How to Publish and Market Your Book

Class Description 
This course is a set of lessons for students on how to publish their books and market them. While writing a book involves hard work, publishing it successfully so that it reaches the desired audience is another daunting task. Whether it is a collection of short stories or poems, an anthology, a biography, comics, or creative work, students would always want to know how to publish their work for the world to read. This course helps young authors to achieve a sense of accomplishment and pride that comes from seeing their work from being published. Today, student authors have more than one option to publish and market their work, and whichever way they choose, they will definitely have a better chance of success. Successful publishing and promotion are challenging without assistance, and this course helps students to gain the necessary expertise and skills.

At the end of this course, the kids will learn 
1)	Introduction to Book Writing & Publishing
2)	Getting Creative – Formatting, Layout and Cover Design
3)	Deciding how you want to Publish
4)	Marketing your Book 

Week 1: Introduction to Book Writing and Publishing
This week, students will learn about the basics of Book Writing and Publishing.
The lesson will give young authors an overview of how a book is published. Students have natural writing talent, but they are not aware of how they can proceed when it comes to putting their thoughts into words, and publishing their work for the world to read. This lesson gives kids an idea of basic details needed for publishing a book of their own, such as choosing the book format, book category, knowing the elements of a book, choosing the book title, book editing, illustration, formatting, content layout, etc. Students get a basic idea about types of publishing and marketing methods too. 
The students move on to learning activities.
Stages of Book Publishing – Students make a chart that explains 
a)	The Elements of a Book  - Structure of the book, No. of chapters, Cover page, Creative elements, Acknowledgments, etc. 
b)	Different stages of Book Publishing. 
Budding Author - Students are encouraged to write a book in any genre – comic, informative, poetry collection, story collection, etc. This book can be further developed for publishing by the students. 

Week 2: Getting Creative – Formatting, Layout and Cover Design

Students have their story ready. Next what? This week, students will learn how to bring their story to life in the form of a beautifully published book. Students learn the importance of book editing, and they can get their content edited from friends, teachers, etc. Students also learn how they can make their book attractive with beautiful illustrations and pictures, and what tools they can use to create illustrations, or where they can find royalty-free images to use. Also, students learn about book layout and cover design. 
The students move on to learning activities.
Be an Editor – Students share their book content, manuscript, stories, or poems with classmates for editing, and they can edit content for grammatical errors, proofread or give valuable content related suggestions.  
Cover Design Activity – Students design beautiful covers for their books using tools of their choice. 

Week 3: Deciding how you want to publish? – Getting a Publisher or Self-Publishing

This week, students will learn about different methods of publishing – Traditional Publishing via agents and Self Publishing. Students will learn the pros and cons of both these methods. Students also get to know about different publishers who offer publishing assistance. Students learn about different media in which they can publish their books, such as print and digital media, and the advantages and disadvantages of these media.
The students move on to learning activities.
Group Activity – Students discuss the pros and cons of Traditional Publishing via agents vs. Self Publishing.
Find Publishers – Students find details about different publishers who assist in book publishing, costs involved, royalty rates, etc. and discuss with classmates. 

Week 4: Marketing your Book

This week, students will learn about Book Marketing. Successful book marketing needs planning, organizing, consistent organization along with hard work. For a book to reach a larger audience, a good marketing plan is essential. In this class, students will learn how to make a marketing plan for their books. Students will get to know the different ways they can use to market their books by making effective pre-launch and post-launch plans for different categories of books. Students get to know book promotional strategies such as social media marketing strategies, blog posts, building a website to market books, reaching book clubs and building email lists, and fun activities like book reading and launch parties.
The students move on to learning activities.
Book Marketing Plan  – Students make a book marketing and promotion plan to market their books, which includes pre-launch and post-launch plans. 
Make Creative Book Promo Materials  – Students promote their books with any one of the creative promo materials or methods such as designing creative social media content, attractive emails, print promotional materials, etc.