6 Ways Your Business Will Profit From Writing an Ebook

You might not think of yourself as an author. But if you are a business owner or head of a personal brand, did you know that your business can seriously profit from writing an ebook?

In this article, I am going to show you 6 ways you can profit from writing an ebook, no matter your business niche.

Bonus: For 10 profitable writing topics, check out my article, “Why You Should Write a Self-Help or Business Book in 2021” here.

Let’s get into some of the major ways you can use an ebook to turn a profit in your business.

6. Position yourself as an expert in your field

Have you ever heard the expression “You don’t need to tell me about X—I wrote the book on it”?

People assume that if you have literally written a book on any subject, then you are an expert in that subject. Writing a book isn’t done in a day. It takes lots of time and lots of research. If you have enough to say about your business niche that you can write an entire book on it, that’s impressive.

With online learning still trending upward, more and more people are turning to ebooks to learn about topics they are interested in. Help them by writing a book about your business niche, and instantly become an expert in their eyes.

5. Build credibility by adding “Author” to your resume

It takes guts to write a book. Even if you use a ghostwriter, you will facilitate the entire journey of bringing your book to fruition. There’s the initial idea and market research, outlining, writing, editing, publishing, and marketing. No one can deny that’s a lot of work. It’s no wonder that authors are respected.

Let me go back to the marketing step. If you launch your book successfully—that is, if you carefully orchestrate distribution on channels relative to your niche and you drum up enough interest to generate a handful of reviews when the book becomes available—you could even add “Bestselling” to your author title!

How does “Founder, CEO, and Bestselling Author” sound to you?

4. Build your following by offering your ebook as a freebie

If you own a business, you better have a website. And if you have a website, make it work for you by capturing leads. A popular and easy way to capture leads (i.e. pull your target clients to your business or brand, then get them to give up their contact information) is by offering an opt-in such as a small free product, or freebie.

Here’s how it works: A potential client lands on your website. Without an incentive to find out more about your business or to keep in touch, the client will bounce (click away) in no time. But if you have a helpful freebie on your website to offer that potential client, you can ask for their email address in exchange for that freebie—in this case, your ebook.

What kind of ROI will you enjoy by offering your ebook for free, given all the hard work and money you spent on it? It’s difficult to measure and will depend on your specific situation. Two important marketing components need to come together for your best chances of winning paying clients by converting them with a freebie:

1. You need to already have in place an effective pull marketing strategy for your website. In other words, you need to have some traffic coming to your site already.
2. Once you have captured your target clients’ email addresses, you need to market to them effectively by email. Email marketing can take different forms, so figure out what is best for your particular niche.

The bottom line is: The bigger your engaged following, the more chances you have of selling paid products or services to them.

3. Connect and collaborate with others in your field, growing your audience

Writing an ebook gives you the opportunity to connect and collaborate with others in your field, whether fellow business owners in your niche or fellow authors.

You can build brand awareness this way and easily grow your audience when you team up with related authors or business owners.

For example, you might offer your book in a giveaway in which other authors in the same subject participate. You share audiences this way and you can grow your following and email list. BookFunnel and Goodreads (not affiliated) are great places to start marketing your book (and it doesn’t have to be part of a free giveaway—you can also market your book for purchase).

LinkedIn is another great platform you can use to find fellow business owners in your niche from around the world. Why not connect with them, strike up a conversation, and see if you can help each other out? Maybe you could offer to feature each other’s ebooks on your websites or social media.

2. Raise brand awareness with other mediums

Another important marketing avenue you should pursue is the media. If you have an agent, try to get your work featured in articles targeted to your potential clients.

If you don’t have an agent, you’ll need to market yourself—but I’ve never been one to shy away from DIY!

So you’ve written an ebook. How can you gain exposure outside the world of publishing? Why not reach out to related blogs, podcasts, or YouTube channels? It could be another great opportunity to connect with others in your field. Plus, you can get featured in mediums outside of your ebook distributer, increasing your exposure further.

Someone who mainly listens to podcasts, for example, has less of a chance of hearing about your ebook—unless you can set up a podcast interview in your niche.

It’s another way to 1) drive traffic to your website, where you can deliver your ebook as a freebie, or 2) drive people to a paid listing such as Amazon. Which brings me to the last way your business can profit by writing an ebook:

1. Add a revenue stream by selling copies of your ebook

You don’t have to offer your ebook for free. All the above marketing techniques are just as valid for a paid product. Selling your ebook is the most tangible way of measuring an ROI when you are doing all the hard work of putting your ebook together.

If you have an ecommerce component to your website already, it’ll be a cinch to sell your ebook. In addition, an Amazon listing is an inexpensive way to sell your ebook outside of traditional publishing. Amazon’s algorithm will even take care of some of the marketing for you if you carefully select the most applicable categories and do a proper book launch with review requests.

And if you think you won’t make much money on ebook sales, think again. I have clients who consistently make 4 figures per month with new and old titles. Imagine the cushion you can create for your business with just 1 ebook listing (and proper marketing). You might be so pleased with the results that you decide to write a second (or third, or fourth!) ebook to increase revenue even more.

Time To Turn a Profit With Your Ebook!

My clients are all about using ebooks to leverage their businesses, so I know firsthand how lucrative their ebooks are. Why not try it for yourself? You can pick just 1 of the above ways to profit from your ebook to start if you don’t want to focus on too many marketing channels at once.

But before you publish your ebook, make sure your writing is clear and error-free and that you sound credible by hiring a professional editor to polish it up. Even if you’ve already started marketing, the great thing about ebooks is that you can retro-edit them and upload the changes instantly across all your marketing platforms. I’ve had clients hire me to do just that!

Get in touch with me today so we can discuss your project, wherever you are in your writing journey.