Have you ever wondered how to figure out what to write about? Well, then grab a cuppa, and let’s chat.
Before you can write a book, you need to determine some things. Let’s start with some questions about you and what you can bake up for the market. This will help you figure out what to write about.
First, I need to explain my Gold Zone Exercise. Then I’ll show you how to use it in a way that will help you with your book or blog posts.
Gold Zone Exercise
For many years, I’ve walked clients and students through what I call my Gold Zone Exercise. In recent years, I’ve seen several other authors and gurus doing a similar thing. Sometimes they put another circle or two in the Venn diagram. This shows that many people can come up with the same idea when none of them knows that the others have come up with it. That’s okay. It’s good, even.
What if only one person thought of something and never took action on it? The world would miss out on that tasty morsel. It’s good for all of us that an idea often occurs to more than one person.
A large sheet of chart paper or a poster board is good for this activity. That size gives you plenty of room. If you don’t have one of those, but you do have a white board or window available, use that to figure out what to write about.
Grab some markers in different colors.
Draw three large overlapping circles like this:
Make the upper left circle green (for money). Label it with something that indicates the circle will contain things people pay for. You might write “paying for” or put a dollar sign there: $. Then list everything you can think of that people are paying for. Not what you think they would pay for but what they actually are spending money on. Here are some examples:
- births
- deaths
- waste removal
- food
- entertainment
- education
- clothing
- accessories
- shelter
- travel
- music
- books
- writing implements
- medications
- surgeries
- supplements
- sports
- pampering
The next step in the exercise is to move to the upper right circle (make it red for “hot”). Jot down everything you can think of that you are good at doing or could quickly become good at doing.
The third step is to log things you’d be willing to do for 8–12 hours a day, at least until things really get cooking. Those things go in the lower left circle, which you’ll make blue (for being loyal, sticking to it).
Writing in the overlapping portions comes next.
Enter each of the items that are in both circle 1 and 2 into the overlapping area of those two circles.
Do the same with the overlap of 2 and 3, and 1 and 3.
The final step is to put into the center only those things that are in all three circles. Most people end up with one or two things. That’s their Gold Zone: the things they love, are excellent at, and could make a living doing.
Gold Zone for a Book
Okay, so how does this exercise help you figure out what to write?
You need to be skilled or knowledgeable in the area you want to write about. It needs to be something you enjoy well enough to stick with it through the tough times that are part of writing a book. It also needs to be about something that people are spending money on.
To apply the Gold Zone Exercise to writing your book, in circle #1, put things people are buying books about. To be clear, the book sales don’t have to be numerous, but they do need to exist. If no one is buying any books on X, think long and hard about whether you want to take the time to write a book about X.
For the second circle, stick to the things you are already good at. You can redo the exercise later if you want to, when you have time to do more extensive research. Start by writing about something you already know a great deal about.
Take a look at your sheet. What do you have in your Gold Zone? Is it like one of these books about mindset and coaching?
• Legendary by my client Tommy Breedlove
• Ungraduated by my client Ken Hannaman
Is it a parenting guide for moms of multiples? Perhaps it’s a book on bearded dragon care, like the one Heather Woosley wrote during a session of Your Book Bakery. Is it an inspirational book for people with disabilities? Maybe it’s one of these:
How-to guide to
• learning sign language
• exercising with arthritis
• homeschooling kids with ADHD
• caring for bearded dragons
Road map for
• homeschooling year round
• parenting solo
• strategic planning for a business
Historic book about
• Depression-Era cooking
• American education
• parenting trends
Informative book about
• the science of cooking
• Orthodox Christian doctrine
• health and wellness
• Navajo culture
Inspirational book about
• homeschooling
• overcoming adversity
• parenting a mentally ill child
• health and wellness practices
No matter which type of book you want to write, you’ll need to make several decisions before you write the first word. And, as you can see, the same topic can be done in different ways. Take a look at the lists again, and you’ll see homeschooling addressed four different ways.