5 Self Publishing Tips for Spiritual Authors

Thinking of writing a book?  Are you a life coach, spiritual seeker, transformational teacher, psychic medium, blogging bodhisattva or luminous lightw worker with a magical message you’d love to get out to the masses?  You are in luck!  🙂

We’ve worked with hundreds of authors of all sizes to grow an audience, build a platform and self publish powerful, purposeful prose in the spiritual development and personal growth niches.

There are tons of articles you can read on what to do, what NOT to do, when it comes to publishing your first (or next) book.  This isn’t going to be one of those articles.  Instead, I’m going to simply lay out 7 simple rules that have worked wonderfully well for me, for hundreds of my clients, students and subscribers, and if you try and apply them, will work equally as well for you.

1.  Teach, don’t write.  Too many spiritual authors are perfectionists.  And because we all want to be the next Hemingway, or Maya Angelou, we spend far too much time trying to pick the perfect words as writers…..rather than focusing on what your audience REALLY wants.  To learn.  And for you to teach what you know and share what you love.  That is why people buy these types of books.  To grow!  So show them what they need and just teach it.
2. Teach one thing at a time.  Quick insider tip:  No one wants to read a 40 thousand word self published book on their Kindle.  People LOVE short books.  Most people don’t even read past the 3rd chapter in ANY book, let alone one they download digitally from Amazon, or anywhere else online.  It may not be the purist perspective, but it’s the real one.  And a freeing one too.  Focus on ONE key lesson per book.  Teach one thing, share one major exercise, technique,  takeaway or TRANSFORMATION per book.
3. Think small, but series.  This goes to number #2 as well.  Start with short books, but think about creating a series….even before you publish #1.  The key to growing a self publishing “empire” in the Amazon era is writing short books, many times.  This allows you to rapidly expand your influence, grow your audience and offer the appearance of being far more prolific, than wasting months or even years writing a single long volume.  (that most folks won’t finish as well!)
4. Create a Content Cornerstone.  This is what we call a master outline, or a data dump of all your “niche” knowledge.  Just create one single “meta” document that grows, flows, evolves and expands as your experience and expertise increase over time as well.  Not only does this allow you to write many short, powerful impactful and inspirational books that cut across lots of related modalities, it will also allow you to convert this content into courses, coaching, group classes, webinars, and more.  (this is something we call “repurpose like a rock star” in our author marketing courses, and something we’ll cover more in a later post)
5. “Help me how to Live”:  One of the best pieces of writing advice I’ve ever gotten, was that, when it comes to spiritual growth or personal development books, your readers ONLY real question is, “how can you help me to live?”  People want to be helped, healed, offered hope and transformed by words of wisdom, and by others (hint….YOU!) who have thought deeply about issues that matter the most to all of us.  If you are a spiritual coach, a psychic medium, a healer of one kind or another, an inspirational author or architect, your primary purpose is to make people better….and to offer all of us a path forward, when we need a lamp to light the way.

Of course there is much more, but these 5 tips are a good place to being.  Keep it simple. Start small.  And think series!  Teach don’t write.  Fierce focus.  And start now!  There has never been a better time to self publish, it’s fun, profitable, and the best way to build BUZZ for your books, blog, brand and business to boot!

Need self publishing help?  Drop us a line and we’re happy to help!