If you’re writing a nonfiction book, you’re likely hoping either to impact others by making a strong point or to establish yourself as an authority and boost your business. Either way, you’re using your book as a tool to disseminate your ideas or expertise in a way that will attract the book audience you’re trying to appeal to.
That means two things:
- Contrary to what many aspiring authors think, you’re not writing for everyone.
- So you need to identify and court your audience.
How do you do that?
You start by figuring out who is most interested in what you have to say and how that will benefit them. As much as we might want to believe that people will be interested in our thoughts just because we’re sharing them, that’s just not the case. Most folks want to know what’s in it for them. Unfortunately, too many of us are so excited about what we do that instead of addressing how our product(s) or service(s) will benefit readers, we launch into telling them about ourselves and our offerings. Readers simply won’t care about any of that if we haven’t given them a reason to.
When identifying your audience, people often focus on age, gender, education level, income, etc. While these demographics can help, pinpointing what drives the behavior related to your topic helps more. Marketing experts refer to this as researching the customer’s pain points. A book that promises to alleviate these specific pain points will garner attention. An author who shares how he dealt personally dealt with those pain points will help establish a bond with readers, a connection that can attract prospects and eventually establish customer loyalty.
But you don’t have to just rely on the negative. Tapping into what matters to people–their families and friends, their pleasures, their hobbies, their passions, their health–can work just as well.
In his blog post “How to Write For and Target the Right Audience for Your Book,” New York Times bestselling author and Scribe co-founder Tucker Max provides great examples of how to pinpoint the specific audience that will respond to your book and become the kind of clients you’re seeking. It’s definitely worth a read.
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