Did you know that Microsoft Word has enough features to make an e-book quite easily? More often than not you’ll need to put a document into an acceptable form to be accessible by others.  One way of doing this is to convert it into an e-book using Microsoft word, a programme used daily by most people.

When writing an e-book, use a minimum of styles; and keep the texts clean and as simple as possible, with a simple layout.

APPLICATION OF CONCEPT – (OWT) 1.1

The steps to creating an e-book using a word doc are:

1. Open word, click new page

If you want to see how your book will appear on several pages as you type, click view, two pages (optional)

It is usual to start with the  following:

• a title page which includes a subtitle if applicable, and the author’s name e.g

• a copyright page
• acknowledgments and a prologue if you wish to include the latter.

2. After each of the above pages, click insert, page break or ctrl +enter to insert the break and go to the next page

3. Copy a page or two, of a doc already on your pc into the other pages.  It must have the main title or heading and subtitle.

Apply these Ebook Writing Steps

On the home tab, look towards the right of the screen and click on change styles, style set.  Hover your cursor over each style in turn and watch how the text you’ve posted on the page changes with the selected style.  Select one to apply to your text.   Apply a normal style to the body of your text, and also choose a style to apply to the heading.

You get the same results if you hover the cursor over the images namely ‘normal’, heading 1, heading 2, etc

Alternatively, you can click on normal and right click modify to make changes to your text.  The advantage with this one is that you see the changes as they will actually look on screen in real time.

4. For a novel with several parts, use

• Use Header One for Parts, if there are several Parts of the book;
• Header Two for Chapters, and
•  Subheadings should be written with Header Three

Click file, save as pdf or XPS, create PDF/XPS button.  Give the e-book a name and Publish.

After publishing, you can use other e-book creation tools to convert the files into whatever other e-book formats you need.

5.  With ‘Table of Contents’, click references and select one of the options provided or click ‘insert table of contents’, choose the first option and click ok.  Click section break, break to go to the next page

 6.  Position your cursor at the place where you’d want the picture to be if there are images in your book.   Click on insert, picture and select a picture from your pc.  Right click on the picture and apply more formatting to it. If you desire to use page numbers

7.  Go to Insert and click the header and footer tabs,  then add page numbers to the pages.

Adding an E-book cover

Word has provided e-book cover templates.  The templates can be obtained from Insert, Cover Page.  Click on one of the templates to insert it instantly.  Also, customize it by adding some text.  Always test the e-book template with a few pages of the book before finalizing it.

E-book covers can also be created with image creation sites like Gimp, Photoshop, Canva, etc. Covers when created, is saved on pc and uploaded unto the book.

Suggested Resources:

Selling ebooks online

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The reason to Write and Sell ebooks

There are a number of people who write and sell ebooks on kindle as a way of working online.  A few people still prefer to read print-on-demand (paperback) books.  But in modern times most people prefer to download and read ebooks. With that method you can get the book to download instantly.  Ebooks are read on a computer screen or from handheld e-readers.

Why ebooks are so popular

Why have ebooks become so popular?  Ebook sales have since 2010 continued to surpass hardcover book sales on both amazon.com and Barnes and Noble.  Self publishing namely print on demand and electronic publishing are easier and more affordable than traditional vanity publishing; thus many companies started publishing ebooks to increase their credibility whilst ebook companies also sprang up to help up and coming authors.Any type of written publication can be turned into an ebook. With ebooks there are no printing costs.

 In thinking of an ebook you have to get a niche i.e what the book will be about.  You also have to research and see what other publications are there on the subject for more ideas.  Also know what people are saying about the subject by joining discussions in the forums and then you can narrow down your writing to meet a specific audience.

Maybe you have a vast knowledge of a topic and you can create a series of books. For example, if you’re a gardener, you can books on rose gardening, vegetable gardening, inside gardening, organic gardening and more.  

Most larger booksellers like Amazon, Barns and Noble etc already have ebook departments.

There are various steps involved in publishing an ebook some of which are;

Researching – find out whether it will solve a problem e.g teaching how to do something , address a fear or satisfy a curiosity.  Search from tutorials and guides on how to write an ebook and also your niche.  Also look up some of the best selling books on amazon for more ideas

Your Niche – is it fiction or non fiction

Writing drafts – dividing into chapters

Finalising writing – should not be too long, [depending on the topic] as people tend to read on their way to work

Adding an ebook cover

Adding security to minimise duplication

Publishing – you may use experts or do it yourself

Pricing

Marketing your book – Theres the need to spend some time getting a facebook page or website, newsletter, rss feed etc. ready on which you will showcase andsell your book.  You may also get offers for your services  through your web presence.  You may even offer it for free, as an incentive to your customers or visitors to your site.

Even though it’s not particularly complicated, writing and publishing an ebook does take a lot of work.

Focus on good aspects of ebook business

1. It should be a quality product,  namely good content, professionally edited, and formatted for best viewing on e-readers, with an appealing cover.

     2.  target an audience who want to read your book and make a plan of marketing                   to  them through amazon, barnes and noble, iboooks, kobo, your own website                       and on social media

5. Tell people about your book. Include your book on your website and marketing materials. Share excerpts and articles related to the book’s topic on your blog and other websites.

Write an ebook that sells

One lady decided to write a book as an experiment and set herself a month to write and publish an ebook that sells. Five months passed without her having done anything. with sheer determination to see it through, she went ahead the following months, wrote and published it with the idea of selling it to get a   buy ice cream!. With her marketing techniques, she sold more than expected and continues to do so.

If you want to write a book you can make time to write it, doing so at a pace that is alright with you and your circumstances