30 Day Self-Publishing Blueprint
When many people think of publishing, they automatically think in terms of traditional publishing – with agents and manuscript approval – a long process that ultimately isn’t very lucrative for most authors.
But these days, thanks to the Internet, you can publish on your own at no upfront cost (unless you want to spend money on certain elements) and use your new book to earn money and build a brand for yourself.
Whether you want to churn out non-fiction books or embark on a career as a fiction author in one of the many genres available to you, this is a process where it helps to have a process of bite-sized tasks that can help guide you along the way.
Day 1: Pick a Genre for Your Publishing Journey
Some people try to go all in on self-publishing, working on multiple manuscripts at once. This can be done, but you may want to wait until you have the hang of it before trying to juggle too many projects.
The first thing you want to do is pick a topic or genre. If you’re publishing non-fiction, it’ll be a niche topic that you feel is lucrative and works well for online info products. If it’s fiction, you need to pick a genre.
Genre choices can be something you, yourself love to read, or something you just find easy or interesting to write. You might choose thrillers, sci-fi, mysteries, romance, or any other number of genres.
Day 2: Protect Your Identity with a Pen Name
You can certainly publish under your own name – and if you’re publishing in the non-fiction world, this may be the best way to go (especially if you’re weaving your own experience and stories into your books).
But with fiction, authors often use a pen name. You can have multiple pen names for genres when you self-publish, too. Some people use a pen name to protect their privacy from rabid fans who want to get a little too close to their favorite authors.
Make sure no one else is using your pen name before you finalize it. You’ll want to own the domain for it, all social profiles and the author page on Amazon and elsewhere. Once you find that all of them are free, you can move forward with your selection.
Day 3: Grab Your Virtual Real Estate for Your Author Brand
Purchase the domain for your author brand first. You can choose the name itself, or something like johndoeauthor.com or johndoebooks.com, too. Make sure you get the dot com and don’t worry about the other domain extensions for now.
Other domains you may want to own are keyword domains, but don’t invest in too many. For example, owning something like bestromancebooks.com could help you later, as could a non-fiction domain like easyweightlosstips.com.
Day 4: Install a WordPress Blog on Your Hosted Author Account
Owning a domain is only half the battle to launching your own author site. You have to get a hosting plan to host the files. Use a simple plan and don’t fork over large amounts of money for extras at this time.
All you really need is to be able to log into your cPanel and install WordPress using QuickInstall. This will place a blog on your domain, which you can easily run on your own or allow an administrative assistant to run for you at a later date.
Day 5: Outsource Some Author Branding to a Pro
If you have the ability to create graphics on your own, that’s wonderful! But make sure they’re as professional as your competitors. If there’s one thing that can tank your sales as an author, it’s having amateurish covers or websites.
Some tools, like Canva, can help you make headers and covers that look good. But you may want to just save up a small amount and outsource it to someone else. You can hire someone on Fiverr or Upwork, or through one of the many Facebook groups for author branding.
Or, you can even purchase premade covers and graphics to help you carve out a look for your books. Either way you do it, you can use stock photos to help you get the right look for your genre.
Day 6: Stake Claim to the Social Profiles for Your Pen Name
Now that you own your own website, you want to go secure the social media profiles that you checked for availability previously. Even if you’re not sure you’ll use them, register the account anyway.
Make sure you get your accounts on TikTok so you can make BookToks (which are proving to be very lucrative for authors). You also want your Instagram account, GoodReads author profile, Pinterest, Facebook author page, and YouTube account.
Day 7: Come Up with an Idea and Outline for Your First Book
Today you’re going to spend time brainstorming. You need a main idea for your book, and an outline to go with it for each chapter. How in-depth you get in the outlining process is up to you, but the more you outline, the easier it can be to achieve your word count each day.
With fiction, some people prefer not to outline at all, but to fly by the seat of their pants instead. At the very least, you need the main concept ironed out so that you have a starting point.
Day 8: Set Daily Word Count Goals and Start the Writing Process
Many authors will join a sprinting room with fellow authors so that every 30 minutes, they work without distraction and then take a short break and chat about how many words they were able to crank out.
You can do this on your own with an egg timer, too. You want to have some idea of a schedule you’d like to publish on, such as every six weeks. In order to do that, how many words do you need to write each day?
You may not be sure how many you’re capable of writing, either. So spend a day writing and see how fast the process goes for you. It may speed up over time as you gain more experience.
Day 9: Polish Your Work or Have a Professional Do It
The editing process can be done as you go or all at once when your draft is complete. If you’re doing it yourself, you might edit each chapter as you go. If you’re outsourcing the editing to a professional, you might hand it all over when you’ve finished the draft.
You can use editing tools (free and paid ones) to help you catch some of the more common mistakes like typos or grammar issues. A human editor can help with more complex issues.
Remember, it’ll take time to get their edits back and then integrate them into your final files with approval or rejection of them, so map out a timeframe that works for you and allows proper editing.
Day 10: Set Up Your Kindle Account on Amazon
You want to get set up with an Amazon Kindle account so that you can publish there as the author pen name you want. You can do this at Author.Amazon.com and it costs nothing to register.
Amazon will promote your author page on each book listing you have, so readers can click on it and see all of the books you have for sale in one place. This helps increase sales.
On your author page, you can add links to your site and social profiles, tell a little about yourself and upload a picture. This helps with branding and loyalty when the readers feel as if they know their favorite author more.
Day 11: Outsource the Cover for Your Book to a Pro
Covers are so important. Whenever someone is on Amazon and enters a genre, like cozy mystery book, they’ll see a search results page filled with your competition. If your book like a do it yourself project, while the others look professional, they’re not even going to click through on the image to see what your book is about.
So while your content might be spectacular, if the cover is lacking, don’t expect to see success. Book cover artists who work with indie authors have great skill at taking ordinary stock images and creating something amazing out of them, so don’t be afraid to work with someone who has a good profile you admire.
Day 12: Write a Blurb That Tempts People to Buy
Your blurb is a more detailed, polished account of your book than the brainstorming session you engaged in when mapping out an idea for your book. If you’ve ever been to a bookstore and picked up a book and read the back of it, you’ve seen a blurb.
These blurbs should be enough to give the reader a hint about what the book is about, without spoiling the read for them. Some indie authors make the mistake of ruining the book by giving too many details out in their blurb.
If you don’t know how to write one, go read blurbs for bestselling books in your genre. You can also outsource the blurb creation process to a professional if you feel like you’re not skilled at it.
Day 13: Sign Up to Groups with Colleagues on the Same Journey
One thing that’s very helpful for you as an indie author is to have some sort of camaraderie where you can ask questions and get support whenever you need it. The guidance of other indie authors can be invaluable.
It’s also a great way to have someone celebrate with you who knows what you’ve gone through to self-publish. There are groups on places like Facebook and you can use sites like KBoards to join other authors in self-publishing discussions.
Day 14: Study the Bookbub Process So You Can Apply When Ready
Many self-published authors celebrate whenever they get approved for a Bookbub. This is a paid ad option you can apply for that’s not easy to get. But when you do get approved, you can run a sale on your book and see a huge spike in sales during your promotion and shortly after.
Day 15: Immerse Yourself in Facebook Ad Tactics
Another form of paid ads that you need to understand are Facebook ads. These are done based on your budget, even if you have a very limited amount to spend. But you don’t want to start running ads here until you know all of the rules.
The last thing you want is to get approved and start running ads, only to see your account get shut down because you violated a rule. So learn those and study how to get the most out of your ad efforts on this social media giant.
Day 16: Know How to Master Amazon AMS Ads
Another paid ad service you want to know about is Amazon AMS ads. These are ads right on Amazon that will strategically place your book cover in front of a targeted audience.
They’re already in buying mode on the site, and checking out other books in your genre, so it makes sense to advertise to them at this time. You want your book showing up for keywords and whenever someone is looking at a similar book.
Day 17: Get a TikTok Account and Start Creating Videos for BookTok
Today, you want to start creating BookToks on your TikTok account. There are many ways to do this. The best way to learn is to follow other authors using the hashtag #booktok or #authortok.
These don’t have to be long (even 15 seconds is good) and they don’t need to be outsourced to a professional. TikTok is very laid back and authors can choose to be on camera or not.
Day 18: Claim Your Author Profile on GoodReads
With your GoodReads profile, you want to settle in here so that readers can leave reviews and interact with you. They’ll see all of the books connected to your profile and you can include links to your site, too.
Fill out the profile and connect your books. Then start answering some of the author questions the site has built in to help readers get to know you a bit. You’ll want to check back here periodically to engage with your readers.
Day 19: Download Vellum and Learn How to Format
Formatting doesn’t have to be a difficult process. For some, it can be confusing. One tool that makes it a super simple task is Vellum. Now this is a Mac only tool, so you may need a Mac laptop in order to use it.
But if you want to have the ability to easily and quickly create flawless ePub files to upload, you’ll want this tool at your disposal. It allows you to make it look like a traditional print book with chapter images and formal fonts, too.
Day 20: Make a Decision About Advanced Reader Copies
ARCs (advanced reader copies) play an important role in helping spread the word about your upcoming release. You don’t want to hand out ARCs to just anybody. Ideally, your ARCs will go to people who like to give you feedback before you publish the final draft.
You can use tools like StoryOrigin to send ARCs and track reviews. That way, if you have people who are only in it for the freebies, you can eliminate them from your ARC list and replace them with someone who leaves reviews and provides feedback for you.
Day 21: Understand Your Limitations and Perks in KDP Select
KDP Select is a program Amazon offers where you get perks for joining, but there are drawbacks, too. This is giving Amazon exclusivity to sell your book. That means it’s can’t “go wide” on all the other sites, like Barnes and Noble.
It’s not a permanent process. You can choose to be in KDP Select for 90 days and then make a decision about whether or not to renew it. You may not want to choose this option if you’re hoping to make it to the NY Times Bestseller or USA Today bestseller lists.
Day 22: Sign Up to IngramSpark and List Your Book
One place many indie authors self-publish is IngramSpark. This is a distributor, not exactly a publishing platform. But it can help you get your book seen by more readers in libraries and bookstores, too.
Day 23: See If D2D Is Right for You
D2D (Draft to Digital) is another distributor you can sign up to that will help you get your book in more than one place and they do it for 10% of your sales. In fact, it has an author dashboard where you can manage all of your platform uploads in one spot.
This is great for authors who have changes, because instead of going to each retailer’s site to alter things like prices, covers and files, you can log into your D2D dashboard and do it all at once.
Day 24: Self Publish on Smashwords
SmashWords has gained credibility among professional indie authors. Instead of just being an amateur publishing platform, many authors upload their manuscript here to get more readers.
Note that D2D now owns SmashWords. It’s going to stay separate for the time being, but the way it operates may change because it’s under new management. So if you’ve used it before, watch for notifications on that.
Day 25: Publish Your Book on Apple and Google Play
Google Play and Apple are two other indie author platforms you can use for your self-publishing endeavors. You can use a Google account to upload your finished (not draft) book and cover.
For the Apple publishing system, go to the Apple Connect program and apply there. You have to enter all of your banking and tax information before getting approved. One of the great things about this platform is that you can set up pre-orders, which help with your launch day sales.
Day 26: Become a Barnes and Noble Nook Author
Everyone knows who Barnes and Noble is. You can have a book on their Nook platform easily. Just apply a few weeks before the launch of your book to give it time to go through the approval process.
Day 27: Publish on Kobo for More Sales
If you want to reach a Canadian audience, you’ll want to upload your book to KOBO, which is similar to Nook in that it has a reading device. Remember not to just upload one book, but place an entire box set in a series on here because loyal readers love to own collections.
Day 28: Increase Earnings By Selling Audiobooks to Your Readers
Text isn’t the only way to sell a book that you’ve written. While many people love to sit down with a paper or hardback book, or even an eReader, some hate reading at all. They want the story, but not the task.
So to appeal to these people, you want to add audiobook versions of your masterpiece to your sales platforms. Audiobooks aren’t hard to create and they add a significant amount of income to your efforts.
Use Audible to help you record and polish your audiobook. Or, hire a professional narrator who can record it for you. They’ll do this for a flat fee or for a percentage of the sales.
Day 29: Brainstorm and Market Your Next Book
Once the publishing process is winding down, you want to remember to keep up the momentum. Start brainstorming your next book, whether it’s a standalone or the next in a series.
After you have the idea, tease your readers with what’s to come. You might have graphics created for it that you can publish as a sneak peek, or even gift some of your readers with the first chapter as part of a contest.
Day 30: Set Yourself Up for Bestseller Status with a Pre-Order
As soon as you have a firm date in mind for your publishing, you can set up a pre-order on Amazon and elsewhere that accepts them. Pre-orders are imperative if you hope to make any bestseller lists.
Because the day of the launch, all of those orders are counted toward your sales for the day, even if the people have been buying your pre-order for weeks. You just have to make sure you can meet the deadline, or else you’ll have a disaster on your hands.
Self-publishing isn’t difficult. Anyone can publish as an indie author. You just need to implement the step-by-step process of creating your author brand and finished work, marketing it and planning for future sales.