Courses for Writers with Jon LaPoma

First Draft to Bestseller: Publish a Book that Sells

Follow a step-by-step guide with the most up-to-date and comprehensive information on how to create, self-publish, and market your book, taught by a certified teacher with over ten years of classroom experience. 

Have you written the first draft of a book but have no idea what to do with it? Do you dream of seeing your book sitting on the shelves of your favorite bookstore? Would you like to learn strategies that have helped many self-published authors quit their jobs and write full-time?

You’re living during the best time ever to be an author. Due to advances in technology, now anyone can present their books to a worldwide audience with the click of a button. But, just because anyone can do it, that doesn’t mean it’s easy, nor does it guarantee that these authors will have any success. Every year, about million new books are published, adding to an already-saturated market. I created From First Draft to Bestseller to show beginning authors how they can create, self-publish, and market a beautiful, high-quality book that will stand out in this crowded market and attract readers using effective and proven strategies that have helped many self-published authors sell enough books to quit their jobs and write full-time.

This course will cover:

  • ​How to edit and format your book
  • How to write an effective book blurb
  • How to increase your “social proof” by getting lots of credible reviews
  • How to build an engaged mailing list using autosequences
  • How to sell your books online and in brick and mortar stores
  • How to sell more books using Amazon Marketing Services and BookBub ads
  • How to avoid common pitfalls that trip up many beginning authors
  • How to turn your book into a screenplay, and much, much more.

Just to be clear, this course does not give any strategies on how to write a bestselling book, but rather focuses on how to turn your manuscript into a potentially bestselling book on the Amazon charts.

I’ve included the most up-to-date, proven and effective strategies to help authors of all budgets create the highest-quality book possible and build their readership from zero by targeting hungry readers with laser-like accuracy. From First Draft to Bestseller stands out from other online self-publishing courses due to its size and quality of material. Though it’s an 11+ hour course, it’s packed with relevant and concentrated information without the filler and redundancies that bog down other courses. It’s also taught by a certified teacher with over ten years of public school classroom experience, and it includes a lesson on how to turn your book into a screenplay.

I’m an award-winning, bestselling author of three independently published novels that have outsold authors such as Chuck Palahniuk, Michael Crichton, and Kurt Vonnegut on Amazon’s Kindle store. Two of my three novels have been recommended by Kirkus Reviews and my most recent, The Summer of Crud, was selected to the Barnes & Noble B&N Press Picks list for February/March 2018. I’ve also written eleven screenplays that have won over 150 awards/honors in various international screenwriting competitions, and in July 2017, I optioned one of those screenplays to one of the producers of the American Pie and Final Destination films. I currently live in San Diego, CA and teach at a public secondary school.

Achieving success as a self-published author is often a long-term journey, but if you stay positive and apply the strategies you learn from this course, you’ll likely experience enough successes along the way to keep you energized and moving forward on that path where you’ll learn things about yourself you that will amaze and inspire you. I’d love the opportunity to show you how I’ve achieved a number of the goals I’ve set for myself as a writer, and how I can help you to achieve your own. I’m ready when you are to take that first step of this journey together.

Follow a step-by-step guide on how to turn your manuscript into a potentially bestselling book that readers will love.

Enroll now!

Create

Learn how to:

  • Find a professional editor for your book
  • Format your book
  • Design your cover
  • Write an effective book blurb
  • Find lots of credible reviews
  • Deal with negative reviews in positive ways
  • Register an ISBN
  • Determine your book’s BISAC codes
  • Register a copyright for your book (in the US)
  • Turn your book or new story idea into a screenplay (Bonus section)
  • And more…

 

Publish

Learn how to:

  • Save time by publishing your book using an aggregator like Smashwords or Draft2Digital
  • Save money and have more promotional opportunities by “going direct”
  • Determine whether or not to use CreateSpace or IngramSpark to create the print version of your book
  • Sell your ebook on Amazon, Kobo, iBooks, and NOOK
  • Optimize your Amazon page by using effective keywords and categories, increasing your chances of having a bestseller
  • Set up your Amazon Author Central and Book Report accounts
  • Avoid getting your book and/or reviews blocked from Amazon
  • Give your book away for free on Amazon permanently, and why this can be a great strategy to sell books
  • Run promotions and sell your books to libraries using OverDrive on Kobo
  • And more…

Market

Learn how to:

  • Use the latest technology to target specific readers who’ll love your book
  • Sell books using BookBub and Amazon ads
  • Start a mailing list and sell books on autopilot using auto responders
  • Set up your book’s Goodreads and LibraryThing pages
  • Sell books by running ads on websites such as Ereader News Today, Booksends, The Fussy Librarian, BookGorilla, etc…
  • Increase your chances of being selected for a BookBub promotion (which is different from a BookBub ad)
  • Convince booksellers to sell your books in their stores
  • Convince librarians to buy your books for their libraries
  • Create free and beautiful Facebook banners, ad designs, and more using Canva
  • Find a number of contests for self-published books, and how winning these can help further your writing career
  • And more…

About the Instructor

Jonathan LaPoma is an award-winning, bestselling author, optioned screenwriter, songwriter, and poet based in San Diego, CA. He’s written three independently published novels, eleven screenplays that have won over 150 awards/honors in various screenwriting competitions, and hundreds of songs and poems.

LaPoma’s novels Developing Minds: An American Ghost Story and Understanding the Alacrán are both #1 Amazon Bestsellers, outselling authors such as Neil Gaiman, Kurt Vonnegut, Michael Crichton, and Paulo Coelho on the Kindle store. His books have been recommended by Kirkus Reviews and Barnes & Noble (B&N Press Presents selection), and they’ve won awards in the 2015 Stargazer Literary Prizes and the 2016 and 2017 Florida Authors and Publishers Association President’s Awards. His black comedy screenplay Harm for the Holidays was optioned by Warren Zide along with Wexlfish Pictures (American PieFinal DestinationThe Big Hit) in July 2017. LaPoma usually writes character-driven dramas that are equal parts dark and humorous, and his work often explores themes of alienation and misery as human constructions that can be overcome through self-understanding and the acceptance of suffering.

Also, since 2005, LaPoma has taught in over fifteen public schools in New York, Florida, and California, and he currently teaches at a secondary school in San Diego where he’s beginning his ninth year.

LaPoma enjoys helping new authors overcome their fears and doubts so they can write the books they’re inspired to write.

Enroll now!