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How to Release an eBook

TL;DR: What is the best way for a first-time author to release a self-published book, get traffic to his / her website, and convert that traffic into sales?

I have been writing a book on working abroad in Japan (workabroadinjapan.com) for the last 6 months. I am planning to release this book as part of a bigger project called Expat Empire (expatempire.com). The book is about 120 pages long so far, and I have just received comments from a few friends that read the most recent draft.

Their feedback is positive, and two of the four editors have asked how I plan to release it as the content is very in-depth and could potentially be broken out into multiple releases. As I think about it now, there are a few options for how I can release this book:

  • Release all of the content in a single book (let's say for $29)
  • Break it out into two books ($19 each, or $29 in a bundle)
  • Break it out into individual purchasable chapters for ~$5 each

In addition, I think it would also be good to release some of the book's content as blog posts on the site so that I can get traffic for keywords related to this topic. I am also thinking to provide a chapter of the book as an email sign-up incentive. However, I do not want to give away all of the content for free as I think it is valuable enough for the target market to be directly monetizable.

I would like to know the community's thoughts on the best way to release this book so that I can get traffic, convert that traffic into sales, and maximize this launch opportunity. Thanks in advance!

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    Fist option is Amazon.

    Second option is your own site. Be prepared to handle payments and delivery.

    In both cases you can rely on ads to bring traffic (YouTube and Facebook). This is the surest and fastest way to bring it on front of people.

    Also, blogging is a great avenue. Try to guest post on expats blogs.

    Have you heard about Derek Sivers company Wood Egg? Either way, he has written a ton about the experience of making a company about books for expats, check out his blog.

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      Hi Satoshi, many thanks for your reply! Any recommendations to handle the payments and delivery side of things? I have signed up for Stripe but wondering on the best way to deliver the product while reducing chances for piracy.

      I had not heard about Wood Egg but really appreciate the suggestion. Lots of cool stuff there to learn from!

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        I don’t have advice regarding payments and distribution. If i were starting, I’d rather sell trough a 3rd party and focus on marketing on the book.

        How was your experience setting up stripe? Did you need to setup an company or a business account?