I register a domain name and create a WordPress website on Cloudways.
The home page will introduce the book and provide a working table of contents.
Writing and Publishing Chapters
Over time, I will write the chapters in Google Drive and publish as blog posts on the website.
More steps coming as the project progresses.
Do You Want to Join the Adventure?
You are welcome to follow along with what I am doing online with your own book project.
If you want my help with creating the Google Drive folders, setting up a website, and cheering you through the process, sign up for my most affordable retainer at $88 per month. I provide everything you need.
Emphasizing the Unlimited part of Shared Visions Unlimited Publishing, I encourage and help you to publish your book in multiple formats on multiple platforms, including:
Printed Book and eBook through Amazon and IngramSpark Put your book out far and wide forever and possibly make some money.
FlipBook Easy distribution and support for multimedia elements. Help people, build authority, and increase influence.
Digital Experience Edition Secure multimedia portal for your book content and support material. Great potential for direct sales.
Audiobook A market for those who prefer to listen.
Video Versions Illustrated readings, training, …
Today, I suggest adding a blogging website to the mix and possibly starting by writing and publishing your book on a blogging website.
Why You Would Consider Publishing Your Book As A Website
This is for you if your reasons to write and publish a book are along these lines:
You have joy in the creating and writing process itself.
You have insights or stories you want to share with the world.
You want to increase your authority and influence.
You may want to use a book as a lead magnet for your products and services.
You want to engage your readers with your content and get feedback to improve the print book.
You collaborate with an editor or writing coach.
This is not for you if you are a perfectionist who wants everything perfect before sharing.
I build high-performing and search-engine-optimized WordPress sites for marketing and various other purposes. Here is why this approach can work for your book and why I am going to use this approach for my own books:
WordPress provides a great platform for writing and collaborating on posts and articles.
Attention to Search Engine Optimization and submitting to Google Search Console can boost your search presence.
The pages can have rich multimedia content and links to related resources.
WordPress provides a good search function for the site itself. This is fabulously useful.
The Google Translate plugin can translate the site instantly. I still think this isamazing! Check out the language selector at the bottom-right of this window.
You can invite feedback and comments for your content as you go.
Sharing to social media platforms is easy.
Linking back from social media platforms and YouTube is easy.
Writing Live and Testing Content
I have a few books in mind: The First Book of Lazy, All My Relations, Adventures in Moving, and The Golden Publishing Sales Machine.
I will create a website and start writing at least one of those books live soon.
Here is the plan:
Register a domain name with the working book title.
Create a website with key plugins, including Yoast SEO, Google Site Kit, and Ultimate Blocks.
Create a home page with a book description and a working outline of topics.
Write the first chapter.
Submit the site to Google Search Console for indexing.
Write a chapter regularly. I will aim for at least three a week.
Post a link to each chapter on social media.
Consider doing a broadcast for each chapter.
I use Grammarly to keep my writing somewhat under control!
If I get readers and interest, I will combine and publish in some or all formats such as a print book, eBook, flipbook, audiobook, and Digital Experience Edition.
At the very least, I will have fun writing and publishing the chapters:-)
The main service I provide for our book publishing is formatting the manuscript for print book and eBook publishing with Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing and IngramSpark.
The tool I use for that is Attiticus at atticus.io.
Atticus supports all popular book trim sizes like 6 x 9 inches.
It includes many book themes that can be customized in many ways.
The platform provides good previews of the formatting of the eBook on various devices and the print format.
Writing
Usually, the manuscripts from our clients come in Microsoft Word format that is imported into Atticus for formatting.
Atticus provides a great writing platform for writing and editing books.
Each book section and chapter is treated as a separate block, which makes restructuring your book a matter of dragging the section up or down on the list on the left panel.
The formatting within each section or chapter is highly style-driven in the sense that all headings and all paragraph styles will be the same across the entire book.
This is a good practice that will frustrate style hackers who want to vary fonts, styles, and colors paragraph by paragraph.
I use Grammarly for writing style and correctness. Other writing tools could work for you within Atticus.
Proofing
Atticus outputs a PDF file optimized for uploading for printing. This file represents the book formatting with high accuracy.
We have been sending the PDF to authors and editors for feedback. Adobe does support review comments, though it is awkward.
My current practice is to use the PDF to create a flipbook with Heyzine at https://heyzine.com/.
The flipbook provides a great presentation of the formatting and can be the preferred way to share books where your intention is to share rather than make sales of the book. Like a lead magnet:-)
There are dozens of flipbook creators. Heyzine is easy to use, offers a lot with the free plan, and the paid plans are inexpensive. Heyzine can also publish multimedia magazines.
I have a lot of skills and tools to enable implementation many different things.
I also can be an enabler of both good and bad habits:-)
As the driver for a group of students, I probably should of been telling the girls to not run through the big puddle.
Instead, I am in the puddle too!
Not growing up any time soon.
Shared Visions Unlimited Publishing
My main company focuses on helping people publish and market books, online courses, memberships, and story productions, often collaborating with Betty Withrow.
Betty is a writer, writing coach, and ghostwriter in Monterey County, California.
Sometime it seems like we are publishing a book a week. We encourage authors to consider creating courses and multimedia programs related to their books.
I teach and offer an approach to publishing called The Golden Publishing Sales Machine.
Almost all of the following projects started with someone, asking :
‘I want to do X, can you help?’
Many times I was able to help.
“How to Coach Baseball to Kids” video course for Rocket Norton.
Websites for various promotions and companies (hundreds). Many of those I inherited from people who stopped returning calls to my client or never completed the project.
Online assessment systems for Human Resources (decades, millions of dollars).
Driver for Rocket Norton’s Town Car Service. I am now once removed from every major actor from the last forty years).
Also once removed from most top musicians, copywriters, and marketers in the world.
Many theatre and concert promotions.
Cancer benefit concerts.
Art in the Garden and other arts events in North Vancouver.
Urban Farming projects.
Food Rescue projects, including video productions.
Capturing and publishing personal stories.
Video capture of events and keynote presentations.
Many online courses and membership programs.
Quirky music videos done for fun with zero budgets.
Doing video interviews of pioneers in the Natural Health Industry.
Helping authors publish their books. Rocket Norton’s Lost In Space was the first one decades ago. Sometimes it seems like Betty Withrow and I and I are submitting a book a week for print and electronic publishing.
Online Summits.
Music concerts where I helped organize, provided sound, did multi-track audio recordings, and recorded with multiple video cameras. Much of that is on my YouTube channel.
Hundreds of hours of video of Unity services, including Unity of Vancouver and Unity of Nashville.
A video documentary for Lynn Valley United Church.
Travel articles, photography, and videos.
Technical documentation.
Software design and engineering.
Organized and showed in Art Exhibitions.
Drove through the Grand Canyon in a snowstorm (there is a story there!)
…
Everything is Figureoutable
Although I have done and learned a tremendous amount of things, I would make a LOT of money if I got paid for what I did not know.
I have joked that the name for that is Consulting.
My main superpower is that I am a Zen Master of search and can read and understand things quickly.
As Marie Forleo’s mother liked to say, Everything Is Figureoutable.
