Nonfiction is the kind of book most often sold on a proposal, before the manuscript is finished, so the proposal has to prove two things: there is a market, and you can reach it. This page gives you a nonfiction template with the platform and market sections expanded, and a filled-in example proposal for a practical how-to book, so you can see the level of detail an agent expects.
Download the template
Free, no sign-up. Open it in Word, Google Docs, Pages or LibreOffice and replace the bracketed parts.
Examples
- Hook: "Most small-business owners keep their own books, and most of them dread it. This book gets the job down to one afternoon a month."
- Market: "I have spoken at [number] small-business meetups this year and my bookkeeping course has [number] past students." Specific, checkable and yours; leave out anything you cannot show.
- Promotion: "I will run a six-week email course for my 9,000 subscribers in the launch month, with the book as the course text."
- Competition: "Unlike [Title, Year], which is written for accountants, this book assumes no training and uses one worked business throughout."
Where nonfiction proposals win or lose
The overview sells the idea, but the platform section usually decides it. An agent wants to see how many readers you can reach directly: an email list, a podcast, a professional audience, regular speaking. Give real, current numbers and say where they come from.
Comparable titles prove there is a market. Choose recent books from known publishers that sold; avoid both ten-year-old bestsellers and books nobody has heard of.
Sample chapters for nonfiction
- Send the introduction plus one strong middle chapter, not chapters one and two by default.
- Pick a chapter that shows the book's method working on a real example.
- Polish them fully; agents read them as a promise of the whole book.
Delivery and length
State a realistic word count and delivery date. Check the length of the comparable titles you list; practical nonfiction often runs 50,000 to 70,000 words, a gift book far less. Say whether the book needs charts, photographs or permissions, because they add time and cost.
Questions
Do I need a platform to sell nonfiction?
It helps a lot for prescriptive nonfiction. Narrative nonfiction leans more on the writing in the sample chapters.
How many comparable titles should I list?
Three to five, published in roughly the last five years.
Can I self-publish from the proposal?
Yes. The market and promotion sections become your launch plan.
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