The noise in the ebook market has gotten so loud it's hard to hear yourself think. It's not so easy to generate a viable income. So how do you do it?
HIRE PROFESSIONALS-People do judge a book by the cover, especially ebooks!
Get a proper book cover done.
Get it edited by a professional
Have it laid out for print by a professional too (because print and ebook covers different markets), especially if you are a non-fiction writer. If you are a fiction writer and this is your first book, then go straight ebook... but don't skip the other steps.
MARKET, MARKET, MARKET-that's all there is too it... become your own advocate and never stop
Before you publish a book you need to start marketing. You should be on Facebook and Twitter, have a webpage and an idea of what your longer term plan is for an author brand (that's you) and platform (that's your body of works). Sounds easy, but it's a full time job if you want to earn a living as a publishing author.
MY EBOOK BUYING RULES
I have several ebook readers - I use them to test files mostly. I am old-school and don't particularly like the ebook reading experience...(I'm always terrified I'll drop the darn thing in the bathtub, even though I've never dropped a real book in!) I miss the feel of a paper book when I'm reading on the devices. But I do download content all the time. After a while I had to develop a list of "ebook reading rules" because I kept downloading stuff that turned out to be, quite frankly, crap. So I made my rules up to guide my purchasing habits:
- Book must have a professional cover, with a professional sounding "about this book" - complete with punctuation and proper styling
- Book needs to be published by a viable publishing company - that means if it says Smashwords, I don't buy your book. If there is something that looks interesting, I look the publisher up, so they should have a website
- Ebook needs to cost less that the print book, since my first love is paper books, and if it costs less to buy a paper book, well, I'll go buy a paper book (and get a latte at the same time!)
- Book should have a balance of reviews - I don't care if they are all good, I like to have an idea of how the book speaks to people
- Must cost less than $15
- Short stories should be indicated as such. I feel quite ripped off if I think I'm ordering a novel and get a short story - I don't mind paying for shorts, I just like to know what I'm getting
- There should be something about the package that entices me to share my hard earned money (and I do work very hard for what little I have!)
- The book must look and feel like a proper book
So those are my basic buying rules. I'd be curious to know what your rules are, if you have any?
