The Cheat’s Guide To E-books
How to Plan, Produce & Promote your first E-book
By Wendy Dashwood-Quick
Visit www.socialmii.co.uk
Follow Wendy on Twitter @socialmii
Smashwords Version 1.1 2012
Copyright Notice
This report is copyright © Wendy Dashwood-Quick. It may not be copied or redistributed in whole or in part by any means including but not limited to electronic, photomechanical or physical without written permission from Wendy Dashwood-Quick
Disclaimer
The ideas and opinions contained in this report are offered in good faith. Wendy Dashwood-Quick offers no warranty as to their effectiveness. Responsibility for sales and other measures of commercial success lies entirely with the purchaser of the report.
Contents
51© 2011 www.socialmii.co.uk All Rights Reserved 1
What an e-book will do for your business 6
What a Hairdryer Taught Me about Writing 6
Gain expert status with your report 7
Where does an e-book fit into your marketing strategy? 8
There is no room for excuses 8
Get out of your comfort zone 9
People want what you’ve got, so don’t deprive them 9
Feel the fear and write it anyway 11
Don’t under-estimate what you already know 11
How to deal with writer’s block 12
Trust me, writing is easier than it used to be 13
How does your approach differ from your competitors? 16
Build trust and rapport with your audience 17
What title should you give your e-book? 21
Andy Maslen ‘Write To Sell’ 22
While we’re onto buzz words – is it readable? 25
Don’t use underline too much 25
A word about the Queen’s English 26
Andy Maslen, Copywriting Expert 27
Tell us a bit about you – even the disasters! 32
‘Funny you should mention that because...’ 35
Should you copyright your material? 36
Don’t talk about yourself too much 37
Remember to save and back/save your material. 39
Done is better than perfect 40
Write a blog post to promote your e-book 41
Here are some useful press release sites: 42
Promote via Social Media (Of course) 43
Share it on your Facebook Fan Page 43
Mention your e-book in your next newsletter 43
Here are a few ideas for Newsletter providers 44
Offer to give away some review copies 45
Answer Questions On LinkedIn 45
Register your e-book online 46
http://www.getfreeebooks.com/ 47
Do you need an ISDN Number? 48
How your book gets read by mobile devices 48
Popular e-book Formats For Mobile Devices 49
Add a ‘Tell-a-Friend’ Plugin 50
Add a url to your Flyers and other marketing materials 51
Add a url to an Article resource box 51
Digital Hosts for your e-book 52
Get your e-book printed and bound 52
Create a cover graphic for your e-book 52
Welcome to The Cheat’s Guide
To E-Books!
Success is where preparation meets opportunity
There’s so much stuff written about the advantages of promoting your own e-book. Marketing experts will tell you that it’s good for business and that it’s a great lead generator.
But what they fail to tell you is that writing an e-book is actually not as easy as it looks. Trust me you can’t churn out an e-book in a weekend, no matter what anyone tells you.
However, my mission is to help you enter into this process with your eyes open and fully armed for the journey.
Part 1 will help you in the following ways:-
How to overcome resistance to writing
Deal with procrastination
Leverage your expertise to add value
How to turn your passion into useful resource material
How to plan and gather material
Now before we start - a little word in your ear. This e-book says Cheat’s Guide. I must make it clear that it won’t teach you how to write something without any effort involved on your part. What it will teach you are most of the skills and techniques that have taken me YEARS to accrue. This will save you time, money and hopefully loads of stress AND it will help you to produce an e-book that people actually want to read.
So to save you all the aggro and unnecessary stress associated with writing, I’m sharing all my knowledge on this subject with you (because I’m nice like that).
What an e-book will do for your business
An e-book will help you whether you are in property investment, finance, horticulture, coaching, baking, teaching, finance, marketing, sales, technology, cooking, health, sport. The list goes on and on.
This is because an e-book contains valuable information that can be used to market your business and help you in the following ways...
What a Hairdryer Taught Me about Writing
I began my writing career by accident at the age of 21 when I entered a writing competition to win a hairdryer. At the time I and my four sisters were sharing one hairdryer, and that situation had to change. So I entered the competition out of sheer desperation. I wrote about the day in the life of a hairdryer, and it paid off.
At that time I was also working in an Advertising Agency in London. I worked with the creative team who were responsible for numerous successful ad campaigns. It was a fascinating, enthralling job. The team I supported were the brains behind ‘Access Your Flexible Friend’. We also had the Ratners’ Account (before Gerald Ratner made that fateful speech which effectively destroyed his business).
I started work back in the days when secretaries actually wrote their bosses’ letters for them. This gave me a good grounding in writing. Later when I became self-employed I wrote newsletters and e-books to promote my coaching business, and eventually published a book.
Recently publishers have been saying that e-books are the new paperback and as a consequence e-books are flourishing online. But you need to keep in mind why you want to write an e-book, and what your objectives are.
This series of e-books series is divided into
Three separate e-books:-
Part 1 covers the groundwork. Most of this will be done on paper, well before you do log onto your computer.
Do your thinking, research, talk to people and make some notes. Much of the work can’t be done sitting at a desk which is why, throughout this series, I suggest other ways to access your creativity, generate ideas and find inspiration.