For better or for worse, books are no longer something found only in a bookstore. With the rise of the Kindle and the proliferation of other mobile reading devices, ebooks have become a viable means for distributing books – and you can take advantage of this trend. Ebooks are easy to distribute, since they can be made into pdfs and marketed across the web for little to no cost (besides your substantial time, of course). But how do you make your ebook take off? In my experience, as long as your ebook is of high quality, all you need is a good high delivery rate email service and some email marketing smarts to see results. Here’s how…
1. Network, network, network – Just because you’re not pitching your book to publishing execs doesn’t mean you can afford to just put it online and hope for the best. You still need to network with some of the top blogs. Once you’ve partially finished some of your book and are comfortable with it, start emailing many of the top literature blogs with an excerpt. Make sure you offer them something in return as well – a mutual link to their blog from your own is always helpful. Developing your own blog will also be critical in this process.
2. Work on your email like it’s a chapter of your book – This email blasting pitch will need to be perfect. What is your book? Why should anyone read it? Who are you? What are some images of your book? What is your call to action? Make sure you answer all of these questions while remember to keep it simple – a text-focused email with a few well-placed images should be the key to success.
3. Test, test, test – Email is going to make up the core of your marketing campaign, so you better make sure it’s working. Take a look at your open rates and conversion rates, then optimize based on the makeup of your email recipients. If you do nothing, you’ll never improve.