5 Ways Publishing an eBook Can Help You Grow Your Business

5 Ways Publishing an eBook Can Grow Your Business

5 Ways Publishing an eBook Can Help You Grow Your Business

Promoting your business isn’t easy.

It’s time-consuming, costs money, and just plain stresses you out. If you get lots of new clients because of your efforts, you’re proud and feel like bouncing off the wall.

Most of the times, though, your efforts get poor results, and you’re left feeling more like banging your head against that wall.

If only you had some way to improve your marketing’s effectiveness.

If only you had some way of boosting your results so that they inspire more wall-bouncing and less wall-banging.

Well, here’s something you may not have considered …

You can add publishing an ebook to your content marketing strategy as a powerful way to attract more customers and grow your business.

How?

1. Publishing an eBook Helps Your Potential Customers Trust You

Your potential customers have a problem. You have the solution.

But how do they know you offer the help they need?

You must demonstrate that you have the knowledge, experience, skills, and resources necessary to give them the answer to their prayers … or at least the next best thing.

An e-book can help you achieve that.

By publishing an e-book, you show potential customers that you can solve their problem. Obviously, a short book can’t solve all problems, but your e-book could help them on their way or give them a general plan of action.

By publishing an e-book, you show your potential customers that you can solve their problem. Click To Tweet

This shows them you understand their problem, which inspires trust that you could help them out further. They’ll look for the products or services that you can offer them.

For example, if you are a life coach, you could publish an e-book in an area of your expertise — let’s say, decluttering your office. You can then showcase your knowledge on how decluttering increases productivity, explain how your method works, and give cases of clients that have benefited from working with you.

Because most e-books are either offered for free or sold for a price between $2.99 and $9.99, they are low-risk for your potential customers. They won’t have to spend a lot of money to learn a quick solution to a specific problem and to find out if you are the right person to help them.

2. It Attracts Your Target Audience to Your Website

Getting organic traffic from search engines alone is difficult. A lot of competition already exists for the top keywords, and most established companies and blogs have secured the first pages of search results.

And then sometimes those that do find you aren’t even interested in any of your services. They just want some free information and then go on their way.

How can a smaller business bring in more targeted traffic to its website if it can’t even get the right people to find them?Click To Tweet

One way is by having a presence in an online marketplace where people are actively looking to buy a solution to their problems.

Publishing an e-book on Amazon, iTunes, and other online bookstores is a great way to have your target customers find you. These are people that are already looking to spend some money on a solution to their problem, and they can find that with your book.

“Ok, but how does that get my website more traffic?” you ask.

Well, if people love your book, and it solved their problem, they’ll likely want to find out if you offer any other solutions to related problems they have.

People that have a real interest in a specific topic will continue to look for and purchase related products and services. So, if you sell products for hiking, for example, you can be sure that fans of the great outdoors are buying lots of these products on a continual basis.

A well-researched book that targets a particular subject in hiking could attract their attention and give you the opportunity to present your company and your other products and services.

That’s why you must have well-placed links throughout your book that link back to your website. (Just a few though – and be careful not to make your book seem like one long advertisement.)

People that otherwise would not have been able to find your website through a simple search engine will now flock to your business page.

3. It Helps You Build Your Tribe (And Your Mailing List)

You may have heard that carving out a tribe of loyal fans is crucial for businesses these days. And if you haven’t, you might check out Seth Godin’s TED talk on the subject.

One of the most useful ways to build your tribe is through a mailing list.

The benefit of a mailing list over social media is that you have more control over your communications with your audience, and your messages don’t get lost among a thousand other voices. It’s like having a one-on-one conversation vs. trying to raise your voice over countless others at an overcrowded market.

You can use your mailing list to build a stronger connection and loyalty by sending them:

  • additional tips and advice to help them with the issue they’re interested in,
  • key knowledge that helps them make smarter purchasing decisions,
  • first news of an upcoming promotion for your products and services, and
  • “just-for-you” special discounts or offers.

Besides the obvious benefits of being able to directly promote your products and services to a more targeted group, as well as strengthen the bond with your customers and prospective customers, your mailing list can help you in more ways than you had initially imagined.

A well-cared-for member of your mailing list will:

  • share the work you do with people they know (if you’ve made a good impression),
  • be the source of ideas for new products and services (if you listen carefully to what they tell you),
  • provide testimonials and reviews (if they’re happy with your products or services, and you remember to ask), and
  • help you understand their needs so that you stay relevant to them (if you actively reach out to them and connect)

Besides, wouldn’t you enjoy working with the kind of people who are attracted to your ideas, work ethic, and business style?

Okay, so how does an e-book help you build your e-mail list?

Well, remember those well-placed links I just mentioned in the previous point?

That’s the secret door!

One way I like to go about this is to place a link to a special offer at the beginning of the book that sends them to an optimized landing page with an opt-in box and hard-to-resist-offer. (That way, people just previewing the first pages of the book online have access to the link.)

Why would people consider giving you their email addresses?

First of all, if you have managed to gain their trust (as mentioned in the first point), and they like your style as it came through in your book, they’ll want to maintain that connection with you in case you can help them again in the future.

As long as you are providing value, your list will be a source of growth for your business for many years to come.

4. It Generates Passive Income

Let’s not overlook this: Publishing an e-book for sale can add a passive income-generating stream to your business.

Research, write, and publish. Do that once. Reap benefits again and again.

Once you’ve done the legwork and have hit the “publish” button, minimal costs are associated with each additional sale of your book.

Even if you don’t “strike it rich” directly from your book sales, they will still bring in steady monthly income without you having to incur any major additional costs.

And if you build out a book series instead of publishing just one book, each book will help sell the others, increasing their financial impact.

Most people would not object to adding such a product to their business!

5. It Opens the Door for New Opportunities to Market Yourself

Not many people can say they have published a book.

Becoming an author of a book that offers valuable information to people can help others see you as an expert in your field.Click To Tweet

It confirms to others that you have something to share in your topic and that you are interested in letting lots of people know about it.

It means you are serious about your business and getting the word out.

This will attract new opportunities for you to talk about what you do and how your business can help others.

You may use it to approach popular bloggers and podcasters and ask for an opportunity to talk about your business and how it can help people.

You can also leverage your e-book to help you get featured in newspapers and trade magazines, land speaking gigs, and even land TV and radio spots.

I have one client who was invited to help design a new curriculum for a university course.

That means you can even use an e-book to help create positive changes for future generations.

Time to Publish That e-Book And Bring In Some More Business!

You can include publishing an e-book in your content marketing strategy as a powerful way to attract more customers and grow your business.

Hopefully, by now you can see how publishing an e-book is something that can add tremendous value to your business by giving you authority, targeted traffic, valuable leads, connections, and new sources of income and opportunities.

What’s not to love?

I know the whole thing sounds a bit daunting when you’re just starting out, though.

I’ve heard so many people (including some of my clients) fret about not being good writers, not having enough time, and not knowing what to write about or where to start; but, seriously, those obstacles are not at all difficult to overcome once you start learning a bit more about self-publishing.

You and your business deserve to have the best opportunities to shine and to do what you are meant to do. Your business can help more people if more people know about it and have a chance to learn what you’re about.

Go ahead and publish your e-book and let the world know about you.

Then smile as you watch your business grow.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *