THE Group for Authors! discussion
Publishing and Promoting
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Questions about DIY publishing (newbie)
Take a look at Ingram Spark.Book Baby may also work for you.
I am using BookPrinting UK and waiting for a proof copy as we speak. Their rates are reasonable and includes the proof and divery by courier. Watch this space for updates.
I've been using BookBaby for my whole trilogy, but that's going to stop. Any new books I write and self-publish will probably be through Amazon from now on. To begin with, I liked BookBaby because they had terrific cover artists. They were worth the expense. They've gone downhill on this and now expect you to pretty much supply it all yourself. There are some other reasons I'm unhappy with them as well, but I won't bore you with all the details now.
I used David Smith with Synergy Books Publishing. The only strings attached was a 1-2 year buyout option if a big company picked you up. We've been pleased with him. It might be worth getting a quote and hearing what he can offer you so you can compare it to your other options.http://synergy-books.com/
Lenita,I used BookBaby once and I will never use them again. The CEO had given a presentation to a local chapter of the IBPA and I was impressed. So I gave them my book, Blogging Just for Writers. Guess what category they chose for my book on Amazon? They chose transportation and another category I can't recall right now that was completely off the wall. I think BookBaby's marketing for itself is great but the service has definite problems. I'll never use them again. In fact, if I were to use a service like BookBaby, I would use Draft2Digital instead. Right now I'm in the process of pulling my book off BookBaby.
Lenita,Would you please bore me with all the details about BookBaby? I'm so curious. I have an e-Book I'm writing that is close to being done or at least close to me just letting it go and they have been working on the cover so far.
Overall, I think their process could be easily fixed so it's not so clunky but wow, from the payment system that didn't work in any browser to even pay them, to the designer that only half-reads my comments and has talent but keeps making the same mistake. It's baffling to me.
Bookbaby does seem like a good choice if you shop around but they definitely require a babysitter. I'm going through edits on my book but spending more time babysitting the customer service person. And then, to add insult to injury, they told me today they want more money! Too funny! I told her to get it together first. I know the person who started CD Baby and he was so adamant about making everything easier for the musicians and he was so articulate. I thought BookBaby would be a great experience of the same ilk, and hopefully later, I'll have a better report, but right now... oy vey!
I use CreateSpace. Because they are POD (print on demand) they don't work out too expensive.I do now have a professional cover designer, Avalon Graphics, so my most recent book (not yet out) will look more professional. The layout is good if you do it correctly - just remember to check the spaces between the words. If the gaps are too great, you need to reword slightly. Check out lots of trad. pubbed books to see the layout they use. They rarely have an index even though CreateSpace provides one.
Vanity Press is expensive and they rarely give you much in the way of professional services such as editing. You can self-edit (but you need to be brutal and meticulous and edit until your eyeballs bleed. Don't even think of publishing without at least ten edits. I've edited 15 times myself for this book, and I have professional editor) but you definitely should have excellent, experienced beta readers you can trust, and if you can afford to pay an editor (cheaper than Vanity Press) look for reviews of their work and check out books they've edited first. I have one who specialises in medieval history, which works well for me.
If you use CreateSpace and want to look as much like a traditionally pubbed book as possible, opt for cream paper, not white. I learnt that a little late.
Please excuse any typos - I've been proofing my latest WIP for weeks and fried my brain.
Lots of luck.
I would not recommend BookBaby to anyone! I launched my book Goddess through them in October 2016 and have had nothing but issues since. For starters, there is a 2 1/2 month lag time where you know NOTHING about your sales. Unlike CreateSpace or Amazon KDP, you have no dashboard to see your sales real time so you are completely in the dark and they refuse to check for you citing the fact that they have over 20,000 authors and couldn't possibly log in to their account to check numbers just for you because they requested them. Another huge problem for me, was on March 30, 2017 when I was a finalist in the Drunken Druid Awards (a small international writing award) when I noticed my book link was dead. It was down the entire next day when the winner was announced...me! So they blasted my book out all over the world as the winner and even if folks wanted to, they couldn't get to the book because the link was dead. That continued into the next day, costing me unknown amounts of sales worldwide. When I hit them up they claimed to be sympathetic but offered me nothing in solace for my loss. It turned out it was their fault, not amazon's that my book was down, which infuriated me further. They still have yet to apologize to me and the other authors who suffered losses those days.Long story, short, do NOT use them! Network, network, network. There are plenty of people who can help you. Amazon KDP and CreateSpace are great Indie options for the newbie as there is virtually no set up required. If you need formatting, free software is available to download or plenty of good folks on fiverr.com can format for you for cheap. You have to do your own marketing anyway, BookBaby is absolutely no help in that area, so you are not at a loss in anyway if you go another route. Steer clear my friend, they will only serve to frustrate and disappoint you. For example, I am still waiting on February 2017 sales numbers from them :-(!
I have written children's stories about animals;'Flip to the Rescue' about two young seals who have adventures in Norfolk and get into trouble.
'Jacob, the Famous Goose' a true story of a goose who saves lives and meets Queen Victoria and the Duke of Wellington.
My new books are 'The Stubborn Chick who would not Hatch',
'Peter Pointer Pig', and 'Tommy sees a Way'. All three need to be printed and I am trying to find an agent or publisher.!!!!
Sheila Marlin
I am a fan of Ingram Spark. I use them for printing books but not for eBooks although they handle both. The quality of their printed books is good, if not very good. Their prices are competitive. They can act as an international distributor. This means if anyone asks for your book in a store, the store can have it within 24-48 hours from Ingram Spark. They charge to format your work as an eBook. I have learnt how to do this, so format my own eBooks and sell these via Amazon. Books for children may have more appeal as printed books and IS certainly work for me. Their marketing is okay as well. One of my books has been placed in their summer catalogue sent to 1000 UK bookshops. No charge. You can get a quote (free) from IS via their web page. Good luck!
Sheila, I'd be interested in reading the books. My email address is tadtexer@live.com
They are available on Amazon or direct from me through my email address.Regards, Sheila
Please email me, Sheila. Maybe there's a publisher you can be connected with.
Thank you all so very much for your comments and insight. I will check out CreateSpace and Ingram Spark; and I'm grateful to have an awareness of what to watch out for with BookBaby. It turned out that when they finally read my e-mails, BookBaby did a beautiful job with the cover of my ebook - almost exactly as I had envisioned it and very classy. My book is called "Always Face the Hounds: The Negotiation for Osama bin Laden" so it's a political/current affairs book. Maybe I should have gone with a traditional publisher for such a title but giving up 85% of the royalties and the Film/TV rights seems steep to me. It's not a record that costs $300k+ to make plus $2+mil in marketing to break a new artist. It seems greedy that the book companies offer basically the same deal as major labels and their costs aren't even 1/10th. It's great that there are so many self-publishing options.
Editing and ProofreadingI cultivated a circle of professional editors and proof readers—this is essential for a quality offering. Many of them know each other and have worked for the big 5, but either moonlight or have set up their own studio—the big five contract this out, too.
Design
I typically use the same design studio for interior layout and cover design, although I usually provide my own cover artwork, but Create Space has a cadre of designers and so forth that you can work with a la carte: editors, designers, etc.
Buy your own ISBN's from Bowkers—I bought a lot of 100 ISBN's, since I plan to write a lot of books (as long as I can) and each edition or format requires a new one.
Production and Distribution
I use LightningSource. They only do business with publishers, so I set up a publishing house, called Woodland Park Press LLC. That is useful when setting up contracts. LightningSource (Like Ingram Spark) is owned by Ingram.
For the Kindle editions and epub (if you want to do that) you go to Amazon and epub at places like Smashwords or Kobo. I did one epub edition and as soon as I did the pirating blossomed, so I no longer create epubs.
The nice thing about working with individual editors is that you develop relationships that are useful.
Thanks for your notes. BookBaby ended up doing a beautiful job with the cover of my book and they will convert the book itself from Word to eBook formats and distribute it internationally (as well as assign the ISBN - I just need to make sure they do the metatags with Bowker's). I was able to get a very qualified and helpful editor for about $11/page (300 words per page) via Servicescape.com. She was exceptional. If the editing isn't perfect at the end it's because I keep messing with it! Almost done though, as it's scheduled for release on June 13th. There will be a paperback as well but not til September. All in all, this is much easier than releasing a record. And oher than the advance on royalties, I'm not sure what the point is of going with a major book publisher anymore - you have to give up too much - creative control, royalties and Film/TV rights. Maybe it makes sense for foreign translations/distribution (haven't looked into it yet), but not for domestic.
Hi Meg,Thanks for your information. It is stimulating to read what you have done. Good luck.
I used FirstEdit and BookBaby for my first book. I am currently battling with another "full service" house, which I won't name until I get the issues sorted out. But I am seriously considering going back to FirstEdit and BookBaby. I wasn't happy with the service provided by either house last time. ButI let FirstEdit talk me into submitting my manuscript before it was ready. Lesson learned - I have had 3 beta readers and 5 or 6 self-edits - I think FirstEdit can handle the cleanup. I have no complaints about books - softbound 5X8 - and e-Book that BookBaby produced. I got an artist from Freelancer.com to produce the cover picture. Then I had to battle BookBaby to use my picture. Eventually they did it my way. There are some missing pieces - ISBN (I expected them to ask me about that but...).I would like to try CreateSpace but I am concerned about botching the setup.
Joe: I did one-shop shopping on CreateSpace, because I KNEW I'd botch the formatting. They charge, but no more than other self-publishing cos.
Jan wrote: "Joe: I did one-shop shopping on CreateSpace, because I KNEW I'd botch the formatting. They charge, but no more than other self-publishing cos."Thanks - I am going to try that one of these days. But the company that had nothing to say for over a month decided that they wanted to publish my book after I told them that I had people waiting in the wings if the found my book too racy. So I guess that I will stick with them for the time being.
That's interesting. I didn't even know that BookBaby has specific formatting requirements. I sent them the book in MS Word format and they figured it out from there. My book didn't require a lot of formatting and there are no pictures in this initial version. I also wasn't hoping for anything special - only that it's easily readable on Kindle on an iPhone 7 so if someone is having a coffee at Starbucks they can read it on their phone without any hassle. It's a short book - good for a coffee break! Bookbaby was fast and it looks fine in my estimation. They also took care of the ISBN for me. I would never try to sell a book (or a record or single for that matter) without an ISBN. There are some retailers who won't even touch a book that doesn't have one. In addition, I don't think the sales of the book can register with BookScan if the book doesn't have an ISBN. As far as submitting myself and finding the time to format the eBook for the different formats internationally and keeping track of each one individually, I'd do it if I have to, but I'm busy so if I can delegate it to a service, I'm happier with that idea. As far as your note about control, I think you always have control over the book as long as you have the ability to cancel an agreement and pull the book off of the virtual shelves.
I'm curious if anyone on here has experience with POD for Paperbacks. I don't want to print a ton of books if I can help it. I only want one :-). What are the upfront costs and royalty rates of Ingram Spark, CreateSpace, etc vs BookBaby? Are they very favorable to the author or do print books fall more in line with what traditional publishers would pay in royalties?
Thanks,
Meg
Meg wrote: "I'm curious if anyone on here has experience with POD for Paperbacks. I don't want to print a ton of books if I can help it. I only want one :-). What are the upfront costs and royalty rates of Ingram Spark, CreateSpace, etc vs BookBaby? ..."I think most of us here have used POD paperbacks. I use and highly recommend Createspace--no upfront costs, and author copies available at cost plus shipping. Ingram Spark is also good but has setup costs.
Keep in mind that POD books will always be more expensive than traditional offset press runs, but the advantage is that you don't have crates full of books gathering dust in your basement.
I would never use BookBaby, but I like to do everything myself--cover design, formatting, e-books, etc. (although I do hire a professional copyeditor). It may be a good option for people who don't like a DIY approach.
HI Meg, I've put together paperbacks through Lulu.com. I sell many more books face-to-face right now but they offer the paperback and print as ordered. I don't like the pricing of the books for buyers through LUlu because they make approximately half the price of the book. That's ok if someone is out of state or not local and they don't mind paying shipping. Sometimes they offer free shipping. I've had people buy my book online. They also distribute through Amazon. It is a viable option however and some will use it. I would probably buy someone else's book online even though I know the price is higher. The print comes out nicely. You know all that is formatted in the file you send to the printer. Usually I just buy five or ten copies at a time and sell them here or ship them myself. I usually break even. I'm just getting started so I'm learning all kinds of tricks. You can see my books at http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/Queenof... Good luck! I'm going to look at Bookbaby. Meg wrote: "That's interesting. I didn't even know that BookBaby has specific formatting requirements. I sent them the book in MS Word format and they figured it out from there. My book didn't require a lot of..."
I agree with Loretta - CreateSpace is the way to go. User friendly and doesn't cost you anything.
Hi Ken,Thanks so much for your input. My friend Dave uses Createspace for his paperback music books as well and he said he's happy with them and he does well, particularly in international markets via their distribution.
Bookbaby is exactly as you said - they're for people who want to move forward without a traditional publisher (whether they can't get one or don't want to give up so much in creative control, royalties, etc) but don't want to spend the time creating cover artwork, formatting an eBook, and figuring out each bookseller individually. You pay a little bit for their service, but you keep all of your rights and all of the royalties, at least on an eBook.
It sounds like Createspace might make more sense for POD paperbacks, although I'm curious what the royalty rates are? I definitely don't want a pile of books around the house and I'm not the right personality to give speeches or book signing talks (even the thought of it gives me a headache).
Shelley, thanks for your feedback as well. This is all very helpful. I always thought Lulu was just about the same as Bookbaby. I met a new author who was happy with Lulu, but I went with Bookbaby because a friend of mine created CDBaby and he was so articulate and amazing with the musicians on there (everybody I've ever talked to about that service loved him) so I thought Bookbaby would be a good choice. To be honest, it was a little clunky at first, but it seems things are moving forward nicely now (maybe mercury was just in retrograde!) and they were good and fast at converting the Word doc to eBook formats (at least it looks good on my iPhone 7 with the free Kindle app) and Bookbaby has a couple of good marketing tools and discounts to get attention for a new book. We'll see. I'd love to hear your progress on lulu and I will report the same with Bookbaby. This is an experiment for me. I have two more books that I've been working on and I have friends watching this as well (everyone seems to have a book in them!) so I hope Bookbaby works out great. And I hope Lulu is great for you. Good luck!
Very best,
Meg
My two cents-- I have published a lot more books with traditional publishers than on my own and I much prefer going independently. And Createspace is equal to or superior in service to what I think of as my last century style publishers and a lot more fun. Either way the author does most of the marketing effort anyway.
Ken wrote: "Meg wrote: "I'm curious if anyone on here has experience with POD for Paperbacks. I don't want to print a ton of books if I can help it. I only want one :-). What are the upfront costs and royalty ..."Meg, I agree with Ken. CreateSpace is a good company. The agents have not ignored my needs, always patient, always friendly, and it has been comforting to work with a supporting team. I like their team spirit.
Thanks, Karl. I think Creatspace might make the most sense for the paperback. They certainly seem to hold the consensus of everyone I've asked.
Hi Steven, that's really interesting that you release titles through a traditional publisher and they allow you to also release books independently (under a different name?). In the record business, the label generally owns all masters recorded during the contract period. I guess the book world is a land of its own or you have a ton of leverage! I think it's an interesting experiment to release a book outside of the traditional publishers and see if I can get any traction. It's not that hard to get a word-of-mouth buzz going but we'll see how it does. Thanks so much for your thoughts on Createspace. I think I'll go with them for the paperback for September 12th.
to answer your question, I am not under contract as an author to any particular publisher. if you look at my author page with Amazonyou will see that while I have done about twenty editions of a textbook with one publisher all the rest are with a very wide range of publishers...including a company I founded myself once .. in fact in that context you might find this essay interesting
https://sagethoughts.wordpress.com/
if the link does not work just google Leibo's World Watch
That's great that you can work independently outside of your traditional publisher contracts. That's ideal. I will check out your author page on Amazon and read the essay today - thanks for the link!At the moment, I'm getting a lesson in why other authors have found Bookbaby's inflexibility annoying. Still hoping this self-publishing adventure was a good idea in the end and not a train wreck. The experiment continues...
I like using CreateSpace. I do pretty much everything on my own, cover creation, formatting, editing. For editing, I tend to let the book sit for at least a month before I go back for all the copy editing stuff, which gives me distance as I work on another project. I've never had any problems with CS. They're pretty good at making sure my images are high quality enough for print. The templates are pretty easy to use, especially if you know Microsoft Word and Adobe Photoshop. I use my own ISBNs now, though I started using theirs. I like the idea that it's my publishing house's name on there instead of CreateSpace's.
I started out -- at least for my first novel with my own company, Silk Screen Press but i must say create space is a lot easier. Is it not an awful lot more work to do it yourself? In my case, I like the freedom create space offered that I don't have with my traditional publishers but the reduction in administrative demands that a separate company requires. Create Space seems like the 'sweet spot in the middle.
I like that you can use your own ISBN with Createspace and still call it your own company. You are just using CS as your "printer" and distributor of sorts.
Ben wrote: "Hi everyone, Before I get started, please forgive me ahead of time for my greenness as I am completely new to this world, and slightly overwhelmed by everything I have read on line. I am interest..."
Hi, Ben.
I'm also new to publishing. Going the indie route (so self-publishing, no vanity press involved, although I do use professional services for editing). I have an ebook on Amazon, Kobo, B&N, and a few other places (and ebooks are where a lot of indies make most of their income). And then I have a paperback through CreateSpace, and I like it a lot, both the process and the final product (I've printed & ordered books for giveaways even prior to publishing the paperback). I'm thinking of expanding to Ingram Spark as well. But these are the main distribution channels, and all are pretty easy to set up (although they take time and I had to learn some new skills).
I haven't attempted distribution to physical bookstores or libraries yet. That's next on my list. Indiebound.com is a place to start if you're aiming at independent bookstores. With large chains, I imagine you would contact them directly. You can also register your book with the Library of Congress (although indies are not eligible for the CIP data, only for the Library of Congress Control Number registration).
You can find a lot of resources on creativeindie.com (Derek Murphy's site). They helped me a lot. Anything from how to format your book for print, convert it to ebook, and design a cover - to how to launch and promote your books online.
Good luck!
I've published twenty four tiles and what you're suggesting makes me go cold. Unless your book is specific, IE: a book you hand out at presentations, or specialist academic, to even contemplate 500 to 1000 print run is not advisable. There are many authors in the past, even before POD, with books in their garages that they will never sell, or even give them away.
I sell ninety percent ebooks to every paperback and most authors do the same. Then no book shop, or distributor, will take a book without an ISBN number and at least 45% markup from your printing cost and profit. That is why POD is the best way, print when ordered, never bulk print, without substantial orders.
Rather than go to a printer with in-house book setup, who charge a lot, you'd be better having somebody typeset the text to the recognized PDF standard. Once you have that and the number of pages, only then can you create a template for the cover. Again, you need someone who is competent in doing the work.
Typesetting from a word file and cover layout from existing artworks will cost you no more than £100. I know, because I've done it many times for people.
At that point, if you want distribution, you will need the ISBN number, otherwise if you intend doing that yourself, submit the PDF's to any printer, but Lighning Source is good and will, if you provide the ISBN, distribute, paying you royalties. Remember the minimum markup of 45% though.
Let me just say that everything Keith just said is in my opinion exactly correct.
I use iUniverse.com. I thought the cost was fair, you have a choice of packages. They offer cover design and for additional cost you can get an editor and may be considered for their advanced programs. Perk--they are owned by Penguin -Random which makes it an easy transition to traditional publishing if they feel you have a book they think is very marketable.
I have used Iuniverse and Createspace and a bunch of traditional publishersCreate Space is far and away the best
Li wrote: "I have used Iuniverse and Createspace and a bunch of traditional publishers..."iUniverse is a vanity press NOT a trad publisher. CS is a POD service, again NOT a trad publisher. Do your research so you know the difference between scam vanity presses, genuine author service providers (like CS) and trad publishing. You don't pay trad publishers, they pay you.
thought this was a friendly space-- in any case "and" suggests I well know that I universe is not a traditional publishers. And I might add that -- having published a great deal some traditional publishers do want money up front. It is called a subvention.
Li wrote: "...having published a great deal some traditional publishers do want money up front...."Firstly I won't stand by and see naive authors told to use iUniverse and other vanity presses. That's spreading misinformation that could potentially cost people thousands of dollars and it will end in disappointment. Not sure why you see informing new writers of potential traps as not being "friendly"?
You seem to be confusing a vanity press model with traditional publishers. Trad publishers do not receive payment from the author. It is not uncommon for authors who have gone the vanity route to proclaim that their "publisher" is legitimate.
Would you care to name these "great deal" of publishers you use, that you have paid money to?
Personally I have not paid but university presses often want some sort of subsidy and while not in the humanities scientific journals demand money-- in fact it is often from the agencies that fund research. Closest thing I have experienced myself was having given up a block of royalties on a a non fiction book because I did not want to do the index myself. In short, my primary point is that it is hard to generalize about traditional publishers as well.
I think you are misunderstanding my point. I am not telling anyone what to use. Merely saying that I have a lot of experience with both routes and they both offer advantages and disadvantages.
Before I get started, please forgive me ahead of time for my greenness as I am completely new to this world, and slightly overwhelmed by everything I have read on line. I am interested in self-publishing through a vanity label but can't seem to figure out where to get started, as it seems most online companies either have pretty negative reviews or they are PoD only, which I hear leaves you with a hell of a time trying to get stores to carry your book. Does anybody know of any reputable companies which will print high-quality copies of your book in bulk sums, with no strings attached? I understand the cost of printing 500-1,000 copies is significant, as well as what it entails trying to promote yourself, but I feel this is the best path for me to take right now.
Thanks for your help.
Ben