“There’s a secret that real writers know that wannabe writers don’t, and the secret is this: It’s not the writing part that’s hard. What’s hard is sitting down to write. What keeps us from sitting down is Resistance.”
~ Steven Pressfield
Steven Pressfield’s “The War of Art” is one of those books that everyone who wants to shift any part of their life to the next level should read. It reminds us of what we’re really facing when we ask one more person to read our manuscript and give us feedback, or add one more chapter, or one more story, or… simply find one more urgent task that needs to be accomplished before we start to write. However, in this article I’m really talking to people who have written a book, but who can’t bring themselves to get the manuscript formatted and ready for distribution.
The list of reasons we give ourselves for not pressing the button is extensive, but most of the time the real reason is our own internal resistance and has nothing to do with a shortage of time, skill, or energy.
Sending Your Thoughts Out into the World Can be Scary…
I understand… as long as your book isn’t published you can treasure the idea in your mind that your approach is unique, incredibly inspiring, a real game changer. But once it’s out there maybe people will say, “It sounds just like…” or “Isn’t that what every [insert your occupation] does?” Or even, “I can’t believe anyone really thinks…!”
Every business owner hears about the idea of writing a book and how it can turn you from just another [insert your business or occupation] to a key person of influence in the field, allowing you to attract more business opportunities and charge more for your services gets excited, but then they are confronted by the reality of publishing the book they have written and they fall flat. This is ‘the Resistance’ at work, and I believe that you should ignore it and focus on the outcomes.
A Few Important Facts You Should Consider:
Fact #1: I have not yet spoken to a business owner who has published a book and who actually uses it, whose business has not grown dramatically. I’m not talking about the authors whose books sit in their garage, I’m talking about the ones who carry books with them as well as business cards, who send them to prospects, who advertise them on their own website as well as Amazon, and who sell or distribute them at speaking gigs.
All these people will tell you that their book is the most amazing marketing tool… whether it gets read or not.
Fact #2: While I believe that your book should have intrinsic value, unless you use it as part of your consulting or training process there is a good chance that most recipients will not read it in its entirety so the chances of people providing genuine negative feedback are fairly slim.
As far as attracting new clients is concerned, the existence of a book is far more persuasive than what it actually says.
At the same time, I believe that you want to write a book that you can be proud of so I recommend that you work hard to ensure that it is highly readable, well-structured, delivers great value to its readers, and is as professionally presented as possible in every way. If that means you need to get professional assistance with writing it, do so… and make sure you get the services of a professional proofreader and don’t rely on Word or your spouse.
Fact #3: The subject of your book should be relevant and you should carefully consider how you plan to use the book. I have worked with authors who wrote how-to books about their processes so new clients would understand what was happening, others use their books as training manuals or pre-study for their courses, some coaches use their books for revision or as a framework for their work, yet others use it as a qualifying tool for prospects, and still others use their best-sellers to launch them onto larger world stages.
Your intention should shape the way the book is structured and it should be written and formatted to fit that intention. If your goal is to write a best-selling business book then your structure, style, and publishing decisions will be quite different to those made when your goal is to create lead generation for your business, or a pre-study guide.
At the End of the Day the Published Book Trumps the One Still in Your Computer
This is true of any business venture. As long as your manuscript is still sitting on your hard drive or locked in your head it’s not generating any traction at all. It’s not until you print the book and start distributing that you can find out how it works.
Actually, I do have one exception to this principle! I reviewed a manuscript for a person which was so preoccupied with their story, and so paranoid about sharing any information which competitors might use that the entire thing was simply fluff. I genuinely believed that if their target audience actually read the book it would damage the business and that was the gist of my review.