One of the most straightforward ways to get into a position to live the Good Life is to write a book—but not just any book—a bestselling book. And while that may seem impossible, it’s not. I know because I’ve done it.

There are two components in this process: writing and selling. If you’re not able to do one or the other, there is very little chance of success. I can help you with both, but the passion and the drive has to come from you.

First thing’s first, you have to figure out what people want and coincide that with what you have a passion to write about. If people don’t want it, it won’t sell, and if you don’t have a passion for it, it’s guaranteed to be of poor quality. Before I started writing, I noticed that diet books always occupied a large portion of the Amazon top 100 bestsellers. People obviously were interested in losing weight and getting healthy. Diet and nutrition also was a passion of mine and I did some initial research to find that there was a diet plan out there that no one was talking about: the hunter/gatherer diet. Since the demand and supply converged, I decided to get to researching and putting together what would become the first Evolution Diet book. It was horrible. Typos everywhere, light on the content, and not a very sophisticated plan to say the least. But the concept was original: eat what and how we were designed to eat, so I knew I had a selling point. Some early success and positive reviews (amazingly), encouraged me to write a second edition, which I can honestly say is a good product. I had strengthened the core principles and had become a much better writer. The first edition was bad, but since I had the passion and the drive I was able to create something I could honestly recommend to someone.

Second, you have to produce the book. With modern technology, it’s easy as pie to publish. Amazon provides services with which you can publish a print on demand paperback or hardcover as well as a service which allows you to publish books to their Kindle electronic book format—all for free! You may need help editing and designing your book, but the publishing part is extremely simple and cheap.

Third, you need to get the word out about your masterpiece. It doesn’t help to have a great book in high demand if no one knows about it. Getting it on Amazon is a great step in that direction, but there are 8 million books on Amazon. You need to stand out somehow. One technique is to put your content online in the form of a blog, complete with social networking tools to help your readers spread the word. For instance, this chapter is going on my blog (/ad-in) before it will go in the book for sale. This technique helps generate interest and traffic for when you’re ready to start selling.

Social networking tools are great also. The Gods of Ruin twitter feed (@GodsOfRuin) has 2500 followers and generates a great deal of interest when I post about that book or others that I’ve published. The Facebook page is not nearly as popular, but generates some interest as well. These tools are free, entertaining, informative, and help complete the marketing package for your book. Just make sure you’re not selling all the time. No one likes to be sold anything. Provide good content in the venues and they will return the goods eventually.

There is one technique, however, that absolutely crushes the others and is the main reason why we’ve had two top-1000 books and one top-2000. Unfortunately, I can’t provide that technique in this venue—you’ll have to buy the forthcoming “The Good Life” book to see what I’m referring to. (what? I have to eat!)

Techniques to Avoid

Don’t publicize yourself. After the release of “Gods of Ruin,” I went on Amazon forums and posted some brilliant questions concerning the ideas in the book. I also put a link to my book in the question. Not only did people illogically disregard the argument because I was using it as a marketing tool, they set out on an ungodly rampage against my book. One of the antagonists posted two negative reviews within an hour under the pseudonymns “Alexandra S.” and “Alexandra P.” then complained when her reviews were taken down. This ridiculous behavior by people with way too much time on their hands is frustrating to say the least and can be avoided for the most part by simply not provoking them. Don’t publicize your own product to the public. Leave that to your friends.

Avoid defending your work. You will get negative reviews and much of it will be completely irrational tripe but you can’t submit to the urge in defending your work against these people. You will end up looking immature and unprofessional.

Also, I recommend against advertising in traditional avenues. Major campaigns will cost thousands of dollar and the return cannot easily be justified. If you want to be on then Glenn Beck radio show or Anderson Cooper 360, your best bet is to produce something buzzworthy that they will want to talk about on their own. It also helps to know people, but I don’t so I can’t recommend that technique.

With these techniques, you should have a good basis for creating and selling a successful book or books. Now all you need is the drive to make it happen. So, get cracking! And enjoy the Good Life when you get there!