How to Write Your First E-Book

‘Everybody is a writer.’ - This is the saying that you could hear anywhere. I genuinely believe that it’s true and that’s why today I’ll tell you how you can write your very own e-book.

Even though everyone is a little bit of a writer, you should understand that not everyone knows the technicalities of writing. Of course, I’m not talking about taking your laptop, opening the text editor and writing the damn article. Nowadays even my granddad can do it without any hassle. I am talking about the things you should do to publish a book online, for example.

I have recently started writing my fifth e-book, and I believe that, as of today, I’ve got some wise things to tell you about my experience in this.

This article will not be a simple motivator; I’d like to tell you a few things you need to consider while writing your first e-book. As a bonus, I will show you how to sell your book on the internet once you’ve written and designed it.

The e-book idea

The idea is a king. Seriously!

The future e-book success is determined by the idea you selected for the e-book and the story you decided to tell the world.

I would say that the idea should not always be unique. Yeah, it would be great to release a book about something no one ever wrote one. However, you can still write a book about the topic you are expert in and bring the valuable expertise to the reader.

Bringing value is something you should always do, no matter what creative field you work in. It doesn’t matter whether you write a book or create a product; it should still bring value to the reader or consumer.

I would recommend you select the topic you are may offer the expertise in.

You may be a freelancer with a ten years’ experience and have something to tell those who just start today. Or maybe you are a copywriter who wants to talk about implementing the basics of SEO into the articles.

Check up the internet for the e-books on this topic and make sure you are about to tell something interesting and valuable. Personally, I wouldn’t waste my time reading a book about something the author has no idea about.

Create the e-book outline

Someone would call it a table of contents, but that’s not a correct term for the thing I want you to do.

You should not only create a table of contents chapter by chapter but also try to underline the essential thoughts you want to discuss in each one.

The tricky part of this process is understanding the structure of your future e-book and having a strong enough imagination. The imagination is needed to be able to summarize your thoughts and create a layout of your future e-book chapter by chapter.

Some of you can say that it’s easier for you to start writing immediately and then try to structurize the outcome, but that’s a newbie’s approach that won’t bring you anywhere, trust me!

Personally, I would recommend you devoting a few days to this process. Gather all your ideas and create a brief description of each chapter step-by-step. This is the fundamental thing that will help you create a serious book, not some amateurs essay.

What text editor should I use?

Everyone prefers the editor that they like to use on a daily basis. For example, a friend of mine is an SMM and copywriting freelancer. She is not a fan of the Google Docs, and she merely writes all her stuff in the Microsoft Word. She says it’s simply more convenient for her, she is used to it, and she knows all the ins and outs of it. Especially she likes the fact that she will have access to her working texts without the internet connection.

For me, there is nothing more convenient than Google Docs. I write all my articles in it, and I believe this is the most straightforward and most minimalistic text editor ever made. I just love it, so even all my books I write there.

In case you are a traveling freelancer, you should consider my friend’s point of view. She is right about the internet connection. So, if you are always on your way somewhere in the car and try to work on your book, Google Docs is not your option, unfortunately.

As of now, you should start writing the first chapter or a brief prologue to your book. Don’t think about the actual formatting or any other things. The real content matters; so make sure that your book will be based on top-quality thoughts and materials.

Once you have written the whole book’s content, you should start the editing process. Check all the chapters, each paragraph, and word. The editing process is so important that you can even give it out to the outsource proofreading freelancer, just to make sure you’re about to release a top-quality product.

Formatting still matters

Yeah, I’ve just said that you shouldn’t care about the formatting, but that’s only while you write the actual content of your book.

When you’re done, you should start thinking about how you will format your book and make it look beautiful and readable.

Now you have a few options to choose from.

• You can format everything and design a cover of your dreams for your book by yourself
• You can give a task to your designers if you work in a big company (yeah, I admit it, sometimes I do so)
• You can submit a job to the freelancing platform and ask someone to format the book for you for a fare

This is something you should decide yourself because I don’t know your budgets and possibilities you have. Personally, I prefer formatting my books on my own.

Here is the service that I’ve discovered while designing my books. Reedsy helps you to format the book and publish it without any additional knowledge in working with the layouts and typographic skills.

Reedsy makes the editing and formatting process such a pleasure! I also decided to include a tutorial on how to work with Reedsy for you, my friends.

How to bring the audience to your book

There are three ways to deliver the book to the target audience. Combine those, and you will be shocked by the results! Here are the key things you need to do:

• Create a sale landing page for your e-book
• Work on the targeted advertising on Facebook and other social media
• Advertise your book through the guest posts in the blogs with the related topics

Once you have prepared your book for the release, you should work on the sale landing page where you will say a few words about your book and create a call-to-action area for the downloading or purchase process. Here is the excellent looking example for you:

Once you’ve prepared the landing page for the book, you need to spread the word about the book over the internet. Nowadays, there is no better place to tell about your product than social media.

You can use the targeted advertising on the Instagram and Facebook to tell about your book. All the options available in the business accounts of Facebook services will give you a chance to target the correct audience. It will help you to ensure that your ad will get to the right audience.

Another thing you can do is writing the guest posts on the blogs with the related topics about something and include a brief ad about your book, saying something like:

“Hey, did you like this article? Did you know that I also write e-books? Make sure you check the latest one!”

Wrapping things up

The content and the idea are the most important things to work on while writing your first e-book. However, you should always understand that the e-book should be formatted and advertised the right way. Otherwise, you will not get sales or e-mail subscriptions.

I hope my small guide will help you to start writing your first e-book. Make sure you leave a comment below in case you already have an e-book released and want to advertise it!

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