Many self-published authors today swear by the “rapid release” strategy.
Here’s how it works – Amazon’s algorithms favor a new book release that comes quickly after the last book release. If they see an author is releasing regularly, they will move their books up the rankings, and they may even highlight those books to readers. It’s a great way to get additional exposure, and if you can get the Amazon machine behind you, you stand a good chance of making a lot of sales and building your career.
But the rapid release strategy is also very difficult. In order to take advantage of it, you have to be releasing a book at least every month, if not every couple of weeks.
To some writers, this may sound ridiculous. How are you supposed to write and publish that many books that quickly? And how can you do so consistently?
Of course, this requires you to write books quickly. Perhaps it may require you to write books more quickly than you ever have before. But you can take advantage of the rapid release strategy even if you’ve never written that fast before.
The following are some factors that affect how quickly you can write and publish a book. Some of them are focused on how you organize your book, and some are focused on the act of writing the book itself. Just know that typing speed is only one factor that goes into whether or not you can rapidly release your books. Look at these other things and see if there are ways you can tweak your process or your organization to release books more quickly and take advantage of Amazon’s algorithms.
How long does your book have to be?
This, of course, will be one of the biggest factors outside of typing speed.
You need to know what goal you’re aiming for when you are writing a book. Do you want to write an epic fantasy novel? Are you looking to write something a little punchier? Do you want to release a series?
All of these are factors in how many books you can get out in a reasonable amount of time. But they can be tweaked. You can experiment with shorter word counts so that you can publish more often.
If you are writing an epic fantasy novel that is 200,000 words long, maybe you could break that up into two or three books. Right there, you’ve created a series that you can now release rapidly over time.
Of course, there are limitations to cutting down the word count. If your book is only 10,000 words long, you’re going to be attracting a very different kind of audience. It’s not impossible, but it definitely will change your career trajectory.
Experiment with different word counts and figure out what works best for your story and for your ability to release books.
Are you plotting beforehand?
We all know writers that love to plot meticulously. We also know writers that try to come up with the story as they go along. If speed is the most important thing to you, you may want to consider plotting out your novel ahead of time.
The more time you spend thinking about your story, the less time you are spending writing the story. This means your daily word counts are going to sink quickly. Rather than flying by the seat of your pants, outlining your book and every major beat can help you spike your workouts rather quickly and easily.
Many authors who employ the rapid release strategy use this method. They don’t sit down to write until they have every little piece of their story figured out ahead of time. That may not work for you. But you do need to consider having the main details fleshed out so that you can get to writing as quickly as possible.
Can you dictate your book?
If your speed is directly related to how fast your fingers can type, then dictation might be something to consider. Many authors swear by dictation as a way of rapidly increasing their word counts.
Maybe you can only type 500 words in an hour. Or 1,000. This is not a concern if you are dictating. With dictation, you could write as many as 5,000, 6,000, or even 7,000 words per hour. Imagine how quickly you could release books if you were writing at that pace!
The process isn’t perfect. You will likely have to do some heavy editing, but you’re going to do that anyway, right? And you may need equipment to do it. You can try it out on your phone, or use your computer’s built-in microphone. But there are ways to test this out for free using apps like Google Docs so that you can see if dictation is right for you. If it is, you could invest in a nice microphone and Dragon software to skyrocket your productivity.
This is also great because it turns off the editing portion of your brain. When you are dictating, it is extremely difficult to go back and edit something that you’ve just written. You are far better off writing as much as you can as quickly as you can and going back and editing it later. That’s why dictation works so well for so many authors. It allows them to draft their book quickly.
Are you ready to set up the next one?
You just finished your first book, and now it’s in the hands of your editor. What are you doing now?
Your answer better be, “working on the next book”. Any downtime you have in your writing process needs to be spent working on the next book. This is non-negotiable. Writing books quickly requires you to be working on them constantly.
You may not enjoy working at this pace. And that’s okay. But if speed is your main concern, and if you are trying to rapidly release books, then you need to always be moving your projects forward.
Can you Outsource it?
If rapidly releasing books is your biggest goal, then outsourcing your work to a ghostwriter might be the best way to go.
At first, this might sound like sacrilege. How can you put your name on a book if you didn’t write it? But the truth is, many famous authors, and especially prolific authors, use ghostwriters. James Patterson is one example of an author today that works with his ghostwriters regularly. That’s why he can put out so many books in a single year.
It doesn’t mean that it’s not your story. You are free to take control of the plot and manage it as detailed as you’d like. What ghostwriting does is allow you to work on generating the storylines and let somebody else actually work at getting the words on the page.
If you can afford a ghostwriter, then you can see rapid releases coming rather quickly. Their entire job is to make sure that content is created quickly. So having one in your corner could be a great move for you.
Focusing on writing speed is something that a lot of writers are doing these days. That’s because they understand that speed does not mean you are not generating a quality product. You can write fast and still write well. It’s just up to you to make sure that you have a process and system in place for generating that content at a high-level repeatedly. If you can do that, you can unlock the power of rapid releasing on Amazon and other platforms.
And the quicker you can finish a book, that’s another asset that you have for your business that can produce revenue for you for years to come. The quicker you can get these books done, the better.
Many self-published authors today swear by the “rapid release” strategy.
Here’s how it works – Amazon’s algorithms favor a new book release that comes quickly after the last book release. If they see an author is releasing regularly, they will move their books up the rankings, and they may even highlight those books to readers. It’s a great way to get additional exposure, and if you can get the Amazon machine behind you, you stand a good chance of making a lot of sales and building your career.
But the rapid release strategy is also very difficult. In order to take advantage of it, you have to be releasing a book at least every month, if not every couple of weeks.
To some writers, this may sound ridiculous. How are you supposed to write and publish that many books that quickly? And how can you do so consistently?
Of course, this requires you to write books quickly. Perhaps it may require you to write books more quickly than you ever have before. But you can take advantage of the rapid release strategy even if you’ve never written that fast before.
The following are some factors that affect how quickly you can write and publish a book. Some of them are focused on how you organize your book, and some are focused on the act of writing the book itself. Just know that typing speed is only one factor that goes into whether or not you can rapidly release your books. Look at these other things and see if there are ways you can tweak your process or your organization to release books more quickly and take advantage of Amazon’s algorithms.
How long does your book have to be?
This, of course, will be one of the biggest factors outside of typing speed.
You need to know what goal you’re aiming for when you are writing a book. Do you want to write an epic fantasy novel? Are you looking to write something a little punchier? Do you want to release a series?
All of these are factors in how many books you can get out in a reasonable amount of time. But they can be tweaked. You can experiment with shorter word counts so that you can publish more often.
If you are writing an epic fantasy novel that is 200,000 words long, maybe you could break that up into two or three books. Right there, you’ve created a series that you can now release rapidly over time.
Of course, there are limitations to cutting down the word count. If your book is only 10,000 words long, you’re going to be attracting a very different kind of audience. It’s not impossible, but it definitely will change your career trajectory.
Experiment with different word counts and figure out what works best for your story and for your ability to release books.
Are you plotting beforehand?
We all know writers that love to plot meticulously. We also know writers that try to come up with the story as they go along. If speed is the most important thing to you, you may want to consider plotting out your novel ahead of time.
The more time you spend thinking about your story, the less time you are spending writing the story. This means your daily word counts are going to sink quickly. Rather than flying by the seat of your pants, outlining your book and every major beat can help you spike your workouts rather quickly and easily.
Many authors who employ the rapid release strategy use this method. They don’t sit down to write until they have every little piece of their story figured out ahead of time. That may not work for you. But you do need to consider having the main details fleshed out so that you can get to writing as quickly as possible.
Can you dictate your book?
If your speed is directly related to how fast your fingers can type, then dictation might be something to consider. Many authors swear by dictation as a way of rapidly increasing their word counts.
Maybe you can only type 500 words in an hour. Or 1,000. This is not a concern if you are dictating. With dictation, you could write as many as 5,000, 6,000, or even 7,000 words per hour. Imagine how quickly you could release books if you were writing at that pace!
The process isn’t perfect. You will likely have to do some heavy editing, but you’re going to do that anyway, right? And you may need equipment to do it. You can try it out on your phone, or use your computer’s built-in microphone. But there are ways to test this out for free using apps like Google Docs so that you can see if dictation is right for you. If it is, you could invest in a nice microphone and Dragon software to skyrocket your productivity.
This is also great because it turns off the editing portion of your brain. When you are dictating, it is extremely difficult to go back and edit something that you’ve just written. You are far better off writing as much as you can as quickly as you can and going back and editing it later. That’s why dictation works so well for so many authors. It allows them to draft their book quickly.
Are you ready to set up the next one?
You just finished your first book, and now it’s in the hands of your editor. What are you doing now?
Your answer better be, “working on the next book”. Any downtime you have in your writing process needs to be spent working on the next book. This is non-negotiable. Writing books quickly requires you to be working on them constantly.
You may not enjoy working at this pace. And that’s okay. But if speed is your main concern, and if you are trying to rapidly release books, then you need to always be moving your projects forward.
Can you Outsource it?
If rapidly releasing books is your biggest goal, then outsourcing your work to a ghostwriter might be the best way to go.
At first, this might sound like sacrilege. How can you put your name on a book if you didn’t write it? But the truth is, many famous authors, and especially prolific authors, use ghostwriters. James Patterson is one example of an author today that works with his ghostwriters regularly. That’s why he can put out so many books in a single year.
It doesn’t mean that it’s not your story. You are free to take control of the plot and manage it as detailed as you’d like. What ghostwriting does is allow you to work on generating the storylines and let somebody else actually work at getting the words on the page.
If you can afford a ghostwriter, then you can see rapid releases coming rather quickly. Their entire job is to make sure that content is created quickly. So having one in your corner could be a great move for you.
Focusing on writing speed is something that a lot of writers are doing these days. That’s because they understand that speed does not mean you are not generating a quality product. You can write fast and still write well. It’s just up to you to make sure that you have a process and system in place for generating that content at a high-level repeatedly. If you can do that, you can unlock the power of rapid releasing on Amazon and other platforms.
And the quicker you can finish a book, that’s another asset that you have for your business that can produce revenue for you for years to come. The quicker you can get these books done, the better.
