*** #1 BESTSELLER IN AUTHORSHIP***How to Write and Publish Your Book like a "Lean" Startup CompanyYou won't find this anywhere else. “What is the fastest way I can get my book done?”I pondered the question a minute. There is all this extravagant education out there on writing a book, filled with hundreds of things to do. But the truth is, you do 20% of the work for 80% of the result (The Pareto Principle).How does one accomplish this? By streamlining all the tasks down to the minimum requirements, and focusing on those.The Author Startup is a process to create a minimum viable product for your book. It is used to get your book out there and build momentum for you.In The Author Startup, you the Boogie Board Approach for publishingUse concepts similar to The Lean Startup for your bookLearn the exact tools I used to create and publish a book in 26 daysFind out how to defeat the “Imposter Syndrome”Receive a complete Action Plan that will change your approach and attitude for publishing your bookThe book contains links to an entire action plan, including video demos. Don’t wait to start your book, learn the quickest way to get it published now!
I already self published a book. Now I am trying to learn from my mistakes and create a new career in writing. Some of these things that are said in the book I figured out on my own. There was a few ideas I thought were interesting. But for the most part not what I needed for my next step in my writing career.
Ray takes the overwhelming aspect of self-publishing by giving step by step instructions on how to do it. After reading this, I feel inspired to apply the method and practical actions towards publishing content!
The goal is not perfection, but to have a product and build momentum. The process in this book helps writers publish quickly to get over the barrier of analysis by paralysis, instill confidence to keep going and continuously improve their craft over time!
Thank you, Ray, for providing insight and resources that equip people for success in writing!
Ray Brehm's approach to writing a book is far less complicated than others make it out to be. Which is a relief to me, since I already use many of the processes he recommends. His info on uploading to KDP, and Ninja mode, was eye-opening. I would recommend this book to any author who wants to simplify their life a little, but especially to newbies. If it were not for some grammatical issues, I would have rated it five stars.
Truly simplifies the process even if this isn't your first time writing a book. If you've gotten stuck while trying to get those amazing ideas out of your head, this is one book to definitely check out.
This is a decent book, but it really is for authors looking to publish their first book. And he's advocating a very short book. Nothing here is in depth. It's quick and dirty.
Ray Brehm, in this book, shares the Author Starup method. A method derived from the Lean Startup by Eric Ries where Ries says that companies looking to launch a product to market need only focus on the minimum viable product in the beginning (and worry about other things later). The minimum viable product is that version of a new product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort.
Rays says this model can work for authors while writing and publishing a book and he explains how...
An author's best friend is momentum. His worst enemy is losing that momentum. Oftentimes authors get distracted by countless irrelevant things during the process of writing a book, which detract from their momentum and either slow or altogether halt their progress towards a published book. Some authors sadly never get to finish their books because of this.
Ray offers a solution. In the vein of Ries' advice, he urges authors to focus on the minimum viable product when writing. Which, in their case, is a published book. They can leave the rest of the stages or processes, whether only marginally or even considerably valuable to the book’s success, for a later time. That way they protect momentum.
Ray gives pertinent tips on how to maintain momentum at each stage of the writing and publishing process so that authors don't miss a beat. He identifies momentum takers and/or stoppers and advises on how to deal with them. Even in reading this book, Ray guides you on how to maintain your momentum so you can maximize your reading experience.
While I believe that Ray's advice is timely and on point, I doubt anything (trick or hack) will ever truly eliminate the inherent hardship that comes with writing, especially writing a book. Well, except maybe for ghost writing, but even that comes with its own challenges. (Also, I haven't tried out every one of his nuggets so I can't tell you they all work. Some may only work for him.)
So, no, this is not a book elaborately laying out a quick and easy method for writing a book. It's just a book that offers what I believe, for the most part, is a much easier and better method of writing a book than you have probably been employing.
A quick read, mostly about how to write your book quickly. Lots of good advice here, and some bad. For example, the author recommends sending gift copies of your Kindle book to your reviewers so they don't have to shell out the 99 cents. Maybe this works again now, but last time I had a client do it, Amazon took down every one of those reviews--totally unfair but true. I wouldn't risk trying it again.
Overall, this is a good book, but it doesn't touch on the marketing stuff at all, and that's what I was really looking for. (To get that, you need the author's book on marketing, Bestseller Book Launch, which was quite good.)
Highlights: Yellow highlight | Page: 19 Here are the 6 DCF questions you should ask yourself about each chapter: What is the problem that this chapter solves or addresses? What is the solution to this problem? What is the target profile of your reader? What objections might the reader have to the information you are presenting? What proof counters those objections? Why is this chapter so unique? This format is a hybrid of traditional structure and sales copy. The intent is to produce a way to engage the reader and in effect “sell” every chapter to him or her. The DCF Introduction paragraph will communicate the first three of your six questions.
Yellow highlight | Page: 33 If you do use GarageBand, Rob Dircks has an excellent 14 minute tutorial on everything from mic placement to using GarageBand. Here is the link.
Yellow highlight | Page: 63 In fact, reach out to me. I will be your first one (I review tons of books for fellow authors).
Yellow highlight | Page: 63 Make it easy on the reviewers. Provide the outline of your book (or a one-page summary). I provide a video summary (in case the reviewer doesn’t like to read - haha!).
Yellow highlight | Page: 63 Once you have the reviews, take some of the better ones and ask the person if they mind if you put it in your Editorial Reviews section of your Amazon book page. You would update this via your Author Central account.
You can tell this is a business writers guide and that’s ok, but as a creative writer of fiction and some nonfiction… it didn’t have a lot to demystify the challenges of creativity. (Guess that’s another writing guide I have to write for myself. Grin.)
I did like that he approaches writing as a business and for an introvert he’s the cheerleader you need in the style of “you can do the thing!” The author does have more of a budget than most independent writers have.
I do like his method of mind mapping for non fiction, and the way of breaking down every step into the most basic things.
Plus there’s a free template and some other good ideas for a bogged down business writer who has no idea where to start.
As an independent writer, I meet up with people who have no idea how to start writing. This will be a recommend for someone writing nonfiction. For fiction, I’ll have to find something else. That doesn’t mean fiction writers shouldn’t read this… I know plenty of fiction writers, including myself who get bogged down in the process… but I can’t see me reaching for this book to cure those woes.
I gave it four stars for the process and the encouragement. But ended up with 3 stars, because it didn’t cover the content I expected. Just be aware it’s a business book if you’re going to be looking for something to help you write fiction.
This quick little book provided so much value and helped me shift my focus so I'm now confident I'll be able to write the damn book, publish it, and launch it. It's so easy to get caught up in all the launch details and I'm definitely guilty of buying lots of online courses for first time authors - but this book streamlines all of that and gets you to focus. The most helpful part was realizing that I can separate PUBLISHING my book from LAUNCHING my book. Sounds silly, but even though I'm in all of these courses and FB groups about writing that hadn't come up. It's so much easier for me to do one thing at a time and build from there. Best of all, the author provides an easy to follow action plan that isn't attached to your ebook reader. It's a separate PDF that you can easily reference and follow all the links he suggests. Love that! Makes taking action so much easier than trying to figure out how to find my Kindle highlights.
Failing Fast As A Writer - book thoughts on The Author Startup
Full-time book authors were generally considered bearded leftist losers who always wore cheap footwear, large chequered shirt and hung out in chalk smelling classrooms of local public schools to talk about some latest book from an eminent author who had succeeded because of political support. Nowadays, full-time authors sport chic beards, wear expensive sports coats and are found typing away on their Macbooks in cozy coffee shops.
I have failed in many things but haven't failed as a published author yet. I was told that publishing a book through Amazon was a piece of cake. The Author Startup is a quick read to walk you through the process of writing a digital book, publishing it and marketing it on Amazon. The essence of the book - everything else can be figured out and is not complicated, but you need to have a compelling story to tell. Takeaway - fail fast fail often as a writer...quickest road to success.
If you like long books because they're long, then this resource make not be for you. But if you're like me, and you like books that get straight to the point, then this book is for you, too.
It's only 10,000 words and less than 100 pages. But the author goes through exactly what you need to learn about KDP without me having to go back and forth to Amazon to search for the answer.
I particularly liked his first section of the book on creating the right mindset to finish writing and publish a book. One thing I "suffer" from is what the author calls impostor syndrome. His honest insight and steps to overcome this mindset are what I value most in this quick.
I've written a book before, but I was able to find new approaches to writing for kindle that I didn't know before. I recommend this book.
You can read this in one sitting, like i did. Maybe two. The length made me a bit skeptical from the start, but being a big fan of the book Rework I was also rather intrigued by the early use of the term Minimum Viable Product, or MVP, which means identifying the least amount of work you need to do to be successful in the shortest amount of time. By the time I reached the end of the book I realized, yes, there it is. Brehm's strategy gets you to finish the most important bit first, sneaking you past the scary bits that can kill a project with stress (believe me, I know). And once that bit is done, the rest seems so much easier to get done. Thanks, Ray. I'm going to keep this book handy for my next launch.
This book contained some valuable links to resources and services for dictating, editing, and designing your book. The author advocates getting your work out there, whether it is perfect or not. This may seem controversial to some people, but I happen to agree simply because society has become so fixated on nit-picking the minute details to attempt to discredit an author. It seems a misplaced comma, to some people, completely erases the value of the content. I'm all for striving for excellence, but let's all keep the focus on someone's ideas, not their punctuation.
Me gustó porque fue muy conciso y practico, te de instrucciones claras sobre los pasos que tienes que seguir para publicar un libro en Amazon. También me gusta el espíritu detrás del proceso: no pierdas la motivación y sigue en un paso tras otro hasta que llegues a publicar. Y el autor te da los consejos sobre la coordinación y las acciones necesarias para que el proceso sea lo más suave posible.
Además, tengo que reconocer que es el mejor libro que he visto en Kindle respecto al formato que sigue, muy estético y sin ninguna falla.
Ray Brehm told you exactly what this book is about and how to use this book. He tells you up front that all the links and references are in the back of the book so you can zone in on the reading without interruption. I gave it 5 stars on this merit alone because I found it inspirational for my own non-fiction writing.
I invite you to take the book at face value because it has some really great advice. His take what you need and leave the rest approach was really nice.
I’ll give this book 5 stars if I get my book published! Until then, this book was solid advise that is easy to follow, with actionable next steps. It almost feels too easy, but that’s the point: get everything out of the way and just get your first book out the door: THEN you have permission to start obsessing over it. I read the entire book in one sitting over two hours and feel motivated to get my sh** done.
Normally self-help book authors would go around in circles with information that may not be necessary. What I like about this book is its directness and ability to provide you with the core ideas while also making it entertaining. It seems like a no brainer when you think about it, but everything outlined in this book makes sense i'm not surprised why the author is a best seller.
The book lives up to its title. It is a radical approach to organize the production of a book from creation to launch. Taking the pressure off by publishing first and then launching seems logical to me and I am motivated to try it. The book provides the minimum actions to be taken at each step and is designed to be read in a couple of settings. The actions required at each step are simplified. This is a remarkable accomplishment, in my opinion.
I'm excited to put his advice into action! Brehm's approach to writing and publishing a book is refreshingly simple and straightforward. By focusing on the 20% of tasks that yield 80% of the results, you can get your book out there quickly and start building momentum. The action plan and video demos are incredibly helpful. If you've been procrastinating on writing your book, this is the kick in the pants you need!
Holistic approach to launch an ebook, offering sweet and sharp advice!
Many great ideas to adopt, such as i) bite-size: more avid readers like to do quick reading (under 100 pages) so I can cut my book into sequels ii) even each chapter should be made short so it’s more motivational for continuing (easier to achieve); iii) all actions at the back with downloadable resources.
Thank you this is a free book, and I’m very willing to pay for the next one! Good strategy!
This was a quick read that offered some very practical step-by-step tips on how to write and publish a book -- going from a blank sheet of paper to getting it done. Very, very doable stuff. It also contains links to websites and tools that are very helpful in the process -- a real time-saver from hunting them down yourself. I highly recommend this book for the aspiring writer.
Ray Brehm cuts through all the noise and stress of writing your first book. He gives you a step by step blueprint from idea to publish. His advice to get your book written and published without adding the stress and complication of doing a launch and shooting for a Best Seller is spot on.
I've been interested in applying Lean principles to my writing career for a while now, and this pamphlet has some good ideas. But it's incredibly short ( it takes about an hour to read through). THis is little more than a high level overview. It's well laid out- You could do worse than following the action plan here.
Self-help fiction is always hit or miss. The more the author turns a "book" into a platform for self-promotion and selling other things as opposed to dispensing valuable information gained from research/experience the more likely the book is to be a miss. This was almost entirely a miss.
Direct and without frills, Brehm educates the potential self-publishing author with the basic nuts and bolts to get the job done. He offers his Action Plan to simplify the writing process and avoid distraction and within that Action Plan, his DCF Template (Dauntless Chapter Framework) to help you construct every chapter to be a winner. He instill confidence to get the job done.
I have read several books on how to write your first book. This one is the best, by far, IMHO. The author gives you exactly what you need to get going and writing your first book, which is always the hardest. I am well on my way to publishing my first book and it is because of this book. Thank you, Mr. Brehm.
This step by step was helpful. It teaches you how to get self-published published, so if you need simple, straightforward directions -- this is your book. I'm glad I came across it. Many books have advice but are filled with excess. This is trimmed, precise.
I've been thinking more seriously about getting over the procrastination and just writing the book and so the search has begun for some how-to help to actually get it done. This was one of my first reads on it and its clearly laying out the steps to take to get it published. A great place to start as I no longer need to work any of that out!
Ray Brehm has written a book for the wanna be authors. Most of the wannabes have an idea but are overwhelmed about the process of launching the book. This book gives you a straight forward approach to publish your book. Very simple and implementable.