Relevant information is what a customer searches for online. A properly developed and marketed eBook can meet this demand for information by taking your content offerings above and beyond newsletters and blog posts. With value-driven content, these digital books can lead interested customers to your door. How? The greatest advantage of e-books is that you can convey relevant, useful and totally non-promotional information to your target audience. This can be done in a way that relates to what you know and believe is true – in other words, in keeping with your brand and brand messages. By enabling prospects to focus on key factors when making a buying decision, your e-books can guide them in the right direction, and lead to you ultimately. Professional and accurate e-book content will be helpful, useful and reliable to your target audience. A good e-book will surely impress your prospects and also pull them away from the competition towards you.
Whether you are a general contractor, retail store owner, lawyer, or any other business owner, maintaining competitiveness is important. Publishing eBooks is an easy way to build authority, credibility and thought leadership. The market for digital books is currently growing rapidly. This trend, combined with the huge number of new devices on the market, opens up new distribution opportunities for publishers. Make your service more accessible to a wider audience.
Business E-books may vary. It can include diverse types such as:
- Publishing your company’s findings in a research report.
- An ultimate guide that takes your reader from the beginning to the end of any topic just like the decision-making process a customer will need to understand for a new build out.
- A beginner’s guide that is designed to cover the basics of any topic.
- Launching a new product or service.
- Experience sharing like what your company has learned over the years and what the future might be. First-person experiences in the field matters.
e-books can be created for different buyer personas and various buying stages.
- Buyer personas signify your ideal customer groups, which you need to target. These may change over time.
- Buying stages signify the particular stage in which the customer is – whether at the very beginning or conducting their initial research. Other customers may be ready to make a buying decision soon.
You need to ensure that your e-book can be downloaded 24×7 as per the prospect’s convenience. If the process is automated and the books made available free of cost, there would be no additional production or variable costs. It is important though, to include tracking feature to find out which books are enjoying high demand, and among whom ,when and where. This data can be used to improve current and future business campaigns and enjoy better results.
LexisNexis Group, a corporation providing computer assisted legal research as well as business research and risk management services, has published a number of eBooks that can be read on Apple® iPad® or iPhone®, SONY® Reader, or Barnes & Noble NOOK® as well as on desktop and laptop computers. Examples include:
- Medical Records Privacy Under HIPAA
- Best Practices for Government Libraries
- The United States Constitution – full text sample!
- Patent Law Digest
Though common among book publishers and authors, many businesses are also using e-book conversion solutions to get their digital books designed. Book to e-Book conversion is also possible that allows the production of well-formatted e-books from hard copy and electronic sources.
PDF and EPUB Formats
While some businesses use PDF-style e-books they create and sell from their own websites, some publish EPUB-style e-books they upload and offer on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and the iBook store.There are some differences between both.
- Though both are readable on computers, tablet devices and smartphones, EPUB files differ from PDF e-books in the way they’re read.
- Easy to put together and share, PDF is the right format to choose for e-books that include more graphics.
- EPUB e-books include MOBI files for Kindle and EPUB files for iPad and Nook. They feature flowing text that can be enlarged or changed by the reader.
Created with a fluid and flexible format, EPUB books are uploaded to third-party websites including Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Apple’s iBook store, where you can share or sell them. However, businesses should make sure that the goal of their e-book should be to provide information, and not for advertisement alone.
