Years ago when Napoleon Hill's famous manuscript on building wealth was ready for publication, it had no title.
His publisher called and said, "If you don't come up with a title by tomorrow morning, I'm going call it "USE YOUR NOODLE AND MAKE A BOODLE." Distraught, Napoleon Hill began playing with words and throughout the course of the night came up with the classic title, "THINK AND GROW RICH."
Have you read Think and Grow Rich? [If not, you need to head to your local bookstore, or library, and pick up a copy.]
It is one of the most best selling books of all time - probably due to its name.
Hey, it's a great book because of what's inside the book. The contents are incredibly powerful ...but, I'm not sure how many people would have bought it with a title like Use your Noodle and Make a Boodle.
Would you have? Not me.
There are many, many other examples throughout history where books were written and published unsuccessfully... until they changed the title of the book.
In fact, some authors have ONLY changed the title of their books and have become best sellers after their first printing sold just a few copies.
I know it's crazy. I know it's not right. But that's life. I'm sharing this with you so you can work it to YOUR benefit.
I'm not proposing that you can put together horrible content for your book, slap on a great title and make tons of money. Although I've personally seen it done (unfortunately), I am not suggesting you do that.
I'm suggesting that once you've got quality content inside your book, let's get a great title on the outside of your book and add tremendous potential on your road to success.
Ok, so how can you get a great idea for a title?
Simple: start looking at the Best Seller lists at Barnes and Noble or Amazon.com.
When Jason Oman and Mike Litman wanted to publish their book they modeled a popular book called "Conversations with God" and published "Conversations with Millionaires." Their book went to #1 on Amazon.com
Another great place to look for outstanding titles is the tabloids in the checkout isle. Those papers and magazines don't sell millions of copies because they write unique and wonderful content - it's because their titles are just SO compelling you've got to read it.
Now that you know how to brainstorm a book title, here are some tips to help you research content for your book.
Most people know about Google.com as the largest search engine in the world... however, few realize how powerful it is as a research tool.
The key is knowing how to tap into Google's research powers. One of the best ways to find content for your book is by using the search string called "allinurl." (pronounced all-in-u-r-l)
You can go to Google.com and type your keyword phrase in after allinurl: - and search its database for sites that have that keyphrase in their URL, either in the domain name or in a file name.
For example, if I was writing a book about Dog Names I could use something like:
allinurl: dog name articles
allinurl: dog name
allinurl: beagle dog names
You should find some excellent content ideas using this method.
Let's check out the real world examples and take a look at what we would find.
#1) allinurl: dog name articles
"A Dog Name is Something To Be Chosen Carefully"
"5 tips for finding the right name"
"Puppy dog name meanings"
Looks like great content for the book. Simply decide which section (from your outline) would be the appropriate section for it to go in.
HOW can you organize your search findings? Put the name of your idea and the Outline Section at the top of a piece of paper.
In the section below put...
Name/Title: The name and/or title of the content you've found
Link: URL to the content
Expert (Owner): Who wrote the content
Type: Is the content text, audio, video, etc.
If you have 6 sections to your outline, you should have 6 of these sheets with content information - one for each section.
After collecting all the content you want for your book, you have four options.
#1) You can contact the content owner and ask permission to include their content in your book.
The benefit of including other experts' content is that when it comes time to market it you've got 'built-in' partners to help promote it and you are leveraging other people's credibility as experts in the subject.
#2) You can hire a ghostwriter to write on similar topics to those in your outline.
#3) You could research and write content following the outline yourself.
I've come to realize the power and the effectiveness of using existing content from experts.
Unless you have to have the entire book be your words, I'd suggest mixing in expert content with some of your own content. This might be as simple as finding a public domain book on the subjects you outlined and using some of its content as well.
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