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Make Ebook Covers - Video

I wrote an article a few days ago about the “Make Ebook Covers” product, which I’d recently discovered. The product also shows you how to make buttons for use in salesletters and on your website, and how to do very impressive effects with text. But it’s with ebook covers that it really comes into its own. By their very nature, good ebook covers are very complex creations when compared with web buttons and text effects.

In my last article, I showed you the finished product of my first attempt at an ebook cover. Today, I got to thinking that if I’d made too good a job of that cover ;-) then you might be left with the impression that the product was difficult to use. This is far from being the case!

So to put that right, I’ve made a video for you that shows my own project at various stages of development. My aim was to break down the finished product into its component parts to show you how the final image is built up. Please note that the rendering of the video by YouTube has adversely affected the quality of the image. CLICK HERE to see the actual quality of the finished ebook cover.

I hope that seeing the progress of my ebook cover broken down into smaller steps will reassure you that THIS IS SOMETHING YOU CAN DO! The video tutorials in the product itself break down the whole process from start to finish into even smaller, more manageable steps. Each of these is easy to do.

Many products claim to be able to make you money. Not many products can truthfully claim to be able to save you money as well, but “Make Ebook Covers” can. Pay for just one ebook cover on elance.com and you’ll likely pay more than you would for this whole product (and you’d have to wait for it to be done)!

“Make Ebook Covers” is a gem of a product, that has been put together with care and dedication. This shows in the quality of their own ebook - they’ve obviously proof-read it! Most ebooks I see are full of spelling and typographical errors. The video tutorials are professionally produced, and both presenters, George and Alex, clearly know their topic inside out, but explain what they are doing at a steady pace so that you can follow them easily. I can see me using the skills they’ve taught me for years to come.

If you’re serious about making money from the internet, you’ll find “Make Ebook Covers” indispensible. You can get it by clicking here.

Posted 28 August 2009 § Useful Tools § Videos § Your Web Business ‡ Comments (3) ° Tagged:

Make Ebook Covers (Review)

It is generally agreed that the way to make the most money from internet marketing is to have your own product(s). Now whether this is your own original work or a private label rights (plr) product, which you are re-vamping to produce your own unique product, one of the challenges you will face will be how to make your digital product LOOK good. Your new ebook, say, may be chock full of quality information, but you’ll only be able to give a taster of that in your sales letter. You’ll also need a quality image - an ebook cover - to graphically represent your product.

Now the old adage “you can’t tell a book by its cover” is still true. After all, how can you hope to convey in one image, on one page, a true representation of the thousands of words that follow? Having said that, though,  prospective buyers are now accustomed to seeing images of digital products. So if you use a dull, boring, ebook cover are they less, or more, likely to buy your product? Point made, I think.

So what are your options: well, you either buy, or make your ebook covers.

Now buying is fine when you have more money than time, and when you know just what you want so that you can describe your project accurately on elance or any of the other freelancing sites. But, initially, it’s a bit of a leap of faith, when you’re starting out, to entrust something so important to someone you’ve never met before.

So, how do you actually MAKE ebook covers. Well, if you’re not worried about quality, you can probably get hold of some “off the shelf” templates and try to personalise those. I must confess to having used these in the past, albeit as a stopgap until I had finally mastered the finer points of a decent graphics package. Three problems here, though: which package? (everyone tends to think of Photoshop, which leads to number two), HOW MUCH? and thirdly, how much time will it take to learn all the basic stuff before you get on to the important bit of making quality ebook covers?

You’ve probably gathered by now that I’ve discovered a solution to this problem. Click here to see my first attempt at using it!

Now, I know it’s not perfect, but I must confess that I’m pretty pleased with it as a first effort. (After all, I did fail my art o-level twice(!) with a grade 8, the next to bottom grade).

The ebook cover I made uses the free Gimp software; now that’s been around a while and has its own tutorials but I’ve never gained any level of expertise with it. What’s made the difference for me is an ebook product (with accompanying video tutorials) that is specifically tailored to the art of making quality images for ebook covers, software boxes, cd/dvd cases and even order buttons.

The basics of Gimp are covered very quickly (but thoroughly for the skills you need to make ebook covers) and then it goes straight into a step by step guide to making a “sample” ebook cover. Just download your copy of Gimp and follow along. That’s all I did, just once, before making my own original design.

I admit that I couldn’t remember all the detailed techniques, so I played the video tutorials again alongside Gimp as I created my masterpiece and that kept me on track. I reckon the final product took me about 3 hours to do. But that included, at least, half an hour to register and wandering about on a site giving access to royalty free images, until I found the coloured graph image, which I decided to use. I believe that I should be able to knock off my next ebook cover in about 90 minutes.

A lot of thought has been put into this product: quality step by step info in 2 formats (ebook and video) to give you all the detail you need when you are learning, but also a 24 point quick reference guide for when you are comfortable with the general process but need reminding of specifics.

The resources section includes no less that 13 sites where you can get quality images, many of them free. This in itself is invaluable; I have to admit that, no way, could I have designed that coloured graph myself.

The package also includes a number of good looking templates to get you off to a good start, if you are happier beginning with an existing design and making minor changes to it. Also in there is a bonus video series showing you 3 ways you can make money with this product. Whether you choose to go down any of those routes, is, of course, up to you - you may be happy enough with all the money you’ve saved by making your own ebook covers, all for practically nothing.

I highly recommend this product. If you want to find out more, CLICK HERE.

Posted 24 August 2009 § Useful Tools § Your Web Business ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged:

virus or hoax?

Hopefully, you do keep your anti-virus software up-to-date and scan your system daily. Even so, we all know that new threats are coming at our precious pcs via the internet all the time. And if your computer has ever been taken over by a particularly malicious virus… well, you don’t need me to tell you just what a nightmare that can be!

So, all in all, the presence of viruses or even the potential for getting a virus on your pc breeds a certain paranoia. So any rumour of a new virus tends to induce a state of blind panic - firstly to protect our own hardware and data, and secondly to let our friends and contacts know so that they won’t be infected.

I was reminded of this recently when a well-meaning subscriber and friend introduced me to the dangers of being e-mailed by a certain Simon Ashton. Now, I’d not had the dubious honour of coming across this particular “gentleman” before, so, sure enough, I dropped what I was doing at the time and gave my full attention to this new “threat” to my valuable data.

Thankfully, I was soon able to put some perspective on this threat by consulting the trusty website, www.hoax-slayer.com. This has become my first port of call whenever I hear of a new virus: this tells me whether it is, in fact, just a hoax. And “Simon Ashton” IS just a hoax.

Now I still don’t understand the mentality of those who create real viruses or even hoaxes - I assume it’s just a “power” thing (punch “Simon Ashton” into Google, and it will come up with 2,190,000 matches) - but I don’t waste much time on them these days. I find I can easily control them by regular use of my anti-virus program and hoax-slayer.

CLICK ON HERE TO TEST HOAX-SLAYER (try typing “Simon Ashton” into the search box).

CLICK ON HERE to download the anti-virus software I use.

P.S. Both of these are free resources.

Posted 31 July 2009 § General Stuff § Useful Tools ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: , ,

Achieving your ultimate goal

If you ever doubt yourself… if your faith in your ability to achieve your ultimate goal sometimes waivers… if you need ongoing inspiration that the small steps you are taking will actually achieve what you want from life…

Here’s a timely reminder of what man can achieve through desire, faith and persistence…

Click to watch video.

Posted 19 July 2009 § Motivation and Mindset § Videos ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: ,

Unstoppable List Building (Review)

You’re probably quite familiar with products that promise to solve your dilemma about effective list building: many of them just don’t deliver. When you reach the end, you’re either overwhelmed with information, or you’re left wondering what you missed.

Justin Michie’s report “Unstoppable List Building”, which he is offering free for a limited time, finally delivers on a much needed Internet Marketing subject. He provides only the information you need to understand how to make list building effective and lays out a plan in easy to follow steps.

CLICK HERE to grab your free copy of the report.

At 65 pages, it takes you through the basics of opt-ins to monetizing your promotions to viral marketing and the importance of testing to maximize your opt-in rate. I particularly like the section that covers how to avoid fraudulent signups.

Overall, the report will get you on track quickly to building your list properly and effectively.

For seasoned marketers, you might find the opening few chapters to be a bit on the slow side, but when you get to the section on Viral Marketing, the pace picks up dramatically. Before I’d finished this chapter, I was anxious to get started with my own viral project to grow my list.

Justin shares some great tips on where to attract people to your opt-in list and he points out the massive benefits to building your list. Imagine how your sizeable list will enable you to create significant income on demand.

It’s easy to relate to Justin’s story about list building while “not really” building a list. That’s when you plod along building a list of a few hundred people, rather than bursting through the gate adding hundreds of subscribers every day.

Justin shows you exactly how to do that in terms anyone can understand and apply.

Unstoppable List Building provides real solid content and is one of the best reports of its kind that I’ve read.

For a limited time, you can grab a free copy of this valuable report by CLICKING HERE.

PS No surprise, Justin’s added a viral element to this report. But I’ll let you find out about that for yourself when you download it!

Posted 16 July 2009 § Useful Tools § Your Web Business ‡ Comments (2) ° Tagged: ,