Some experts claim the height of the blog-to-book trend occurred two years ago. Nina Amir, author of How to Blog a Book: Write, Publish, and Promote Your Work One Post at a Time, believes more blogs are being released in book form now then ever before. That means aspiring authors with successful blogs can blog their way to book deals and have their books become the next Julie & Julia, Stuff White People Like, Escape from Cubicle Nation, The Book of Awesome, or, more recently, The Puppy Diaries, Hack, Fed Up with Lunch, or Confessions of a Scary Mommy.

Today, great ideas and writing are not enough to turn aspiring authors—especially aspiring nonfiction authors—into successful published authors. Writers must prove to publishers their ideas are highly marketable and readers are waiting at the book store doors eager to purchase them. To sell numerous copies of their books, let alone produce a bestseller, they must have a huge author's platform.

"A successful blog represents a successfully test marketed book idea," says Amir, whose book will be released on April 21 by Writer's Digest Books. "Publishers are looking for popular blogs because they are as close to a sure bet as they've ever had before."

A blog also provides a test marketing method for a writer wanting to self-publish a print or ebook. "Aspiring authors can write their books on a blog and see if anyone is interested in the book or the topic. Build up the blog, and then self-publish," Amir explains. "Blogs with lots of readers provide a platform from which to self-publish books successfully."

"To succeed in the competitive publishing market, writers must creatively take their careers into their own hands and use current—and proven—technology," according to Amir. "A blog provides an aspiring author with a powerful platform-building tool and a superb way to gain exposure to agents and publishers. The savvy writer should learn how to use blogging as a unique and fast way to write a book and to promote it one post at a time on the Internet."