You’ve decided to write an e-book – that’s fantastic! There’s always room for another well written e-book, especially in the non-fiction genres. However, there is little room left on the market for a mediocre e-book that does little to provide knowledge to the reader. In other words, you need to go beyond the obvious – that which is readily available for free or without searching very hard.

These days most of us that are looking for information head on over to the internet  to Google. Less than 20 years ago we would have likely looked up what we wanted to know in a book, newspaper, encyclopedia, etc. and now these same resources are very low on our search list and in some cases completely off the list. When was the last time you looked at an encyclopedia? 

For non fiction authors it means that your fiercest competition is not other books on the topic you are writing on, but rather the Internet itself.  If a person is looking for basic information, figures and facts they are likely to go look online. This makes it difficult to sell an ‘average’ e-book, and rightfully so. Why would a person pay for information that can be easily found online. 

Even if you are lucky enough to sell a basic book, your reader is going to be disappointed when they discover that they could have found the same information with a simple Google search. They won’t be impressed, they won’t say good things about your book and they certainly won’t buy another one of your books. 

What this means to you is that you need to go beyond the obvious, the information that can easily be looked up and you need to take your e-book from average to awesome so that your readers love the information they get. When they are happy with their purchase they are likely to tell others about how great your book was and that’s going to increase your sales. 

Don’t mistake this for meaning you have to write a university level book or that it has to be complex and hard to understand. Quite the opposite actually. You need to present complex information and interesting information in your book in a way that sets your book from others because it is easy to understand and grasp the information presented. 

So when you are writing an e-book dig deep, find case studies if applicable, bring to life insights that aren’t typically looked at, keep it unique, and give your readers value for their money.