How to Work with a Professional Book Ghostwriter Part 1

Warning: ‘How to work with a ghostwriter’ isn’t going to be the ‘typical’ article that talks to you about asking a potential ghost for writing samples, explains why creating an outline is important or gives you a checklist of what you need to know about project scopes, milestones and fee agreements.

While those things are important, there are some other things you need to know first about how to work with a ghostwriter – things that will determine the ultimate success – or dismal failure – of your book.

Let’s start at the beginning – with your book idea.

It doesn’t matter if you’re planning on writing a fiction or non-fiction book – if one of your main goals is to get other people to see what you see – to write something that inspires and influences and makes your reader believe, care and even take action – then you need to start with the basics.

You need the  ability to tell a story – your story – in a way that grabs the readers attention and makes them want to keep reading – and makes them want to share your story with the people they know – is what’s going to make your book wildly successful.

It probably won’t surprise you to know that this is one of the main reasons many authors want to work with a ghostwriter.  (Industry statistics show that almost 40% of traditionally published books are written with the assistance of a ghost.) Because while they’ve got a great idea for a book, many authors aren’t sure how to develop their idea into a commercially viable manuscript that has the potential to go viral – and to end up with a book that attracts hundreds – if not thousands – of buyers and readers.

Working with a professional ghostwriter can help you make that happen.

Finding Relevance, Meaning and the Right Mindset

When someone goes to a bookstore looking for a book, chances are they want more than just something to read.  They’re looking for an experience, something that sparks their imagination, grabs their attention, and validates their beliefs, experiences and  viewpoints.  In other words, your book has to be relevant to your reader.  Seth Godin (author of Tribes: We need you to lead us) said, “Great stories agree with our world view. The best stories don’t teach people anything new. Instead, the best stories agree with what the audience already believes and makes the members of the audience feel smart and secure when reminded of how smart they were in the first place.”

What publishers want

Most publishers will tell you they’re not looking for a brand new story that’s never been told before. They want a story that people know – but they want it told in a new and different way. So if you want a commercially successful book, this means don’t write a book about change, write a book about continuity that picks up where the old story left off, and shows what to do next.

Why your book idea needs to be relevant to your intended audience

If you want to write a successful book – one that is acclaimed and enjoyed and shared – you absolutely have to know who your audience is – before you start working with a ghostwriter.  Because in order to get people to read your book, you have to meet them where they’re at right now.   Here’s why:

In the last 10 years, ‘we’ve come a long way baby‘… and we’re no longer living in the ‘information age’. We, as a society, have moved beyond the place where all we want is information.  Today all the information is at your fingertips and readily available to almost anyone with a computer and an internet connection.  Not only is it readily available, most of the time, there’s too much of it, and not all of it is good, or truthful, or helpful or relevant.

In fact, once ‘information overload’ became an accepted condition in business and in our daily lives, we moved into another era. Today we’re living in the recommendation era.  As consumers we don’t trust ‘information’ any more, unless it comes from a source we recognize and trust.  People are ten times more likely to believe something if a friend, family member or colleague – someone they know and trust – recommends it to them.  Which is why social networks like FaceBook and twitter and LinkedIn have taken off like wildfire!

So as an author who is about to write a book, you can’t act – or write – as if it were ten years ago.  Society has changed, people have changed – and the way we do business has changed.  One of the best examples of this has to do with raw information. People don’t want information any more.  They want something more.  They want to find someone they trust, someone who is willing to take the time to go through all the information about a subject, and filter it -through their own experiences, their beliefs, their values – and distill it down, to its essence and then share it.

One of the biggest problems we, as a society have – is finding someone we can trust.

But we still, as a society, tend to trust authors.  If your name is on your own book, it sets you apart from the crowd.  People will sit up and take notice of you.  And more than that, they will trust that what you have to say matters.

So before you start working with a ghostwriter, you need to understand what you’re writing about and why and who you want to reach.