Richard Moloney's Blog

Welcome to all my readers both new and returning.  If you have not already done so why not sign up to my RSS feed for notification of when I post new posts here.

This is the ninth post on what is a series of posts on the reasons Why YOU Should Write YOUR Own Ebooks.  They will all come together in an ebook I will be using in future giveaways.

Writing Your Ebook – Contd.

Step 3 – Once you have your thesis, and before you start to write, make sure there is a good reason to write your ebook.  Ask yourself the following questions:

1. Does your proposed ebook present useful information and is that information currently relevant?
2. Will your proposed ebook positively affect the lives of your readers?
3. Will your proposed ebook be dynamic and will it keep the readers attention?
4. Does your proposed ebook answer questions that are meaningful and significant?

If you can answer yes to these questions you can feel confident about the potential of your ebook.

Step 4 – Work out who your target audience is.  It is this group of people you will be writing to and they will dictate many elements of your ebook such as style, tone, diction and even length.

Figure out the age range of your readers, their general gender, what they are most interested in and what socio-economic group they primarily come from.  These are some of the questions you should ask yourself:

1. Are they people who read fashion magazines or book reviews?
2. Do they write letters in longhand or do they spend long hours every day online?
3. What will my ebook help my target audience with?

I am sure you can think of many, many more questions to ask yourself about your target market.  The more you can narrow down your target audience the easier it will be to write your ebook for them.

Step 5 – Make a list of the reasons you want to write an ebook.  I have listed some possible reasons below as questions to ask yourself.

• Do you want to promote your business?
• Do you want to bring quality traffic to your website?
• do you want to enhance your reputation/

Step 6 – Write down your goals in terms of publishing.  The following questions will help you do this.

• Do you want to sell the ebook as a product on your website?
• Do you want to offer it as a free gift for filling out a survey or for ordering a product?
• Do you want to use the chapters to create an e-course?
• Do you want to use your ebook to attract affiliates from around the world?
• Do you want to use your ebook in JV Giveaways to build your list for future email marketing campaigns?

The more you know upfront the easier the actual writing will be.

Step 7 – Decide on the format of your chapters. Keep the format from chapter to chapter fairly consistant.  Perhaps you plan to use an introduction to your chapter topic and then divide the chapter into subhead topics. Or you may plan to divide it into five parts each one beginning with a relevant anecdote.

This series will be continued in part 10 coming shortly.

Your comments are always welcome and if you have anything you would like to add please do so below.  I look forward to reading what you have to say.

Richard

Welcome to all my readers both new and returning.  If you have not already done so why not sign up to my RSS feed for notification of when I post new posts here.

This is the eighth post on what is a series of posts on the reasons Why YOU Should Write YOUR Own Ebooks.  They will all come together in an ebook I will be using in future giveaways.

Writing Your Ebook

The hardest part of writing anything is the first sentence.  When you look at the whole project it seem like an impossible task.  That’s why you need to break it down into manageable chunks.  For your ebook these would be the chapters.

Imagine you are going to climb Mount Everest, you are standing at the bottom looking up at the summit disappearing into the clouds.  How can you possibly climb such an immense and dangerous mountain?

There is only one way to climb any mountain and that is: step after step after step after step.

Now think of writing your ebook the same way – one step at a time.  You must create it step by step and one day you will take the final step and will have your complete ebook finished.

The first thing you have to do, just the same as a mountain climber, is to get yourself organised.  Instead of climbing gear you must organise your thoughts.  There are some some steps you must take before you begin.  When you have worked through the list, detailed here and in following posts, you will be ready to start writing your ebook.

Beginning steps to writing an ebook.

Step 1 – think of a working title for your ebook, don’t worry you can always change it later.  Jot down a few different titles and eventually you will find one you like.  Titles help you to focus your writing on your topic.  They guide you in anticipating and answering your readers queries.

Many Non-fiction books along with some ebooks have subtitles but these are not essential so don’t worry about them.  Aim for clarity in your title although cleverness always helps to sell ebooks as long as it’s not too cute.  Some examples of titles are: Remedies for sleeplessness – 20 different ways to count Sheep.  Or Get off that couch – 15 exercise plans to whip you into shape.

Step 2 – Write out a thesis statement.  Your thesis is a sentence or two stating exactly what problem you are addressing and how your book will solve that problem.  All chapters will spring forth from your thesis statement.  Once you have it fine tuned you have built your foundation and from that foundation your ebook will grow chapter by chapter.

Your thesis statement will help keep you focused while you write your ebook.  Remember all chapters must support your thesis statement.  If they don’t they don’t belong in your ebook.  If your thesis statement gives a number of ways to do something then you should have that number of chapters in you ebook.  You might have only 5 or 6 chapters or you might have 20 or more it doesn’t matter as long as each chapter is relevant the number of chapters is irrelevant.

One method to help in setting out your ebook is mind-mapping software or alternatively you could use index cards.  By writing your suggested titles on a series of cards and then your chapter titles on more cards using one card for each title.  You can then select the ebook title which you feel is the best and rearrange the chapter titles into the order you feel the chapters should come in the ebook.

This series will be continued in part 9 coming shortly.

Your comments are always welcome and if you have anything you would like to add please do so below.  I look forward to reading what you have to say.

Richard