Top 6 Tips to Successful Self-Publishing

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Opportunity

Beat the “Print-on-Demand” industry!  You can do so much better on your own! Don’t be fooled by POD Services.

Are you ready to publish your first book? Get to know the pros and cons of Print-on-Demand and of real self-publishing. Follow these few tips, and you will find the road to success as an author-publisher so much smoother!
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1. Bookstores don’t buy POD books.  Many novice self-publishers are opting for the heavily-advertised Print-On-Demand companies, which promise publication at low fees. For a niche book with an easily-found audience POD can be an option. But what the POD companies won’t tell you,  is that neither bookstores nor libraries will generally buy a POD book. However, if you are savvy enough,and have written at least three books (or join with another author) you can find the right wholesale arrangement through Lightning Source / Ingram and Baker&Taylor as outlined in Aaron Shepard’s website and guide book http://www.newselfpublishing.com. But don’t expect to get the same retail discount from “brick and mortar stores” as from Amazon.
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2. You can judge a book by its cover.  That’s what most people do.  You never get a second chance for a great first impression!  You can get a decent book cover for as little as $100 and a fantastic cover for around $ 500 or more.  Just shop around and find out who makes great covers.
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3. Act like a professional publisher.  Nothing is more embarrassing as finding reviews of your book on Amazon that complain about typing and grammar errors in your work. Make sure your book is complete, well-edited, and thoroughly proof-read. Use spell checks, let it copy-edit, content edit and proofread by professionals – not your family or friends.  These services provide you with a manuscript that makes you look like the professional you are.
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4. Don’t use the print shop down the road.  Search for a printer that specializes in printing books. You will not only have fewer problems with production, but the prices will be much less expensive.  You should be able to print 300 copies of a 250-page soft cover book for approx. $ 2.90 per copy. Digital printers or espresso book machines are useful only for very small amounts of print books, such as for gifts or a book launch party – if you plan to sell mostly e-books.
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5. Get 100 ISBN’s if possible.  ISBN is the International Standard Book Number, and every book sold in bookstores and at most online retailers must have an ISBN. They are the global standard for identifying titles and used world-wide as a unique identifier for books. They simplify distribution and purchase of books throughout the global supply chain. Without an ISBN, you will not be found in most book stores, nor online.  In the U.S. ISBN’s are available only from Bowker.com, and you can buy them in blocks of ten, hundred, or even thousand. The fewer you buy the less it costs, but buying just a block of ten marks you as a one-book publisher. And everyone in the publishing industry can figure out how many ISBN’s you’ve purchased by looking at your ISBN number. Lucky if you are a writer from Canada: ISBN’s are free!
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6. Don’t wait to start marketing until your book is finished. Many first-time writers and self-publishers focus on the writing and the publishing process, and postpone thinking about the book  marketing until they have books in hand (or hundreds in their garage). A book – no matter if it is an e-book or a traditional paper book – will succeed or fail on its marketing plan. Before starting your self-publishing project, find out who your audience is, and where and how you will find them. Get to know your competition, search the internet and in bookstores for similar books. Only move forward on your writing project after you have finished your research and your marketing plan. Even find book reviewers before you start writing the book, and blog at least for one year to build an audience for your work. I don’t know of any self-published writer who is successful, without having a blog. Once your book manuscript is finished, don’t forget to use the end of one book to promote another book you have written or you write on currently.
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Self-publishing can not only be lucrative, it can be a lot of fun too. But you need to be somewhat entrepreneurial and do lots of careful planning to really enjoy success with true self-publishing.

Read more about author-publishing and POD’s:

http://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2011/08/21/the-truth-about-pod-publishing/

http://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2012/03/03/why-pod-contracts-are-bad-for-authors/

http://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2011/12/11/comparison-of-major-print-on-demand-pod-services/

http://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2013/05/07/pros-and-cons-of-print-on-demand/

http://www.theauthorsredroom.com/top-10-self-publishing-tips/

http://www.sfwa.org/other-resources/for-authors/writer-beware/pod/

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are 750 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

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77 Reasons Why Your Book Was Rejected

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77 Reasons Why Your Book Was Rejected

Written by Mike Nappa, available as e-book and print book at Amazon. The author’s experiences as acquisitions editor, marketing copywriter, and literary agent uniquely qualify him to write on this topic. He is also the author of more than 40 books and received more than 2,000 book rejections during his writing career!
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The book is divided into three sections: Editorial, Marketing and Sales Reasons for Rejection.  Starting with: “It takes less than a minute to reject your book” (by big publishers that is) Mike Nappa goes on with all the legitimate and also the silliest reasons your manuscript or book idea might be rejected.

As an author you might be able to work on many, such as marketing and your platform and following, however some of the reasons have nothing to do with the quality of your writing. 

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An editor is going to look at your proposal – and if it doesn’t meet certain editorial standards, it will go no farther. If it passes basic editorial scrutiny, an editor will then consider whether you have done your “marketing” homework — analyzed and defined your audience, established a platform, shown that you know how and why this book will sell. From there, the editor will need to convince the publisher that they can sell this book, and sell enough to merit the investment in its publication.
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Perhaps the clearest message that emerges from this book is that getting published is a lot of work. The job doesn’t end when you finish writing the last chapter. Publishers are in the business of selling a product, and it’s your job to convince them that your book will sell.
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Or maybe you will decide to author publish. After all you have to do your book marketing anyway, even if your book is accepted by a commercial publisher. “Success is the best revenge”  .

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are 750 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

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Weakness of the 5 Big Publishers

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… and what you can do better as an author-publisher.

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Large traditional publishers have relationships with book stores and book chains. They have publicists working for them to promote their books and editors to polish the final products. They have established relationships with their customers over many years or even decades. They submit books to all the major book awards. Imagine trying to research, compile, address, and pay for 200 give-away books and shipping just to put them in the hands of jurors. And I’m sure there are a lot more things that they do to get books to the readers.
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To learn where they miss the boat is to gain access to a market segment and marketing ideas that you might have overlooked.
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1. New York Publishers Don’t Think Outside the Mainstream
Publishers have particular criteria they look for in a successful book; the first is mainstream appeal, which is understandable since they have to appeal to a larger bookstore-driven market. If you have a book that is outside the mainstream, this is actually good news, unless you’re trying to find a major house to pick you up. The idea here is to understand that traditional publishing dominates the mainstream, but it’s the niches that tend to do very well. You’ll see these books in places like book clubs or the Writer’s Digest book collection and smaller, niche publishing houses.
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2. New York Publishers Don’t Do Consumer Research
Yes, often publishers do not do consumer research. How do publishers know what to publish? They tend to rely on bookstores to direct their attention, as well as trends. What does this mean for you? If you have access to consumer data, you are light years ahead of the big six. Sometimes just having a mailing list on your website or even having a website where you interact with your consumer is sufficient. If you have access to this data and you are publishing mainstream, you are a very valuable writer to any publisher out there. Having access to this data is crucial for most of us and seen as a bonus when a publisher is considering a manuscript.
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3. New York Publishers Don’t Publish to Niche Markets
Niche markets have no appeal to publishers and ironically, that’s where the trend of successful authors is headed: into the niches. Niches can be powerful but New York publishers stay away from them. Their entire model is set up to cater to mainstream product, so to slot some obscure, niche work in there would never work.
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4. New York Publishers Don’t Sell Direct to Consumers
Publishers don’t sell from their websites; many have tried and failed. Why? Because the publisher isn’t the brand, the author is. This is starting to change in some areas as publishers seek to bypass Amazon and gather their share of the consumer market. Most consumers don’t really identify with a publisher as much as they do an author or a trusted online shopping portal like Amazon or BN.com.
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5. New York Publishers Only Promote Their Authors to the Top 30 Media Markets
When publishers develop marketing plans for their books, they don’t look at markets that aren’t in the top 30.  Knowing the landscape and marketplace will position you for success and you likely won’t get caught off guard by a stumbling block or situation that could have been avoided. Know your market – the more you do, the faster you will succeed!
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Excerpts, re-blogged from “The Book Marketing Expert newsletter,” a free eZine offering book promotion and publicity tips and techniques. http://www.amarketingexpert.com

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 750 of them : )  if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

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Why Ask Yourself Some Hard Questions

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Key to Success

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Writing is an art, publishing a book is a business!
Before you even attempting to write, develop and market an e-book, or paper book for that matter, create yourself a road map.  Research first and build a solid foundation. The problem is that too many people are in a hurry to start writing and don’t lay a foundation for book marketing. They spend all this time writing, and then they have no buyers.  Do the research and find out if your idea is going to make money. If yes, great! Go for it. If not, find another idea, such as freelance writing for magazines or newspapers where you can earn money much faster and without spending money for layout, editing or cover art.
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Ask yourself some hard questions:

• Who will be your e-book readers?

• Is there a demand for your eBook product?

• Is your e-book a “must have” purchase?

• How much will people pay for your product?

• Does the purchase of your eBook lead to additional e-book sales?

• How much money will you need to fund your project?

• How likely are you to excel among the competition?

• How do you contact and “pitch” your product to your potential buyers?

• How to you get the important book reviews?

• Do you have already lots of followers in your social networks?
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Writing your book is only 20% of the work, 80% is marketing!  Having a plan on how you intend to market, publicize and sell your book before starting to write it, is crucial for your works success.

• Choose your book content
• Start marketing your book, even before writing it
• Design and format it into a perfect downloadable file
• Create a professional cover for your e-book
• Select the e-book retailers to upload your book (Amazon, Kobo, Apple, B&N, Sony…)
• Continue marketing your book

You are responsible for providing your own ongoing marketing for e-published work – the same as for paper books that are often not very well marketed. A book might be great, but if nobody knows about it, it won’t sell. Authors can’t count on the public seeing their books on shelves or in store windows – they have to find it on the internet.

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are 750 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

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Want to Sell More of Your Books?

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E-books are great, but there is also still a huge market for print books.  How to get your book(s) successful into book stores worldwide?  Ingram and its subsidiary Lightning Source ( for Print on Demand) are international book distributors for both electronic and print books.

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Aaron Shepard: Aiming at Amazon

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The best way to get your paper book(s) both, into the major chains, as well as Amazon, and in individual book stores is through Lightning Source. This company is not only international distributor of books and affiliated with Ingram, the biggest U.S. book wholesaler, which delivers basically all bookstores in the country, as well as many libraries and schools.  Lightning Source offers international business solutions to publishers worldwide. The opportunity to easily access local markets around the world.

But Lightning Source also prints on demand (POD) for self-publishing companies, small and big ones. In fact they are printing almost two million books per month!  But how can you get your foot in the door of this valuable distribution system? Lightning prefers to deal with publishers and self publishing companies rather than with authors directly as they do not provide support to newbies.

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Aaron Shephards book POD for Profit

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If you want to cut out all these middleman in POD publishing, order a package of ISBN’s (International Standard Book Numbers) and register your own small publishing company and get a savvy computer guy (or girl) helping you to deal with uploading your files etc. if you are not already a computer whiz.

How dealing with Lightning Source exactly works can be learned “by the book”, actually two books, written by Aaron Shepard: “Aiming at Amazon” and “POD for Profit: More on the NEW Business of Self Publishing”.

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 740 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

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Pros and Cons of Print-on-Demand

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“Currently unavailable.” When you read this on Amazon’s website you can be sure it is a POD Book.  Amazon assigns many of those out-of-stock books an availability status of 2-3 weeks. And no one wants to wait that long when ordering on the internet…
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POD (Print on Demand) services call it “self-publishing” – but there are important differences between a POD service and true self-publishing. They are in fact VERY EXPENSIVE PRINTERS – NOT PUBLISHERS!  POD printers are producing the book only when ordered. What are the differences?
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Rights
TRUE self-publishing:  all rights remain with the writer, who has full ownership of her work, including the ISBN number.
POD services:  mostly owns the ISBN and the author has a very limited claim on digital and/or electronic publishing rights.

Control
TRUE self-publishing:  the writer controls all aspects of the publishing process, cover art, print style, pricing etc.
POD services:  choices are typically limited to their service package

Book Sales
TRUE self-publishing:  the author keeps all proceeds from sales.
POD services:  they keep most of the sales proceeds to cover printing costs, and pays the author a small percentage of royalty, usually from the books NET price.
The POD Cons:

• Books from POD services are expensive and may be of poor physical quality.
• There are lots of extra fees, such as renewal fees, distribution fees, extra charges for non-template cover designs, charges for proof corrections etc.
• Royalty income may be less as it is mostly based on the books NET PRICE,  the retail price less discounts and/or all the publisher’s overhead.
• Your book will receive only wholesale distribution, and mainly sold online, Booksellers don’t like dealing with POD services.
• You do not get an advance – YOU have to pay an advance to the POD company, it just doesn’t make sense economically
• Marketing consists often only on listing on the company’s website and with various online booksellers, sometimes in a wholesaler’s catalogue.  Many POD services offer “marketing packages or media kits” for an extra (high) fee – a total waste of money!

POD Pros:
It is only recommendable if you:

• need galleys, or for short-run publishing and specialty markets
• want to print small non-fiction projects such as lectures or workshops
• want to create a recipe book, a family memoir, genealogy etc.
• bring back out-of-print books into circulation
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Who is the publisher?
It is the one who owns the ISBN for a book. If the author applied for and paid for the ISBN in his or her own name, then no matter who produces and sells the book, the author has become the publisher of record, an authentic self-publisher!
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Listen to the truth behind POD “publishing” or read more articles about this topic:

http://www.writersandeditors.com/self_publishing_and_print_on_demand__pod__57417.htm

http://beforeyoupublishyourbook.com/2011/07/22/the-truth-about-print-on-demand-publishing/

http://www.writergazette.com/content/pros-and-cons-self-publishing-print-demand

http://fonerbooks.blogspot.ca/2005/08/printing-offset-vs-print-on-demand.html

Do you have any experiences with POD publishing and how much was each soft cover book you ordered from them?

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 740 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

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Is Your Book Listed Worldwide?

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Few authors have ever heard about BowkerLink:  a source for publishers and distributors seeking to update or add to title listings, found in Books In Print, Global Books In Print, and the Publisher Authority Database.  How can readers, bookstores or librarians in Japan, Australia, UK or Belize find your book and read, buy or lend it?

This  FREE portal allows you to market titles through Bowker products to many sectors of the book industry including wholesalers, distributors, retail chains, independent retailers, online retailers, schools, libraries, and universities.

You may know Bowker from ordering your ISBN numbers, but they are also the provider for Books In Print and Global Books In Print that contain listings of bibliographical information for international book titles available in the USA or any other part of the world.

In addition, Bowker sells its products worldwide to retailers and libraries, so your titles are exposed to many facets of the book industry through a single web application including other Bowker products like inventory status checks, library catalogue information, and sales data reporting services. Your data is circulated to all of these customers free of charge. To market you book successfully worldwide you need to have it listed worldwide! Their website http://www.bowkerlink.com

Setting Up A New Book on Bowkerlink is easy, just fill in:

ISBN
Title
Subtitle
Translated title
Number of pages
Number of illustrations
Binding type
Language
Subject (1 or 2)
Contributors names and functions
Length, Width and Height
Weight
Year of copyright
Year of original publication
Library of Congress Card Number
Annotation (description)
Country of Sale
Imprint
Title status
Publication date
Price
Price type
Currency
Target market
Age range of the readers

Items in bold are required, the others optional. You should try to fill as many of these fields as possible, as completely as possible, in order to be found easily.

Why register with BowkerLink?
Listing your titles is absolutely free. The BowkerLink Publisher Access System allows you to announce your new release titles, as well as price and status updates to a wide audience of book, audio and video buyers. Your titles are WORLDWIDE exposed to many facets of the book industry through this single web application.

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 740 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

Thanks a lot for following:

@111publishing

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How to Pitch Your Book Idea to Publishers

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If you really don’t want to self-publish, learn how to pitch your book idea to major, traditional publishing houses.

Be aware, that marketing is up to you and you better start long before the book’s launch. Once your book is in stores, it has only weeks “to make it”.

Publishers don’t want to hear only about your book idea, but also how you are going to market and promote it.

After all, they are in the business to make money with your work.

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Let your potential publisher know how you plan to get your author name out there.

• Will you do book signings, contests, chats, online signings, book club readings or placement into independent bookstores.
• Do you have a website? And / or a blog?
• Do you participate in Twitter, Google+, Goodreads and Facebook?
• Do you have any special groups, such as book clubs, reading groups etc. that you know, and who would be interested in this type of book?

This is called a promotional plan and a platform and more and more publishers require it. But in any way, it is always an asset. There are also a number of things that you should not do when submitting a manuscript:

• Never send a manuscript without a query letter or synopsis. Publishers like to get an idea of what the story is about before plunging into a novel.
• Make sure that the publishers guidelines are followed to the letter.
• If the publisher specifies that all submissions should be double spaced in Times or New Roman font, save it as an RTF file. Do not send something that is single spaced in a gothic font, saved as a PDF.
• Do not tell the publisher how wonderful your work is, or how much you think he or she will enjoy it. Stick strictly to the facts.
• Do not write the publisher over and over again asking if they have yet read your manuscript.  Most publishers will list an average response time. Only after that time has passed should you contact the publisher for an update.
• Make sure that your document is appropriately labelled with your name, pen name, title of the book, word count and your email address. When manuscripts are sent by email, your document is often saved in another location. This manuscript could quite possibly be passed to various staff within the company in order to find the line that best fits your title. If there is no identifying information on the Manuscript itself, a publisher cannot respond to you.

When you are submitting your work, remember to be professional, be kind and be patient. The publisher is working hard to review works and put out the best quality pieces to the reading  public.  As an author, it is your job to follow some simple guidelines when submitting a manuscript in order to allow the process to go smoothly and your work to be accepted.
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More on this topic:

http://www.publishersandagents.net/com/how_to_pitch_book_to_publishers.php

http://michaelhyatt.com/how-not-to-pitch-your-book-proposal.html

http://www.wikihow.com/Pitch-a-Non-Fiction-Book-to-an-Editor

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 730 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

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Entrepreneurs and Craftsmen as Authors

Books are becoming popular marketing tools for the self-employed.  An estimated almost 1 Million titles written by entrepreneurs and other non-traditional authors were published in the U.S.

That’s more than double 2008′s figure, according to Bowker LLC, which, for U.S. publishers, assigns the unique ISBN numbers that identify books.
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Mike Holmes book MAKE IT RIGHT
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“Entrepreneurs in most cases are not actually looking to produce best-sellers. Instead, most are taking advantage of new forms of publishing, including electronic publishing and print-on-demand, to generate a marketing tool and additional income at the same time.  That income stems from speaking, consulting, press and new customers. It’s not about selling copies.

The National Speakers Association, a trade group in Tempe, Arizona, USA, reports that about 70% of its 3,200 members are authors and more than 60% earn $100,000 a year on average just from giving presentations.

The trend wouldn’t have been possible without the emergence of print-on-demand publishers and the advent of the e-book.  The electronic-book market and the Internet in general have eased the distribution process for authors.  Within minutes you can now upload a file and have a book.” Mr. Witty is the author of 21 Ways to Build Your Business with a Book.

Blogger Kim Bookless writes in her article:

Your Book Is Your New Business Card

• Your book will encourage customers to buy your product or offer you speaking engagements.
• Your book will convince clients to hire you for consulting or freelance work. To establish your expertise and set you apart from your competition, give copies of your book to prospects when you meet them and include copies when you send proposals.
• Your book will add legitimacy to training courses and workshops. It will help establish you as a subject matter expert and encourage people to register for classes.
• Your book will help you build your list. Selling your book on your website enables you to capture important contact information.
• To realize these benefits, you must produce a book that is well written and designed.

Read more:
http://writeahead.ca/2012/10/03/entrepreneurs-your-book-is-your-new-business-card/#.UX46zrVO-So

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjIPHExADoE

http://techcrunch.com/2012/01/28/why-every-entrepreneur-should-self-publish-a-book/

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 730 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

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How to Sell Foreign Book Rights

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It is not that easy to sell your foreign rights without an agent or a publisher, but it’s not impossible. Women’s fiction author Kay Raymer did the whole agent query routine in 2000, but nobody would look at her novel, Hannah Street. So she sent the manuscript to her attorney, who happened to know someone at Bertelsmann / Germany. Bertelsmann made an offer on the book, and her lawyer helped arrange the contract. As a result, Raymer’s first novel appeared in Germany in 2001, a paperback original called Das Rosenhaus. Read more in Gwen Ellery’s article.

Most agents charge 20% (or sometimes even 25%) on foreign sales (including British and translations).
This 20% rate is justified because normally two agents are involved (the second one being in the foreign country), and they end up splitting the commission.

You should never agree to be paying over 25% commissions for any type of sale.
Note that your foreign sales will likely be subject to a local withholding tax (10% is common), and that all of that tax burden will be borne by you (that is, the agent will take his or her commission off the pre-tax gross).

If you are not represented already, why not try to find agents or even publishers yourself in other countries, especially if you speak more than one language?
I just found a blog post from a successful writer, who did just that: searched the internet, found contact addresses of agents in other countries and contacted them. He wrote:

“How does one sell rights in the international marketplace?
My first foreign rights sales occurred as a result of Book Expo America, where for a small fee my book was displayed in a co-op booth.  Although the book didn’t take Book Expo by storm — as I somehow thought it would — it received interest from and I sold translation rights to publishers in Mexico, Poland and Nigeria.  If publishers in such diverse countries and cultures wanted the book, I was sure publishers in other countries would also want it.”   Read the whole article here: http://axiomawards.wordpress.com/2008/09/05/selling-foreign-rights-around-the-world/

Morris Rosenthal gives also great, detailed tips in his article about book contracts.
http://www.fonerbooks.com/contract.htm

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 730 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

Thanks a lot for following:

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What Every Author Should Know

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When consulting / coaching our clients, helping them with their book marketing, we often have to watch them coming to a screeching hold when they try to organize special sales or free days: authors cannot change prices, text or anything else on their retailers account if they go with a publisher. No matter if it is a traditional big publisher or one of these “vanity” publishers, as only those can go into the retailers account – unless they give their authors the keyword and other details and the permission to do changes on the sales page.
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Every writer, no matter if they author-publish (really self-publish) or if they have sold their manuscript, they have to do their own marketing. But how can you do it, if you are on the mercy of a publisher – real or vanity? If you don’t own the ISBN and if they have no access to they retailers publishing pages?
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This is a huge problem (among many others) that authors face after they have given away their work for pittance – or worse, have paid thousands of dollars to a vanity firm. So, what’s the difference between both, beside the fact that they hinder the authors in their marketing efforts?

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Traditional Publishers

• Accept very few submissions
• Authors receive a small advance and royalties
• They do not use print on demand (single or few books)
• Authors have barely any say to cover image, publishing date etc.
• It takes very long until the book is published
• Publisher pays for printing, editing services and cover image 
• Distribution services are covered by the publisher
• Professional marketing services available – but only for celebrity writers
• They own the ISBN for the book
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Vanity Publisher

• Accepts almost all submissions 
• Author never receives any advance 
• Author pays for printing, editing services 
• Quick turnaround and Print on Demand 
• Barely any distribution services
• No professional marketing services 
• Very few royalties – if any at all
• They own the ISBN for the book

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Why not self-publish?
If an author has all these challenges, waiting times (or costs to cover in the worst scenario) – and cannot even do the necessary marketing without huge problems, what’s the point in having a publisher? Why not author-publish / self-publish in the first place, and be independent when it comes to marketing?

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

If you enjoyed this blog post, please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 720 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

Thanks a lot for following:

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50 Biggest Publishers in the World in 2012

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UK Publishing Pearson was already the world’s biggest publisher before they joined with Penguin-Random House (Bertelsmann Group, Germany). Seeing their revenues, one might wonder why they pay their authors such lousy royalties…

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Rank (2011)	Rank (2010)	Publishing Company (Group or Division)	Country	Mother Corp. or Owner	Country Mother Corp.	2011 Revenue in $M	2010 Revenues in $M
1	1	Pearson	U.K.	Pearson	U.K.	$8,411	$8,097
2	2	Reed Elsevier	U.K./NL/U.S.	Reed Elsevier Corp.	U.K./NL/U.S.	$5,686	$7,149
3	3	Thomson Reuters	U.S.	The Woodbridge Company Ltd.	Canada	$5,435	$5,637
4	4	Wolters Kluwer	NL	Wolters Kluwer	NL	$4,360	$4,719
5	6	Hachette Livre	France	Lagardère	France	$2,649	$2,873
6	8	Grupo Planeta	Spain	Grupo Planeta	Spain	$2,304	$2,427
7	7	McGraw-Hill Education	U.S.	The McGraw-Hill Companies	U.S.	$2,292	$2,433
8	5	Random House	Germany	Bertelsmann AG	Germany	$2,274	$3,844
9	11	Holtzbrinck	Germany	Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck	Germany	$1,952	$1,512
10	10	Scholastic (corp.)	U.S.	Scholastic	U.S.	$1,906	$1,912
11	9	Cengage Learning	U.S.	Apax Partners et al.	U.S./Canada	$1,876	$2,007
12	13	Wiley	U.S.	Wiley	U.S.	$1,743	$1,699
13	12	De Agostini Editore	Italy	Gruppo De Agostini	Italy	$1,724	$1,843
14	15	Shueisha	Japan	Hitotsubashi Group	Japan	$1,714	$1,597
15	16	Kodansha	Japan	Kodansha	Japan	$1,551	$1,498
16	17	Shogakukan	Japan	Hitotsubashi Group	Japan	$1,444	$1,441
17	33	Readers’ Digest	U.S.	RDA Holding Co.	U.S.	$1,438	$1,460
18	14	Houghton Mifflin Harcourt	U.S.	Education Media and Publishing Group Limited	U.S./Cayman Islands	$1,295	$1,673
19	19	Springer Science and Business Media	Germany	EQT and GIC Investors	Sweden, Singapore	$1,138	$1,149
20	18	HarperCollins	U.S.	News Corporation	U.S.	$1,100 (est.)	$1,269
21	20	Informa	U.K.	Informa plc	U.K.	$1,069	$1,039
22	21	Gakken	Japan	Gakken Co. Ltd.	Japan	$1,043	$956
23	22	Oxford University Press	U.K.	Oxford University	U.K.	$1,004	$941
24	24	Grupo Santillana	Spain	PRISA	Spain	$936	$852
25	23	Bonnier	Sweden	The Bonnier Group	Sweden	$909	$927
26	26	Kadokawa Publishing	Japan	Kadokawa Holdings Inc.	Japan	$904	$794
27	27	Simon & Schuster	U.S.	CBS	U.S.	$787	$791
28	28	Egmont Group	Denmark/ Norway	Egmont International Holding A/S	Denmark	$703	$792
29	29	Woongjin ThinkBig	Korea	Woongjin Holding	Korea	$685	$723
30	25	RCS Libri	Italy	RCS Media Group	Italy	$667	$805
31	31	Klett	Germany	Klett Gruppe	Germany	$594	$617
32	32	Cornelsen	Germany	Cornelsen	Germany	$558	$584
33	34	Mondadori	Italy	The Mondadori Group	Italy	$506	$549
34	35	GeMS – Gruppo editoriale Mauri Spagnol	Italy	Messagerie Italiane	Italy	$494	$525
35	39	Lefebvre Sarrut	France	Frojal	France	$467	$430
36	36	Harlequin	Canada	Torstar Corp.	Canada	$450	$468
37	37	Sanoma	Finland	Sanoma WSOY	Finland	$446	$464
37	40	China Education and Media Group (form. Higher Education Press)	China (PR)	China Education and Media Group	China (PR)	$445	$393
39	38	Media Participations	France	Media Participations	Belgium	$442	$434
40	46	Abril Educação	Brazil	Abril Group	Brazil	$411	$308
41	47	Perseus	U.S.	Perseus	U.S.	$350	$300
42	43	Westermann Verlagsgruppe	Germany	Medien Union (Rheinland-Pfalz Gruppe)	Germany	$339	$342
43	41	La Martinière Groupe	France	La Martinière Groupe	France	$335	$377
44	44	Bungeishunju	Japan	n.a.	Japan	$331	$337
45	55	AST	Russia	Privately owned	Russia	$330	$215
46	45	Groupe Gallimard	France	Madrigall	France	$329	$320
47	42	Shinchosha	Japan	n.a. (privately owned)	Japan	$319	$364
48	49	Kyowon	Korea	Kyowon	Korea	$298	$273
49	48	Weka	Germany	Weka Firmengruppe	Germany	$282	$277
50	52	Saraiva	Brazil	Saraiva	Brazil	$267	$249

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For the latest news about the publishing giants check out Publishers Weekly Financial.

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

If you enjoyed this blog post, please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 720 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it.  There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

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You Are Not Alone – Get a Mentor

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You just wanted to write – and upload your book to Amazon, expecting that it becomes an instant hit. The writing – your skills – an art you mastered, is making you proud. However the publishing / marketing process feels scary … and you never before thought about becoming an entrepreneur.
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Sure, you know all the benefits of self-publishing:

• Author-publishing brought your book much faster to market, than waiting almost two years till it hits the shelves, even if you got a publishing contract
• The marketing part will always be completely on you, no matter if you self-publish or if you go with a big traditional publisher
• As a self-publisher you keep full control over the book design, the sales outlets, the price and the time your book will be on the market (maybe forever) – just to name a few
• if your book is successful you can make a lot more money than a “published author”

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You learned a lot already:
You read all the blog articles how to become a real author-publisher, even with printed books and their distribution to bookstores, running from April 8 – April 13 on http://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/

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But you still have many questions… it seems, as if you have to learn a complete new profession. Wouldn’t it be great to have someone on your site to help you with:

• all the details of the e-book and print book production process 
• how readers can find your book on Amazon, B&N, Kobo, Apple etc.
• how you can create your “platform” and establish a brand as a writer
• how you set up a blog/website and a social media presence
• which reader forums you should join 
• … plus all these questions you did not even know to ask
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The Value of Mentor-ship
We do not only work for our clients during the time you actually book us, but long after, giving you regularly tips and news.  The articles we write about your book will stay on our sites forever.
With our help, self-publishing and book marketing can become an enjoyable journey for you: We help you to save time, money and efforts in your publishing / book marketing process.

Take advantage of our professional help, we have studied business, marketing and e-publishing and have 30 years publishing experience. We customize coaching to your needs and teach you:

• how you can establish a brand as a writer
• the publishing and retail possibilities
• all the pre-publishing book marketing steps
• blogging & automatic posting of your articles to Twitter, FB, Google+, Goodreads…
• how to save a lot of time using social media sites for reader contacts 
• researching your possible competition & popularity of genres/positioning
• how to identify your target readers & plan your blog content & marketing strategies
• how to find lots of readers, book bloggers & reviewers
• … and the list goes on and on. Don’t forget: Writing is an art – publishing a business!

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Would you learn to drive a car or fly a plane without instructor? It is frightening first, but once you have learned it – with a professional instructor on your site – gaining self-confidence, it becomes sheer pleasure for you. Everything you accomplished in life makes you proud and is fun doing. So will be author-publishing and book marketing!
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If you want to get help and valuable support, for less than $1/per day: Sign up now for an individual Book Marketing online seminar & coaching, customized to YOUR book and your needs. Get practical support to market your book almost for free. Find all the details: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

For your questions and to get testimonials contact us via: 111Publishing  gmail.com
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Further reading and details:
http://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2013/03/14/10-reasons-to-get-help-boosting-your-books-success/
http://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2013/04/01/writing-is-an-art-publishing-is-a-business/

• we offer weekend classes for groups,
• individual online seminars, targeted to your needs for a very low fee
• and even a publishing / book marketing seminar at sea

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If you enjoyed this blog post, please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 720 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on ”LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can share and submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

Thanks a lot for following:

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Distribution of Your Print Book

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New York City – Manhattan

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A proud moment for every author: to discover their book in a bookstore or library. However distribution of your book to stores is one of the toughest nuts to crack when it comes to publishing, compared to how easy it is to get your print book into Amazon, Barnes&Noble or Apple. And then there are discounts, returns and commissions… not to speak of waiting times till your invoice is paid. Book distributors & wholesalers take care of all this – for a price.
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POD print and distribution
For small amounts of print books, say less than 2,000 books, an author is better off to have it “printed on demand”, done by CreateSpace or by Lightning Source, who are also the distributors. The printing might be higher priced, but you can decide on discounts and there will not be any returns from book stores for unsold books, which can be costly. POD produces only after receiving orders.
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Distributors
Let’s assume your book sells like hot cakes and you would like to have it distributed to book stores. So, how to find a book distributor? And should you go with a big, national or a smaller distributor?
An advantage to small distributors (often specialized in certain genres) is that they often know their bookstores better than larger distributors. The orders tend to be smaller but more realistic. Returns with larger distributors to bookstore chains can be very high: 30% returns is expected, but it can be as high as 70%.

Another option is to make an arrangement with a medium-size publisher who already has a distribution deal and a sales team. For a percentage of the sale, they could include your book in their catalog, which goes out with the sales reps to book stores across the country, and their sales team will present your book. Some publishers may want all the attention for their own titles, but some may like the idea: there’s no printing cost for them, for instance. Their catalogs are produced 5-6 months in advance.

Many large US book distributors won’t take you on before you have at least five to ten books in print. They might also want you to have a sales team who will present your books to booksellers, to show that you are willing to move those books. They also prefer a contract for a certain number of years. Another issue with full service distribution is that they take a minimum of 20% commission, but it will often be closer to 30% if you’re a small publisher. Check them out before signing with any book distributor. Talk to their customers (both publishers and bookstores) to verify they would be a recommendable company for you to work with.
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Be aware of these book industry distribution arrangements

1. Discounts: Bookstores get ($8 when a $20 book sells) or in percent, a 40% discount from the distributor, big box stores often get 45%.
2. Returns: Bookstores can return books back for credit against future orders, on average, about 30% of their initial sales might be returned. Paperbacks are not “stripped” so they can be shipped out again when another bookstore orders them. However, distributors may charge for warehousing of returns.
3. Commission: Sales reps work on commission and only gets paid when books “sell through” (sold to the consumer). The distribution company also works on commission, which is one of the reasons they are so picky about taking on non-validated clients: if the books don’t sell through, they lose the money they have spent storing and shipping the books, their commission is usually 25-30% ($5-6 on a $20 book).

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Direct Sales via your website
There is an even more lucrative way to sell your print book and distribute it: through your own website. You keep 100% of your revenue, and you know exactly who bought your books. Valuable data that you can use for promotion of your next book releases. The only “work” you have, is to stuff envelopes and ship your books once or twice a week – or more if you sell a lot. Setting up a PayPal account and an ordering form on your website is pretty easy. Direct selling means that you can make almost three times the amount per book than you can make, compared to a sale through traditional bookstore distributors.
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Book Fairs
Comb the Internet and regional newspapers for Book Fairs. Rent a booth or share one with other writers and have fun to meet readers in person, sign your books, maybe even meet library buyers and book store owners – and keep 100% revenue. Authors could even band together and exhibit at national and international book fairs, such as New York, Edinburgh, Leipzig, Bologna or Frankfurt. If ten or more authors for example share the cost for exhibition, travel and accommodation, it seems to be visible.
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Consignment at Bookstores
Some local independent bookstores will take books on consignment. A 60% to you, 40% to them split might seem a bit unfair to the uninitiated, but it’s the standard in the book trade. If sales are really good, some bookstores will offer to buy your book or you offer it to them which saves on paperwork and hassle. In this case you might offer them 50% discount.
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Fazit:
Small publishers and author-publishers with at least 3 books might be better off with Lightning Source / Ingram and CreateSpace combined – until their book sale numbers are into the several thousands – also due to the print on demand possibilities that both companies offer.

Lightning Source connects you with the world’s largest distribution channel of book wholesalers and retailers. In addition to distributing books through their parent company Ingram Books, they print to order, which means, your book is printed and ready for shipment in 12 hours or less. With over 30,000 wholesalers, retailers and booksellers in over 100 countries your titles will gain the maximum exposure.

Lightning Source / Ingram work  with over 28,000 publishers of all sizes around the world. They deliver digital, print, wholesale and distribution services through a single source, and makes it easy for you to reach more customers in more places.

CreateSpace has slightly lower print on demand fees and set up fees per book, but it doesn’t get you into Ingram worldwide distribution. They offer something, called the Expanded Distribution Channel: “the potential to distribute your book to a larger audience through more outlets including: retailers, bookstores, libraries, academic institutions, wholesalers, and distributors.” Well “potential” which means actually nothing! If a bookstore is really willing to order a single book from them, they will deliver…

Whole Sale and Book Distribution in USA

• BCH Fulfillment & Distribution – BCH is also a vendor for Ingram, Baker & Taylor, Amazon and Barnes and Noble. BCH offers 24/7 telephone order taking, an on-line catalog, representation at major trade shows, and more.
• Atlas Books - Distributes online, via wholesalers, and commissioned sales reps. AtlasBooks is the distribution and marketing arm of the BookMasters Group which represents small to mid-size publishers.
• Midpoint Trade Books – works with small and medium size publishers. No catalogs, so they can take on new titles any time of the year. 
• National Book Network – Distributes for 85 publishers, they offer Print on Demand, starting at 20 books
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Book Whole Sale / Distribution in Canada:

• North 49 – trade book wholesaler with an inventory of over 3000 bestselling books from more than 500 publishers from Canada, UK and USA 
• Librarybound – a wholesaler delivers Canadian books to libraries (fulfillment orders only, no warehousing)
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More resources:

Distributors and Wholesalers, compiled by IBPA, Independent Book Publishers Association
https://www.ibpa-online.org/resources/distributor-wholesalers/#.UWlwW7VO-So

Create Space Vs Lightning Source
http://write2publish.blogspot.ca/2011/02/why-create-space-is-better-than.html

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With 30 years experience in both, print and now e-publishing, we can provide you with many more tips, background information and support – additional to the huge amount of promotion you get in our online and off-line seminars. http://www.111Publishing.com/seminars

 

If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

If you enjoyed this blog post, please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 710 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

Thanks a lot for following:

@111publishing

http://pinterest.com/111publishing/

http://on.fb.me/TvqDaK

http://bit.ly/VmtVAS 111Publishing @ Google+

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How to organize Printing or Print on Demand

Printing – to sell more books?

Why should you have a print book, such as a paper back and not go with the digital version only? In a former blog post we listed eleven reasons for this:

• The majority of book buyers still chooses printed books at the moment (that will change)
• You can give out review copies to newspaper/magazine or book blog reviewers
• To be hosted at local media / TV interviewers who want to show a copy of your book
• To sell your book easier to libraries
• To participate in a Goodreads giveaway
• To sell your book to those who really don’t want an e-Reader or just love paper books
• If you write non-fiction it is almost a must to offer it in paper as well
• You have an ISBN number and can get listed with Bowker at worldwide bookstores
• Physical books are just nicer to give on Christmas – unless you put an e-book on a new e-Reader and wrap it
• To sell more e-books! Yes – because they seem to cost so much less in comparison…
• To list your book in more categories / genres on Amazon: per book type you are allowed to choose two categories / genres. Two print and two digital versions – which increases your books’ visibility and also shows you exactly in which genre you have the most success.
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Espresso Book Machine

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During your pre-production phase you acquired already a bar code (for your print book) and an ISBN, the International Standard Book Number, a 13-digit number that uniquely identifies books published anywhere in the world. How to get one? Or better a blog of ten, if you intend to write more books. The price of a blog of ten is the same as buying only two ISBN’s.

Good news for authors in Canada: ISBN are free for Canadian citizens, publishing a book in Canada – no matter were it is sold. But that’s not the only benefit for the publishing industry in this country.

Selling your e-book on Amazon doesn’t necessarily require an ISBN, you will get automatically an ASIN, Amazon’s identifier. Other retailers may require an ISBN, such as Kobo URL for example.
ISBN numbers are assigned by a group of agencies worldwide coordinated by the International ISBN Agency in London, England.  In the United States, ISBN’s are assigned by the U.S. ISBN Agency: R.R. Bowker is the independent agent in the US for this system. You can apply for an ISBN online. On average it takes about two weeks for ISBN’s to be assigned. Getting your own ISBN is very important, as the initial purchaser of this number is considered officially as the publisher. Don’t fall for “free” ISBN and don’t purchase it from other sources than the official organizations.

 

Plan and calculate printing carefully
Unless you have hundreds or even thousands of paperback orders, it doesn’t make sense to have your book printed the traditional way. Book printers expect a run of at least five thousand books to give you a reasonable price per book. Avoid to be one of these authors who have a garage full of books and no idea how to sell them ever. Get your distribution channels (more about this in one of the next blogs) first and then order your printing.
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For small print runs consider “Print On Demand”
CreateSpace and Lightning Source are recommendable POD’s who offer small print quantities and are distributing your book to wholesale and retailers. They have changed the book publishing landscape considerably. The issue of discounts and returns (the banes in book selling) are one of the primary reasons you might use them. Getting into Lightning Source (LSI) requires you have at least three books for sale. If you have only one book, you can band together with other authors, however, one of you has to be the official publisher. You can get your book into Amazon.com and Barnes&Noble.com with only a 20% discount, and you avoid accepting returns.
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Use both POD services for best results
Printing through Lightning Source is the least expensive way to get your book into Amazon.com. If you get into Amazon via a distributor or the Amazon Advantage program, you’ll pay a slightly higher discount. Lightning Source is owned by Ingram, so when you sign up with LSI and pay $12 per year (per title), you get your book into Ingram’s large distribution network.
The benefit of CreateSpace: it’s owned by Amazon and your book will always show as available on Amazon’s website. However you can go with both to get full advantages and broader distribution of your book.
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For just a few copies use “Espresso Book Machine”
If you don’t want to have print books, but would like to have a book signing or your grandma wants a copy of your book in paper, use either a print shop that offers digital printing or any of these Espresso Book Machines that are sprouting up in large cities. You certainly can order it online from them and get it shipped. Their prices are a bit higher, but if you need a bunch of books “yesterday” then it is a good option. Locations can be found at their North America Map.
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Traditional book printing
Finding a cost effective Book Printer who wants to deal with a small publisher requires a bit of a search. Most printers can print books but few printers are professional book printers. There are only about 50,000 printers in North America and only a handful of them are book printers. Few book printers want to work with the first time publisher. Get referrals from other writers, check out books in your library that often shows the name of the printer or ask at writer seminars others about their experiences with printers. Don’t just order it from the first book printer you cross, get at least ten quotes for printing & binding prices, including shipping costs and references to have enough points to compare. Then ask those printers to give you titles of books they printed, and even maybe contact the independent authors, who dealt with the printer. A Google search or the Better Business Bureau regarding the printers reputation might be helpful too. Sample printing calculations can be found here: http://www.selfpublishing.com/

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Expect at least about 2-3 weeks in average including freight, but this depends heavily on your printer’s schedule – The earlier you book, the less time you need to budget. Add at least ten days as a safety margin for unforeseen’s, such as lost freight, weather disasters, machine breakdowns and other delays. A great source for detailed information about the printing process and explanations of trade-specific “slang” can be found at http://www.creativemindspress.com/printing.htm

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Use the printing time to increase your marketing efforts:

• Plan and advertise the book launch
• Get as many pre-order for your book as possible
• Increase Social Media efforts and sign up with even more reader forums
• Spruce up your web page and write lots of blogs
• Prepare news / press releases
• Schedule interviews and book signings
• Use Google+, Flickr, Pinterest etc. to show your new books’ cover image

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The book release date is not the end of your book journey, but the beginning. Your book should have an active life span of at least 2-5 years, and much longer for an e-book, as it is a living document and can be revised to a new version any time. You now have almost a full-time job of being an author, and should continue to perform all of the marketing activities that you have been ramping up before.  More about book distribution channels in the next blog post. Stay tuned!

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