Do It Myself Blog – Glenda Watson Hyatt

Did you know that with as few as 24 pages of content, you can have an actual book (you know those ORDs – Old Reading Devices) available for sale on Amazon through their CreateSpace service?

I became vaguely aware of Amazon’s print-on-demand service a few years ago, but I was reluctant to go down that route because I still had (and still do have) boxes of my autobiography I’ll Do It Myself sitting in my living room. I wasn’t keen on using CreateSpace until more of the already printed copies sold.

However, recently, this realization struck me: I was doing potential readers a disservice by not having paperbacks available on Amazon. Rather than having my book available where people buy millions of books online. I was expecting them to happen across my tiny website, to realize I had a book for sale and then to buy said book. How inconsiderate is that?

i am happy to say that I have corrected my thinking and that paperback copies of I’ll Do It Myself are now available on Amazon and on CreateSpace, (Of course, autographed copies are still available directly from this blog.)

Much too my relief, uploading my book to CreateSpace was relatively quick and painless. Actually, that was the easy part of the whole process.

Some individuals might say that by having the paperback format now available on Amazon creates a passive income. I say: bull hooey! I now need to ensure potential readers can find my book amidst the millions of other books; that requires work. It might not mean as much work as writing the book in the first place, but work is still needed nevertheless. I like to consider this as less-effort income, which, really, is way more accurate than passive income the big guys talk about.

Now that I know how easy CreateSpace is to use, I’ll be going through previously created content to see what I might be able to repackage and to offer to readers where they prefer to buy books. Of course, the goal will be to provide quality content of value; too much content offered on Amazon is lacking in value. Readers deserve better than that!

This plan dovetails nicely with the intent of the 4-Hour Workday: to generate more “less-effort income” so that I can get out and enjoy more of life. I know my Faith kitty would have approved.