You Can’t Judge a Book by Its Cover, but a Good Proposal Helps
A book proposal is NOT your book. Rather, it effectively and passionately communicates a book idea to an agent or publisher.
A book proposal is essentially your business case for why your book should exist and, if done well, can persuade an agent to represent you or a publisher to make an investment in your work—perhaps even before you sit down to write the entirety of it. Whether your purpose is to entertain, educate, or improve your readers’ lives, you need a proposal to shore up why someone will want to read your book based on your know-how, expertise, platform, or concept rather than turning to the internet for answers. And it will enable you to approach an agent or publisher prepared or properly convince yourself or an investor to crack open a piggy bank or two if you are self-publishing.
A good book proposal will include the following elements:
1. The Nitty-Gritty Details
Unveil the working title of the project along with your name, email, and phone number.
2. Table of Contents of Your Proposal
State and easily link sections to page numbers within your proposal.
3. Brief Synopsis of Book
Give your elevator pitch in a brief and compelling way. You can give a one-sentence synopsis and then a longer narrative description if you feel necessary or provide a one-to-five paragraph description of your project that answers what is the project, why you are the right person to write this book, your tonal objectives, reader takeaways, what is your audience and how you can reach them, and any connections or partnerships that would help with distribution.
4. Chapter Breakdown
Create a list of chapters with a few sentences describing what you will cover in each one from your outline, notes, or idea board.
5. Book Formatting Details
Describe the details of the project, including your estimated page count, organization, formatting, layout requirements, proprietary tools, special design needs, images and artwork, color decisions, and cover concept.
6. Audience Profiles
Detail your targeted reader demographics (role, age, education, etc.) and what are their felt needs.
A book proposal is NOT your book. Rather, it effectively and passionately communicates a book idea to an agent or publisher.
7. Sample Chapters
Prepare and include three chapters to generate interest. Ideally, you would include the introduction plus two sample chapters.
8. About the Author/Biography
Let someone get to know you: Tell who you are and make an argument for why you are the right person to do this project. Demonstrate that you can reach a buying audience with this book idea. Have you written any blogs, appeared in any published works, taped any podcasts, or spoken in front of audiences? Don’t be afraid to let yourself shine!
9. Your Platform/Ready and Waiting Audience
Demonstrate your reach. List here your stats for Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, TikTok, website, blog, and podcast for those medium you own. Also include the number of people on your mailing list, if applicable, and detail any other way you have of engaging with an audience.
10. Market Profile
Give your market narrative for this book and why it fills a viable gap. Establish that this particular book does not already exist, but similar books do. Follow with a list of similar books and note the date of publication. You can enhance this portion with a brief argument about what makes existing books similar or different from yours.
11. Selling Venues Outside of Traditional Bookstores
List any specialty shops that would be likely to stock this book.
12. Your Endorsers
List any well-known, influential, or famous people who might provide a blurb about your book. If you have quotes that others have already said about you, share them here.
13. Preliminary Schedule
What is your plan? How long after signing the contract would you need to deliver the final manuscript and, if applicable, all of the supporting collateral?
While it may seem as if you are writing a book to promote your book, a successful book proposal will show that you are a clear communicator who can deliver ideas and methods in a way that will help and inspire readers to achieve their goals. Even better will be if it shows that your ideas and methods are new and exciting and that the most recent books missed something critical that readers must know to accomplish their goals or dreams.
Are you ready to tell that story that only you can tell? Contact The Bulb team to assist you with putting together a book proposal that will get yours noticed!
