Lessons from self-publishing a technical eBook
twitter.com
twitter.com
Some takeaway excerpts:
"2. If nobody knows who you are, you're going to have to solve that problem first."
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"5. You're going to be the writer, publisher, distributor, and promoter. Don't self-publish with Amazon. They take a 65% cut for ebooks > $9.99, and if you're going to do all the work yourself, what's the point?
Put it on @Gumroad @ 3.5%. They're awesome! And follow @shl."
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"6. Paid ads don't seem to work, but I might have been lucky.
I tried Google, Quora, LinkedIn, and Reddit.
Nothing worked (either cost-per-click too high, or clicks don't convert), except on one Reddit sub: r/aws.
So far I sold $812 & spent $525 from r/aws ads. $100/day budget."
"But if I had no sales from my own organic reach, I wouldn't have had anything to share on those forums.
The order matters!
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Sales from external forums:
HN: 164 - $4,592
Reddit: 68 - $1,904
Indie Hackers: 24 - $672
LinkedIn: 5 - $190
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Total: 261 - $7,358 (18%)"