WealthyWriter.ws Book Review

The Wealthy Writer is an impressive package. All 11 chapters and 259 pages.
I’ve been a professional writer for 40 years and now I teach novice writers how to earn money from their writing ability. So I do know a bit about writing for commercial gain as well as writing for personal satisfaction.

Even so, I found a stack of ideas, shortcuts, techniques and websites with software tools which will make my future writing easier and – hopefully – even more profitable.

I always read with a pen in my hand, plus a notebook. My technique is to underline, make margin notes like “Do this” or “Check this”. When I look back over this Wealthy Writer manual, wow, have I got some exciting follow-ups to follow up. I can hardly wait to get into them.

I hope you’re getting the message that I found this writing to earn money manual the best I’ve come across in a decade. Remember, my job is to go looking for books like this so I can advise my students.

Here’s what I liked:

The Table of Contents covers four pages. This means every item I go looking for is easy to find.

This is a current manual, less than a year old. Not something from the old 20th century. I hope the authors keep it updated. So far, every website link I’ve checked works perfectly.

Each chapter has cohesion. For instance, Writing Copy For The Internet covers the intricacies which make website copy quite different from newspaper features and magazine ad copy. I write both and they are radically different.

There are dozens of shortcut tools to help anyone interested in creating their first blog or website. BTW, every writer should have a website, preferably with a CV and stuff you sell from it.

By shortcuts I mean really useful tools like: KeyWordFinder, KeyWordDiscovery, GoodKeyWords, FreeKeyWords and KeyWordToolExternal. These tools are already saving me hours of repetitive work. For every six key words I think up 106 new ones come back. Some are in street language I’m not familiar with. I’d never have thought of them.

There are heaps of suggestions for attracting visitors to your website. That can mean the difference between success and failure for an ebook. Getting traffic is a numbers game. Anything extra you can do to attract more traffic is good.

The authors (Nick Daws and Ruth Barringham) recommend giving stuff away free, and they show you how to create fresh articles quickly. For instance, devise five questions your target audience wants answered, then answer those questions. Presto – one new article!

Offering free stuff plus actively using the social media (Blogs, Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn, ficblogs*, etc) can turn a website viral. Remember how Susan Boyle’s song went viral within a week? *Ficblogs are fiction blogs. I hadn’t heard of them either. That’s where fiction writers can post a sample chapter and get feedback from hundreds of readers. One benefit is it can tell you whether to write the rest of the story or flag it away.

Back to the scores of ways a reasonable writer can earn a lot of money.

Here’s one suggestion I’m working on: write a new ebook, report or manual every 10 days. That’s not difficult, because The Wealthy Writer even gives us templates for doing this. An ebook can be 10-50 pages, that’s about 5000 - 9000 words. Sell just one ebook of each title every day at $10. Keep that up and you’ll earn $300 in the first month, $600 in the second month, then $900 pm etc. The amount grows exponentially. Not bad from this one idea. Just do it! OK, cut the numbers in half and you’re still doing well.

There’s a section on how much you should charge for your eBook or eReport or eManual. Charge too little and it appears lightweight. Charge too much and you won’t sell as many because you’ve crossed the discretionary spending threshold. It’s important to know about this.

Remember, most stuff on the Internet sells in US$. So there’s a built-in exchange rate bonus for New Zealand and Australian writers.

The WealthyWriter authors explain interesting add-on factors, like selling the reproduction rights to an eBook you wrote. Or selling Private Label Rights. That’s a one-time cash windfall, even after you pay your income tax.

Here’s another bit I’m excited about. Becoming an affiliate (which I did) and looking on Clickbank and Amazon and WCCL and CJ and CraigsList. If you don’t know about these places, you should. But be careful. Their warning about scams and rogues always applies on the Internet. They seem to have covered everything. There’s a lot of excellent value here.

Another thing I liked was how the downside of any tools or software was mentioned. For instance, there are websites where writers can bid for jobs, eg: elance. They remind you you’ll be competing on price against competent writers in India and Asia. However, if you want to write something real, more for the experience than for the money, do it.

Being warned that something is ‘not good value for the money’ is helpful. I appreciate their honesty.

Did I dislike anything? Yes.

There was no index, as in Key Words at the back. But I guess I can use the FIND or SEARCH buttons to find what I want. Maybe I’m guilty of old-book-format thinking?

The word THAT appeared too often for my liking. I have a thing about fluff words and fluff phrases (‘I should like to take this opportunity to say’) which should have been removed by an editor. But they don’t diminish the value of the information.

I consider their ‘Index Page’ (sales page) over-hyped and too long. I mentally assign phrases like “anyone can earn a six-figure income” to the trash can as American bullshit. I know how difficult it is to earn a big income as a writer. I’m reasonably smart, I’m diligent, but I still haven’t cracked that $100,000 pa figure they talk about.

To give them credit, the authors didn’t say earning big money as a writer would be easy. Just that it can be done. Come to think of it, in the past year I’ve met a dozen people right here in Auckland who are earning well over that magic level on the Internet. Well done them.

So that is my review of The Wealthy Writer eBook.

Actually, it’s a 259 page manual. It sells online at US$47. Because I teach writing, and once I’d agreed to become an affiliate, I was offered a special deal which I’m allowed to pass on. So you can buy at the reduced deal I arranged. Same ebook, same bonuses, smaller cost.

If you’re interested in buying this book you have two options. Go to the front door and pay US$47. Or click here < http://www.wealthywriter.ws/?afl=62644 > and buy at the side door for US$37. That’s about NZ$68 but the exchange rate varies daily. When you get to this site you can bypass the hype by clicking the BUY NOW button near the top right side.
Being an eBook, there is no postage and delivery takes one minute. It’s in PDF format, so you can either read it on-screen (with live links) or print it on paper. I printed mine so I can read it in bed and write notes to myself in the margin.
Yes, the eBook comes with bonuses and a 30 day money-back guarantee. Believe me, you won’t need the guarantee.

If you have reasonably non-fiction writing skills, this will be a good investment. If your writing skills are modest, polish them. This ebook will give you lots of reasons why you should.

Brian Morris
Principal@nzibs.co.nz
New Zealand Institute of Business Studies
Yes, we teach journalism and non-fiction writing. Plus fiction, poetry, travel writing and 10 other writing courses. www.nzibs.co.nz
Here’s the BUY NOW button link at the reduced fee I arranged for students. http://www.wealthywriter.ws/?afl=62644