How to Create a Bestselling Book and a Million Dollar Business

No matter what subject your book is about, there are several ingredients that are helpful when marketing your book. Some features are absolutely necessary if you want to sell enough books to make it a bestseller. Everyone knows that in order for your book to be sold in retail stores, it must have an EAN barcode, an ISBN number, and certain bindings and features.

However, if you add certain less well known features to your book, you will hugely expand your book's marketability. For instance, almost every New York Times Bestseller has certain features and it would be wise to incorporate them into your book so that you improve your chances of being one of them too.

Listed below are the top 7 features that will make it much easier to promote and market your book into becoming a bestseller. When you design these features into your book (right from the beginning), you will market your book faster and better than other authors who fail to do so.

Feature 1 – Pick a powerful theme and build it out. Find a flavorful title that makes people demand to know more. Outline your book and be specific with what you want in it so you attract the right people. Just gathering a list of your best ideas and putting a cover on it is not enough. That will get you a book, but it won't be a bestseller. You want something that you (and others) will be proud to promote.

Feature 2 – Get stories from people other than yourself and you will be viewed as the expert of experts. Ask people to share a personal story in such a way that it has a self-help element. You'll reach a bigger audience if each story provides benefits and helps the reader to see how they could apply the lesson to their own situation. In every story, you should mix in Important resources, specific examples, strategies, tips, and insider secrets, whether they be from you or someone else.

Feature 3 – You can build in marketing value by quoting the top people in your field. Each quote should be selected to fit in the topic and message of that chapter. Some experts may be flattered enough that they will help promote your book to their customers, which helps both of you. They may even purchase books directly for their special clients and colleagues.

Feature 4 – Proactively seek out interviews and testimonials, and find the right person to do the Foreword. Interview other experts if you can and use the opportunity to get relevant examples for your section of the book and audio clips for promotion. These interviews and testimonials will add credibility to your book.

Feature 5 – List all of the people and organizations who helped in creating the book. You might also seek a corporate sponsor who might fund some of the expenses in exchange for a prominent mention in the book. And it is often very helpful to seek out a sponsor to partner with in your promotion.

Feature 6 – Your book will be much easier to read and reference if you include an index. This feature will make your book much easier to sell to libraries which will enlarge your readership and help you draw more customers to your website. Yet this feature is often ignored in the book writing process.

Feature 7 – Create a resource section with a topical rolodex. List numerous agencies, organizations, associations, services, and other professionals related to your book's subject. This will broaden your audience and it might even cause some of the leaders/owners to actually purchase quantities of your book for distribution.

Bonus Feature – Include a bibliography. This is not only helpful to the reader who uses your book for research, but there are many people who like to own copies of the books that include theirs in the bibliography. Be sure to include the books from any experts who contributed stories, interviews, or examples.

ACTION STEP: The more features above you can add to your book, the easier it will be to market and promote. Especially focus on the features that get other people involved in your book, because the more that you involve others and promote them, the more likely they will help you in promoting your book... it is called the Law of Reciprocity and it works like a charm.