Hey Sadik,
Thank you so much for your kind words and for sharing your thoughts. I appreciate it. We did mention the possibility of advertising in email newsletters, very briefly, but didn't go into detail on them specifically, just because I felt it would be largely repeating what we had already discussed in that chapter. No worries, in any case. You are right that they offer additional opportunities to monetize!
I'm glad that you found a reason not to dismiss it in the very first chapter.
Haha. It's funny that you mention that, and "free crappy ebooks," though.
One of the things that I pondered with this project was how to distinguish it from the sea of free ebooks. Most free business ebooks tend to be marketing teasers or gimmicks. I'm a professional writer, a published author and I take writing seriously. I have been managing online forums for 12 years and take online community very seriously, as well. I've never written a free ebook or white paper prior to this. So, my approach to it was that of a "regular" (whatever that means) book, with the same diligence as I put into my first book. Even though Skimlinks sponsored it, I had full, unquestioned editorial control. I decided every word in the book and who was allowed to contribute those words. It was the only way that I would have worked and they wanted that, too.
Beyond just me and my approach, the book was in development for 9 months. It was professionally indexed and a second set of (experienced editor) eyes went over the writing, helping me to tighten it. I would guess that these facts are not true for a lot of free ebooks. So, I'm thrilled that it showed in your reading.
When you offer something for free, people sometimes view it in a certain light. If they pay for it, they assign value to it. If it is free, they don't. We discussed selling it, for this reason, so it wouldn't simply be dismissed by people with free ebook overload. But, in the end, we decided to offer it for free.
In any case, I don't want people to think "oh, that was good - for a free book." I want them to think "that was great - I would have paid for that." I think this is important because your time is worth more than that. Even if you don't pay for something, if you spend time on it, you are giving something up because your time has worth.
Thanks again,
Patrick