Kindle publishing is extremely hot. If you choose the right niches and topics and consistently publish, you can earn a lot of money. It’s honestly the perfect business for writers.
But, what if you’re not a writer? Do you have to just skip this publishing opportunity?
Of course my answer is no.
If you want to self-publish and earn money on Kindle, you can. You don’t have to be the best writer in the world. You don’t have to be a writer at all. You don’t have to know how to make covers, and format, and market your work—you can get others to do that for you.
Maybe it’s the case that you are an “idea person.” You have tons of great ideas swirling around in your head. For whatever reason, you just can’t or don’t have time to write and self-publish.
It could be that you’re not a good writer, you’re not confident in your writing, or you don’t have time to publish as frequently as you know you’d need to publish to be successful.
What’s the answer to this? It’s outsourcing.
You can come up with the ideas and outsource the rest. You can even outsource it all—from the idea generation, to the research, to the outlining, to everything else. It’s totally up to you.
You might be wondering where you’re going to find a good outsourcer, and that is very important. The good news is that there are many great ghostwriters and freelance writers and other outsourcers out there—we’ll talk about how to find the best of the best.
You also might be wondering how you’re going to afford to hire ghostwriters so you can have a fast self-publishing output. You’ll probably be very pleasantly surprised to learn that many ghostwriters are available for hire for relatively low prices. You can get some fantastic content for very low rates.
It’s also worth mentioning that you can start to outsource content even if you are self-publishing content you’ve written. You can write some of what you publish and you can outsource the rest. It’s really up to you. Just know that outsourcing content can really allow you to scale up your business.
By the way—this is mostly about outsourcing content but it’s not all about outsourcing content. There are other components to self-publishing that are important as well.
Maybe you’re great at writing content but you have no idea how to format your book for self-publishing on Kindle or other platforms.
It’s also important to note that you have to have a great book cover if you want to make sales. People really do judge a book by its cover, because when they’re browsing books on Amazon, that’s all they see originally.
There’s also the matter of setting up your descriptions, getting a reader review team together, and marketing your book.
Think about all these pieces. What do you want or need to outsource for your self-publishing business?
How To Choose What To Outsource For Your Self-Publishing Business
At this point, you have an overview of what the possibilities are for outsourcing in your self-publishing business.
Now, it’s time to make some choices so you can get started.
Are you going to outsource book idea generation?
Are you going to outsource the research?
Are you going to outsource the outlining?
Are you going to outsource the actual writing?
Will you outsource some of the content or all of the content?
Will you outsource cover creation?
Will you outsource the technical steps to publishing your book?
Will you outsource the marketing?
Take a look at your self-publishing business as it is or as you want it to be. Start to make decisions about what you want to outsource and how much of it you want to outsource.
How To Find A Great Outsourcer
If you want to successfully outsource parts of your business, then it’s important to make sure you’re hiring someone who’s going to do a good job for you.
Some people have had really awful experiences with outsourcers. They either get something back that isn’t up to snuff, get something way too late to use, or just have a totally frustrating experience and feel like they should have just done it themselves in the first place.
One great way to find a good outsourcer is to ask someone you trust. There are bound to be others in the self-publishing business who can give you referrals to those they’ve used before and have had good experiences with.
You can also visit the website/sales page of the outsourcer you’re interested in. Go through their portfolio, look at their testimonials, and get a feel for whether you’ll enjoy working with the person.
After you’re sure you’re ready to hire someone, go ahead and do so with a small project. You’ll want to do a small sample project first as a test. If they do a good job and you work together well, then you can hire them for bigger jobs related to your self-publishing business.
How To Manage Your Projects And Those You Outsource To
Once you start to hire more outsourcers for your self-publishing business, you might start to feel overwhelmed. That might surprise you because it’s the opposite of what you’re going for. You want this to be easier, not harder.
First, it’s worth noting that you’re now a project manager even if you didn’t realize it. You have to assign different projects and make sure everyone is doing what they’re supposed to do. You have to know who’s doing what and when it’s due.
You have to check in and prod people sometimes. Freelancers mean well, but many tend to deliver later than they thought they would. You have to keep track of what’s going on and make sure things are getting done. Remember that the squeaky wheel gets the grease.
Keep track of what’s out there. Keep a calendar. Consider using project management software like Basecamp. Dropbox and/or the Google set of tools have great options for collaboration these days as well.
Scaling Up Your Business With Outsourcing
The more often you hire people, the better you’ll get at outsourcing. You’ll be able to scale your business up beyond your wildest dreams. It’s exciting to be able to outsource and boost your business in this way.
Focus on your goals. What do you need to publish to achieve your goals and by when do you need to do it?
Keep your eye on the prize and work with good, solid outsourcers who care about your business as much as you do.
Getting Started Outsourcing Your Self-Publishing Business
There’s no time like the present. There’s a lot that goes into self-publishing and you don’t have to do it on your own. You can hire others to do the things you don’t want to do or the things you don’t like to do.
This might mean outsourcing content. This is probably what many reading this will focus on when it comes to outsourcing. You can outsource it all or outsource part of it.
You can outsource covers, graphics, marketing, and everything else.
Are you getting excited yet? Outsourcing can be very freeing. When you think about the money there is to be made in self-publishing, starting to outsource becomes even more enticing because you’ll be able to start publishing or scale your publishing up.
Publish like a machine, with the help of outsourcers, and you can really earn some great money on Kindle.