What perhaps the most unfortunate aspect about this scenario is that authors are paying these “publishers” hundreds of dollars to send out these junk press releases, not knowing that the same, untargeted and anonymous list is being used again and again. The author has high hopes of landing a mention in a publication or even getting a request for a review copy, but this almost never happens because the reporters are so tired of getting massive amounts of paper-wasting faxes (and email) from the same companies that they get angry whenever one comes in…and they throw it away, just like we do.

Other authors eagerly pay their “publishers” hundreds of dollars for bookmarks, magnets and more marketing products. These items often cost more than the sales they subsequently generate.

One publisher asks writers to pay to contribute to a co-op ad in a major newspaper. It’s very expensive! However, on viewing the ad, we noticed that the ads for the books themselves are very small, while the mention (the ad for) the publishing house is quite large. I imagine the ads are bringing in more authors for the publishing house than book sales for the authors.

When being tempted by a publisher who is trying to upsell you on marketing products and services, you should balance the cost of the service with the income you expect it to generate. And don’t fool yourself. Very few of these expensive products and services are going to generate enough sales to warrant the initial expense.

Most consumers need to be exposed to a product several times before they’ll buy. One ad, one interview, one book review or one mention in a publication isn’t likely to generate many sales at all, if any. It’s unfortunate that so many self-publishing companies keep concocting more ways to separate authors from their money rather than giving authors free marketing tools and advice. Giving authors free marketing tools benefits both the publisher AND the author by generating book sales with little or no investment.

Angela Hoy is the publisher of Booklocker.com, Inc., an author-friendly POD publisher that takes no rights, pays high royalties on a monthly basis, and treats authors like people, not numbers. She is also an advocate for writers’ rights and publishes WritersWeekly.com, the free marketing emag for writers, offering paying markets and freelance jobs every Wednesday at no charge.

Traditional and Self-Publishing Companies have different advantages and disadvantages. Choosing the right publisher for your book can begin simply by analyzing information on a publisher’s website. From there, you can compare different companies and crunch your numbers to decide which publisher or publishing option is the best one for your book.

Many first-time authors want to find a traditional publisher for their books. While books like Writer’s Market and Literary Marketplace annually come out with new editions that list publishers, more and more authors are going to the Internet and publisher websites to find a publisher.

A huge difference exists between self-publishing companies and traditional publisher companies, and for a new author, that difference can be confusing. Here are a few things to look for to determine the difference and to find a publisher who is right for you.

First off, a traditional publisher will never ask you to pay the publishing costs. Traditional publishers will cover all of the publishing costs, which is one main advantage of being traditionally published; another is that the publisher hopefully will have wider marketing capabilities than you as the individual author.

Many self-publishing, subsidy, vanity, and P.O.D. websites (those terms are largely interchangeable and yet there are differences in them which would require an article in itself) will expect the author to pay the publishing costs. Then authors will purchase copies of their books from these publishers. The publishers may also sell the books themselves from their website and to distributors. These sales the publisher makes result in the author receiving royalties. Books the authors buy themselves from the publishers do not. By comparison, while traditional publishers will also sell you copies of your books to resell, again, they will not expect you to pay anything up front for publishing the book.

In visiting publisher websites, a key way to tell the difference between traditional and self-publishing publishers is each one’s website layout. Many of the self-publishing companies will have a lot of information on their sites about how to get published and the benefits of being published by them. I’ve often seen these sites’ home pages have half-a-dozen or more pages regarding publishing, publishing packages, author login pages, etc. but only one, often almost unnoticeable page for their store where they actually sell their authors’ books. If the website, as in this case, looks like it is more interested in convincing an author to use the company to publish his or her book, rather than appealing to a reader to buy books, then it’s probably not a traditional publisher.

Another differentiator may be an advance for the book. Self-publishing companies will not pay the author an advance for the rights to publish his or her book—in fact, as stated above, these companies will ask the authors to pay them to publish it. If a publisher offers an advance, then you have found a traditional publisher. However, just because a publisher does not offer an advance does not mean it is not a traditional publisher—due to the current economy, many traditional publishers have quit offering or only offer minimal advances. If you do begin to negotiate with a traditional publisher, you can always ask for a larger percentage of sales for your royalty in exchange for not taking an advance—you may not get it, but it doesn’t hurt to ask.

Self-publishing companies will also sell authors their books at a discount. For example, if you buy up to 25 copies of your book, you’ll get 25% off the retail price, 100 copies might earn you 50% off the retail price etc. You then will determine the individual print run of copies you want. These publishers, because they use digital or print-on-demand (POD) technology, also will print just one or two copies if a book distributor wants to buy a small number. The advantage here is you can print as many copies as you want and can afford.

A traditional publisher, by comparison, will pay for the printing of the books, but it will determine how many copies to print. The print run will probably be larger than what you could afford. With a self-publisher, you might only have the budget to print 100 or 500 copies to buy from the self-publisher, while a traditional publisher might print 3,000 copies. But when those 3,000 copies are sold out, the traditional publisher may decide not to reprint the book because it doesn’t believe a market exists for another 1,000 or so copies. Whereas, if you pay the self-publishing company to print your book, and you are good at marketing it yourself, you can keep ordering and selling as many copies as you want. If you do go with a traditional publisher, in this case you will want your contract to state precisely how many copies will be printed, and you will want to negotiate terms for additional print runs (which the traditional publisher will agree to if the book sells well), or the rights to buy back your rights to the book to reprint it yourself if the traditional publisher chooses not to reprint it.

In the end, your decision of which type of publisher to use should come down to money. Don’t let your dream of being published emotionally interfere with your financial concerns. Use the publisher that will be most economical for you, but also in the long run provide you the greatest financial benefit. Having a traditional publisher print your book for free, and then pay you royalties of $1 per copy for 3,000 copies may be great if that’s the most copies the book is likely to sell; however, using a self-publishing company and being able to resell the copies you buy from the self-publisher at a $5 per copy profit, and being able to print endless copies, might be a greater, because more profitable, advantage—especially if you are good at marketing your book. In this scenario you would only have to sell 600 copies to earn what you would have from the traditional publisher, and your book may never go out-of-print and far exceed the traditional publisher’s print run in sales.

Advantages and disadvantages exist between using a traditional or a self-publishing company, and only you can decide which is right for you. Do your research, weigh the pros and cons, make sure you actually talk to someone at each company and get all your questions answered satisfactorily before you make your final decision. Do your homework, ask other authors what worked for them, and rationally make your decision. And remember, even if you make a mistake, it’s fixable. You will have gotten your book published, and you will be better educated about the process for your next book or the revised edition of the first one. Good luck!

Irene Watson is the Managing Editor of Reader Views, where avid readers can find reviews of recently published books as well as read interviews with authors. Her team also provides author publicity and a variety of other services specific to writing and publishing books.

Where do you find a good editor? Many self-published authors have made the mistake of hiring a subsidy or print-on-demand publishing company to edit their books, or even a freelance editor, only to find out after the book was published that professional editing was not done and even that changes requested were not made. While many good editors are out there, and POD companies may have good editors working for them, just because a company claims it has good editing services does not mean a quality editor will be assigned to your book.

Trust me. I learned this the hard way. When my book “The Sitting Swing” was first published, I paid a subsidy press to do the editing, and then after I was told the editing was done, the book was published. Not long after, as my book started to gain attention, I was contacted by a major newspaper reviewer who told me she would have written a story about my book for her newspaper but she couldn’t because she found major editing issues. Consequently, I halted sales of my book. Later after I found a traditional publisher and an editor I could trust to do a professional job, I released a revised edition of “The Sitting Swing.”

I don’t base this article simply on one example. Recently another author contacted me who told me:

I have had two unhappy experiences with the same publisher (POD). I realize that there is no recourse according to my contract, and obviously, the first was less distressing than the second….In my case, not only were two sets of galleys not properly corrected (I wasn’t given a final approval, but I had to have faith that the second set would have the corrections made before printing), but the printer left out whole blocks of type. The result..[my book] offered for sale at $17.95 isn’t worth $5! It’s humiliating.

I could provide many more examples, but it’s sufficient to say if you do decide to hire a subsidy or POD publisher, be sure you have a contract that will cover all your bases. Because most of these publishers work within a “cookie cutter” one-size fits all mindset, they probably will not agree to special stipulations within their contracts, but be sure to ask anyway and move on if they will not.

Here are a few stipulations to make sure are included in your contract:

1. Have a sample edit done. Before you agree to let the company, or any editor for that matter, edit your book, ask to have an editing sample done. Submit a few pages and ask to have them edited and a quote provided for the editing. This way you will know up front what the editing will cost, and you will be able to see what kind of editing will be done. If you’re not happy with the editing, request a different editor and another sample done, or look elsewhere. And don’t be afraid to ask other people’s opinions about the editor. It doesn’t even hurt to have two or three different editors do sample edits for you. Interviewing your prospective editors will not hurt at all.
2. Review the editor’s work. I don’t mean spot-checking. After the editing is done, sit down and read through your entire book slowly. If the editor returns the manuscript with the track changes on it, it may take you a while to go through it, but you will also see what was done and be able to change or approve it as you see fit. Remember, it’s your book, not the editor’s, so be sure you get the final say on changes made. That said, be careful with any changes you make yourself—too often authors make last minute changes which are grammatically incorrect or contain typos and punctuation errors.
3. Retain the right to make changes. You, not the editor, should submit the final manuscript to the printer to ensure that the edited version you approve is used. Once the book is then laid out, you will be sent the proofs. Most subsidy and POD companies, as well as most independent book design and printing companies, will charge you for excessive changes at this point—primarily so you don’t rewrite sentences, but fixing typographical errors are perfectly permissible at this stage. Read over your proofs and request any changes be made. Even if you are only allowed something like fifty corrections, do not let this deter you from correcting errors. Often errors found are not your fault but the book layout people’s error, such as not italicizing something, a title omitted, a paragraph accidentally cut, a special quote not indented or centered. Make sure these errors are corrected and you are not charged for any that were caused during the book design and layout process.
4. Double-check all changes. Once you send in the corrections for the proofs, make sure you are sent back another proof so you can see the corrections were made. Double-check each correction closely. The author I quoted above had problems because these changes were not made. Perhaps it was an honest mistake and the wrong file was sent to the printer, but in any case, the author should have had the right to make sure the changes were corrected.
5. Double-check the first printed copy. A good printer will send you a single printed book to ensure you are happy with it before a larger print run is made. Most POD companies, however, do not send a sample copy. Insist they do so or go elsewhere. A pdf of a book cover is well and good but when you see the printed cover, the colors may be lighter or darker than you want. The book itself must also be put together properly. Make sure you go through the book to ensure every page is there and all the pages are inserted properly—not upside down. The last thing you want is people to come back to you later complaining that their book is missing or has defective pages. Believe me—many an author has gone through a nightmare situation when books have been shipped that contain flaws.

These simple steps can save you from a lot of trouble, frustration, and heartache down the road because a publisher, editor, or printer failed to live up to his or her promises. Always get a contract and make sure any foreseeable problems are covered in it. If a publisher, editor, or printer does not want to work with a contract, find another. Similarly, if the person or company is unwilling to alter the contract to allow you to have final say over all steps of the editing, layout, and printing process, look elsewhere.

Remember, this book is your book. It has your name on it for the rest of its life. If it’s your first book, the process of publishing can be overwhelming, but don’t let that stop you from being assertive and making absolutely certain your book will be the best product possible. Once you find a publisher, editor, and printer you can trust, you’ll be ready to publish your future books.

Irene Watson is the Managing Editor of Reader Views, where avid readers can find reviews of recently published books as well as read interviews with authors. Her team also provides author publicity and a variety of other services specific to writing and publishing books.

Tons of vanity presses make it easy to publish a book. These companies charge tens of thousands of dollars by preying on the fact that naïve authors will pay and do just about anything to be in print. I know of companies that charge $12,000 for 500 books. That’s $24 a book! As Solomon said in Ecclesiastes, “Vanity, vanity all is vanity!”

Subsidy presses will offset, or subsidize, a portion of the publishing expenses. The author pays for editing and printing, the press pays for marketing; however, they will also participate in the proceeds for each book sold.

An independent or small publisher usually focuses on a specific genre. These publishers may or may not pay advances and often have fewer than twenty authors on the roster.

Print-on-demand (POD) publishers are better described as high-priced printers than publishers. These companies charge exorbitant fees and act more like the middle man on a book project. One of my clients paid $150 to copyright her title through a POD. Had she done it herself, the cost would have been $35 (that’s a markup of almost 500%).

I am a proponent for self-publishing because you control the process. You decide when the book releases, the cover and content, the retail price, the printer and the marketing strategy. As a self-published author (self-pub), you can expect to spend about $3,000 to publish 1,000 copies of your title (or $3 a book). And if you sell those copies for $10 each, you’ll gross $10,000!

Sidebar: Regardless of the publishing option you choose, your books will not automatically fly off the shelves. You will have to market, promote and sell, sell, sell!

Let’s take a look at some differences between self-publishing and PODs:

1. Many PODs do not provide a comprehensive edit although they charge like a professional, developmental-writing editor who’s providing personalized coaching and a manuscript critique. Self-pubs can find competent editors for a fraction of the cost.
2. PODs use templates for book covers. I have a client whose inspirational book has the same cover image as a book about demons, witches and warlocks. She was horrified by the discovery. Self-pubs can contract with graphic designers to create customized one-of-a-kind covers for as little as $300.
3. Now for the real deal: making money!
   1. If you’re in business to make money, it’s almost impossible with PODs. Thorough self-pubs can acquire books for less than $2 each; however, the POD cost for a comparable book often exceeds $10. Doesn’t sound like much, but when authors try to market to bookstores, libraries and distributors, they soon learn that it’s not cost effective. To make money, bookstores charge 40% of the retail price and distributors up to 70%. So, if a book is priced at $15 and the author has to give up 60% (or $9) to a distributor, the gross profit is $6 ($15 retail price – $9 to the distributor). If a POD printed the book, the loss is $4 a book ($6 gross profit – $10 POD print cost). As a self-pub, each book sold results in a net profit of $4 ($6 gross profit – $2 printing cost). I have a client who went with a POD—against my recommendation—because she wasn’t charged any upfront fees. I admonished her to find out her cost to purchase books, but she was too ecstatic about “the savings” to read the fine print. Well, as I expected, they got her on the back end. The POD charged her $25 to buy her book which should retail for $12.95. The cost made the book a hard sell, so she packaged it with trinkets to enhance the perceived value, sold it for $20 and lost lots of money.
   2. PODs don’t pay royalties on books purchased by the author and most books sold through PODs are purchased by the author. Go figure! For the few books that are sold by the POD, the author earns a whopping $110 in royalties on average. The earning potential for self-pubs is limited only by the author’s persistence and ability to creatively market and sell books.
   3. PODs charge excessive fees for promotional material and marketing. One of my clients purchased business cards through her POD. They charged her $200 for 200 cards (at $1 per card, they’re too expensive to give away) that didn’t even have her contact information. To add insult to injury, the cards directed the consumer to the POD’s site, so she paid to advertise for the POD. Awful!

The only plus to PODs is the ability to print small quantities. For writers who want to test the market or print copies for family history, POD may be a viable option. If you absolutely must go POD, go straight to the source, Lightning Source. Most of the PODs contract with them to print books and then markup the fee to authors.

If you’d like a FREE list of PODs or want us to rate your publisher, visit the Contact Us page at PenOfTheWriter.com.

As a bestselling author and award-winning publisher, Valerie J. Lewis Coleman has helped thousands of aspiring authors navigate the challenges of self-publishing. With over ten years of experience in the book business, this expert divulges industry secrets on avoiding the top five mistakes made by new authors, pricing your book to sell and identifying dishonest publishers. Her dynamic presentation and knowledge of the business takes writers from pen to paper to published as they master self-publishing to make money! To learn more about Valerie, her books and succeeding as a self-published author, visit ValerieJLColeman.com, PenOfTheWriter.com and QueenVPublishing.net.

Copyright © 2010 by Valerie J. Lewis Coleman

Although POD publishing is the usual printing method for subsidy publishers (so-called “self-publishing companies”), even traditional book publishing companies are switching to POD for some titles.

Consider these as some of the advantages of the On Demand Publishing method:

• It does not require storage of books. Unlike traditional publishing, you don’t need to print books in advance. Once a book is sold, it is produced and delivered.
• Publishing companies do not have to think about selling printed books and fear getting the books being damaged or becoming outdated over time.
• On demand publishing allows a publishing company to test new titles without large expenditures for printing, shipping and storage.
• Both large and small publishing companies can keep titles with low demand in print and available for longer periods. With on demand publishing, the only cost of keep a book “in print” may be the minimal cost of storage of the digital files on a computer.

The primary disadvantage of on demand publishing is that the cost per unit is higher than when books are printed in large quantities. For example, a book that can be printed for $1 a copy in quantities of 5000 may cost $3 or more when printed on demand. However, there are interest and opportunity costs in having to fund a large print run (and ship and store those books) that can more than make up for the difference in unit costs.

To conclude, on demand publishing is an economical and effective method of publishing. It allows many publishers to keep a wider variety of titles in print and available without the risk of printing thousands of books that may not sell.

Learn more about writing, publishing and selling books here at SellingBooks.com.

So, I turned to self-publishing. At the time, making a lot of money was not at the top of my priorities. I simply wanted to publish my own book, my own way.

Now that I have self-published my first books, things have changed.

Yes, I still want to have full control and yes I want keep all of my rights to the book. But now the royalty checks have become a top priority, especially with the economic climate that we’re in. That’s why, when I self published my second book, LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) AP Exam Guide with Outskirts Press (a print on demand publisher), I took a different approach.

My book had the benefit of being published at the right time, at the right price. I earned over $30,000 in royalties ($31,207.68, to be precise) in one month. I earned even more the next month. Within six months I had earned over $110,000!

Here Are The 5 Steps I Took When I Self-Published My Second Book…

Self-Publishing Success Step #1: Write a Valuable Book

This step is easily overlooked, but it is Number One on this list for a reason. Your book must provide some sort of value or benefit for the reader. In my case, my books are non-fiction and leaders in their niche. LEED is currently revolutionizing the construction industry. In fact, I earn the lion’s share of my royalties from my LEED AP Exam Guide, which provides a mock exam, study guides, and sample questions for the LEED AP Exam. It is invaluable for those wanting to obtain the title of “LEED AP (Accredited Professional).

I don’t think I’m saying anything revolutionary when I say that publishing non-fiction is an easier proposition on the self-publishing front than fiction. But even fiction books are valuable if they provide the type of “escape” your reader is seeking. Whether you write non-fiction, fiction, poetry, or something else entirely, the book must deliver on its promise. You might do everything else on this list, and you might even find some short-lived success, but ultimately, the success of your book comes down to how valuable your book is to its readers.

Self-Publishing Success Step #2: Identify Your Target Audience

Who is your reader? If your answer is “everybody” you need to reevaluate your goals and recalibrate your expectations. In fact, the smaller your audience, the more success you will find. Look at my books: Planting Design Illustrated and LEED AP Exam. That small, target audience is precisely the reason my books are well-known in the proper circles.

Do I care that someone who reads Harry Potter has never heard of me? No. Is it incredibly important to me that students and professionals in the field of green building design and construction have heard of me? Yes.

Who do you think it is easier to find and market to—a person who reads Harry Potter, or a student/professional in the field of green building design and construction? Exactly! Remember, the smaller your pond, the bigger your fish.

Self-Publishing Success Step #3: Recognize the Type of Book You Are Publishing

You should be realistic about the type of book you are writing, and the type of publishing you are doing. If you are self-publishing your book (regardless of whether you are doing it yourself or through the publishing services of a POD company like I did), don’t try to force your book to be something that it’s not.

Your book is not a mass-market paperback like those you find in a grocery store. Nor is it the latest hardback, discounted 80%, like those you find at Costco. As a self-publishing author, both of those scenarios are too risky, and to be frank, you probably don’t possess the means to take on that kind of risk.

So why try?

Self-publishing authors publish trade paperback and hardback books that can be available regionally (perhaps), locally (probably), and online (definitely).

Self-Publishing Success Step 4: Price Your Book Appropriately

No, this does not mean you should simply make your book as affordable as possible. It means you should complete market research to determine the prices of similar books in your category. Look on Amazon.com for similar books (you’ll need to be aware of these books anyway, when it comes to marketing yours). Examine their page count and price point.

Now, make an honest assessment of your book in relation to the other books in your category. Does your content justify a higher price? Does your page count suggest a lower price? Your method of publishing should be considered but should not play a definitive role in the price of your book. The marketplace should.

It doesn’t matter where you publish your book if no one is buying it.

Self-Publishing Success Step 5: Publish Your Book Wisely

When I chose my POD publisher for my second book, I was not considering how much my royalties were going to be. That only became important to me after the book was published. But they say hindsight is 20-20, so I’m going to share with you one of the main reasons my royalties are so high. The publisher I chose, Outskirts Press, pays me 100% of the profits of the book and lets me set my own pricing. iUniverse pays 20% of the profit. Xlibris pays 10% of the retail price. But by paying 100% of the profit, Outskirts Press allowed me to set the retail price to whatever I wanted, and now I earn the entire benefit of increasing my price.

Here’s another way to look at it: If I had published my same exact book with iUniverse at the same exact retail price, instead of earning $31,207.68, I would have earned approximately $5,300. If I had published my same book with Xlibris, I would have earned approximately $4,600. Yes, without knowing any better, I would have still considered myself a successful self- published author, but probably not enough to write this article.

As you can see, self-publishing is working for me. I’ve made over $111,000 in six months. My royalties are increasing every month and I’m working on my third book, which I will also publish with Outskirts Press. If hindsight is indeed 20-20, I can only imagine what my royalties will be for book #3!

If you follow the steps above, you too can be on your way to earning $30,000 a month self-publishing!

Gang Chen is a LEED AP and a member of the American Institute of Architects (AIA). As the internationally acclaimed author of “LEED AP Exam Guide” and “Planting Design Illustrated,” Chen highly recommends self-publishing with Outskirts Press. Find out if your book is good enough to earn over $100,000 in six months with the 2 free e-book publishing guides available without obligation at: http://outskirtspress.com/ebook

POD is an outgrowth of the huge changes that occurred in printing technology when digital printing was developed. For the first time, authors were not forced to use offset printing with its minimum press runs of 1500 to 2000 books. For the first time, an author could order only the number of books he/she needed with this new technology, and was able to fill in small quantities as future needs arise. This was a great boon for beginners who were feeling their way in the publishing industry and for memoirists who wanted to distribute books just to family and friends.

The novice writer enjoys the advantage of having the POD house handle all of the prepublication work that is required to produce a book. And that service is available at a very minimal initial outlay of money for the services one receives.

For a production payment of as little as $300, the house will produce a finished book and in most cases do it extremely professionally. The high end of that scale—a ceiling of about $1,000—represents lots of bells and whistles that the house will try to sell you, but which frankly are of little or no value. You can receive a top quality book for an average investment of under $500, and that’s the level you should be at when dealing with this method of publishing. Use the company’s basic program, nothing more.

The Process
You turn your manuscript over to the POD house, along with an initial production check. In return, the house art staff produces a professional book cover. That alone would normally cost you anywhere from $300 to $600 if you were to hire a designer yourself.

The text that comes off the computer, of course, is not what appears in a finished book. It must be formatted to conform to the page size, produced in a type font that is conducive to easy reading and leaded (spaced between the lines). This requires a high level of skill. You can learn to do it, but I strongly recommend a professional formatter. The cost depends on the length of the book. Formatting a 300-page volume, for example, can cost between $800 and $1200.

Every book requires an ISBN number if it is to be sold to bookstores or libraries. This is an identification number that is assigned exclusively to a single book. Barcodes are needed to accompany the ISBN. In addition, Library of Congress Cataloguing is a necessity if you plan to tap into the huge library market. All of these are obtained for you by POD staffers.

The POD House will then print your book, bind it and register it with a major wholesaler (usually either Ingram or Baker & Taylor), a requirement if you are selling to libraries and bookstores. The book will also be placed on Amazon, Barnes & Noble.com and Borders.com. Further distribution and promotional activities are your responsibility.

Be Aware
Two words of caution: Most houses do not obtain a copyright for your book. But that’s not a serious problem. You can do it yourself for just a few dollars. Search for “Copyright” on the Web. The government’s copyright web site will come up and explain each step you must take. It will also supply you with a formal application form. Completing everything is perhaps a 15-minute task and very easy to accomplish.

The second matter you should be aware of is that when the ISBN is ordered by most POD houses, it is listed in the house’s name. You must understand that the entity that owns the ISBN controls all of the finances of the book. So when you read in the publicity, “You control the book. All decisions are yours,” it is a bit misleading. Don’t construe this to mean that you lose total control over your book. It is yours by copyright.

In fact, on the finance side, you do have the right to decide how much of a royalty (percentage of the profit of the sale of the book) you wish. But the reality is that when it sells your book, the house will insist upon taking a certain flat amount, which is usually quite substantial. As a result, if you select a high royalty, the retail price will shoot up above the competition. With a lower royalty, you will make very little money. Nonetheless, at any level of royalty, you have managed to publish your book with no more money out of your pocket than the initial production fee. That’s a pretty fair deal for what you’re getting in return.

The only negative, aside from the minimal compensation, is that there is still some reluctance to handle POD books on the part of the better book reviewers and some book sellers. This a carry-over from the old days of the vanity press, when the level of quality was so poor and from the sloppy, haphazard work y turned out by the charlatans who infected the POD world when it first began.

Today most of the reticence has faded. People judge POD books not by the publisher that produced them, but by the quality of the book itself. POD creations have reached the best seller lists in some cases, and they are available through the majority of bookstores. Even if they are not stocked on the store shelves, they can be ordered quickly.

Finding a POD House
Most POD publishers maintain web sites. Click onto “POD Publishers,” and you will find a number of them. Read their sites carefully, and discount the meaningless extras (the bells and whistles I spoke of above). Be extremely careful if you go to contract. Study the document before you sign or better yet ask a literary lawyer to review it. Think ahead. What impact will each of the conditions of the contract have on the sales of your book. How easily can you leave the POD house and either self-publish future editions or contract for them with a traditional publisher?

While I am reluctant to evaluate the different houses that I have not used, I leave that task up to others. There are a number of sites that make these evaluations. The one I recommend most strongly is www.bookmarket.com/ondemand.htm. The site is owned by John Kremer, a highly respected publishing guru, and supplies information on a large number of publishing on demand houses.

Another site I recommend to you is www.sfwa.org. This extremely informative site is maintained by the Science Fiction Writers of America, but its information is applicable to all genres. Although I do disagree with the site’s contention that POD is not the best choice for a beginning writer, I find the rest of its counsel excellent.

Click on the site, scroll down to the box near the bottom that states “Writer Beware.” Click on it. Over on the left side of the next screen, you will find “Print-on-Demand, Self-Publishing Services.” Click on that, and read it carefully.

POD publishing may not be ideal for every author, but it is a worthy alternative for beginners, family memoirists and in fact anyone who strikes out with traditional publishers and and has a burning desire to make his/her book available to the public.

This column is an excerpt from the blog of Charles Jacobs, book coach and author of “The Writer Within You,” named a Best Book of the Year seven times and winner of both gold and bronze medals. The book can be ordered at www.retireandwrite.com. For coaching, Charles can be reached at carosbooks@gmail.com.

The book after the editing process may not even resemble your work. But you do get an advance, although it might not be too much for a first time author, and if you don’t “sell through,” that is, make back your advance in sales, you will have a really hard time convincing the publisher to put out another book of yours. And you may never see a dime after your small advance. As well, if your book does make it to the book store, if it doesn’t sell in 30 days, the books will be returned and you will most likely be blacklisted by the publishing house.

You generally have to sign your rights away unless you hire a good attorney who has stipulated that you will get the rights to your book back if it does get shelved. Traditional publishing houses used to pay royalties of 10% retail (i.e. if your book is $20, you get $2) but now they mostly only pay 10% of wholesale, so you only get $1 for that same book.

Self-Publishing is hard, because you have to do everything yourself, but the returns are great, because you can retain 70-90% of your investment. If you print them up yourself and then sell them, you really can make some great money. However, the biggest stumbling block is distribution. Very few distributors will deal with a self-published author. Even getting online distribution with Ingram or Baker & Taylor is going to be very tough. Plus, you have to print up at least 2,000 books to bring the price down, and they will most likely be sitting in your office or basement until you can figure out how to sell them.

POD – Print on Demand – is a great technology that combines the two types of publishing. It’s great because there is no inventory to return, or sit in your basement, and if you pick the right pay to publish company, they will give you a pretty good return on your investment – that is, if you choose the lowest distribution discount (20%) to maximize your online royalties. For example, the POD that I am with, they give me $6.28 out of every $14.95 book that I sell. And they provide online distribution, so the book is on Amazon.com, B&N.com, etc. The drawback is that you have to pay an upfront fee, like $1000 to publish with them. And if you are trying to be NYTimes bestseller this won’t happen because they don’t review POD’s. As well, you will not be in bookstores because POD’s carry a non-returnable status.

But, more good news: you own your rights 100%. What I do, is I use my POD for online distribution and cover art (but you can also submit your own cover design, interior files and retain complete
control). Then, I purchase the cover back from them, and take the files to a printer so that I can get my book printed up for substantially less, so as to have copies to send out to the media, sell at various events, etc. My POD charges me $5.65/unit, whereas if I go to a small printer, I can get my books for approximately $3.50/unit.

This is just a quick overview. But choosing the type of publishing for your book is an important one, so it is worth taking the time and energy to figure out which one is right for you.

Please visit Sally Shields, speaker, radio personality, free publicity specialist and author of the #1 Amazon.com bestseller, The Daughter-in-Law Rules on the web at: http://www.thedilrules.com for contest giveaways, free bonus gifts, Sally’s newsletter, 101 Surefire Ways to Market Your Book, Product or Service, free music, … and more!

But in December of that year I had an epiphany.  I was about to reach a “significant” birthday and I couldn’t wait any longer for someone to say yes to me.  And at that moment I was finally open to hearing what my colleague had been saying for months:

Self-publishing today takes many forms but it is definitely not restricted to the old vanity press model where you paid for thousands of books that you then stacked in your garage.

Today one of the easiest options is a print-on-demand (POD) publisher – only the books ordered are printed.  That’s right – even one book at a time I learned.

I signed up with BookSurge, the POD unit of Amazon, and away I went.

Now in fairness to the people reading this guest post, I’ve taught copyediting at the college level.  So I was pretty confident in my proofreading abilities.  But earlier I had hired a book consultant to find the missing element in my book.  (People read the manuscript and liked it but kept saying something was “missing.”)

He was expensive and worth every penny even though the basic problem was the confusion of the timeline of events.  I worked on fixing that, then rewrote once again, and proofread again.

The other advantage I had is that I’d studied advertising design a long time ago.  Thus I knew how important the cover would be.  And while I paid to have a cover designed by BookSurge, I had very strong opinions which were honored.  I wanted the faces of four very different women on the cover representing the four protagonists of the novel.

If you don’t have the background for your own proofreading and cover design, I strongly urge you to get professional help in both these areas.  I’ve read self-published books that haven’t had professional editing – and you can really tell!

Next then comes perhaps the hardest part – marketing your book.  I was lucky in this arena because, while my book was going through the BookSurge stages, MRS. LIEUTENANT was named a semi-finalist in the first Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award.  We were each given a page on Amazon, and I spotted that another semi-finalist had a blog on her page.  I wanted one too!

That started my intensive quest to learn everything I could about internet marketing.  And the result of that intensive quest led me to becoming an internet marketer and sharing what I’ve learned with others.

And FYI – while some book reviewers still treat self-published books as a stepchild, other reviewers have embraced the wider diversity now available.  Plus the proliferation of blogs that review books means that there’s so much more opportunity to get your book reviewed than there was when print media controlled which books got reviewed and which didn’t.

If you’re a book author and you truly want to see your book published, do consider self-publishing – as long as you have your book professionally edited, get a good cover design, and are prepared to learn how to do the marketing yourself.

Phyllis Zimbler Miller is a National Internet Business Examiner at http://budurl.com/internetbusiness as well as a book author, and her company http://www.MillerMosaicLLC.com provides internet marketing information with easy-to-implement solutions to promote your brand, book or business. On July 1st her company launched the Miller Mosaic Internet Marketing Program.

In POD Publicity, Wallace takes authors step-by-step through the process of publishing and promoting a print on demand book. She recommends reading the book from beginning to end, rather than skipping around, and doing so provides a sequenced plan to effectively publishing and marketing your book.

After a foreword by publishing guru Dan Poynter,  Wallace explains why POD is the right choice. She starts her how-to right at the beginning, addressing issues such as cover design and title choice. Your book’s image will play a big role in any promotions, so design and title should not be taken lightly.

In the chapter on Building Your Web Presence, Wallace discusses blogging and provides a checklist of what should be included in your online media kit.

Because online sales are so important in selling your print on demand book, Wallace gives many suggestions for effectively presenting your book on Amazon.com. Amazon wants you to sell books, and they provide many tools to do so. POD Publicity shows how to make use of the easy and free ways to promote your book on Amazon.

The largest section of the book covers publicity. Wallace explains how to go beyond the press release to use the Internet to pursue publicity opportunities, including finding and approaching book reviewers, article marketing, writing guest posts for blogs, and more.

In the Networking Works chapter, Wallace suggests several ways to use social media to promote your book. And in Alternate Formats, she offers how to make your book available for Kindle, as an ebook and as an audiobook.

POD Publicity is not the most comprehensive book on book promotion. However, it is an approachable, easy to read guide with actionable steps that will not overwhelm the new author. Anyone considering producing a print on demand book will get useful information that will help them to make their book successful and profitable. A small investment in this book can save you from making costly mistakes, and help you sell more books.

Get your copy of POD Publicity!