How My E-Guide is Selling & How Much I’m Making

August 9, 2011

More than a handful of you have asked how my new informational e-book is selling, and how much I’m making off the project.

Since my transparency could help some of you succeed at similar ventures, here’s the breakdown three weeks after launch:

Product: How to Build a Part-Time Social Media Business

Launch post: Social Media Biz Guide Launch

Affiliate option (just launched): Become an affiliate

Guides sold: 32

Price: $24 each

Total sales: $768

Money invested: $5/month for e-junkie commerce system

UPDATED on 9/6/11: Almost forgot PayPal fees! Of the $24 for each guide, PayPal takes $1 ($1.25 if the buyer is overseas).

Time spent: Estimated 35 hours, includes writing, editing, formatting and figuring out an e-commerce system (since this is my first e-guide)

Hourly rate at this point: $22/hour

Marketing effort: Not much. I’ve had several unexpected time-sucks lately, so I haven’t marketed the guide nearly as much as I’d like. One post that seemed to sell a bunch of guides was How to Make Money Off Your Social Media Smarts on Brazen Careerist’s blog. Beyond that, I simply reached out to my network via this blog, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. I’m now looking to guest post on a few bigger blogs whose readers might be interested in the guide, and I’ve got a few other ideas for promotion, too. I did not count promotion in my time spent, though I’ll make sure to do that next time.

Feedback: Nothing but love so far! I’m starting to compile recommendations on the bottom of the e-guide page.

How I feel about all of this: Awesome! This was my first blog product, I LOVED creating it and I get such a high when readers tell me it’s helping them launch a side biz they’ve thought about for a while. I’m totally pleased with how it’s sold so far, and I’ve got high hopes that it will continue to fly off the digital bookshelf.

Coming tomorrow: A full-on guide to creating your first informational e-book.

What else can I tell you that would be helpful?

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