How to Decide Your Book Topic

Nowadays books have become more than just “books” – really, they’ve become elevated business cards and credibility signals for experts and entrepreneurs everywhere. Writing a book might be on your bucket list already but what most budding authors struggle with the most is the age-old question “but what am I going to write about?”. In this video and blog post, I’ll be helping you to decide your book topic, who it’s for and how it’ll help the people you want to serve by writing it in the first place!

Who is your book for?

First things first, you need to start with your reader. Who is going to buy and read your book? I know you’re watching this video because you want to know how to write a book and what it’s going to be about… but, before you can even get to those important decisions, the one thing you need to ask yourself is WHO am I writing this book for?

When I wrote my books Virtual Freedom and Rise of the Youpreneur, I knew exactly who was going to buy and read them before I wrote a single word.

You must begin by identifying your audience. In fact, as a rule of thumb, you should never launch anything unless you know who it’s going to be for!

Now you need to niche down even further. Your target audience might be business owners. But what kind of business owners? What industry are they in? What are they struggling with that they’re desperate to read a book about, in order to get answers to their questions?

The clearer you are about the specific person you are going to help, the more likely you are to write a book they want to read. 

What problem is your book going to solve?

Now you know who your book is for, you need to ask yourself what do they need to know? Why do they need your book? What problem does your book solve for them? If people do not see the value in your book immediately, they are not going to buy it, pure and simple.

We’ve discussed the importance of defining who you are before. As an entrepreneur you should have a clear idea of what you and your business are all about. So marry your book with that definition. Make sure it shares your message about that one specific area of your expertise with your target audience in mind. 

What can you say in a way no-one else can? What insights do you have to share? What stories do you have to tell? People love stories. They connect themselves to them. They fall in love with them and more importantly, a lot of the time – the people that tell those stories!

What is the WHY behind your book?

The final thing you need to be clear about is your reason for writing a book. You might think the reason is obvious, but believe me, writing a book is a lot of work. There are going to be days when you sit there and think: why am I doing this? Knowing your reason for writing your book is going to help you get through that. It’s also going to help you write a better book.

It could be that you’re simply wanting to solve a big problem that a subsection of your industry is experiencing. It might go deeper than that – perhaps more of a legacy focus on helping people lead better, more fulfilling lives. Perhaps the reason for writing it is to simply position yourself as a go-to expert in your niche. Whatever it is, getting clear on the WHY behind the book, for you personally, is a game-changer.

To make it easier for you to write and market a bestselling book, I’ve put together a FREE guide that’ll help you navigate the in’s and out’s of successfully writing and marketing a book to bestseller status. 

Your book should reflect what your area of expertise is and how you can serve your community by providing them with value. #Youpreneur Click To Tweet

Wrap Up

If today’s video has helped you in some way… perhaps answered a few questions you’ve been having, or helped you develop a new idea or two, let me know what your biggest takeaway was. I’d love to hear from you, tweet me @chrisducker!