Have you ever thought that you could create a miracle?

Every child born is a miracle and acknowledged as such.  Aside from that most people would deny that they could create anything else described as a miracle.

What if your words could touch people all over the world?

What if you could start a conversation that led to people you didn’t know creating positive change in their lives?

At a recent networking event I was talking to someone in business about writing books. Now I’ve known this businesswoman for several years and she’s always struck me as confident and capable and very talented in her field.

But… she seemed to lack that confidence to write her experience down in the form of a book.

Think about the books you’ve read in your life.  I’m sure that some of them have had an impact on you.  Maybe they helped you pass exams, open a door into a new career, dulled the pain of unhappiness.

When you write your book, you will have no idea what ripples it will cause in your own and others’ lives.  But is that any reason not to do it?

And if you’re worried about the experience of writing a book, then I’ve a downloadable pdf on Writing A Book: 5 Strategies to reduce the stress.  You can find it at my other site, www.writerslittlebook.co.uk

It’s an ethical bribe to tempt you to join the Writer’s Little Book Club.  It’s FREE to join the Club and that way you’ll find out what we’re up to first.

And think about it – what do you know that can help someone change their life?

We’re making progress every day towards the launch on 28th January.

If you’re in the Nottingham area and would like to join us at the event, go to www.writerslittlebook.co.uk and request an invitation.

I’m publishing the book myself because I believe that with the digital printing revolution and the rise of social media networking for businesses,  that’s the way ahead for many authors.  That’s what we’re going to help promote in the Writers Little Book Club and offer training to show you how to do a great job with your book.

All our training and other things we offer via the Club will be as practical and down to earth as we can make them because I believe that small steps work, encouragement is vital and passion is where we begin.

Come and join us for the launch or at the club.

We’re going to have some fun with it and we’d like to share it with you.

How to write a book proposal 6

What type of book are you writing?

I spent about an hour in a bookshop recently with a client who has started to write a book.  We were looking for…

some inspiration on how her book would look when it was finished and where in the book shop it would sit.  It’s always time well spent looking at the market segment your book fits into.

And as I’ve said before publishers will begin with that.  It’s almost like Tesco taking on a new product and deciding what part of the shop it goes into.  If you’re selling a new type of yogurt then it wouldn’t be much use putting it with the wines.  It might be found there but it wouldn’t sit well in that section.

And taking the yogurt example further, whenever you look at that section it’s crammed with everything from plain(several varieties and styles of plain) to yogurt with extra elements attached to it.

So is your book of the plain yogurt variety, a black and white book with basic layout with down to earth text, maybe a how to guide.  Or is it a yogurt to attract the young, sassy market who pick out things as much for the design on the pot as for the contents?

For sure it can’t be both.  Trying to please all segments of the market can generally be doomed to failure.  There’s always an exception.  But it’s best not to count on yours being that exception.

To go along with that is the treatment of your topic.  Is it that down to earth book aimed at beginners.  Or a more advanced approach catching in some of those with experience.

All the blog entries I’m writing for this thread are pushing you towards the same thing.  Clarity and focus about what you’re writing.  The more you can present a coherent approach to a publisher in your proposal, the more likely they are to accept it.

Next week.  How to work out your contents list when you haven’t written your book.

How to write a book proposal 5 – What’s a feature

We’ve covered the three key factors you need to concentrate on.  Preferably before you start to write.  It’s not critical if you have already started but bettter if you haven’t.

Now let’s take a look at a vital subject many writers ignore – even professional ones.

Features and benefits

This article may be aimed more at writers of non-fiction than novels but it won’t harm to find out if you don’t already know.

Features and benefits are drummed into anybody who writes for business.  Or at least they should be.  Because knowing why they’re different and how you can use them are the cornerstones of most advertising.

Let’s take a look at them as far as books are concerned.

Features of books:

• They have specific measurements eg 10 x 5 or 8 x 10 or 6 x 5
• They may be a softback or a hardback
• They contain words, drawings, photos, illustrations, tables, graphs etc
• They have information about the author

Benefits of books:

• A soft back book measuring 7″ x 4″ is small and light which means that it will fit in your pocket or bag
• A hardback is not easily damaged
• From books you can gain information about subjects which you need to pass exams, gain ideas and find your way
• Knowing about the author means that you can judge if they are an expert on their topic

As well as benefits there are deeper benefits.

From passing exams or gaining ideas you can improve your status and income, you can gain courage to transform your life or support you in your current situation.

Thinking about the features and benefits of the book you want to write can help you gain a clearer understanding of its purpose and how to design it.

How to write a Book Proposal list item 3

How to write a book different from your competitors

If you’ve done any of the research I suggested in the past three weeks, then you should now have a fair idea of your market and what’s already in it.

If it seems to you that the ground has been covered well already, then this is the point at which you have to apply some native cunning.

One of my clients this year wrote a book which combined two areas that have been written about extensively, but not previously in the same book.

Think about your topic.  What is your experience in the field?

Are you an expert?

Are you writing for other experts or to people outside your field who might want an easy introduction?

Are you just interested in the topic but wanting to interest other people at your own level?

Do you have experience that contradicts the expert theories?

Somewhere in what you’ve done, or how you’ve become interested in the subject, there’s an approach that might not have been tried before.

You may have been contributing articles from which you can make a book.  You may have a diary about an event – such as preparing for a marathon – that would interest both other runners or non-runners.

The wider you think about this the more easily you’ll find your approach.

Again – ask around – not just your family and friends, but spread your net wider.

And as ever – keep your focus and you’ll get there.

Let’s turn to the second item on the How To Write a Book Proposal list -

How to structure your book

I’m not sure how much we’re being shaped as readers by the web. I know that people say that we no longer read as much. Not true in my experience but I do think that we perhaps read differently.

When I’m writing for websites, I have to take into account, skimmers, scanners and readers because we have different approaches, depending on the site and why we’re there.

That’s why when I’m working with clients writing books we take that into consideration when we look at the structure of the book.

Think of yourself for a moment as your own possible buyer. How do you look at a book when you pick it up, before buying?

Do you look at the contents page first?

Do you look at the backof the book?

Do you open in the middle and dive right in?

Just as with your skimmers, scanners and readers, you have to think about having something to interest all of them. It can make the difference between a sale and not a sale.

It’s difficult to give you more specific advice since I don’t know what type of book you want to write, or who you’re aiming at. Just as with the research for your market last week, you need to look at what’s out there.

How are the books in your market arranged?

Do they have a traditional chapter structure or are they in sections?

Do they have a theme to each chapter?

Think about what you would like. It’s said that we want to write the book we want to read. But relying only on our opinion as writer isn’t always the safest thing to do. Ask other people. After all you must know people who would be the ideal customer for your book.

More research I know – but trust me it will pay off in the long run… and make your book easier to write when you start.

I want to look today at the first item on the How to write a book proposal list from last week.

How to find a market for your book

Let’s take the instance of the romantic novel that I talked about last week.

If you’ve never investigated the sector, which by the way is one of the most successful fiction sectors turning over billions of pounds/dollars each year, then you may not realise the depth and breadth of what’s available.

You can have:

• historical
• medical
• erotic
• mildly erotic
• occult
• stories with business women
• stories about women achievers
• stories about women who stay at home
• romantic thrillers

It’s a long list and you can aim for different age ranges by reflecting your readers’ interests in the characters and plots.

If you look at most romantic novels, they’re written to a formula, in terms of their length and chapter structure.

Knowing this information doesn’t stifle your creativity, it should spur you on. One way I found to challenge myself was to take a topic or a story title and see how many different ways I could treat the topic, and in how few words. Or take a common phrase like “too many cooks spoil the broth.” I tried that one and came up with a story that my friend said was quite gruesome. A touch of the Sweeney Todd about it.

If researching your novel market is important then it’s vital if you’re writing non-fiction.

So how do you research the market for your book?

These days it’s easier than ever with the tools at our disposal on line. But even if you don’t have access to the net it’s easy. The work is done for you by other authors and publishers.

Whatever your subject there will be the following on or offline:

• sections in libraries of bookshops
• magazines
• websites
• forums
• groups

Before you even start planning your book, and way ahead of writing it, you need to look at what’s out there.

It’s human nature not to want to sully our beautiful writing idea with reality because maybe we’ll find that someone has done it before us. That’s a challenge but not a reason to give up.

It will hurt more if you take the time and trouble to write your book then find out it’s unsellable.

Take heart. All things are possible… with focus.

For the next 4 weeks my How to write a book thread will be about creating a book proposal.  That’s because I think it’s the most vital thing you can do before you start to write.  Why?  Well I learned how to think about…

researching a market twenty years ago when I worked for a medical equipment company.  My boss was a product development specialist.  Unlike many development people, his approach was rooted in the real world.  So many innovators come up with an idea, become convinced that it’s going to revolutionise the world and pursue that idea through thick and thin.

My boss was quite different.  I’ve seen him design a product, do all the process calculations on the back of an envelope and then set about getting it into the marketplace as fast as possible,  But he was only able to do this because his product was rooted in what people were asking for.  He’d talk to anyone who was involved in using similar equipment and ask them what their problems were. Then he’d design something that fixed the problem.

In 5 years we introduced 8 products into the market and had them selling successfully.  Rough and ready it might have seemed as a process but it worked.

That’s why it surprises me that more people who write books don’t do the same thing.  Whilst I believe that books are the key to so many things, can introduce people to ideas and ways of improving their lives, they still have to be considered as products.  Because that’s the way publishers treat them.

And it isn’t like the publishers don’t help you to find out what they want.  A few months ago I met a woman who wanted to write a romantic novel.  So I directed her to the site for the company that publish most of the Mills and Boon books and the Silhouette imprints.  They have an enormous amount of information on the site helping you plot characters, work out your themes.  Has she been there yet?  I’ve no idea but I doubt it.

I investigated the site because I wanted to do the same.  In fact I’ve written three, all unpublished, but what great experience in actually doing all of that and getting to the end of a book.  Tried the last one out on a few people who liked it but not acceptable to the publisher… yet!

But any publishing site will have a book proposal outline and they don’t differ much.

Key points in creating a book proposal are:

• Who are you writing for?
• The structure of the book’s content.
• How you can offer something different from competitive titles.

There’s a lot more to the proposal but if you can crack those three you”ll be ahead of most would be writers.

More next week.

What stops you from writing?  Is it the fact that you actually have to write?

I love words.  I’m a word junkie.  I can’t remember learning to read and seem to have fallen into it without any problem at all.  And I was brought up on radio not TV and they say the pictures are better on radio.

So though I’m much stronger on words I do like pictures and like most children I probably started off with picture books. And that’s fine for children when there aren’t many words in their books. 

But what happens when you grow up and the world seems to have so many words in it that they overwhelm you?  Even with adult comics there are still acres of words out there.

Now with most word processing programs these days you have sophisticated forms of grammar and spell checking tools.  And I know more than one person who manages to hide their fear of words, by using the tools. 

I had a boss once who was dyslexic and used to run his letters past me before he sent them out.  It was a bit of challenge sometimes because he had a very individual way of putting things and I never was quite sure if he meant to use a word that looked odd to me.

He developed his own strategies for not having to deal with the words too much and I’ve met other word phobics who have their ways of dealing with the challenge. It’s said that’s why dyslexics are often innovative because they have to find new solutions that work for them.

What happens though if you know you should write a book?  Maybe people keep saying “oh that’s so good you need to put it in a book”.  Telling them you’re too busy at the moment to tackle it is one way.  Or saying it’s not quite ready to be in a book yet.  Or even better is “I’m working on it”.

“I’m writing a book. I’ve got the page numbers done.”

Stephen Wright

Well you know there’s a lot of computer technology out there that can make life much easier for you.  I’m about to launch out into using voice recognition software.  For me it’s more about saving myself from RSI than anything else.  But as a tool for avoiding the problems of too much typing it could work for you.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that if you want to write a book enough, we can find a solution for you whatever your challenges.

I was talking to a prospective client yesterday about the problems he faces trying to use his website.  He’s faced with parameters set by the organisation his business is part of.  And he’s faced with parameters concerning the business he’s in(financial).

So how to make the best of his site?

He can personalise it – at the moment that really only extends to details about himself and a photo.  Any other changes he has to get permission to make.  Quite a challenge.

I haven’t worked in his sector before and can understand that he might have difficulties about what he can say or promise.  But it seems to me that the approach has to be the same as with any other business.  Which is tailoring the text to the clients’ needs.

After I met up with him I had a look on the web at various financial companies and by and large they were on the boring side.  Agreed they need to underline how secure they are and how long they’ve been in business but with many of them on the home pages there wasn’t really anything focused on the reader.  There wasn’t anything that showed they understood the depth of the insecurity we feel at the moment about our finances.

In fact I bet that many sites hadn’t been changed for a long period.  Which in search engine terms could be as short as a month.  I talked to him about blogging to find that while he’d like to have a go, his organisation is against.  Presumably because they believe like many people still, that blogging is the preserve of the teenager writing weird things in their bedrooms.

Maybe so a few years ago and even then I know of some innovative entrepreneurs who were using it to make themselves quiet fortunes.  But I’ve found it a great way to get the search engines interested and it’s also a lot of fun.  I’m now on the lookout all the time for events I can pass on and tips that I think will be useful to people so for me it’s a good idea stimulus.

Putting together my workshop (How To Write A Book Workshop) I’ve been researching quotes to pass on.  I love quotes and they fire up all kinds of ideas for me.  I’m not good at jokes but I love quotes.  Here’s just a couple.

“I’m writing a book.  I’ve got the page numbers done.”  Stephen Wright

“My most important advice to all you would-be writers: when you write try to leave out all the parts that readers skip.” Elmore Leonard

Oh so true both of those!