Self-publishing http://mysterysuspence.blogspot.com/2012/01/self-publishing-what-do-you-think.html - PowerPoint Presentation

Slide1

Self-publishing

http://mysterysuspence.blogspot.com/2012/01/self-publishing-what-do-you-think.html

Slide2

Agenda

Why self-publish?

Brief overview of ebook retailers, aggregators, formats.

Brief overview of Smashwords.

Practical

: preparing a Word manuscript for publication on Smashwords

Slide3

Materials needed

Microsoft Word

I’m used to 2010, but any version should be OK

Project files

A Word manuscript prepared for print

Sample Word documents

http://bit/ly/saoimselfpub

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Why self-publish?

“Vanity publishing” isn’t a pejorative anymore

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http://www.publishyourownebooks.com/wp-content/uploads/AAP-Ebook-Revenue-Growth.jpg

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In the words of Mark Coker (founder):

“We’re

entering a new phase of rapid evolution in

publishing”

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Bookselling moving to the web

Brick &

Mortar

Web

Today?

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Ebooks to overtake print

Print books

Ebooks

Today?

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Global ebook market to eclipse US market

Global

Today?

U.S.

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Power of publishing shifting to authors

Author

Today?

Publisher

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Number of books published indie vs. traditional

Indie

books

Today?

New trad.

books

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And to further complicate things

The devil’s in the e-details…

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Reading moving to screens

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Should I ‘just’ do an ebook?

We’re far from a paperless environment

Traditional publishers still have value

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Wrong reasons

Rejected by agents and publishersTraditional takes too longTraditional is too complicated to learnSelf-publishing print is too costly

http://www.publishyourownebooks.com/should-i-just-do-an-e-book/

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Right reasons

You’re passionate about your story.It’s been edited almost to a fault, by other than you.You are a serious writer, seeking to make a living as an author.

http://www.publishyourownebooks.com/should-i-just-do-an-e-book/

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Right reasons

You’re positive this is as good as you can be.The book accentuates your brand or name.You want to reach out to the world.You have a well-honed marketing plan.You’re willing to bust your butt to self-promote

http://www.publishyourownebooks.com/should-i-just-do-an-e-book/

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“You don’t resort to e-publishing. You proactively choose it.”

- Hope Clark

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Ebook retailers

Online book stores

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Ebook retailers

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

Apple (requires ISBN)

Sony (requires ISBN)

Kobo

Google (only US)

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Retailers becoming publishers

Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing

Barnes &

Noble

PubIT

!

Apple

iBookstore

(need a Mac for direct publishing…)

Kobo Writing Life

(released mid-2012)

Sony Publisher Portal

*

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Ebook

retailers – many more

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Retailers withhold 30% of income until tax forms filed.

Not a problem if tax treaty with US (South Africa - 0%)

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p901.pdf

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Kindle Direct Publishing

Example workflow

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kdp.amazon.com

Open account on KDP

Company information (incl. tax)

Book details

Book categories (two)

Cover image

Upload file (DRM or not?)

Choose rights (worldwide)

Lending or not?

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6. Upload file

Word  (.doc or .docx)ePub  (.epub)Plain Text  (.txt)Mobipocket  (.mobi or .prc)HTML  (.zip, .htm, or .html)Adobe PDF  (.pdf)Rich Text Format (.rtf)

https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/help?topicId=A17W8UM0MMSQX6

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Content Distribution

That is, the four ways to get your ebook sold & delivered

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Content Distribution

Direct to customer

Direct to retailer

Via a distributor / aggregator

Via a “traditional” publisher

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1. Direct to customer

High

profit margin

Direct

contact with

readers

R

etain

all

rights

Customer service

burden

Credit

card processing

fees

T

ough

to attract traffic

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2. Direct to retailer

Good

profit margins

Exposure

to millions of

readers

Real

time

reporting

Retain

rights

Time

consuming to manage

Not

all retailers offer direct

option

Distributors

may offer higher margins

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3. Via a distributor

Good

margin

Time-savings

A

ccess

to multiple

retailers

Aggregated

reporting and

analytics

Retain rights

Delayed

reports

from retailers

7.5-10

% commission on retail price

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4. Via a publisher

Advance, access to B&M

retail

Editing

and

revision

Marketing

and promotion,

prestige

Low

royalties

R

eporting

delayed up to six

months

Limited distribution

Lose rights

C

an

go out of print quickly

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Ebook aggregators…

…to deal with multiple workflows for multiple stores.

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Ebook aggregators

Instead of publishing directly to storeInterface between author and storesSome offer print-on-demand and delivery, so not only ebooks

http://www.publishyourownebooks.com/ebook-aggregators-comparison-chart/#ixzz1wzg4u8rl

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Why ebook aggregator?

If non-US resident (e.g. B&N requires US bank account / tax ID)Don’t have the hardware or software required to publish your ebook directly (e.g. Apple requires a Mac).Don’t know how to technically format the manuscript (e.g. to epub validation)

http://www.publishyourownebooks.com/ebook-aggregators-comparison-chart/#ixzz1wzg4u8rl

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Ebook aggregators

Smashwords

Lulu

BookBaby

Ebookit

FastPencil

Xinxii

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Ebook aggregators

http://www.publishyourownebooks.com/wp-content/uploads/screenshot.318.jpg

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Assuming you’ve chosen an aggregator…

… the aggregator will sell your ebook in multiple formats.

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The principal ebook (end) formats

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Epub-compliant readers

For instance, Aldiko on your Android smartphone

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Epub-compliant readers

Adobe Digital Editions (Windows, Mac)

Aldiko

(Android)

Calibre (Windows, Mac, GNU/Linux)

Google Books (Web app, Android,

iOS

)

iBooks

(

iOS

)

Readium

(Chrome)

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Epub-compliant authoring tools

For instance, InDesign supports EPUB export

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Epub-compliant authoring tools

Adobe InDesign

Calibre

iBooks

Author

oXygen

XML Editor

Pages

Sigil

Word (manual labour required…)

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One format to rule them all…

HTML as the common denominator

For instance – the inside of an EPUB book:

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If you publish through Smashwords

You’ll only need to work with a Word /

OpenOffice

document

(Which can have its own problems…)

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About Smashwords

Global

ebook distributor

Authors

, publishers, readers and major ebook

retailers

Ideal

for

novels

, personal memoirs,

poetry,

short and long-form fiction, and

non-fiction.

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About Smashwords

Readers: one purchase, multiple

formats

.

40,000+

authors

globally

125,000+ ebooks published

You control

the pricing, sampling and

marketing

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About Smashwords

Receive 85% of the net sales (Through Smashwords.com)

70.5

% for affiliate

sales

Earn

60% of the list price for sales

through retailers

Apple

iBookstore

, Barnes & Noble, Sony, Kobo and the Diesel eBook

Store, etc.

Slide55

Smashwords Features

Consolidated

sales

reporting

Centralized

metadata

management

ISBN management

Ebook

conversion

(9 formats)

Updates

to book and

metadata

Marketing

and selling

tools

Slide56

Smashwords Overview

UploadAuthor/publisher uploads a Microsoft Word fileFree conversion to 9 ebook formatsReady for immediate sale onlineDistributeTo major retailersProfit?- Receive 85% of net = 60% list from major retailers

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Four steps to publish through Smashwords

(With many teensy tiny steps in between… the devil’s in the details)

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1. Word processor & manuscript

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2 – Formatting guidelines

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3. Word .doc to Meatgrinder

Automates the conversion process.

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Step 4: Distribution

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Assuming you have a Word-formatted manuscript…

… you’ll have to fix it.

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Workshop

Format a Word manuscript for publication on

Smashwords

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My first project

In your project files, look for the Word document called manuscript.doc

This document was prepared for print publication – pre-layout (so not stuck in an InDesign file)

Our goal is to “fix” it for publication on Smashwords.

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Overview

General notes on

formatting

A

)

Making

Word

Behave

B

) Formatting

C

) Building

Navigation

D

) Front Matter

E

) The End of Your

Book

Post-formatting

Uploading Your Book to Smashwords

How to Market Your Book

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Steps…

Step 1: Make a back upStep 2: Activate Word’s Show/HideStep 3: Turn off Word’s “AutoCorrect” and “AutoFormat” featuresStep 4: Eliminate text boxesStep 5: The Nuclear MethodStep 6: Unify Manuscript around Normal paragraph styleStep 7: Managing and modifying paragraph styles, fontsStep 7a. How to choose the best paragraph separation method (first line indent or block?)Step 7b: How to implement your chosen paragraph separation methodStep 7b-a: How to define a proper first line indentStep 7b-b: How to define trailing “after” space for block paragraphsStep 7b-c: Special tips for poetry, cookbooks and learning materialsStep 7b-d: How to define proper line spacingStep 8: Check your normalized textStep 9: Why you should never use tabs or the space bar for indentsStep 10: Managing paragraph returnsStep 11: Managing hyperlinksStep 12: Designating chapter breaks, page breaks, section breaksStep 13: Working with imagesStep 14: Text justificationStep 14a: Centering textStep 15: Managing font sizes

Step 16: Style formatting, symbols and glyphs

Step 17: Headers and footers

Step 18: Margins, page sizes and indents

Step 19: Add the Heading style to your Chapter headers (optional)

Step 20: Building navigation into the manuscript

Step 20a: Creating the NCX

Step 20b: Creating the linked Table of Contents

Step 20c: Advanced link building (Footnotes, Endnotes)

Step 20d: Troubleshooting and testing

Step 21: Front matter

Step 21a: Blurbs (optional)

Step 21b: Title and copyright page (required!)

Step 21c: Add a Smashwords license statement below copyright page

Step 22: The end of your book

Step 23: Preparing your cover image

Step 24: Review requirements for Premium Catalog distribution

Step

25: How to upload your book

Step 26: How

AutoVetter

works

Step 27: After you publish – check your work

Step 27a: Check for EPUBCHECK compliance (important!)

Step

28: Read the Smashwords Book Marketing Guide (how to market any book)

Step 29: Read the Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success (best-practices of successful authors)

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Ebooks are different from print books

Don’t try to make your book look exactly like print.

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Ebooks are different from print books

Ebooks look different on every device.

Most

ereading

applications allow you to change font face, size, line spacing.

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So stop trying to format for print.

Or, fix manuscripts that were formatted for print…

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Five common formatting mistakes

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1. Indents

Never use tabs & spaces to create indents

Avoid using tabs & spaces for positioning elements

http://img.ehowcdn.com/article-new/ehow/images/a07/u2/na/block-indent-word-800x800.jpg

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2. Paragraph returns

Never use more than four paragraph returnsUsually creates blank pages on smaller devices

http://img.ehowcdn.com/article-new/ds-photo/getty/article/129/20/55910388_XS.jpg

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3. Paragraph separation

Either first-line paragraph indents

or

Block paragraph method

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4. Fonts and styles

Use standard fonts

Avoid coloured fonts

Avoid kerning fonts

Avoid compressing / expanding fonts

Avoid very large fonts (e.g. +16pt)

As few paragraph styles as possible

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5. Copyright page

Basically, the required front matter

must

be present for your manuscript to be accepted.

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These “common” mistakes

Are often those that make conversion (and metadata management) a pain.

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Making Word behave

A)

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Oh Word… I’d like to have a word with you.

Word’s word processing facilities are extensive and useful

However, current trade ebook formats are still pretty primitive

Word inserts glyphs (visible and hidden) and other document objects that make conversion difficult, if not impossible.

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Step 1: Make a back up

Save as…Do this often (use date as marker)Disable “track changes”

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Step 2 - Activate Word’s Show/Hide

You want to see all paragraph returns, extra spaces, tabs, field codes etc.Basically, any hidden formatting.

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Step 3 – Disable autocorrect/ autoformat

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Step 4 – Eliminate text boxes

Text boxes break ebooksView: print layout

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“Step 5” – The nuclear method

Removing all possible formatting from your manuscript.

Free from hidden formatting / corrupted styling.

Select all, copy

Paste in Notepad*

Paste back into Word

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Formatting

B)

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Step 6: Normal paragraph style

Many pre-set paragraph styles in WordChange everything to normal to avoid inconsistent formattingNormal becomes your standard style; any styles you create are based on the normal style from here on.

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Step 7: Managing paragraph styles & fonts

What you see is (not always) what you get.

If the underlying paragraph style is e.g. 12pt Arial

And you change it manually to 14pt

The underlying paragraph style is

still

12pt Arial…

…which makes conversion unpredictable.

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Step 7a. Best paragraph separation method (first line indent or block?)

First line indents (most fiction, narrative non-fiction)

Block paragraphs (most non-fiction)

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Step 7b:

Chosen

paragraph separation

method

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First line-indent

paras

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Block

paras

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Step 7b-d: Proper line spacing

Either single or 1.5.

At: field should be blank

Never exactly / at least

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Step 7b-d: Proper line spacing

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Step 8: Check your normalized text

Everything in normal paragraph style?

Fix issues that cropped up.

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Step 9: Never use tabs or space for indents

HTML treats whitespace differentlyMost ebook formats are based on HTMLManage indents with paragraph style, not with tabs/spaces.

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Removing tabs / spaces used as indents

Manually: very time-consuming.

Text replacement:

Ctrl+H

Edit: Replace

“Find what” - ^t

“Replace with” – nothing

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Step 10: Managing paragraph returns ¶

Pilcrow

(¶ symbol)

Indicates a paragraph return (or new line)

Don’t use multiple ¶s to

force page breaks / arrange text.

Can create blank pages

Can create gaps in text

Generally: never use more than 4 ¶s

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Step 11: Managing hyperlinks

Can point outside your book or to sections inside your book

Consider hyperlinks & touch devices..

No affiliate links (violation of

ToS

)

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Step 12: Chapter, page & section breaks

Only PDF and RTF conserve page breaksEnter a ¶ or two before and after breakFor formats that don’t conserve page breaks

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Step 13: Working with images

Never insert images as links

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Step 13: Working with images

Plain text doesn’t support images

Use

.jpg or .

png

images

Manuscript can’t be larger than 5MB

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Step 13: Working with images

No floating imagesSelect “in line with text”Then “center” image

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Step 14: Text justification

Left-justified generally works best

Centred works well (esp. title/copyright page)

Word’s “justify” command might cause PDF problems

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Step 14a: Centering text

Create a custom style for centered textAvoid just using the “center” optionBase this custom style on normal

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Step 15: Managing font sizes

Avoid frequent font size variations

Try 12pt for body, 14

pt

for title and headings

Largest font size at 14

pt

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Step 16: Style formatting, symbols and glyphs

Italics

,

underlines

work well across formats.

Some symbols (®, £,

∞

)

may

translate

Generally, don’t use © symbol

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Step 16: Style formatting, symbols and glyphs

Graphical touches used to separate sections of book. Small, simple black images.

http://geekweekend.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/glyphs.gif

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Step 17: Headers and footers

Remain in PDF and RTF, disappear on all others

Recommend to remove

Definitely remove auto-page numbering

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Step 18: Margins, page sizes and indents

Use Word’s standard margins for printing

8.5x11 inch or A4? (60% US customers)

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Step 18: Margins, page sizes and indents

If indents are hard to manage, set indent in

paragraph

settings

Select all text

Paragraph -> Left: and Right: indentation to 0

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Step 19: Add heading style to chapter headers (optional)

Some formats (e.g. EPUB, MOBI) automatically insert a page break before each heading styleAlso helpful to generate a table of contents

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Step 19: Add heading style to chapter headers (optional)

Apply heading style only to

single sentence

Never apply heading style across

more than two paragraph returns

(¶)

Don’t use heading style for body text, front matter, table of contents

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Navigation

Building navigation into your ebook – since you can’t literally turn pages.

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Step 20: Building navigation into the manuscript

Primary navigation elements

1. NCX file

2. Linked table of contents (

ToC

)

3. Intra-book links (footnotes/endnotes…)

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Step 20a: Creating the NCX

This is the table of contents accessible via your ereader.

NCX – Navigation

Center

eXtended

Basically, an XML standard for navigating ebooks

Think “

ToC

” when you read “NCX”

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Adobe Digital Editions (PC)

NCX

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Readium (Chrome browser)

NCX

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iBooks (iPad/iPhone)

NCX

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Step 20a: Creating the NCX

Three possible steps

(

to help

Meatgrinder

generate the NCX)

Start all chapters with “Chapter”

Create a linked table of contents

Let

Meatgrinder

guess

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Working with hyperlinks can get messy

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Step 20b: Creating the linked Table of Contents

Not a Word-generated ToCEntails the use of bookmarks hyperlinksSelect heading styles to select the text that should appearPage number references irrelevant*

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1. Type out your ToC

Or select your

ToC

text via a style

if you’ve been consistently applying

Ensure text is in

normal

paragraph style

Don’t add new lines to separate items

Only add items you intend to link

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Text of chapters in Word

Table of

contents

Chapter

1: PROLOGUE

Chapter 2: DEDICATION

Chapter 3: PREFACE

Chapter 4: ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Chapter 5: FOREWORD

5.1: REFLECTION

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These will become hyperlinks

Table of contents

Chapter

1: PROLOGUE

Chapter 2: DEDICATION

Chapter 3: PREFACE

Chapter 4: ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Chapter 5: FOREWORD

5.1: REFLECTION

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2. Insert bookmarks

These bookmarks are your targets

Places in the book you want to link

to

Each bookmark has a unique

name

Try to use only alphanumeric characters

Don’t use spaces

Make names descriptive (see example)

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Navigate to where you want to link

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Then insert bookmark (Ctrl+Shift+F5)

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Table of contents bookmark

Gets a special name:

ref_TOC

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Once all bookmarks have been inserted…

… we create (hyper)links to these bookmarks.

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3. Start linking text to bookmarks (except “ToC”)

Table of

contents

Chapter 1: PROLOGUE

Chapter 2: DEDICATION

Chapter 3: PREFACE

Chapter 4: ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Chapter 5: FOREWORD

5.1: REFLECTION

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Highlight the link text, make it a hyperlink (Ctrl+K)

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Once all text has been linked to bookmarks…

… test them in Word (

Ctrl+click

to follow link)

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Front matter

First and second pages of your book.

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Step 21a: Blurbs (optional)

Testimonials, reviews, etc.

Avoid adding too much content (samples, paging)

If you do use them, place them before

title & copyright page.

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Step 21b: Title & copyright page

Required for distribution

Includes copyright information (must include English)

Used to identify author/publisher

Can link to other books

And a few other rules…

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Sample title & copyright page

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Step 21c: Smashwords license statement

Below

copyright

page

All Smashwords titles are DRM-free

Hence, default license statement to minimize accidental piracy

Can also use a Creative Commons license.

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Smashwords License Statement

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people.

If

you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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Post-formatting

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Step 23: Preparing cover image

Recommend: hire a designer

That also understands ebook covers

Must be shaped like a book cover

Generally 620x1000 pixels

Various rules on content of cover

No nudity

No price

No web address (Apple rejects these)

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Step 24: Premium Catalogue distribution

Standard catalogue distribution is limited

Premium catalogue – larger ebook vendors (and often stricter requirements)

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Common disqualifiers

Book cover missing, doesn’t match dimensions, or missing title & author name

Lowercase author names

Book description, title in ALL CAPS

Poor paragraphing (block vs. indent)

Missing an ISBN

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Step 25: Uploading book

Publish – attach book file and cover file.

Pricing

“Reader sets price” (only when purchased through SW)

Price should end in $.99 (Apple)

Start the conversion process.

SW now checks books for inclusion in Premium Catalogue

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Step 26: AutoVetter

Analyses book: formatting errors

“

Printed In” error.

Possible copyright error

Tabs, space bar spaces, textboxes and tables: critical errors

Approved? Ship to retailers once a week.

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Step 27: After publishing, check ebooks

Check each format for quality

Deactivate irrelevant formats (e.g. .txt not suited for picture books)

EPUB most important format (sent to retailers)

Adobe Digital Editions to check EPUB

MOBI format popular for Kindle owners –

dont

’ deactivate.

Kindle for PC/Mac to check MOBI

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Step 27a : Epubcheck compliance

For Apple’s

iBookstore

(very strict)

Epubcheck

(

http://smashwords.com/epubcheck

)

Online validator to help check (

http://validator.idpf.org/

)

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Step 27a : Epubcheck compliance

Hyperlinks must have http://

Email address must have “mailto(

mailto:emailaddy@email.com

)

HTML and styling errors, due to hidden Word-generated content

Misidentified image files – e.g. GIF instead of JPEG.

Properties error - Examine properties in Word , remove strange HTML characters

PlayOrder

error – Recreate table of contents

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Further reading

Gary McLaren.

Publish your own

ebooks

.

Mark Coker.

Smashwords Style Guide

.

David

Gaugran

.

Let’s get digital: how to self-publish and why you should

.

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Further reading

Guido Henkel.

Take pride in your eBook formatting

.

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Further reading

eBound

. 2011. 

‘An introduction to HTML and CSS for EPUB’

. Posted 10 June. 

This tutorial is based on EPUB2, not 3; nonetheless, it covers the basics needed

.

O’Reilly. 2012. 

‘What is EPUB 3? An introduction to the EPUB specification for multimedia

publishing’

.

You

can preview it online, but you must create an account on O’Reilly to download the free ebook version.

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Further reading

eBook architects:

http://ebookarchitects.com

/

EPUBsecrets

:

http://epubsecrets.com/

http://epubsecrets.com/resources

A list of resources that will help you create your

ePUB

files.

Slide154

Further reading

Tallent

, J. 2009. 

‘Kindle formatting: The complete guide’

. Kindle Formatting

.

Kolwalczyk

, P. 2011. 

‘Creating

Epub

ebooks

with

Sigil

: #1- getting started’

.

Teleread

. Posted 7 October.