As a business professional, you may be thinking about writing a book, but you aren’t sure where to start. What main topic should your book focus on? What would keep readers engaged? How can you narrow your vast experience into a single book?
Here’s a simple test for selecting your first book topic: Could you teach this topic in a one-hour webinar or workshop? If you can teach it, you likely have a viable book topic.
Many books begin as presentations. I’ve helped one client develop a series of books, each based on a two-hour teaching. Her teaching outline became the foundation of the book. Her in-class notes, examples, and answers to student questions filled in the outline. As editor, I prompted her in places where more information, clarification, or examples were needed. Just like that, she had not only one book but also a series.
Let’s look at examples from the financial field, although the same test works in any business field. Imagine a workshop on the following:
- Steps to take in your 40s to prepare for retirement.
- How to avoid common investing mistakes.
- Financial planning for new business owners.
Each of those topics can easily be taught in a webinar. If the topic works in teaching, it can be a useful and engaging book topic as well.
A one-hour webinar has an outline that may cover five main points. For example, a webinar on preparing for retirement might include the following:
- Setting your goals.
- Understanding your current financial overview.
- Creating a plan.
- Making room for the unexpected.
- Adjusting your plan over time.
That’s not just the outline for a webinar. It’s actually a great foundation for a book. As you fill in your talking points for that webinar, you’re also expanding your book outline. Record yourself teaching in the webinar, and you’ve got meat to add to that outline structure. Develop further examples and anticipate reader questions, and you have the first draft of your book.
So be encouraged: choosing a book topic doesn’t have to be complicated. If you can teach it, you can write it.
Today, think of a topic you’d enjoy teaching in a workshop. Write down the five main points you would cover. These points could be the beginning of your book outline. Optional but not necessary: If you actually decide to teach a workshop in the process, you’ll have great feedback for your book.
Janet Eriksson 