Table of Contents
How much money can you earn by writing and selling eBooks?
Amazon is by far the most popular place to sell your eBooks.
More than 300 million people use Amazon’s site right now. That’s a HUGE group of people to sell to.
Sorry, but not all of those people will buy your eBooks.
But even if only a few people buy your book every month, that’s still a lot of passive income.
With Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), you get 70% of the sale price of each book you sell as a royalty.
If your book costs $1, you will make $0.70 from each sale.
We’ll talk about prices later, but $2.99 is a reasonable price for a short eBook.
With a price of $2.99, the royalties are $2.09.
Each person who downloads your work of art gives you just over $2.
Sell 100 eBooks, and earn $209. If you sell 1,000 eBooks, you’ll make $2,090.
How to Sell an eBook
The whale is Amazon. If you want to reach the most people and make the most sales, you should sell on Amazon.
You could also sell the eBooks through your website. This means you keep the wholesale price and not just 70%.
Weebly makes setting up a website and selling digital products easy and quick.
If you go this route, you’ll have to put in more effort to get people to visit your website.
Nook Press is a third choice. This is Barnes & Noble’s version of Kindle Direct Publishing from Amazon.
Even though Barnes & Noble has fewer customers than Amazon, people still want to buy ebooks.
Nook Press is slightly cheaper than Amazon, with a 65% royalty per sale and a price of $2.99.
Smashwords has yet to be well known, but it is still an excellent place to publish. Smashmouth says that it sells more independent eBooks than anyone else.
By publishing on Smashwords, your eBooks gets sent to some of the biggest eBooks retailers in the world.
Those are the four leading platforms to sell your eBooks on, and Smashwords will ensure you’re on all the smaller, lesser-known marketplaces.
Now that you know where to sell and how much you can make, let’s talk about writing an eBook.
Step 1: Finding Content
You’re excited. Ready to put your feet up and start writing an eBook? The only problem is that you need to figure out what to write.
That’s why an eBook is so great. Anything can be written about.
No publishers or editors decide what you can publish and can’t.
Your content is what you know.
If you’ve moved to the United States or know much about it, write about it.
Write about it if you have a secret way to learn Spanish.
You could even write about organic, healthy dog recipes.
You can make an eBook from any knowledge you have floating around.
Even things you don’t know but want to learn could be put into an eBook.
Read 12 books on a subject that interests you. Make an eBook with all the essential or recurring ideas from each book.
Your Content Strategy: Hacking It
One easy way to improve your content strategy is to read reviews of your competitors:
Go to Amazon.com:
- Look for eBooks about the same thing you want to write about.
- Look for books that have an average rating of 4 stars or more.
- Read the reviews of these books that were the “most helpful.”
- Find the things that the best books “lack.” People might like a book but wish it was longer. If one of the best sushi cookbooks doesn’t show you how to make a California Roll, ensure your sushi cookbook does.
If you want to spend a little money, you can also download up to 20 of the best eBooks in your space.
Then read each section’s “Popular Highlights” and put them in order of “most popular.” This makes it possible to read each book in half the time.
You’ll also know what topics you have to cover in your eBook. The more important it is to include, the more highlights there are.
Step 2: Come up with an exciting title for your eBook. Titles are hard.
The title of your eBook is what people will see the most after the cover.
More than anything else, a great title and a well-designed cover will make people want to buy your book.
When coming up with a title, there are a few different ways to go about it.
You can start by reading blogs.
Titles have been something that bloggers have been working on for a long time. Like eBooks, your blog post needs an interesting title to get people to read it.
Bloggers use a four-part formula to come up with catchy titles:
Part 1: How It Works
What kind of eBook will this be? Will there be a list? A list of things? Strategies?
How many things will be on the list? How many facts or plans do you have?
Adding a number to the title makes it more interesting.
This only works if you want to write a non-fiction book that teaches someone something or helps them do something.
Part 2: An emotional hook
Use a powerful word like “Amazing” or “Powerful.” Something to catch the eye of people who are just browsing.
These kinds of words are appealing to our brains.
You can feel something when you read them. It happens automatically in the amygdala, which controls feelings, survival, and memory.
Part 3: Content Type
Here, you say if the eBook is a collection of facts, tips, myths, etc.
This is what the eBook is mostly about, how you will help the reader reach their goal or better understand the subject.
Part 4: Your Subject
Does the book talk about weight loss? Spending less? Investing? Trying to eat well?
Here you say what the subject is. About what the whole book is.
If you put these four pieces together, you could come up with titles like:
- 10 Crazy Facts About Weight Loss
- Dividend Aristocrats: 8 Bizarre, In-Depth Profiles
- 13 Powerful Ways to Make Yourself Stronger
Check with the crowd.
If you want to avoid copying blog titles, look at what the best-selling books in your niche are called.
Set up two lists:
- Every title of the best-selling book in your niche. Write down every Word and random thought that might have something to do with your topic.
- Try putting these two lists together to make a list of possible titles.
Once you have a few titles, ask your friends and family to look over the list and choose their two favorite’s.
Based on what they say, use a cheap Google AdWords campaign to test the last two. This is what best-selling author Tim Ferriss did to develop the title of his book, “The 4-Hour Workweek.”
Once you have chosen a topic for your ebook and come up with a working title, you can start writing.
Step 3: Make an outline
It would help if you made a plan for everything.
Every point of discussion, an important fact, introduction, and conclusion.
You can get ideas from the table of contents of the best-selling ebooks in your niche.
The ebook will be easier to write if your outline is detailed.
Putting the most important things you learned from your research on the topic on separate notecards is a simple way to make a detailed outline.
Also, put all the missing information you found in the reviews on notecards.
For this kind of writing, Scrivener is a great tool. All of these things can be put on digital notecards.
Once each highlight is on a notecard, you can put it in the desired order.
Try to group things that stand out into bigger groups. Select 3–5 parts.
Choose 10-15 sections if the ebook will be more like a list.
Now, each area you’ve marked is where you can go into more detail when writing.
Step 4: Make a schedule for writing
You need to make a plan for writing and stick to it.
If you’re worried about getting tired, take an hour every day to talk about one highlight more.
Or, decide when you want the book to be done. Divide the number of highlights in your book by the days until your goal date. 50 days times 100 highlights = 2 highlights per day.
Set aside sometime every day to write about two things that stood out.
Use Jerry Seinfeld’s method to track how much you get done.
Between 10 pm and 8 am is the best time to write.
Almost everyone else is asleep, so you don’t have to worry about anything else. You have nothing to worry about.
Start staying up late or getting up early to write.
Step 5: Edit your eBook like a pro
Editing the book yourself is the easiest and cheapest thing to do.
Even though Scrivener, Google Docs, and Word all have good spell checkers, you’ll want to run it through something more powerful.
Try something like Grammarly. It’s a free program that checks to spell and ensures that the words used to make sense in the context.
Grammarly will point out that “the book is over there” is incorrect, but Google Docs won’t flag “there” as a misspelt word.
In the free version, you can check your grammar and improve your vocabulary.
The paid version also checks punctuation, sentence structure, and even style.
You can also give your ebook to friends and family so they can give you feedback. Tell them to point out any mistakes that stand out.
The last option, which is also the most expensive, is to hire an editor through Freelancer. It will cost you some money, but a professional will ensure everything looks good.
Step 6: Making the book’s cover
I would look to hire someone else to do this part unless you are VERY creative.
“Don’t judge a book by its cover” is an old saying. But that’s different from how Amazon works.
People judge EVERY book by its cover.
You want yours to look like it was made by a professional and stand out.
Your eBooks will look professional if it has a good cover. It shows that you mean business and that what’s inside is good.
There are a few places you can look for great book covers:
This is the most expensive option from 99designs. Most of the time, a book cover will cost between $50 and $500. I know, that’s a lot of food.
With 99 design, you’ll run a contest. You’ll describe what you want, and then people will send you their creations.
You immediately say how much you’re willing to spend on the design. The more you pay for a design, the more people send you their ideas.
Freelancer: Most likely, a book cover will cost less than $50 here. You hire a freelancer to do the design work through Freelancer.
In contrast to 99designs, you choose a single designer and pay them to do the work. So before you choose one, look at some of their samples to make sure it’s what you’re looking for.
You usually pay someone by the hour, but you can also set a price for the whole job.
Fiverr is the least expensive choice. Get an ebook cover designed for $5. On Fiverr, everything costs only $5. You might think you can’t get a good design for that price, but you’d be wrong.
Some of the people on Fiverr are skilled people who are just starting. They are making little money to build a portfolio and get their name out there.
Step 7: Formatting, pricing, and a description that draws people in
Formatting
Once you’re done writing the ebook, you must change it to the Kindle format before publishing it.
You could use Amazon’s Kindle Create if the ebook were written in Word.
It will help:
- You can see how the ebooks will look in Kindle format and make changes to them.
- Make and change your table of contents as you format your eBooks.
- Add themes made by professionals to make your ebook look better and easier to read.
Many services will do it if you want to avoid the conversion process.
Amazon even lists companies that do eBooks conversion as their primary business.
Pricing
Because ebooks are cheaper than physical books, most people prefer to read them. Here, ebooks have a clear advantage over paper books.
Since there are no physical materials to buy, the cost of those materials doesn’t have to be considered.
You can charge any price you want.
The sweet spot on Amazon is between $0.99 and $2.99. Each eBook used to cost $0.99, but that’s going away.
People put more value on things that cost more. When everything else seems the same, we automatically think more expensive items are better.
When compared to $0.99, $2.99 is a better deal. But $2.99 is still a price that most people are willing to pay with little thought. That’s where we do best.
Description
The ebook description is the next thing a potential buyer will see or read after the cover and title.
It would be best to describe it well to get them to buy the ebook.
Take your time! It’s very important to get this right.
Use the Amazon Top 100 list of books as a source of ideas. Find out what they do to get people’s attention and try to do the same thing.
If you describe something well, it will help a lot.
Step 8: Getting Reviews
Anyone who has ever bought something on Amazon knows how critical reviews are.
Ideally, they should be good.
When someone looks at two items, one with 30 four-star reviews and the other with three, guess which one they’re more likely to buy?
If your ebook has good reviews, other people have bought it and found it helpful. That tells the person who might buy it that they should too.
It shows that people think your book is good.
Use social media, friends, family, and other ways to get feedback. Tell them to buy the book on Amazon and write a review. If they whine about the $2.99, give it back to them.
An important note. You can pay for reviews through certain services. DO NOT DO IT.
Amazon is improving at determining which reviews are paid for and which aren’t. I can see a day when having these fake reviews on your product will cost you.
Setting up a review bank
Once you have a list of people willing to review your ebook, send them a PDF copy.
Tell them to write a review, which they should keep.
You want a big launch party with lots of sales and reviews on Amazon as soon as the book comes out.
This is how you get on Amazon’s list of best-selling items.
When the book is finally on Amazon, everyone should buy it.
Amazon must know that the people who write reviews have bought something. It gives the reviews more weight in Amazon’s eyes and the eyes of possible buyers.
Tell them to go ahead and post their review after they’ve bought something.
Step 9: Advertise and market
You’ve spent a lot of time writing.
Your designer and I have sent and received emails about getting the perfect book cover.
Everyone you know is willing to write an Amazon review.
Now is the time to get down to business and start marketing.
The difference between an ebook that makes money and one that doesn’t is marketing and promotion.
The publisher would handle this in an ordinary book, but you must do it yourself.
It would help if you told people about the book BEFORE it comes out on Amazon.
Why does it happen before you publish?
Because you want your book to go straight to the top of Amazon’s best-seller lists when it comes out.
To do this, you need people interested in the book and ready to buy it as soon as it comes out.
It would help if you got to know people.
Make a profile for the author.
It comes up often. Some famous authors try to write books under different names but fail.
Stephen King’s alter ego, Richard Bachman, did it. In the 1980s, he tried to write a few books under a fake name, but they didn’t do well.
Only 28,000 copies of the first print run of the book Thinner were sold. When people discovered that Richard Bachman was Stephen King, ten times as many copies were sold.
The same thing happened to J.K. Rowling. Under the name Robert Galbraith, she wrote The Cuckoo’s Calling.
There were 1,500 hardback copies sold. When people discovered that Galbraith was Rowling, sales increased by 4,000%.
People buy books by authors whose names they know.
Let people know who you are.
Find a good picture and use it on all the websites about you as an author.
Use the same picture on your blog, social media accounts, and Amazon Author Central profile.
Consistency makes people feel good.
How powerful can social media be
When it comes to social media, there are so many different ways to go.
Facebook and Twitter are the two big ones in the room.
- Make a page on Facebook.
- Set up an account on Twitter.
Whatever you put on your blog should also go on Facebook and Twitter.
You can do a few things from there.
- Take part on Reddit.
- Do guest posts on other niche blogs or sites like Huffington Post and Inc.
- Make a profile on Amazon Author Central and GoodReads.
The better your chances of success, the more places you can get your name out there.
More Marketing or More eBooks?
Does this whole business of marketing seem scary to you?
It can be a lot to handle.
There are so many things to do that starting can seem pointless.
That could be the best way to go.
Writing eBooks to make money is a numbers game.
You can write an eBook in a week, market it like crazy for months or years, and try to make $10,000 monthly from it.
Or, you can do what Steve Scott does and write 20 eBooks that each make $500 per month.
He still has his blog, Facebook page, and Twitter account, but that’s about it.
Write the book and fix it up. Make a cover. Get your friends, family, and followers to write a review and publish it.
Rinse, wash, and repeat!
When people know your name because of one good book, it’s easier to sell more. And one more. And one more.
