20 Incredibly Useful Resources for Aspiring Authors
(You’ll Wish You Knew About These Earlier.)
Throughout my career as an author and publisher, I’ve curated a list of tools that make literary pursuits significantly easier. In this article, I’d like to share some of them — in the hope that they will help others in their own book creation journeys. So, without further ado, here are 20 incredibly useful resources for all you aspiring authors out there:
Writing Your Book Without the Headache:
This software utilizes machine learning to increase accuracy, so that you can simultaneously dictate and transcribe your book…without losing your sanity. In fact, this is how I was able to write my first book in five days flat. While the regular price for Dragon can land outside of most people’s budget, Dragon Anywhere offers a monthly subscription that falls well within an affordable range.
As much as I love Dragon, a new platform has come onto the scene — and I couldn’t help but make the switch. This SaaS product is fast, cost-effective, accurate, powerful — taking AI-based transcription to a whole new level. It has a 3-minute turnaround time for 60 minutes of audio; however, if you prefer human transcription, they can do that too. Simply upload your recordings (or use the real-time transcribe feature) and watch the spoken word turn into written word in a matter of minutes.
Medium is a platform for writers to share their ideas with over 65 million monthly users and is excellent for overcoming any lapses in motivation. Use it to gamify your writing by breaking down specific chapters into smaller articles. You can also use these articles to build your fanbase by including a link to your book’s Amazon page or to a sign-up form for your book’s email list.
Wattpad is another great platform for sharing your progress online. It also allows you to build your fanbase prior to launch by leveraging its community of over 80 million avid readers. While Medium is a better fit for non-fiction writers, Wattpad is the equivalent for those who write fiction. Highly recommend.
When I first tried writing my book, I attempted to do so using Google Docs, which resulted in a bit of a nightmare. Scrivener — a word-processing software designed with aspiring authors in mind — saved me from pulling the hair out of my head. It allows you to organize and manage all of your research, concepts, chapters, and notes in one place for a streamlined workflow. I’ve never looked back since.
Professional Editing That Won’t Break the Bank:
I stumbled upon Book Butchers quite by accident. I was reading an article written by the founder, Derek Murphy, and found myself on their website only minutes later. (Talk about effective content marketing.) These editors handle everything from proofreading to line editing, while also offering content organization, sales copy revisions, plot development and pacing. Services are rendered at a very affordable price per word.
If Book Butchers isn’t a good fit, another great option to try is Reedsy. Reedsy is a marketplace for some of the best publishing talent out there. They also offer some great resources, like free publishing courses and book formatting software.
Bad-Ass Book Covers:
Canva is the cheapest possible Do-It-Yourself option for book covers. I have nothing against it, but many publishing experts out there recommend investing in a professional designer instead. The rule of thumb I live by here is: Do what you do best and leave the rest to a professional. (Read: Use your own discretion here.)
There are many talented designers available for hire online. To find them, check out book covers that you like on Amazon or other book retailers. The book’s cover designer can be found somewhere in the front or back matter, usually in the Acknowledgements section. From there, you are only a Google search away from finding the perfect cover designer for your book.
Easy-Peezy Book Formatting:
As previously mentioned, Reedsy offers free book formatting software but with limited options. Simply upload your book, choose a format, and play around with it from there.
Scrivener also has book formatting features that you can explore.
I’m a huge fan of Vellum. It offers a number of formatting templates and customization so that you can create a beautiful, professionally-formatted book without having to deal with the headache of hiring a designer.
Publishing (with À La Carte Options):
BookBaby is a self-publishing platform that offers significantly discounted ISBNs and worldwide distribution for your book. They have a pricing calculator on their site if you want to tweak and plan your publishing budget accordingly.
IngramSpark distributes to retailers outside of Amazon, including Barnes & Noble, independent bookstores, libraries, among others. There’s a one-time setup fee of $49. Just be aware that this platform can be tricky to navigate for new authors. If you don’t know what you’re doing, ask for help.
KDP is Amazon’s publishing arm for distributing both ebooks and print-on-demand across their U.S. and global marketplaces. They don’t charge anything upfront, which is great if you’re on a tight budget.
Book Marketing on Your Terms:
Many new authors miss out on the easiest marketing opportunities, including forgetting to set up their Amazon Author Central and Goodreads profiles. These are essentially your “About the Author” pages that get linked to your book’s product page on Amazon (and elsewhere.) This is also where you can customize your book listing, add editorial reviews, and more.
BookBub is your golden ticket to reaching millions of targeted readers, if you can get it. The price to run a promotion is reasonable given the return on investment, but they are highly selective about the books they choose to promote. So, be sure to read through the submission guidelines to maximize your chances of landing a spot.
Sending out ARCs (advanced reader copies) to reviewers or people on your email list seems easy enough…at first. When you consider that readers are consuming ebooks on thousands of different reading devices and apps — each with its own quirks and issues — it can be exhausting to have to constantly troubleshoot. With BookFunnel, you can just send a unique, non-shareable download link that allows reviewers to read a water-marked copy of your book in any digital format of their choice (epub, mobi, pdf, etc.)
Goodreads is another hidden gem for getting the word out about your book. It only takes a few minutes to set up an author profile and claim your book. From there, you can use the platform to promote and build buzz when it comes time to launch.
“The money is in the list.” As cliché as it is, this statement is key to a successful book launch. Mailchimp is free for your first 2,000 email subscribers, which makes it the perfect tool for list building and marketing your book on a budget.
For the less tech savvy, I recommend using Substack. This newsletter platform was built to save writers the hassle of having to learn the ins and outs of email marketing so that they can focus on doing what they do best.
Done-For-You Self-Publishing
Booksmith.io brings your story to readers around the world by supporting you throughout the entire journey to market — from editorial to design, distribution to launch. With access to the same resources used by Big Five Publishers and New York Times bestselling authors, you can publish your book with confidence and reach that highly coveted bestseller status that every author dreams of.
Author’s Note: This article has been revised and updated to account for services that have gone out of business, as well as new platforms that can provide authors with an overall better publishing experience.
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