The Write to Flight

by Danielle Bruckert
(Namibia)

Cessna 182 Training Manual

Self publishing has allowed me to begin selling books that may have never reached the market if I had to use traditional methods, expending large amounts of time to woo a publisher. Presently I publish a number of aviation text books, which sell reasonably well, and I have begun writing some non-fiction for children as a hobby.

The Beginning

I have been writing all my life. Yes, it sounds like a cliché, but for most writers it is true; you begin in school - once you've learned to read and shape letters into words, the teachers invariably set some fun creative writing tasks. Anyone who loves to write becomes absorbed in this phase and begins their own projects at home - although I'm sure some people only discover a passion for writing later in life. I was one of those children who wrote my own story books on my spare time.

Beginning with stories and poems, I never thought I was any good at non-fiction writing, probably because most of the assignments at school were not very inspiring - even if the topics were own choice.

Once I left school I took up my other passion in life - aviation, and began study to become a professional pilot. This, by chance, led me back to writing. I began writing my own study notes for exams, which I distributed to other trainee pilots. When I qualified as an instructor, necessity, created by a lack of decent affordable textbooks, led me to convert my study notes into full texts.

Developing the Material

My first complete book was Namibian Air Law for PPL. When I began flying in Namibia there was no air law text available, and a short break from flying with a broken leg allowed me to finish the book, which was both a study and reference text.

Fortunately this coincided with the increased availability of laser printing from pdf files for short runs ('print on demand'). I had my first book printed directly from my file and spiral bound at a local short run printer. I always joke that, with respect to Namibian Air Law, it is the best book on the market,....and of course the worst book on the market, seeing that it was, and still is the only book on the market. This would tend to mean you are guaranteed sales! Always a good angle to look for when writing a non-fiction book, but, the draw back for me in attaining meteoric sales is that it is a very small market. Most of the student pilots in Namibia now study from my air law and sales tend to be about five books a month. The following year I managed to complete a Namibian Commercial Pilot's Air Law, which also (being a monopoly) sells quite well, however I fear many struggling new CPL's copy and distribute the book. When I think of how I struggled back then after paying off a huge loan and only earning a meagre salary as a junior pilot, I don't really mind, we still sell a couple a month, and the series has an added bonus of making me a kind of Air Law expert.

My second series was a joint effort, begun when a long time friend and colleague came to me with the idea of a type rating series, in fact he had already finished a draft manuscript, with the idea that once you have finished one it is fairly simple to modify for each new type.

There are many great type series books, however most of them only covered the trainers (Cessna 152 or 172, and PA28's etc). I believe traditionally pilots felt that you only needed this type of in-depth information when you were learning to fly. So again we seemed to enter the market with a product which had a monopoly.

Models within a type can have considerable differences such as operating speeds, airframe and engine configurations which are very important to flight operations. The series, compiled from a vast number of resources, and in-depth author experience, provides resources and information seldom available from one instructor or a single model's manufacturer's handbook. The research again proved an invaluable addition to my own experience and level of instruction.

The added advantage of the type series was that it had an international market, and so potentially much larger sales, but how to distribute them? Shipping out of Africa to Europe and America was incredibly expensive and without a publisher behind us we were incapable of reaching wider sales which would allow us to increase production and reduce end costs for competitive pricing.

Enter Lulu and Internet Sales

Completely by chance when researching children's books, I tried to purchase one online and was taken to the author's Lulu storefront.

What a break! I found I could now access the world! We had put our books online on my own site, but I was ever fearful of someone buying one as I had no effective way of shipping, and so I did not put any efforts into marketing.

As all my files were in pdf with jpg covers, with a little tweaking of the embedded fonts, I managed to upload and order the first book, our Cessna 172 Manual, followed by the C152, C182, the Namibian Runway Directory, and the Air Law books.

I ordered the first copy to proof as recommended, and for the first time, I had one of my books in a 'perfect bound' version (a feat not easily possible with small run printers in Namibia). For ease of use the spiral bound books were much better, however the perfect bound books - as my partner commented "just look so much more professional - like a proper published book!".

I have to give Lulu full credit for their service and the concept, I thought it was the greatest thing on the internet since I found gmail!

Now the Hard Part - Marketing.

Despite the benefits, it still astounds me that pilots have so much trouble buying a 20USD book, when flying a 100,000 USD aeroplane! But they do. Getting the books into the right places for sales, and convincing pilots of their worth (without spending too much money) was the next problem.

The books were online at a recognised site, but getting the word out was still essential. A book on the internet was just a drop in the ocean - how did people know you were there? And aviation books were not likely to spread like wildfire unless actively promoted to flight schools.

I spent a bit of time putting up all the free advertising I could get, again with the theory it takes some time, but once you have done it for one book, it is easier for the rest, and online sales slowly started to pick up.

Through our entire range we are now selling approximately twenty books a month, and this would probably be more, but I prefer to spend time on the books I have on the drawing board (more in the type series (C210, C310, and C206), an Instrument Flight Quick Reference Handbook and Procedures Guide, and some ab-initio pilot training manuals) rather than active marketing, it will come eventually when I complete all my projects - or maybe one day I'll find a publisher to do it for me.

My Biggest Compliment

I was at the flight school one day, looking for the manufacturer's flight manual for the aircraft I was about to fly, (which is part of the legally required on-board documentation for flight). As an author you don't always get immediate feedback for your work, so I thought it was great when one of the young students unknowingly handed me my own book and said, " Here try this, I found it much more helpful".

Where to From Here

I would like to obtain an ISBN for general marketing of the books, and obtain some professional assistance with layout. Many self-publishing websites recommend a professional cover service, but I really love the ones we have, (which were completed by someone very close to me who claims to "really suck at graphics"), besides I feel the content should sell a book - not a "wow me" cover.

Final Word

The Internet has brought to authors what open source has brought to software users - a true free market where the user can establish the rules, and ultimately the best products will triumph. My hat goes off to the self publishing pioneers and sites like this.

Visit Red Sky Ventures.