By The WBR Team
An increasing number of entrepreneurs are waking up to the immense value of writing a book.
Which is great news for publishers, editors, copywriters and marketers alike!
But we’re not here to sell you on whether or not entrepreneurs should write business books. The fact is, they are.
Barriers to entry
However, there are two main stumbling blocks when it comes to entrepreneurs writing business books, and they’re pretty significant:
- Writing is usually not in the entrepreneur’s skillset
- They are extremely busy and have limited time to dedicate to projects like this
So what’s the solution? How can we take the unique knowledge and expertise that successful business leaders have, and package it up into a well-written, error-free manuscript that’s delivered to a publisher on time and in full?
By working together.
Skilled copywriters and editors can work with the entrepreneur to ensure high-quality, on-time manuscript submissions. Bonus points if these skilled copywriters and editors are especially adept at working with entrepreneurial personalities!
The publisher’s perspective
Most publishers will, at some point in their career, have worked with a difficult author. This doesn’t mean they’re wrong-fit clients, it just means that more likely than not you’ve had to put in more hours, more back and forth, and a lot more energy.
Many first-time authors – especially entrepreneurs whose first priority will always be their business – may have lots of questions (and complaints!) regarding contracts, directions, and submission schedules.
It’s understandable that when working with clients of this nature you might adopt a cautious approach due to potential consequences such as late submissions or poor-quality drafts. When you sign an author, you’re taking a huge risk – especially if that author has other priorities (like a business they’ve spent years building).
The entrepreneurial author, too, might have their reservations. Perhaps they feel the manuscript they submitted was of the highest quality they could produce. They might feel stifled by deadlines, or feel as though the time they can dedicate to their business is being threatened by demands from their publisher.
The consequences
A poor author-publisher relationship can have dire consequences. Entrepreneurs in particular are easily “turned off” a project. Too much back and forth, feeling as though things are being demanded of them, and being unable to dedicate as much time as they’d like to their business can cause them to shut down. Late or poor-quality drafts become increasingly likely in this toxic environment.
Of course, delays in manuscript submission have a huge impact on the publishing process and marketing opportunities, and can have severe implications for both yourself and your author.
Let’s explore a few of these implications below:
1. Financial loss
Delayed book releases or those not properly marketed can result in fewer sales.
2. Increased editing costs
Rushed, poor-quality drafts are going to need a thorough proofread, which causes further time delays down the publishing chain and incurs additional expense for both yourself and the author (and no one ever said additional expense was great for maintaining healthy business relationships!).
3. Damaged reputation
Poor collaboration can lead to some sub-par books. Of course, you’d never publish anything that didn’t get the seal of approval, but you might be missing out on nuggets of genius in the entrepreneurial author that would have come out had you had more time and better communication.
How can we help?
Luckily, answering the three pain points above is what we’ve dedicated the last 15 years to at Write Business Results.
We’re a team of skilled copywriters and editors well versed in the publishing process, and it’s our job to ensure high-quality, on-time drafts to improve the overall publishing experience for entrepreneurial authors.
Here’s how:
- We ensure high-quality content
When we’re not ideating, structuring, and writing a manuscript from scratch alongside an entrepreneur, we improve the clarity, coherence, and overall quality of pre-written manuscripts before they go to the publisher. This saves you time (and money!) in editing.
- We ensure deadlines are met
We help entrepreneurs stay on track with their submission schedules. After working exclusively with entrepreneurs for the last 15 years, we know how to structure a process to best suit them. Missed deadlines, late submissions, and the wheels falling off a project halfway through are frustrations of the past.
- We reduce editing costs
A well-edited manuscript minimises the need for extensive editing services, meaning the time between a manuscript landing on your desk and the finished book hitting the shelves is reduced.
- We help to enhance reputation
There’s a hungry audience for well-written, helpful business books. Publishing such books can be a fantastic opportunity for profit, and having your name alongside a successful entrepreneur can be great for networking and reputation building.
- We boost sales
Alongside being a team of professional editors and copywriters, we’re also a team of marketing experts. We can cover the marketing of the book all the way from one month pre-launch to one month post-launch, generating excitement, alerting the entrepreneur’s audience on launch day, and maintaining the buzz afterwards. All of this translates to more sales.
- We ensure contract compliance
Our team ensures authors meet their contractual obligations. It keeps us safe, it keeps the author safe, and it keeps you safe.
The collaborative approach
Gone are the days of publishing houses existing only behind big locked doors on prestigious streets in New York. Publishing is an industry of collaboration and teamwork: many talented minds coming together to produce something magical.
Collaboration is a partnership, and like any partnership, should be approached with consideration. It’s important to choose a skilled copywriter-editor with sector-specific experience.
At Write Business Results, 100 per cent of the books we’ve written and marketed alongside entrepreneurial authors since January 2022 have gone on to become Amazon bestsellers. Now, this might not be the goal of a traditional publisher (we know there are some tensions between Amazon and traditional publishing!) but the ingredients that make up our successful statistic can be translated to all publishing deals:
- Keeping the entrepreneur on track, motivated, and enthusiastic.
- Tapping into their wealth of skills and knowledge and pulling out the most useful, actionable advice.
- Producing high-quality, error-free manuscripts on-time and in-full.
- Supporting the publisher and the entrepreneur through the publishing process post-submission.
- Spearheading an engaging and successful marketing campaign to boost sales for both the entrepreneur and the publisher.
The future
We believe this way of working – a three pronged approach between the publisher, the copywriting team, and the entrepreneur – is the future of business books. Each perspective offers a unique breadth of knowledge that can be leveraged to produce the best business book without it taking years, going over budget, or ending badly.
If you’re ready to collaborate and build some relationships in the copywriting realm, get in touch today to see how Write Business Results can help. We’d love to hear from you – after all, the basis of any great relationship is having things in common, and we love great books just as much as you do.