Design Mistakes to Avoid

The worse ebook covers are those that look like they were thrown together in just a couple of seconds. Avoid using plain gradients or chunks of primary colors for the background: these unattractive choices can be seen from a mile away, and we don’t mean that in a good way. The background should be eye catching, but subtle enough to maintain a sense of professionalism.

When using images be extra sure to avoid the big clichés: stopwatches, financial charts, happy businessmen, stacks of cash, puzzle pieces, supermodels holding props, light bulbs… You get the picture. Photos and small graphics should be clear and simple – and rarely will you ever need more than one. Your ebook cover design is meant to stimulate the consumer’s appetite for your information; it’s not the place to include an author snapshot or dramatic sunset no matter how beautiful.

Breaking the Mold

Cliché or not, a few of the most stereotypical visual effects are widely abused because they actually work – and they can work for you, too! The trick is to take a proven technique and make it your own. Don’t shun a huge innovation like 3-D covers just because they’re popular – just make a 3-D cover that is more unique than the competition’s. Seals and stickers are quite overused, but if you use them properly (to denote value-added extras) they can have a powerful impact on sales.

Mimicry should not be abolished, but it should be definitely be limited. You can still take advantage of popular tools like ecover creator 3D and successful ebook cover design techniques by following the crowd, but make your efforts something special.

After writing ebooks in 2007 I was researching ways to sell them online (i) securely, (ii) without having to pay commission and (iii) without needing constant mediation to handle sales. Seeing that other webmaster’s DLGuard reviews online were favorable I decided to give it a try.

My initial impression was that it was a run of the mill shopping cart application. True enough, it does provide all the web pages and processing for a shopping cart with single product/multiple product/membership sales. In addition it can communicate with PayDotCom, Paypal and other payment processors so doesn’t require any intervention there. It is after a sale is made where the application becomes valuable.

In an ebook business protecting your PDF files and their download links is the key to not losing out on sales, especially where download links may be shared with multiple users in order to freely steal your ebooks. DLGuard steps in at this point by making the download link (that it auto-replies to customers) secure through configuring how long the link is valid for and how many download attempts can be made using a single link.

Once you add your ebooks to the inventory database for DLGuard and add some buy-now links or buttons to your website the product handles the sales and sending out the download links automatically. The main point of intervention needed is on refunds and in this case the customer tracking & reporting ably assists you in doing this.

All in all, DLGuard is an economical download sales tool for any webmaster wishing to customize their shopping cart and avoid commissions to online services.

You might be surprised how easy it is to publish your own e-book. And there are a range of service providers who will put that e-book into print too. There’s a common misconception that in order to make any kind of profit from a book you have to be a bestselling author.

That’s not the case. All you actually have to do to write a profitable e-book is provide information that people are looking for and are prepared to pay for.

And because there’s no publisher involved, no distributors, no retail outlets (all of whom take a large cut out out of traditional printed books), all the profits go directly to you! You’re operating on a much higher margin than you would be if you went down the traditional route, so you only need to sell a fraction of the amount you would otherwise.

Another advantage. Publishers in the printed world can be very picky about who they work with. If you’ve ever tried to get a book published, you’ll know how hard it is to get one to even read your manuscript.

But when you self-publish, that is no longer an issue.

Another great thing about e-books is that they don’t need to have wide appeal, they can be very niche-specific. Consider the situation in a traditional bookstore. Space is at a premium, so generally the only books on display are those with a wide appeal. But online, you can appeal directly to your niche market.

In terms of writing style, people who buy e-books are generally more used to a casual style. Most e-books tend to be fairly conversational in tone. Why? Because the buyers are looking for information, not literary excellence. They want answers to their questions. So if you can provide them with the answers they are looking for, you’re on to a winner.

If there’s one point I want you to take away from this article, it’s that everyone is an expert on something, and so can probably write about it. What’s an expert? Somebody who knows more about a topic than somebody else! If you can write with a little authority about a topic you know something about, you can produce an e-book of value.

So, what are you waiting for? This is a great Internet money-making idea, so get to it! Get writing!

For more ideas, visit Money Making Ideas Now

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