Building a Course With AI Part 1: Writing the Content

My Experience: Wrote a Book, Built a Course, Created a Community

Early this month my Build With AI cohort launched its virgin voyage.

It was the first of its kind. Preparing all of the resources for it was intense, to say the least. I had promised 2 courses and multiple live trainings, and I wanted to deliver. The first course, Become a Power Prompter (originally called The Prompt Fisher) was the first one to build. To put it together as quickly as possible with ChatGPT, I decided my first step was to…

Drum roll please!

Write a book with the help of AI!

Now, I had already done this before but this time was unique:

1. I was going to integrate dozens of personal stories into the book. ChatGPT would need to be a great ghostwriter.

2. I needed the book to transfer seamlessly into a course.

I was excited.

In just two days I had finished the majority of the book and began recording the videos for each section.

For me, the coolest part about Becoming a Power Prompter is that I was able to include personalized AI assistants that the readers use to either 1) learn the framework in a personalized way or 2) apply the framework instantly using the power of generative AI.

I believe that future courses will all be AI enhanced (if not completely AI powered).

With AI powering them up, courses will move ever closer to having the student immediately practice the skill with visible results.

That’s the best way to make something feel like play right? Instantly put someone into the fray and challenge them to act. I sought to move in this direction with the Become a Power Prompter book and course.

Once I had finished recording the course for my Build With AI cohort, I decided to turn it into a lead magnet to bring more people into the cohort.

You can get access to the course by signing up for the Build With AI community, a digital gathering place for forward-thinking professionals, educators, and knowledge workers.

How To Write a Self Help Book With ChatGPT, The Step By Step

Writing a book, in terms of steps, is simple.

There are lots of reasons it can take a long time, but the main reason: it takes time to write words!

Enter, the Book Writing Assistant: an AI assistant designed to guide you through the process of writing a book, while helping you actually write it!

Nicolas Cole, a professional writer who has made millions writing online, has a 10-80-10 rule that he uses when working with generative AI:

• You do the first 10% by bringing the idea or topic.

• AI does 80%, getting it close to the mark.

• You perform the remaining 10% to carry it over the finish line.

Book writing with my assistant will function in quite the same way. Don’t expect the AI to be perfect. Expect it to get close enough at each step for you to carry it over the finish line.

Step 1: Identify Your Book’s Core Purpose and Audience

Before you begin, the Assistant helps clarify your book's focus by asking key questions:

• Who are you solving a problem for?

• What problem are you addressing?

• Why is this a problem?

• What benefits does your book offer?

• What promise are you making to the reader?

• What emotions are you aiming to evoke?

• What action should your reader take next?

This initial brainstorming sets a solid foundation for your self help book. If you’re not writing a self help book, or don’t care about these questions (common for fiction writers) you can ask the AI assistant to skip this step.

Step 2: Create a Working Title

The Assistant works with you to brainstorm a compelling working title. It involves:

• Understanding your book's main idea.

• Exploring various title options to best represent your content.

• Refining the title to ensure it's catchy and relevant.

A well-thought-out title can significantly impact your book's appeal.

Remember, this is a working title. It’s ok to change it! You just need a starting direction.

Step 3: Creating the Chapter Outline

Next, the Assistant helps you create an outline:

• Breaking down the book's main message into chapters.

• Naming each chapter to reflect its core content.

• Ensuring each chapter contributes to the overall narrative.

A clear outline streamlines your writing process and keeps the content organized.

Before the assistant moves on from here it will ask you for approval. You can remove chapters, add them, or give the AI a bullet point story and ask it to recreate the chapters based off of that.

Your options here are broad.

Step 4: Develop Chapter Subpoints

For each chapter, the Assistant aids in generating subpoints:

• Identifying key topics and themes within each chapter.

• Structuring these into focused, digestible subpoints.

• Enriching chapters to cover all essential aspects.

This step adds depth and detail to each chapter, and will be done chapter by chapter (which is super valuable for longer books).

Once the AI has done the initial 80%, you ask it to revise those subpoints, add new ones, remove some, or restructure them entirely, just as you did with the chapters. Ask to move them around the the AI will do so, rewriting them in a way that gets closer and closer to what you need.

Step 5: Compile the Working Outline

Creating Your Book’s Blueprint

The Assistant compiles all the information into a working outline:

• Listing each chapter with a brief summary.

• Including the subpoints under each chapter.

• Organizing the content for logical flow and coherence.

This compiled outline serves as your guide throughout the writing process.

My recommendation: Copy and paste this somewhere you can refer to it to keep yourself on track.

Step 6: Bringing Each Section to Life

Finally, the Assistant helps you flesh out each subpoint:

• Creating drafts for each subpoint.

• Ensuring the content is engaging, informative, and on-topic.

• Revising and refining based on your feedback.

This step transforms your outline into a complete manuscript. It happens one subpoint at a time. The AI will keep the writing succinct (around 3 paragraphs) per point unless you tell it to do otherwise.

This is where you can start feeding stories to ChatGPT to have it turn them into narratives!

When I was writing Become a Power Prompter, almost every section had personal stories. I would not have been able to write the book as fast as I did without AI taking my story as a bullet point list of events and writing it into a narrative.

By following these steps with the Book Writing Assistant, you can systematically and creatively write your self-help book with the help of AI (in record time).

Looking Forward

This is part 1 of at least a 2 part series.

Our journey in creative and educational innovation is just beginning.

Next week, we dive into the exciting realm of transforming your freshly penned book into a captivating video course, utilizing a beautiful AI tool called Descript! Man I love Descript. Turning your book into professional recorded content has never been easier. By harnessing AI, you’ll take each subpoint in your book and transform it into an engaging video.

And your course's perfect home? Skool. I’ll walk you through how to publish and share your course on this dynamic platform, connecting you with an eager (and rapidly growing) audience ready to learn and interact. Skool's unique environment is ideal for hosting your course and fostering a community that thrives on collaboration and continuous learning.

So, take the first step into this innovative journey: join our Skool community and experience the course I've created. See firsthand what you'll be able to build and share next week. Your path from author to educator is clear and waiting – let's embark on this adventure together!

Fetching pumped to see what you build!
Sterling Long!

P.S. This series is based off of multiple requests I have received: At least 10 people have wanted to know how to write a book with, and this week 2 people approached me wanting to build a course with AI. Respond to these emails with questions, comments or violent reactions. My goal is to solve your problems!