[Writerpreneur] Day 26 - Lesson 0403: The Book as an Idea Container - Write Once, Publish Many Ways
They call it diversifying. Write once, publish all possible ways. What it does is to reach audience that is other places, like other versions.
How many different ways can you publish the same content?
Dozens, probably.
The secret to effective publishing is to diversify your output.
It's not just one and done, having to run ads to tell about your book, while it still sells diddly-squat and you're out even more money.
This isn't what Writerpreneurs do - not the ones that make any real income from their writing.
You don't work for the book distributors, you put them to work for you.
Back to our original concept - here's a partial list:
...ebook, audiobook, paperback, casewrap hardback, deluxe dust-jacketed hardback, large print paper and hardback editions, digital courses, video courses, webinar series...
You catch the drift here.
The underlying reason for all these is that readers and listeners like their books in different formats. And often will buy them in multiple formats to experience them fully. Ebook fits on your smartphone for ready reference. Audiobook is good for road trips and exercise. Paper editions are good for curling up on a couch, bookmarking, highlighting, dog-earing...
The smart writerpreneur doesn't buy the simplistic advice to quit when they have their ebook out there. And then wonder why they don't make much money from the average sale of 250 copies of $3.99 ebooks. When the paperback and hardback sell for more copies and also have 3-5 times the royalty.
Meanwhile, the course based on a non-fiction book can command 100 times the return income to that author. Sure each of these additional versions requires more work. And that effort isn't all that glamorous. But that smart writerpreneur is crying all the way to the bank - alligator tears. Because they are producing different output of the same content and getting additional sales of each.
And maybe they hire that out as a project to some contractor. Because they can afford to. Meanwhile, they get started on the sequel or next in series.
Now, an editor recently pointed out to me that the reverse isn't always true. Just having a new content form doesn't mean you have a good book on your hands. The amount of text that goes into a video course (in spoken words) is no where near enough to make a 200-page print book. (Which would be about 350 minutes or nearly 6 hours of video – something hardly no one would binge watch.)
The overall process of books as idea containers starts with a well-written book. Not usually the reverse. (Although many studios have commissioned writers to take their rich movie graphics on-screen and turn these into descriptive prose which amounts to a decent-sized book.
The point here is that you aren't limited on your publishing. The more versions you create from the same text, the greater amount of sales from the same initial work.
A story is a book is an idea container.
Each idea container has its own buying public.
The more containers you can build out of your original text, the higher your income.
Write once, publish (and profit) many ways.