Creating, Writing, and Selling an Ebook
This is the part everyone hates. Well hate is a strong word, researching for your ebook is the part people dislike the most. Just take into consideration what I am going tell you in this post, and you will be able to get all your researching done in less than an hour. Amazing!
Ok, so here is how it works: I want you to asses how well you know your topic. Give yourself a grade on a scale of 1 to 10.
- I don’t even know how to spell my topic.
- -
- I know little about my topic.
- -
- I could hold you in a conversation for 5 min about my topic.
- -
- I know more than the average person about my topic.
- -
- -
- I am an EXPERT on my topic.
If you rated yourself anywhere above a 5 skip on down to the bold headline below. If you scored yourself a 5 or below, you have a little work ahead of you. Read up! The only way you will learn about your subject in a quick amount of time is to read about it. Go to Wikipedia, do some googling, go to the library, just do something to increase knowledge on the subject. You want to be able to at least hold an intelligent conversation about your subject. Once you have accomplished that, go on to the next paragraph.
Researching Made Simple!
While preparing to write my ebook, which happens to be about golf, I read a few books on writing books (oh the irony). One book stood out beyond the others, How to Write a Book on Anything in 14 Days or Less… Guaranteed. What a crazy book title! That link is an affiliate link, but I think the ebook is free and they try to upsell you or something. I’m not sure, but anyways, Steve Manning wrote an amazing book on writing books, and much of what I will be telling you about writing, revising, and research came from his book. So let’s get on with it.
Before I wrote my book, I would have scored myself an 8.5 about golf. That is mainly why I chose to write the ebook about golf. There were still some things I needed to research, though. So how did I do it?
I researched after I wrote my ebook.
I simply wrote the ebook and left spaces where I needed to research something. This might seem kind of crazy, and before you click off my site never to return again, hear me out. Why research for hours on things you won’t even use in your book? While writing your ebook just leave a space for something you need to research and mark down exactly what it is you need to research. That way, after the first draft of the ebook is complete, you can go back, and finish off the parts you left blank. Researching will be ten times faster because you know exactly what to look up.
Is this method of research too crazy for you? Let me know below!
photo credit: Spintwig
{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
I know about what I want to write. I am just being lazy. Any help for that.
Agent Deepak´s last blog ..Interview with James Richmond – The InfoPreneur
Haha well that is a whole different problem. Maybe I’ll tackle that one next.
For me a good way to get niche information is forums, generally if someone asks a question about a big topic people will reply with information, advice, links to good content and so on.
A few big forums and you’ve got enough information to write your product.
Jason @ Make Money At Home´s last blog ..A Preview Of The New Design And Site Updates
Ah that is a pretty good idea. Methods like that work well for getting content. You can also, watch some youtube videos, read a bunch of articles, or listen to podcasts. Still though, would research after I wrote the ebook, to fill in the blank spots. Way faster!
I think that just writing down what you know and filling in the blanks with research later is a great idea. Stopping to research can stifle your creativity and slow the whole process.
Tom | Build That List´s last blog ..The 4 Reasons People Unsubscribe Mailing Lists
Yes sir it can, I wrote about a fourth of one of my ebooks while stopping, researching, and then continuing, in the same amount of time as the new method wrote the other 3/4. Glad to see you commenting on my blog Tom. You are a very active commentor on many blogs, and I hope you will be at the top of my Top Commentators widget. (It will be here in a few days)
Well I have just subscribed to your RSS, so expect to see me here quite a bit!
I am currently working on a free course that needs writing and just today I have been working on one of the days content. Since I was on my laptop with no internet access I was able to just push out content without getting distracted – and that works so much easier!
Tom | Build That List´s last blog ..The 4 Reasons People Unsubscribe Mailing Lists
Great break down of researching an ebook. I went through this process over a year ago and kinda did some of same things you suggested. I wrote the parts I knew, and left certain areas blank. Then I researched the topic more and added quality content.
Writing an ebook can definitely be time consuming…but it’s absolutely worth the effort.
Steve Scott Site´s last blog ..Embark on Your Hero’s Journey
It is an odd strategy when you are using it the first time, but after you get used to it, it saves you hours of work.
I agree, ebooks do take a long of upfront work, but totally worth it in the end!
Absolutely…if done right, they can a huge income stream, with very little maintenance.
Steve Scott Site´s last blog ..5 Stupidly Simple Ways to Make Money on the Internet
Exactly right.. Patrick
Dev | Technshare´s last blog ..30+ Inspirational Social Bookmarking Sites
I like the very practical idea of capturing what you already know in the rough draft with placeholders. It helps get past the hardest part of writing: GETTING STARTED! Is much easier to have some sense of accomplishment already when you start researching your knowledge holes!
Thanks – marshall
marshall | genverters.com´s last blog ..Off Grid cooking – Quick Steaks [3]
Yeah, getting started is definitively the hardest part, but the journey of a thousand miles begins with one footstep
Thanks for reading Marshall, I checked out your blog and it is pretty cool. I have always been interested in “living off the grid.”