Guest Article by Joseph C Kunz | Deborah H Bateman

Whether you are about to self-publish your first book, or start a micro-niche publishing company, you need to have a business plan in place. A business plan will give you a basic roadmap for your new business. An easy and quick way to do this is to create a one-page business plan. This will let you quickly clarify your own thinking about your new business. This short, one-page plan can also be used as an outline for a longer more in-depth plan. With some research, you should be able to complete this one-page plan in under one week. Here is a list of five questions that you must include in your simplified, one-page business plan.

1. WHY do you want to self-publish?

Your answer cannot be only about the money. It needs something more than that. It also needs to be short, very specific, and very personal.

Examples:

a. “I want to write a book that will help new nurses be more productive, more effective, and more marketable in today’s tight job market.”

b. “I want to write small-business management books so that I can share my knowledge and expertise with others that would like to start their own small-business. I gained this knowledge and experience over the last 35 years while starting and managing my own successful small-business.”

c. “I want to write and self-publish a book to give myself more credibility in the eyes of my peers.”

2. WHAT will you write about?

Explain it in one sentence, in very specific detail. You must understand what your writing niche, or specialty, will be.

Examples:

a. “I will write and publish books about all aspects of self-publishing for people who have not written a book before.”

b. “I will write a how-to book for experienced nurses who want to advance to become part of nursing management in a hospital.”

c. “I will write a how-to guide for new parents who are raising a deaf child.”

3. WHO is your market?

You must narrow this down to a very specific group of people. Your answer cannot be “everybody and anybody”. You must know exactly who buys your type of book. You only have a limited amount of time and money for marketing and promotion. You must target your best efforts at those who are most likely to buy your book. Keep your answer down to a few tight sentences.

a. “The market for my book is American nursing students that are in nursing school, or have just graduated as RN’s with an AS or BS degree in nursing and are searching for their first job. They are generally females between 20 and 26 years of age. Half of them like to read a hard-copy of a book; the other half like to read the ebook version. They are very worried about getting a job after graduation, because the nursing shortage has ended.”

4. HOW do you define success?

You might spend the next twelve months writing your first book. And then a year later you are selling less than 8 copies a month on Amazon. Therefore, you must come to terms with what success means to you. Does success mean seeing your name on the cover of a book? Does it mean being able to give each of your customers a copy of your book so that they will have more admiration and respect for you? Does success mean getting letters and emails from people who read your book – telling you that your book has helped them in some positive way? We all can agree that making a lot of money is great – and is possible as a self-publisher – but it cannot be your only reason for writing a book. Therefore, you should write a paragraph here about how you define success for your book.

5. HOW HARD are you willing to work at it?

How much time and hard work are you willing to put into your self-publishing venture? This is probably the step that you must put the most honest thinking into. Are you willing to spend most of your time marketing and selling your book? Your book might take 6 to 12 months to write. But you will spend the next several years marketing and promoting it. Are you willing to put yourself out there and market and promote yourself, your name, and your book, the for next several years? Are you willing to keep writing and building your next book? The more time and effort that you put into your self-publishing venture, the more success you will have. It will be much easier to go the distance if you love your subject matter. And the more you love your subject matter, the more successful you will be at self-publishing. It is as simple as that.

Joseph C. Kunz, Jr. is an author, publisher, educator, business manager, and entrepreneur. Life-long love affair with books and reading. Very excited about being part of the new media movement. Known for casual, easy-to-read writing style and ability to explain complex topics in an understandable way. “If you are serious about your work you should self-publish. Retain creative control. Retain the profits. Enjoy the satisfaction and status that comes with being published.” Visit Kunz’s website about all aspects of self-publishing at http://www.KunzOnPublishing.com/, for an insider’s guide to becoming a financially successful and happy self-publisher, and sign-up for his free newsletter.

Author: Joseph C Kunz, Jr
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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Here I share my favorite reasons for becoming a self-publisher. Some reasons are much more important to me than they might be to you. But I am certain that on this list you will find a reason that is important or intriguing to you. I hope that you find one that gets your internal capitalist into gear, and gets you onto a new path too.

1. Retain Ownership: As a self-publisher you retain complete control and ownership of the book – forever. I’m sure that for all of you reading this article, this is a very important reason – as it was for me.

2. Instant Credibility: The book will instantly give you credibility – and help boost your career or business. We all want this. The more professional your book is, the more credibility you will have with your audience. With self-publishing you can easily and quickly make improvements to your book – especially with an ebook.

3. Control Fate of My Book: As a self-publisher you control the fate of your book – not some publisher that has no interest in your book or subject other than how much money they can make from you. Self-publishers are writing and publishing books because we love our subject, and want to share our knowledge with others.

4. Speed to Market: Traditional publishers take way too long to bring your book to the market. A big publisher would think that you are a silly fool to believe that you could get your book into a world-wide audience within a few weeks. But of course, we now all know that we can – and do.

5. Plenty of Help Available: As a self-publisher you can choose to be involved with as much, or as little, of the creative process. Self-publishing is where you, the author, bypass all the intermediaries that are involved in traditional publishing. These intermediaries do the editing, designing, illustrating, marketing, promotion, etc., of your book. As a self-publisher these functions will typically be your job. Although, you can easily hire people to do these functions for you and still be considered a self-publisher. As a self-publisher you get to choose which functions you want to do, and which ones you need to hire someone to help you with.

6. Keep All Profits: As a self-publisher you keep all of the profits. A traditional publisher will keep almost all of the profits. Then, after several months, when your book sales start to slow down, they will dump you for someone else that is more profitable for them. Even if your book makes you just a few hundred dollars a year, these profits will come to you year after year after year. The more effort you put into making your book look professional, and into your marketing and sales, the more profit you will make. You have complete control as to how much success your book will have.

7. Low Entry Cost: It is much less costly to produce a book now than it has ever been before. You can get an ebook online with a big-name website for free within minutes. You can also get your book accepted by a big-name print-on-demand company that will distribute your book to the entire market for about $112. Additional expenses like ISBN fees, and CIP fees, will add about $100. Hiring a professional cover designer can be anywhere from $250 to $750.

8. My Knowledge of The Market: With some effort and study, you can do a much better job promoting your book than a traditional publisher can. This is especially true when your book is directly related to your career or business. You know your market, your audience, your customers, and your readers, much better than anyone else does. This intimate knowledge of their needs is what will help make your book and career a success.

9. Niche for Success: Your book’s subject might fit into a very small niche – one that is too small for a traditional publisher to even bother with. Filling a small, tight niche is where the money is for many self-publishers.

10. Creative Outlet: Self-publishing is a great way to satisfy your need to be creative – writing, designing, and illustrating – as well as being creative with marketing, advertising, and promotion. Self-publishing will force you to be creative in many areas.

Author: Joseph C Kunz, Jr
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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