How to Create and Market an Ebook – Part 3
January 9th, 2008 | 20 commentsThis is Part 3 of a ?-part series. If you haven’t read Part 1 and Part 2, you can do so by clicking the following links:
How to Create and Market an Ebook Part 1
How to Create and Market an Ebook Part 2
By now, you should have your domain set up with a small sales-letter, including nice looking graphics, and an opt-in form to capture potential customers. You’ve also registered at a few related forums and made some relevant comments with the link to your sales-pages in the signature of each of those forum replies…Now it’s time to actually create the product!
How to Create the Ebook
Go to OpenOffice.org and download their free “Office Suite.” It’s very easy to do, free and it’s excellent software! This will be used as your word processor (optional) and it will convert your ebook to PDF as well (mandatory.) There are other options to convert to PDF, but OpenOffice is free and does the job perfectly. You can, however, write the ebook in Microsoft Word, then use OpenOffice to convert it, but you will probably have to do some format editing once you open the Word doc in OpenOffice.
Once you have OpenOffice you’re ready to get started.
Open the OpenOffice “Writer” and insert your title. I won’t go too deep into OpenOffice, as I’m not a pro myself, but it’s much like Microsoft Word in it’s primary functions. The only difference is, in my opinion, it’s much more stable. I’ve lost a countless number of documents when Word crashed on me and I’ve yet to experience a crash with OpenOffice. And it also converts documents to PDF unlike Word.
Once you begin there are a few things you’ll want to include. For instance – an index (Table of Contents,) about the author, introduction etc. But don’t worry too much about having a format that is perfect. Remember, the purpose of this ebook is to teach others something. As long as it looks decent and your customers aren’t confused you should be good to go.
Inserting Page Numbers and Copyright Statements into the Footer:
Click the “Insert” tab at the top left of your OpenOffice screen. Select “footer” then “Default” (above.) This will open your footer up for editing. To insert Page Numbers click “Insert” once again but this time select “Fields” then “Page Number.”
You should now see the page number appear in the footer of the document. You can now center or move it to the left or right. It should look something like this:
Don’t worry about the shades of Grey. That goes away once you convert the document to PDF form.
This page number will automatically change for each new page you create and it will be outside the editable region, so you won’t have to worry about it’s format etc. for the remainder of your project.
To insert your Copyright Statement just type it in the footer before or after the page number. You can hit “enter” to place the copyright statement above or below the page number and it will not effect the format. You have a certain amount of space to play with for the footer. I couldn’t tell you how much space because I’ve never exceeded it, but you have plenty of room to insert page numbers and a copyright statement.
Converting the Ebook to PDF with OpenOffice
You’ll notice a button with a PDF image on it. DO NOT USE IT. If you use this you won’t be allowed to edit the security settings and people will be able to copy and paste your content and they will! If you haven’t noticed, there are alot of idiots out there who don’t care much about copyright statements.
Instead, click “file” then “export as PDF” (below.)
You’ll then be shown the following screen:
You can generally leave all of the settings at default except for the one within the security tab. So go ahead and click that “security” tab. Now put a tick mark in “restrict permissions” then click the “set permission password” button and insert a password that you’ll remember then select OK.
Now select “high resolution” for printing (many people like to print out their ebooks) and select “not permitted” under “changes.” Be sure that there is NOT a tick mark in the box next to “Enable Copying of Text.”
Click “export” then save the file where you want it and your ebook is now complete 
Click here to go to Part 4 (coming soon)
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9th January, 2008 at 9:43 pm
Hi Josh,
I’ve been working a lot with Open Office lately and I’m finding that I like the Writer program MUCH better than Word. Especially for formatting ebooks. Word likes to format things the way it wants to all the time and it drives me crazy!
Would you happen to know how to make the Table of Contents clickable so that when the reader clicks on a link in the TOC it will take them to the respective page? I suppose I could figure it out if I tinkered with it enough–but just thought I’d ask in case you knew off hand. I have a couple ebooks with that feature and I really think that’s a nice feature to offer your readers.
Thanks for the info
9th January, 2008 at 11:16 pm
I just recently started using Open Office myself after playing with different pdf converters for years without finding one that actually did what I wanted it to (you’d think that would be a simple task).
Great tutorial Josh, thanks! I learned a few things I haven’t checked out yet like the pdf settings.
Angela
10th January, 2008 at 6:13 am
This tutorial has come at just the right time, as you know. Great series!
10th January, 2008 at 8:46 am
Josh, just checked out the series so far and have to say – Really Great!
Should be good for me as writing my ebook at the moment.
10th January, 2008 at 4:32 pm
@ Amanda – I’ve really grown to dislike Word, although many still love it. It’s slowing loading, it crashes all the time, it has less functionality than OpenOffice and it’s expensive. I’ve actually never made TOC clickable, but it’s something I need to figure out myself. Let me look into it and I’ll add it to this post.
@ Angela – I’m glad you got something from it. Like I said, I’m not a pro user, but I’ve used it quite a bit.
@ Courtney – Thanks. I saw your email come in and I’m excited to take a look at your new ebook. I’ll send a reply your way in a few minutes.
@ Nick – Thanks. Good luck with the ebook
10th January, 2008 at 6:46 pm
Just wanted to add my encouragement and compliments on a very informative little series. Thanks for sharing your knowledge.
I’m looking forward to reading the rest, particularly interested in the marketing side and best tips on security for electronic distribution and downloads (that’s a hint that I’d like to know how you do it, compared to what I’ve learned elsewhere already).
Good stuff Josh, keep ‘em coming
11th January, 2008 at 2:52 pm
Thanks Maurice.
I’ll definitely dissect marketing. For secure downloads I use the best damn download software on the planet
DLGuard created by Sam Stephens. Awesome software and awesome support! One of the most highly recommended products I’ve ever used! Sam also provides probably the best support I’ve ever dealt with.
12th January, 2008 at 5:20 am
Awesome info Josh, I got the OpenOffice and it
is the b o m b . It took me six
hours to download it with dial up.
I used it to make a (manually) brandable
ebook .
It also has security features that seem
to be pretty powerful.
Catch ya soon,
Steve
14th January, 2008 at 4:00 am
Hi Josh,
thanks so much for putting up this post about Open
office!
It really does rock and me and my partner just fell
in love with it the moment I read your post.
It should definitely load much, much faster than
MS Word.
Heck, it took me something like 15 seconds to load
up MS Word for me….
Cheers,
Vern
16th January, 2008 at 4:38 am
Thanks for the information on DLGuard – I’ve been using SmartDD myself for my reseller stuff and I’ve been pretty happy with it – always on the lookout for new ideas though.
17th January, 2008 at 11:15 pm
[...] Josh Spaulding provides a great step by step guide on how to add the eBook to your website. It’s too early to speak fully debate the investment vs. the impact, but if the readers continue to find a market, they present a range of exciting opportunities for those advertisers that learn to use it in an effective manner. [...]
20th January, 2008 at 10:19 am
Josh,
Great work! I’ve been using OpenOffice on one of my PCs for about 3 years now. I was actually recommended by our IT guy, and it does work great. I use Word on my other machine and I’ve never had a problem with compatibility between them.
About your series, one question. When I create an e-book, I also do the sales letter first. In some cases I’ll even use it as an outline for the book itself. Why do you begin promoting it so early. I typically wait until it’s about half done before I actually do any promotion. I agree, it’s a great idea to get pre release buzz, but if you begin this early, how do you deal with the fact you have no product? Do you just get everyone on a pre release mailing list? I guess that would actually be a great way to have a good number of copies pre-sold before you went to press. I’ve had problems in forums with pre-release publicity, because people think you’re spamming the forum. I guess in a way, they’re right.
Thanks for the great series (and the rest of the blog)
20th January, 2008 at 7:13 pm
[...] How to Create and Market an Ebook Part #3 – Grr, I am irritated with myself that I managed to totally miss this series from my buddy Josh Spaulding. Still, it’s not too late… don’t miss part #1 and part #2 also. I’ll be taking a closer look at these next week and applying anything I learn to my own recent ebook release. [...]
21st January, 2008 at 2:31 pm
@ Steve – I forgot to mention it’s a large program. It took me about 10 minutes to download with 10.0 cable which is extremely slow
@ Vern – No problem, I’m glad you like it. Ever since I started using OO I don’t touch Word.
@ Maurice – No problem. I haven’t tried anything other thatn Dlguard and I know I never will. It’s one of those things that I just know couldn’t get any better
I really love it that much.
@ Opportunity – Thanks for stopping by. When you get a minute please read my comment policy
The order isn’t extremely important in my opinion. I just had to put it all in some kind of an order.
I start promoting early for the exact reason you stated, to get people’s email. They aren’t paying yet, they are just signing up to get notified when the product launches.
If people complain that you’re spamming the forum you need to analyze your technique. It’s not about announcing your product. You just have a link in your sig (if the forum in particular allows it) and you answer questions related to the topic of your product. No direct marketing. No marketing at all actually. You’re just participating and when you you’re helpful people look at your sig.
7th August, 2008 at 2:50 am
Hi again Josh, I just left a question about spamming in forums on the Part 2 section of this series…it is answered above…excellent, I now know how to go about it now.
Hey Josh, where is Part 4???? I am hoping you will cover off whether you think Adwords is worth using to market an ebook. My keywords are super expensive so think no but then think what about some long tail low cost keywords, is it worth doing? I’d love to be able to say I’ve never paid for advertising to my product but without sales under my belt I wonder what other’s do and what you’d advise.
Cheers.
7th August, 2008 at 7:55 pm
@ Michelle – You got me… I need to finish this old series off. Thanks for the reminder.
I do recommend adwords and PPC in general, but ONLY if you know what you’re doing. PPC is a great way to make alot of money, but it’s also a great way to lose alot of money!
17th September, 2008 at 10:18 pm
Josh
I have found this tutorial very informative. I am in the process of writing an ebook , so has someone above mentioned I found this at the right time.
I just have one question, does an ebook have to be converted from MS Word or Office Suite to a PDF document.
Thanks
Paul
18th September, 2008 at 6:53 am
@ Paul – Glad to help. Yes, it would need to be converted.
14th January, 2009 at 8:27 pm
Josh, I know it’s been a year since part 3, but have you considered doing a part 4?
One question I have is what do you do so people can download from your website and how does that work with paypal so you get paid?
Thanks
15th January, 2009 at 2:58 pm
@ Tom – I do need to finish this up. Since I did this Mark Mason has come out with an excellent guide on the subject at http://www.firstebooknow.com/
If you use PayPal you just create a buy now button from within “merchant services” in your PayPal account. Before you generate the button there are some options and one is the return URL. That would be your download page.