Three Ways To Make Money Writing Ebooks

There are many ways you can make money writing ebooks. Here are three of them. You don’t even need a website for the last two.

Ebooks - The Traditional Way

It may be a stretch to call something “traditional” in an industry that is only a decade old, but this method is as close as you can get to that. The basic idea is to write an ebook targeted to a particular market and sell it on your website. This is not as difficult as it sounds.

For example, suppose you know how to get a good deal on a used car. You could write 40 pages on that, convert it into a PDF (there are even free services online for this), and load it up to your website. You then create a page that links to it, allowing it to be downloaded there. This is called the “download page,” and it’s where buyers will be sent after they pay.

Then you create a sales page detailing why a person might want this book, and targeting the keyword phrases they might be searching (like “used car buying tips), so they can find your page. You sell it for $29, or cross that off and have it permanently on sale for $17. Certainly if you have good advice, it is worth that much or more to someone looking to buy a used car.

You don’t even have to take credit cards. Just set up an account at one of the vendors who handle digital products. Buyers click your “buy now” button, and the vendor handles the order for a fee. This leaves out the hardest part, of course, which is marketing - but that’s a subject of its own.

Make Money Giving Away Ebooks - Part One

There is more than one way to make money with ebooks without a website. One way is to give them away, but have affiliate links in them. The idea is to provide something of real value to readers while giving them an opportunity to buy something that you make a commission on.

For example, suppose making fishing equipment is a hobby of yours. You write a 30 page ebook on how to make your own fishing poles and lures. Prior to doing this you found a good ebook on how to catch trout, which you can promote for a $10 commission. You have several links to the book in your ebook, each with your affiliate code in it, of course, so you make $10 for each sale you refer. Now you just find places on the internet that distribute free ebooks, and upload your book there (of course there is much more you can do to distribute it, but that’s a start).

Make Money Giving Away Ebooks - Part Two

This method is about promoting whatever you have online. You write and distribute small ebooks or e-reports for free, and each one links to your online “property.” that could be your website, but if you want to do this really cheap, you could also have a free blog set up (there are several good places to do this), and send the traffic there.

Of course to make money writing ebooks in this way, you have to have a way to make money once the readers visit your site or blog. That could be pay-per-click ads or affiliate products that you promote there. You also have to get them there. A promise of something they’ll find on the site is a good way to accomplish this. In the example of the ebook on making fishing gear, you might say “visit the site for a list of the best suppliers of basic materials.”

Those are just three of the many ways to make money writing ebooks. Why not get started?

 


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February 22, 2009 | Filed Under Writing and Speaking

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