According to enterprising women magazine:

“Studies show that retention is frequently higher with e-learning than in a traditional classroom setting”

All the more reason to save some cash by not traveling to a live seminar but utilizing e-learning, and e-books to learn more effectively while saving time and money.

Are you an author? If you sell a paperback or hardcover book do you also sell it as an e-book?

Book Business magazine recently took a survey of their readers and found that almost 50% of Book Business readers do not offer e-books.

Why do you or don’t you offer your book as an e-book?

Since I sold my collection agency to write full time, my new job description could be writer, author, publisher, marketer or starving artist. Hence my need for free or low cost publicity or marketing. When I sold my agency, I started a diary of everything I have done to market myself and my books. I know there is a great need for this type of information out there and can’t wait to finish publishing this book and share it with everyone. In just 9 months, I have created a whirlwind of publicity for myself, all for free.

One of the most important things I did was to find out who my target audience is. It doesn’t end there, you must find out details about your target audience. What types of books, magazines and newsletters do they read? Where do they work? What are their hobbies? Are they married, single, women, men, both, have children, pets? When they read these publications, what are they looking for? Do they attend trade shows? Which ones? You want to learn everything you can about them. Then you want to position yourself so that you are everywhere they are.

Once you find out what they read, you must read the same materials. See if you can contribute articles or do a link exchange with that publication. Networking is a key factor in your marketing efforts. Networking can be free. I purchased a notebook and put tabs on the top, online ezines, magazines, TV, newspapers, radio, places to post free press releases and places to post free articles. You want to then create lists of your media contacts for each medium.  I also use Constant Contact for this and it works very well.

Everyone’s list will be different; you can start your list by going through the local phone book. Find your local radio stations, newspapers, and magazines, visit their websites or call and get the editors name. Introduce yourself and put their name in your notebook. Do this for each medium in your field. For example, most of the magazines and ezines in my notebook are credit and debt related. So your notebook will be customized to what you are selling. You will be adding to your notebook all the time, each time you make a new contact.