Get Your Book Written--Fast! Six Myths And Options- Part 1

You may have thought you have a great message to get out to your audience to make their lives better; you may be in business and want to write a book to brand yourself and attract new clients; or, you may want to write a novel to educate and entertain.

What ever your reasons, you may still have doubts you can do this. Maybe you think you are too busy or you're not a natural writer, or it would take too much time, effort, and money. These are reasons, but they aren't real. They are myths. You can write a profitable book-even a lot of books--fast! Here's solutions:

Getting Your Book Written--Six Myths and Options

1. Takes talent.

Actually, the less writing know how you have, the better. In my innocent beginnings felt I was only a speaker, a trainer, a teacher, a coach. I didn't think of myself as a writer!

Yet, because my audiences kept asking for my information to take home, and from encouragement from other writers, I started writing short books, booklets, and special reports. I didn't write the end-all-be-all book of 200-400 pages. Like me, you can write a series of short books, each taking about a month. No more messy (and unprofitable) seminar handouts. Like me, you need to see a need and fill it..

Lke many emerging authors , I read and followed advice to get an agent and publisher. After many wasted hours and money going with this traditional publishing route, I found it didn't serve me. First, it takes too long--even two years or more. Second, nobody cares more about your book than you do. You are the one that can get it done and because publishers don't help much with promotion, you'll have to that too, so you may as well go the direct route to your audience with self-publishing and self-promotion.

When you don't know what you don't know, you can forge ahead with self-publishing. You may have a lot of questions or fear, but you can turn to the talent of others. Knowing Jim Belasco, management consultant some 25 years ago, I followed his advice, "Do what you do best, and hire the rest." With little book budget then, small steps led to learning about Portable Document Format, simple covers that still packed big marketing pizzazz, and mentors like Dan Poynter and John Kremer. Reading and applying knowledge from books is the least expensive way to get started.

2. Takes creativity.

Dan Poynter told me many years ago that information can be repackaged for any particular target audience. It doesn't take creativity, it just takes some editing, rewriting, adding a few new ideas and resources, and putting it together in an organized, short and simple format to please the consumer who wants easy-to-read information.

If you are like me, you can package several of your books and others' related books together for increased back-of-the-room sales. It's great to earn first, small profits, but soon your sales can be more than $4000 a month if you put time into getting the word out. These figures go up each year you spend on better marketing.

If you are flexible and willing to learn new ways, you can sell even more copies easily with online promotion techniques. For me, learning about writing articles and submitting them to article directories defined my breakthrough.

3. Takes time.

Some writers claim it takes 2-10 years to write a quality book. Some say 14 days. Maybe a few months to a year can be your story. It will take longer if you change your focus, your format, or try to be perfect. That's why you need to do some market-driven pre-planning before you write your book.

It's far easier to write your book to fit your audiences' needs than to write it, and then look for an audience. Each audience has a different problem to solve. Think what benefits your book will fill first, what audience will buy it, along with other "hot-selling points" that help you pre-market and also help you write, focused, organized, easy to read compelling copy. Like me, you can write a series of short books, each taking less time than a month. Just see a need and fill it.

You don't have to write a 200-page book to be a credible author either, and today's online audience of hundreds to 500,000 who see your ePromotion each week, and who prefer short books, especially eBooks, will make it worth your time.

Think of your benefits in writing a book! Your book expresses who you are. Your clients, associates, and companies who need speakers or coaches need your book. Your fiction audience wants entertainment. A book ensures a constant stream of contacts who consider you a leader in your field. People online are looking for information on your topic every day.

Whether you market your book offline or Online, people want your solutions, inspirational words, and stories. What follows? A lifelong, constant stream of income.