What is the Best Kept Secret to Writing Your First Book?

Writing your first book?

If you answered yes, please read my post.

Experiences are best teachers, agree? I am hoping my experiences with writing will help you do a great job in writing your first book- with less stress and in record time!

What is the Best Kept Secret to Writing Your First Book?

Okay, so here goes:

I always wanted to be an author. I wanted to write tons of books and get my name listed on the New York Times Best Sellers List. I used to have so many unfinished stories stashed upon my desk from where I will be randomly selecting one and will be working on it whenever the mood strikes. I kept writing years and years without any sort of planning and discipline and NOTHING happened.  I did not write my first book! Whaatt??

I know I shouldn’t be surprised as to why I couldn’t write one single book back then…

My writing schedules were always erratic.

I did not have any set time that I dedicate completely to writing on a typical day.

And I was not consistent in writing everyday.

This was pretty crucial in my failure to become a published author.

Anyhow, fast forward few more years.

Something amazing happened!

Drumroll please…

…….

…….

 I published my first eBook back in April of this year!!!

Yes! This ‘humble me’ has also joined the elite club of authors, finally!

Now, the book I wrote is NOT AT ALL related to the niche of this blog which is Parenting and Family. Its related to my career as an Insurance Advisor. By the way, I do have a site where I write exclusively about insurance and finance.

Working in the industry for 9 plus years, Insurance is something I live and breathe along with this blog. Consider me a subject matter expert if you will although I am sure I don’t know EVERYTHING about insurance either.

The name of the book is A Pocket Guide to Everyday Insurance. 

Here is an excerpt from Amazon product description:

Topics discussed in the book, “A Pocket Guide to Everyday Insurance” ranges from Auto and Home Insurance to Life and Health, Recreational Vehicles, Credit protection and Jewelry insurance. It also contains information on Identity theft and preventive measures.

This book is designed to make your life easy when it comes to providing only with what is relevant to your insurance needs.

Have a question on your car insurance? Chances are you will find an answer to that one on this book.

Worried about your home insurance premium going up this year? There are tips on how to bring it down on your next renewal.

Sick and tired of your insurance going up every year? Well, there are some tweaks you could do to make your costs manageable going forward.

What’s all the fuss about life insurance? Do you really need it? Answers you find in this book may surprise you.

Concerns about fixing your credit history, protecting your identity online or insuring your valuables adequately are all discussed in “A Pocket Guide to Everyday Insurance”.

“A Pocket Guide to Everyday Insurance” is all you need to face your deal with Insurance no matter from which walk of life you are from.

 

So, yeah! I felt SO accomplished when this happened- You see, I always wanted to be an author. This blog was sort of like a platform where I held myself accountable to fulfilling this dream.

But it took me awfully long…

MomLess Mom was born in 2012 and we are in 2016. This is where we go back to the beginning of the post where I mentioned about my chaotic schedule when it comes to writing. There was no order, no planning. I write some days, and not on other days. Not an effective strategy if you are in the process of writing your first book!

In my case,

It took me almost 4 years to write a small 100 page eBook!

Yes, I paid 4 years of my life time for not having a plan or simply because I was not following the best kept secret in the writing industry-which is to WRITE EVERY SINGLE DAY!

But it is better late than never, right?…

I still wrote a book! Geez, even saying it loud gives me goosebumps. I am glad I lived to see this day.

Now, enough about me. I want to share something with the future authors out there…

Hey Future Author!

I know you are writing your first book. But what is it? Are you struggling with words? Lacking inspiration or creativity to complete your book? Don’t lose your heart and don’t give up hope. 

One piece of advice from this newbie author might help.

Write EVERYDAY Till You Finish the Book.

That’s it! This is the best kept secret among successful writers.  

The keyword to remember here is EVERYDAY. Remember to write EVERYDAY.

Experts will tell you to have an outline of the book you are planning to write, topics mapped out and have a beginning and end in mind. Yes, they are right! It is crucial to incorporate that into the whole process of writing. 

But it not as important as WRITING EVERYDAY. Getting those words out into your word document or simple  white paper (Whichever is your method) is of utmost importance if you want to put your name to a book.

Have a target word count in mind to write each day. 300 words is good length. It is achievable. So, start there.

Don’t worry about grammar, or what you write makes sense. They probably won’t. Your only objective at this stage is to create a rough draft. And rough drafts are allowed to have tons of mistakes. So ignore the mistakes and bad sentence structures and fill up your document with words. Create that rough draft.

Remember, If there is no rough draft, you will never hold your book in your hands one day…

 

#happysunday ! #quoteoftheday #inspiring

A photo posted by Vinma Joseph (@amomlessmom) on Jun 26, 2016 at 5:51am PDT

So yeah!

Trust me, by doing this simple thing, you will be finishing off your book in no time.

Just write…

 Write EVERYDAY. 

Sincerely, 

Your newbie Author

Now, writing is only one part. Editing, formatting, publishing and marketing are the other parts of launching your book. I had an Editor and he helped me with formatting as well. God bless his heart! But the publishing and marketing was all me! Geez, save my book!

Speaking of marketing,  I do not have a sales landing page on my blog, to date. I haven’t done ANY marketing campaigns either. Yes, you guessed it. My sales are not going through the roof ‘yet’.

Because, I haven’t done the second half of the work- which is ALL marketing.

 There are 2 reasons why I severely lack on the marketing side of things.

1. I have NO IDEA how to market my book effectively
2. I just don’t have the time to sit and research ways to get my book out there.

There I said it!

However, I put up a shop through WooCommerce platform so people can buy A Pocket Guide to Everyday Insurance right from this blog. Whew! It took a while to set it up but yes, it is there now. If you purchase my book from the blog, it is $2.99. Everywhere it is $3.99. Just sayin’ 😉

Anyways, opening the shop on my blog  got me to publishing this post today so that, you guys know what’s going on in here. Yes, I know I suck at it, but hey! Give me a break, will ya? I am allowed to suck at it as this is my VERY first attempt. This is where I will be making mistakes because, it is through them I will learn to do a better job next time around.

However…

There is still a book on my name. I wrote my first book, you guys!! Okay okay I will stop saying that now 😉

Jokes apart…

Writing your first book can be a grueling process. Been there, done that. But it is not an impossible task as proved by the ever growing population of published authors in the world. 

Start writing your first book today…

And Write Everyday until you finish it…

 

Here are some resources that may motivate you when you sit down to write:

Enjoy!

1.  Jeff Goins talks about tips on writing books
2. Scott Berkun on writing a book.
3. M.G Leonard on the importance of writing everyday!  (one of my favorite posts, M.G Leonard’s thought provoking words is a must read for any one who aspire to be an author someday!)
4. How to write a Book by Jerry Jenkins, New York Times Best selling Author

 

That’s all folks. Now, go write that first book of yours. Good luck!