If you think that there are a lot of opportunities for self-publishing books and making money out of them, then you are right. Still, this is not an easy thing to do, but if you have all the necessary skills and knowledge to publish and market your book, you can achieve solid success, and if you are lucky, you can even become a respected author. This can open up many possibilities for you professionally and you might even get a good publisher.
If your writing is solid, and you put in a lot of hard work and effort, your devotion will pay off. Still, before we continue further, you must remember one thing and get it into your head: the chances of achieving overnight success are almost zero, so don’t rely on this happening to you. This is something that rarely happens, and even those stories you’ve read online are not true; they don’t explain how much some authors worked and failed along the way before they made a breakthrough with their 6th or so book.
Write a Good Book
Write a good book? Really? Well, I know it sounds obvious, and easy when you say it like this, but it really is important that you have a well-written piece. But, what do we mean by this? Of course, this means that your writing is good and intriguing and that you have to get an editor who will make sure that there are no grammatical errors or badly composed sentences. Still, a lot of people think that they must create a “monumental” piece in order to make some money out of it.
You really don’t. Finding a balance between a well-written, interesting story and marketing it properly is the key. One important marketing aspect you should always take into consideration are the current trending genres.
A blockbuster sets trends and people get hooked to that type of writing. Through it, you can write similar stories in your own way and make money off them. It’s all about timing; no matter how good your story might be, if there are generally no people interested in those types of books, you won’t be able to sell much. This is what I mean when I say “a good book.”
Choosing a Self-Publishing Platform
One of the essential aspects of self-publishing is the platform you use to sell your eBook. All of them are unique in their own way and have a specific base of followers that like some stories more than others. For example, you can choose a platform that has three times more followers than some other, but your sci-fi story won’t go so well there, since the majority of those people are into epic fantasy.
The number of people won’t do you any good if your target audience is not there and if the followers on that platform generally don’t have an interest in what you are offering. Furthermore, each of the platforms gives you unique marketing options and tools that you can use to promote your book. This is also important to consider, depending on the marketing strategy you plan on enforcing for your book.
This is why you should take a lot of time to determine what platform is the most suitable for your book. Make sure that you thoroughly research some of the biggest self-publishing platforms and learn about them as much as you can before you choose one.
Find a Suitable Niche for your eBook
When deciding on a topic to write about, you must find a suitable niche for it. This niche needs to have a large enough crowd, with the potential to generate the number of sales you’re aiming for, while at the same time being small enough to give you space to dominate. In order to determine your niche, the best course of action is to try and generate a list of keywords that best represents your genre and style of writing.
You should start off by researching a wide phrase and, if you find out that there is a lot of competition, then you should narrow it down. Repeat this process until you are able to find a niche of your own.
When you do this, it is important to see how many sales they have and whether they are spread out equally or not. If all of the titles have little sales, then this means that the interest in the niche is quite low and you should find another one. If you find out that there are only a few titles that generate a lot of sales, then it means that there is a lot of interest in this niche, but that there are already leaders who will make it hard for you to make a breakthrough.
Combine a couple of niches to enter a third one, find the one that has sales that are evenly distributed and focus on it.
Start a Blog
Most successful writers and publishers who know how important it is to think outside the box are realizing that traditional marketing methods are quite limiting. This is why they are starting to connect different online marketing channels in order to promote their eBooks. When it comes to self-publishing, the core of all these channels is a blog. Not having a blog is one of the biggest marketing mistakes.
The first thing you need to do is to create a professionally designed blog and get good hosting for it, so that it can run smoothly. Simply putting your eBook on a platform is not enough. Sure, you can set an appropriate price, include an appealing cover, find a niche with great potential and write something intriguing to attract users. Also, don’t forget to optimize your “ad”. However, the reality is that your eBook will quickly get swallowed by other fresh publications.
A blog is your home base and it can fuel your optimization, social media and other sales efforts. By previously creating a blog that you will update regularly with fresh content, you can establish yourself as an author. Not only will people be able to find out about your books through your blog, but when they see it, they will also see how you think and write, and this can be a decisive factor in determining whether or not they should buy your book.
Furthermore, you can enhance all your blogging effort with social media by sharing, commenting and engaging people. Blogs are the foundation for building a community online and it is important to learn how to run a blog in order to get the most out of it. Writers must have blogs. That’s a never-ending rule.
These tips are something that can give you a fresh perspective and help you increase sales when it comes to self-publishing. It is important to work hard and publish books regularly, but not too quickly; you don’t want your quality of writing to drop. In this process, both your writing, publishing and marketing skills will improve and you will build your community. Don’t get discouraged; your eBooks will always be there, and even if your third book achieves success, people will look at your blog and social media to find your other work.
The author is highly qualified and writes blog posts weekly.
