by Dana Sitar
Ebooks can boost your online presence, create passive income, and grow your audience. Bloggers and entrepreneurs know this. It’s time for freelance writers to get on board.
An ebook can increase your credibility on a topic and help you get noticed by the kinds of people you want to work with. Creating this product to anchor your brand can help you take control of your career and get picky about doing the work you love.
Here are my tips for using an ebook to boost your freelance career:
Write About What You Love
Trending topics and keywords are tempting because of their ability to draw a lot of eyes fast. But they also doom you to writing about a topic you may not like long into your career. Instead, choose a subject you love to write about. Take a unique angle and show off your voice and expertise to catch the attention of the right readers.
Keep It Simple
Simplicity is a good rule of thumb for creating an ebook. You have the opportunity to add illustrations, design, and multimedia to enhance a reader’s experience – but you don’t have to to make the book effective. You can create a simple PDF to share with readers in one link. Then get back to your freelance work.
Keep your content simple, too. Make your ebook short and digestible, so readers will actually read it. No one will learn who you are or know your expertise if you write a massive tome that intimidates them out of reading it.
Launch Big
The launch is where many a self-published freelancer misses a major opportunity. You’re thinking of your ebook as a side project and decide you don’t have time to promote it; you’ve got too much client work.
Big mistake.
If you want a freelance career you love, where you can be picky about working with the best clients, you’re going to have to let them see you.
Your book launch is a key opportunity for this.
Book promotion sounds like a lot of work on top of your freelance load, but if you make room for yourself like you do clients, it can pay off. With a strong launch in the blogosphere, you’ll gain quality clips and killer contacts for referrals and testimonials in exactly the space you want to write for.
Keep the Conversation Going
After launch week, stay on point by presenting new angles on the topic at your blog, creating related multimedia content, hosting communities or events on social media, and more. Leverage the excitement you’ve built to become the go-to expert in your niche.
Get Ready to Write
I know you’re overwhelmed with client work, your blog, Twitter, family stuff… But there’s no better time to start writing than now. Take it slow and steady, plan ahead, and most important, carve out time for the work you love in the midst of client work.
Have you written an ebook? What was the biggest benefit for your career? Tell us in the comments below.
Dana Sitar (@danasitar) is an author and digital publishing coach, and also a branded content editor at The Penny Hoarder.
