I've always had a passion for writing, but until summer 2013, I'd never done anything to pursue it. Not since I was a teenager, anyway. That summer is one I'll never forget, because it's the summer I wrote and sold my first ebook. It was an exciting time, because for YEARS I've allowed myself to believe that I could never (and would never) produce anything with my writing that people would want to buy.

So I never wrote anything or put forth any effort.

But that summer, everything changed, and I've been writing, selling and self-publishing ebooks ever since.

I bring this up because I've had a few people on this site email me with questions about writing ebooks, selling them, effective marketing strategies and what platforms to sell them on. So instead of answering emails one by one, I thought I'd publish a new thread outlining my steps with writing and selling my first ebook. So here we go!

When I first started out, though I already had 11+ years of entrepreneur experience under my belt, I had ZERO experience as a writer. Which made things a little easier for me because I was already familiar with the concepts of marketing and selling online. Just not when it came to selling written content.

As for my writing goes, I didn’t have any resources when I started. I didn’t have any influential friends who could pass my work on to their huge list of followers and readers. I didn't have much money to spend on marketing, covert art or editing. (At the time I was struggling to save a dying business that was sucking up all of my money.) I didn't even have much of an audience of my own. All I had was 79 people who followed my blog, which was the same thing as someone liking a Facebook business page. Just because they click the 'Like' or 'Follow' buttons, doesn't mean they read all (or any) of your work. So in short, I didn't have much of a real audience to market to.

Never the less, I decided to try my had at writing and see what would come of it.

Now I do understand that it is possible (and simple) to make something people want, even if you don’t feel like you are an expert on the subject. However, producing something people will BUY is totally different. Or at least it was for me.

When you search online for methods to writing and selling ebooks, there is no shortage of articles by people who swear that making a living by writing ebooks is easy and anyone can do it. While that's partly true (yes, anyone can write an ebook. If you can type it, you can write it.) but earning a living from selling ebooks is not as simple.

In this thread I will share with you...

How I built the courage to start writing
The process I used to validate my book
The process I used to write my book
The process I used to market my book
The process I used to sell my book.

I'll provide as much detail as possible to help you get started writing and selling your work.

Let's go!

What The Book Is About

My first ebook was a book about the Law of Attraction. It sounds silly, but it was something very easy to write, and it was something I'd already written a number of blog posts on. If you aren't familiar with the Law of Attraction, it basically states that it is the attractive, magnetic power of the Universe that draws similar energies together. It manifests through the power of creation, everywhere and in many ways. This "law" attracts thoughts, ideas, people, situations and circumstances.

There's more to it than that, but that's the basic version of it's definition.

I chose this topic because in the beginning, I struggled a lot with coming up with a topic to write about. I wanted to write about investing (something else I LOVE to do) but I felt that it was too technical, and I would spend more time researching content than actually writing a book.

My next choice was to go with starting a blog or online business, but again, felt it would take too much time to write. So I went with the Law of Attraction.

I should also note that part of my problem was that I struggled with confidence issues. I didn't think I was a good enough writer to write anything worth selling. Part of that was because I allowed myself to belief the assumptions of other people that only great writers and successful authors could sell their writing. Which is not true.

ANYONE can sell their work. It's not about being a good or great writer. That's only part of it. You have to be able to write something people WANT. If you can do that, it won't matter if you're a greater writer or not. Don't believe me? Try reading some of the self-published books on Amazon. Many of them are not well written, but they offer great stories and valuable information.

It took a while for me to develop my confidence as a write, but it started with when I began writing my first book. That book changed everything for me.

So I shared an update on my blog that I was writing an ebook. It wasn't to get attention for my book. (Not yet anyway) but only that it would create an opportunity for someone to bring up or mention the fact that I'd failed to write and publish my book, if I didn't succeed. And if I refused to answer, it would hurt my credibility on my blog. At least, that was my thinking. And as flawed as it was, it worked. (In a way). And after that post, I began writing the book and submitting regular updates to my blog to track my progress.

At the time, I had been blogging consistently for about a year prior to writing my book, but I mostly write about past experiences as an entrepreneur and spirituality. Most of my articles were not particularly well written, but again, this blog was about my personal experiences and I didn't think putting a great deal of effort into was a big deal.

But the more I wrote, the better I got, and the more articles I wrote, and with it, my confidence increased. It also helped that some of my readers became regular commenters on the blog, offering advice and constructive criticism for my work. Positive feedback is a tremendous confidence booster.

I'm sure you were expecting some great reveal for my secret to overcoming confidence as a writer but truthfully, there isn't one. You just have to start writing. Slowly if you have to, but you MUST WRITE! Otherwise, you'll always feel incapable of producing anything, and because of that, you never will.

Looking back, blogging was a necessary step (for me) because it allowed me to build my confidence. Little did I know, it would also be the thing that would allow me to leverage my writing to sell and publish more later down the road.

Truthfully, I don't think I would have ever managed to get that book written had it not been for my blog. Had I not published that article about my decision to write and publish an ebook, I don't think I would have ever been able to achieve any of the success that I have over the past to years because I believe I would have never written a single ebook. I believe that I would have continued to think/believe that I could never write a book, and thus, would have never written one.

I would have remained in my bubble of self doubt even today. This thread wouldn't be possible, had it not been for me taking the initiative of that first step to make something happen. And it all began from blogging.

Truthfully, the best parts of the book came from questions posed by my blog readers, and doing the research to answer those questions. The blog also allowed me to lay a foundation for a growing community, which helped me launch things even further later on.

I published the above post October of last year, and since then I've launched a number of websites, ebooks and courses offering similar training, but none of them have ever achieved the success I had hoped for.

I was hoping to create something that I could leverage and use to build a sustainable business, but that never happened.

Currently, I'm in the process of building a new website to share my progress and process for writing and self-publishing an expansive fiction series. My plan is to use this experience to show beginners how to build and grow an online presence, by sharing the resources, strategies and systems I'm using on my own site.

In theory, it should be the ideal experiment and case study. But we'll see how things play out in practice.

Before I charged a monthly membership fee for access, but I won't be doing that this time around. This time the site will be completely free. Most of my reasoning is that adding and managing an e-commerce element to a site creates more work. I could outsource the customer service aspects, but that would only create more expenses. And I certainly don't want to do that.

When it's available, the new site can be viewed HERE.

I will be sure to post updates in the days to come to keep you up-to-date on any changes to the site, or my plans.

Thanks for reading!

Be blessed!