Study Books
There is a constant need for reference material both for business and academic use. This could cover everything from supplementary reading for school kids to advanced math tutoring for university students. Do you know something others don’t?

How-To Books
“Do-it-yourself” and self-improvement books. Straightforward approaches, pictures and analogies that teach everything from archery to amateur zoology. Although all these types of books sell, the how-to-books and guides are by far the best sellers on the web. You don’t have to be massively original here. The most profitable books are those that offer a slightly new take on a topic with proven popularity. There’s no point in picking a subject that only interests you and your best pals.

I’ve found that these are the ten most popular and most profitable topics for “how-to” ebooks.
Making money.
Saving money.
Saving time.
Saving effort.
Building a more comfortable life.
Achieving greater success.
Solving a problem.
Increasing knowledge.
Attaining better health.
Gaining information.

Those are pretty general, and clearly you’re going to have to generate ideas that focus on a particular topic. A book entitled “Making Money” isn’t going to sell many copies; a book entitled “Making Millions in Your Pajamas” will. When you’re looking for a topic, first make sure it’s a subject that you do actually have some knowledge about. Otherwise, make sure
you hire a writer who does.

If you’ve found a subject that no one else has touched, or even come close to touching, it’s unlikely that anyone will want to read it. The reason that there are millions of romances on bookshelves (and almost all of them the same) is that publishers know they sell. And like
you, they’re interested in making money not breaking new ground.
So how do you assess the popularity of your chosen topic? Here’s a simple three-step process:

Identify keywords for your book idea.
Conduct a search of your keywords to determine how many people are searching for the information you’re putting out. Run your keywords through the search engines and look for
the following information:
The number of ebooks already available on the subject.
The number of paid sponsor ads for the search. This indicates that there is interest on the subject. Otherwise big companies wouldn’t be wasting their marketing budgets to sponsor the searches. What does all this information tell you? First, it tells you whether there is a market at all; and secondly it tells you whether the market is saturated or not. This is critical info that you need to know before launching a project to write and market a book on the Internet.

Choosing the Right Topic
We discussed earlier the importance of choosing the right topic for your ebook. The Internet is primarily used to communicate, entertain, educate and research. It is thus no wonder that nonperishable, information-intensive products including books, travel guides, and magazine subscriptions are the most popular online products at present. Content-rich sites,  subscription-based sites to advertisersupported sites focusing on a wide range of topics, have been sprouting all over the Internet. Ebooks and guides on various subjects have been prospering in the recent past. Anything you can put in a physical book, you can put in an ebook. You can sell just about any content as long as you have an offering that has a market and an ability to get it to your customer. Yes, there are exceptions. In some cases you might be competing with big companies with a large chunk of the market share. Here are some categories that you may pursue:

Personal Advice, Motivation and Self-Help Sites There are several sites aimed at the individual — mainly motivational and self-betterment sites. Such sites offer tips, articles, advice and counseling on how to build self-esteem and self-confidence and reduce stress for a happier life. You may also provide great inspirational quotations, inspirational stories, motivational poems, and other resources to motivate and inspire your visitors. It could include psychology tests, IQ tests, emotional intelligence tests and personality tests for self-improvement.

The market for personal advice and counseling is huge. You can provide educational counseling through such sites. Professional advisory information and training is covered in a subsequent category.
Fitness and Health, Diets, Weight Loss Sites
These sites provide complete guides, articles, tips and counseling on proper eating and exercising habits, benefits of diet and exercise, fitness techniques, diet articles and diet tips, weight loss, as well as some of the popular diet plans. They can include tips from fitness
experts, reviews of fitness and diet programs, message boards, forums and discussions on health and fitness.

Information of various nutritional and diet supplements, healthy and non-healthy foods can be included. A couple of the popular fitness and health sites are eDiets.com and eightWatchers.com. Not all these type of sites are comprehensive in nature; most in fact focus on some specific program(s) and try to promote those programs to their members. Members are provided not only great details about some proprietary programs, but also personalized guidance to suit their individual cases. Members are also able to share
their experiences. Generally, such sites will also offer privileges and discounts to their members for fitness equipment, nutritional supplements and/or membership at fitness clubs.

Credit Help Sites
This category includes sites offering access to consumer credit history records and related content, for example ConsumerInfo.com
and CreditExpert.com. Such websites also offer credit counseling and tips as well as credit consolidation services. Articles, guides, and tips for credit improvement are provided as well.

Medical Research Sites
These sites focus on medical issues and/or health insurance. Medical research websites provide an extensive listing of research resources on various diseases and promotion of health through public education. They often include clinical information as well as information about doctors and hospitals in all states. Information on medical ethics and fraud is often provided.
Consultants, paralegal and legal researchers and consumers are amongst those who have interest in such sites.

You might also consider a site that provides information on health and medicine for the general public or for a specific target group, say women, nursing mothers. While there are quite a few sites that offer this type of information free, there is room for those that can provide uniquely targeted information. Alternate and complementary medicine and therapy is another area evoking wide scale interest.
Personal Finance and Investment These sites offer advice and tips on managing personal finance and investments. These include articles and guides from financial experts and assist in retirement planning. Such sites provide comprehensive information on various investment plans such as investing stocks, mutual funds, bonds, real estate and so on. They also offer advice on taxes.

Launching Your Info product
Once you’ve selected the niche market that you want to build an information business around, it’s time to get to work and create your first info product. If you’ve always thought of yourself as a writer and want to do it yourself, go for it. If you’d rather pay a professional,
that’s a good option too. Since online information products are so cheap to distribute, you can probably make your initial investment back once you’ve sold thirty or forty copies of your new info product.

Information products can provide you with an unending stream of revenue. Once you’ve uploaded the book onto your server, set up the website and payment system and launched your marketing campaign, the money pretty much rolls in by itself. There’s no shipping, no
inventory, no fiddling about with order sheets. You just keep an eye on the marketing and make sure the visitors keep coming. Put a series of books like this out, combined with the marketing methods discussed in this book and you’re looking at a pretty easy way to make a living.