Everything I Know about Self-Publishing(hackpad.com)
hackpad.com
Everything I Know about Self-Publishing
https://hackpad.com/Everything-I-Know-about-Self-Publishing-d4zCU7alhJX
7 comments
What was your book about? Fiction, non-fiction?
Non-fiction.
Making a financial success of fiction is (even) harder. Much harder. Generally speaking, I think you need a publisher behind you for fiction, although Amanda Hocking recently managed to bootstrap her way to self-published vampire success.
Making a financial success of fiction is (even) harder. Much harder. Generally speaking, I think you need a publisher behind you for fiction, although Amanda Hocking recently managed to bootstrap her way to self-published vampire success.
I agree -- harder to be successful in self-publishing for fiction.
(1) There's less "need" for your book. People aren't saying, "gosh, I wish I could find a book on zombies from Mars attacking Earth. Let's see what my options are!" (2) You can't differentiate yourself as easily. (3) To be successful as an author, you need a platform / promotional strategy. It's harder to build that with fiction books (at least until you are well-known). In an "informational" space (business, reference, technical, etc), you can build up a following by starting a business or a website that provides assistance in some area.
(1) There's less "need" for your book. People aren't saying, "gosh, I wish I could find a book on zombies from Mars attacking Earth. Let's see what my options are!" (2) You can't differentiate yourself as easily. (3) To be successful as an author, you need a platform / promotional strategy. It's harder to build that with fiction books (at least until you are well-known). In an "informational" space (business, reference, technical, etc), you can build up a following by starting a business or a website that provides assistance in some area.
Both this and the link to James Altucher's article in the sibling comment should prove to be very useful for my upcoming self-published book[1], especially the link to the image generator. Thanks for sharing!
[1]: http://www.petekeen.com/mastering-modern-payments
[1]: http://www.petekeen.com/mastering-modern-payments
Good luck! I signed up for the free chapter, and feel free to contact me if you'd like some feedback.
great stuff, thanks! you should also check out James Altucher's recent article, it has tonnes of great tips:
http://www.copyblogger.com/professional-self-publishing
Can someone explain to me why the author is implying CreateSpace is disreputable?
Apparently ISBN's are not acceptable from there an bookstores will not order through them. Why would this be?
Apparently ISBN's are not acceptable from there an bookstores will not order through them. Why would this be?
You can use CreateSpace to print and distribute your books to Amazon. I do.
Just don't use CreateSpace as your publisher, i.e. don't buy their ISBNs. For a number of reasons, you want to be the publisher of record, which requires buying your own ISBNs (from Bowker, in the US).
Just don't use CreateSpace as your publisher, i.e. don't buy their ISBNs. For a number of reasons, you want to be the publisher of record, which requires buying your own ISBNs (from Bowker, in the US).
CreateSpace is a self-publishing service owned by Amazon. It has a direct effect of undermining publishers and bookstores. For obvious reason other bookstores do not work with CreateSpace.
Undermining in a good way?
Former CreateSpace publisher here. CreateSpace has purchased a large block of ISBNs, which it "recycles" among its books: if you publish a book, then stop publishing it, it will be reused for someone else. They also don't update the ISBN even if you radically revise the content of the book. Needless to say, this wreaks havoc with 3rd-party inventory systems that rely on the ISBN on being unique... although in my particular case, it saved our ass!
http://gyrovague.com/2012/12/18/wikitravel-press-seven-lesso...
http://gyrovague.com/2012/12/18/wikitravel-press-seven-lesso...
I'm not sure that's true that CreateSpace recycles its ISBNs. I haven't seen a credible source discussing this, and it doesn't make sense to me. ISBNs are cheap and it would be a pretty gross misuse of the ISBN system (which are supposed to be unique even across different formats of a book).
It may be that they will "recycle" an ISBN if you start the process with them but never actually complete the publishing process.
It may be that they will "recycle" an ISBN if you start the process with them but never actually complete the publishing process.
Whoa! Not saying CreateSpace is disreputable at all. I love CreateSpace.
It is, however, a self-publishing service and thus it is "disreputable" in that sense. There's additional credibility when you're backed by a publisher, particularly a major one. Thus, by using CreateSpace, you're lacking some credibility there. That credibility, as well as the sales channels, can be pretty valuable for getting a book into a store.
There's nothing wrong with CreateSpace specifically though.
That said, Barnes and Noble will not order books for their stores through CreateSpace (unless, perhaps, specifically requested by a customer). That is, it won't stock books with a CreateSpace ISBN on their shelves.
One person (who handles independently published books) at Barnes and Noble told me that this is because CreateSpace / Amazon is a competitor. Maybe that's true, or maybe CreateSpace does something funky with returns (like not accepting them with good enough terms) or doesn't offer a sufficient discount. I'm not sure.
Regardless of the reason, the fact remains that Barnes and Noble will not accept books printed by CreateSpace for their stores. (They will, however, list them on their website... which I can't imagine many people order from.)
AND -- if you purchase your ISBN from CreateSpace, then CreateSpace owns your ISBN and only CreateSpace can print your book. You can't, say, have CreateSpace print your book for Amazon sales and then Lightning Source print your book for B&N sales (or Pothi.com for India).
If purchase your own ISBN (for like $250), then you can print through multiple sources. This will allow you to print your book with Lightning Source (as well as CreateSpace), and thus get into Barnes and Noble stores.
That said, for the vast, vast majority of self-published books (or any book), getting into Barnes and Noble stores just isn't going to happen anyway.
Happy to answer more questions / clarify!
It is, however, a self-publishing service and thus it is "disreputable" in that sense. There's additional credibility when you're backed by a publisher, particularly a major one. Thus, by using CreateSpace, you're lacking some credibility there. That credibility, as well as the sales channels, can be pretty valuable for getting a book into a store.
There's nothing wrong with CreateSpace specifically though.
That said, Barnes and Noble will not order books for their stores through CreateSpace (unless, perhaps, specifically requested by a customer). That is, it won't stock books with a CreateSpace ISBN on their shelves.
One person (who handles independently published books) at Barnes and Noble told me that this is because CreateSpace / Amazon is a competitor. Maybe that's true, or maybe CreateSpace does something funky with returns (like not accepting them with good enough terms) or doesn't offer a sufficient discount. I'm not sure.
Regardless of the reason, the fact remains that Barnes and Noble will not accept books printed by CreateSpace for their stores. (They will, however, list them on their website... which I can't imagine many people order from.)
AND -- if you purchase your ISBN from CreateSpace, then CreateSpace owns your ISBN and only CreateSpace can print your book. You can't, say, have CreateSpace print your book for Amazon sales and then Lightning Source print your book for B&N sales (or Pothi.com for India).
If purchase your own ISBN (for like $250), then you can print through multiple sources. This will allow you to print your book with Lightning Source (as well as CreateSpace), and thus get into Barnes and Noble stores.
That said, for the vast, vast majority of self-published books (or any book), getting into Barnes and Noble stores just isn't going to happen anyway.
Happy to answer more questions / clarify!
Thanks, that was a great answer! I just misunderstood your intent in the OP, good clarification.
This is already a great list, and it's just a few of the resources available to people hoping to achieve success with self-publishing.
Great list of tips. I helped a friend self pub his first novel about 3 years ago. Amazing experience, I organized the cover (lucky to kow an extremely talented graphic designer who worked for a small percentage of sales) and I did all the internal layout using indesign (the OP was right on how much of a technical nightmare it is to get up and running with InD!)
My inspiration and guide for working with the interior of the book, believe it or not, was don knuth's TAOCP. That is one of the most beautifully typeset books I've ever read (ha, I mean have tried to read over the last 12 years). It was a lot harder than I had imagined, and took a lot of by hand tweaking to make each and every page look just right. But it was worth it as the printed version of the book looks great, without the self-published look I've noticed from people who I believe may have just downloaded a template for Word to layout the book.
I don't know about the various comments here about createspace isbn's. That's what we went with, and small bookstores and Barnes and Noble stock the paperback version. (Although I don't know if B&N have it in their stores, but you can buy the paperback version online through them)
The hardest part we found was the marketing. My friend started a blog, and is active on twitter, pinterest and Facebook. The book is a novel so he can't show domain knowledge via the blog, but his blog is entertaining and does lead to sales as the book contains comedy, but isn't a comedic work.
The biggest problem was trying to reach out to traditional media - not even a rejection email from various reviewers we tried to reach out to, even though we focused on papers where he is from and also where the book is set (Philly and Pitsburgh). This could of course be because of the fact that it's self published. But when is next book becomes a big hit we will remember the great websites and independent magazines that did review the book so they'll get first dibs on the author. But I will definetly go through this list with a fine toothed comb when I have a chance and check out the marketing tracking tips.
Regarding piracy, we believed in the old adage that I think O'Reilly came up with - 'It's not piracy that kills authors, it's obscurity.' But I couldn't convince him to go the whole hog like Paulo Coello and upload his book himself to pirate book sites, and I can understand as we worked on the book for about 4 years (by we I mean him doing all the work and me cracking a whip to keep him motivated and writing, then proofreading and editing through 4 drafts)
Happy to say he's sold a few copies, and it keeps plugging along. This summer I get to do it all again as he has almost finished the first draft of his second novel.
If you want to check it out, the novel is called 'Senseless' and the author is Damien Galeone (http://damiengaleone.com). The book is available on both Amazon and B&N (paper, kindle and nook) Or you can email me if you want a copy of the book in PDF, if you'd like to check out the internal formatting (this is marketing, not piracy and I just called the author he said he's fine to hand out some copies:)my email is in my profile.
My inspiration and guide for working with the interior of the book, believe it or not, was don knuth's TAOCP. That is one of the most beautifully typeset books I've ever read (ha, I mean have tried to read over the last 12 years). It was a lot harder than I had imagined, and took a lot of by hand tweaking to make each and every page look just right. But it was worth it as the printed version of the book looks great, without the self-published look I've noticed from people who I believe may have just downloaded a template for Word to layout the book.
I don't know about the various comments here about createspace isbn's. That's what we went with, and small bookstores and Barnes and Noble stock the paperback version. (Although I don't know if B&N have it in their stores, but you can buy the paperback version online through them)
The hardest part we found was the marketing. My friend started a blog, and is active on twitter, pinterest and Facebook. The book is a novel so he can't show domain knowledge via the blog, but his blog is entertaining and does lead to sales as the book contains comedy, but isn't a comedic work.
The biggest problem was trying to reach out to traditional media - not even a rejection email from various reviewers we tried to reach out to, even though we focused on papers where he is from and also where the book is set (Philly and Pitsburgh). This could of course be because of the fact that it's self published. But when is next book becomes a big hit we will remember the great websites and independent magazines that did review the book so they'll get first dibs on the author. But I will definetly go through this list with a fine toothed comb when I have a chance and check out the marketing tracking tips.
Regarding piracy, we believed in the old adage that I think O'Reilly came up with - 'It's not piracy that kills authors, it's obscurity.' But I couldn't convince him to go the whole hog like Paulo Coello and upload his book himself to pirate book sites, and I can understand as we worked on the book for about 4 years (by we I mean him doing all the work and me cracking a whip to keep him motivated and writing, then proofreading and editing through 4 drafts)
Happy to say he's sold a few copies, and it keeps plugging along. This summer I get to do it all again as he has almost finished the first draft of his second novel.
If you want to check it out, the novel is called 'Senseless' and the author is Damien Galeone (http://damiengaleone.com). The book is available on both Amazon and B&N (paper, kindle and nook) Or you can email me if you want a copy of the book in PDF, if you'd like to check out the internal formatting (this is marketing, not piracy and I just called the author he said he's fine to hand out some copies:)my email is in my profile.
"I don't know about the various comments here about createspace isbn's. That's what we went with, and small bookstores and Barnes and Noble stock the paperback version. (Although I don't know if B&N have it in their stores, but you can buy the paperback version online through them)"
Right. It's carrying it in B&N physical stores that's an issue. They will put it up on the website or allow a customer to order through a store.
B&N won't stock books printed by CreateSpace in their physical stores. And, as long as you have a CreateSpace-owned ISBN, only CreateSpace can print the book.
That said, for the vast majority of self-published authors, it's sort of irrelevant. B&N won't carry their books because they're not selling well enough.
Right. It's carrying it in B&N physical stores that's an issue. They will put it up on the website or allow a customer to order through a store.
B&N won't stock books printed by CreateSpace in their physical stores. And, as long as you have a CreateSpace-owned ISBN, only CreateSpace can print the book.
That said, for the vast majority of self-published authors, it's sort of irrelevant. B&N won't carry their books because they're not selling well enough.
To keep your options open, you definitely want to buy your own ISBNs from Bowker (if in the US).
Above all, do not use a "vanity press" that charges you to publish your books.
Source: The rewarding and time-consuming experience of self-publishing my first book.