Writing an e-book is not as difficult as it may sound - in fact, anyone can do it! Most people write e-books for marketing purposes, for example, to spread the news about their website or product promotion. Of course, e-books are also a great idea for any author who cannot get published the traditional way.
So how do you format an e-book yourself if you are not working with an online publisher that usually handles all the formatting issues for you? Luckily, it's very easy to prepare a manuscript for e-book distribution. Most people use Microsoft Word and then convert the file to PDF format.
The Majority of e-books are sold in Adobe Acrobat's PDF file format, however, the designing of your e-book will first be done in Word (some people may have to use Pagemaker or Quark for more complicated designs containing illustrations).
The good news is that you don't have to own a version of Adobe Acrobat to convert a Word file into a PDF format. At the same time, owning the Adobe Acrobat program will allow you to add neat features to your e-book, such as hotlinked URLs, forms, and pages imported from other programs. This gives an e-book a higher quality appearance. Adobe costs about $200.
The Design
A good e-book has to be well designed and well organized - you don't want it to come off looking cheap and unprofessional. Fortunately, it's very easy to use the features available in Word for proper formatting.
Page size. e-book pages are usually between 5x7 and 6x9 (5.5x8.5 is the typical format). Set the custom page size in the Page Setup menu of Word.
Margins. Use the Format: Document command and set margins to at least three quarters of an inch on all sides. If you want to include a header or footer in your e-book, set the top and bottom margins a bit larger. Turn off the Mirror Margins option as well.
Headers and footers. Your e-book should have a running header at the top of the page for most people this is the book's title and the page number. Input this information flush left, flush right, or center. There are a few different combinations, so choose something you like. It's recommended to use a smaller font for the header/footer and italic or bold to make it stand out a bit. Make use of the Border command to create a line between the header and text this comes out looking quite nice.
Font. Stick to standard fonts such as Times, Times New Roman, Century New Century Schoolbook, or Palatino. Arial or Helvetica are a good choice for chapter headings and subheads. As far as size goes, use 11 points for the main text, and 12-14 for subheads. Test the fonts you're considering before making a final choice to find a winning combination some fonts look better on the screen than when they are printed.
Formatting is rather easy, so don't let it intimidate you. Play around with Word and your e-book will turn out great.
Listed below are more articles related to the above article from the "Ebooks" article category.
People interested in the above article "How To Format Your E-book In Word And Convert To A PDF File - Part 1" are also interested in the related articles listed below:
With eBooks on the rise, should children be given more freedom with eBooks? Currently young adult fiction is a big mover in eBooks, but what about illustrated eBooks. This article discusses the issue, giving an insight into the world of eBook publishing for children.
If the substance of your E-book is classified or in other word confidential you can password protect your E-book so it will not be read by anybody except you. So with this available feature you can keep it private and no need to hide it anywhere.
If you are a reader then you should know the advantages of an E-book over the traditional paperback books. If you are really a reader and really love to read everyday then you should love E-books and be thankful of its existence.
Whether you are selling your own products or someone else's, you really can't go wrong with free reports. The reason is that most people jump on the internet looking for information. This is a way to provide them with that information. (It's also a good way to make money online for free because, if you do it right, it won't cost you anything, and your ebook could go viral.) Free reports also allow you to deliver your content in PDF (portable document format), which is a universal format that can be read on any computer. PDFs are considered to be far more valuable than say an article or blog post.
Are you an avid reader professionally or purely as a recreation? Then one of the modern skills that you must know is how to convert ebooks. By learning the simple steps that will turn your humongous tome into kilobytes of information you will change the way you interact with books altogether. Soon you won't be driving to a bookstore but rather browsing leisurely on the internet and downloading what you want. Books previously confined to university libraries will now be at your fingertips to access and read at your leisure.
The slow but steady rise of the e-books the more popular synonym of the electronic book has changed the very nature of the printing and publishing business. By drastically reducing the overheads required to put together a first edition it has started revolutionizing the way people approach books as a whole. An e-book does not need a large printing machine or paper; it also does not need a large market and gross sales to be profitable. They are easy to distribute and store and the greatest thing about them is that need never go out of print. So finding the title of your choice is really now a matter of a download or at most an email.
Before we can talk about how to convert ebooks, we need to understand what e books are. Not all people are computer savvy or net proficient. There are many who do not know what e-books are. Before the advent of computer, the only books we knew were the printed kind. Letters and words printed in ink on paper, which were then bound. These are still very much in use. But gradually with the increase of electronic gadgets, namely the computer, a new form of book has emerged. They are the electronic books or better known as e-books.
Unless you have the specific query it becomes a phenomenal task to find the right results from internet. For example, you ask the engine to search 'Insurance' and the result will show in the millions. Therefore, you have to specify, which type of Insurance and for what purpose and that makes the results limited for you to browse. Much of the information is futile and full of fluff and errors.
