Barb Drozdowich's Blog, page 31
February 21, 2017
Win up to 12 Non-Fiction eBooks
(2) Grand Prize “Gift Baskets” of ALL eBooks!
(11) Winners of Individual eBooks (randomly selected titles)
The books being given away are listed below – I’ve included a copy of my book Blogging for Authors.
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February 13, 2017
Happy Family Day
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Here in British Columbia, it’s Family Day today!
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Regardless of whether your family is big…
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Or smaller and furrier, I hope you enjoy your day where ever you are!
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If you missed last week’s post, you can still get in on snapping up a free book that is focused on the needs of authors.
Click on the graphic below to look at the selection of books available
The post Happy Family Day appeared first on Bakerview Consulting.
February 6, 2017
#Instafreebie Non-fiction Books just for Authors and Writers AND Learn about Amazon Marketplace
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Exciting News – Two pieces of exciting news!
First of all – I’m guest posting on the Alliance of Independent Authors blog today!
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The “Third-Party Seller” system – or what Amazon calls “Amazon Marketplace” seems to be poorly understood. I’m going to use this opportunity to clear up some of this misunderstanding, and describe what is a major money maker for Amazon.
Many authors are unaware that “third party sellers” are selling used and new copies of paperbacks along side CreateSpace versions of the books. Unaware buyers may be purchasing new books from other than the author/Createspace.
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As you can see in the graphic above for one of my books, there are several listings for new and used copies of my books. The used and new listings below the “Paperback” box are third party seller listings. For a full explanation of this significant part of Amazon’s business, drop by my post on ALLi’s blog
Next piece of big news!
Looking for help focused directly on your author needs?
Want books to help you write and market smarter, but not break the bank?
I’m participating in a group promo of free books! 18 free books all focused at the needs of authors. Have a look at the books available here.
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That’s about it for this week. Still editing my newsletter/mailing list book and since Mailchimp rolled out a major change this weekend, I’ll be doing some re-writing…
Be sure to share this post with anyone who may be interested in getting some free author-focused books or subscribe to the blog posts to get regular technical hints in your inbox.
In the meantime, if you haven’t already, add your email address to pick up two free books!
The post #Instafreebie Non-fiction Books just for Authors and Writers AND Learn about Amazon Marketplace appeared first on Bakerview Consulting.
January 23, 2017
How to create an ebook using Vellum
Today’s post is going to be short and sweet!
I’ve been doing a lot of formatting lately – for myself as well as other people through my new service – Book Formatting for Authors. I’m tired of hearing of people contorting themselves, using two or three different programs to try to format their book. I’m also tired of people who are being taken advantage – paying huge sums of money for something that generally speaking isn’t all that time consuming.
So, I created a video showing how I can create a 3 chapter ebook with Vellum in under 10 minutes. Watch and see how non-technical this is – anyone can do this!
Although I make this look really simple – and it can be. I had the bio and blurbs about my other books already prepared, the cover graphic was already prepared and I was confident in my content and didn’t go through and proof it – which can be time consuming.
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In other news, I’ve sent my manuscript on Newsletters, Mailchimp and Mailing Lists to my editor so you can anticipate a new book in a little while! Lots to share in that one!
Secondly, if you are interested in taking my free Goodreads course, the link is here.
The post How to create an ebook using Vellum appeared first on Bakerview Consulting.
January 16, 2017
How to use Canva to create Social Media Posts
Today we are going to talk about interacting on social media. I’ve been busy lately creating graphics for my social media streams. I like sharing the wisdom of people much smarter than I am with my friends and followers on social media.
I feel if I run across something that I find really interesting, they will also. I’m always looking for ways to help people – to teach people so sharing quotes from experts, sharing quotes from peers are always a good way to help.
Canva
As I was creating some graphics on Canva – and we’ll get to Canva in a sec – and I ran across a quote from Pat Flynn. His quote “Selling to people through social media is like going to a party, meeting someone for the first time, and then saying, ‘Hey, do you want to buy this Tupperware?'” had me virtually hopping up and down with excitement! So I created a graphic to share on Facebook out of that quote.
I think this quote really resonates with me, as I’ve been trying to collect some thoughts on networking lately. I truly believe that when you are first starting out, networking is the key to finding your pool of readers. Posting “Buy my book” tweets and FB posts don’t attract friends – and people just tune this type of post out.
Back to Pat Flynn for a sec – I’ve been listening to his podcast for quite some time now. In fact I have a collection of podcasts that I like to listen to while I walk the princess puppy each day. (Mocha isn’t much of a conversationalist). Although I’m not always interested in the topic, I find the whole tone of the podcast to be motivating and uplifting!
Back to Canva…there is a lot of research that tells us that the human brain assimilates pictures much, much faster than it does words. I often try to post pictures on my social media streams and in many cases I use Canva to create those graphics.
I’ve also created a video to walk you all through how to use it, but one of the main reasons I like Canva, aside from it being rather intuitive, is that it comes with preset sizes for graphics. You don’t have to go look up what size is required for a FB graphic or a Twitter card – it is filled with all sorts of presets.
Have a watch of the video and see how easy it can be to create attractive graphics yourself.
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On other news, I used a Christmas gift card to get a copy of Dragon. This is a piece of software that allows for dictation to documents. I’ve found that it doesn’t play nice in the sandbox with Word but I love using it with Scrivener and with my Gmail.
At the beginning, the program takes the user through a training process to help Dragon recognize your speech differences and then you are off and talking.
I’ve heard quite a few fiction authors say that they couldn’t ‘write’ this way, but since my books are a lot like my teaching, I can talk my way through content faster than I can type it. And with my carpal tunnel flaring up, this software is a great help. I’ve been working on a Newsletter/Mailing List book and it’s flying together thanks to this software.
Let me know if you use or have used Dragon and what your thoughts were.
And as always, I’m giving away free books. See below:
The post How to use Canva to create Social Media Posts appeared first on Bakerview Consulting.
December 30, 2016
How to add an Image to a WordPress post and Optimize it
Another video post today. With the post coming out on Rachel Thompson’s blog Bad Redhead Media site about how to optimize a blog post, I’ve been getting questions about how to do some of the things that she suggests.
It was time to update my video about putting pictures in place on a post, so I added instructions on how to optimize a picture. Optimizing an image is a fairly straightforward process, but so powerful to do.
If you have any questions about this latest video, don’t hesitate to ask! If you have a suggestion for my next video, send them my way.
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If you have found this post helpful, don’t hesitate to share this post with your friends using the little share buttons below. If you are interested in getting some free books, click on the graphic below!
The post How to add an Image to a WordPress post and Optimize it appeared first on Bakerview Consulting.
December 19, 2016
What’s the difference between WordPress.com and WordPress.org
I’ve been getting a lot of questions lately on the topic of WordPress.com vs WordPress.org. I’ve had people tell me they pay for their blog so it must be WordPress.org (in fact they have only purchased a custom domain). I’ve had people tell me that they have trouble logging into their blog (because they find their blog via a Google search.) I’ve had people tell me that they can’t remember their password and can I please give them a new one (they can do this themselves.)
Since today looks like this outside:
I decided to stay inside and create a new video. Why type when I can talk and show pictures live?
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I hope this post was helpful to you. Feel free to use the buttons below to share with your friends. Don’t hesitate to subscribe to get the posts directly to your inbox using the subscribe widget on the sidebar –>
If you are a new visitor and are struggling with the tech issues that many authors and bloggers face, download 2 free books here
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In book news…An Author’s Guide to Goodreads: How to Network with Millions of Readers is available on Amazon Kindle.
It is also available on other platforms via this link
To help people understand Goodreads, I’ve created a companion video course to go with. The book is currently $2.99 and the course is free for a few more days.
I encourage you to buy yourself a Christmas present and start learning today!
The post What’s the difference between WordPress.com and WordPress.org appeared first on Bakerview Consulting.
December 12, 2016
How to load a Kindle book onto a Kindle Reading App
There have been a flurry of questions lately about how to get a Kindle book – a .mobi file – onto a Kindle or a Kindle reading app on your tablet, phone or desktop computer.
Although I can write the instructions out in steps, it was just easier to screencast it. Enjoy the latest video and let me know if you have any questions.
Just for clarification:
Kindle book = Kindle ebook = Mobi file = .mobi file (the last is more technically correct)
Please don’t hesitate to send any questions you might have my way. I did my best to be as clear as possible on the video – but always admit to being human 
December 5, 2016
Re-inventing the Wheel – part 2 of Formatting for Paperback
Today we are going to continue with our discussion of formatting for paperback.
Last week I asked the question of why you would want to list your book on IngramSpark. I had several correct answers sent my way. Yay!
Before I share the answer, let’s do a mini review…
You want to make the creation as easy as possible and as normal as possible – in other words, you want to find a simple process to create your PDF and not combine a whole bunch of activities that end up taking you hours of work. In addition, you want your book to look like the industry standard. You want your book to be noticed for the outstanding story, not the funky formatting. You don’t want the formatting to be noticed, essentially – you want it to exist to be in the background.
Many authors upload a Word doc directly to CreateSpace and that can be done, but if you are going to upload to IngramSpark, you will need a PDF, so bypass the Word doc and go straight to the creation of PDF – remove one step in the process.
As I said in last week’s post – stop contorting yourself – find a straightforward process. As we move back towards last week’s question of why to upload to IngramSpark, let’s talk about the requirements for uploading to that platform. Although there is mention briefly of a PDF created from a Word doc, the guide that IngramSpark produces to guide authors in the creation of files needed only talks about PDFs generated from Adobe’s InDesign or Quark.
In actual fact the help documents state: “Please note that PDFs created using the “save as” function from MS Word are not supported.”
If you know differently, please correct me, but as far as I know, you can’t just upload any old PDF to IngramSparks.
Why would you pay the fee and upload to the Ingram Spark list?
The short answer is so that your book is available for purchase from everyone, everywhere.
There is an excellent article about having your paperback available on both CreateSpace and IngramSpark. I was originally published on the Self-Publishing Advice blog by Karen Myers. The title is “How to Use CreateSpace and IngramSpark Together.” I suggest giving it a read – full of information.
This article points out some obvious and not so obvious facts:
Amazon and Barnes & Noble are business rivals and as such, Barnes & Noble is unlikely to list your paperback in stock if it is only available on Amazon but will do so if it is available from Ingram
Some bookstores have a philosophical objection to ordering from CreateSpace, and others don’t have a philosophical objecting, but choose to only order from the Ingram list – depends on their business practices
CreateSpace is not a world wide distributor – except for Amazon – so if your book is ordered from a bookstore in India, it will likely be distributed to the store via Ingram – resulting in lower royalties for you.
Amazon only offers one discount in expanded distribution – 60% and bookstores will expect 55%
Then we have the issue of returns. As was said in the above article:
Historically publishers grant booksellers the right to return unwanted or overstocked copies of books. IngramSpark allows you to designate whether or not your titles can be returned. Please note that many booksellers will not stock books that are not returnable; however, the cost of the returned books is deducted from the proceeds of your titles.
It is my understanding that CreateSpace books are not returnable. Books coming from IngramSparks are.
This, of course brings up the question of whether or not you want to deal with returns. That is a personal decision.
Ultimately, what are your dreams for your book? What are your goals?
If you want your book available on-line to people shopping on Amazon and you want to focus your sales on ebooks, then that is what you need to do.
However, if you want your books available for order in every bookstore the world over, you need to be looking at IngramSparks. And this means moving beyond a formatted Word doc to a PDF created using InDesign.
I recently had someone say to me – “I have expanded distribution through Amazon – so why aren’t my books being carried in Barnes & Noble.” Find below screenshots from my CreateSpace account:
The top graphic shows the three choices for expanded distribution. The next two graphics show the help blurb for BookStores and Libraries. It would seem that CreateSpace books will be carried in other stores and available at libraries.
And interesting quote from the article by Karen Myers above:
When you use the CS expanded services, what happens is that CS uses Ingram to distribute the print book (like many other small vendors). It registers your book in the Ingram database, as “Publisher=CreateSpace” (EVEN IF YOU USE YOUR OWN ISBN, NOT ONE PROVIDED BY CS). This means when a bookstore (including online bookstores) looks for your print book, they search the Ingram database, find it under “Publisher=CreateSpace”, and if they are sensitive about Amazon as a competitor they may refuse to carry it. For example, at Barnes&Noble, where my ebooks are sold, my print books appeared as “available from third parties” (when I only used CS). Some bookstores think of Amazon as competition, and others associate CS with “indies” and scorn indies as presumed low quality.
One final comment about using IngramSparks in combination with CreateSpace – there is a difference in royalties between the two. There is an incredibly good article to explain this by Jim Giammatteo HERE.
One of the issues that was brought up in Karen’s post is purchasing ISBNs, but let’s attack that subject in a future post.
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I hope this post was helpful to you! Feel free to use the buttons below to share with your friends, and don’t hesitate to subscribe to get the posts directly to your inbox.
I’m happy to announce that my Goodreads book is finally live! An Author’s Guide to Goodreads: How to Network with Millions of Readers is available on Amazon Kindle.
It will gradually become available on other platforms as time progresses. I uploaded it to Amazon first and will start the process of the other platforms today.
To help people understand Goodreads, I’ve created a companion video course to go with. The book is currently $2.99 and the course is free.
I encourage you to buy yourself a Christmas present and start learning today!
The post Re-inventing the Wheel – part 2 of Formatting for Paperback appeared first on Bakerview Consulting.
November 28, 2016
Re-inventing the Wheel – Book Formatting for paperback
We’re back to the subject of re-inventing the wheel again this week. Several things have happened in the last few weeks to bring the topic of book formatting to my attention.
As I said in my previous “Don’t reinvent the wheel” post, I find that authors are frequently taking the advice of peers that is described as “the easiest.” Let’s be honest, most authors are creative – they create stories that I can only read – and be amazed. I certainly couldn’t create like many authors – as I’m fond of saying, I create non-fiction how-to books because I couldn’t create dialogue to save my life 
