How to Write an Ebook

The hardest part of writing is the first sentence.When you look at the whole project, it seems like animpossible task. That's why you have to break it downinto manageable tasks. Think of climbing a mountain.You are standing at the foot of it and looking up atits summit vanishing into the clouds. How can youpossibly scale such an immense and dangerous mountain?

There is only one way to climb a mountain ? step bystep.

Now think of writing your ebook in the same light. Youmust create it step by step, and one day, you willtake that last step and find yourself standing on thesummit with your head in the clouds.

The first thing you have to do, as if you actuallywere a mountain climber, is to get organized. Insteadof climbing gear, however, you must organize yourthoughts. There are some steps you should take beforeyou begin. Once you've gone through the followinglist, you will be ready to actually begin writing yourebook.

Beginning Steps to Writing an ebook

First, figure out your ebook's working title. Jot downa few different titles, and eventually, you'll findthat one that will grow on you. Titles help you tofocus your writing on your topic; they guide you inanticipating and answering your reader's queries. Manynon-fiction books also have subtitles. Aim for clarityin your titles, but cleverness always helps to sellbooks ? as long as it's not too cute. For example,Remedies for Insomnia: twenty different ways to countsheep. Or: Get off that couch: fifteen exercise plansto whip you into shape.

Next, write out a thesis statement. Your thesis is asentence or two stating exactly what problem you areaddressing and how your book will solve that problem.All chapters spring forth from your thesis statement.Once you've got your thesis statement fine-tuned,you've built your foundation. From that foundation,your book will grow, chapter by chapter.

Your thesis will keep you focused while you write yourebook. Remember: all chapters must support your thesisstatement. If they don't, they don't belong in yourbook. For example, your thesis statement could read:We've all experienced insomnia at times in our lives,but there are twenty proven techniques and methods togive you back a good night's sleep.

Once you have your thesis, before you start to write,make sure there is a good reason to write your book.Ask yourself some questions:

* Does your book present useful information and isthat information currently relevant?

* Will you book positively affect the lives of yourreaders?

* Is your book dynamic and will it keep the reader'sattention?

* Does you book answer questions that are meaningfuland significant?

If you can answer yes to these questions, you can feelconfident about the potential of your ebook.

Another important step is to figure out who yourtarget audience is. It is this group of people youwill be writing to, and this group will dictate manyelements of your book, such as style, tone, diction,and even length. Figure out the age range of yourreaders, their general gender, what they are mostinterested in, and even the socio-economic group theyprimarily come from. Are they people who read fashionmagazines or book reviews? Do they write letters inlonghand or spend hours every day online. The more youcan pin down your target audience, the easier it willbe to write your book for them.

Next, make a list of the reasons you are writing yourebook. Do you want to promote your business? Do youwant to bring quality traffic to your website? Do youwant to enhance your reputation?

Then write down your goals in terms of publishing. Doyou want to sell it as a product on your website, ordo you want to offer it as a free gift for filling outa survey or for ordering a product? Do you want to usethe chapters to create an e-course, or use your ebookto attract affiliates around the world? The more youknow upfront, the easier the actual writing will be.

Decide on the format of your chapters. In non-fiction,keep the format from chapter to chapter fairlyconsistent. Perhaps you plan to use an introduction toyour chapter topic, and then divide it into foursubhead topics. Or you may plan to divide it into fiveparts, each one beginning with a relevant anecdote.

How to make your ebook "user friendly"

You must figure out how to keep your writing engaging.Often anecdotes, testimonials, little stories, photos,graphs, advice, and tips will keep the reader turningthe pages. Sidebars are useful for quick, accessibleinformation, and they break up the density of thepage.

Write with a casual, conversational tone rather than aformal tone such as textbook diction. Reader's respondto the feeling that you are having a conversation withthem. Break up the length and structure of yoursentences so you don?t hypnotize your readers intosleep. Sentences that are all the same length andstructure tend to be a good aid for insomnia!

Good writing takes practice. It takes lots and lots ofpractice. Make a schedule to write at least a page aday. Read books and magazines about the process ofwriting, and jot down tips that jump out at you. Theart of writing is a lifetime process; the more youwrite (and read), the better your writing will become.The better your writing becomes, the bigger your salesfigures.

In an ebook that is read on the screen, be aware thatyou must give your reader's eye a break. You can dothis by utilizing white space. In art classes, whitespace is usually referred to as "negative space."Reader's eyes need to rest in the cool white oasisesyou create on your page. If your page is too dense,your reader will quit out of it as soon as their eyesbegin to tear.

Make use of lists, both bulleted and numbered. Thismakes your information easy to absorb, and gives thereader a mental break from dissecting your paragraphsone after the other.

Finally, decide on an easy-to-read design. Find a fontthat's easy on the eyes, and stick to that fontfamily. Using dozens of fonts will only tire yourreaders out before they've gotten past yourintroduction. Use at least one and a half linespacing, and text large enough to be read easily onthe screen, but small enough so that the whole pagecan be seen on a computer screen. You will have toexperiment with this to find the right combination.

Of course, don't forget to run a spell and grammarcheck. You are judged by something as minor as correctpunctuation, so don?t mess up a great book by tossingout semicolons randomly, or stringing sentencestogether with commas. (By the way, that's called a"comma splice.")

Last of all, create an index and a bibliography.That's it! You've written a book! Now all you have todo is publish your ebook online, and wait for downloadrequest from your website visitors.