Who Should Be Acknowledged in Your Book?

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Updated February 9, 2023

Subtitle
Recognizing and thanking those who helped you will help make your book more successful

Synopsis
The Acknowledgments is an excellent place to thank those who helped along the way to publishing your book. You should include those who had a meaningful impact on you and your book. Here is a list to help you get started.

What You Will Learn
1. You will learn who you should thank for helping you.
2. You will learn who should be in the Acknowledgments.
3. You will learn how and why the Acknowledgements are an excellent place to connect emotionally with the reader.

Introduction
You have finally finished writing your non-fiction book, and now you want to thank those who helped you. At first glance, you might believe that writing the Acknowledgments will be the easiest section to write. But then you start thinking about it and quickly realize that quite a few people have helped you.

Even if you are self-publishing your book, you are not entirely alone. As you will see in the list below, there is a vast range of people and companies you have received help from in one form or another. This list will help you remember who assisted in some way to help you publish your book.

Who Should Be Acknowledged?
Although you might start with a long list of names, you need to whittle it down to only those who directly helped you research, write, and produce your book. You should only include those who had a meaningful impact on you and your book. And anyone whose unique expertise was critical to helping your book become more credible.

Here is a List To Help Get You Started:

Group # 1. Family: Your parents, spouse, children, siblings, and relatives who supported your efforts while writing your book. The family plays a massive part in the success of my books. My mother does errands for me so I can stay in front of the computer writing. My kids are experts at finding information on the internet.

My wife helps with editing and freely offers constructive criticism of my work. I generally find extra time to write by getting up in the morning before everyone else and staying up later after everyone else has gone to bed.

Group # 2. Sources: Anyone, such as librarians, teachers, professors, or industry experts, that provided data or information needed in my book. In addition, anyone that you interviewed that provided helpful information and assistance. Be specific in what each source provided for your book.

Group # 3. Editors: Make sure that you list any editor that helped you complete your book. Be specific in describing what each editor helped you with.

Group # 4. Researchers: Anyone who assisted you in finding data and information in the library or on the internet, etc. Do not forget those college interns and librarian assistants. Again, mention what research was found and by whom.

Group # 5. Illustrators/Photographers: These people helped bring your text to life. If you use illustrators and photographers, you will undoubtedly have plenty to tell the reader about them.

Group # 6. Graphic Designers: You should also give the name of those that designed your book’s interior, as well as your book’s cover. Discuss some of the great designs that they gave you to choose from.

Group # 7. Mentors: These people taught you the ins and outs of your business and career. You credit these people with helping you move up within your industry.

Fun Fact:
“Acknowledgment Page” and “Acknowledgment Section” are often used interchangeably.
1. Many non-fiction books have a one-page Acknowledgment Page at the front or back.
2. Larger non-fiction books might have a two-to-three-page Acknowledgment Section at the end of the book.
3. But it would be fine if you simply called this section of thanks and appreciation Acknowledgments, no matter how long you make it or where you place it in the book.

Group # 8. Writing and Publishing Coaches: If you used a coach, mention in what ways they helped you. These people have much more experience with writing and publishing and help you create a professional-looking book. These people save you a lot of time and grief.

Group # 9. Writing Buddies: This can cover people such as a co-worker or professional acquaintances you share ideas. Of course, if you had a co-author for your book, you should have much to tell your readers about how your writing relationship with this person greatly enhanced your book.

Fun Fact:
An Acknowledgment Page is not a Dedication Page.
1. Your non-fiction should always have some acknowledgments and a dedication.
2. Acknowledgments show gratitude to those who helped you with your book. Written in narrative form.
3. Dedications are usually short, with minimal words, to a concise list of people not necessarily connected to your book. The dedication also shows your gratitude but for a more personal reason.

Group # 10. Publisher: If you used a publisher, mention each person at the publisher that helped you improve your book. Mention what each person at the publishing company did for you and your book.

Group # 11. Foreword Author: You will owe this person an outstanding debt of gratitude. In some cases, this person might also be one of your mentors. A proper foreword will significantly impact your book’s financial and critical success.

Group # 12. All The Rest: Here, you can give a blanket “thank you” to the countless others that assisted you in finishing your book. This group should include those that helped with research, writing, and editing and those that helped you develop and understand the concepts you write about in your book.

Conclusion
Give Respect, Get Respect
By giving sincere and honest thanks to those who helped you build and complete your book, you are honoring them by giving them the respect they have earned and deserve. This sense of honor and respect you are paying them will positively affect your reading audience.

The readers will feel a sense of this same honor and respect for you because of how you are writing about those that helped get you to where you are today.

Make A Strong Emotional Connection
This emotional connection is one of the reasons you must remember that every section of a book can positively impact how the readers view you, feel about you, believe you, and listen to you.

By paying sincere respect to those who helped you, the readers will realize you also have the same respect for the subject matter and the readers.

This respect helps build a solid emotional connection between the author and readers. And as you should know by now, this will help you sell more books AND enable you to help more people succeed – the two main reasons why you became a writer in the first place.

Questions to Think About
1. Please share why you honored certain people who helped you.
2. Did you write your acknowledgment in a way that helps make an emotional connection with your readers? How and why?