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Business Growth 2
How to Self-Publish Your
Book
by Paul R. Lloyd
Is there a book waiting to pop out of your head? Is it written but
collecting electronic dust inside your computer? Maybe you wrote it,
submitted it to some publishing houses or agents and for whatever
reason its been rejected. Bottom line, if you want it published,
its time to do it yourself.
How many books can I expect to sell?
Do self-published books sell well? If you put Seth Godin's name on
the cover it will. Ditto for
Stephen King. The key to book sales is what's called the
author's platform. It's basically your network.
Like most selling efforts you start with the idea that you will sell
1% to 2% of the people in your target market. How big is your
personal network and how many are in your target market? If you can
reach 1,000 targets with a good message (sales pitch), you should
expect to sell 10 to 20 books. Expect better results from friends
and family. So maybe you're good for 50-75 books if you know 1,000
people including friends and family plus networking connections. Add
in a few speaking gigs and you'll up the results. How many books do
you want to sell? It's a math game, isn't it?
EBook or
Paperback?
Your profit opportunity is important. Publishing an ebook is very much
the same as publishing a regular book, except you save the cost of
printing. You might want to offer your book both ways since you can
use print-on-demand methods for your paperback with little or no
upfront cost.
Sales Support Tool or Product You Sell?
Don't self-publish a book or ebook unless it provides some value to
you. It can either be a sales support tool or a product that you
sell. For example, giving away an ebook is a great way to get people
to sign up for your email newsletter. In that sense, you want to
think of an ebook as a sales-support tool rather than a product you
sell. Since most of us don't have a huge following like a Seth Godin,
using ebooks to build a database is an excellent way to begin. The
idea is to have something you want to sell to your database like
consulting gigs, speaking opportunities, etc.
If you plan to sell your ebook or paperback book, then you will be going
into the content business. Content providers (your competition) use ebooks and paperback books to support their speaking careers. Speaking
is where the money is, not the book.
Self-Publishing for fun and profit
Let's say you have this unique special knowledge that you want to
turn into an income producing opportunity. You want to sell this
knowledge to the many potential buyers in the universe. You can do
this through several means:
Paid speaking gigs
Seminars
Books (ebook or paper)
Consulting gigs
Coaching
Teaching at the university level
Incorporate as many of the the selling methods as possible so that
people have a variety of ways to purchase your content. The simplest
model is speaking gigs and seminars (highest income potential) combined with
books you sell. You can leverage your books to gain the speaking
opportunities. The speaking opportunities should lead to
opportunities for paid consulting, coaching and teaching gigs. You
can sell your paperback book or ebook on DVD at every speaking gig
to leverage the selling opportunity. Keep in mind that you may have
to speak for free many times before you establish yourself as a paid
speaker.
Your content business can be a nice income producer and may lead to
a business idea or opportunity that is scalable as you meet some
fairly significant people through your thought leadership.
Building your platform
The basic approach to building a platform is networking, especially
online social networking. Begin by giving content away until people
start offering you money for it. The perceived value of your content
has to be extremely high. The classic example of this model is Seth
Godin. He gives away high perceived value everyday to what...
gazillions of readers?... on his
blog. He publishes a book through a
major publishing house on a regular basis. Because his following for
his free stuff is so huge, his book sells bazillions of copies
without a whole lot of additional effort. Of course there is
additional effort. The publisher puts it in every bookstore in the
world. His publisher runs a huge PR program to push the book. As a
result, Seth gains another quintillion readers of his daily blog,
plus he makes big bucks in book sales for himself. And we haven't
even gotten to his speaking and consulting gigs which are sure to be
high paying.
Use Seth Godin as a model and build your content business on a
small scale to start and then build it up. The better your content,
the more likely you are to succeed. Your stuff doesn't have to be
all that original. It has to be trustworthy and stimulating. It has
to demonstrate thought leadership. It has to be directed at a big
enough market to support your sales goals, but small enough to be a
clearly defined niche.
And it has to be a business. A one-time ebook or paperback book is not
going to go anywhere by itself. Do you want to go into the
content business or do you want to write an ebook that will support
your current business? If you are thinking of writing only one book,
the best plan is to use it as a sales support tool for your regular
business.
The seven steps to creating a self-published book
1. Write your manuscript. We're talking about a non-fiction
business book. Your book should have something important to say. Ask
yourself what action you expect your reader to take after reading
your book. Write an outline that makes the case for the action you
want the reader to take. The action should be the result of
something you teach the reader or new information you convey. Visit
a bookstore and compare your outline with business books that are
already published. How is your book different? What makes it better
or unique? Why would a reader want to purchase your self-published
book instead of one of the books available at the bookstore?
2. Edit
your manuscript. No one gets it right the first time around.
Edit and polish your writing. Consider joining a writer's critique
group while you are writing your book. You will be trading your time
to edit chapters of other people's books in exchange for other
people editing your book. Most critique groups focus on fiction
writing but will usually allow a nonfiction writer to join. Fiction
writers have a lot of expertise to offer on what makes good,
compelling writing. For example, they can advise you on the use of
hooks and teasers. (If you live in Chicago's western suburbs, I run
a writer's group that is free to members -- send me an
email if you are interested.)
3. Have at
least 6 people from your target readership read your manuscript.
This is your basic research to find out if your polished manuscript
works for your audience. Incorporate any necessary changes or
suggestions into your manuscript based on reader comments.
4. Review
your manuscript one last time. This is your chance to find any
typos or other tweaks you want to make before you spend money
printing your book or releasing it as an ebook. If releasing as an
ebook, decide how you will distribute it and set up your
distribution system. One way is to promote your ebook on your
website with a free download. If you are building an email marketing
list, consider requiring the visitor to sign up for your email
before having access to the ebook download. You can either sell or
give away your ebook depending on your overall marketing program. If
you are planning to print paperback books, continue reading. You can
find an example of an email newsletter sign-up box at the top of
this page on the left side as well as on other pages of this
website. If you are reading this page, chances are you are already
signed up for my newsletter so go ahead and click the sign up box to
see how easy it is to use. Our system automatically deletes
duplicate email addresses so no harm done by doing so.
5. Decide
if you need an ISBN number and purchase one if you do. Visit
www.bowker.com to obtain your
ISBN number. The process requires that you establish yourself as a
publisher, even though you will be self-publishing. It's a technical
detail. Generally, you want an ISBN number if you will be selling
your book through bookstores or other retail outlets, including
online retailers like Amazon. If you're not sure about your ability
to place your book with retailers, you can hold off on securing the
ISBN number until you do a future printing. Most self-publishers do
not need an ISBN number, but you should familiarize yourself with
the process and why you might need one. One reason to have is it
makes your book look more professional. If you decide to have an
ISBN number, you will need a barcode to print on your book. The
Bowker website will lead you to sources for producing your barcode.
If you use an online self-publishing company, they can handle this
task for you for a fee. In this case the online company will sell
you one of their ISBN numbers which will make them your official
publisher. Make sure you retain copyright to your book if you decide
to use this service.
6. Prepare
your manuscript for the printer. Some online book printers
provide free templates for you to use to layout your book. You'll
still need to create a front and back cover. You also need to create
the spine of the book at the proper width. Your printer can guide
you on this based on the page count of your book. Current
self-publishing printers request two high resolution PDF files for your book. One
contains the inside content of your book and the other contains the
art for the front and back cover and the spine.
7. Send
your manuscript to the printer. Depending on where you live, you
may be able to find local printers who can produce paperback books.
Otherwise you can find them online. Search for print-on-demand book
printers or book printers. One example is
www.48hrbooks.com. We've used
this source and have been happy with them. We use the online
services strictly to print the books only. We never purchase their
"publishing" services because we do that ourselves. Print your book
as a paperback, not a hardbound book. Hardbound books are expensive
and you are unlikely to be able to price a self-published book high
enough to recover your cost. Besides, most printed books today are
paperbacks.
Bonus Extra
Step: Make coffee, relax and read your paperback book when your
shipment arrives. Then get busy promoting your book. The world needs
to know.
Nearly two dozen self-published books
Zuk-Lloyd Associates has worked on 23 self-published book projects
including both ebooks and paperbacks. We provide a one-stop
self-publishing resource. If you need help or advice on your book
project, call or
email your questions.
Join Paul
R. Lloyd for a business casual conversation about your company's future at a
coffee shop near
you. Call 630-393-6516 or send an
email.
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