How I Self-Published My Book and You Can Too

Last month, I released my first book, Win the Day. And I just received my second shipment of 50 copies. It’s exciting to think that this book is available in print to the entire world. It didn’t take the miracle of being vetted by a large publishing house or the approval of Amazon, because I did the whole thing myself.

Over the course of the editing, design, and distribution processes, I documented how I wrote my book on Medium. And although I hit a snag when trying to publish to Amazon’s KDP (choose the lower percentage revenue share with less restrictive rules), I would recommend this method to test your content.

Publishing my chapters as articles allowed me to harvest many reviews as I was working on the first draft.

Once I finished that first draft, I needed to shape the material into a cohesive book and get feedback on Win the Day’s effectiveness. So, I recruited friends as editors of the second draft and paid an editor to ensure my book met the professional standards I was striving for once I had incorporated their suggestions.

Then, I became a project manager and turned my manuscript over to people who had helped others create their books. It is never easy to give up control of your work, but this is an essential step to ensure that what you’ve written will have an audience beyond your friends and family.

Here are some book horror stories to avoid:

• A friend of mine wrote a book a few years back and sent the wrong copy of his manuscript to the publisher. It wasn’t until he received the first shipment of 10,000 books that he realized his mistake.
• Another friend self-edited. His book was riddled with errors, and he desperately sought feedback from buyers so he could revise the next priniting.
• Then, a third wrote an interesting book that didn’t have a professional feel to it. I’m not sure if it was the book’s size, page stock, or the ads in the back. For some reason, the experience of reading her book felt cheapened.

I would not buy any of these books if I were perusing them in a bookstore or an airport bookrack. I wanted to ensure that my book looked as if it had been published by one of those huge publishing houses. The only way to do that was to invest in a top-notch book designer.

As your book project nears the finish line, you will need ISBN numbers. This hidden cost is one that trips-up many new writers, especially those of us on a budget. But these book identifiers are an absolute necessity.

I recently saw a question on Quora that went something like this: “I listed my book on Amazon. Why isn’t it selling?” Well, books don’t sell themselves. Your job, once the book is out in the world, is to market it. For me, that has meant increasing my social media presence, designing courses, and even building a Woocommerce store for my website. I’ve become my own publishing house.

Publishing my book has been a huge learning experience. I’ve invested a fair amount of money in the process. And at the end of the day, I have a beautiful product that I am proud to have represent me in the world.

Win the Day is a handbook for taking more control of your life. And if it helps a few people to live with less stress, anxiety, or depression, that will make it a success to me. If you have a message that can make the world a better place, maybe you should consider publishing a book too. It won’t make you rich, but it will fulfill you like nothing else can.

There are mores stories about self-publishing in my book publishing list

https://john-cunningham.medium.com/list/book-publishing-6339e78a53c1