Review: 'eBook Secrets Exposed'

By Michael Southon
Posted Monday, January 3, 2005

If you want to make a lot of money with your own eBook and you only read one book on the subject in the next 12 months, I strongly recommend that it's 'eBook Secrets Exposed' by Jim Edwards and David Garfinkel.

The authors are both well qualified in this area. Jim Edwards has written five best-selling eBooks (including 'The Lazy Man's Guide to Online Business' and '33 Days To Online Success').

David Garfinkel is considered by many to be the world's greatest copyrighting coach. He's an award-winning business journalist and is also the author of several best-selling eBooks, such as 'Advertising Headlines That Make You Rich' and 'Killer Copy Tactics'.

There have been so many books on this subject that I really couldn't imagine how this book could add anything new.

But I have never before seen an eBook that explains so clearly how to do it. I got the feeling that you could literally walk in Jim Edwards' footsteps and get the same results he did (over 4,500 eBook sales in 9 months).

What makes this book very readable and enjoyable is that it's simply a long interview - David Garfinkel asks the questions and Jim Edwards gives the answers.

The book is packed with so many 'insider tips' that's it's difficult to know where to begin, but one of the most valuable tips is how to find out - before you write your book - if there's a market for it.

You do this by following Jim Edwards' 5-Step 'Ultimate eBook Success Formula'. The formula allows you to find out if there's a target audience that is already actively looking for the information you're about to sell online. And if so, if they are prepared to pay for it.

One of the interesting things you'll discover in this book is that competition is actually good for your eBook.

If you come up with an idea for an eBook and you find that there are no competing books, you need to get worried - it means there's probably no market for that idea.

But if there are books competing with yours, you're on safe ground - you know you have a market.

And don't be put off by competition: anyone who is serious about a particular subject will buy at least 4 or 5 books on that topic.

Many eBook authors who make big money quickly with their eBooks do resale rights. Instead of making $29 per sale, they're making $99 per sale. As you can see, resale rights can get you into serious money very fast.

But there are definite pitfalls with resale rights (such as finding out a few months later that your cherished information product has become a free eBook). If you want to avoid these pitfalls, you need to read Section 2 carefully.

You might think that best-selling eBook authors don't bother with affiliate programs. Wrong!

Jim Edwards shows you that one of secrets to making money with your eBook is to load it up with back-end affiliate links. But there's a right way to do this and a wrong way (more about this in Section 5).

But the real secret to how Jim Edwards made over $40,000 in one month from a single eBook is joint ventures - finding people with lists of 10,000 or even 100,000 and getting them to do a personal recommendation to their readers.

On the Internet it's not products that make money, it's lists (products don't sell, lists do). Or as Jim Edwards puts it: 'the power is in the pipes, in the distribution'.

Let's say your eBook is priced at $29 and you find someone with a list of 10,000 and they do a mailing that results in 3000 people turning up at your website.

And let's say that those 3000 visits result in 90 to 180 sales - you and your joint venture partner are suddenly making thousands of dollars in a few days.

Jim Edwards shows you exactly, step-by-step, how to set up a joint venture. He even shows you the exact same letter that he used to set up joint ventures for his book 'How To Write and Publish Your Own eBook in a little as 7 Days'.

One of the keys to making joint ventures work is what Jim Edwards calls 'the Santa Claus technique' (more on that in Section 2).

A question many people have is how to price their eBook. And it's crucial that you get this right. In Section 4 Jim Edwards reveals his 'pricing formula' - a very clever way to find your eBook's 'breakpoint' or equilibrium.

There's another very valuable tip in Section 17 - 'My Secret Method For Slashing Refunds' (this tip on it's own could be worth the price of the whole book).

This is the best book on eBook publishing I've read in the last 18 months - in fact, while reading it, I came up with the idea for my next eBook!

You can get your copy of 'eBook Secrets Exposed' at: (http://www.freezineweb.com/ese.html)

About the Author
Michael Southon has been writing for the Internet for over 3 years. He has shown hundreds of webmasters how to use this simple technique to get massive free publicity and dramatically increase traffic and sales. Click here to find out more: (http://www.ezine-writer.com)