How to Publish an Ebook, Step by Step - labordebuirl1989
Want to issue a book? You can either defeat a crowd of trees, or get with the 2010s and publish it as an ebook.
If you oasis't noticed already, ebooks are nary longer a niche commercialize. As of June 2011, ebook reader adoption had reportedly rack up 25 percent in the Joint States, with the grocery store growing at a phenomenal 169 percent year terminated year. Today, most new releases are existence published in ebook format.
An ebook can provide your small business a real capitalist reward by bighearted you instant credibility and visibility in the marketplace.
Unfortunately, the ebook sales market is fragmented. Publishing an ebook means working instantly with numerous companies, each with its own formats, rules, and quirky systems. While Amazon is the clear leader, some Apple and Barnes & Noble have solid substance abuser bases for their respective devices. Industry watchers in the main believe that Amazon holds nearly a 60 pct share of ebook sales, while Barnes & Noble has 30 percent and Malus pumila claims the remaining 10 percentage, with a handful of other services fill in the cracks.
As a budding publisher, you wish need to prepare your book for at least those three platforms. I'll walk you done the process here.
I have a couple of ebooks along the market, but for the historic few years they've been in stock only for Kindle. To create these tips, I went through the republishing of Quintet Stars! (my manual for aspiring celluloid critics) on all of the major platforms.
Prepare for E-Publishing
Before you even create your Amazon or B&N account, Hera's how to get ready for your vocation as an e-publisher.
Start with the book: First, spell a book. That's hard enough, but putt your book into an ebook-friendly format is almost as complicated, because each ebook seller has its own rules on everything from illustrations to indentation to the manner smoke points work. Amazon's "Formatting" Q&adenylic acid;A forum has over 3000 threads in it.
The best advice I can tender is to spare yourself the head ache and hire someone to data formatting your book. Exploitation a list from ebook aggregator Smashwords, I found a provider who formatted my book in a matter to of hours for $65. Shop around: Pricing can buoy range up to $100, and reversion meter can be ahead to several weeks. Reasonable think of that formatters do not edit your book's placid.
Translate ePub: A few years ago the world of ebook formats was a mess, but today the ePub formatting is the nearly common standard. This ASCII text file format looks a lot like HTML, only you don't need to deal directly with ePub–every ebook newspaper publisher will convert a Microsoft Word text file into ePub for you, and many will Lashkar-e-Toiba you download the born-again ePub file to check it out yourself. (Use Adobe Digital Editions to read your ePub file free of charge.)
After you send your document to a formatting serving, you'll invite it back in .doc format (sr. versions of Word, pre-.docx, are best). Take some time to make sure everything looks good; my finished file had whatever unsupported characters that I quickly cleaned leading manually before submitting. Exercise this .doc As a passkey file cabinet for everything else you do.
Make multiple versions: While the master .doc file you make up will be the most common one, you'll want to have different versions available, mainly with covariant prelims. Smashwords, e.g., requires a Smashwords-specific notice that you'll privation to remove from the filing cabinet for submission to Amazon and other providers. You'll also want to wealthy person a PDF of your book available (which you can create in Word), as recovered as excerpts prompt to go. Just save a portion of your leger (the first 20 to 50 pages) as its own file to create an excerpt. While you're at it, prepare descriptive blurbs at various lengths. You'll involve these as you submit the Holy Scripture to Sellers.
Create a cover: Level though your book is electronic, you still need a high-quality (300 dpi), full-size of it cover, since this image will service to promote your book on seller sites and can get you placement in Web image search results. You stern plan a cover yourself using stock art or your own photos or illustrations if you'ray handy with Photoshop, or you hind end take someone to make one for you. It isn't toll-prohibitive, but expect it to take some time during the alteration operation. While you're at IT, make sure to create a back cover and a spine. Some services require these items, and you'll want them if you resolve to print on paper someday.
Next Page: Set the Magic Leontyne Price, and Empathise Your Rights
More E-Publication Preparation
Understand ISBNs: An International Standard Book Number is the unique code appointed to all hold published, much like a UPC. A company called Bowker issues and manages ISBNs, and they aren't garish: $125 for a uniform number, or $250 for a ten-pack. (I bought a ten-pack in 2005, and ingest secondhand only three of them to date.) ISBNs are mandatory for all written matter, but by and large they'ray elective for ebooks, as most ebooksellers don't need them.
The only substantial reason you'd need one is that Malus pumila insists on it. You give the sack obtain one directly from Bowker or format for one and only through an collector (such as Smashwords), which usually doesn't bear down anything for the numeral but ties you to its service pretty a great deal forever.
Set up a publisher website: It's proficient advice to create a publication "company," Oregon at least an author's website where you bottom join to all the places where your ebook is on sale. Most sellers link hind to whatsoever disposable publisher site, and this helps with search rankings. My publishing house website isn't much to view, but it covers the basics. A blog system would work satisfactory.
Have a bank account ready: Most payments for book gross sales are wired directly to a bank business relationship, or sometimes to PayPal. Have these account numbers ready to go when you're preparing to sell. You'll also need to provide your Social Security number or Employer ID Figure to Peter Sellers for tax purposes.
Set the magic price: Pricing isn't too tough with ebooks. Unless you are publishing a highly discipline textbook, you'll almost always have to Price it at $9.99. This is the accepted and nearly required price index for complete ebooks nowadays: You'll make far to a lesser extent in commissions from most sellers if you go higher–and if you price IT lower, your book will calculate cheap.
However, if your book is short–low-level 45,000 words or so–lower pricing may live necessary. You'll as wel find that some services have clauses ensuring that you don't charge less for the ledger somewhere other, which pretty much locks you in to peerless damage for all platform.
Determine what you earn: Now that your pricing is set, your profits are going to look absolutely fantastic. Most services now offer 60 to 70 percent commissions on gross sales, and some smaller sellers give you even Thomas More. The bottom pedigree is that you'll be making around $7 for apiece book sold, which is vastly more than you would make with a dead-tree diagram book–often near $1 with a tralatitious publisher, and only after you've made back your improvement (read: never). Tied print-on-demand gross sales aren't more than to a greater extent profitable: The Five Stars! print version, published past Amazon's CreateSpace service, earns well-nig $8 on to each one book sold for $19.99 at Amazon, merely books sold elsewhere scarce earn $4 each.
Understand your rights: The terms of service for ebook sellers tend to equal byzantine and baffling. I won't pretend to be an proficient about these terms–or evening to have read them–but if you're attentive about what rights you're yielding, pay closely knit attention to the small print. Apple's iBooks Author terms have already generated significant disceptation.
Tackle the DRM brain-teaser: One of the big decisions is whether to protect your book with digital rights direction engineering, which prevents it from beingness mutual with other readers. DRM will lock chamber your ebook to the reader's invoice and the service from which the customer purchased it. The disputation over DRM isn't one I can dig out into here, but ebook plagiarization is a growing phenomenon. It's unlikely to materially impact your self-published work; merely if you're insane, IT is something to consider. The catch: Once you make a decision virtually DRM on most publishing platforms, you can't change your mind. It's connected or off for spirit.
Ever be promoting: Erstwhile you've submitted your manuscript to the ebook sellers, the yobbo work begins. You'll need to promote your book ruthlessly–which is what Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest are for, reactionary? Reviews are immeasurably helpful, but those canful take time to get, and most reviewers prefer reading paperback manuscripts over ebooks. They are well worth the effort, though, As review blurbs look great on your ebook listing pages.
Make revisions: Luckily, you can change an ebook at whatsoever clock. Whether you're fixing typos or adding new material, you can upload content in a matter of minutes. Upload freely and frequently.
Right away that you know what you demand, let's propel on to the specifics each ebook publisher requires, starting with the biggest name.
Next Page: Prepare Your Book for Amazon River Kindle Maneuver and Barnes & Baronial PubIt
Amazon River Kindle Direct Publishing
You can't argue with the numbers pool: Amazon should be your firstborn stop as an ebook publishing company, and if you're planning to co-occur with just one seller, this should be IT. The uploading process for Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing is quite straightforward and deficient in surprises; you supplying book and author info, keywords, excerpts, and your DRM selection, and then send your manuscript for review. Books are generally online and on hand happening the Amazon store within 24 hours.
Virago's royalty system seems complex, but the bottom line is that you'll make virtually 70 percent along your book if it isn't stuffed with illustrations and IT costs betwixt $2.99 and $9.99. Amazon bequeath also make your book available through its various foreign divisions at your postulation.
One intriguing option is Virago's KDP Pick out program: Make your book exclusive to the Conflagrate for 90 years, and you get a share of Amazon's multimillion-dollar bill Circulating library fund, plus some free content juice.
Amazon has its own file format known as KF8 (Kindle Format 8), but uploading your ePub-set up .doc charge volition mold fine. Inserting a table of contents is nice, but not required away Amazon. The finished book looks smashing both on the Inflame and on Amazon's site, with the listing page linked to some paperback versions of the Word of God, an author Sri Frederick Handley Page, and more.
For more details, check out Tony Bradley's guide to publishing for the Amazon Elicit.
Barnes & Noble Nook/PubIt
The royalties from this seller aren't as good as those from Amazon–65 percent on about books from $2.99 to $9.99–but the Nook is a large adequate chopine to merit investing the time it takes to publish there. The procedure is nearly identical to that of the Kindle: Just fill out a form and upload your ePub-friendly Word file, and you're in order to go. A table of contents is optional.
One of the nice features about Barnes & Noble's PubIt system is that IT includes an offline app (Nook for PC eReading) that you keister use to trailer your manuscript without having to clack through page after page of your book in a Web browser, which can exist excruciatingly slow.
In one case your record book is uploaded, B&N promises that it leave be live inside 24 to 72 hours, and the company had Five Stars! up faster than that. The listing page is a little spare–even with the five review blurbs I uploaded–and the book is alas non linked to its paperback counterpart, which is also open from Barnes &adenylic acid; Noble.
Still, the process is simple, and the sales possibilities are enticing.
Next Page: Prepare Your Ebook for Apple iBooks and On the far side
Orchard apple tree iBooks
The 70 percent commissions from Malus pumila iBooks are dandy, but before you generate too excited approximately your book being available for the iPad, be aware that publishing directly through Orchard apple tree requires you to have a Mac. Inflexible PC owners tail end usance an collector to make an end-run around this issue (encounter below), only the commissions are turn down if you do.
To get started, sign up for a Compensated Books Account (you can offer your ledger for free via a different mechanics), victimisation your Apple Idaho. Fill out the personal information requested, and wait for an e-mail reply: Apple has to sanction your application. Once you induce the okay (my approval took a few days), you have more paperwork to do, including a bevy of additional forms to round.
With that full-blown, you must navigate additional hoops. Apple requires some an ISBN for your book and your manuscript in ePub format. While different providers will transform a .doc file for you, Apple North Korean won't. You can use any of a change of tools to exchange your book to ePub format, operating theater just utilise a creature that one of the other Sellers made for you (which is what I did). Then, using the iTunes Manufacturer software (here's where the Mac comes in), you can finally publish your book. But you're non cooked yet: Apple has another "quality recap" at this peak. A week subsequently I was still waiting for my book to be live on the iBookstore.
Suprisingly, compared with Amazon and Barnes & Dignifying, Apple's publishing scheme is by a inaccurate margin the most confusing, slow, and tall process you'll encounter, true if you already have a Mac. Admittedly, the iTunes Connect Mobile app (which lets you hold in on your book sales via your iPhone) is a nifty plus to the package. On the whole, all the same, if you'Ra considering using an aggregator at all, the complexity of Apple's process is the best reason to pay for that kind of help.
Aggregators
One option with ebook selling is to let someone else do some of the work. You still receive to write and data formatting your book properly, only after that's done, the aggregator works with the reseller on your behalf, freeing you from dealing with accounting, ISBNs, and signing up ninefold times on each servicing. As a matter of fact, Apple openly encourages the use of an "authorized" aggregator in its service FAQ, likely due to the headaches outlined above.
You can line up many aggregator services. I checked out deuce for this piece, Smashwords and Lulu. In the main, the process is about the same as on the job with retailers: You upload your manuscript, a cover, descriptive terms, and payment information, and past the aggregator takes over. Aggregators organize with the retail sites, and they sell the books at once themselves, as well.
Smashwords is a somewhat scrappy startup, and next to the polish of Amazon and Malus pumila, information technology looks a bit quaint (the land site is a bit buggy too). Smashwords will prepare your ebook for impartial about every platform known to mankind, including Kindle, Nook, and iOS, plus Kobo, Sony Lecturer, Stanza, Borders, and more. Commissions range from 80 percent for books oversubscribed directly through Smashwords to 60 percent or less for books sold via other merchants, as Smashwords takes a stinger of each sales agreement alongside Amazon or Apple's cut. After all is said and done, you could be earning close to 50 percent commissions in the inferior possible scenario.
To deal with additional merchants, your book must meet Smashwords' instead strict guidelines for "Premium Catalog" inclusion. Unfortunately, two weeks after I submitted my book, I was still wait for the favorable reception process to skilled, with no ETA received. That is vastly thirster than working with the merchants themselves, simply given the likelihood of someone actually buying a book directly from Smashwords and manually syncing it to their ereader twist (instead of having it automatically downloaded for them from a retail ebookstore), it's certainly meriting the fuss if you're provision to go this route instead of merchandising to a retailer forthwith.
Lulu is another solid-state option, just it has fewer gross sales partners: It sells only via its own site, iBooks, and Barnes & Noble. Commissions are 81 percent for direct sales, and 63 percent for other merchants. Lulu began its life as a print-on-demand provider (particularly for people creating photo books), and its roots show: Information technology offers to print a hard-copy book for you and even design a professional cover (for a fee).
The site is a bit nutty and slow, and the service requires you to pay significant attention to machine-driven netmail messages to get your book online, but ultimately the finished project looks reasonable pulverized, requiring virtually atomic number 102 manual interference if you've done your formatting right.
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Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/469231/how_to_publish_an_ebook_step_by_step.html
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