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Chapter 4 Where to find artists to develop great cover art

"Wait! Why would an eBook need cover art?"

Do not for a moment think that an eBook does not require a cover. If you're going to sell your eBook to the public, go the extra half mile and get some great cover art for it. Of course your eBook is full of all your best, Grade A meat. It discusses a sought-after topic, was prepared by a solid ghostwriter, and was edited and approved by you yourself. Customers should be able to read about you on the Internet, click on a text link, and buy your book. Write it and they will come. Right?

Wrong. Even online, people continue to judge books by their covers. Look at it like this. Would you buy a book from Barnes and Noble if it were just a stack of papers stapled together? Heck no you wouldn't. For $15.95, you want something with an official binding and cover.

What would bookstores be like if every shelf held only stacks of paper held together with binder clips, large staples, rubber bands or manila folders? Even if Edgar Allen Poe wrote the pages (assuming you hadn't heard of him), and his handwritten pages were sitting there, hardly a soul would be enticed to buy.

No matter how good a book is, it must be nicely packaged. The value of a paper book is exponentially increased by the addition of nothing more than a glue binding and nice cover. Likewise, and eBook's sale-ability and appeal is exponentially increased when it is packaged with an appropriate cover.

In order to sell well, a book sitting on a retail shelf will actually have to have more than just any old cover. It will need to have a spine as well. And the pages cannot be attached with noteBook rings (usually). The cover should appear to be professionally designed. In other words, a red cover from Kinko's will not make buyer's pull out their credit cards and rack up purchases. Brick and mortar booksellers know how to sell books. They do it with eye-catching displays and covers with color, catchy text, and shiny spines.

And if they really want to grab your attention with a book, they may make a special display, offer a bonus, have the author available to sign copies, or set a particular book on a particular shelf where it will be more visible to passers by.

As we all know, it's tough to sell a book! Sometimes even good covers get passed by, because other covers are more enticing! So, hear me when I tell you, don't even think of trying to market an eBook without cover art!

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Mailing List – The electronic equivalent of the mailing list, often a list of customer emails that have authorized the site to send them newsletters and the like.

Market Research - An aspect of ecommerce dedicated to researching online habits and preferences, as well as research.

Merchant - The seller of the product or service online. The merchant may not necessarily be the website owner.

Merchant account – The account a merchant uses to transact with the merchant bank.

Meta tag - A code hidden in the site's programming that "tells" search engine what the content of the site or page is.

Micro blogging - A form of blogging popularized by Twitter, which allows users to blog up to 140 characters.

Mobile-enabled – A website that has been optimized for viewing for mobile or tablet users.

Multi-Author Blogs – Blogs featuring more than one writer or author, often a supplement of larger websites for newspapers, universities or other media outlets. Often edited and curated by a larger group or body.

MLM – An abbreviation for multi-level marketing or a form of marketing that targets different demographics using different forms of media i.e. print, radio, TV, online, micro blogging, etc.

Mutual Linking - A process by which two (or more) websites agree to host links to each other to increase traffic.

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Now that we’ve established that there is a very large group of consumers using 4G wireless devices on a daily basis, it’s time to talk about how you, as a business owner and advertiser can get to these consumers through their ever present wireless devices.

Wireless mobile advertising may be one of the most important advertising vehicles in the coming years. Wireless usage and applications are only expected to grow and smart business owners will take advantage of this trend. There are a number of ways you can get your message out to mobile users today; and you can be sure that each year will bring a variety of new applications and marketing possibilities.

IBM conducted a survey with mobile phone users asking if they would be willing to receive ads on their mobile phones in order to receive free digital content. Most responders indicated that they would be interested in such an option. In addition, responders said that they would be willing to share their personal information with mobile advertisers in order to receive incentives, such as discounts, coupons and air or hotel rewards points.

Advertising to the wireless user can be quite simple, and most businesses can begin quickly, using tools you already have. You may be able to make some simple adjustments to immediately give you more visibility. Then, over time, you can apply new techniques and use new applications to increase your visibility even further. First, we’re going to talk about your most obvious advertising vehicle.

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42) Fine-tune Your Strategy – Test out different techniques on different social networks and determine what type of content your readers are responding to.

43) Blog Updates On Facebook Page – Once you have published new blog posts to your blog, update it to your Facebook ‘Page’. There are programs that do that for you automatically, ie. Networked blogs

44) Social Media Campaign Plan – Plan out an integrated social media promotion project that incorporates blogging, use of commercial social networks, and a face-to-face event to build leads and drive awareness of a product or service.

45) Thematic Pictures – Post interesting and cute pictures that revolve around a theme and share it on social networks such as Twitter, Facebook etc. For example, Halloween theme - Pets in Halloween costumes.

46) Ask For A Response – After posting cute thematic pictures on your social network, start a conversation with your followers by asking them questions relating to the theme. For example, what their best Halloween costume was as a child, and ask them to share a photo as well.

47) Facebook Page - Share content and links on your Facebook page that will make your fans want to share and like your updates.

48) Measuring Social Media Metrics – Take a step back and think about why you are tweeting this information, or why you have a Facebook Page. Is it because you want sales? Then measure conversion rates. Is it for market research?

49) Live Videos – Conduct live interviews, online talk shows and etc. with uStream.tv and Mogulus, or Qik on a cell phone. Such sessions become viral very fast.

50) Contests And Competitions - Create competitions or contests on social media networks such as Twitter, Facebook etc. to conjure up buzz surrounding your company products or services.

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41. Signature Scan

Business reports, plans and other collaterals often require signatures. To save time and increase productivity, scan and save your actual signature as a graphic and insert it into Word documents as a picture. If it’s a PDF, save your signature as a Custom Stamp.

42. Cache Email

Make sure you can cache your e-mail because in this way, you can work on planes or in areas where you do not have an Internet connection.

43. Start Small

We tend to think big, blue sky concepts. The downside is that such thinking makes the barrier to entry – and action – quite high. To avoid “blue sky paralysis,” pare your idea down to a small, immediately executable concept. Once you’ve road-tested your idea on a small scale, you’ll have loads more insight on how to take it to the next level.

44. Create Simple Objectives And Revisit Them Regularly

Sometimes we get too caught up with new ideas that might make it impossible to ever really complete anything. The best way to avoid it is to write down a simple statement summarizing your objective at the start of each project. After which, be reminded to revisit it regularly.

45. Stick To A Routine

It can be tempting to do the more enjoyable things even if there is a lot of work to do. Procrastination can easily overcome us therefore, create a routine and stick to it. It will help create a pattern in terms of both work and leisure.

46. Do Away With Unnecessary Meetings

If there must be a meeting, make sure everyone knows what needs to be accomplished from the outset. If people are present who don't help out with achieving that objective, let them leave. Always start your meetings with the question, "Do we all know why we're here?" and then follows with, "Does everyone need to be here?"

47. Tackle The Toughest Nail First

Most people like to start with the easy stuff and complete them first. However, if we end up finishing the easy task first, we might end up procrastinating because we may feel complacent and contented to have completed some tasks. When we get to the tough part, frustration and stress sets in when we meet a challenge in the tasks. Thus, it is best to get a head start by completing the worst task first and slowly make a transition into easy ones, you’ll feel great to have completed so many things by the end of the day.

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29) Utilising Google groups

In a group or community, people like to share and learn from each other. Ask or answer questions on Google Groups related to your niche and provide links to relevant resources, which can be backlinks to your website.

30) Backlinks at Wikipedia

If you run a fairly reputable company, create a page about it in the Wikipedia or in topic specific wikis. If it is hard to list your site directly, try to add links to other pages that link to your site.

31) Write testimonials for others

Write a great testimonial for a product or service that you used. This can get you a link from a very authoritative site and has a big chance to drive you loads of traffic.

32)Blog commenting

Commenting on other blogs may not provide much direct search engine value. However, if your comments are useful, insightful, and relevant, they can drive direct traffic to your site. They also help make other bloggers become aware of you, and they may start reading your blog and/or linking to it.

33) Link trading

Swap some links with relevant partners on a small scale. When swapping links, try to get links from within the content of relevant content pages. Do not try to get links from pages that list hundreds of off topic link partners. Only seek link exchanges that you would consider pursuing even if search engines did not exist. Instead of thinking just about your topic when exchanging links, think about demographic audience sets. Stay away from the link trading hubs and networks.

34) Make a donation

There are some blogs there that has an Amazon Wishlist or a “buy me a drink” donating buttons. Most of them lists down all the people who have donated in some way. They may include your link via blogroll or via a post. These are normally permanent links.

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35. Edit Audio For Others

Business owners often promote their services or products using podcasts therefore there is a high demand for audio editing services. Using a simple audio studio software, you can easily offer audio editing services in return for compensation.

36. Create Topical Resource Hubs

Put together an overview of a topic you have expertise in and assemble some of the best resources on the topic from around the web. Then you can create topical hubs and get paid through sites like Squidoo, HugPages and Google Knol. Payments are based on a combination of ad revenue and affiliate fees. The good thing is these sites have a built-in supply of traffic and tools to make content creation easier.

37. Become A Professional Blogger

If you like to write and is disciplined to be able to work from home, you can make money online by becoming a professional blogger. There are many sites where you can search for paid blogging jobs. There are a number of blog networks that pay bloggers a flat fee per post or word that the blogger writes or the blogger receives a percentage of advertising earnings tied to the number of page views his or her posts generate (some networks even pay both a flat fee and a percentage of advertising revenues).

38. Donations

Ask for donations on your blog. It's easy to add a PayPal donate button, and you never know who might be feeling generous!

39. Guest Posting Services

You can offer to write guest posts for other blogs for free as a way to promote their own blogs. However, you can also provide guest posting services for a fee.

40. Become A Consultant

After you have established yourself as an expert in your blog's topic, you can offer consulting services to other people or businesses who could use the help of your expertise. Alternatively, you could offer consulting services related to developing and writing a successful blog.

41. Host Paid Memberships

Establish a broad community with a steady stream of traffic to get to know what interests your readers and what does not through your blog. After which, begin offering paid memberships. The blog itself can still be free, but a reader with a paid membership status can read more in-depth articles or access a consistent flow of other special features, creating a sense of exclusivity.