Write an E-Book Without Writing Anything
Did you hear how Bob Bly found $40,439 hidden in his desk drawer?
It’s the wildest thing, yet totally true.
A few years back, Bob was rifling through his desk drawer for something. He came across a folder of articles he wrote for a client several years before.
The articles were all about the craft of writing. And Bob remembered getting paid $7,500 to write them.
As he thumbed through the pages, something occurred to him. Something exciting.
So he fired off a quick note to his graphic designer: “Package these up as an e-book. Nothing fancy.”
The designer sent back a neat little PDF. Bob then wrote up a nice little landing page that linked to a shopping cart where his readers could buy the PDF. Between the graphic designer and the website fees, Bob was out about $175.
But then, he emailed his email subscriber list. In no time at all, he got his first sale. Then another. Then sales started to climb.
And climb.
And climb.
When all was said and done, that little e-book pulled in $40,439. And that’s on top of the $7,500 he already pocketed for writing the articles in the first place. That’s an ROI of over 23,000 percent!
Sound like something you’d like to do?
Here’s your task for the day:
- Go through all your old writing projects. Have you written content that could be turned into an e-book? This doesn’t necessarily have to be past client work. It could be a project you worked on in school, journal entries about a particular topic, or even content you wrote at a previous job.
- If the content was for a client project, you’ll have to check with them to find out whether they own rights to the copy or whether you can legally reprint it. (As a side note, consider writing “First Rights Only” on any future projects you write for clients.)
- Even if a client owns content you can’t reprint, you might have pages of research you can pull from to quickly write a book on a subject.
- Or, you can ship the research off to another writer and have him or her put the book together for you.
What’s key in this process is that you get an e-book put together in record time. And the less time and effort it takes you, the better. Especially since that’ll free you up to write the marketing content needed to sell your e-book—which we’ll talk about tomorrow.
Bob Bly’s Ultimate Guide to E-Book Writing Success
Bob Bly shows you exactly how to build a six-figure passive income in under two years writing, publishing and selling your own e-Books. It’s the easiest, fastest, surest way to earn six figures.
Learn More »
Yesterday I started to repurpose some old blog posts about critical thinking, and what undermines our ability to think clearly and critically about social issues, politics, and personal affairs. I am using the terms "social pollution" and "social pollution protection" to add interest.
Guest (Chet) –
Hi Mindy.
I'm doing something similar. A few years back I spent the winter sailing in the Bahamas. Every week or so I would publish a log (this was before blogs). After a couple of months I would get feedback saying his much they enjoyed my logs. They could live vicariously through them.
About a year ago, I thought about editing these logs and publishing an eBook. There are a lot of grammar and spelling mistakes to correct and I need to create leads from one log to the next, but I am progressing. The two AWAI courses on Travel Writing and Photography have been helpful in creating thus book.
Regards, Dave McGuire
FreeTrader –
I wrote a children's story a few years back. I wonder if that would work? It is only 2-3 pages long.
Guest (Beverly ) –
I am excited about trying this with a project paper that I wrote for a grad course. Wish me luck!
HV –
My books will be down the road a year or two. One will be about an actual buried treasure friends and I found as kids. It had old coins and certificates and even several gold coins. It all added up to over $11,000.
The other is about a WWII soldiers dog tags I helped return to his daughter about 60 years after he lost them while serving Italy.
Guest (Tom) –