Seven Easy Steps to Writing and Publishing Your Book

Do you have a book taking up real estate in your head?

It’s time to get it out of your head and out to the world as a book.

It is not hard. If you have a good idea of what you want to share, the writing and publishing can be done comfortably in a month for most books.

Here are the basic steps:

Choose a topic and a working title.
Create a chapter outline
Write the chapters
Do a few rounds of editing
Format the document for submission
Create a cover
Submit for publishing

The next actions expand on the steps.

You can do it all yourself or have Greg Dixon help you work through the steps.

1. Choose a Topic and a Working Title

In this step, you determine the topic of your book and choose a working title that represents it.

Don’t worry too much about the title. After writing the chapters, you can refine the title, subtitle, and book description to represent your writing.

2. Create a Chapter Outline

The outline creates the overall structure and content organization for your book.

You can write your outline or chapter headlines in Microsoft Word, Google Docs, Atticus, or a writing tool of your choice.

Once you have the outline, the rest is filling in the space with content.

3. Write the Chapters

You can write the chapters with content to support the title of the chapter.

The content can be as simple or complex as you want to communicate the subject.

4. Do a Few Rounds of Editing

Read through and edit your manuscript a few times on your own until you are happy with it.

You then have others or a professional editor look through to make suggestions and adjustments for improvement.

I recommend a few rounds of reading and editing.

5. Formatting the Document for Publishing

Amazon and other publishers have specific formatting requirements for submitting your book.

The formatting will change according the trim size, such as 6 x 9 or 5 x 8. 6 x 9 inches is a good size for most books. You can find the details on the Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing pages.

This is where I typically jump in the process for our book clients. I use Atticus to format the book for print and eBook.

6. Create a Cover

Creating a cover that meets the print publishing specifications is the trickiest part.

Amazon will generate a cover template based on trim size, page count, and paper type for use designing a cover.

Amazon also has a decent book design feature when you are uploading the book.

This is another area where I can help with the cover design or tweaking an existing cover to meet the specifications.

7. Submitting the Book

We generally submit to Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing and to IngramSpark for people who want to get their books into bookstores and libraries.

The process is mostly completing forms and uploading files.

Amazon will then provided an online preview and conduct a quality review when you submit.

We usually do this for our clients using their Amazon and IngramSpark accounts.