Ok, so you heard somewhere (maybe even from me) that an e-book is one of the best ways to capture potential customer information.

You took some time, came up with a compelling article, and a beautiful cover designed, and wrote some great content.

Then you put it up on your website and low and behold; people started downloading it! New leads started coming in, and all was well.

Then something starts nagging at you. 

After speaking with a few of your new contacts, it didn’t seem like any of them had read the e-book they downloaded! Some of them were even paying you now and asking questions you had already answered for them in the free e-book. 

What did you do wrong?

Absolutely nothing. Let me share my own story to explain.

About eight years ago, my team created a free e-book for our customers. We used a popup ad on our website to give them a chance to download it. And it worked! Our new leads tripled over what we were getting from our newsletter signups (Yes, yes, I made that mistake too… Lesson learned). 

We were ecstatic, and we started calling these leads a few days after their download to see if they had any questions about the content that we could answer. 9 times out of 10, they hadn’t even read it. A majority hadn’t even downloaded it. We felt like failures. Why wouldn’t they read this great content? What had we done wrong?

The answer was nothing. This is the way it works. Of course, some e-books will be read more and others even less, but this metric is no indication of whether the strategy is working or not. Don’t believe me?

Eight years later, that same e-book (with an updated cover but the same name and content) is still producing over 1,000 leads per month, AND we routinely close sals on downloads from 3 or more years ago. 

You see, while they may not have read the e-book, they were reading our emails. Click To Tweet To be honest, they weren’t reading a lot of our emails either, but by merely staying consistent over time and showing up in their inboxes time and time again, we built a list of over 100,000 leads and sold millions of dollars to them every year.

What does this mean for you?

First off, don’t worry if people aren’t reading your e-book. It is still doing its job, and it’s there for them anytime they decide they’re ready.

Second, the most significant factor in getting a transitional call to action working is to communicate with your customers via email consistently. Email them great content that is on-narrative and do it over and over again. If enough time goes by, freshen up your old content and send it again!

There are three types of content you can email to those who downloaded your e-book.

1. Automated Warm-Up Sequence. Every new downloader should be put into an automated email sequence. An automated email sequence is a set of 5 or more emails that go out at set times. It may sound complicated, but they are pretty simple to set up, and the best part is they work 24/7. These sequences are perfect for transforming browsers into buyers.
2. Blog Content. Writing blog content can be a lot of work, but even as little as a single blog per month can bring a significant return. I send out two articles every week, but you may want to do 1 per week or even less. The key is consistency. There are countless blogs that were quick out of the gate but then faltered just as fast. If you stay consistent over time, you can reap big rewards.
3. Ads and Promotions. Don’t be afraid to send ads and promotions to your list. If you’ve been giving them valuable content, some of them will WANT an opportunity to buy. Sure others will ignore you. Maybe a few will unsubscribe, but what is the alternative? The last thing you want is to work hard to build a huge list of people that never buy anything from you.

Email is far from dead. If you’re building your list with an e-book, the best thing you can do is to email your list consistently. If you give people great value and give them plenty of chances to buy, you and your customers will win big!