How to Sell an Ebook in 2023 to Maximize Your Income – Automated Ebook Business at its Best

How to sell an ebook? What strategies work best in 2023? And how to create your first ebook quickly? 

Our detailed article above will answer all these questions. In addition I will show you how to make your ebook creation efforts 10X profitable and take advantage of the e-learning boom to launch a stable business around ebooks. 

I will also show you the beginner’s pitfalls that plague ebook sales. Finally, we’ll talk about a great service to automate all this! The one essential low-cost tool you’ll need to build your ebook empire. It also has a free account to quickly start at $0, while you wait for the first sales 😉

Do you like the program? Let’s get started!

What is an Ebook?

An ebook is an electronic book, often in digital PDF format. It can be paid or free (we will see why in the following paragraphs). Its content is generally useful (non fiction), and solves a specific problem for a certain category of people. 

Because it is electronic, the ebook can be downloaded on your computer, or on your smartphone and can be easily read with the software installed by default.

We often hear about Amazon ebooks, but it is important to know that the vast majority of ebooks circulating on the Internet are not affiliated with Amazon or its Kindle reader. They have other specific reasons to be created.

But precisely, why do we hear more and more about creating an ebook, selling an ebook, and making money?

Why create an ebook?

There are many reasons to create and sell an ebook, for example:

1-Create an ebook to launch or reinforce your brand image as an expert in your field. 

Creating an ebook, or even several ebooks is essential to demonstrate your expertise, while helping your prospects and followers with their daily problems.

Let’s say you’re an expert in industrial design and you’re talking to industrial designers in Autocad and similar softwares. And you want to increase your reputation in the industry. 

A good strategy would be to list the most pressing problems of people in your industry, and then create a short ebook that solves that specific problem. For example « 10 must-have software programs for every industrial designer, 3 of which are free and off the beaten track ».

Another example is « 7 beginner draftsman mistakes that an expert will notice right away on your Autocad sketch ». Or « How to present an industrial design quote that pleases the end client, the SMART methodology. »

2-Create a free ebook to be used as a « Lead magnet », or « A Prospect Magnet »,

ie. a downloadable resource for capturing lead emails. 

Here the goal is even more specific, we don’t just want to develop a brand image, but we want action from our website visitors. We propose a direct exchange to all the people who arrive on our landing page, or landing page: « Your name and your email » against « a relevant and very interesting ebook that solves your current problem ».

In the real estate sector, for example, we can create an ebook entitled « 7 tips from a professional real estate agent to sell your property in less than 30 days at a price 10% higher than the market ». 

We then create an email landing page on a specialized service like Système io. Then we promote this landing page using organic and free SEO strategies or by buying advertising.

The visitors then arrive on this landing page and give us their contact information in exchange for our ebook. 

Of course after that, they are subscribed to our email list, and they start receiving a sequence of pre-programmed emails, also called autoresponders, in order to get to know us better, learn more about our services, and eventually buy our services. 

This email marketing is very effective and can propel your business to the sky. You can start with Systemeio service which allows you to launch your autoresponder for free up to 2000 subscribers.

3-Sell an ebook directly and develop an ebook sales business.

The objective is different, and the strategy too. The goal is to create a useful, high value ebook that solves two or three of your customers’ major problems using a clear step by step methodology. 

This is the secret to selling an ebook directly! 

Keep in mind that since it is a digital resource, the price of your ebook depends solely on the importance of the information it contains. A book that gives you a methodology to have a « Seductive Magnetic Look » that attracts beautiful women to your bar table can be sold from $7 to $19.

Another ebook that gives you Warren Buffet’s methodology of investing in the stock market, with three real-life case studies that show you how to turn $10,000 into $150,000 on the New York Stock Exchange in 2023, can be sold for $97 or even $197 without any problem. 

It’s the result that counts in the end! And it’s the final result that your client buys. This last change of mindset is essential, if you start selling ebooks. 

You are selling a result, not a mere PDF!

So, if you have a secret methodology from your grandmother that solves a concrete problem, it can be worth several hundred dollars. I personally know an entrepreneur who sells his ebooks for $799. 

What is your margin when you sell an ebook? Shocking figures!

Let’s assume that you sell your ebook at $7. And that on average you pay $4 to buy each internet visitor (using Facebook advertising for example). What is your profit margin? $7 – $4 = $3 right! 

Wrong! And dead wrong! 

Your profit margin can be $300, $500 or more. But wait, Jimmy!

I don’t follow you anymore. How can you have a margin of $300 when the total selling price of the ebook is only $7? you might ask.

Well, because selling an ebook is only the first step in your sales funnel. So let’s dig deeper together …

How to sell an ebook like a pro?

Let’s take the example of the e-book on investing in the stock market for example. 

After each sale of an ebook at $7, you can include an Upsell, that is to say an additional offer of a digital course which explains in video with exercises, the same subject of the sold digital ebook. 

This digital training is priced at $397. 

And that’s not all!

For people who have purchased your digital course, you can offer a third Upsell of coaching in small groups of 3 people, where you, the expert, will follow each of your students for 6 months to implement your methodology from A to Z and until reaching the final goal, getting 30% or 3X from their stock investments.

You will then be available for them on WhatsApp, and maybe do a zoom conference twice a month. They will be able to literally rent your brain, and borrow 30 years of expertise to avoid any mistakes during this process. Result? They will maximize their gain!

This close coaching can be priced at $2997! and it will be a great deal 😉

And guess what… after this offer, the sales funnel doesn’t stop there. It can continue with even more offers at different price levels. 

Can you see the potential here?!! 

The key numbers for selling an ebook 

What you need to know is that around 15% of your ebook buyers will buy the training at $397, and 10% of those buyers will also buy the coaching at $2997.

So when you add it all up, you end up with a sale margin of $300, $500 or even $1000 for your sales funnel. 

When I first discovered these advanced marketing strategies, my mouth started to salivate. Excited as hell! 

Because the potential is real, and these offers are legitimate. We absolutely help our clients at all levels, whether it’s through the ebook, digital course or coaching to really reach their goal. As a result, the clients are very happy, and your banker too!

Nevertheless, at this point, the first objection that came to me was the technical implementation. How to do this, without spending months and months coding, and without costing me an arm and a leg?

What technical tool do I need to sell an ebook?

Indeed, it may seem like a lot of technical programming and design work. And to be honest, it has been for many years. But today there are marketing platforms that have simplified this process to the core!

On the Systemeio platform for example you have ready to use sales funnel templates. You select the design, edit the text, put in your photo or video and boom your ebook sales page is done!

You choose another landing page template, add a video of the text and your $397 digital course sales page is done!

Finally you do the same for your coaching offer. Add another video, some text and your coaching sales page at $2997 is finished. 

Systeme io allows you to easily implement the latest marketing ideas such as Upsells, DownSells, Bumps… 

It also allows you to launch emailing campaigns to your prospects who did not buy your ebook, or who skipped your digital course. Systeme io also allows you to automate the sending of login and password to your buyers at an unbeatable price of $27/month.

See here our detailed description of this essential tool to sell your ebook for the price of two capuchinos.

How to sell an ebook on Facebook?

One direct consequence of building a sales funnel is that when you buy advertising on Facebook or on the Google search engine, everything changes! 

When you send that same web visitor to your ebook sales page, the expected sales potential is no longer just $7! but the potential is $7+$397+ $2997= $3401!

This is how the best marketers in the world do it today: A Facebook ad that sends visitors to an effective sales funnel, which contains 3 or more offers… 

I sell my ebook on Facebook with a sales funnel using Systemeio (Free Plan Available)

How to set the price of your ebook?

This is an existential question when you start selling an ebook. Will you charge $7, $9, $19 or $29? 

One is torn between a small price and a large volume of sales on the one hand, and between a reasonable price with a small number of buyers on the other. 

Nevertheless, using the sales funnel strategy, it is easy to understand that our real margin is not $10 or $20.

This is not where the bulk of the sales are made. But it is on the second offer at $397, the third offer at $2997 and on other following offers that we propose to our email list. 

Because let’s not forget it! 

Only a small minority of our email list will buy when we launch our ebook. 95% of our subscribers are there at your disposal. They know our offer. And they know us.

So we can send them a regular autoresponder, ie. a sequence of pre-scheduled education emails, once a week or even twice a week to offer new promotions, new digital courses, coaching or even affiliate products from other entrepreneurs in the same industry. 

As they often say, « the money is on the list ». So the more paying customers you have in your email list, the more new products you can offer them to buy.

You will surely have noticed on your Facebook wall, offers of ebooks for $7, $4 or even $1. These savvy marketers focus on building a list of potential customers with credit cards, ready to buy. 

This is your real gold mine!

In conclusion, when in doubt, set a price of $7 for your ebook and make sure to create your sales funnel behind it. You can always increase or decrease the price and test the market reaction afterwards.

How to find a good idea to sell your ebook without difficulties?

Before writing a single sentence of your ebook, you absolutely must study your market. Whether it is for a free ebook or a paid ebook, you must study your market.

You need to determine exactly what specific terms your prospects and customers are searching for on Google.

But how do you do that? Well, here is an easy process the pros use! 

1-You need to go and create an advertising account on Google Ads here. It’s easy, your name and email are enough.

2-Then go to the « Tools and Settings » menu, and select « KeyWord Planner ». The traffic forecasting tool of Google, aka, how many people are searching for specific terms.

3-Make sure you select the right country.

4-Enter 5 to 10 terms, called Keywords. 

Choose these keywords from the content of your future ebook. For example, what is the title you have in mind for your ebook? What sections and subheadings will you include in this ebook? Those will give your seed keywords.

5-Launch Google’s « KeyWord Planner » tool. It will give you an estimate of how many searches your prospects and customers are doing on those keywords. 

6-If you find keywords with less than 100 searches per month, you’ll know that the topic is not popular and that your ebook will be a total flop!

What to do? Take three deep breaths, brew a nice cup of coffee and start brainstorming a new topic for your ebook.

Once you’ve found the title and 5 subtitles. Back to the drawing board! Give them to the KeyWord Planner.

A good start would be to find two or three terms that have a search level of 5000 searches per month or more. Got them? Good!

Take the time to look for other keywords close to your main topic. The goal is to gather 7 keywords that give monthly searches of 9000 queries each, at least.

Now you’re on the right track!

And you can start writing your ebook with peace of mind. Your market has a clearly identified and proven need. 

This step is so crucial that I invite you to take your time to do this process and repeat it if necessary.

Understand this! 95% of failed ebook sales come from this unfinished or quickly botched market research alone.

Shortcut! How to quickly write your ebook?

Here is the best and fastest way to create your ebook. I recommend when creating your ebook, to use Google Docs.

1-First write the general structure. 

• A title,
• Introduction
• Subtitle 1
• Subtitle 2
• Subtitle 3
• Subtitle 4
• Subtitle 5
• Subtitle 6
• Subtitle 7
• Conclusion. 

2-Then go to the Tools menu in Google Doc. And choose « Voice Dictation ». Choose the English language, 

3-Then click the gray Micro button, and start dictating your text. 

This is a little-known but truly extraordinary tool. It will cut the time it takes to create your ebook by 95%.

Of course you will have some mistakes here and there, but Google Docs will highlight them and you will be able to easily correct them. You might need to reword some sentences.

Nevertheless, the final result is really very good!

 The article you are reading was dictated this way 😉. Tell me in the comments, what do you think?!

With this methodology, you can easily write between 2000 to 3000 words per day. That means you can write your free ebook in a weekend, no more! 

You correct the mistakes, export to PDF and boom! You’re there!

So in the end, is it profitable to sell an ebook?

The short answer is yes, it is very profitable!

Let’s look at some numbers. Let’s say you have an email list of subscribers to your newsletter of 5,000 emails. 

If you follow the method described above, you can create an ebook every two weeks! Let’s assume that you sell your ebook only to your list of 5000 subscribers.

Assuming an average conversion rate of 5%, and a very reasonable price of $7, your monthly revenue will be 5000 x 0.05 x $7 = $1750. For 250 buyers.

But, this figure does not take into account the Upsell (price: $397) of 250*0,15*$397=$14.689 for 37 buyers (15% of buyers take it).

Then comes the second coaching Upsell (price: $2997) at 37*0.1*2997=$8991. (10% of digital course buyers take it).

Bottom line, our launch generates 1750+14689+8991= $25.430!!!

Without the strategy of a sales funnel, we would generate only $1750.

We then find ourselves with 14 TIMES the turnover made from the sale of the same ebook.

So, Yes! It is very profitable. I do not say that it is easy, and that you will arrive at these figures in 1 week by working 45min per day. But, the logic of the system is indisputable, and you can learn the ropes quickly. 

Do you need help? I can help you! Send me an email at [email protected] and let’s discuss a collaboration!

Either way, I really advise you to get started now. The opportunity is real and the numbers are in front of you 🙂 

What do you have to lose?  Start creating your ebook sales funnel today and earn the money you deserve!

But, I can hear one objection from behind the class 🙂 “I don’t know how to create a 5000 subscriber mailing list?”

Don’t worry! I’ve written a detailed article on the subject where I explain in detail how to build a persuasive landing page here and collect as many emails and subscribers as you want. Keep reading!!