Best Money Making Ideas

Sell What You Know: Self-Publish Your Own EBooks

You don’t have to be a good writer to create your own EBooks. That is what editors and proofreaders are for - but more on that later. The question is, what do you know? Pull out some paper and pen, or pull up your word processor. Ready? Let’s start brainstorming!

* List your work experience - all of it

* List your current and past hobbies

* Any volunteer work?

* Any military experience?

* You can also list things you would like to know about and research the subject(s)

* Anything else you know about?

Remember, you don’t have to be an expert to write an EBook on the subject you choose. With the Internet at your fingertips, you can research your subject to fill in the blanks.

Narrow down your list until you end up with a few items left. Save the others for the future, though. Now comes the hard part - choose one subject for your EBook. Now that you have a topic to write about, next comes the outline. Start with a title, introduction, and then the chapters that further teach your reader about your topic. For example, it should look something like this:

How-to Give Yourself a Salon Quality Manicure

* Introduction (Introduce your reader to the subject any way you like. You can include the history, a summary, your thoughts, etc.)

* Chapter 1: Manicure Supplies You’ll Need

* Chapter 2: Why You Need Supplies and How They Work

* Chapter 3: Basic Nail Care

* Chapter 4: Getting Your Nails Ready

* Chapter 5: Proper Polishing

* Chapter 6: Using Fake Nails, Stickers, and Other Accessories

* Chapter 7: Types of Manicures

* Chapter 8: Getting fancy with Colors

* Chapter 9: Nail Maintenance

* Chapter 10: Extra Tips, Tricks, and Advice

See how it flows from the first chapter to the last in introducing the information to the reader? Once you have your outline, you can come up with subcategories for your chapters, and start writing! Don’t worry too much about the writing itself - it can always be revised later, which brings us to the next point. If you are not a writer or have poor spelling and grammar, I suggest getting an editor or proofreader to look over your work and help you on that end. Readers want to be able to understand the information you are trying to convey in an easy to read format.

Formatting is also important in EBooks. People will be reading your information online, which means your EBook needs to be skimmable. Sections need to be broken up as much as possible for easier reading. Two pages of only text and very little white area will bore your reader. Separate sections with subheadings. You can also add images and pictures to your pages. All of this should be done in your word processor (I recommend Microsoft Word), and then put into PDF format.

Here are some free programs to turn your text document into a PDF file, which all EBooks come with:

http://convert.neevia.com/

http://createpdf.adobe.com/

http://www.pdf995.com/

http://www.acrosoftware.com/Products/CutePDF/writer.asp

Now that your EBook is complete, it is time to start selling! Here are some places you sell your EBook where you should be able to keep all rights to it, meaning you are free to sell elsewhere. Read the fine print for this one.

http://www.payloadz.com/

http://www.artopium.com/library/sell_ebook_downloads.htm

Another great option is to create your own website and sell your book there. Market and promote it through advertising, asking family and friends to pass along the word to their email buddies, join relevant Yahoo groups, start a blog and others, etc. Once you are done, you can get started on the next one! Get that list out!

Additional Resources:

www.makemoneyfromwriting.com

www.ebooktemplatesource.com

www.excessvoice.com

www.writerincome.com

www.quickcashwriting.com

www.6stepswriting.com

www.writing-world.com

Sell Your Family History

Everyone is still talking about Aunt Gertrude’s famous apple pie, even though she’s been six feet under for several years. Mom makes the world’s best brownies and no one can beat Dad’s meatball recipe. Sound familiar? Even if you are the only chef in your family, you can use those coveted recipes to earn cash.

If you walk into any large bookstore, you will find hundreds of cookbooks. They might follow a theme or be full of general cooking instructions, but they’re popular just the same. Everyone wants to be able to follow a simple recipe and end up with a masterpiece. Your family favorites can fill that need if you know how to turn them into a book.

First, select the best recipes you own or can get from others. Test each one and write the ingredients and instructions down clearly and thoroughly. The reason for this is that, although you may make the same thing every week, your personal method is probably different from the original recipe. Some recipes might not even be written, just memorized. And still others, particularly older ones, won’t have the proper measurements. The general public can’t usually cook with a recipe that calls for ’some flour’ or ‘enough sugar’. Your job is to translate Great-Grandma’s spidery and sketchy notes into full blown, easy to follow recipes. In order to have a book, you will need a minimum of 50-100 recipes.

Type up the recipes and don’t forget to make backups! Before you go any further, give several friends a handful of the completed recipes and have them test them out in their own kitchens to double check your accuracy and the clarity of your instructions. If everything goes well, you are on your way to having a cookbook.

When you write a cookbook, you have the option of just doing recipes or turning it into an interesting story as well. The best way to do this is to include family anecdotes surrounding the history of the recipes or stories about occasions that the recipes were made. Anecdotes that make your readers feel connected to generations of women at the heart of their families will add to the personality of your book.

For example, folks will be more interested in trying Uncle Burt’s Egg Nog if they first read a funny anecdote telling the story of how the dog got drunk on it one year at Christmas. You don’t have to come up with these anecdotes on your own. Ask family members for their recollections having to do with food. They don’t have to be funny. Great Aunt Ruth’s story about how she ate only potato soup during the Depression could be a good way to start off a recipe for the same soup.

Once you have compiled all of the recipes into a book, you will need to find a publisher and discuss a format with them. Nowadays, you also have the option of publishing e-books online. You could do either or both.

Now that you have a completed book in hand, what do you do? Well, sell it of course! There are plenty of options for this. If you opted to self publish, start pumping them to friends and family, advertise in newspapers, magazines, put up flyers, and start a website to promote your book. Then start hitting smaller and larger bookstores with samples in hand.

Don’t forget that even if your family isn’t terribly creative in the kitchen, you can use any recipe that you have changed from the original version. Good luck!

Resources:

www.quickcashwriting.com

www.makemoneyfromwriting.com

www.6stepswriting.com

www.writing-world.com

Starting Your Career As a Freelance Writer

www.authorhouse.com

www.thesmokering.com

The Internet Is Going Local

Use the following idea and offer hosting, web design or marketing expertise to local businesses.

The late, great Cory Rudl once said:

“…the biggest change I see heading our way is a shift from the global market to the local market….the Internet is going local! Here is the secret: If you realize this and the power it will have on society… can you find a way to capitalize on this? If you have ideas and position yourself now, you will be an incredibly wealthy person!” (Excerpt from the Internet Global).

Cory’s prediction has come true — the Internet IS going local. The question is, when will small business owners realize it?

According to The Kelsey Group, “70% of U.S. households now use the Internet as an information source when shopping locally for products and services… Findings also suggest the Internet is poised to surpass newspapers as a local shopping information resource.”

The search engines have laid the groundwork and put some incredible tools in place. Google Local Business Center lets business owners add or edit their company information to Google Local. MSN & Yahoo have their own Local Search offerings. Most of them are free (for now), just there for the taking.

Tell that to small business owners. Try talking to them about local online advertising and this is what you might get:

- “Oh yeah, the Internet. That’s for selling stuff to the world, but all of my customers live here.”
- “I tried the Internet, it didn’t work for my business.”
- “I have a website but it gets no traffic - what a waste of money!”
- “The Internet is for products - I have a service business.”

…and so on. It may be hard to believe, but many of them have no clue how much the Internet could help their business.

Yet they will pay exorbitant prices to advertise in those heavy 20 pound behemoths known as the Yellow Pages.

If you think about it, the Yellow Pages are a little ridiculous: a teeny tiny rectangle’s worth of information that you can’t change for a year, on the SAME page as your competitors’ ads. And for that they charge you hundreds or even thousands of dollars a year.

But the Yellow Pages are familiar, so small business owners stick to it. And since most of the Yellow Pages are online now, many will get basic online listings by default.

Still, it’s a shame that so many small business owners have such misconceptions about the Internet. A lot of that is a due to all the hype and craziness of the early Internet days, when they got sucked into paying huge sums of money for worthless websites that they thought would magically bring customers through their doors. Those experiences left a bitter taste in many a business owner’s mouth, which still lingers today.

Okay, well that was then. It’s time to turn the page and move forward. How can we help small business owners wake up and smell the coffee?

A little bit at a time.

Help your neighborhood businesses get the message. Even if their eyes glaze over when you mention it, tell small business owners some of the ways you use the Internet in your life. If you have family or friends who own businesses, make sure they get their business online.

Encourage every business owner you meet to get an Internet presence — not a glorified brochure, but something that helps them to connect and build relationships with visitors and customers.

Don’t try to convince them, just inform them in a friendly, non-threatening way. Forget the hard sell, especially if you’re in the web design business.

Tell them that if they’re NOT using the Internet to attract and communicate with local consumers, they’re losing money.

Then put your money where your mouth is and patronize local businesses that DO get it. Eventually the others will get with the program … or they’ll go out of business.

Resources:

http://local.yahoo.com/

http://www.cityslick.net/