Transcript
Ken Freire: Welcome back to another episode of the Solo Skilled Podcast. I am your host, Ken Freire, and today i am here with Kevin. Kevin, I just realized I never asked you how to say your last name.
Kevin Creighton: Creighton.
Ken Freire: Creighton.
Kevin Creighton: Yes, it's the Irish version of the Scottish Creighton.
Ken Freire: Okay. You see, almost went Creighton, and I was like, that's probably wrong.
Kevin Creighton: that No, that's the, I have been called that at times.
Ken Freire: So, Kevin, thank you so much for for being on the show. You are a writer, a photographer. And today we're going to talk about you just published your book, but you've also been an Internet marketer for decades and you just kind of know the world. i And we're going to talk a lot about your business and how you're promoting your book and stuff like that. But first, just tell me a little bit about like the origin. How did you get here?
Ken Freire: What's your story?
Kevin Creighton: Well, I grew up in, i actually was born Western Canada, spent 30 years in Arizona, and I now live in Southwest Florida. I've lived there for 10 years. I am a huge, I've always been a reader. I mean, I'll go through, you know read books voraciously.
Kevin Creighton: And my favorite genre these days is detective fiction, reading people like Robert B. Parker with the Spencer series or John D. McDonald's Traves McGee series. Absolutely terrific, well-written books.
Kevin Creighton: But then at some point, the hero says, and that's when we took off our clothes and jumped into bed. And I'm like, hey, stop, time out.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: You know, that kind of conflicted with my beliefs. I'm like, these are great stories, but you kind of lost me there. So what I wanted to do was write something in that genre that a Christian could read and not freak out all that much. Now, I wouldn't call them faith-based. I would call them faith-adjacent.
Kevin Creighton: You know, it's like like Johnny Cash's view on life, you know, on Christianity. Johnny was a rough man, but you want to go ahead and you know, you're not, no one is ever going to deny his belief in Christ.
Ken Freire: Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, it's fascinating that you talk about that because even movies, sometimes there's like, it's a great movie. It it has some great, amazing, you know, themes throughout it.
Ken Freire: And then all of a sudden, like curveball, there's like women getting undressed and they put like the and in there and you're like, what just happened?
Kevin Creighton: Yeah. Why, why did you do that?
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: Yeah.
Ken Freire: So you're like, it and it was like, not necessary. It didn't do anything for the plot.
Kevin Creighton: like Oppenheimer.
Ken Freire: Yes, Oppenheimer was, and and I know like Oppenheimer, some some people were like, no, no, they were trying to show his artistic side.
Kevin Creighton: Perfect example. Yeah.
Ken Freire: I'm like, dude, come on. Like it was like not necessary the way they dropped it.
Kevin Creighton: Right. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. you know And that's, and that's kind of what I wanted to avoid this book. Basically I wrote the book that I wanted to read.
Ken Freire: Awesome. Okay, so now you you've written it, you're yours you're selling it, you're you're kind of that's your goal as a business. I'm curious, how are you doing in growing that market to for people to say, yeah, i want to read this book?
Kevin Creighton: Well, you know, and i am finding, okay, so back up a little bit. I'm good friends a guy named John Gabriel. I've known him for years and years and years. He's a big player on the conservative side of Twitter.
Kevin Creighton: And he started his fiction novel after I started writing this one. So it kind of shamed me in finishing this one.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: Okay, fine, you caught me. He published his book and it got picked up by a bunch of conservative influencers and just blew up. It was the number one book in like historical fiction.
Kevin Creighton: for a couple of weeks. And he said to me though, it was amazing that the people who I counted on to publish to to promote my book never showed up.
Kevin Creighton: And I'm finding that here as well. you know I'm not unknown out there in social media, but by the same token, I wouldn't consider myself an A player by any means.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: And people who have talked about my stuff in the past, the minute you say you have a book to promote crickets, Nobody wants to talk to you. And that's kind of been disappointing. the you know So it's forced me to fall back on plan B, which was old-fashioned shoe leather.
Kevin Creighton: In this case, you know I'm joining a local writer's group with the idea of getting into a book fair and getting more and stuff out that way. In Amazon, the big thing is your reviews. Once you get 50 reviews, things change. You know your you get promoted more. your your Your ads become effective that you run.
Kevin Creighton: So it's getting that 50 reviews, that's the challenge. Those you have to kind of sort of do organically. Excuse me. So that's kind of been you know my biggest challenge is it really, it is a huge pond on Amazon. you know With AI out now, somebody can press a button and write a book and then press another but button and have the cover of a book.
Kevin Creighton: And now all of a sudden you're facing off against them. And it's be it's a bit of a challenge.
Ken Freire: Okay, so so you went old school. I'm curious, going back to the people you expected that they should have promoted it, and not should have is probably the wrong word, but that you expected like, oh these these guys would do it. Why do you think they they ended up not promoting it? Is it more because they felt jealous that you are now in this space? Or do you feel like, what what what do you think it happened?
Kevin Creighton: I think because it's one thing for them to promote something that I wrote for a third party versus to promote something that might benefit me directly like this, that they didn't, you know, that this is me doing shameless hucksterism, which to be fair, it is, you know, but it is, you know, there's that, I guess they just didn't see. And also they get, you know,
Kevin Creighton: They and didn't see, it's harder for them to understand the value of a book versus the value of article that you can skim in, you know, to 30 seconds that, you know, this is worth, this is worth talking about versus, you know, 7,000, 70,000 words in a novel.
Ken Freire: Got it. Okay. So, and that's where you started going back to old school and be like, all right, let's see, how do we help people grow the the book? So what have been some other skill sets or things that you've done to grow it?
Kevin Creighton: I'm going after, but well, as my, presence here indicates, uh, I'm going podcasters, you know, the old school there would, you know, it would have been a radio tour. Now it's a podcaster tour.
Kevin Creighton: you know, the, the, I'm not going to spend any money on advertising for a while until I get that 50 limit. are services out there that are, you know, will help you increase your reviews. And I'm, and I'm engaging in those.
Kevin Creighton: you know, the biggest thing though, it because it's fiction book, I wrote this book, not because I think it would become a uh, you know, an instant bestseller overnight, but I wrote it because I had to, you know, and it's like, I wanted to write this and I did it, you know, for me, I was a photographer for 12 years, commercial photographer, you know, uh, and then I moved over to the internet advertising when I saw the digital was going to wipe out my little, you know, niche that I had and it did. and then, uh, I was a writer, you know, for eight years.
Kevin Creighton: So the, you know I don't do this because it was the easiest thing in the world to make money. If I did that, I'd become you know like a stock worker or something like that. you know I do this because I have to.
Kevin Creighton: Because if I don't give my creative muse some leech, I'm a very ugly, nasty person.
Ken Freire: So, so this is more of like a great outlet for you to say, hey, this is something deep within my heart that I want to put out there. And you're like, I'm not, I'm not even worried about how to make the revenue, it'll come, the Lord will provide.
Kevin Creighton: Right.
Ken Freire: But it's something that you're being driven by passion. Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: Right. And it's the process, you know, it, I have to trust the process. I remember, gosh, eight, nine years ago when I saw, well, 10 years ago when I saw my peers, uh, getting, started off in blogging, you know, I would do 300 words a day, every day.
Ken Freire: Right.
Kevin Creighton: And I would see my peers getting hired on to work full time as writers. And I'm going, hi, I'm here too, guys. Remember me? and And it hurt, you know, for about four or five years to have be passed by. And then I managed to spend eight years at it doing it full time. It was wonderful.
Kevin Creighton: But I had to trust the process that it was going to happen that, you know, work on your craft, work on your enough marketing to become competent at it and stuff will happen.
Kevin Creighton: Yeah.
Ken Freire: So now, as you are processing this, you've kind of taken the long road to create the book, which I appreciate that you're like, hey, I'm going to book fairs, I'm networking with people, I'm doing all this stuff. What have you found to be some challenges that you're up against?
Kevin Creighton: I did not write an easily, a book that fits easily into a niche. You know, this book rear is influenced by my faith, but it's not necessarily explicit about my faith.
Kevin Creighton: I call it faith adjacent versus faith based. You know, if you like the way that Johnny Cash lived his life, you'll like this book. However, one thing I'm finding in my niche among Christians is that A lot of Christians don't like that.
Kevin Creighton: They want to have a bubble that is, you know, oh, we only listen to Christian music because the other stuff is, you know, secular. I'm like, well, you know, Bach wrote some really good secular pieces.
Kevin Creighton: I hate to tell you this, you know, and some really good Christian pieces, too, you know.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: and And so I struggled with this for a long time, actually, when I first became a photographer, because The visual arts and Christianity do not have a good relationship with each other. Music, not a problem. Yeah, yeah everybody knows you can write a Christian song. Not a problem. I mean, look, you know, here go.
Kevin Creighton: Sandy patty, blank. Okay, got it. But I struggled with the idea of creating a Christian photograph. And then a cousin of mine who was a photographer as well, you know, and a Christian, set me down. He said, look, your faith and your worldview is going to come out in your photos.
Kevin Creighton: Worry about being a good photographer first. The rest will follow. and Oh, okay, yeah. You know, it doesn't really, if if if I try to make the message primary, the medium is going to suffer.
Kevin Creighton: So concentrate on the medium being good first, and the message will follow.
Ken Freire: Yeah. You know, it it the the subtle lie that a lot of people, Christians in particular, believe is that sacred-secular divide.
Kevin Creighton: Right. Yeah, no, there's no such thing.
Ken Freire: were There's no such thing. So I think it was Martin Luther who was like, man, love Jesus or love God and like do whatever you want. kind of was like But do it well. Master your craft so that people are going be like, whoa, this was a great book.
Kevin Creighton: Right.
Ken Freire: I'm going to go. I want to learn more about Kevin. And then they'll see that you're a believer and and maybe want to reach out to you.
Kevin Creighton: Yeah, you know, you look at like the foot, the woodcuts of speaking of love, Luther, the woodcuts of Albrecht, they're fantastic. They're gorgeous. And it never once did he decide, you know what, I'm going to make a Christian woodcut. No, I just need to do woodcuts.
Ken Freire: Yeah. Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: Michelangelo, same way. You know, all of that was done that. But we've allowed ourselves to be trapped in this little ghetto. I'm like, well, no, he's a Christian. he can't be He can't really make good music because the message is going away. And the funny thing is we're seeing this now happen in the larger world when you see movies coming out here that pound the message down so hard, they forget to make a good movie.
Kevin Creighton: you know And it's like, why why do people not go into movies? Because I don't need to be preached at 10 o'clock on a Friday night. That's what 10 o'clock on a Sunday morning is for.
Ken Freire: Kevin, I'm gonna use that one. I'm gonna. that's great But it's so true. Like there's certain movies now that are coming out, there's, there's always an agenda and you're like, okay, that's, I came to escape the agendas for a moment.
Ken Freire: And now I'm just being sucked right back into it.
Kevin Creighton: And the same is true, you know, and honestly, i'd i the same is true for a, quote, Christian movie. You know, like, oh no, guys, I just want to watch a good movie about the the gospel, the life of the apostle Paul.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: I don't need you know, an altar call at the end of it. Just go away.
Ken Freire: Yeah. Oh
Kevin Creighton: was It was, you know, and that was, that was, that was the one that really got me. There was a movie that came out about, oh gosh, six years ago on the life of the apostle Paul in prison, where he's telling, telling a story to Luke. and it was great. It was a good movie. It well built. And then they ended it with Eric Metaxas giving an altar call. Now, Eric Metaxas is a good author. His, his biography of Bonhoeffer is fantastic.
Kevin Creighton: But, It's like, did you really need to do that? How about we just make a good movie and let it sit on its own? Okay, pause for a second here. there's They're doing construction next door. I hope that didn't get, did you pick that up?
Ken Freire: No worries.
Kevin Creighton: Okay, good.
Ken Freire: You're good.
Kevin Creighton: Okay. right, next question.
Ken Freire: Okay. So as you're thinking about the the selling of the book, what's the end goal for you? Like, is it just to become a multi-time book author? Is it, hey, going to teach other people to write? Like, what's what's the goal?
Kevin Creighton: That's an interesting question. I mean, obviously, yes, my own yacht is definitely one of the goals. But yeah I'd be lying if I didn't.
Kevin Creighton: One thing I've seen, and this is something I've seen, is we've lost our mythology as a culture where we've had in the past these great epic poems and stories where there's there's a line from C.S. Lewis that he said, I'm going to butcher it, but he says, we don't teach children about dragons to make them scared.
Kevin Creighton: We teach children about dragons to help them understand that dragons can be slain.
Ken Freire: Yeah. Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: And yeah and i butchered it. You know, he's obviously he's like the one of the best writers in the world. So whoops. But that's kind of, I think what we're missing, we're missing the idea that men can be heroic, that they can overcome their circumstances and,
Kevin Creighton: do so in a way that doesn't compromise their belief system or make them into monsters. You know, this idea of toxic masculinity that I'm seeing, I'm like, yeah, I can tell you what toxic masculinity looks like. And it doesn't look like a guy working nine to five providing for his family. That's not it.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: That's the exact opposite of toxic masculinity. We need more of that. You know, I'm teaching middle school English right now. And the majority of my kids but i don't know this for certain but statistically the majority of my kids are growing up in one-parent households i think that's awful
Ken Freire: Yeah. No, and you bring up a great point, because i I'm extremely passionate about this topic. So I'm trying to make sure I don't go off course of the topic.
Kevin Creighton: oh i'm an expert at that i have adhd you know but it's never diagnosed but anyway
Ken Freire: But I mean, this is why i have another podcast. It's like my personal passion project of like, it's called Shameless. But it's helping men just overcome one sexual addiction, but to overcome and like become God given glorified men, you know, like, what does it look like to walk in your God given authority?
Kevin Creighton: yeah
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: and this isn't this isn't really a god thing it's a really a christian thing it's a guy thing you know i was talking with another another person mine said you know the number one i'm a firearms instructor uh i would consider myself be a firearms expert because i've been doing this for 20 years And i'd I've testified court and stuff like that, so you know i i'm I'm okay with calling myself an expert.
Kevin Creighton: But the number one source of death right now with firearms is self-inflicted gunshot wounds by white males, period. And that's horrible. That's a disease. But we're not doing anything about it.
Kevin Creighton: I take that back. The National Shooting Sports Foundation, which is actually the gun lobby, they're doing a very good program on that. But we have this generation of men who have grown up without Other men.
Kevin Creighton: Now, I love women. I mean, my my I've been married to almost 30 years for the same woman. So that's proof that I love women. You know, yeah my two kids, further proof. But men need time to be with men.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: That whole thing about iron sharpens iron. I've had four friends of mine that I've known since 1991, or three friends, the four of us. And we've always been there for each other. In fact, one of them was John Gabriel, the guy who beat me to the punch with my book.
Kevin Creighton: You know, so I've been blessed with that, but I understand there's other people out there who haven't had that. And we've missing that. That sense of camaraderie of, you know, the the way I describe it is the way just one of them recently got a diagnosis, diagnosis of cancer.
Kevin Creighton: And I said, dude, we are the guys on the roof. You know, when g when when Christ was preaching in in in a house. This guy's friends opened up the roof and let him down so he could be healed.
Kevin Creighton: That's our job. We are the guys on the roof. We are there to pick you up and bring you the healing you need when you can't do that. And we don't see those processes in place anymore on and on a on a cultural basis, much less the church basis. We're not even talking about the church. you know For those of you who are not Christians, i this has nothing to do with Christianity. This is a cultural thing.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: And we need that guys on the roof thing, like I got your back. There's nothing wrong with it. There isn't a person, you know, I researched the military. I've never served in service. But I did a lot of research on the military and a lot of friends who served in the military before I wrote this book.
Kevin Creighton: And one thing that's consistent is I got your back. The military trusts, the the trust that's implicit in the military is extraordinary.
Kevin Creighton: And once you remove the people from that trust, those people are like, well, now what do I do? Who do I trust? I can't trust anybody.
Ken Freire: Yeah. and And, you know, sadly, if you also enter into the business world, that's how a lot of business leaders, you know, feel the same. They're like, who's got my back?
Kevin Creighton: Right.
Ken Freire: and And they struggle because as as I listen to you, Kevin, they struggle to even succeed. And I found this for a lot of the people that that I coach and client with that because they're like, I have no one to be a sounding board with.
Ken Freire: I have no one to connect with.
Kevin Creighton: Yes.
Ken Freire: I have no one to engage with. So they give up. Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: And and's it's not only that, like I can trust to do that. That won't stab me in the back. You know, he's sitting there going, yeah, man, I am having problems with this one supplier.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: He is just goofing off and he's not doing anything like, oh, hey, that's business intelligence.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: Let's do something with that. Like, no, no, no, that wasn't meant, that wasn't meant to end up for you to take advantage of. I need you to help me find a solution. That's stabbing me in the back. Yeah. Yeah.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: I, I, I totally understand that. You know, it is, I have been blessed with four friends like that. But I realized that I am the exception, not the rule. And that needs to that needs to change. And that's kind of why I wrote, one of the reasons why I wrote this. You know, we don't have that that archetype anymore of what he a man should be like anymore.
Kevin Creighton: Like you when I was younger, when I first married, we I got heavily involved in promise keepers.
Ken Freire: Oh, yeah.
Kevin Creighton: And promise keepers were fantastic. But it kind of fizzled. And I don't think that large stadium thing is the answer. It may be the answer, but i tell you what, it didn't hurt.
Ken Freire: Yeah. And you're right. And I love how you're thinking about this because you're now thinking generationally, how do we keep having men in the forefront and equipping them in a godly way that they could serve, love and lead their families and society?
Kevin Creighton: Yeah. Yeah, in a godly way, let's let's just expand. Let's go moral way.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: Let's go anything other than a nihilistic way. I'll settle for that. you know, let's just, let me because, you know, I, I see so much nihilism out there that nothing matters that why bother? it it You know, like, no, no, something has to matter.
Kevin Creighton: If it doesn't matter, then all is lost, you know, and, and, uh, I'm fortunate that, you know, my sons understand there's larger things in life that they don't necessarily have to, you know, put down with them, what the world is, is is giving them.
Kevin Creighton: But, You know, I don't know. We are in inflection point in history where one of those points where it's like, you know, as a friend of mine said, we're one of those points we have when all the arrows are pointing to this one. And then this happened, you know, and that's kind of where we are right now it as a society.
Ken Freire: Yeah. Well, Kevin, you know, you and I can talk about society and culture for hours. I'm sure of it. Maybe just need to come back for my other podcast. But what I want to do real quickly, I've been talking to all of the entrepreneurs who have been coming on the podcast, growing their podcast or being on the podcast is this expert led business trend report. So my goal this year is to interview 110 entrepreneurs.
Ken Freire: entrepreneurs right Right now, I think I'm like about 30, if I remember correctly. Same five questions I'm asking and just trying to see like what are people doing. So rapid fire, here are the questions. Question number one for you, what's something in your business you're experimenting with right now?
Kevin Creighton: The biggest thing would be finding the correct in-person contacts.
Ken Freire: Okay.
Kevin Creighton: you know It's easy for me to find stuff online, but finding the right in-person contacts to grow you know, my the sales of my book and increase myself as an author. Yeah, that's definitely the, I've never done that before.
Ken Freire: Okay, that's great. Question number two, what part of your business feels the most influx or keeps you up at night?
Kevin Creighton: What could, boy, and one none, I don't really keep, the study refuse to let anything like this, you know, interrupt my sleep cycle. But probably the biggest thing would be the lack of initial success.
Ken Freire: Perfect.
Kevin Creighton: I was expecting a much bigger launch and it didn't happen.
Ken Freire: Hmm.
Kevin Creighton: And that really, that like, okay. Okay. Well, that didn't work. Time for plan B.
Ken Freire: Yeah, i've I've had that multiple times.
Kevin Creighton: Yeah. Yeah.
Ken Freire: I'm like, we have this launch, let's do it. Question number three, what's a goal you're building toward this year that you're really excited about?
Kevin Creighton: Writing the sequel.
Ken Freire: All right.
Kevin Creighton: I want to, I want to get the sequel out. I like say I teach now, so I've got the summer off and I figure if I can do 1500 words a day, I'll be there. And I can do 1500 words a day if I want to.
Kevin Creighton: That's not a problem.
Ken Freire: I love it. I love it. This is a follow-up question just out of pure curiosity. Are you using AI in any way as you're writing?
Kevin Creighton: Nope. I take that back. I use AI to summarize the book, but I will not use AI as a primary creative tool.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Ken Freire: OK.
Kevin Creighton: I refuse to. In fact, the cover of it there, was designed by a friend of mine who's a graphic artist. I refused to use AI for the graphic for the cover because I was a visual artist.
Ken Freire: OK.
Kevin Creighton: you know And I'm like, well, I could take a photo and use that. you know I don't. i don't AI is not a creative tool. It is a responsive tool.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: It cannot build something on its own. It can only take what has originally been created and then condense it.
Ken Freire: Yeah. Okay. Question number four. Where do you see the industry shifting for you? Maybe might it be books like with ai and stuff like that. And how are you preparing for it?
Kevin Creighton: AI is a big deal in this end of publishing industry, man. Oh man.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: The forums and stuff like that, you know, and it's a big deal in photography, my previous career, you know, I think you know in photography, let's go back up. Cause I know that better in photography.
Kevin Creighton: I think the biggest shift that we're seeing on there is the way that a lot of people are using it is they're no longer providing. Like when you're a commercial photographer, the art director says, okay, here's what the cover of Here's what the ad is going to look like.
Kevin Creighton: You know, You've got your ad here Okay, going to have the copy up here and then a blurb down there and the logo there and this, that.
Ken Freire: Yeah. Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: So your photo has to fit in that area there. And then they just do a rough sketch and they handed it to then I had to create the photo. With AI, what we're seeing now is here's what I want it to look like. Make a version of that.
Kevin Creighton: Like generate the whole darn image and then I get to do my interpretation of that. And that's where I see AI in writing. In fact, in the whole creative industry being like that. Like, okay, you know, like I had AI generate an idea for my cover photo. I said, oh, that's a good idea.
Kevin Creighton: And then I took that photo. I didn't rely on AI to do take, make the photo for me.
Ken Freire: Yeah. Love it. All right. Last question. What's the legacy you want to leave behind?
Kevin Creighton: I'd like to move the needle a little bit on having men care for the other men and for their loved ones.
Kevin Creighton: You know, caring is, is, is Being able to say that you're important in my life is an overrated or underrated a portion of being a man.
Kevin Creighton: We like to think that we don't need anybody.
Ken Freire: Yeah.
Kevin Creighton: I i am a rock. I am an island. You know, no, no, that's silly. I mean, I've got me. I have my my people around me. have my family around me and my friends. No, no. I have all these people that mean a lot to me.
Kevin Creighton: And I want other people to understand they have the same type of people and they need to make sure that they stick around.
Ken Freire: Kevin, for those who are endeared to you and they listen to this and like, man, this is awesome. I love it. And i want to even read the book because it probably might be gripping their heart as you're talking. What's the best way to contact you and buy the book?
Kevin Creighton: Best way to find the book is Search for Salvation by Kevin Creighton, C-R-E-I-G-H-T-O-N on Amazon. My website is kevincreighton.com you can find Kevin Creighton on Facebook.
Ken Freire: Awesome. Kevin, thank you so much. And thank you for your heart for men, because I'm sure that bleeds through throughout the whole book. right And just like saying, how do we help people truly get salvation?
Ken Freire: and And not in the gospel sense, right? But like in just like walking through people a path of there's a better way to live.
Kevin Creighton: No.
Kevin Creighton: Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. that i appreciate i love the time talking with you.
Ken Freire: Yep.
