One of the best ways to start a home-based computer information business online is to put together an eBook on a topic of interest. I first did this in 2007, and once I saw the possibilities of just what I could accomplish by leveraging the power of the Internet I knew that I was on to something big. I’ll share my tips here on how to write an eBook.
Even if you do not like to write, feel that you do not have any information that others would pay for, or believe that you must be a technology wizard to set everything up, I will tell you that it’s easier than you might think.
First of all, start by making a list of the topics you are interested in. this may include things like photography, sailing, spending time with your family in Hawaii, and so on. Now make another list of everything you have knowledge of and experience with, such as going to school to be an optometrist, living with asthma, and having a dyslexic child. You are looking for something I refer to as the ‘sweet spot’, where the topics you have an interest in come together with the areas where you have experience, knowledge, or training.
My ‘sweet spot’ was helping real estate agents to market themselves in their neighborhood. This began when I first moved to a new community during the spring of 2006. One of my neighbors, Carla, was in real estate and not doing too well with her business. Her husband told her that if she did not make some money real soon she needed to get a ‘real’ job. Carla shared this with me one morning over coffee, and I told her that I would help her to get some listings and make some sales.
I had previously worked as a real estate broker and residential appraiser for more than twenty years, so this was an area I knew something about. Now that I was starting my online business I knew much more about marketing, so all of my experience, knowledge, and training could be brought together to help real estate agents to market themselves and get more business. If you’re wondering whether you have enough experience to write about your topic, please read this post by Jim Edwards on ‘How Much Experience is Enough’.
I started out my writing out my very best tips and information and gave it to Carla in the form of a two page checklist. I then expanded that checklist by using the twelve best tips as chapters in my new eBook. Twelve chapters became the basis for what would become an eighty page eBook, and it contained every bit of information I could think of at that time. This took me about two weeks to write, and I knew that others would benefit greatly from what I had created. If you need help deciding how long your eBook should be, here is another post on ‘How Long Should My eBook Be?’
The next step was to make sure people would pay for this information, so I visited blogs and online forums to see if this would be of interest to other real estate agents. When I received a positive response from more than a dozen people I had someone put up a simple WordPress site where I could give away the first chapter in exchange for a name and an email address. I was building a list of prospects who were excited about my topic. After they joined my list I took them to a page where they could purchase the complete eBook.
Real estate is no longer my passion, so I’ve moved on to a variety of other topics for my eBooks. You can also do extremely well by giving away your eBook for free. If you have a brick and mortar business, use your eBook to generate leads. If you do affiliate marketing, use it to recommend relevant products and services. Share your information with others through eBooks, and your business will grow exponentially. The very best training on this is from Jim Edwards, where he teaches every detail of how to write an eBook in his reasonably priced course.