If I Were To Start All Over With Self-Publishing I Would Do This
I wouldn't have spent months, I would have spent days to get started.
If there is anything the last few years has taught me, it’s this one truth: time is short.
The older I get, the more I learn that our time is short.
We have a lot going on in our lives. There are family obligations. We are involved in our communities. And for many of us, we have full time jobs that can suck the life out of us or at the very least eat up a third of our day.
Yet, we have something to give to the world.
It took me a couple of years writing online to realize that I had at least one book in me. Turns out that one books has turned into 19 more along with a few in progress. And with learning that my time is short, writing that many books over a few years has made me realize that I am not likely alone in my time constraints.
After all, I am a dad of four with a day job. We have property that we care for and a community that we are actively involved in. There is a lot going on in our lives and getting the time to write is getting harder and harder.
But, I cannot stop writing and creating.
I have a message to share, stories to tell, and people help. And I do it through writing here on Substack or over at Medium and of course through my books.
And while holding my infant son this morning, I started thinking about what I would have done differently as someone who is starting out as an author. And I thought I would share that with you today.
What I will share is what I do now, however, its what I wish someone would have shared with me five years ago.
Step One: Writing Your First Book & Creating an Author Platform
My first book was built off of multiple blog posts. This was how I got started. However, what happened to get me there was creating a lot of content and then sifting through that content to find what went together.
Here’s what I would do differently:
Pick a niche.
Find a problem in that niche.
Write 10 to 20 blog posts in that niche and on that problem.
Take the ones that hit well with people and turn them into a mini book.
Sell the mini book on Gumroad to start my self-publishing business.
You see, I started out by writing hundreds of blog posts, picking twenty or so that did well, and then writing a full 200-page book that I published on Amazon.
This worked well, but I could have saved time and effort and made a little more money by starting smaller and selling an interactive, problem solving, ebook directly.
Along the way, this would have helped grow my author platform more quickly and set me up for publishing with Amazon and writing a different type of mini book.
If you are at the beginning of your self-publishing journey or you want to give it a try, start here with my 7-Day Mini Book Challenge!
Step Two: Expand the Mini Book
Now, what I wish I would have done, is to take the original mini book and expand that into a 100-page, traditionally-styled book to publish with Amazon KDP. Then I could have grown that platform further and reached a different audience.
I’ve written about this before, but I wanted to share a snippet of it here.
Writing a mini book and selling it directly is different than writing a mini book and selling on Amazon. There are two types of audiences that you can reach and if you tailor your book to those audiences, you can grow faster.
Amazon mini books are typically 100 pages or less. They are traditionally formatted (which means that read like regular books). And they are an information piece, not as much of an interactive piece.
Directly sales mini books are typically 50 pages or less. They are formatted with more whitespace and have a tendency to solve a very specific problem and are much more interactive to help lead to action immediately for the reader.
This is why I would suggest taking your original mini book, and expanding on it. You add additional information, some personal stories or examples of why the solution you offer works, and format it for a traditional reader.
Then you can take your previous platform, share your Amazon book, get reviews, and watch your book sell organically and be sure to promote it regularly.
This will increase the range of your audience and help you grow more.
If you want to get started writing and publishing on Amazon, I have this guide that will help you go from idea to bestseller in 90-days or less.
Step Three: Create a Mini Course for Your Niche
Next, I would take what I’ve learned from creating a mini book that I sold directly and creating a mini book for Amazon KDP and I would turn it into a mini course.
Now, what is a mini course?
A mini course is content that can be read or watched or listen to in an hour or less which expands on the problem you solved and helps your reader succeed at a larger scale.
This might be an expansion to the solution that you originally presented in your direct sale mini book. It would cover more details about frequently asked questions or problems that might come up along the way with your solution.
Why would you create a mini course?
There are a few benefits to this for you and for your reader:
Your mini books weren’t originally supposed to be a catch all in solving someone’s problem. The goal was to get people started and motivated to solve their problem.
A mini course doesn’t have to take a lot of time to create. You can expand on your topic in blog posts, and then add them in as written content or create new visual or audio content.
Most of all, a mini course, will cost more for your reader to encourage a greater sacrifice in order for them to learn how to solve their problem. This can be enough motivation for them to actually take action.
Creating a meeting course will ultimately establish more authority for you and will help you with creating back in sales that will make you money to support the next step.
Step Four: Write a Series of Books
Now that you’ve written too many books and created a mini course it’s time to dive into writing a series of books for your niche, solving common problems in your niche.
You can go about this three ways:
Only writing mini books on Amazon and pointing people to your mini course.
Or writing direct sale mini books and expanding them to Amazon KDP mini books.
Or some combination of both. Perhaps not all problems. Need a direct sale mini book and a Amazon mini book.
However, when it comes to writing your series of books, it’s going to be important that you write five or more in your series.
It’s going to be this series of books that is going to help you sell more books to earn more money to grow your authority and platform.
Here’s what I would do:
Write a list of 10 to 20 topics for your books.
Research all of the topics to see if the market wants a solution to those problems.
Narrow your list down to 5 to 10 book ideas.
Start writing your next book.
Writing a series of books will help you sell more books organically, it will help you make more money, and it will help you grow your author platform.
Reminder: Capture Emails
I’m only going to briefly discuss this, but you need to be sure to capture emails every step of the way. People who trust you with their email are going to be the people who will buy your books and ideally leave reviews for your books.
These are the folks that you want picking up your books on Amazon and the first 30 days. It’s during this timeframe that you need reviews. And it’s going to be important for you to have consistent sales during that time.
If you have a stable of emails with people who are committed to your content and books, you will be able to have consistent sales and get reviews with ease.
Most of all, you will find more back in sales for that mini course from your email list then you will from the random person who reads one of your mini books.
Here’s how I capture emails:
A call to action in the front and back of all my Amazon books.
A call to action at the bottom of all my blog posts.
Promoting my email list on social media.
These are the three primary ways that I capture emails and I’m able to sell my books and courses. You can use Substack to do this or a traditional email service provider that you need to capture emails.
Final Thoughts
It wasn’t until I had published 10 books that I realized that a system like this would help me earn more money to write more books and do it in a timely manner.
This is the system that I use today.
It’s simple, straightforward, and easy to write and publish books while having a day job being the father to four children and staying actively involved in my family and Community.
Don’t wait any longer! Write and publish your book this year!
Get started with this free resources: The Self-Publishing Author’s Checklist
Hi! I’m J.R. Heimbigner. I’m a #1 bestseller on Amazon and I have written & published 20 books (bookstore). I’d like to connect with you in one of three ways:
Check out my best article of all time: How to Self-Publish a Bestselling Book (Even If You Have No Audience)
Learn how to write & publish your bestseller before the end of the year with The Minimalist Author Way Guide.
Or start smaller with the 7-Day Mini Book Challenge!
I look forward to connecting with you and can’t wait to read your book!
Love this approach JR, going to write my version on Medium and share both yours and mine in my newsletter :)
Thank you for this. Such valuable information! You answered my question about how long a mini book should be (how many words) and added other comments that I find so useful. Not least, tempus fugit! (Time flies!)