  • Time management and discipline required to build a writing career
  • Common mistakes new authors make and how to avoid them
  • Building a consistent reader base through regular book releases


Resources mentioned:


Book Recommendations:

  • Before and Laughter by Jimmy Carr


Connect with Daniel Hurst:

  • Website: http://www.danielhurstbooks.com
  • Free book download and newsletter signup available on website
  • Latest book: "The Baby Swap" available on Amazon
  • Weekly newsletter every Sunday with book updates and personal life


Connect with Teddy Smith:

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[00:00:00] Teddy Smith: Hi everyone. Welcome to the Publishing Performance Show. Today I'm really happy to be joined by Daniel Hurst, who is the bestselling author of lots of books. We don't even know how many books are at the moment been so welcome to the show, Daniel. 

[00:00:12] Daniel Hurst: Thank you. Thanks for having me. 

[00:00:13] Teddy Smith: How many books do you think you've actually got now?

[00:00:15] Daniel Hurst: it's in the seventies, but I need to check and obviously it changes all the time because I'm bringing it new ones out and then I lose count and then, yeah. So I'm gonna say 75. Maybe 

[00:00:27] Teddy Smith: you, you just get a counter for the shelf behind you so that we can see what's going on there. Yeah, 

[00:00:31] Daniel Hurst: I've not got all my books up there either.

[00:00:33] Daniel Hurst: And then I get translations now, so it's kind of throwing me off. I'm not keen to total, but yeah, I dunno. 

[00:00:38] Teddy Smith: Well, thanks so much for joining me. It's, it's nice to speak to a British person, so o of often I speak to a lot of American people on here, so it's nice to speak to someone a bit closer to home.

[00:00:47] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, great. Yeah, no worries. 

[00:00:49] Teddy Smith: Well, why don't you tell me a bit about your background and what got you into writing in the first place? 

[00:00:53] Daniel Hurst: Yes. So it was always a childhood dream. It was always something that I wanted to do. So as a kid I would, you know, I'd watch a movie or a TV show, and then I'd find myself with an Air four piece of paper lying on the carpet, you know, making up my own episodes of that TV show.

[00:01:09] Daniel Hurst: Or if I watched a James Bond movie, I'd start writing my own James Bond action. And it's probably just regurgitating what I've seen on the screen. You know, he is jumping off mountains of a parachute. But I do like one air, four side of paper and then give it to my mom and dad and I, I pre presume read it.

[00:01:25] Daniel Hurst: I don't know any mind, I just kind of said, yeah, we've read that and handed it back. but I just used to do that, throughout my youth and, you know, into my teens and, you know, I'd make kind of a, a fate book. So I'd draw front cover, I'd write a story, I'd do the back page. I used to do the barcode on the back.

[00:01:41] Daniel Hurst: you know, I'd only write a four page book, but I used to think, yeah, I've written a book here. And I was always an avid reader as a kid as well. So yeah, that was, that was my youth. And then I guess I always told myself, I'll be a writer when I'm older and that's, that's what I'll do. 'cause you just assume as a child that it's as simple as that.

[00:01:58] Daniel Hurst: And then you get older and you go into the world and you realize you need to get a job, you need to pay the bills. And suddenly that dream kind of went on the back burner. And I wasn't sitting down to type as much as I, I was sitting down to write as much as I used to. Yeah. What, what job did you have before you went full-time into writing?

[00:02:16] Daniel Hurst: so I've had many jobs. I've worked in offices, I went traveling, so I've worked on bars, that kind of thing. But the job I had just before I became a full-time writer was as a procurement officer. I. Which sounds pretty dull. yeah, so sounds like a good name 

[00:02:32] Teddy Smith: for a thriller. 

[00:02:32] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. Yes, it was my job to order things, whether it's for the office like stationary or you know, the paper or, um, you know, anything that they might need.

[00:02:44] Daniel Hurst: I would get free quotes. People would come in and try and sell to me and I would choose the best one. 

[00:02:49] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:02:50] Daniel Hurst: I'm trying to make it sound as exciting and fun as possible, but 

[00:02:53] Teddy Smith: I absolutely it. So were you writing alongside your job for a while? 

[00:02:58] Daniel Hurst: So for a few years I've still had the dream of doing it, but it was, you know, if I had a spur night, maybe I'd sit down and write something and then, you know, so I felt like I was working towards it, but I actually wasn't getting anywhere.

[00:03:10] Daniel Hurst: And then I got married in 2019 and I suddenly thought to myself, okay, the next step will be at some point we'll have a house and then we might start trying for children. And I thought if I start getting all these extra responsibilities, I'm never gonna have time to try and pursue, you know, my writing dream.

[00:03:27] Daniel Hurst: So I did then make the decision to try and use every spare minute I could outside of work. so in the evenings, weekends, my lunch hour, you know, I'd get up early before work. And as the months went by, I just started to pull myself more and more into as much time as I can. Let's get these, let's get some books out there and see what I can do.

[00:03:47] Teddy Smith: Yeah. And can you remember, did you follow a particular system or a particular process with your writing? Was there anything that helped you to really get that structure of, okay in writing, I'm gonna write this amount of words, or I'm gonna write this, amount of chapters. Did you have a process you followed?

[00:04:01] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, so when I first started I was always quite bad at, you know, the new shiny idea. I would jump onto something so I'd get halfway through and then, oh, new idea, jump on that. Yeah, I did that for a few years. So I was always writing, but nothing was ever finished. And then I started to a few podcasts about self-publishing and I found, you know, Facebook groups where people were talking about doing this.

[00:04:22] Daniel Hurst: So it seemed like, okay, there's some people that have somehow managed to, you know, earn enough money to do this. I need to just get the discipline to figure out how I can do it myself. 

[00:04:32] Teddy Smith: Yep. 

[00:04:32] Daniel Hurst: So then when I did commit to writing a book, the first thing I told myself was like, whatever I start writing, I've got to finish it.

[00:04:38] Daniel Hurst: I can't keep jumping between stories because, you know, the years will go by and nothing gets finished. So, yeah, it just became about, you know, I'd set myself again, I wanna do 500 words tonight or a thousand words. And over time, so I get faster at typing and, you know, I get more confident with what I was doing.

[00:04:56] Daniel Hurst: So it did just become, a discipline thing of how many words I want to do, how many chapters I'm gonna do today. And as I got faster and faster, I could kind of figure out how many weeks it'll take to get a first draft. so if I did a lot of that, I knew I wasn't working as hard as I could do. So, yeah, I guess it was one of those things where you just, you look yourself in the moon, like, do you want to do this?

[00:05:18] Daniel Hurst: And the answer is yes. It's like, well, you've gotta give it everything you've got because there's any offer. No, you can't just go onto a job website, pop in your CV and get a job as an offer. You kind of got to make it yourself. It's quite, you know, you've just gotta conjure it all up from inside you and put it into the world.

[00:05:36] Daniel Hurst: Um, so yeah, that kind of requires so much. It's nice to think it's just about creativity and sitting down with an idea. 

[00:05:43] Teddy Smith: Mm-hmm. 

[00:05:43] Daniel Hurst: But it's, it's discipline and persistence and all those kind of, yeah. Not as exciting words, but yeah. 

[00:05:48] Teddy Smith: Yeah, of course. And the targets you set for yourself, was it number of words written?

[00:05:52] Teddy Smith: Was that the, that's how, that's how you got from being like, okay, I'm, I finished the amount of work I need to do for tonight. I've done 500. That's enough. Is it, was that the sort of process you followed? 

[00:06:01] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, so it was, yeah, kind of building blocks of a book. So if you sit down to do 70,000 word book, you are gonna get overwhelmed because it just seems a huge amount.

[00:06:11] Daniel Hurst: But if you can chip away 2000 words a day or a thousand words, you know, straight away you can think a thousand words, 70 days to get a draft. So you can start to making more manageable. And when I found these Facebook groups. There were people in there that were, you know, writing 10,000 words a day. Yeah.

[00:06:29] Daniel Hurst: And it just completely blew my mind. But then I thought, if they're physically capable of doing it, I've got no health issues that will stop me from doing that. So can I, over six months or a year, build myself up to do that? 

[00:06:41] Teddy Smith: Yeah, one of my first interview guests I had on here was Craig Martel, and he said that sometimes he's wrote like 10,000 words a day, and I was just like, how do you do that?

[00:06:50] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. Craig Martel is, he's been a big inspiration. Yeah. Yeah. obviously his group, 20 bucks, 50 k, that was the Facebook group I'm kind of alluding to. 

[00:06:57] Teddy Smith: yeah. 

[00:06:58] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. People in there just, you've got all the ends of the spectrum. You've got people who do one book a year and you've got people who do. One book a month and I just kind of, I guess every offer you find where you fit into that.

[00:07:10] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:07:11] Daniel Hurst: And for me, I had the energy and the time, so it's like I'm gonna, I'm gonna try to do a book a month as well. 

[00:07:15] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Amazing. Now, when you got your first book out, you were writing a, it sounds like you were writing a couple at the time 'cause you had your, that shiny object syndrome, which everyone gets.

[00:07:24] Teddy Smith: Yeah. So which was the first book that actually got released? 

[00:07:27] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. So when I first discovered the self-publishing world, all the advice was to write a book in series. So I was in London at the time. I was getting a tube every day, and I had all these ideas about, you know, all these different people on the tube, where were they going, what were they doing?

[00:07:43] Daniel Hurst: so I kind of made a, a series of all these characters on the tube with different stories that in interconnected. And my idea was to do a series of that. You know, we keep revisiting the characters, different settings, different scenarios, and I did that over time. It was getting some readers, but I found that for me, the, the series wasn't, I think it wasn't to market, so it wasn't exactly taking off.

[00:08:07] Daniel Hurst: so I was enjoying what I was doing. The readers who found the books seemed to enjoy them, but it was still a million miles away from ever being something that I could quit my job and do. So then I decided to try a standalone, standalone book. And because psychological fillers tended to be my natural, my natural voice, what I gravitated towards, like.

[00:08:28] Daniel Hurst: Ordinary situations. and then something unusual happens. I did a standalone book called Til Parts, put that out, run a few Facebook ads on it. And it wasn't like it took off and went to number one or anything, but it started, I could straight away, I could see the difference between that and the CES that I was doing and the interest.

[00:08:48] Daniel Hurst: And I quickly realized, okay, if I can just get a few more books, say it like this. I'll be able to quit my job and do this full time. 

[00:08:55] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:08:56] Daniel Hurst: For me, standalones were the big, difference maker, 

[00:08:59] Teddy Smith: right. And so death till death do us part. So tell us about how you got the ideas for that, and what your process was like for getting that written.

[00:09:06] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, so that book for me is always, is like the most special one. Not just because it allowed me to quit my job, but because. I committed to writing about a year before, and it's like I said, I was writing every sperm minute I had. so I was sacrificing, you know, watching tv, you know, relaxing with my wife.

[00:09:23] Daniel Hurst: There's times when my friends were going to the pub on the weekend I wasn't going. And then when we went into COVID lockdown, I know many people kind of completed Netflix in that time and used it to kind of chill out or exercise. I was just writing all the time. I was definitely getting to the point where I was burnt out, and I wasn't seeing much success or rewards from all that hard work for a year.

[00:09:44] Daniel Hurst: So when I committed to doing a standal and I just sat down and I felt, you know, I've always given it a year of everything I've got, I don't wanna waste anymore time by, you know, doing an outline and, you know, thinking of it too much. So it just kind of pulled out to me. So it was just a simple husband, wife situation, alternating chapters from their point of view.

[00:10:06] Daniel Hurst: And it was basically like the husband's got a secret. The wife doesn't know it, so she thinks he's perfect. So you kind of flipped in between these two, different views softly. The readers in on the Secret, the two characters aren't, and I completely pantsed the whole story. I didn't plot it out. it's about 60,000 words.

[00:10:24] Daniel Hurst: I got to about 50,000 words without knowing how it's gonna end. And then I just thought of like an incredible twist, which I ended up putting in. And which I think helps, you know, make the book successful. yes, that was it. It was just, I went, if I ever go back and read the first few chapters, I just realized that how kind of raw and unfiltered it was, it was just me, just kind of, it was almost, it felt like, in a way it was my last chance.

[00:10:50] Daniel Hurst: I don't think I'd have given up, but I was so tired and I was like, I need, you know, please, this has to work. I can't keep getting up at 5:00 AM and writing before work. So just, it, it would just get words down on the page, see what happens. 

[00:11:02] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Amazing. So, and so you literally had no idea where the plot was gonna go at the end.

[00:11:07] Teddy Smith: Did you just get there and you think, I've gotta end this at some point? 

[00:11:10] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. I was aiming roughly with about 60,000 words. but I actually did this for the first few, standalone self-published books. Yeah. Just kind of completely pants them. because I just didn't want anything to slow me down when I started typing.

[00:11:25] Daniel Hurst: I didn't wanna think, okay, what's gonna happen next? And then, you know, if you're staring at the blank page for too much time, you're getting your own head and then you, you can't, oh, what, what should I do? You overthinking the first sentence and then, because it felt like I was, I was trying to maximize my spare time into writing.

[00:11:40] Daniel Hurst: When I did have that time. I just wanted to get words down. I wanted to work out to be going up. 

[00:11:44] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:11:44] Daniel Hurst: But yeah, just if I, if I had an evening to write, I'm thinking like two frozen words. I'm not gonna spend, you know, an hour in the outline stage plotting it because. Also, again, I guess the more time spent on outlining the risk of shiny new idea comes in and I jump onto something else.

[00:12:01] Daniel Hurst: So yeah. 

[00:12:02] Teddy Smith: Yeah, of course. Why, why were you aiming for 60,000 words? Was that something, just a number that you thought seemed manageable, or is that just, yeah. What was the reason for the 60,000 words? 

[00:12:11] Daniel Hurst: Yes. I feel anything under is probably a bit too short for, you know, a standalone book. But yeah, I guess anything bigger like 78 seemed, you know, a bit overwhelming.

[00:12:21] Daniel Hurst: Um, and also I didn't know if, again, if anyone's gonna read it, is it gonna go anywhere? 

[00:12:25] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:12:25] Daniel Hurst: I didn't want to write some kind of 90,000 word masterpiece that nobody reads. So I kind of hit in the middle 60,000, it seems, you know, manageable. Um, and I was getting to the point where I could write maybe five, six frozen words in a day.

[00:12:41] Daniel Hurst: So in my head I was like, well, that's 10% of a book. Yeah. Yeah. yeah, I'm not that quick anymore. Don't have the energy, but, um, yeah, I guess a lot of it was just expiration. Like, get faster, get faster. And like I said, there was people in Facebook groups that were doing 10,000 a day. 

[00:12:55] Teddy Smith: Yeah. So I 

[00:12:56] Daniel Hurst: knew it was possible.

[00:12:57] Daniel Hurst: It was just, it's like going to the gym, you've gotta, you've gotta build it up. 

[00:13:00] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:13:00] Daniel Hurst: You know, if somebody hears this, think, oh, I can never do that. It's like, I used to think 500 words a day was, you know, my absolute maximum. Then a flight was a thousand, then a flight was 2000. So you do, you do build it up 

[00:13:12] Teddy Smith: just a bit of practice and you just sort of get better at the, all the different processes.

[00:13:15] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. I guess it's like mechanics as well. Like your hands will just get faster at typing, so that helps. Your brain will, the more you engage in the story, your brain comes up with the next sentence quicker. 

[00:13:25] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:13:26] Daniel Hurst: I kind of, I try and end each chats on a bit of a hook. obviously it keeps the reader going, but for me as well, if I hook into the next chapter, so want chapter.

[00:13:35] Daniel Hurst: Okay, 

[00:13:36] Teddy Smith: let's, so that's, that's what I was gonna come onto next. So let's, let's go into that in a bit more detail. So your books are kind of psychological thrillers mostly, or Yeah. The sort of genre you go for. And so one of the things is you've got that hook at the end of the chapter. So how do you approach things like the suspense and the pacing?

[00:13:53] Teddy Smith: Do you have like a, a, a way of, getting those bits of details down before you start writing, or is it just a case of you've got 'em in the back of your head and you just start writing? 

[00:14:02] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, so these days, I do structure out full outline before I write. So a basic, each chapter, what happens, but I, I don't always know how I'm gonna hook at the end of the chapter until I'm almost at the end of the chapter.

[00:14:15] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:14:16] Daniel Hurst: I think obviously I've done so much now. I'm used to getting towards the end in my head, okay, 200 words to go in this chapter. Right. Let's start making it exciting so you, the reader wants to carry on. 

[00:14:25] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:14:26] Daniel Hurst: but yeah, in psychological fillers, it's kind of known as a genre where there's at least a big twist at the end.

[00:14:31] Daniel Hurst: And if you can add more twists before that, you know, fantastic. So, yeah, I guess it, as I was writing it, I was trying to come up with ways where you, you taking the reader one way and then you can, you know, you take 'em another way halfway through and then you know, if you can get that big twist, you know, the twist at till death is a big one.

[00:14:49] Daniel Hurst: I can't say that all my books have got such a big twist at the end, and it's quite hard to come up with. I think sometimes the best twists are the ones where if you are writing it and you don't know where it's going as a writer, then the reader's never gonna guess. so that's the best twist. Whereas if you've got a really good twist in the outline stage, you know, you as you're writing it, you're probably seeping in a few things that setting the seeds, but then the reader might pick up on it.

[00:15:13] Daniel Hurst: so yeah, there's definitely something to be said about pantsing and plotting, like both of them have got the strengths. But just these days, I think pants is a bit too stressful to write, you know, so many words and not know how it ends. 

[00:15:25] Teddy Smith: Do you find that you still do that pantsing, like whilst you're writing, so you'll have that structure outlines, and then suddenly you'll just think of something else and you think, oh, well maybe I've gotta rewrite this whole section.

[00:15:33] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. So when I do the chapter outlines, it's quite short. I don't want to give myself the whole thing because then it just feels like you're just going through ticking off. You know, painting by numbers, so there's definitely room to go off on tangents and different things. And when I work with a publisher now, I do tell them that, okay, here's the outline, but if I get halfway through and something comes to me, I'm gonna try and weave that in as well.

[00:15:56] Daniel Hurst: yeah, that obviously having an idea in the moment is the most exciting thing as an office, so I wanna keep the space for that. 

[00:16:03] Teddy Smith: Yeah, definitely. Now, you mentioned before like the first book you released that was almost enough for you to essentially quit your job. So did you, how, what did that feel like?

[00:16:12] Teddy Smith: What was that got? Did you have a particular sort of monetary aim in mind? So sort of replace your salary, or was it just a case of let's just get this first one and see, see how it goes? 

[00:16:20] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, so it was definitely just replaced the income that I had, um, from my office jobs. It wasn't a high powered, high paying job.

[00:16:27] Daniel Hurst: I was probably like the lowest paid person in the office. so it wasn't like I was trying to hit six figures a year or anything crazy like that. I think it was like about 35,000 a year. just made like two and a half grand a month, something like that. 

[00:16:38] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:16:39] Daniel Hurst: And I would've probably quit a bit under that.

[00:16:42] Daniel Hurst: I was quite happy to just get bare minimum wage and, you know, struggled for a while. But my wife, obviously wanted to see a bit more. 

[00:16:49] Teddy Smith: You 

[00:16:49] Daniel Hurst: know, so she was like, if you, yeah, I know. Yeah. So she was like, if you can earn what you're earning from your office job, then obviously end, there's no issue. so, but that, so it didn't seem like much, but that still seemed a huge goal to reach.

[00:17:03] Daniel Hurst: So in my head I was kind of thinking about a hundred pound a day, if I could just get to that. and when you, you know, when you're earning zero or five pounds a day, it seems just so far away. so. KDP self publishing dashboard and it was approaching that a hundred and then the next day it was still up there.

[00:17:17] Daniel Hurst: I was thinking, oh my God. Like this is everything I've ever dreamed of. Like, I can't believe this. yeah, I remember sitting in the office, opposite my boss. We both on our computers and I was checking Amazon, like til death. How was it doing? 

[00:17:30] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:17:30] Daniel Hurst: it was kind of going into the charts. It was, you know, it was probably only in the, just in the top 1000 or 800, so it wasn't anywhere near the top.

[00:17:39] Daniel Hurst: But for me, you know, having never been anywhere like that, I was like, oh my God, this is, this could be something. And I, I remember just thinking, my boss has got no idea that I've got this thing going on in the background. You know, like my dream's coming through before my eyes and that she's quite thinking, right.

[00:17:53] Daniel Hurst: I've got, I'm gonna make Daniel do this this afternoon and we've got this. Yeah. 

[00:17:57] Teddy Smith: Right. That's amazing. And, so with, your books, you had, you've had a couple that have been gone onto bestseller. So could you, let's go through some of the marketing strategies that worked for you both for your first book to get it to replace your salary and also the marketing that worked to really get your books up into the top levels.

[00:18:15] Daniel Hurst: Yes. So when I started out, I knew I wasn't, obviously you've gotta be a bit of a salesman. If you're gonna self-publish, you've got to sell yourself. But I didn't wanna spend all my time doing the marketing because. One, I didn't have the knowledge or the experience. And two, my dream was to be a writer, not to be a, a marketer.

[00:18:33] Daniel Hurst: So I com I kind of discovered the things that seemed enjoyable. So doing a newsletter, that's a big thing for self-publishers, and I decided to do one every single weekend, where some people might do one a month or they might just do one when they've got a new book out. I thought, okay, every Sunday morning I'm gonna send a newsletter.

[00:18:52] Daniel Hurst: Just tell my readers what I've been up to. And then obviously any book news. And they enjoyed that. 'cause it didn't feel like I was selling, it was just, here I am, this is what I've done this week. And obviously when it started, there wasn't many people reading those newsletters, but I just carried on doing it anyway.

[00:19:07] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. And also I knew the two big advertising platforms for self-publishers was Facebook ads or Amazon ads. And I watched a couple of videos on both straight away. Amazon ads completely confused me. So I was like, I'm not doing that. I have no idea how that works. And to this day I've still never done that on self publishing.

[00:19:26] Daniel Hurst: so you've never done any Amazon 

[00:19:27] Teddy Smith: ads at all? 

[00:19:28] Daniel Hurst: Not myself, no. Never. Oh, wow. Now I'm ever publisher. Everyone's from Amazon ads for me, but I've never, I just couldn't figure it out. yeah, so I just do Facebook ads 'cause that seemed quite easy. in comparison and even that was very basic. Most people would do Facebook ads on the desktop.

[00:19:45] Daniel Hurst: I had the app on my forums. I just did the very bare minimum. 

[00:19:49] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:19:49] Daniel Hurst: you know, phone cover, my book tag line, couple sentences at the top, and then just the link to Amazon and, 'cause I didn't have much money when I started. It was maybe five, 10 pounds a day blood chip. I always felt like I'm gonna have to do multiple books rather than, you know, write one book and then hammer the advertising.

[00:20:07] Daniel Hurst: It was always bring a book out, advertise it for three weeks. But in those three weeks I'm writing the next one. 

[00:20:13] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:20:13] Daniel Hurst: So I've got something new to advertise. and I was always looking at it like the, the 20 books, 50 K model, rather than having one best seller, can I have 10 or 20 bucks that are just making enough each.

[00:20:26] Daniel Hurst: for me to do this. but yeah, I wanted to make sure most of my time was writing, not marketing. And fortunately I've always been able to do that, which is why I can write so fast because a lot of authors say, you know, you've gotta spend your morning writing, but then your afternoon marketing. Yeah. And I was like, no, I'm spending my morning writing and my afternoon writing.

[00:20:44] Daniel Hurst: That's what I want to do. That's a dream. So that's what I did. 

[00:20:47] Teddy Smith: Yeah. And so now you write how many books, how quickly do you write your books? 'cause you, you've basically. Produce lots, lots of books each year. So how, how long did it take you to write one book? 

[00:20:58] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, so when I went full time, obviously having the whole week available to write, and all the excitement and enthusiasm I had with that.

[00:21:04] Daniel Hurst: I was just writing, you know, all day from morning till night, so I could get a draft, like two weeks. and then it's, I slowed down a bit, but I was still very much Monday to Friday, nine to five, just writing the whole time. 

[00:21:17] Teddy Smith: So, 

[00:21:17] Daniel Hurst: yeah, I was comfortably doing 7, 8, 9, 10,000 words a day. and it, I gotta to the point where it didn't feel like it was, it was too difficult because I'd maybe do, you know, 1500 words an hour.

[00:21:29] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:21:29] Daniel Hurst: Or, you know, three hours in the morning, three hours in the afternoon. It's like 9,000 words a day, but still find time to go for a walk. I go to the gym, So, yeah, I did that for a couple years and I guess there was always that fear and paranoia because I, I still remembered what it was like to work in the office that I hated, so I was like, this might all go away any minute.

[00:21:44] Daniel Hurst: So. Maximize it while I can give my readers, you know, as many books as possible, get all my ideas out. yeah. So I did that a couple years and then me and my wife had a daughter, so obviously that slows everything down. 

[00:21:55] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:21:56] Daniel Hurst: so yeah, I, I definitely don't write as fast as I used to, but I guess from the outside, anyone would still see how many books I've got out and think, oh, he's, he's not slowed down at all.

[00:22:06] Daniel Hurst: But I know him himself. I've definitely slowed down. But I do try to get a draft in, you know, three or four weeks maximum, just because it still feels fresh for that amount of time. And after a month it starts to get a bit, okay, I wanna move on to a new idea. so if I get it finished in a month, it's, I know it's still fresh.

[00:22:25] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Right. So you actually kind of get bored with your own writing by the time you've finished your first draft? 

[00:22:29] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. If it starts to get three or four weeks in, I'm. If I'm near the end, it's fine, but if I'm only halfway through, I'm thinking, oh, it starts to feel like a bit of a, because I'm already thinking of the next thing.

[00:22:40] Teddy Smith: Yeah. And do you, um, do you work with an editor with your books as well? 

[00:22:43] Daniel Hurst: Yes. I've got someone who, so when me self-publishing, it's, it's more just an edit of, you know, tidying it up and the, the grammar and the sentencing and, you know, the other, um, apostrophe and all that comes. Right, right. So you basically just go 

[00:22:56] Teddy Smith: line editing with self-publishing?

[00:22:58] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, so with self-publishing it's kind of just the freedom of, this is my idea, um, this is what came to me in this month, so I'm just gonna put that out there. and then I was approached by a couple of publishers since the success of the self-publishing and obviously they go through much more story development, um, 

[00:23:14] Teddy Smith: yeah, 

[00:23:14] Daniel Hurst: different rounds of edits.

[00:23:16] Daniel Hurst: You know, they'll, it's good 'cause they'll push me to try. I've got a draft and I think, oh, what if we try this? You know, they'll make it better. It just takes more time. 

[00:23:25] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:23:26] Daniel Hurst: so yeah, I can see the value of both, but I do enjoy the self-publishing 'cause it's very much, if you've got your idea, you can just keep that whole idea intact.

[00:23:33] Daniel Hurst: Nobody else is gonna, um, try and mold it in, shape it into something. and I think that's one of the reasons I had this success because. When I first started start publishing, to be honest, I couldn't name dozens and dozens of psychological Phil author. I didn't know who the best sellers were in my genre.

[00:23:50] Daniel Hurst: I just had an idea. So I started writing it. And when you do work with publishers, obviously they're, it's a business. They're data driven. They will try and steer you towards something that they think will definitely work. 

[00:24:03] Teddy Smith: Yep. 

[00:24:04] Daniel Hurst: so you definitely more of a framework. So I'll do a couple of my publisher.

[00:24:08] Daniel Hurst: And I'll, I'll set some time think like the next book, self published. I can do whatever I want. I can, my title is my title. It's not gonna be changed. so I enjoy the freedom of that and it feels like I'm just starting again when I do that. So it's quite exciting. 

[00:24:21] Teddy Smith: Nice. And so with your books now, you've got some that are self-published and some that published.

[00:24:25] Teddy Smith: how did you, how do you balance the difference between being published and self-published when you're writing different books? And also how do you decide which ones you're gonna self-publish and which ones you're gonna go through the publishing route. 

[00:24:37] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. So yeah, I guess I've call myself a hybrid offer now.

[00:24:40] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. Ly in what camp? Or? I'm in between. with the, so obviously when my publisher says, okay, we shall we do a couple of books together, then I'll just come up with some ideas. We'll go back and forth, we'll have zoom calls, and then we'll eventually settle on a couple of ideas. If something comes to me at any point in the year, I think I'm excited by that and I come up with a, maybe like a unique title and, but back of my mind I'm thinking, well, if I go to my publisher, they might the point change title.

[00:25:09] Daniel Hurst: They might try and steer me another way with the story. I think that'll keep that one for myself. So it's kind of on the back burner. so then when I'll do my two books with a publisher and I think, right, let's do a couple of self-publish books and then go back to the publisher again. So, yeah, it's nice to just kind of go between like both worlds and I've definitely reached a much, much bigger audience with going with a publisher than I ever could have done.

[00:25:33] Daniel Hurst: Really? Really? Yeah. I mean, I guess I could have reached more, but I again, 'cause I don't wanna spend all my time marketing. I don't wanna spend too much money marketing. there's always gonna kind of be a ceiling, when it's self-publishing. Team up with a publisher as well. There's been translations, audio books have been created, so I've definitely reached, you know, the much more, 

[00:25:54] Daniel Hurst: So, yeah, I can see obviously working with a publisher is, there's so many more avenues that I wasn't going into. but self-publishing for me is more about, I guess the eBooks and the Kindle, you know, page reads, that kind of thing. 

[00:26:06] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Nice. Now when you speak to, I guess you must speak to authors a lot who are like new authors and wanting to get into writing and things like that.

[00:26:14] Teddy Smith: 'cause your backstory is so inspiring. Like people must wanna hear from you about like how they can get started as well. So are there any particular mistakes you see that new authors make quite often and is there any tips you've got for avoiding them? 

[00:26:26] Daniel Hurst: yeah, I guess I think back on some of the mistakes I made.

[00:26:29] Daniel Hurst: it is funny because when you go into it and you hear all of them, you know, there's YouTube videos about don't make these mistakes and you think I'll never make them. And then you for some reason it's like you have to go through it and they're called the mistakes before you get through what works.

[00:26:42] Daniel Hurst: So for example, you know, writing a book and then thinking, oh, I don't need an editor. So you just put it out and then it gets, you know, pulled apart. 'cause people are saying the grammar, you know, it's a good story, but the grammar's not good. 

[00:26:54] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:26:54] Daniel Hurst: or thinking I can design my own front covers. I tried that myself.

[00:26:58] Daniel Hurst: Absolutely terrible idea. So there's all these obvious things. So it's like if, if your script is writing, stick to that, but then understand the editing, cover design, that's another skill and expertise. So I get somebody else that can do that. And also, one of the things I get asked from people who, who want email me and asking, they wanna be offers, usually the question is, how do you write so many books?

[00:27:25] Daniel Hurst: How do you write so fast? and it's difficult because. It's not an exciting answer, but it's like it is just sitting down and typing words and getting faster at it. I guess a few years ago I didn't appreciate perhaps how much time I had, especially when I went full time. 'cause we didn't have a do then, so I could just write all day and into the evening if I wanted to and stayed up till midnight and get up at six and, you know, so I, I feel like now, okay, you know, if people have got a couple of kids at home, it's not as easy to do that.

[00:27:54] Daniel Hurst: So it is just about finding time in your day, and some people probably need to look at it and honestly think if I'm working a day job, that's got nothing to do with writing and my dream is to be a writer. What am I doing in the evenings when I get home? Am I watching TV or that's not gonna help get you anywhere closer to what you want to do?

[00:28:17] Daniel Hurst: am I spending all weekends going out doing things? It's like, can you reduce those hours? You know, instead of watching TV every night. Can you only watch it two nights a week instead of going out every weekend? Can you have a couple of weekends that you keep to yourself? And, you know, it's not an exciting answer, but it's, that was the biggest thing that made a difference for me when I said, I'm going to use all my spare time for writing, rather than, you know, sitting on sofa or going out to the pub.

[00:28:44] Teddy Smith: Mm-hmm. And it 

[00:28:45] Daniel Hurst: was, that's, that's what made a difference and, and committing to that. And, you know, you have, you have to sacrifice something if you want to. If you want your dream, you've gotta sacrifice something. It, there's no other way about it. 

[00:28:56] Teddy Smith: Yeah, definitely. And also the benefit to reducing that stuff is when you do finally go to the pub, it's way more fun.

[00:29:02] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. Yeah. It's nice. Yeah. I pub last night actually with couple friends and Obviously there's times where they'll say, oh, you know, it's all right for you. You don't have to go to work tomorrow. You wish I was my own boss. And, 

[00:29:14] Teddy Smith: yeah. Yeah. It's thing that Jimmy Car said, isn't it? Everyone wants to like be the on the stage, but no one wants to do the work in the back end to get to that point.

[00:29:21] Teddy Smith: And they don't really Yeah. You, 

[00:29:23] Daniel Hurst: yeah. You, you wanna see you, the Jimmy car's 

[00:29:24] Teddy Smith: waking up at 6:00 AM every day to write 20 jokes and stuff like that. Yeah, 

[00:29:28] Daniel Hurst: exactly. Yeah. Yeah, I read Jimmy Carr's All Wealthy actually. Is, that was quite, inspiring. It's all about, yeah, you know, the hard work it takes to follow your dreams.

[00:29:35] Teddy Smith: yeah, amazing. That book it's called, it's called Before and Laughter. 

[00:29:37] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, that's the one. Yeah, I read it a couple years ago. Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:29:41] Teddy Smith: Really 

[00:29:41] Daniel Hurst: good book. but that's what I say as well, if people listening to this thinking, oh, but you know, I don't wanna sacrifice all the time with my family or, you know, watching TV or weekends, you don't have to do it forever.

[00:29:51] Daniel Hurst: It's just, it's a certain amount of time If you can commit to whether it's six months or a year. If you can do it and make it work and you become a full-time author, you've got the entire week, you know, to play with. so today actually, I'm not done much writing. I've been to the gym, whilst we're doing this podcast.

[00:30:08] Daniel Hurst: So it's not as if I'm just still waking up and, oh, I've gotta get 10,000 words done. I've got no time to do anything, you know? 

[00:30:13] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:30:14] Daniel Hurst: If I wanna just go and watch TV after this, I can. Now, obviously, I'm not gonna go the other way and not be disciplined at all, but it doesn't have to be. One thing or the other, writing and everything else is neglected.

[00:30:26] Daniel Hurst: you can do it for short time and then read the rewards afterwards. 

[00:30:30] Teddy Smith: Yeah, definitely. Now, before we go onto the books, you are like currently working on your sort of upcoming projects. What are the books that you've previously written that were like, maybe either they're the bestsellers or they're the ones that really turn the dial in terms of getting you like more famous for want of a better word.

[00:30:48] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. so self-publishing, it was, I think my success grew just from being consistent and rapid release books coming out almost every month for, for the first couple of years. So the readers I got, they just knew that I'm never gonna have to wait too much time for Daniel's next book. so it was quite nice that once I found my readers, they would always, you know, they'd read the book and they'd like, when, when's the next one?

[00:31:10] Daniel Hurst: Like straight away, you know. If I had a book out yesterday, I did it today, like when's the next book? So it's almost like my readers are, I found a group that won books all the time. 

[00:31:21] Teddy Smith: Mm-hmm. 

[00:31:21] Daniel Hurst: so the first couple of years just being, disciplined enough to keep providing those books, was enough to build self publishing, create.

[00:31:29] Daniel Hurst: And then when I signed with, we did, the doctor's wife, which was office put together, and it went to UK number one, which is. Yeah, on the Amazon Kindle store, which was a massive surprise. I never expected that. so obviously that's my bestselling book. and that's been, you know, translated into multiple languages.

[00:31:50] Daniel Hurst: So I guess that made a huge difference, I think in, yeah, I guess it exposed me to so many more readers who perhaps either don't read self-published books or they don't find them, or, you know, whatever it may be. And it's just, it's just time. It's the accumulation of, I've been doing this now for four or five years, so something simple as your Amazon follower accounts.

[00:32:12] Daniel Hurst: you know, if you're a self-published offer, you can, I'm not sure, I think maybe any offer, you can see how many people follow you on Amazon. 

[00:32:17] Teddy Smith: Yep. 

[00:32:18] Daniel Hurst: and again, like when you start anything, it's zero, then it's one, then it's two. So it's not gonna do much. But over the four or five years, it's built into the thousands.

[00:32:27] Daniel Hurst: So it just means that each new book that comes out is much easier. It is not like it sells itself, but I don't have to advertise as much because I've got the foundation. The fan base is there. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. My Facebook page is built up time, my Instagram page. so it's, it's not as if I am having to, if a book does well, I've, I've, I've spent more money on it.

[00:32:47] Daniel Hurst: I've pushed it more. It's just, I think it's just a gradual buildup. And then there's always books that some do better than the others. And you're not sure why it was Exactly. but I just look at it as I've written a book. I enjoyed that. Here it is. And then now I'm onto the next one. I'm not too about each one has to be bigger and better.

[00:33:06] Daniel Hurst: I'd better think that way. 

[00:33:07] Teddy Smith: Amazing. And so what are the projects you are working on the moment and what are the new books you've got coming out? 

[00:33:12] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, so I had a book out yesterday called The Baby Swap, which is just over there. yes, that's, that's the next item. It's one my publisher, which means f to write.

[00:33:21] Daniel Hurst: Its so far in advance. So I think it was August when I wrote this one. So in my world, that's like an eternity ago. 

[00:33:28] Teddy Smith: Yeah. It's 

[00:33:29] Daniel Hurst: quite funny to see people just finding it now and like, oh, I love the twist at the end. And I'm thinking, oh, what was the twist at the end again? Because I've written six books since then.

[00:33:38] Teddy Smith: it's like when, it's like JK Rowling gets people coming up to her and telling her about the stories in her book, and you're like, well, yeah, no, I wrote that. But 

[00:33:45] Daniel Hurst: yeah.

[00:33:45] Daniel Hurst: But yeah, I'm always, I'm always on the next thing. I think in a way that's, it was a way of me when I first started back shielding myself from the stress and the worry, because, you know, if you pour your heart and soul into a book like any author does, and you put it out there, if you just sit back and wait to see what happens, obviously it might be amazing.

[00:34:04] Daniel Hurst: People might think it's the best thing ever. But there's a chance it might not do well in the charts. There's a chance it might get one star reviews, and if you've just put all your eggs in that basket and sat back and waited to see and then it hasn't done well, there's a potential that it could obviously devastate you and you might not sit down and write this, the next book.

[00:34:23] Daniel Hurst: So I guess there's an insurance policy. For me, it was always, okay, I've finished the book that's coming out in a few weeks, but I'm gonna write the next one. So by the time that first book comes out, I've already written the next one. So it's, I'm not gonna stop if that book doesn't do well now 'cause I'm still going, if that makes sense.

[00:34:39] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:34:40] Daniel Hurst: I still do that to this day. I never kind of rest and think, okay, I've got a book out next week and I think it's gonna go well, so I'm gonna, you know, take a few months off and see. 'cause there's always that voice. It's like, well it might not do well. And then, you know, you've gotta, you've gotta then sit down to write the next book on the back of something that's not done well.

[00:34:56] Daniel Hurst: Yeah. It's best to keep ahead of it all the time. 

[00:34:58] Teddy Smith: Yeah. And most of your books are standalone. Have you got any plans to write any series upcoming? 

[00:35:03] Daniel Hurst: possibly. I've done a few books now, like the Doctor's Wife became a four book series. done a couple of self-published books where I've done a sequel, which I was always kind of against doing, because you're worried that, you know, if you commit to doing a sequel and then the first one, not many people read it.

[00:35:16] Daniel Hurst: You think I've given a sequel to something that nobody wants. but yeah, I've. I'm definitely seeing a value in I, yeah, I used to think you do a standalone. That's the whole story. I've maximized those characters and then move on, but I'm, now I'm seeing, oh yeah, there's so much more I could do with these characters.

[00:35:32] Daniel Hurst: So it is nice to do that. So yeah, I definitely got, definitely got plans to do small series. I'd say maybe not the Big 10 book series that many people do, but yeah, three or four books I think I could do. 

[00:35:43] Teddy Smith: Nice. Well, it's been great chatting to you. I've, it is been absolutely fascinating to hear your story.

[00:35:47] Teddy Smith: I love, you know, looking forward to hearing your, your seeing your new book out on the shelves. It's gonna be really exciting. remind me ru of the name of that new book that's coming out and where people can get hold of it. 

[00:35:55] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, thanks. It's called The Baby Swap. so at the minute it'll just be on Amazon.

[00:35:59] Daniel Hurst: and then hopefully it does well and then it might start popping up on some bookshelves, and translations and things. Yeah, the baby swap on Amazon. 

[00:36:06] Teddy Smith: Fantastic. And if people wanna get in touch with you or to hear more about your work, where's the best place to hear about you and sign up for your newsletter and things like that?

[00:36:13] Daniel Hurst: Yeah, so that'd be my website, uh, www.danielhurstbooks.com. Not the most original there. yeah, if you go on there, it's quite a basic website as well, because I've did it myself. 

[00:36:24] Teddy Smith: Yeah. 

[00:36:24] Daniel Hurst: yeah, if you go on there, you'll see there's a free book that you can download and that signs onto my newsletter. Oh, great.

[00:36:31] Daniel Hurst: And it's. My book moves on the other half of just me and my wife and my daughter and what we've been pursue. Nice. Great. Well it's been great chat you to, I'm looking forward to seeing your more success and coming back on to hear about your new books. Yeah. Thanks Comingle. We'll speak in soon. 

[00:36:47] Daniel Hurst: I've enjoyed it.

[00:36:47] Daniel Hurst: Thank you. Bye. 

[00:36:49] Teddy Smith: Thank you so much for tuning into the Publishing performance podcast. I really hope you found today's episode inspiring. I love chatting to authors, writers, and people in the publishing world. Now, just before we wrap up, let me tell you about publishing performance, the number one platform for authors who want to increase Amazon book sales, but I'm not really sure where to start.

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