Eat the e-book Elephant a blog at a time
You see it all the time. You land on a website and they are offering a great looking e-book (generally a much smaller version of a printed book) that gives you some useful tips and insights into the business you’re visiting, or possibly just be interesting reading on a subject related to that business.
They offer the e-book for FREE! All they want in return is your e-mail address. Who can resist something for free? - So you’re drawn in. before you know it you have library of useful e-books, but more importantly, the businesses offering them have built a great data base!
Take it from me though, this is not the only reason every e-book is an excellent marketing tool. An e-book, if it has been sensibly compiled, so that each chapter works as a stand-alone article, also gives you a whole series of articles to release and (derived from these articles) several short posts that are populating your social media sites with content on a regular basis. It is therefore a great content marketing tool too.
It seems like a ‘no brainer’ doesn’t it? Why then do so many businesses not just automatically create these e-books? Well there are a few reasons and my business as a professional Content Writer is to help my clients overcome these challenges. So what are some of the objections?
I can’t afford to write a whole e-book
As I’ve already alluded to, just as you eat an Elephant a bite at a time, you can eat the e-book Elephant a blog at a time! It’s not quite as cost effective as writing the whole e-book at once, but my rates for blogs at the rate of 4, or even 2 per month is still very, very good.
So this way it could take a bit longer to create your e-book, but as you are doing so you are posting blogs to your social media platforms, maintaining your online presence and building your brand as you aim towards your goal.
It’s a big project – I don’t have time
An e-book, unlike a full book is not necessarily very large. It is more to do with quality of content than volume. Remember we live in an age of brevity and immediate gratification and shorter, more concise articles are what people tend to read. It stands to reason then that if each chapter of the e-book is a stand-alone article, you only need about 20 or so to call these collective articles an e-book.
Obviously if you don’t have the time to write a whole e-book at once, you can engage a professional Content Writer - and my fee for what is effectively 20 blogs, all commissioned at once, is exceptionally reasonable! So this is the most cost effective way to do it.
I really don’t know what to write about
Once again, part of my professional writing skills have taught me a lot about what people can best say when trying to build an impressive online presence. Essentially you are offering useful information related to your business for free and once people are drawn to that and they have given you their e-mail address, you can be reasonably confident that they have an interest in what you are selling.
One rule of thumb is, think about what your clients want to know and what are their FAQs in relation to your service or products? I will guide you through this and together we will brainstorm a campaign that leads to the content of a great e-book.
The benefits outweigh the challenges
Potential customers are drawn to businesses that give something for nothing. It is a great ice breaker and providing you follow up with promotional e-mails (another speciality of mine) that are also helpful, you build a relationship, which ultimately builds trust and leads to a sale or new client.
So, the overall benefits of an E-book as a business booster, brand builder and way to create an impressive customer base, are pretty impressive.
If you have found this article helpful and like me, are convinced that every e-book is an excellent marketing tool, contact me and let me help you eat the e-book Elephant a blog at a time!
