9 Easy Steps to Writing a Successful eBook That People will read

Technological growth has made it really easy for anyone to write and publish an eBook.

 However, that doesn’t mean everyone is good at it. Many people have written eBooks that are downloaded and left to gather dust on hard drives because they lacked skills of how to write readable eBooks.

The goal of writing any eBook is for people to actually read from cover to cover and connect to your ideas. The ideas or storyline shared in the eBook must be valuable enough to make people want to share with their family and friends.

And if you write an eBook for your business, then it’s got to be an interesting one. Because a good eBook, read and shared by your audience will boost your lead magnet’s conversion rate. 

So how do you write a readable eBook?

Well-written content isn’t content that’s beautifully written, its contents that answers a reader’s questions and solves their problem. Therefore, write clear and comprehensive content that targets to answer your reader’s problems.

But first, here are some ways writing an eBook will benefit your business:

• You capture more leads effectively.

Other than in-person events and webinars, an eBook is a top-cited lead magnet that every business must have.

By gating your eBooks, you gauge your lead’s interest in using your products and services. This means you can provide more value to them and get their information (eg. email) to nurture them better.

• You establish yourself as an industry topic expert or thought leader

Depending on the topic you cover in your eBook(s), you can easily establish yourself as the go-to source for comprehensive content on the topic(s). 

• You can easily reuse and distribute content.

Not all eBook content has to be content created from scratch. Instead, you can go deeper into a topic you’ve already covered on your blog — reusing it, therefore, distributing it better. 

With that, let’s dive into how to write a successful eBook. 

Step 1: Revisit your target audience person.

The first step to ensuring your content resonates with your audience is to identify who they are. This is necessary as it helps you discuss their problems and provide solutions that’ll solve their pain points using their language.

Therefore, go on and revisit your buyer persona. And if you don’t have one, these two steps will help: 

Visit your Google Analytics.

Log in and have a look at Demographics to identify your audience for instance, what’s their gender? where are they located?

Then, click on Interests and Affinity Categories. Here you’ll see the topical categories that your audience is interested in. You can use the information to write your content. For example, for making relevant references. 

Talk to your readers.

Arrange interviews with your customers to discuss their problems. In your interview, ask open-ended questions and stay on the listening end. Pay attention to their words. Then use those words and phrases in your content. 

Step 2: Choose a winning topic.

Once you’ve identified your audience, select a topic that will address their problems. Use keyword research to understand these pain points. But to make sure you aren’t selecting a topic based on keyword research alone, do this: 

• You can list several topics on your newsletter and social media. Then ask your target readers to poll for the most important topic.
• You can also identify high-engagement-driving topics you’ve previously published. Choose one and go in-depth into the topic.

Step 3: Research the competition.

With a topic in mind, researching competition is the key to creating unique and invaluable content.  

Find out if there are existing eBooks on the topic you would like to cover. If so, is it worth targeting the same topic? 

In case there are only a few eBooks on the target topic, 

Have a look at: 

• How are they handling the topic?
• Is there any uniqueness in the content?
• Is there any insufficiency in the content?

Then create a one-line value proposition for the content you wish to create. 

Finally, ask yourself: how’s my eBook content going to be distinct? How will I make it unique and a better read than the rest?  

Step 4: Create an outline.

Now that you’ve your topic idea ready, create a bare-bones structure for your eBook by writing an outline on it. This gives your eBook a clear direction saving you from unnecessary edits.

Decide on what you’ll cover and how you’ll cover it. The outline should cover the questions people have on the topic.

To be sure about the questions you can either ask your audience via social media, do a quick google search, or try AnswerThePublic.

And since you want your eBook to appear lively and engaging, it’s best to plan any visuals such as infographics, concept maps, or supplementary graphics you want to create in your outline. 

Step 5: Write one chapter at a time.

With your outline in place and divided into chapters, start writing. 

A proper way to ensure you write smoothly (and without wasting time) is to write without chasing perfection — at least in the first round. But you’ll leave room to fix errors while editing. 

Here are a few writing tips to speed up drafting: 

• Engagingly address your audience. Use the pronoun “you.” 
• Shun away from lengthy, wordy sentences. They’re always hard to read and digest.
• Write to a single person. This makes your writing more focused.
• Write like you’re talking to a friend. This makes it easy to understand even complex topics. 

Step 6: Write the introduction and conclusion.

Instantly capture your reader’s attention by writing a compelling introduction. 

You can choose to: 

• Sprinkle your introduction with analogies and metaphors
• Start with a value-packed industry expert quote 
• Begin with a controversial statement then explain it later on 
• Start with a burning question addressed by your audience on the topic 
• Leverage storytelling — but ensure you keep it succinct though 

Oftentimes, people prefer starting with an introduction. But if you find it too overwhelming and time-consuming, you can choose to do it later. As for your conclusion, it’s easy to rush through but you have to do it right if you want a good conversion rate.

For example, leave readers with some food for thought. Or recap everything you’ve covered. You can also summarize actionable takeaways.

Lastly don’t forget to add your call-to-action (CTA). Want readers to sign up for a free trial? Tell them. Want them to jump on a demo call with you? Again, tell them. For better results stick to only one CTA— add too many and you risk losing readers’ attention who can get confused about what to do. 

Step 7: Proofread and edit.

After you’ve finished drafting your eBook, take some time away from it. Then come back with a fresh mind to edit and finalize the text content.

Shorten your sentences, break those lengthy paragraphs, and rewrite sections for clarity where need be to make them more engaging. 

You can use Grammarly or Hemingway Editor to edit your eBook.

After editing, reread as you look out for these factors: 

• Is the flow smooth? 
• Does it level with your brand voice? 
• Have you answered all of the questions your reader has?
• Is it easy to read and understand?

Step 8: Design your eBook.

Having accomplished the bulk of the work, you can now create a visually engaging eBook design — complete with an enticing cover page. 

Use an eBook template to tackle most of the heavy lifting for you. Canva or Visme are good tools for formatting eBooks. They have customizable templates meaning you can you’re your eBook according to your brands visual identity.

Step 9: Publish and distribute.

Finally, it’s showtime. Publish your book and let the leads huddle. 

Then you also have to distribute it proactively by: 

• Running YouTube and Facebook ads to encourage downloads.
• Sharing your eBook on social media, on Slack channels, and in your newsletter. 
• Answering Quora questions on your eBook topic, then encourage people to read your book for a far-reaching answer to the question. 
• Writing a short guest article on the same topic. Plug in your in-depth eBook in the piece and publish it on a guest site where your audience hangs around. 

And that’s a wrap. 

But before I go, keep in mind that the answer to how to write an eBook focuses on two key things: writing about an important topic to your audience and writing in the simplest way possible.