When people ask me for help with self-publishing, I always say that I want to see their first 100 pages before anything else. The reason for this is that the hardest part of self-publishing a book is realizing how much work it is. It sounds glamorous to say that you wrote a book, but you don't realize how many hours it takes just to write a single chapter (not to mention all the research you need to do). So if you can sit down and write a hundred pages for your book, then you will know that you have the self-discipline to write the entire book.

A few things I think are most important for self-publishing are seeing if you have an interested audience and promoting the book. Both of these goals are accomplished by putting up a website telling people about your book and giving away some free content. By giving away free content you find out if people want to buy your book or not. If you find out that no one reads your book when you are giving it away for free, then there is little hope that they will pay for it. So make sure your website gets a lot of traffic before spending your money on printing it.

The book's website is a great marketing tool and you can use the URL in any communication with people to spread the word about your book. Always put the URL on everything and always ask people for links. Organic traffic is the best self-publishing promotional tool you have.

I hope this helps you with self-publishing!