Intentional Publishing

I am sure that you have heard the slogan " a good product will sell itself" several times. While this is true, I think there may be some cases where some work needs to be done for an excellent product to sell itself.I want to use this analogy in explaining the book industry in Nigeria. I have read some books by many foreign authors; I mean bestseller books that have sold over 10million copies. I have also read several books published here in Nigeria by sound authors.However, I have noticed that a number of the global bestseller books are not necessarily richer in content and ideas than some books published locally by Nigerians. My study showed that most of the best-selling books were contracted to corporate publishers with global reach and structures. In contrast, many valuable books are only contracted to printers and publishers with no virality structures. Such books will sell 200 copies to friends and families, and that is it.The idea should not be to only make a lot of money from the books but to make the quality of content and knowledge viral beyond the country's shores. The concept of writing should be for knowledge virality and not necessarily for some extra cash. Money will come, but you would have also achieved knowledge drive beyond the shores. I read some things sometimes, and I wish the book could get into the hands of millions of people globally. Each time I get on social media, somebody is advertising a new book they just wrote to their social media followers.For as many authors who have valuable contents to publish, we must begin to look beyond publishing for our 4000 social media followers and start to look beyond the 1million naira we can make or the passive income the books will generate and begin to strategize on publishing globally impactful books that can shape ideas, cause transformation and kickstart global conversations. We are brilliant people, and the world must read from us more.While we are passionate about writing, let us also endeavour to write impactful books that pass the test of regions and climes. I read some books published by some of our friends, and they are just like plagiarized copies of some other books we have read, nothing new and no fresh insight. An undergraduate student who has not done any successful business once told me he had published ten books at 200 level.It is not only enough to publish on Amazon and some other online channels; we must begin to write deliberately and plan strategically to make our books global forces. We must not only sell to our church members and office colleagues; we must sell to the world.Oluwaseun David ADEPOJU