THE PUBLISHING BOOM

The editorial market is booming. It has the potential to grow by USD 18.69 billion worldwide during 2021-2025*. There is a growing number of individuals interested in writing and publishing. Sometimes, they just don’t know how to create a book and plan a publishing project.

Each day, more and more people and professionals are becoming writers and publishers, working independently or partnering with publishing companies. They realized offering books eBooks is an opportunity to help sell other products (like courses, mentoring). Furthermore, they can also associate with sponsors by offering content to customers.

The amount of online publishers is also growing. If you’re willing to launch your own eBooks, you have plenty of options to share, promote and sell them.

Many experienced publishers share their knowledge online as well, so they also facilitate the process and access to specialized information. They’ll indicate how to get a writer register (ISBN), tools for book editions, and online publishers.

* Publishing Market by Platform and Geography – Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025 – technavio.com

THE PATH TO CREATE YOUR WRITING & PUBLISHING PROJECT

It’s a fact that a lot of information and tools are available for your production. But how will you manage to conduct all the processes and not get lost?

Writing and/or publishing your book is a fantastic experience, and we believe you should focus your energy on it. As it’s a long-term commitment, a project management tool can help you set your production flow and relate to your partners to reach your goals. Apply the agile methodology principles to become an agile writer (focus on reader, welcome change, working together, deliver value).

GitScrum is a project management tool based on the Scrum Framework, which helps individuals and professionals increase their productivity and reach their goals.

Mainly, organize your writing project from start to end.

START YOUR CREATIVE PLANNING

Even if you’re not a writer yet, but you’re considering the possibility to be, using creative techniques to release creative ideas is an excellent start. If you already have your book project in mind or started your writing, planning the scope of your project can be a fun and stimulating exercise.

Mind mapping is a visual resource that’s been helping thousands of people and teams worldwide to pull out creative insights and collaborate in an interactive way. In fact, many writers do that intuitively on sheets of paper by themselves but often lose their notes.

Keep your ideas bank in your project management tool, creating mind maps for your ideas, and plan the stages for your project.

Things you can create with GitScrum Mind Mapping:

• Stages of your writing & publishing project;
• Planning your goals for the project (short to long term, visibility, circulation, downloads, sales, social media engagement);
• Your book index/topics;
• Target audiences/buyer readers (“personas”) to write to or research about;
• Your expertise subjects (potential book themes);
• Career planning by area as a writer (work, study, personal marketing);
• Social media editorial planning.

Start using GitScrum Mind Mapping to plan your Writing & Publishing projects.

BECOME PRODUCTIVE WITH KANBAN BOARDS

After planning your project’s goals and defining its stages, you will customize your daily working board to make them happen.

Kanban boards were created by the Japanese Taiichi Ohno and introduced into industry usage in 1940 at Toyota. Since then, they’ve been used worldwide to help all kinds of companies plan activities and reach goals.

GitScrum Board brings a modern version of Kanban, where you will dynamically move tasks forward as long as you complete them, getting a sense of accomplishment and motivation. You can make it yours by naming the columns according to your project stages (researching, writing, in review, waiting for approval, done). Also, label it with different colors, so you’ll immediately spot the status of the tasks.

This is a collaborative board made for you to add your partners, editors, assistants, coauthors, counselors, and supporters as collaborators. Turn them into active contributors to your project during all its phases. You can assign tasks to them, interact, hold discussions, comment on each others’ tasks and turn objectives into practice. Work together and become agile!

KEEP UP WITH YOUR SCHEDULE

Your GitScrum Board is integrated with other productivity features:

GitScrum Gantt Charts gives you an agenda mode, where you get an overview of your writing project tasks going on and the ones to start right away. You can share this view with the partners you’re collaborating with to make your project dynamic and make sure everyone is up with the assignments.

There’s another essential Scrum feature that can accelerate the release of your writing & publishing project: GitScrum Sprints! Associate your weekly sets of tasks (writing pieces and parallel actions) to GitScrum Sprints, time-boxed sessions of deliveries you will monitor with a deadline. Add your assistants’ assignments into separate sprints to monitor and support their work.

MANAGE YOUR PRODUCTION AND DOCUMENTS

Writers and publishers have different ways to conduct projects. Each project leader decides how it’s supposed to work – whether research is to be done first or along the way, whether reviews are gradual or final. You decide how it’ll work for you. What’s important is that you’ve got the right tools to manage and keep your production safe and organized.

There’s plenty of software out there you can use to write and edit your book. Whatever your choice, use GitScrum Documents to save and manage your writing files and relate them to your tasks. This way, you ensure you keep your project safe and allow your editor and partners to check for updates anytime.

Collaborate with your contractors and coauthors on GitScrum and invite them to access your Documents, providing feedback. Release previews according to your schedule, so your editors can log in and check the progression of your book chapters.

Use GitScrum Documents to keep and create:

• Your writings backup;
• Reference files gallery (text styles, images, typography, quotes);
• Contacts spreadsheet;
• Design Templates.

Organize your book projects with unlimited storage – GitScrum Documents

WORK READER-ORIENTED

To create books based on people’s real interests, you need to dive into your readers’ universe, get closer to them by obtaining small fragments of testimonials on their day-to-day needs. But how to do so?

Use GitScrum User Stories to write small reports on real readers and your target buyer personas (your ideal customers). This can be done to tell what someone needs in their lives, what they would like, or what could be improved in your books… You can collect these reports via the website, survey forms, or personally. This will help you write more relevant content.

Create a gallery of your audience’s main issues and interests you can explore in your writing projects.

GitScrum User Stories Examples (reader  standpoint):

“As a child, Mila(8) would like to find more books on farm animals so that she learns more about the country lifestyle.”
“Josh(42), as a father, would like to learn educational games, so that he can entertain his kids while he works from home.”
“As an elderly, Mario (81) would like friends to visit him and bring larger typed books, so that he can beat loneliness at the rest home.”

GitScrum User Stories Examples (publisher  standpoint):

“As a publisher, I would like to receive books perfectly proofread so that I can save time.”
“Since I’m a publisher, I would like more books to have the audio version available so that I can offer more options to all readers.”

This feature will help you apply the agile principles of delivering value and welcoming change to your projects, even late, if it’s for good.

BUILD A STRONG NETWORK TO PROMOTE YOUR BOOK

Well, we’ve talked before about adding the essential contributors to your project (editors, coauthors, publishers), but you can go beyond that if you’re willing to run a great project! After you’re in a more advanced stage of your project, you can release your previews (teaser ads, book preview) and invite a group of digital influencers, journalists, and friends into your Gitscrum private interface for an exclusive “premiere” of your book.

To make it the most professional way, fully customize it with your brand and your own domain using the GitScrum White Label feature. Remember, if you want your book to stand out, smartly present yourself first.