New Ebook on Nutrition and Depression Link.

As a backgounder: my mother has been a depressed individual all my
life. I grew up vegetarian by choice; I didn't like the texture of
meat. However, my parents never researched the kinds of things I would
need to be eating for proper nutrition; I grew up on white minute-rice,
bread, sugary cereals and snacks, and various other forms of junk food.
I was spacey, easily provoked to tears, and depressed as a teen.

Since
I've been a webmaster and writer for a wellness company, I've been
learning of the importance of antioxidants and essential fatty acids. I
started asking myself how many vitamins actually contribute to
depression when they are deficient in the body. So I started writing a
book. I dreamed of having an online business that practically ran
itself and didn't depend on the weather, like our other business. That
dream fueled me to keep going when I didn't want to keep going. I've
finished that book now, and I started with the basic idea in Jan. 08.
It's 59 pages packed with information about depression, the vitamins
that are essential to keeping depression away, amino acid lessons,
essential fatty acid lesson, and five other ways people end up sad for
no reason. (thyroiditis, subluxation, candida…etc).

I went on a
learning journey to make this book, and though I'm not a nutritionist,
I've propelled my knowledge of general nutrition forward exponentially.
To read more about it, see the main sales page:

http://www.liveonpurpose.info
or
http://www.sadfornoreason.com

“Sad for No Reason: How to Use the Mood-Food Connection to Banish Depression Naturally”

It's
currently offered only in pdf, with several free bonuses. I'm keeping
the price very low to try to encourage sales through these lean days.
$14.95 I appreciate all criticism and suggestions.

If you are inspired by this work and would like to tell others about it, I do also offer an affiliate program for the book. You'll get 30% of the sales price if someone clicks from your affiliate link to my site and buys the ebook. Respond if you'd like the link to the affiliate program.

Re: New Ebook on Nutrition and Depression Link.

Hi Jess,

Just an idea, but you obviously have a great story to tell, and one that could help a lot of people, and you are obviously familiar with blogging - but have you considered serializing your book in a blog with a view to creating a demand of the kind that would interest a publisher?  It may sound like you are giving it away, but actually you will be creating what is known to us 'inbound marketing' types as a 'world wide rave' or viral marketing.  People are 50 times more likely to download an eBook if it is free of monetary or registration requirements, and people will still buy a copy of a published book even if they already have the pdf.  This has been done very successfully - see http://dudeblogyourbusiness.com/?page_id=3
It is a great way for new authors to gain attention to their work. If you are interested I am happy to chat further.  Jasper.

Re: New Ebook on Nutrition and Depression Link.

Thats good advice.

Tho I would modify it slightly - give away a free summary ebook, and sell a larger more detailed ebook at the same time, along with access to a members-only area where you give direct advice.

And possibly attract a print publisher thru the buzz.

Re: New Ebook on Nutrition and Depression Link.

Bill: I like this approach and have been considering it for a month. I was thinking of simply one chapter as a free ebook, but it's so hard to pick which one because the book builds on itself. I may be able to make my own “PhilosophersNote” overview on my ebook and give away the summary like that, but would that work to convert sales?

About advice: hmmmmm, I'm conservative about that one. I have all the disclaimers in the book that this is not to be taken as medical advice and to see your physician. I'm not a dr, nurse, or nutritionist, but perhaps I could find one who would like to give advice. Perhaps thru joint venture?

Re: New Ebook on Nutrition and Depression Link.

Thanks very much for that great idea Jasper. I've been reading Seth Godin's blog for the past couple of years and he also says if u give away the ebook, people will still buy the book. I tried it with fiction, a book my publisher boss wrote, but it flopped. I'd love to chat with you further privately.

I'll have to go set my prefs to alert me when there are replies to this group. I remembered to check in today.

Re: New Ebook on Nutrition and Depression Link.

I've always enjoyed Cory Doctorow's take on giving it away… Here's a recent post from boingboing, one of the pioneers of creative commons.

http://www.boingboing.net/2009/05/11/free-ebooks-effects.html

“John Hilton, a doctoral candidate in Instructional Psychology and
Technology at Brigham Young University, crunched the numbers to
determine whether releasing books through Creative Commons and other
methods really does benefit authors and publishers.
He found that four titles recently released for free by Random House
saw an 11 percent increase in sales in the eight weeks after releasing
the online copies compared to the eight weeks prior.”