How to Write a Book in 8 Weeks

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Despite the radical shifts in social media and other forms of “personal branding” over the past decade, there is still nothing that provides the stamp of authority like being an author does. A book can be a way that you’re introduced to the world, can be a source of supplemental income, and can be the ultimate brochure or “click bait” to offer on your website in return for contact information.

Even better, it’s never been easier to write and publish a book. While there are many approaches and nuances, here is a method for writing a book in only eight weeks:

1. Determine your subject. This could be a fun flip chart exercise during which you’ll probably come up with several.
2. Identify eight chapter titles and create a physical or online “folder” for each one. Start filling out each folder with articles, past writings, bullet points, and recordings.
3. Dedicate one week to write each of the eight chapters.
   1. A faster way to do this is to simply dictate your thoughts and notes into a digital recorder. Then, upload those recordings to a transcription service like revco.com or temi.com and wait a few minutes for the transcripts.
   2. With the transcripts in hand, you can either cut and paste and edit the transcripts, or you can outsource that to fiverr.com or any other outsource website.
4. When you have your entire book (let’s say 80 pages for an e-Book, 160 for one that you want to see in print) you can again go back to fiverr.com for an editor to smooth out the entire book.
5. Also on fiverr.com (and other sites) you can have someone design the cover
6. You can use Amazon (Kindle Direct Publishing) to publish your book as an e-book or a printed paperback…or both.
7. Or if you want to give away a few hundred, perhaps as part of a gifting strategy, you can actually go to a printer like docuprint.com.

What I’ve left out, of course, is the fact that you might want your book to be a picture or coffee table book. I know that’s very tempting to designers but it’s also a very different animal in terms of production and cost. My plan above is really for an advice-based book, like “The Ultimate Kitchen Design Book,” that might have a few images, but won’t depend on high quality graphics and expensive printing methods.

If you want to go the picture book route, you can still use some of the steps listed above and then go to a site like blurb.com to consider publishing options.

When you’re done, you can consider marketing promotions including press releases, book signings, and of course, you’ll want to send an autographed copy to…ME! Happy writing.

—