Doris-Maria Heilmann's Blog, page 3
September 9, 2018
Fall 2018 & Spring 2019 Writer’s Conferences
Why attending writer’s conferences? Well, it’s very inspiring to be surrounded by other writers. The writing process can be solitary so being surrounded by other writers who are also going through the process is motivating – no matter at what stage of writing career you’re at. Learn to practice your pitch, clarify your book concept, get inspired, get feedback, and learn a lot of new things – way more than you expected.
PNWA 2018 Conference Seattle, WA
Take your writing to the next level. Attend the Pacific Northwest Writers’ Association 2018 Conference, one of largest writing conferences in the country.
Sep 13-16, 2018
https://www.pnwa.org/default.aspx
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Southern California Writers’ Conference
Believing that craft matters, SCWC has facilitated well over $4 million in first-time authors’ book and screen deals. Irvine, CA, Los Angeles, Palm Springs & San Diego, CA: Sunriver, OR.
Sept. 21-23, 2018
http://writersconference.com/la/
Flathead River Writers Conference in Kalispell, MT
Presenter expertise – memoir, publicist, digital marketing, writing blockbuster fiction & series, the path to publishing. Agent and publisher conferences for early registrants
September 22-23, 2018
https://www.authorsoftheflathead.org/conference.asp
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Write on the Sound – Edmonds, WA
Writers’ Conference and Pre-Conference
Located on Puget Sound, this affordable and small conference focuses on the craft of writing, plus information on publishing, marketing, and specialty topics.
October 5-7, 2018
http://www.writeonthesound.com/
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James Bonnet’s Storymaking Workshops in France & California
7 Day Storymaking Retreats in CA and France for Novelists and Screenwriters with James Bonnet. Santa Monica, CA – Sep 8-14, 2018. Nans sous Ste Anne, France – Santa Monica, CA: France.
Oct 6-12 and Oct 15-21, 2018
https://www.storymaking.com/
Florida Literary Arts Coalition Annual Other Words Conference
St. Augustine, FL
This year’s theme is Water: flood, fish, drought, swim, drink, rain, rivers, tears, dams, oceans, and other sundry wetness.
Oct 11-13, 2018
http://www.floridarts.org/
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Sanibel Island,FL, Writers Conference
Four-day conference for writers of all levels, features workshops, panels, and consultations with our faculty of celebrated authors and teachers.
Nov 8-11, 2018
https://www2.fgcu.edu/siwc/
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Writers Studio at UCLA Extension
An intensive 4 days of instruction and writing. Participants choose from 10 workshops in which they work closely with a professional writer, limited to 15 students.
February 7-10, 2019
http://writers.uclaextension.edu/writers-studio/
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San Miguel (de Allende) Writers’ Conference
San Miguel de Allende, Mexico
See why Tom Robbins said: “If Dante had had the San Miguel experience, he might have written more about heaven and less about hell.”
February 13-17, 2019
https://sanmiguelwritersconference.org/
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2019 Las Vegas, NV, Writer’s Conference
Las Vegas Writer’s Conference has sessions and workshops for all levels of writers from beginners to ready to publish whether traditional or self- publishing
May 2-4, 2019
https://hendersonwritersgroup.com/las-vegas-writers-conference/
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Search for more writing programs by location or keyword, or view a calendar of upcoming writing events: http://writing.shawguides.com/
The energy of being around so many other people who are excited about this process is absolutely contagious. A writing conference will leave you invigorated and charged up, ready to head out into the real literary world.
Oh, BTW, you can write it off as a business expense. Yes, you’ll get a tax break for attending a writers’ conference – even if you haven’t started making money yet.
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Books by Doris-Maria Heilmann:
111 Tips to Create Impressive Videos:
How to Plan, Create, Upload and Market Videos
https://www.books2read.com/u/3GYnpa
111 Tips To Make Money With Writing
The Art of Making a Living Full-time Writing
An Essential Guide for More Income as Freelancer
https://books2read.com/u/bWZMjz
111 Tips on How to Market Your Book for Free:
Detailed Plans and Smart Strategies for Your Book’s Success
https://books2read.com/u/bMre1a
111 Tips to Get Free Book Reviews:
Best Strategies for Getting Lots of Great Reviews
plus 1,200+ reviewer contact links
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5nx5
Book Marketing on a Shoestring:
How Authors Can Promote their Books Without Spending a Lot of Money
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5gdp
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September 2, 2018
CreateSpace Now Replaced by KDP Print
Last fall we published – for the first time print books in the German language via the printing arm of KDP. We were very lucky as the books were in German, and intended for readers in Europe. The language and the country for which the books were mostly intended for are supported by KDP. That’s not the case in some other countries:
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Languages
Authors and publishers can upload and sell books with content and metadata written in the languages listed here: https://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/help/topic/G200673300
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Distribution – Orders
Amazon’s KDP Print doesn’t currently support several paperback distributions, for example to Amazon.com.au, Amazon.com.br, or Amazon.nl. Australian users can place orders from Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk. Portuguese language users can place orders from Amazon.com. Dutch language users can place orders from Amazon.de.
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Other Requirements:
Let your lay-outer, e-book formatter, and cover designer know about the Amazon specifics, such as trim sizes. They are varying slightly from those of CreateSpace for example.
The most common trim size for paperbacks in the U.S. is 6″ x 9″ (15.24 x 22.86 cm), this will be displayed as the default option when you access the “Print Options” from the Paperback Content section of your book. If you want a different trim size, click “Select a different size” from the “Print Options” section and choose from Standard and Non-standard Trim sizes. Here’s a list of industry-standard options:
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See also the cover sizes
https://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/help/topic/G201953020
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Metadata
Books are linked automatically if the author name and book title of both editions match exactly. During the publishing process, KDP tries to match book details like title and author name to other editions available in the Amazon catalog. Linking these formats provides the ideal browsing experience for customers, so you’ll want to make sure the title and author name you entered for your eBook and paperback match exactly.
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Amazon’s Recent Updates to Paperback Features
– Publishers and authors can now order printed proofs from KDP.
– Author copies from KDP are a greatly appreciated step too. Books can be stocked in local bookstores and libraries or used as advance review copies, press release packages, paperback giveaways, and for book signings or to sell at readings and workshops.
KDP introduced their author copies and proofs – printed and shipped from Europe which will please British and European authors.
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Author Chris Mullen wrote: “It looks increasingly as if KDP will eventually become CreateSpace’s equal sister company. Perhaps the two companies will be soon consolidated, or perhaps all the CreateSpace titles will migrate to KDP.” He wrote a quite detailed comparison between the POD offers of CreateSpace and Kindle Direct Publishing.
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How to “Move” from CreateSpace to KDP Print
Nicholas Rossis explains in a recent article:
“Set up a new paperback title on your KDP Bookshelf. On the Paperback Details page, enter the same metadata used for your CreateSpace book.
Select “Yes” when asked whether this book was previously published on CreateSpace.
Click “Save and Continue” to move on to the Paperback Content page.
Under the ISBN header, enter the same 13-digit ISBN used to publish your book on CreateSpace. Do you have a 10-digit ISBN issued by CreateSpace? If so, use the ISBN converter to find your 13-digit ISBN equivalent.
Click “Continue” to sign in to your CreateSpace account and validate your ownership of the title.
Once you’re redirected back to KDP, your book’s files and details should update automatically. Scroll through to see that your files and information have properly transferred over. You can launch the Previewer to review your book before publishing.
Scroll to the bottom of the Paperback Content page and click “Save and Continue.”
In the Paperback Rights & Pricing tab, you can enter the same price you used on CreateSpace.
Now scroll to the bottom to submit your book for publishing.”
“After you publish your CreateSpace book on KDP, Amazon will automatically remove your CreateSpace paperback from the sale. Your KDP sales will be tracked in your KDP sales and royalty reports.”
Read more details in this Amazon article – for example, what to do if your book cover or interior book layout has previously been created by CreateSpace. If you plan on using multiple POD platforms at the same time, then using KDP Print and Ingram Spark at the same time will work just fine.
Amazon finally sent Createspace users last week an email – informing them that Createspace is merging into KDP Print.
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Books by Doris-Maria Heilmann:
111 Tips to Create Impressive Videos:
How to Plan, Create, Upload and Market Video
https://books2read.com/u/bP5wrd
111 Tips To Make Money With Writing
The Art of Making a Living Full-time Writing
An Essential Guide for More Income as Freelancer
https://books2read.com/u/bWZMjz
111 Tips on How to Market Your Book for Free:
Detailed Plans and Smart Strategies for Your Book’s Success
https://books2read.com/u/bMre1a
111 Tips to Get Free Book Reviews:
Best Strategies for Getting Lots of Great Reviews
plus 1,200+ reviewer contact links
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5nx5
111 Tips to Create Your Book Trailer
How to Create, Where to Upload and How to Market Your Videos
https://books2read.com/u/mVZkjr
Book Marketing on a Shoestring:
How Authors Can Promote their Books Without Spending a Lot of Money
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5gdp
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August 27, 2018
Statistics On How You Can Better Use Social Media
When I started out on social media ten years ago – seems like a lifetime – there were no books, articles, stats or any data available. Spending many hours a day on all kind of sites (sometimes that are long gone) and still sticking with Google+, Twitter, Pinterest and LinkedIn I had to learn mostly through trial and error. Nowadays it’s much easier:
“Data and statistics might give you a good starting point for testing out your own strategies. Start with these statistics, test them for yourself, and find the best system that works for you”, explains social media guru Kevan Lee.
First Things First: Maximize Your Profile Data
Help more awesome people find you. Hava complete bio and links to your blog, web and social media presence. You need to help people find you and make it easy for them to follow you.
Your Biggest Advocates Might Have the Fewest Followers
Social monitoring website Mention analyzed over 1 billion social mentions from the past two years, and in their analysis, they found that 91 percent of mentions come from people with fewer than 500 followers. Less than 10% of mentions will come from a power user. You can prioritize these power users if you want, but it’s also important to give a quick and delightful response to those with few followers—the vast majority of those talking about you.
Less Than an Hour to Respond on Twitter
Consumers expect a lot from you on Twitter, as recent research by Lithium Technologies confirms. According to Lithium, 53 percent of users who tweet at a brand expect a response within the hour. The percentage increases to 72 percent for those with a complaint. As a business owner either invest in a monitoring service to manage your timeline or get really good at checking your Twitter email alerts.
Late Night = Best Time For Retweets
TrackMaven analyzed over 1.7 million tweets to come up with data behind the best practices for earning a retweet. The best time of the day to tweet for a retweet? After-hours, between 10:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m. ET. is the best time of day for a retweet. Track Maven also found that Sundays are the best day of the week to get retweets and that tweeting with the word “Retweet” or with all caps or exclamation points leads to more retweets.
The Social Intelligence Report from Adobe analyzed over 225 billion Facebook posts. Their research on the best day to post pointed to a clear winner: Fridays, with more comments, likes, and shares than any other day of the week.
Twitter, Pinterest, and Facebook Drive the Most Traffic
In terms of quantity, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter are the top three referrers of traffic. Social sharing site Shareaholic revealed an interesting split in the way that social media
YouTube, Google+, and LinkedIn Are the TOP Three Sources!
Get involved in social media accordingly. If you’re after a big reach and spreading brand awareness, go with Facebook and Twitter, and think long and hard about joining Pinterest, too. If you’re interested in more qualified traffic, then be sure to invest time in Google+, LinkedIn, and YouTube.
There’s a “Best Day” for Everything on Pinterest
The Pinterest blog recently revealed which categories get the most engagement on each day of the week:
Monday: Fitness
Tuesday: Technology
Wednesday: Inspirational quotes
Thursday: Fashion
Friday: Humor
Saturday: Travel
Sunday: Food and crafts
If possible, create a Pinterest board that touches on each of these seven topics, and build this sort of specific sharing into your Pinterest schedule.
Written Content Trumps Visuals
Social Media Examiner’s annual survey of nearly 3,000 marketers leads to a ton of insights into how marketers think about social media and sharing. Surprisingly, 58 percent claim written content is their most important form of social content. Visual content came in second (19 percent.) Original written content can be a great opportunity for thought leadership, authority, and brand awareness. When you’re creating new content to share, keep in mind the power of storytelling.
When Thinking of Social Media, Think of a Big Party!
Imagine you are invited to a big party. You are entering the room, you say hello to everyone, you small-talk a bit, you participate in a discussion, you listen what others say, you make some compliments or praise someone, you have fun and you show yourself from your best side.
https://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2013/11/17/which-social-network-is-best-for-authors/
Are You a Good Party Guest?
https://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2012/12/11/acting-like-a-professional-author-on-social-media/
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Books by Doris-Maria Heilmann:
111 Tips to Create Impressive Videos:
How to Plan, Create, Upload and Market Videos
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BYDH41S/
111 Tips To Make Money With Writing
The Art of Making a Living Full-time Writing
An Essential Guide for More Income as Freelancer
https://books2read.com/u/bWZMjz
111 Tips on How to Market Your Book for Free:
Detailed Plans and Smart Strategies for Your Book’s Success
https://books2read.com/u/bMre1a
111 Tips to Get Free Book Reviews:
Best Strategies for Getting Lots of Great Reviews
plus 1,200+ reviewer contact links
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5nx5
111 Tips to Create Your Book Trailer
How to Create, Where to Upload and How to Market Your Videos
https://books2read.com/u/mVZkjr
Book Marketing on a Shoestring:
How Authors Can Promote their Books Without Spending a Lot of Money
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5gdp
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August 21, 2018
Scammers and Self-Proclaimed Indie Professionals
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M.A. Demers, a publishing consultant, and author wrote in an article:
“As with anything successful, scammers and self-proclaimed indie professionals have multiplied like cockroaches, lining up to abuse the dreams and pocketbooks of indie authors.”
Vanity publishers whose tactics are at best misleading and at worst fraudulent. They are often small printers who claim they offer print on demand (POD) services when they only offer short-run digital printing.
Beware of:
marketing companies that promise instant fame and financial success – for a hefty price – and never deliver
companies that offer paid positive reviews
ebook formatters who troll the indie writer forums
exaggerating technical difficulties and exploiting author inexperience in order to drum up business
self-declared editors who offer cheap proofing services but do nothing more than placing a manuscript through word spell-checking.
These practices have made it crucial for authors to research the “business offers” and to think critically, to check references before contracting services, and to learn the right questions to ask so as not to be defrauded. DO NOT enter into an agreement with any publishing service without checking their professional background, history, their reputation, and ethics first.
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How to Find the Rotten Appels:
JustPublishingAdvice offers some tips on how to identify scammers:
Unsolicited Invitations to Submit Your Manuscript
“Literary agents and publishers all have huge slush piles, so none would be asking to make them even higher. If you are asked to submit your manuscript by someone you don’t know, especially by unsolicited email, DO NOT reply. It’s 99.9999% sure to be a scam.”
Marketers and Racketeers
“DO NOT pay for book marketing services packages. Arrange and pay advertisers for your book advertising directly with reputable and well-known advertising service providers.”
Vanity Publishing
“The key warning signal that you are dealing with a vanity press is when you discover that you are being asked to pay a huge amount of money upfront to publish your book. It means that the author pays for everything in the publishing process, which can often amount to thousands of dollars. This cost does not normally include marketing a book other than that it will available on the vanity publisher’s website. Vanity Publishers don’t make their money from selling books, they make it from letting the author pay top $$$ for (often lousy) publishing service.” A detailed article on how dangerous for authors these vanity publishing contracts are can be found in one of my blog posts.
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More Helpful Sites With Warnings How to Avoid Scams:
https://accrispin.blogspot.com/
https://blog.reedsy.com/scams-and-publishing-companies-to-avoid/
https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/literary-agent-advice-_n_1855541
Stop: Vanity Publishing aka Subsidy Publishers
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Books by Doris-Maria Heilmann:
111 Tips to Create Impressive Videos:
How to Plan, Create, Upload and Market Videos
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BYDH41S/
111 Tips To Make Money With Writing
The Art of Making a Living Full-time Writing
An Essential Guide for More Income as Freelancer
https://books2read.com/u/bWZMjz
111 Tips on How to Market Your Book for Free:
Detailed Plans and Smart Strategies for Your Book’s Success
https://books2read.com/u/bMre1a
111 Tips to Get Free Book Reviews:
Best Strategies for Getting Lots of Great Reviews
plus 1,200+ reviewer contact links
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5nx5
111 Tips to Create Your Book Trailer
How to Create, Where to Upload and How to Market Your Videos
https://books2read.com/u/mVZkjr
Book Marketing on a Shoestring:
How Authors Can Promote their Books Without Spending a Lot of Money
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5gdp
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August 14, 2018
5 Ways How You Can Beat Your Competition
Did you notice that all of the online book sites, be it Apple’s book sales pages, BarnesandNoble.com (they show even several slots with books in the same genre), Amazon.com, or Kobo, wherever your book is sold, have a listing at the bottom of the screen that says “Customers also bought” or “People who bought this book also bought …” and then it shows all the books of your competition. They are listed on print sites or e-book sites (or both). So, what can you do to beat your book’s competition?
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Write More Books
If you write more books, say between five and nine books, and readers like what you do, guess whose books appear in this paragraph? Yours! If you only publish one book, then those slots get filled with books, written by other authors. These book suggestions show that readers who liked not only but also bought these books. A great example of a very prolific writer with more than 20 romance books is Jan Scarbrough. Just click on one of her books, scroll down and you will see lots of her other books shown under “Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought…”
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Write More Short Stories
However, it might take years until you have written so many books that only yours show up as suggestions.
An even better way to promote your writing is to write and sell short stories as e-books (either self-published or traditionally). Unlike book publishers, short story publishers only hold onto exclusive rights to the story for a limited period of time. After that period of time, either the rights revert to you or they become non-exclusive. Read more about book contracts and rights in former blog posts. You license your copyright for a certain period of time. After this period of time – specified by your publishing contract – you can then put your short story up as an e-book or put it in an e-book collection of your own (or both), without having to remove that story from the place of first publication. If you self-publish your short stories you can do whatever you want and don’t need to wait until your publishing contract expires. Short story markets will allow new readers to sample your work. Readers you would never ever reach without.
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Sampling is the Best Way to Hook a Reader
Retail businesses know the importance of sampling. Sampling in grocery stores work. I almost always buy these food novelties after I can try them. Then there are the many samples arriving in the weekly flyers, and personal products, such as shampoo or body lotions get promoted through hotels to their guests. In the past, some publishers would offer the first chapter of each book in their new book listings, but they only handed these reading samples out at book fairs or to bookstore owners. But barely anyone read them. Readers can download samples of any book published electronically. If they like the sample, they will most likely buy the book.
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Write a FREE e-Book
It doesn’t need to be a full-length novel, just more than a short story. You certainly can implement all your other book’s sales page links, your Social Media links and even ready-to-click tweets about your book. Readers want to know more and interact with the author whos’ book they are buying – not only see ads with the message: Buy my book, buy my book, buy my book … Readers rather want to see samples of your writing before they purchase more of your books.
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Start With Maximizing Your Foreign Presence – For FREE
To maximize your presence in overseas Amazon Kindle stores, just set up an Author Central account in each of those country-specific sites where your book is available. As Amazon divided the world in single countries, announce your Countdown Deals, new book launches or Free Kindle KDP Days in several languages: Use Google Translation or Deepl Translation into Spanish, French, German etc. for free. The countries with the most usage of eReaders, according to a survey of Bookboon are USA, UK, Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Denmark etc.
Get more than 111 Tips on How to Market Your Book for Free:
Detailed Plans and Smart Strategies for Your Book’s Success
For Example:
Creating Audiobooks, Hardcover, Translations of your Books, Distribution to all Online Retailers etc.
https://books2read.com/u/bMre1a – available worldwide
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More Books From the Author:
111 Tips to Create Impressive Videos:
How to Plan, Create, Upload and Market Videos
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BYDH41S/
111 Tips To Make Money With Writing:
The Art of Making a Living Full-time Writing – An Essential Guide for More Income as Freelancer
https://books2read.com/u/bWZMjz
111 Tips to Get Free Book Reviews:
Best Strategies for Getting Lots of Great Reviews
1,200+ reviewer contact links
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5nx5
August 7, 2018
How to Create an Audiobook With Draft2Digital
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Audiobooks are up about 20% year over the year across the publishing industry for the first eight months, according to the Association of American Publishers’ data reports from 1,200 publishers. In the same time period, print books rose just 1.5%.
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A year ago, in July 2017, aggregator Draft2Digital announced their partnership with FindawayVoices, an audiobook creation and distribution service which gives authors more freedom and control over their work. It’s easy to create and sell audiobooks to listeners in more than 170 countries, through the world’s largest audiobook distribution network.
To celebrate one year of partnership, D2D is giving the gift of one finished hour of audio for FREE! Choose any narrator at any rate, and mention the code ONEHOURFREE in the casting questionnaire, then enjoy a free narrator hour on us!
“We’ve had a blast working with FindawayVoices over the past year, and we know you will feel the same. And when you start your production from Draft2Digital, you won’t have to pay the $49 casting fee for your book – plus you get one free hour of narrating until August 18.”
Terms and Conditions:
Start an audiobook between July 18–Aug 18, 2018
Sign contract before Oct. 31, 2018
Audiobook must be minimum of 5 finished hours
Applies to any project cast by FindawayVoices
The project must be transferred from D2D, special code ONEHOURFREE must be mentioned in casting questionnaire
Limit one per author
Upload your manuscript at Draft2Digital.com, and when you get to the Publishing step you’ll get a chance to transfer your book to FindawayVoices.
If you have any questions, please contact support@draft2digital.com
FindawayVoices is an innovator in the audiobook industry for more than 10 years and a global leader in digital content delivery across retail, library, and K–12 channels.
https://www.draft2digital.com/blog/weve-been-hearing-and-sharing-voices-for-a-whole-year/
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You Control the Cost
The length of your work and the narrator selected determine the cost for creating your audiobook. Narrators are quality checked and approved by our audio experts. Narrator rates are shared on a “per finished hour” (PFH) basis, and the general estimate is every 9,000 words of text equals one finished hour of audio. For example, if your book is 72,000 words, it would be approximately eight finished hours.
FindawayVoices works with you to make the right decisions when creating your audiobooks. They provide a list of suggested narrators at a range of PFH rates. This lets you choose the right voice at the right price. The range is typical $150 to $400 per finished hour. See a table on their website to better estimate your potential audiobook investment: https://findawayvoices.com/pricing/
FindawayVoices gives authors everything they need to create professionally narrated audiobooks, including:
Full Control—With FindawayVoices, you set the price, own the rights, control marketing, choose your distributors, and never sign an exclusivity agreement.
Global Distribution—You’ll gain access to a global platform that reaches consumers in more than 170 countries, through all major audiobook sellers across retail, library, and K12 channels (and yes, this includes Audible).
Custom Narrator Casting—The experts at FindawayVoices review your book and create a tailored list of recommended narrators at a range of prices for your specific title. FindawayVoices will work with you at every step to ensure you choose the right voice at the right price for your book.
Professional Production—All narrators are vetted for quality, and all audiobooks are quality-checked before publication, giving rights holders an extra level of assurance.
Full Service and Support–As an author, who distributes via D2D you are used to high-level customer support, and you can expect the same with FindawayVoices. If you have any questions or need help, you can reach out to an expert.
Already have an audiobook?—If you have already produced your audiobook, you can distribute through FindawayVoices without exclusivity, and at no cost.
You will be able to quickly and easily start the audiobook production process, right from your D2D publication page. Once you have converted your ebook, you can start creating your audiobook with FindawayVoices, with full support from their team. You can determine your production budget, select a narrator, and have your book produced and distributed to a large, robust audiobook network – which includes not only online retailers, but also libraries and independent bookstores.
As the author or publisher, you keep 80% of all royalties FindawayVoices receives, which vary by partner, channel, and business model. The royalties FindawayVoices receives from its partners are within the following ranges:
A la carte: 40% to 50% of list price
Subscription: 30% to 40% of list price
Amazon Audible: 25% of the sales price (Audible’s standard, non-exclusive terms)
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Frequent Asked Questions
Who owns the rights to the finished audiobook?
You! Authors and publishers who work with FindawayVoices always own the rights to their works.
Do you require exclusivity?
Absolutely not! You will never be asked to sign an exclusivity agreement. We believe in opening the audiobook market for authors and publishers and work tirelessly to introduce audiobooks to new listeners through our products, partnerships, relationships, and innovations.
How does FindawayVoices compare to ACX?
Well, in several ways. With FindawayVoices, you’re never asked for exclusivity, you control the price for your book, and we give you control over marketing and promotions. Our team works with you to guide the process and ensure creating an audiobook is easier than it’s ever been!
I’m an international author, can I work with FindawayVoices?
Yes! FindawayVoices is available to authors and publishers in all countries and can recommend narrators to match unique accent and style demands.
I’m a publisher. Can I use FindawayVoices to distribute my catalog?
Yes! Contact FindawayVoices at support@findawayvoices.com to discuss how Voices in more detail.
What’s with the $49 fee?
D2D PUBLISHERS DO NOT HAVE TO PAY THE $49 ADMIN FEE!
This is a one-time administrative fee that covers project management during production, and ongoing administrative tasks such as consolidated royalty reporting, ISBN registration (if you don’t have your own ISBN), post-processing, final mastering, and other behind-the-scenes tasks carried out, for every audiobook produced. This fee applies to production only, and you will not have to pay the fee if you provide your own audiobook.
How does FindawayVoices compare to Author’s Republic?
FindawayVoices is similar to Author’s Republic in that they offer audiobook distribution, but are different in a few ways that set them apart:
FindawayVoices is a single service where authors can both create and distribute their works. If you have created your own audiobook files, you can also choose distribution only.
Regarding distribution: With FindawayVoices, you keep 80 percent of all royalties earned through the sale of your recordings. Author’s Republic, for example, offers only 70 percent.
FindawayVoices will NEVER ask you for exclusivity. You are always free to distribute your titles anywhere else you like, and you always have complete control over where your titles are available within their network.
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EXCERPT FROM OUR UPCOMING BOOK ON SUCCESS WITH AUDIO-BOOKS:
Creating an AudioBook
How much does it cost to create an audiobook?
The cost of narration is calculated on a “per-finished-hour” basis and will vary based on several factors, including the length of the book, narrator selected, and complexity. FindawayVoices will provide suggested narrators at a range of “per-finished-hour” rates to best meet your cost needs.
Contact FindawayVoices at support@findawayvoices.com to learn more.
The only other charge is a one-time fee of $49.00 to cover project management during production and ongoing administrative tasks such as consolidated royalty reporting. But:
NOTE: D2D customers will not have to pay the $49 admin fee for their audiobook!
What does per-finished hour mean?
“Per Finished Hour” is the standard way payment is calculated in the audiobook industry. Narrators are compensated for each hour of finished recording, rather than by studio hour since this can vary. 9,000 words equal one finished hour. 72,000 manuscript words would be approximately eight finished hours of audio.
How do I choose a narrator?
First, contact Findaway at support@findawayvoices.com. To find the right narrator for your book, we’ll ask you a few simple questions to guide our suggestions (book subject/genre, emotional tone, protagonist profile) and then prepare a curated list of narrators for you to choose from. All narrator recommendations from Voices are tailored to your style preferences and material. We’ll include voices at a range of per-finished-hour rates to ensure you get the right voice at the right price. Every narrator in our talent pool has been vetted for professionalism and quality.
Can I hear a sample of my book performed by a narrator?
Of course! Before committing to a narrator, you can request a sample of that voice paired with your work. Simply share with us with a sample chapter (or the full manuscript) and we’ll coordinate with the narrator or narrators you choose to provide you with samples.
What is the approval process?
You review the first 15 minutes of your audiobook before committing to the full performance. Once the first section is approved, your narrator will continue recording the remainder of your work, providing completed chapters for your review, and adjusting to any feedback along the way. You will provide final approval for the audiobook before it is published.
How long will it take to create my audiobook?
Project timeframe varies based on each book’s length, but 6-8 weeks is typical from project start to your title is available for sale.
Do you offer royalty sharing as an option for compensating narrators?
Currently, FindawayVoices does not offer royalty sharing though we may consider it in the future.
Can I narrate my own audiobook?
Yes! You’ll follow almost the same process as if you were selecting a narrator, except you’ll be the one recording….and approving the work! FindawayVoices have narration guidelines to ensure a high-quality standard.
Can I recommend a narrator or use a narrator I already work with?
Absolutely! All of the narrators we work with are independent contractors. FindawayVoices can work with your current narrator(s) to ensure consistency within your catalog if that’s important to you. Just put us in touch!
Where will my audiobook be available for sale?
With Findaway Voices, your audiobook will be distributed through the world’s largest network of audiobook sellers, representing a variety of industry partners, sales channels, and business models. Their global distribution network includes top sellers from retail, public library, and K-12, and they are always expanding with the market.
Current partners include:
Audible, Amazon, Apple
Barnes and Noble NOOK
Baker & Taylor
Biblioteca
EBSCO
3M/
Follett
Hoopla
eStories (formerly eMusic)
Playster
24symbols
Downpour
Audiobooks.com
Hummingbird
Libro.fm
AudiobooksNow
InstaRead
Mackin
Odilo
Otto Radio
Overdrive (for Libraries)
Perma-Bound
Rakuten Kobo
TuneIn
Scribd
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Who Sets the Price for my Audiobook?
You do! You set pricing, and they pay based on that list price for sales through most of our distribution partners. Also, you can update your price at any time and we’ll ensure all retailers.
80% Royalty for authors
As the author or publisher, you keep 80% of all royalties FindawayVoices receives, which vary by partner, channel, and business model. The royalties that FindawayVoices receives from its partners are within the following ranges:
A la carte: 40% to 50% of list price
Subscription: 30% to 40% of list price
Audible: 25% of the sales price (Audible’s standard, non-exclusive terms)
How often are authors paid?
Every month, you will receive any royalties collected on your behalf. FindawayVoices will deposit royalties for you within 30 days of receipt from our partners. Some partners pay us within 30 days of the end of each month, and others pay quarterly.
Do I have to list my book with all retailers?
No! You decide which partners you want to work with. If you wish to remove an audiobook from one or all of our partners, simply alert them via email support@findawayvoices.com, and they will coordinate with the partner on your behalf.
When will my audiobook to be available for sale?
Each audiobook is approved separately by each of our distribution partners, who have their own processes and timing. In general, you can expect your audiobook to appear for sale about 2 – 3 weeks after you’ve published through Voices.
More questions and answers here: https://my.findawayvoices.com/help-and-resources
How to get started
You must transfer your book to FindawayVoices via Draft2Digital to get this deal. You will be able to export your book to Findaway Voices after the Publishing step of uploading and distributing your ebook, or by following these steps:
Log in to Draft2Digital.com and click on My Books
Choose the book you want and click the little orange microphone, the audiobook symbol
Read more:
Julia How explains in detail how she used FindawayVoices to produce audiobooks
https://www.thecreativepenn.com/2018/07/18/producing-audiobook-findaway-voices/
Comparison Amazon ACX vs FindawayVoices by author Julie Gilbert
https://juliecgilbertwriter.com/2017/10/30/company-comparison-acx-vs-findaway-voices/
Audiobooks: What Indie Publishers Need to Know
https://deborahjacobs.com/2018/04/03/audiobooks-audible-acx-amazon/
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Books by Doris-Maria Heilmann:
111 Tips to Create Impressive Videos:
How to Plan, Create, Upload and Market Videos
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BYDH41S/
111 Tips To Make Money With Writing
The Art of Making a Living Full-time Writing
An Essential Guide for More Income as Freelancer
https://books2read.com/u/bWZMjz
111 Tips on How to Market Your Book for Free:
Detailed Plans and Smart Strategies for Your Book’s Success
https://books2read.com/u/bMre1a
111 Tips to Get Free Book Reviews:
Best Strategies for Getting Lots of Great Reviews
plus 1,200+ reviewer contact links
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5nx5
111 Tips to Create Your Book Trailer
How to Create, Where to Upload and How to Market Your Videos
https://books2read.com/u/mVZkjr
Book Marketing on a Shoestring:
How Authors Can Promote their Books Without Spending a Lot of Money
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5gdp
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August 1, 2018
9 Ways How to Sell More Apple iBooks
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Sure, Amazon sells the most ebooks, but did you know that Apple has moved past Barnes & Noble into the number two position, and is continuing to grow?
You can publish directly on iBooks if you’re a Mac user, or you can take advantage of all the same opportunities by publishing through aggregators/book distributors. Some authors even make more money from iBooks than they do from Amazon. So, how do you sell more books on iBooks:
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Write a Series. Why?
iBooks has promotions for free first in series. iBooks readers are less price sensitive, so even if you give the first away as a free starter, you can still put the rest at full price.
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Sell Box-Sets
You can sell higher priced box sets as there’s no $9.99 cap on royalties. iBooks readers are used to these as traditional publishing sell at pretty high prices. If you publish directly to iBooks, you also get more choices for categories which can improve discoverability.
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Use Pre-orders and Promote it to Readers
You can add iBooks up to a year in advance. Having it there for so long means that as soon as someone finishes a book, they can order the next one with no need to remember buying it later.
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Pre-orders on iBooks Rank Twice
They are counted in the iBooks bestseller lists while on pre-order and then you get the sales counted all on the live date. Yes, you have to do more planning in advance, but it helps to keep to the production schedule and customers know what to expect next.
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Promote Your Book While it is on Pre-order
Drive customers to the pre-order site by revealing aspects during the journey to publication. Do a cover reveal a few months out and an early sample of your book. The pre-order, if it’s a series, it will be linked on the iBooks page.
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Link Directly to the iBooks Store
Some authors complain that they don’t sell many books on iBooks, but there’s no evidence of them actually promoting their iBooks. You can also share directly from iBooks to social media.
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Use Promo Codes for Reviewers
You can get promo codes that enable you to give your books away for free to reviewers.
Like all online bookstores, iBooks has algorithms that help discovery for books with more reviews and more traffic.
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Use Mobile Marketing
iBooks is the default reading app on all Apple devices. There are also in-app purchases, unlike Amazon’s Kindle app, which makes it easier to buy with a click.
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Share Direct Links
Use direct links to your books in the iBooks store when you tweet or update a social media status. Readers who are browsing on mobile will be able to click and buy immediately. Make sure you include great images in your iBooks marketing.
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See a Comparison: Apple iBooks with Amazon Kindle
https://selfpublishingadvice.org/alli-watchdog-amazon-vs-apple/
<><><><><>
Books By Doris-Maria Heilmann:
111 Tips to Create Impressive Videos:
How to Plan, Create, Upload and Market Videos
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BYDH41S/
111 Tips To Make Money With Writing
The Art of Making a Living Full-time Writing
An Essential Guide for More Income as Freelancer
https://books2read.com/u/bWZMjz
111 Tips on How to Market Your Book for Free:
Detailed Plans and Smart Strategies for Your Book’s Success
https://books2read.com/u/bMre1a
111 Tips to Get Free Book Reviews:
Best Strategies for Getting Lots of Great Reviews
plus 1,200+ reviewer contact links
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5nx5
111 Tips to Create Your Book Trailer
How to Create, Where to Upload and How to Market Your Videos
https://books2read.com/u/mVZkjr
Book Marketing on a Shoestring:
How Authors Can Promote their Books Without Spending a Lot of Money
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5gdp
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July 26, 2018
Is it Worth to Go With a Publisher?
When people say that ebooks are forever, that may be true in the strictest sense of the word. But your ownership rights in your (self-published or published) ebook will terminate seventy years after your death, and that will undoubtedly restrict your commercial ability to exploit things.
If you sign a traditional publishing contract, you do not tie up your rights forever: All U.S. authors have the statutory right to terminate a grant of rights 35 years after publication under 17 U.S.C. 203. “However, an author (or the heirs) need to terminate the grant of rights during a period of five years beginning at the end of thirty-five years.”
Another aspect is: money earned today is worth more than money earned next year. That’s because you could take the money you earned today, put it in the bank, and have more money waiting for you next year. What that means is that if someone offered to give you $50 a month every month forever, with no stopping, they aren’t offering you an infinite amount of money. You can actually put a finite dollar value on how much that costs.
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The Value of Your Rights
Courtney Milan explains: “Here are the things you need to do to figure out the net present value of your rights. For the calculations that follow at the end, I’m going to use 2% as the rate. This is actually high when you compare it to today’s discount rate, but interest rates are historically low, and we’re doing the calculation over 35 years.”
“What you’re being offered: Let’s take the example if someone who is offered $3,500 royalty advance for a book. What would it take for the net present value of your self-published earnings to come out to $3,500? Using 2% as the discount rate, a contract that offers you $3,500 is the equivalent of earning $139 a year for 35 years, making $11.58 a month. That’s what a $3,500 a book means. A $3,500 advance is an absolutely pitiful investment by a publisher. They will earn back what they put in without even batting an eyelash…”
“What if you were offered $500,000 for a book? That’s a huge advance. A self-published book that has the same net present value is one that makes $19,750 a year, $1,645 a month – which means selling about 633 copies at $3.99 a month every month. Put another way, a book at $3.99 that falls somewhere between Amazon rank 5,000 and 10,000 for 35 years is worth $500,000 today.”
What kind of steady sales would you need to equal that advance over time? Ask if it’s worth it. There are a lot of reasons why people go with traditional publishers.
They don’t want to do the work.
They want books on the shelves.
They want the prestige.
They think the publisher will do a better job in marketing.
They want reviews in major print publications.
Some people want the advertisement that a big print run will give them.
Some people think it’ll help them break out to the next level.
Some people think that diversification is important in income, and so want to diversify. And so on…
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Read the rest of the eye-opening article:
http://www.courtneymilan.com/ramblings/2013/08/19/know-what-your-rights-are-worth/
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Books By Doris-Maria Heilmann:
111 Tips to Create Impressive Videos:
How to Plan, Create, Upload and Market Videos
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BYDH41S/
111 Tips To Make Money With Writing
The Art of Making a Living Full-time Writing
An Essential Guide for More Income as Freelancer
https://books2read.com/u/bWZMjz
111 Tips on How to Market Your Book for Free:
Detailed Plans and Smart Strategies for Your Book’s Success
https://books2read.com/u/bMre1a
111 Tips to Get Free Book Reviews:
Best Strategies for Getting Lots of Great Reviews
plus 1,200+ reviewer contact links
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5nx5
111 Tips to Create Your Book Trailer
How to Create, Where to Upload and How to Market Your Videos
https://books2read.com/u/mVZkjr
Book Marketing on a Shoestring:
How Authors Can Promote their Books Without Spending a Lot of Money
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5gdp
.
July 19, 2018
The ACX of Book Translations & Distribution
In the past, translating a book was an expensive and time-consuming process. You had to find a translator and pay them even before the book was published. And then you needed to find out how to sell your book in a foreign market you were unfamiliar with, and without a platform or followers. You transferred your book into print, digital and into an audiobook. Now, let it translate into other languages, or sell foreign rights to your book.
Then Came Babelcube…
A matchmaking service set up a couple of years ago to get books translated to other languages. Think like ACX but for languages and in a text, not audio. You post your book, the translator bids on the job to translate your book if you accept, they translate. Babelcube distributes the translated work and everyone takes a cut after sales (NO up-front fees!). You keep your rights. They just get the option to sell the translated book in other markets during the next five years. After that, you can opt out and choose to sell elsewhere if you want (and make more money).
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Babelcube: Initially Free Translation
The translation and distribution service offers authors and publishers a different option: You can list your book and then partner with translators who will create your book in other languages, such as:
Afrikaans
Dutch
English
French
German
Italian
Japanese
Norwegian
Portuguese
Spanish
Once the translated text is ready, Babelcube’s platform will prepare your new book for publishing and distribute it to all the major online retailers and 100’s of local ones. The only cost to you is to share the royalties from your new book.
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How to Screen the Translation
Most of the translators on Babelcube have been in the business for years, have websites, LinkedIn profiles, portfolios etc. At the same time, try to find several beta readers, native in the language your book will be translated. Let them check the translation. It would be wise to pay for an editor who verifies the translation text. And don’t forget to let posts and tweets translate too. You will need this when promoting your translated book into completely new markets. Don’t rely only on Google or Deeply https://www.deepl.com/translator translations of your social media/promotional text.
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Approval Points
Rights holders have two approval points, where they can review the translation: a) after the first 10 pages have been submitted as a sample (cancel if unsatisfied) and b) at the end of the book’s draft translation. Your book will be sold through numerous retail and library channels, based on its language. Babelcube sells books through 300+ retailers (such as Amazon, Google, Apple, Nook, Kobo, Scribd) and 20,000 libraries – and you can choose which sales channels you prefer.
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Copy Rights & Translation Rights
Who owns the copyright of the translated version of the book? The rights holder of the original version of the book, typically the author or publisher, maintains the copyright of the translated book, including the associated material such as the cover. Translators are paid through book royalties only – not a viable way to earn a living as a translator unless the book is well-promoted and had already high numbers of sales in the original language.
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Pretty Much the ACX Principle
Babelcube owns the distribution rights for the translated book for the first five years. After which, the rights holder can decide to continue using Babelcube’s global distribution network or sell the book via an alternative method they choose. This ensures the translator(s) will be fairly compensated for their efforts.
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How and when will I be paid?
Babelcube will pay you via your PayPal account. If you don’t have a PayPal account, you can set it up in a couple of minutes here and link it to your bank account. Authors will be paid each month when your account is over the $10 threshold. If your account is below the threshold, its balance will be carried over to the next month.
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Revenue
The royalty revenue is based on the Net Sales Receipts* received by Babelcube from the retailer. Each individual book in each language is treated separately. Example: Suppose that a book generated a gross income of $8,000 for the translation into one language. Each party would receive:
For the first $2,000, the rights holder would receive 30% ($600), the translator 55% ($1,100) and Babelcube 15% ($300)
For the next $3,000, the rights holder would receive 45% ($1,350), the translator 40% ($1,200) and Babelcube 15% ($450)
For the remaining $3,000, the rights holder would receive 65% ($1,950), the translator 20% ($600) and Babelcube 15% ($450)
In total, the rights holder would receive 49% ($3,900), the translator 36% ($2,900), and Babelcube 15% ($1,200).
*Net Sales Receipts means the monetary amount received by Babelcube from sales of each unit sold by Babelcube and Babelcube’s sub-distributors, less any cash incentives, promotional discounts, sales or use taxes, excise taxes, value-added taxes, duties, distribution fees, and returns.
Read the whole FAQ’s here: http://www.babelcube.com/faq
Conclusion
Bestseller Derek Haines concludes in his blog: “With such a low return to the author of 30% of net royalties, plus the consideration that translated books might not sell in huge numbers, it may not be a big money maker. However, it is an opportunity perhaps for those authors who wish to test the waters, or expand their readership.”
Well, I think, after all, it doesn’t cost anything and after 5 years you own a translated book that you can sell wherever you want and it might be a money-maker. In the meantime, you make more than selling your manuscript to a trade publisher. As an easy (and free) translation way into the non-English-language markets, Babelcube is a great starting point.
However, BOTH, the author AND the translator need to promote the book – and hopefully, Babelcube will do their share of promotion as well!
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Read also:
http://www.thoughtsontranslation.com/2017/06/23/babelcube-one-translators-experience/
https://translationandteaching.wordpress.com/2016/12/02/my-experience-with-babelcube/
https://ebooksuccess4free.wordpress.com/2014/08/06/my-babelcube-experience-author-seeks-translators-part-1/
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<><><><><>
Books From the Author:
111 Tips to Create Impressive Videos:
How to Plan, Create, Upload and Market Videos
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BYDH41S/
111 Tips To Make Money With Writing
The Art of Making a Living Full-time Writing –
An Essential Guide for More Income as Freelancer
https://books2read.com/u/bWZMjz
111 Tips on How to Market Your Book for Free:
Detailed Plans and Smart Strategies for Your Book’s Success
https://books2read.com/u/bMre1a
111 Tips to Get Free Book Reviews:
Best Strategies for Getting Lots of Great Reviews
1,200+ reviewer contact links
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5nx5
111 Tips to Create Your Book Trailer
How to Create,
Where to Upload and How to Market Your Videos
https://books2read.com/u/mVZkjr
Book Marketing on a Shoestring:
How Authors Can Promote their Books Without Spending a Lot of Money
https://books2read.com/u/mZ5gdp
.
June 4, 2018
How to Sell Translated German-Language Books Overseas
Germans are avid readers
Germany has a population of over 80 million
Book sales volume is 40% of that of the USA
Millions of German speakers in Austria, Switzerland, and the rest of the world
Germany is the third-largest ebook market
Books are higher priced in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland – good for authors!
If you are entertaining the idea to exploit language rights as a self-publisher, consider both, market size but also the ease of publishing. For instance, it would be fantastic to be able to do this with Mandarin or Arabic – which are spoken by billions of people. But right now, you’re better off getting a foreign rights agent to try and sell those rights, rather than attempting to self-publish in these Middle East and Asian languages. Germany should be the first choice for self-publishing in translation due to the growing e-reader base on Amazon.de and Tolino-Thalia-Weltbild.
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Finding and Working With a Translator
If funds are no issue, hire a professional and recommended translator for your book. The second (inexpensive) method would be to let Google Translation or BabelCube do the job and then hire a German native speaker (teacher or other languages professional) to edit the translation. Or you can band with a translator and exercise the “royalty split translation model”. Let’s look into these three options:
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Royalty-Split Translator
In order to keep the translation cost, there is a royalty split model for translation: Your translation is free, but your translator will get a certain percentage of your book sales. Many translators are looking for ways to be more creatively involved in their finished product. The royalty split can be better financially in the long run and you get a marketing partner in the language of translation. This means that you get your emails for review pitches, blog interviews etc. translated. A business model that resembles a real partnership:
All the ongoing work of building the book in the market is shared between the author and the translator. You can trust the work of the translator more as they won’t get paid unless the book is good enough to sell. They have a vested interest in making the work the best it can be. The risk is split between you and there is no upfront payment, so it’s easy to try things out. It certainly needs a written contract – but everything else only works when there is trust on both sides.
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Working Directly With Your Translator
You can find and hire translators through one of the many translation associations and professional bodies online. Here is a list of notable translators organizations around the world I found on Wikipedia.
No matter in which language the translation will be, when working with a translator, they will ask you questions (hopefully they do!). These are necessary for the translator (and for you too) in order to choose the right words, to provide the best meaning, and to retain the original thought of the author. As translations are a months-long work, you might receive a tremendous bill at the end.
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BabelCube Offers a Royalty-Split Model Too
You can also use BabelCube – for any of the 15+ languages and royalty split deals. They offer a distribution platform and take 15% royalty and their translator/rights holder split varies on the number of books sold. There are no upfront costs – just share the royalties! Choose your translator – or a team of them. Authors will be able to sell their book in world languages through 100s of online retail channels and subscription services.
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File Formats and Distribution
BabelCube will enable you to convert the book into the different file formats for the various sales channels, publish it, and update things like pricing. BabelCube distributes your book to all its channels that support the book’s language. Their 300+ sales channel include the global online retailers, such as Amazon and Apple, and local retailers specializing in regions. You can request assistance from the translator(s), as desired.
Revenue share is on a sliding scale – towards the author. As more books are sold, as more the author earns.
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German-Language Rights Sales
If you want to outsource the German-language rights only for a couple of years and let the German publisher pay for the translation: exploiting dormant international rights became easier than ever for author-publishers. Writers can now engage with readers and licensees worldwide without even leaving their office. Authors and publishers can license their English-language or translation rights to traditional publishers located in Germany.
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Two Global Rights Network Platforms
Selling the rights to your books can be a lucrative business, putting local versions of your writing into the hands of readers all around the world. The predominance of book fairs and back-and-forth negotiations between rights agents and editors left a gap for literary rights-holders.
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“Now there are online marketplaces for the 365 days 24/7 trading of book rights available. Publishers of all sizes, including self-publishers, can make their book’s rights available for sale from several online profiles. It allows authors to sell their rights based on their own terms, growing income, and in many cases, creating totally new income streams!”
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What are these new Digital Platforms Doing?
Automated rights selling systems, allow you to make titles available for rights transactions – worldwide – with little up-front work! Set up your prices for rights by language, territory, format (paperback, hardcover, ebook or audio) and length of the deal. Swap out the standard contract for your own – if you choose.
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Detail Your Book’s Rights
Decide to use the digital platform’s contract – or use your own. You even receive helpful hints from the digital platforms if you’re using your own contract. At PubMatch, for example, you create multipliers for different formats and contract lengths. The multipliers will tell the system to increase the amount you will receive for a specific format or length.
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Choose the language, exclusivity, territory, formats available (choose one or all), contract lengths available (choose one option or many), and other contract terms like print run and royalty percentage. Detail your individual rights available for individual titles or groups of titles that have all the same rights available. The base price you assign will be your minimum price and will go up – based on your multipliers- and what formats you’ve made available.
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IPR License is an online global publishing network where you can find authors, book publishers, agents and book rights professionals from across the globe. It is a Marketplace for publishers to trade foreign rights globally. The platform offers the opportunity to monetize or find the best new content in a global marketplace. It also acts as a copyright hub, making it easier to locate copyright holders to clear permission for use of their work.
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Other Considerations When Selling Abroad
You may choose a different title in German than the English language version would be translated. Traditional publishers generally use a different title and often even a totally very different cover. A good example is Hillary Clintons latest book. Scroll through lists of German bestselling titles in your genre to get a good overview before deciding on whether to use your “old” book cover design or background image.
Always purchase your own ISBN. This shows you are the publisher! You can buy your ISBN in your own homeland as it is valid worldwide. Make also sure that:
The cover fits European taste (depending on genre)
The book description is edited and proof-read by your German editor
The book text is, of course, translated to German
The book already has a few reviews
You set the Euro price
You need to have a German-language author page on authorcentral.amazon.de (separate from amazon.com!)
Depending on the distributor, you may or may not need to add VAT (the stores will always add a 19 % VAT for ebooks or 7% for print versions, before showing the price to the customer).
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POD and Distribution in Germany
German bookstores won’t order from Amazon. Place your book to Amazon.de by yourself – or place it on your Amazon account that you use for other books in your homeland. Use the services of European book distributors to let them deliver books and ebooks directly to local retailers and German language online stores. You can take these distributors for your books to Kobo, Apple iBooks or to libraries. Popular European booksellers are Weltbild.de, Weltbild.ch, Weltbild.at, Hugendubel, Thalia.de, Thalia.at, Thalia.ch, Buecher.de, eBook.de, Mayersche.de, Bol.de, Osiander.de, Buch.de, Buch.ch, or Libris.nl. Ask your distributor for direct links, and where exactly your book is sold.
Tolino
Instead of .com most companies and online retailers in Europe use the country-specific names for their website, such as .de is for Germany, .at for Austria, .nl for Netherland and .ch for Switzerland. Tolino ebook Readers are in Germany (and their neighboring) countries what Kindle is in North America.
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Better Conditions Than Amazon …
Tolino media is Tolino’s new self-publishing platform. Publish your book now with Tolino media. Publish quickly and easily your eBook in just three steps: writing, uploading and it’s immediately available in online shops of major German, Austrian, and Swiss booksellers such as Thalia, Weltbild, Hugendubel and many others.
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Use the Book Trade Experience of These Partners
In addition, you benefit from top conditions such as 70% author’s revenue (70% of the net sales price) for titles from € 2.99 (under € 2.99 you get 40%), no costs, a monthly statement, an overview of daily sales, a simple operation of the software, direct contact with partners in the Tolino world and much more.
Questions? Go to https://www.tolino-media.de/FAQ
Distributors:
eBookPartnership (English)
Draft2Digital (English) D2D converts your manuscript for free! into epub and in mobi format
ePubli.de (German – using the ePubli.co.uk page, instructions can be easily followed).
The ePubli staff speaks English and you can email for help which is great. How to convert your manuscript into epub is explained on their website, where you can download their tool for free. Or you can order to have your manuscript converted to epub for 80 Euro.
After loading the ePub file and all the same information as is usually needed (but in German), ePubli/eBookPartnership/Draft2Digital will distribute to various stores and online retailers. Print-on-demand, as well as selling and distributing through them is the same as with any other distributors in North America, such as Smashwords or BookBaby. You pay a revenue share. An exception is eBookPartnership where you pay a small yearly fee (ca. $30 per book), but never a revenue share!
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Genres and Keywords
Ask your translator to explain you the categories and keywords on Amazon.de. They don’t necessarily translate directly. Also, let him or her identify the best keywords. And use Amazon.de’s book and ebook site to dig deeper: Look for similar books in your genre, their covers, prices, editorial reviews, and book descriptions. At Amazon.de are also far fewer categories. Try to get the help from native German speakers or your translator to set up your Amazon.de Central account with a translated description.
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Fixed Price Law = Buchpreisbindung
It means legal requirements for books to be priced the same on all stores in Germany, which makes it difficult to run price promotions. It’s against the German reader “culture” to buy books only due to a low price. They rather look for excellent writing. This also stops the Amazon’s deep discounting, protecting German retailers. Sales Tax (almost 20%) is always included in the book price, so you need to calculate it in! As you can see print versions are in all countries much lower taxed then eBooks.
Germany:
VAT/sales tax on e-Books: 19 % – on print books: 7 %
Austria:
VAT/sales tax on e-Books: 20 % -on print books: 10 %
Switzerland:
VAT/sales tax on e-Books: 8 % – on print books: 2,5 %
Speaking of rules: Should you create a German website (hosted in Germany) the owner of this website has to be mentioned on the site, as well as the postal address (city, street, civic # and phone or email). In case you are wondering… when you read the “Impressum”. Some German authors and companies even post this on their social media sites.
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Print and eBook Formatting
My advice: Never, ever use an English-speaking formater or book lay-outer to design your German ebook and even more important your print version. German words are VERY long, and at the end of almost every line, they need to be split properly. The German language has different hyphenation rules which means that your print formatting needs specific language settings in order to flow correctly and still have the straight line edged formatting.
It took almost a year, two book-formaters/lay-outers, dozens and dozens of emails and corrections until the book could go to print. In the end, I would have been way better off to hire a German lay outer in the beginning. And certainly a German book editor.
I was so far not successful to find a German pre-editing program similar to Grammarly, EditMinion or PaperRater. Translators can be extremely professional, and a great help for the “cultural” part of the translation, but an edit is still necessary to fine-comb your manuscript before sending it out to the lay-outer.
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Print Sizes
German printing is in centimeters, so if you’re using 5×8 or 6×9 inches for a POD, you will now have to use centimeters if you use German print distributors. 6×9 inches, for example, is 15 cm x 23 cm. Non-Fiction are mostly 13,5 x 20,5 cm. Before you decide for a book size ask your print book lay-outer which sizes in your genre are usually chosen by authors, publishers, and bookstores in German-speaking countries.
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How to Upload Your eBook to Tolino
Tolino Media is the self-publishing initiative of the German Tolino group, consisting of nearly all the major bookstores, except Amazon, of course. They offer a 70 percent share and 40% for books less than Euro 2.99 priced. However, you need a German address and bank account. If you can manage this your earnings will be higher per book, as distribution costs are eliminated. More details on their site: http://bit.ly/2HDciKg.
Just copy and paste the text of the Tolino Media website platform in Google translation, and you get the instructions in English. Tolino upload works very similar to uploading on Amazon.
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Marketing for German Language Books
Start with opening a separate account for Twitter, Google+ and Facebook to find as many potential German readers as possible. Check out social media sites of folks in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland and follow them. Go to their “Followers” and “Following” and pick potential readers to add to your own account. Share their posts and “like” them. On Goodreads watch out for readers of German-language books, and start a giveaway of your ebook version – the same for giveaways at Amazon. In the section “Want to Read” place as many German books as possible into your virtual “shelves” and most important, write reviews!
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Website/Blog in the German Language
This is a must! Even if you don’t speak the language, you can post excerpts from your book, or write short articles about your publishing experiences, or place your book trailer or slides, or images that fit the genre of your book. Short blog articles can be translated easily with Google translator. Place a list of your sales channels – or even better a Universal Link – on every page of your website or blog where readers in Europe can purchase your book,
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Reader Reviews
Focus on reviews through existing networks in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria from your newsletter email list or your LinkedIn or Goodreads friends. Ask them if they would like a review copy. Those who respond positively, send an ebook or a mobi file or ePub files for Kobo, Nook, and iBooks. This is a slow approach to reviews, but giving books away is always a good start if you have no audience.
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Book Review Sites & Reader Communities
“Lovely Books”, “Was Liest Du” and “Vorablesen” is the German equivalent of Goodreads (or even better : )
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Lovely Books is online since 2006 and has 170,000 members and 4,500 authors.
Vorablesen.de
This is a service that allows cover testing and votes, pre-reading of samples and then the chance to win the ebook in advance of publication. It’s run on a points system which incentivizes reviewers and bloggers to add reviews quickly and on multiple platforms. Vorablesen is aimed at readers and they have over 10,000 active reviewers out of 36,500 users. Their users are mostly women who read over 35 books a year.
Vorablesen is a valuable service, offering help for authors on questions about their book during the writing process. Authors can get feedback from readers on cover design, style, and characters, and receive early writing critique. All the services include a report with data to help you with the launch of your book.
Was Liest Du is another reader community with almost 20,000 members. WLD encourages their members to write book reviews. Members can receive books via raffles. They also have a points system which incentivizes reviewers and bloggers to add book reviews.
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The editorial staff for Indie Publishing (a project of the German trade magazine Buchreport) regularly publishes reviews of self- and indie published titles in the German language. Their target: to make authors heard that are having a hard time in a market dominated by large publishers. The editors decide which titles are reviewed – but authors and small publishers can always propose their books.
The service is free, the books must be available in printed form from any German bookstore (no Createspace-only editions). The reviews are then published in the “Indie-Katalog” which is produced and distributed in digital and printed editions.
Draft2Digital, the US-based book distributor (which is delivering to Tolino shops too!), provides a fantastic new marketing tool for authors: You now have the option to add store specific marketing links to all your e-books uploaded to them. Stores usually don’t allow adding links to other stores. However, D2D’s universal link includes all sales links to your book – worldwide.
Tolino stores do promotions as well, and it’s these promotions that work best, just like official Kindle deals usually work better on Amazon than external deals. To get them, ask your distributor. The easiest way though is to contact Tolino Media, Tolino’s self-publishing service.
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Conclusion: While every child learns English in school in Austria, Germany, and in Switzerland, they are often too lax to read English-language books. But reading they do – a lot! What better than to translate your English books into German and publish it there.
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