A Strategy Guaranteed To Get Your Book Out Of Your Head And On Paper

I had a conversation with my wife a few days ago when we were getting the kids ready for school. She mentioned a friend of hers who was interested in writing a book to get her consulting practice off the ground. Her idea was to use the book as a way of launching her career.

The problem she had was figuring out how to start the process. My wife has an interesting way of getting me to consult by proxy. Since her friend wasn’t ready or able to afford my consulting fee yet, I wrote a plan of action for my wife’s friend. The plan was pretty simple, but not easy; I’ll tell you why later.

Start with your plan.
Writing a book is like starting a business. You first need to have a plan. I have a simple two page book writing plan at my website DiDPublishing dot com that aspiring authors can follow when breaking down their ideas into book format.

Your table of contents – the framework for your book
A friend of mine told me that he writes his books by coming up with the table of contents. He spends a lot of time just creating his table of contents. This becomes the framework for his books.

Whenever he has a problem with a chapter, he switches to another chapter and completes it before going back to the troublesome chapter. He finds that this usually clears his head to pursue the solution to the previous chapter.

Start with the market- Who are you speaking to in your book? What are they like and why would they want to listen to you? What interests do your audience share with you that will bring them closer to your way of thinking? Why will they value what you have to say and can your audience make use of your information to enhance their lives?

Go to the library.
Get out of the house and go to the public library. Find others who have accomplished what you’re looking to achieve. Read their work, listen to the voice they project in their work. Once you’ve found an author(s) that you connect with, read more of their work.

Getting unstuck.
When you find yourself stuck and unable to make coherent sentences, stop and take a break. I read other materials when my head is not into the process of writing. That is the time for more material gathering. You’ll find that something in your research will trigger the writing response and get you back to writing almost immediately.

Use the power of articles.
Writing articles is a great way to get into writing about your subject. You can get the practice you need by writing 600 to 800 words on a specific area of your topic. Layout your article the same way you would a book. Once you have the skill to create two or more articles a day consistently, you’ll be able to write your book with skill and consistency. You might be able to take your series of articles and reengineer them into a book by expanding them and connecting to your chapter headings.

The secret to writing – write
My high school buddy and I have debated this issue for decades but time has proven me right on the subject; the best way to become a good writer is to start writing and keep writing. You have a chance to become a better writer if you are writing than if you stay in the conceptual stage. The real art of writing happens in the editing stage. Keep that in mind it’s an important point.

Using the interview model for writing information products.
So what does it take to put a book together? The first thing to consider is what you’ll want to write about. I sometimes conduct interviews in my business so, I follow a specific structure.

I start with a series of general questions to get an idea of the overall subject matter of the person I’m speaking with. Then I ask the personal history questions and allow the interviewee to connect with the audience. I ask about the pros and cons of the interviewee’s experiences and inject a bit of humor when appropriate.

The next step is to have the interviewee teach their subject to the audience. There are steps involved in any experience or practice and I allow my audience to gain a detailed overview of my interviewee’s system.

When the interview process is complete, I not only have an interview, I actually have the contents of a book. Of course, if the interview was going to be a book, the interviewee would have to go into detail in each chapter to contribute more information but by now you can see how easy it is to get an information product started.

The next step is laying out the words on paper or in these times, on the computer screen. This is a killer for many people because they are unfamiliar with the process of transferring thought to written form. In order to find your style, you need to do a lot of reading in the format of your subject and market. That doesn’t mean copying someone else’s style; it does however mean finding your voice by recognizing it in voice of others.

So you’ve created your plan of action and broken down your story into chapters, now you want begin to make sense of the words you’ve written; avoid taking this step. This is still not the time. Make sure that you’ve written as much information as you can in each of the chapters and fleshed out the material as much as possible.

The art of writing is similar to the art of filmmaking. You’ll be creating the work during the editing process. Before you get to that phase, you’ll have to give the work more than it will be able to handle. You want to be able to carve out the finished work by reviewing the material and restructuring it until you’ve created a diamond from a lump of coal.

How do you know when you’re done?
You will be finished with the first draft when all of your chapters are completed. Once that happens, you’ll move on to the editing process. This phase will take a little time and I suggest that you get a hold of a professional book editor. They’ll be able to not only get the work in shape, they’ll also help you to write more effectively. Keep your ego in check and evaluate the suggestions and edits with objectivity. If you get to work with an editor, ask a whole lot of questions. This is an opportunity to learn.

Warm up with blogging
When you start the editing process, keep a journal. Start blogging as a way to warm up your writing muscles. It’s a great way to chronicle the struggle and will be appreciated by your fans later. If you follow this strategy, you’ll be able to get your ideas out on paper and in the hands of your fans.

By: Dennis Francis

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Dennis Morales Francis is a small business coach and the author of “Double My Revenues In 12 Moths or Less” and "Push Button Profits! A 30 Day Program For Making $120,000 A Year On Auto Pilot" Head over to www.DoubleMyRevenues.com/money.html to get your FREE copy now before it's too late!