Over on my Online Writing web site I have posted an article about writing eBooks and how it can be done consistently to ‘code’ in just 20 hours for a reasonably sized 12,000 word eBook. This is not the next great American novel, nor is it supposed to be the definitive text for anything. It is a researched, 100% original information product. Basically I allocate 5 hours to research and 15 hours for writing, editing and formatting with an hour or so in there for planning. The web brings everything one needs to know right to one’s fingertips and speeds up the process considerably. This is not a peer reviewed PhD thesis being written but it does require good habits and procedures to keep it legal, legible and legitimate enough to pay good money for.

The reason I wrote this article and divulged some of my many secrets to the world is that apart from not being able to handle all the eBook writing business out there anyway, I feel there is a genuine need for writers to be able to make a living online. The internet has opened up writing as a vocation for many of us yet at the same time it has sealed the fates of many writers who for decades earned their daily bread writing for print media. Media now closed down due to shifting reading habits and revenue streams, most particularly in the USA. Content mills churning out articles do pay for words albeit very little but even they are culling the herd and may be doing this because they are finding it harder to find paying customers. So much free content is offered by people just keen to be published but that is not the big issue.

ESL, or English as a Second Language writers in India, Pakistan, Africa and the Philippines in particular live in economies where $100 a week is a good income and more likely to be a monthly salary. So they can write 150-200 word articles for SEO programs, pumping them out to SPLOGs and blogs just to drive web site rankings and search results for $1 a throw. They can write four an hour and make more than a teacher does in their country. We in the west can’t compete and neither should we. The standard of these ‘articles’ is pretty poor with bad grammar and nonsensical gibberish too often the result. Finding better paying writing work on the other hand requires specialisation and effort. Too many freelance writers fail to spend as much time looking for work as doing it. They work out their rates based on how much they need per hour if every hour of the week they were producing words. Yet they should have an hourly rate that covers the time it takes to find that work and most don’t do this. When asked why, those who even know of this concept cite the market not paying anywhere near what they would have to charge. So either play the game their way or find a new game. I found a new game.

If you can write a 100% original information product, it doesn’t have to be the most in-depth account of the topic available online. It just has to be value for money if a price is placed on it or worth the effort if used as a value added incentive to get someone to opt in to a mailing list. You can also use it as a product around which you build a web site, then ‘flip’ the site and make money on the difference between what it cost to build the site and what you sold it for. If you can write there are plenty of people who can’t and they will pay for your content. You just need to find the right people for the content you have. Remember what I said above. Spend as much time working int he business finding work as working for the business grinding it. It is valuable time but too many of us think we are wasting writing time or doing stuff nobody is paying for. They are paying for your time, somewhere along the track but not in a dollar for minute exchange. You need to think differently or else you are stuck wondering why you can’t even compete for one cent a word articles with people who can’t get their articles, definite and indefinite, in the right order.

Quite frankly I had held off formatting any of my titles (either my own or those I publish on behalf of others)in the ePub format used by Apple and Barnes&Nobles’ Nook eReader simply because it was all too hard. You have to be so spot on with your formatting and conversion and you also need to be an American, or have an alien IRS tax ID. All too hard to get in a hurry, believe me. As the man over at Smashwords says, unless you are selling hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of eBooks, not worth the effort.

While researching the process I read that I could use an ‘Aggregator’ like Lulu.com or Smashwords.com. I already print my hardcopy books through Lulu.com but their distribution to B&N and Apple is a little slow, I have found. So I figured to give Smashwords a go. For the first time in my online life I actually followed the advice int he How To section and downloaded and read the Style Guide prior to formatting the first manuscript. I know, I can’t believe I did that either. I had already read all the FAQs and other data and had a fair grasp of how things worked and funnily enough, when it came to uploading and formatting and what not, it all seemed to go so much smoother than usual. Perhaps at last these sites are getting user friendly?

The style guide was a brilliant education on the finer points of Word. I have used that word processing software for two decades or so and at last I know stuff that tore me apart for years. It pays to learned he ropes, to get the education on how to do this stuff properly. That time I invested in reading the style guide paid off as the manuscript formatted correctly first time. When I tried the second book the copyright error message kept coming up until I simply copy/pasted what worked perfectly for the first book then changed the title and it went through without a hitch.

Epub gets you into Barnes&Noble, who are huge and their Nook eReader is chasing Amazon.com’s Kindle and closing, I believe. More importantly it let’s your work be sold to those with iPods and iPads and iEverythingelses. Just relying on .mobi for Kindle is not enough. You have to be out there in multiple formats and that includes html, rtf, pdf and even Sony’s old lrf… or is that lfr? Ltr? Ltf? Nevermind, they switched to ePub recently anyway, so I read.

Get into ePub and stay abreast of the industry, the trends and the technology. Get in the habit of keeping up and you won’t ever have to play catch up more than once. It is a huge, steep and never ending learning curve but with the right mindset, a lot of fun. And it sure beats hand writing a manuscript or mailing off 500 badly typed pages and a stamped, self-addressed envelope for the return of said manuscript with rejection slip like in the good old days!

I had the pleasure of spending 16 hours with writer-psychologist Jayne Fordham when she attended my Online Writing course last year. Since then she has written a great book and created a very helpful and informative blog, hit the social network marketing trail and much more. Well done Jayne.

Jayne asked me to be a guest blogger which I was happy to be. She offers the same courtesy to other writers and relevant commentators and I have to say her blog is richer for this. Many years ago when I taught martial arts and self defence for a living I had a guest instructor give a mini seminar every monday evening. I never lost a single student to these other stylists however many of my students also trained with them after seeing what they offered. Even if they left me for the new style I would have been happy because they would have found what they wanted as a result of my giving them the opportunity to see what else was on offer.

Sometimes you need to give, to get. Even giving with no expectation of getting is a good thing. Good for your soul, good for your growth. Here is a review I did for Jayne’s great YA novel ‘A Season of Transformation’. The comment about the commas is in response to another review where the critic says there should be some comas here and there. I didn’t argue with that, even though Jayne had me edit and format, then publish the book for her through her Lulu.com account. One could say any error in punctuation not picked up before publishing is mine. OK, mea culpa. The point is, it really is not that important in the grand scheme of what the novel has to say, a comma here or there. What is important is that Jayne wrote it, published it and is now flat out marketing it and that is the true journey of the writer and their story. So why not see where you can post a review and share the love. Help the writer, help the reader and help yourself.

A Season Of Transformation by Jayne Fordham

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A good first novel that caters to a market too often passed by, the Australian YA. While this book and the characters and story can be enjoyed anywhere in the world, it really rings true for the Australian audience. The tone and voice is natural to the Aussie ear yet not too colloquial to alienate the rest of the English speaking world. The reason for this is that the conflicts faced by the characters and the audience are very similar across the globe. Within the text there is a second narrative that resonates with Gen Y that can’t be taught or edited in or out of the story. It is the writer’s own input and while technically this could benefit from those commas mentioned by another reviewer, the soul of the story is all there. A great read. Her next book will no doubt be even better.



View all my reviews