Writing a book is a once-for-all experience. Once finished and published on Amazon or other e-commerce platforms, writers will continue earning royalties in the long term and make a consistent income for life. What’s more, ebooks don’t have to be very long and don’t involve traditional publishers. It’s beneficial for one’s writing career and is ideal for demonstrating your ambition and prospects with your specific writing field.
If you’re tempted to begin a new writing and content adventure by publishing your very first ebook, two questions should first be answered: What is an ebook and why do we need one?
Advantages of E-Book
In a survey by Statista, the total global ebook sales in 2021 are estimated to reach US $15,635 million, and the revenue is expected to show an increasingly annual growth rate of 3.18%. Why are ebooks becoming exponentially popular these years? The main reasons can be summarized as below:
- eBooks are delivered almost instantaneously. When the need to read arises, just search, download, purchase on any digital device, and you’ll be immersing yourself in the book within minutes. Time physically spent at the bookstore or library can be spent surfing your internet options;
- eBooks are comparably environmentally-friendly because the paper isn’t required during manufacturing;
- eBook sellers will launch promotional activities to boost sales with various bonuses or coupons. Therefore, readers have the advantage of paying for lower-priced ebooks;
- eBooks are search- One just needs to type a little identifying information in the search bar without any further actions;
- eBooks are portable and have no space limitations. One can store hundreds of ebooks within any mobile digital device. Storage or shelf space isn’t a precondition for owning ebooks, and the weight of a book is no longer a problem.
How to Write an Ebook?
Seeing as ebooks have overwhelming advantages over paper books, writing one becomes enticing. As a beginner, knowing the tips and tricks to write an ebook is essential. Take a look at the following eight tips for new ebook writers:
Select a Suitable Topic for Your Audience
Much like planning for travel, knowing where you’re going before departure is very important. Without any purpose or direction, you won’t get anywhere, causing your journey to feeling useless and upsetting. In other words, your writing adventure should be well-planned and you should start with a guiding topic. It isn’t easy, but one can consider personal expertise or the audience’s needs when brainstorming the topic.
Realistically, the ultimate purpose for writing an ebook should be for yourself rather than potential sales. Certain topics are seemingly appealing, such as the cliches of how to build a healthy body or how to strike a balance between work and life.
Let’s face it, though; these topics have been discussed too many times. Sure, they are helpful, but the market left for you is way too saturated. The competition between you and other big names won’t be beneficial. It’s time to think outside the box!
Consequently, you’d better begin with a topic you are fond of and familiar with so that you don’t get bored by the lengthy writing process. This pre-writing preparation will save you from going through too much trouble. If you still don’t have a clue of which topic to settle on, check subscription emails in your mailbox or your visit history to summarize which types of content you like the most.
Allocate Time for Research
Doing much-needed research can take you deeper into a particular topic, even though you are familiar with the content. Research still serves as an important part of writing as you’ll need to offer the whole picture of the topic. As a result, writers are supposed to connect every knowledge fragment with vivid or detailed descriptions.
Additionally, writers should be responsible for their audiences as facts and statistics may be frequently quoted within the book. Thus, one needs to ascertain or double-check the validity of the facts they’re providing. That said, research doesn’t have to take up a ton of your time. Generally, the research process can take approximately a week, more or less, depending on the topic.
Sketch a Contents Page First
When the research is completed and the topic determined, the next step is to sketch the Contents page, which provides a hidden treasure - organizational structure - to the audience. The Contents page, also known as the Table of Contents, can be informally abbreviated as TOC or Contents.
A table of contents is significant in guiding the readers to locate specific chapters, much like lighting a lamp for the audience to explore the book better. The Contents should at least include the following essential components:
- The titles or descriptions of first-level headings (chapters if in longer works);
- The second-level headings within the chapters as well; and
- Third-level heading if applicable.
In certain cases, references may be needed when it comes to popular science ebooks.
Break Down Every Chapter Carefully (Edit the Content)
When you’re ready to move on to this step, it means it’s time to start writing. Writing an ebook is not an easy job, and therefore it’s highly suggested to write one chapter at a time. In other words, breaking down the big cake into smaller slices will help writers feel less overwhelmed and keep their completion objective in view. Please remember:
- Be sure to keep the content consistent even though each chapter is written separately. This is conducive to bridging different paragraphs with natural descriptions or transitions, keeping the audience from feeling puzzled or confused by vague and illogical progressions from one chapter to another;
- Try putting yourself in the audiences’ shoes. What kind of information do they need the most to address the problem. Looking back, why did you want to write an ebook? Obviously, to address a specific issue. Don’t forget to include data and graphics to support your opinions.
- Furthermore, when you devise every paragraph, it’s equally important to add appropriate calls-to-action (CTA) to the content as it is an excellent way to drive traffic to your website. A CTA can be a link to a resource page in your content, a visual object, a blog post that supports your argument, or even an opportunity to communicate with you directly. Your most crucial CTA should be an invitation to join your mailing. Use your ebook to expand your marketing funnel to better turn your readers into leads and traffic for your business.
Double-Check Content Errors
Your first outcome definitely won’t be problem-free. If you’re only relying on yourself as the proofreader, a large majority of your time will be spent on reading and re-reading the text over and over again to pinpoint spelling mistakes, remove unnecessary content, screen out grammatical errors, and produce the best possible version.
One great tip is not to proofread your book while writing. This only slows down the pace and is considered the most challenging part for an author. Revise it right after you finish the first draft. And don’t try to complete the proofreading work at once. Proportion the project into sections based on the tempo below:
Framework: Give an overhead view of your book. Check the structure of the work, including order, headlines, and subtitles. If it is found that your titles are hard to comprehend, you’d better think about reworking them. The author can’t expect their audience to figure something out he or she doesn’t even understand.
Argument: Review and revise your arguments so that unnecessary content will be trimmed. It is noteworthy that thoughts or descriptions that are useless for supporting your main ideas should be deleted as well. By removing such nonsense, your book will keep engaging people’s attention.
Syntactical Rules: Syntax is the study of sentence structure and the rules of grammar. While people can do what they want with language, syntax helps common users of a language understand how to organize words so that they make the most sense.
The syntax is the rule people follow to communicate on the most fundamental level. Here, syntactical rules put sentence and paragraph cohesion as well as grammatical mistakes under the spotlight.
Invest in Design & Layout
If your ebook is purely text, it may be considered less interesting or lively. Alternatively, writers can choose to incorporate new elements to offer an optimal reading experience for the audience, such as infographics for example.
Humans are visually motivated. Numerous studies have indicated that human observers are sensitive to the visual elements that are helpful to grab people’s attention. Therefore, properly investing time in design is quite worthy. It is recommended to use infographics in one’s ebook, and the particular reasons behind it are the following:
Infographics can be useful in many ways, including:
- Presenting a quick overview of a topic;
- Narrating a complex step by step process;
- Displaying research statistics and survey data;
- Summarizing a long blog post or report;
- Differentiating and contrasting multiple choices;
- Spreading knowledge of a particular problem and the cause;
There are many different types of programs and graphic applications that you can use to create infographics. Their main advantage is that they have many elements that can be directly used in graphics. Thanks to this, we will be able to present the data that we want to convey through the infographic much easier.
However, do remember to keep all visual elements relevant to the topic. No matter when you apply them to your content, during, or after you have finished writing, these new visuals should be closely pertaining to the book.
Everything you do should revolve around the most important ideas. The core of the new design is to illustrate a difficult concept in an easy-to-understand and striking way. What’s more, visual elements ought to enhance the understandability of the materials.
While design centers on the outside part of an ebook, the layout emphasizes the significance of the inside part. Writers should pay attention to the layout of the ebook since it is an essential factor influencing the reading experience. These rules should be followed:
- Give your pages wide margins, use large font size, and plenty of space between every line and paragraph;
- Apply page numbers either on the top or bottom of each page, and utilize headers and footers when necessary;
- Include a copyright page and an “About the Author ” page with calls to action.
Use a Stable Format
Ebooks can be saved into several file formats. A stable format will be of huge help for writers. No one wants their book wrongly displayed or laid out. The following formats are frequently used in daily life:
So far, PDF, otherwise known as Portable Digital Format, can be viewed as the most globally used electronic document format. It can be read on any operating system and device regardless of your hardware or software. PDF is an ideal format for ebooks, simply because it is a stable and consistent one that respects the original layout once created.
Users can make whatever changes to the document until it meets their personal needs. Simply put, converting your ebook into a PDF is a reliable method to avoid content corruption and distortion during file transmission. If in need of a useful PDF converter, SwifDoo PDF can help by providing a 30-day free trial for every registered user. Give it a try now!
EPUB
EPUB is the abbreviation for Electronic Publication and is a more flexible ebook format. Where PDF frustrates software developers, EPUB bridges the gap. EPUB is a popular file format for storing ebooks and can contain words, images, stylesheets, fonts, metadata details, and tables of content.
Content in EPUB files can be displayed on screens as small as 3.5 inches. Hence, this format can be supported by a large proportion of eReaders.
MOBI (AZW)
Mobi files are the ebook files exclusively used by Amazon’s Kindle devices. This format was originally a Mobipocket Reader format but has been adopted by several different readers as well. Amazon purchased Mobipocket in 2005, and later discontinued the Mobi format in 2011.
Therefore, Mobi files, still supported by Kindle, exist in name to a certain degree. Later, AZW took the place of MOBI and became the standard format used on Amazon’s Kindle.
The biggest benefit of this new format is that it is under the protection of Digital Rights Management (DRM) which can lock or encrypt the book allowing it only to be read on devices associated with the specific account. In addition, this format can maintain bookmarks and annotations within the ebook.
Promote Your New Book
The saying goes, “it’s easier to climb up than climb down”. Once you’ve spent a great deal of time writing the ebook, you may find it even more challenging to sell and promote it. Marketing isn’t as easy as it seems, and for non-professionals, it’s a much tougher job than writing alone.
Akin to any new product, one needs to come up with a thorough marketing strategy to promote your book. Keep in mind that you’ve already performed a little research concerning the audience and what they need in the first phase of this process. This could be regarded as a part of your marketing insight. If you want more ideas, maybe the following strategies could be of huge help:
- Publish your new ebook on your website;
- Promote your ebook through your blog;
- Send emails to your contact list;
- Share posts to social media with a link directing readers to your ebook;
- Work with internet influencers or advertise on different promotional
To sum up, everything that has been stated above, even though writing an ebook won’t be easy, the payoff is promising - a popular book can hold massive attention and drive traffic to your business, as well as help shape your image in the industry. Get started on writing your ebook today!
