How To Write Your Book In A Month
I don’t have to convince you that writing a book can really boost your business do I?
A lot has been written about that already. You know that writing your own book will give you instant credibility in your field, opportunities for publicity in your business, and a way to presell your customers with educational content that will lead them back to you as the person they know, like, and trust to solve the problems you address. So why haven’t you done it yet?
Why haven’t you written a book and used it to promote your business in all these ways and more? Well if you’re like most small business owners and entrepreneurs it’s probably for one of 3 reasons:
1. You don’t know what to write about
2. You don’t know how to write it quickly
3. You don’t know how to get it out to the public (traditional publishing vs self publishing)
Let me answer all these questions for you right now using my own experience as a guide. By the way, my name is Joshua Seth and I am probably the busiest stage hypnotist in the world. I tour about 300 days a year all over the world and still found time to write my own business boosting book. If I can do it with my crazy travel and touring schedule you can too.
What To Write About
That’s easy. Just be outcome oriented. What action do you want the reader to take as a result of being exposed to your book? Work backwards from there.
I wanted people to see me as an expert in my field and not just an entertainer. I had this idea to start running weight loss hypnosis seminars the day after my shows but hardly anybody came. They thought of me as a performer and that did not translate to seminar attendance.
I tried advertising but it proved to be too expensive. I tried sending out press releases but they didn’t have the desired effect. It was only when I literally wrote the book on my subject “The Weight Loss Hypnosis Solution” that I found it easy to attract press, easy to fill seminar seats, and easy to establish myself as an expert in the field.
Now I close my shows by holding up my book and talking about how hypnosis can be used for more than just fun and games, it’s actually a great way to lose weight. And I tell them about my seminar. If I don’t have a seminar scheduled, the book itself upsells them to my 6 CD self hypnosis set on the topic. If they don’t get book they can still get all the downloadable freebies on my squeezepage at www.7weightlossgifts.com and fall into my sales funnel that way. Everybody wins, but without the book to establish credibility in the first place none of this would ever happen.
Here’s 7 simple steps you can take to outline your own business building book right now:
Follow This Simple 7 Step Formula When Outlining Your Book
1. Define your customer’s problem in their own words
2. Agitate the ways in which not solving this problem immediately can hurt them (turn up the pain in order to motivate them to take solution oriented action)
3. List all the things to beware of when they’re looking for a solution (disqualifying your competitors in the process)
4. List the ways in which you’ve been able to provide those solutions in your business (which gives you an opportunity to provide social proof)
5. Destroy the myths and misconceptions that people have about your product or service (subtly answering their objections in the process)
6. Offer them an incentive to let you help them solve that problem and build in a strong call to action
7. Show how you have already helped other people just like them by including lots of testimonials throughout
I’ll bet you could sit down and outline your book right now couldn’t you?
Of course, you’ll have to refine and shape that outline into something suitable for your book, but the basic outline should be clear to you just from reading the 7 steps listed above. If it isn’t, then you don’t know your business or your customers well enough.
How To Write It Quickly
You don’t need to spend months or years writing your book. This isn’t going to be the great American novel after all. In the interest of full disclosure, I should mention here that it did take me eight months to write my book and nearly that many rewrites. The problem was that I started the process by having one of my seminars transcribed and then filling things in from there.
What I should have done is start with an outline! Having an outline like the 7 point system listed above cuts down on the work (and the rewrites) enormously. Now I help my coaching clients to write and publish their own books within a month.
One of the ways we shortcut this process is to create a strong outline first and then record a phone interview where I ask them questions stemming from their outline and follow up on their answers with more questions that create even more content. We send the mp3 of that interview to a transcription service and their answers become the rough draft of the book. No writing is necessary
From there it’s an easy matter of outsourcing the editing, layout, and design work through elance or a similar service. Now that your book is done you’ll need to answer that controversial question…
Should You Self Publish Or Waste Time, Money, And Opportunity Trying To Get A Traditional Publisher
If my answer isn’t clear already let me state it plainly for you now: self publish. Get it out there. Get it done. Start benefiting from the publicity opportunities right away. Use it for positioning and lead generation as soon as you can. It’s the best kind of business card you can have but it’s utterly ineffective if it just sits there on your hard drive gathering nano-dust.
Don’t let yourself get paralysis by analysis, just get the thing done and get it our there. You can always sell it to a publishing house later if you want to.
Here are 3 things to avoid when self publishing your business building book:
1. Don’t use a Vanity House. If you find yourself getting enticed by an offer to do everything for you in exchange for some five figure fee, splash a glass of cold water in your face and wake up. This process isn’t difficult, you just need to know where to get certain things done (such as which printing house Amazon uses so you don’t have to mess around with fulfilling orders yourself)
2. Don’t Make Your Book Too Big. No one will read it. Better to be brief and leave them wanting more than to intimidate them with your towering tome. Also, it’s cheaper to print and ship your book if it’s a little over 100 pages than if it’s twice that size.
3. Don’t Let Anyone Else Own the ISBN Number. Whoever owns the ISBN number owns your book. Make sure that person is you.
Your Next Step
I’ve created a series of training videos designed to help speakers and entrepreneurs who want all the benefits of having their own book with the minimum investment of time, trouble, and expense.
Comments are now closed. Here is what was submitted:
- thursdaybram.com » Blog Archive » The Business of Freelance Writing Carnival, Edition 69 on May 23rd, 2009 8:52 pm (Edit) [...] Seth presents How To Write Your Book In A Month posted at Joshua Seth [...]
- TerriRains on May 27th, 2009 5:05 pm (Edit) You make a good point re: the importance of organization and structure in writing a book. Those who just dive in without a plan take a lot longer (and don’t get the results) of those who plan appropriately.
- Book Marketing Blog Carnival – May 27, 2009 : Selling Books on May 27th, 2009 9:58 pm (Edit) [...] Seth presents How To Write Your Book In A Month posted at Joshua Seth Blog, saying, “I don’t have to convince you that writing a book can [...]
- The Self Published Carnival #2 – Story Hack on June 2nd, 2009 8:15 am (Edit) [...] Joshua Seth gives some ideas on How to Write Your Book in a Month. [...]
- 32nd Carnival of Making REAL Money – June 2009: part 2. | InvestorBlogger on June 7th, 2009 11:16 am (Edit) [...] learnt on my road to making money online through writing and blogging,” Joshua Seth presents How To Write Your Book In A Month posted at Joshua Seth Blog, saying, “I don’t have to convince you that writing a book [...]
- Selling to Zebras Blog » Blog Archive » Complex Sales and Selling Strategies – June 12, 2009 Edition on June 12th, 2009 12:04 pm (Edit) [...] Seth presents How To Write Your Book In A Month posted at Joshua Seth Blog, saying, “I don’t have to convince you that writing a book can [...]
- Make Money Online » Blog Archive » 59 Ideas for Improving Writing Skills and Promoting Books on July 3rd, 2009 10:24 pm (Edit) [...] and speaker Joshua Seth gives seven outlining steps for non-fiction [...]
- Terri Rains on July 20th, 2009 11:04 am (Edit) Your seven step plan is pretty good, Seth. I can see where it could really help make the process rocket fast. I appreciate the fact you aren’t just telling people to transcribe an interview and call it a “book”–that seems to be the “flavor of the month”.
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