A few thoughts from someone who has a website and a book: they are very different audiences. Your blog audience is likely not your book audience. I wrote a book as ‘work for hire’ for a set fee, for a major publisher. The deadline was tight and there were some major frustrations, but it was interesting, and I saw it as a ‘foot in the door’, and it has led to other offers. A friend self-published but he already had a big real-world interface through regular stands at expos and shows in his field, and he was willing to invest a great deal in self-promotion. His book had a very specific target market.

I enjoy your blog very much and I’d definitely buy your book IF it is suitable for me (ie, relevant to an Australian audience without too much US – specific stuff, like whatevertheheck a 411A or such is)

What makes your writing different is the personable, friendly, easy-to-read style, and the fact that it is ‘personal finance for the rest of us’. Ie those of us who don’t trust all those sharks who are out to get our money. I don’t want fancy investment negative-gearing strategies that I don’t understand and take loads of paperwork to manage.

It can take AGES to get a proposal looked at. Have you researched good book proposal style, and have you directed it at the right publisher? You might be better off getting an agent first. Check out the Writer’s Market or Writer’s Digest.

You’d probably also do well submitting short pieces to regular publications – what about approaching a magazine like Women’s Weekly to do a regular personal finance feature. Your blogging track record shows you can come up with the goods.

Oh, and I agree with the person who suggested CPA accreditation or the like – quals are always handy!

You may not want to ’sell out’ but at the very least you should have an affiliate program (such as commission junction or Amazon) running though your website so you can get a commission from the books you review. If you are up front about it, there is no conflict of interest. IMHO. (If you write a bad review, you can add a link to say “buy this book instead!” to a book you like; that way, you don’t feel there is any pressure to make a positive review.)

I’m going to guess that you don’t want to put all your eggs in one basket by relying on this blog, particularly as its quite new.

Two hours a day is quite a lot on top of your job, and I guess you’d need to spend the same amount of time on any new blog. I reckon that it won’t pay off for a little while if it works out at all (i.e. you can’t guarantee it would be as successful as this site).

Being a financial advisor might work out, are you near a sufficient population size that this would be feasible? (The only thing I know about Iowa I’ve read in Bill Bryson books – I’m picturing endless cornfields). The level of any success that you’ve had with your computing business should give you the idea about whether this could work.

If the goal is to spend more time with your family, perhaps you should be looking into Home Depot as well. You could work there part-time, work on the blog and hang out with the kid(s). Sounds like a nice life (except for the kids, but you probably like them).

You blog/write at a madman’s pace. You really should write a book and make some dough with your ability. Heck, you’d probably have it written in a week. Just start with a good outline and find a good editor.

Keep blogging, but save the book for your autobiography when you are blog-famous many years from now.

Few comments:

1. Like the idea of ‘conversation based writing’ as opposed to formal bookish elegant writing.

2. I would prefer reading atmost 1 article a day. 3-4 a week. Currently I feel I’m missing on something. May be other people have different thoughts.

3. I like your writing style on the website here, inverse pyramid. Key phrases are highlighted. Don’t suppose a book will have the same would it?

Have you heard of lulu.com? I recommend that as a start up point for you to publish … they print when orders are received! Great on-demand program.

I’m one of the people that commented on repetition in your writing style. It’s not a huge deal, in fact most people probably don’t even notice it (I probably only notice because I am studying a lot of poetry at the moment, and am trained to pick up on repetition as it is a common prose tool for emphasis), but once you do notice it, it sticks out like a sore thumb. For instance, whenever you write about food (which you do extremely well), I’m literally counting the words until you say ‘delicious’. Seriously, it’s used at least once on every food post, and sometimes more than once in a single sentence! Nothing wrong with it as a word, but there are other superlatives you know ;-)

It is easy for those of us who spend most of our time on-line, in front of a monitor, to forget that the vast majority of the American labor force does not. Thus, I suspect you are not getting the information you need about this project by asking your on-line readers: For all of the reasons outlined in the posts yesterday, your on-line readers are not the natural target audience for your book. (Publishing on-line, for this reason, is a less optimal strategy.)

Granted, a book project aimed at securing a new off-line audience would require a somewhat different marketing approach. Maybe a step in this direction is to secure this alternative audience through magazine articles, or other print media, first, and then move on to the book. (Colleges are especially keen to offer personal finance courses: Could your book be written as a text?)

Good luck!

No need to re-invent the wheel if someone else has figured out ways to make a living by blogging.

I may be in the minority here, but I actually think you post more entries than necessary. One entry per day would be great. I like to read everything you write, but I find myself skimming because of the sheer volume! Call me simple…but here’s my idea. I liked the suggestion above that you diversify; so how about 3 different blogs with (single) daily postings? You have a cogent, informed, earnest writing style that will work very well across the range of subjects in which you are interested. Good luck to you, and good for you for being so nimble!

Cheers
David

Regarding yesterday’s post, I think you definitely have skill and talent to write a book but you need to do something that has not already been done. Everything you write about is covered in books such as the Wealthy Barber, the Tightwad Gazette, and dozens of other books. What I think you do a good job of doing is fusing “paying yourself first” and the necessary lifestyle/mentality changes into actual choices and activities that average people can relate to. Personal Finance books tell you to set aside 10% and take it as a given that it will stick. Day in and Day out, you actually dig into into the meat of what makes this possible (and even fun).

Another thing, I’ve not seen extensively addressed in other PF books is the change in ones mindset from needing to buy all of the best “stuff” whether you need it or not, to carefully examined purchases. I know I gain esteem from my Omega Watch, NorthFace gear, Polo clothes, etc. I’m sure most people deal with this need for prestige and/ or Quantity of purchases (e.g. 100’s of DVD’s) For me, having a high net worth, gives me all of the confidence I need “now”, but some words of inspiration would be helpful in terms of discipline and patience, to those just starting out.