Most authors think publishing a book means uploading a file to Amazon and clicking “publish.” I get this. From the outside, that’s what it looks like. You write your book, you put it on Amazon, and it’s out in the world. Simple.
But there’s a lot that happens between “My manuscript is done!” and “My book is live, looks professional, and is actually selling”, and most of that work is invisible to readers. It’s also the difference between a book that quietly sits at the bottom of its category and one that looks every bit as good as a traditionally published title.
So I want to pull back the curtain and discuss what actually goes into taking a nonfiction book from a finished manuscript to a published book on Amazon. This is the same process I walk my authors through and the same process I share in my book Business Books.
One thing to know up front: I don’t publish my clients’ books under my own imprint. My whole goal is to help you become your own independent publisher. Your book goes out under your own publishing house, and you own everything. I project-manage the process and bring in the right professionals—editors, proofreaders, designers, formatters—so you end up with a properly published book without having to learn every one of these steps yourself.
This is different from a vanity press, which will do everything I do—but they’ll do it under their publishing house. This means that you don’t get direct access to sales data; you have to go through them. It also means you can’t use KDP’s marketing tools without asking them to do it.
This is independent publishing, which is why I want to help the authors I work with to be truly independent.
It starts with the manuscript, not the cover
The temptation is to jump straight to the exciting parts: the cover, the launch, the Amazon page. But everything is built on top of your manuscript, so that’s where we start. Some authors come to us with a fully finished, ready-to-go manuscript. They’ve already edited and proofed it, and they just want it published.
But other authors need a bit of help with the manuscript. In this case, before anything else, we look at what the author has actually written. Is the structure working? Does it deliver on the promise of the title? Does it actually help the reader? A nonfiction book lives or dies on whether it does its job for the person reading it.
And if the nonfiction book feeds into the author’s business, we need to look at how we can share client stories and seed business offerings into the book.
This is also the honest-conversation stage. If a manuscript needs more work than an author expects, I’d rather say so now than after we’ve designed a beautiful cover for a book that isn’t ready.
Editing: the part readers never see but always feel
Editing isn’t one thing. There are really three types, plus proofreading as the final step:
- Structural (big-picture) editing looks at the overall shape of the book—whether chapters are in the right order and each one earns its place.
- Line editing looks at clarity and flow. You know when you read a sentence three times, and it still doesn’t click? A good line editor catches that before it ever reaches your reader.
- Copyediting works sentence by sentence on grammar and consistency.
Then comes proofreading, which is always the last step: you don’t want to pay for a final proof until you’ve stopped adding new sentences, because every new sentence is a chance to introduce a fresh typo.
Here’s how much this matters: I once worked with an author whose books went through six rounds of proofreading, with a different person each time (to be fair, these were nonprofessional proofreaders; they were all volunteers). I found it shocking how Person #6 would catch a typo that the previous five people all missed. This is a lesson in working with volunteers, rather than professional proofreaders.
Readers won’t consciously notice good editing, but nothing earns a one-star review faster than a book full of errors.
Metadata: the invisible work that decides whether you get found
This is the stage authors underestimate the most, and it’s one of my favorites, because I love doing this kind of research.
Your metadata is everything Amazon uses to understand and surface your book:
- Keyword research: the actual search terms readers type into Amazon. I use Publisher Rocket to find keywords people are really searching for and that your book can realistically rank for.
- Categories: these are the vitual shelves your book sits on, and are chosen deliberately (again, with Publisher Rocket) for relevance and how easy they are to rank in.
- Title and subtitle: clear, compelling, and quietly doing some of the discoverability work. I tend to write longer subtitles that fold in three keyword phrases that clearly specify the results a reader will get.
- Book description: this should read like sales copy, not a synopsis, and end with a clear call to buy.
You can have a great book with a beautiful cover and still be invisible if this part is done carelessly. Publishing isn’t just about putting the book on Amazon. It’s about making it findable by your ideal readers.
Cover design that fits your category
A lot of first-time authors want a cover they personally love. What you actually need is a cover that signals “this is a serious and relevant book in this category”—and that stands out while doing it.
I only work with graphic designers who specialize in book covers, never general graphic designers who focus on things like logos and websites. The cover is that important. It has one job on Amazon: to make the right reader stop scrolling and click, and it’s often seen as a tiny thumbnail on a phone rather than a full-size image on a screen.
We also think ahead. When I brief a designer, I think about the whole family of books an author might write, so a future series looks like it belongs together. My own business mindset books share a look; my walking books share a different one. That cohesion is a design decision made on purpose, early.
Formatting for print and ebook
A Word document is not a book. It has to be turned into properly formatted files—one for the ebook, one for print—and they’re not the same thing.
The print interior needs correct margins, chapter styling, and a professional layout (this is where things like orphans and widows come in—trust me, you don’t want to hand-fix those). The ebook needs to reflow cleanly on every device. I format both in Vellum, which produces a truly professional result. It’s one of the reasons a book we produce doesn’t look self-published, even though it is independently published.
Publishing across formats and getting distribution right
Now we reach the part everyone thinks is publishing: the actual setup.
We publish your paperback and ebook—under your own publishing house—to KDP and Draft2Digital, so you’re selling on Amazon and getting extended distribution to other retailers. (If an audiobook makes sense for you, that’s an option too.) We upload the files and check the previews carefully. For print, we order a physical proof for you to review. There’s nothing like holding the actual book to catch the small things a screen hides.
I’ll be honest about my own preferences here: I publish to KDP for Amazon and use Draft2Digital for wider distribution, because it’s straightforward and it works. There are other routes—IngramSpark, for example—but they come with more fees and quirks, and I only use them when there’s a real reason to.
Pricing with a strategy, not a guess
Pricing feels like it should be simple, but authors agonize over it—and often get it wrong in both directions. Price too high and new readers won’t take a chance on an author they don’t know yet; price too low and you undercut the book’s value.
The right price depends on your format, your goals, and your category. It’s a strategic decision, not a number you pull out of the air. (I’ve written a whole separate post on how to figure out the best price for your book on KDP if you want to go deeper.)
Hitting publish is the starting line, not the finish line
Here’s the honest truth I share with every author: getting your book live is the beginning, not the end of the project.
A published book won’t sell itself. Simply being on Amazon won’t generate sales—that’s what launching and marketing are for, and they’re a whole different conversation (and a whole separate set of blog posts). I mention it here only so you go in with realistic expectations. The authors who do best are the ones who understand that publishing and marketing are two different jobs, and plan for both.
Why I’m showing you all of this
I’m not walking you through every step to convince you it’s impossible to do yourself. On the contrary: I want to help you decide what’s right for you. Plenty of authors publish their own books, and some genuinely enjoy learning each of these stages. I did, back in 2012 when I started doing this work.
I’m showing you this because I want you to see what’s actually involved, so you can decide how you want to spend your time. Every one of these stages costs either time or money. You can invest the time to learn and do it all yourself, or you can hand the pieces you’d rather not do to someone who does them every day—and still end up as your own independent publisher, owning everything (as long as you don’t go with a vanity press).
Neither choice is wrong. But it’s a much better decision when you can see the whole picture.
If you’re looking at a finished manuscript and feeling overwhelmed by everything between here and a published book, that’s exactly what I love to help with. Sign up for a no-obligation, complimentary call with me, and we can talk through where you are, what you want, and which parts of this you’d rather not do yourself, if any.
And if I think you’d be better off handling some of it on your own, I’ll tell you that, too.
