Between 2010 and 2016, the number of self-published books increased by almost 400 percent. Some of those books were great. Most of them were crappy.
Writing a great business books is hard work and it takes time and effort. If you don’t care about whether you’ve got a great book that will boost your career and your reputation, you can write a crappy book instead. Here’s some advice on how to do it.
Don’t Add Anything Original
Great business books have original stories and original research. But, that’s a lot of work. Instead of adding original material, just use the stuff that other people have already written. Reword it a little, but don’t worry about doing original work.
Don’t Get Feedback
The danger of feedback is that people will tell you things you need to fix. Skip that entire fixing part by not getting any feedback at all. After all, you’re a good writer, right?
Don’t Think Things Through
Business book authors that want to write a great book spend a lot of time gathering information and clarifying their thinking. They wrestle with the order of presentation. You don’t have to worry about that if you want to write a crappy book. Slap together an outline and then follow it slavishly.
Don’t Take the Drafts to Get It Right
Most of the business books I work on take at least four drafts before they go to the professional editor. You can cut that time down significantly by just doing one or two drafts. After all, it’s just making changes to ideas you’re already sure of.
Don’t Use a Professional Editor
Did I say professional editor? Why bother with that when there’s a spell and grammar checker in your word processing program? You’ll not only save time, but you’ll save some money, too. And, since you’re writing a crappy book, that won’t matter.
Don’t Check Your Facts
Since you’re not doing any original research, you can probably assume that the other people you are using as sources got things right. Not checking facts is dangerous if you want to write a great book, but since you’re writing a crappy book, you don’t need to worry.
Bottom Line
If you don’t care about quality or reputation, a crappy book will do fine. You can skip a lot of the hard work that goes into writing a great book Remember, though, that book will represent you for decades to come.