Being a writer can be a very lonely job. You work from home or from a coffee shop. You can’t stop in the lunchroom for a chat. There’s very little human interaction.

Author or writer collaborations can help take away from the loneliness. It gives you a great excuse to work with a group of writers and still work. It’s like working on a team project in an office.

There are several ways that you can organize it.

#1 Co-author a book

If you can find another author that writes in the same genre as you and has a similar writing style, you can write a book together. Perhaps you can each write from the perspective of unique characters in the book. Or you could each take turns writing chapters.

When you finish writing the book, there are two of you to share the costs of publishing. Once you publish, there are two of you to promote the book.

The cool thing about co-authoring a book is you can work on other projects while your co-author is working on his or her portion of the book.

#2 Join a group of authors in writing a series

I’m in several series collaborations like these. In November, 22 other authors and I will launch a series with 22 books. We will release a new book daily, from Monday to Friday. All the books take place in the same world and are in the same genre. The covers were all made by the same cover artist so they are branded as part of the same series.

For a newer writer, this can be a great opportunity to get some leverage on your pen name. Readers of this genre are prolific readers and will probably pick up each book in the series. There’s a good chance that even a new writer can make a decent amount of money with a collaboration like this.

Another reason to join a collaboration like this is that new writers can find a reader base. If your book is good, there’s an increased chance that they will pick up books from your backlog and they may even sign up for your mailing list.

#3 Blog together

You don’t have to write fiction to take part in a collaboration. Bloggers can work together, too.

Connect with other bloggers that write in the same niche as you and decide on a common theme. Each of you can write blog posts that connect in a series. Decide who is writing on what topic and then make a schedule.

Each blogger can include an index of articles that link to each post in the series.

Bloggers could also work together to release a free ebook on a common theme. Decide on what each blogger will cover (a chapter or a section of the book). Let each author include a bio at the end of their chapter or section or at the end of the book.

#4 Work with specialists

Love writing but hate marketing? Hate social media? Can create a decent cover? Each individual has special skills.

Why not work with a group of people that have very specific skills and share in the profits?

If you’re a brilliant writer but struggle with everything else, all you need is a couple other people who will profit share in income. Decide who you need on your team and work out the percentages that each person will earn from the income.

#5 Create a bundle of free work

Readers love free, whether it is fiction or information or something else. It gives them the opportunity to find new writers they can enjoy reading.

A month ago, I took part in a free book promotion. There were over 100 authors involved and each of us made at least one book available for free on Kindle for one day. Some authors had permafree books that they included.

Each author promoted the event for the week leading up to the event. For me, the result was thousands of free downloads. Those downloads led to reviews, purchases of my other books, and new email subscribers.

By working with other authors, you can get the word out for your promotions easier. You reach a wider audience and find new readers.

We did our promo without the requirement of a newsletter sign up but you can also do your giveaway to get email subscribers. StoryOrigin, Bookfunnel, and other sites like these can make it easier to set that up.

Where can you find authors interested in collaborations?

All this sounds great doesn’t it? But before you can organize your collaborations, you need to find like-minded writers to work with.

Facebook groups can be a good place to make connections with writers. There are writers’ groups for almost every genre of fiction. You can find blogging groups, Medium groups, and others where you can find writers to take part in your collaboration.

Twitter and LinkedIn can be another good place to find people interested in collaborating with you.

If you don’t like social media? Try forums. Or even Medium!

Have you ever collaborated with other writers? How did you like it? Would you do it again?