Short ebooks and special reports?

[Calbo15]

Hi!

What is the best way to publish these?
Is .pdf files best? What app is best for converting onto pdf?

Thank you!

[Calbo15]

Anybody?

[Greenwolf103]

I've heard that PDF is the way to go. I'm not sure if it's true, but someone said that viruses can easily get into .exe files.

[Calbo15]

Ok... What is the best way to publish them?

[aka eraser]

Well, you can start by Googling "ebook publisher." Then sift through the hits. You'll want to research all probables pretty carefully. It's a relatively-new field, chockful of inexperienced publishers, some who are only out for a quick buck, as well as those who are legit.

Check Amazon for ebook titles and make a note of the pubs. Contact other writers who've e-published and ask them about their experience.

Gotta do some homework.

[Jyndral]

Are you meaning to basically self-publish them?

If so, there are some software programs out there that will distill them to a .pdf format for you, but the best (in my opinion) is Adobe Acrobat.

Acrobat Reader is free, the full version of Adobe Acrobat is not. I don't remember how much it is right now, though.

When you open up Acrobat Distiller to convert files to a .pdf, it will ask you if you are doing an ebook or something else. I've only seen the dialog prompt box a couple times, so I don't remember exactly how it's worded.

[Selenia692]

If you're willing to play around with software a bit, there's a free macro for Open Office called Extended PDF that performs almost as well as Acrobat.

If you aren't technically inclined though, I'd warn against using it. I had a few problems with getting it to work properly, but it was the only free pdf creator that would give me bookmarks and clickable links and such.

I can point you towards the instructions for that if you (or anyone else for that matter) is interested :)

[Calbo15]

Thanks for the answers, i'll look into it.
But what is the best way to publish (read: sell) it? Its short (around 10 pages) so self-publishing is probably the only way, right?

[Selenia692]

Well it depends on the subject matter. You might come across a publisher or site that deals with your subject directly, so you may want to ask if they are interested in featuring it.

For my game strategy guides, I work with an ebook publisher. I could just as easily have went through channels specific to that game, such as fan sites and the like.

There is a great deal of self promotion involved with self publishing, but if you have a niche topic, you can easily focus your efforts to target your audience, especially through articles and forums and such.