Review in depth the intelligence you have accumulated over the years and you will have no problem in identifying where your primary source of expertise lies. However, before cementing your choice of a topic it will be necessary to run the data through several tests to confirm its suitability as the subject matter for your first how-to book.
1. Will the topic be convincing enough to warrant widespread appeal among devotees?
2. Will you be capable of confirming its validity and expanding on received data?
3. Will you be able to convert your expertise into a teaching module?
4. Will the accumulated material manifest a disposition for regular updating?
5. Will the topic have the potential for subsequent editions?
6. Will it have the propensity to spawn more books on disparate aspects of the subject?
7. Will you tempted to abandon the project if your topic has already been covered?
You won’t be able to resolve all of these questions right now but you will be by the time you’ve finished reading my Writing for Profit’ tutorial.
WHAT ATTRACTS PEOPLE TO WORKS OF NON-FICTION?
Autobiographies and biographies of celebrities are always in demand because they arouse the curiosity factor and particularly so when the material evokes an expectation of salacity.
The curiosity factor is equally evident in readers of how-to books, guides and manuals, but directed by a more responsible motive: the thirst for information on how to do something, do it better and excel at it. And so the chosen topic must be capable of fulfilling these wholesome expectations by ensuring that readers will become better informed on the subject matter for which you and they share a common interest.
Your personal expertise must be equal to the task you set yourself because otherwise, no matter how cleverly conceived or creatively scripted, your work will never be published. Commissioning editors can spot a fake a mile away. While they may not be expert on your subject, they will very quickly ascertain whether or not you are.
PASSIVE V ACTIVE PARTICIPATION
Levels of reader participation tend to vary between different genres and the differential with regard to commitment invariably favors non-fiction.
People read fiction to be entertained
(Passive participation: in one ear and out the other)
People read non-fiction to
1. Become better informed
2. Learn new skills
3. Hone existing talents
(Active participation: invoking the faculties of reasoning and memory retention)
Much popular fiction is in style for just a while but superior niche non-fiction can be around forever, earning the estates of its originators drip feed residuals in perpetuity. For example How to Win Friends and Influence People’ by Norman Vincent Peale was first published in the mid-1930s, sold millions of copies worldwide, and is still re-issued from time to time. This famous book has been through several publishing houses but it has only one originator.
Whenever people pick up a how-to book they are demonstrating willingness to engage in active participation. They know they are in for some work and you should in there pitching with them, providing an interesting topic and knowledgeable text in an easy-to-read format that transforms a chore into a pleasure.
WHY GUIDES, MANUALS, HOW-TO BOOKS ARE ALWAYS IN DEMAND
No one willingly volunteers for instruction unless there is more, much more than mere passing interest in the topic, and therein lies the market for quality guides, instruction manuals and how-to books.
QUALIFIED, TARGETED PROSPECTS
You are preaching the partially converted: all the more reason then that you run your expertise through all the tests to ensure its validity. Your knowledge must be superior to that of the reader and it must be quantifiably so. Unsubstantiated opinion has no place in this classification of non-fiction and so you must validate all that you think you know and expand upon it responsibly with every means at your disposal. This calls for intensive research and without it you will end up with egg all over your face because your manuscript will never get past the first reading stage of any professional publisher you might approach.
ESTABLISHING THE DEPTH OF YOUR KNOWLEDGE
Never take for granted that you already know enough about your special subject to fill a book. No one is that clever. Spend some time testing out the depth of your knowledge by making lists of what you know and what you don’t know. Take particular note of those areas that require substantiation or where you are lacking corroborative detail.
CONFIRMING ITS VALIDITY AND EXPANDING ON THE INFORMATION
This is where you start your research and it is so important that an entire chapter in my tutorial is devoted to the subject. Most of what you need you will find online at home or in the free-to-use ‘active learning’ centres provided by your local library where you can double up by accessing appropriate hard copy references manuals.
TESTING THE POTENTIAL FOR LONGEVITY IN YOUR CHOSEN TOPIC
Testing out the potential for life beyond a single edition is something you can do for yourself quite easily by carrying out this simple test.
CHECK IF YOUR TOPIC HAS A NICHE-CARVING ASPECT
In other words: that it is not associated with a fad or a fashion. For example, I’ve had several books published over the years, some of which have been in style for a while then disappeared, others have bombed, but two of these titles just keep going on from strength to strength. Why? Why should two out of several prove so popular? They are popular because they are directed at niche markets that are self-perpetuating and have a seemingly bottomless pit of prospective participants. Like the London buses, there’s always another one coming along in a minute.
Back in 1994 when I wrote Starting Your Own Business (How-To-Books ISBN 1-85703-859-2) government initiatives on helping people to start up on their own were just beginning to bite all over the world. As these initiatives increased in volume, so too did interest in my work. Similarly, when I became increasingly aware of the hype on home based web operations, I wrote Starting an Internet Business at Home (Kogan Page ISBN 0-7494-3484-8). This latter tome has only been around since August 2001 but it is already selling well in bookstores all over the world and (as I suspected it would) as an Internet purchase via Amazon, BOL, Barnes & Noble, etc.
Now, spotting an opportunity and carving a niche for yourself only works when you know the market inside out and when it identifies precisely with your own expertise. Look again at the marketplace identified with your topic and establish whether there is a sector or sub-sector that is tailor made for exploitation through your special brand of knowledge. That is how to position yourself in the right place at the right time. It has nothing to do with luck; the answer lies in creative forward thinking.
Jim Green is an online enthusiast and bestselling author with an ever-growing string of traditionally published niche non-fiction hard copy titles to his credit. View his test marketing experiment at this website:
http://howtobecomefamousonline.howtoproducts-xl.com
