Robust UI e-book

I've made 10 sales of the e-book at $5 each.

Plus one given away to my first purchaser. Who originally purchases the book at $40 when it was up for pre-order.

I've added a new chapter and want to keep gradually increasing the price as I keep making it more valuable.

Not sure when I should make the price increases.

The sales are giving me good motivation to finish off the book. Which I don't want to squander too much with fewer sales due to an increased price.

Released the book in early access form.

It already has 6 purchases.

The email list now has 48 subscribers. I emailed them all to let them know it's available.

I think people reading my unfinished work will give me the motivation I need to get it finished.

This was the main goal of releasing in an early access form.

The e-book is around 50% completed and for the last few weeks I have been emailing subscribers with chapters from the book.

I have been also publishing the content from the book to my blog. I'm unsure if that devalues the book. I'm considering continuing to publish the chapters to my blog, the e-book will then provide a way to consume the same content in a more organized way.

I realized during writing Robust UI that writing only about testing was not very unique. I pivoted my e-book to now include content about React component design patterns and then deep-diving into how to write tests for them.

I now have a more consistent example running throughout the book, a <Multiselect /> component.

I am feeling more focused now that the book has a table of contents and a tighter focus.

This is an attempt to increase the perceived value of the book and hopefully lead to subscriptions. If it leads to pre-orders too even better.

Gumroad had a required field for release date, I choose a date around 5 months away which will help keep me on track, especially if pre-orders start rolling in.

I would appreciate any feedback on the landing page. Thanks, everyone!

I made a post on Reddit which directed a bit of traffic to the book newsletter. It seems the first pre-order came from that, it might be a good indication of Reddit being a good marketing channel, I plan to investigate other subreddits to see if I can find another good fit.

https://www.reddit.com/r/reactjs/comments/hcuc0p/hi_everyone_i_am_writing_a_ebook_on_testing_and/

I first launched a very minimal version. Thanks to Netlify previews we can go back in time:

https://5ecf3192fc40e5000721c5bc--samdawsondev.netlify.app/react-component-testing-book

Every day I am making small tweaks and realizing I need to incorporate more advice I have heard from the indie hackers podcast, like listing benefits instead of features (not sure what podcast but I think I heard that here). Practical advice is good if you remember to use it.

Compared to the first version it has more copy including benefits, features, release date, and some book artwork. Let me know what else I am missing or anything that is not clear.

I still want to add testimonials, chapter details, and a "why I wrote this book" section.

https://www.samdawson.dev/react-component-testing-book

Got my first subscriber after creating the pre-order option for my e-book. Still unsure about the pricing, but I can adjust it after getting feedback.

Also discovered that linkedin might be a good marketing channel for this e-book since I know a lot of software developers.

I launched a subscription for an e-book on React component testing. I'm planning to release chapters of the book for free via email and the website, then once the book is completed release it as a paid e-book with accompanying video content for each chapter.

The motivation behind the subscription early access model is to build an audience, gauge interest and get feedback on each chapter as early as possible.