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Why You Should Write Your B Book

This article is more than 5 years old.

I had a well-known press expert tell me once that there are two people who get the most press: celebrities and authors. This has always stuck with me and it’s an adage I pass along to my coaching clients.

The problem? The thought of writing a book is very overwhelming and anxiety-inducing for a lot of people. If you’ve been thinking about writing a book - great!

This is not that book.

That’s your A book - Im talking about your B book. Make no mistake, that doesn’t mean the content should be inferior in any way, but let’s take some of the pressure off. This is NOT your novel - this is not the project that you are hoping to land on the New York Times Best Seller list. Save your A book for later, this is a book on a topic of which you are an expert. It’s not long, it’s not complex, but it is valuable to your reader.

When you self-publish a book, you now have a topic to speak on. Publishing a small ebook does 3 things:

  • First, it gives you something to talk about with the press. It gives you some credibility.
  • Second, if you have thought about doing speaking gigs, which I recommend you do, this gives you a platform to speak on.
  • Third, it allows you to tap into the massive network we call Amazon.

     

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And another little benefit? It could bring in a few hundred bucks a month in revenue, not bad, but that’s not the real purpose. The purpose is to get your valuable insights into the hands of more people and to provide you with a platform to speak upon.
Think about the core of your business and what you really do to serve your clients or customers. Think of their most pressing questions and write up a little guide on the subject. For me, I constantly get asked about business plans. So I’ve written up a lot of material on the subject and even have a few different outlines that I like to use.

My suggestion is for you to take your most popular blog post and just expand upon it. If you’ve created a top 10 list of any kind, you now have 10 short chapters to write in this ebook. It can be anywhere from 25-50 pages. It doesn’t matter. If the content of the book is good it’s ok if it’s short. Some of the best guides I’ve ever read and still use to this day, have been under 50 pages and only cost $2.99. You might have a white paper you’ve written or a free pdf that you give away on your site - whatever it is, turn it into an ebook and self-publish on Amazon.

You are now the founder of your company and a published author. Wow! When you publish your book, you now have an extra feather in your cap to go out and talk to the press, engage with investors, give as gifts to potential customers or clients, and help you book speaking engagements. I’ve talked to so many entrepreneurs who told me their entire business changed once they published their first ebook. It really works.

Having a book will help you as you localize national stories as well. These strategies all dovetail together to create a powerful punch. Again, this shouldn’t be a daunting task - you can get this done in a weekend.

Decide on your topic. I recommend piggybacking on your most popular blog post or addressing the question you get asked the most. For me, it was writing business plans - for you, it could be how do I hold an event, how do I set up my social media pages, how do I lose 10 pounds? You’ll want to address their biggest questions. Think of this as an intro to your work, not an all-encompassing tome.

Some things to consider:

  • Don’t feel like you have to cook the whole Thanksgiving dinner. Just a side dish! Take one small aspect of what you do or know and expand upon it. More and more, people are gravitating to smaller books with dense information rather than a novel.
  • Make it valuable and compelling. This book is to really pack a punch for your readers. Something they can really learn from and put into use.
  • Consider a series. If you have a topic that can be broken into a series, do it.
  • It’s a good idea to use this B Book as a way to get readers to visit your site, watch more videos, subscribe to your podcast, etc. This is a way for you to strut your stuff. Take advantage of it.

If you’ve been procrastinating on writing a book because you are overwhelmed at the thought, you now have a strategy to get around that. Writing your b book will allow you to grease the wheels a bit, gain some confidence, provide value to your audience, reach new potential customers and garner some credibility.

Now, get to writing!
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