What are e-books? Why are they needed? What is the difference between them and ordinary printed media? Who creates them and how? How do I sell ebooks online? If you are a poet, writer, journalist, copywriter, author of courses and methods, you have certainly asked yourself such questions. Let’s talk about these questions in more detail.
What are e-books?
E-books are books that have been digitized. They are placed in the digital space, somewhere on the Internet or on your computer.
What are e-books for?
All information on the Internet is stored digitally. This format takes much less space than storing the same information in physical form. Therefore, e-books are very convenient and practical.
Many people like to read, but nowadays books are quite expensive. What should we do if we want to read a book, but not enough money for it? Pay attention to e-books. They are much cheaper than their physical counterparts. They don’t take up much space on your computer or other device where they will be stored. Also, they won’t collect dust from the shelves.
If you are a friend of the Internet, then you know exactly what ebooks are. Nowadays, there is almost all the information in electronic format: various books, courses, articles, instructions and much more. In electronic form, you may have access to books that are not available in printed form.
Who makes them and how?
To create e-books, you need certain knowledge. If you don’t have it, you can always learn it. And if you’re too busy creating ebooks yourself, you can always have one of the many remote employees create ebooks online.
Where do I start?
Within the scope of this article, I will not touch on how to write a book at all. You can find plenty of information about this on the Internet. Suppose you have already written a book. What to do next? How to translate a written creation into an electronic form, if you decide to create electronic books, rather than ordinary ones.
Adobe has developed a great PDF format for electronic publishing. This format (unlike the DOC format) allows you to fix the text in the version that the author wants. In other words, texts typed in different programs, thanks to the PDF format, can be printed on any printer in the same form.
E-books created in this format will be of high quality, but large in weight. For example, a book of several pages in PDF format may weigh several mb. While the same book in DOC format will weigh several tens of kb.
PDF format is one of the most popular formats for creating e-books. The advantage of this format is that without special knowledge it is impossible to change anything. And this protects the book from copying. It opens such a book on any device.
Therefore, if you decide to create electronic books, I advise you to use PDF format. A draft in DOC format will simply need to be converted to PDF format.
E-book layout
Stages of creating e-books:
Writing a draft in DOC format,
book layout in special programs,
Placement of the finished book on the Internet resources for sale.
E-book layout programs:
E-books are created in different programs. DTP specialists choose a certain program based on personal preferences. The most popular programs for multi-page layout are those developed by Adobe and other companies:
PageMaker,
FrameMaker,
InDesign,
QuarkXPress,
Corel Ventura Publisher,
TeX.
Each program has its own chips, tools and specializations. For example, FrameMaker, Ventura Publisher and TeX are more oriented towards the layout of complex structures of text rich in tables, formulas and references. And PageMaker, InDesign and XPress are more oriented towards the layout of illustrated texts (in other words, more applicable in advertising, magazine and book layout).
It’s hard to believe, but there are also publications that are professionally coded in MS Word. With the help of special add-ons, this program can be adapted to the layout, which performs work on the text, almost duplicating the functions of PageMaker, XPress or InDesign.
It is also possible to make a layout in Word, if it is convenient for a layout designer, but most of the specialists consider it unprofessional. After all, convenient programs, specially designed for layout, have already been invented!
Most of the professional designers agree that so far nothing better than InDesign for the layout of books have not invented.
Copyright protection
Of course, it will also be necessary to think about copyright protection for electronic books (and in general, all publications on the Internet). We will definitely devote a separate article to this.
How to sell e-books via the Internet?
You can sell e-books in different ways. There are several ways to do this:
Through your own website/blog
through online retailers
through social media groups
through thematic forums
through online libraries
When you sell your e-books from your website or blog, all the profits from the sale goes to you.
In order to place your book in an online store or online library, you will need to agree with the owners of these resources about mutually beneficial cooperation. As a rule, when selling an e-book with these resources, part of the money will be deducted from the owner of the site.
What makes for good sales?
Relevance of the chosen topic
well-defined content
interesting design
the uniqueness of the book (no analogues on the Internet)
good book advertising
Proper book promotion strategy
optimal price
So we’ve sorted it out with you: how to create e-books and sell them over the Internet. Creative success, loyal customers and great sales to you!
