E-publishing 101: How to Get Started

Posted on August 8, 2011 by Lindsay

Judging by the comments on this blog, there are lots of folks stopping by who are just getting into e-publishing (or thinking of getting into it), so I thought a basic checklist post might be in order. If you print it off and put it on the fridge, let me know. I always wanted to be fridge material.

Here we go, how to get started with e-publishing:

1. Get your short story, novella, novel, etc. into as good of shape as possible

I know this sounds obvious, but, judging by the reviews, ebooks on Amazon are rife with typos and grammar faux pas. I see slow pacing, repetitiveness, and plot holes mentioned a lot too.

Finding other writers to trade critiques with will help you polish the story, and an editor can do a final pass to look for typos and grammar nits. Trust me, no matter how many times you read over the story yourself, there will still be typos!

2. Create cover art

If you’re artistically talented, you can do your own cover art, but, for most of us, it’s worth hiring someone. The cover art is the first thing readers will see, and, when they’re surfing Amazon and your book comes up in the search listings, they may not even click on it to check it out if it’s not appealing.

Check out my earlier post on affordable cover art designers if you’re looking for someone. I mentioned two folks, including Glendon Haddix who’s done most of my covers, and there are more artists who left their information in the comments section.

3. Format your ebook

This is one of those things you can learn to do yourself if you’re looking to save money. Unlike editing and cover design, it doesn’t require oft-practiced skills — just a willingness to follow directions and learn the ropes (I’m a little lacking in that area myself, so I pay someone to do my novels and use the Smashwords meatgrinder for my shorter works).

If you’re a DIY type, there are several ebooks out there with instructions, some costing less than $3. Here’s an Amazon ebook and also a link to a long, but thorough how-to guide on the web (free):

4. Get your ebook online

Head to the Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing site and go through the two-page wizard that leads you through uploading the mobi file, the cover art, and inputting your chosen categories, keywords, sales price, etc.

Do the same thing at the Barnes & Noble PubIt site.

To get into other stores, you can work through Smashwords (they won’t accept the files you worked so hard to create, but their meatgrinder will take your Word document and turn it into epub, mobi, pdf, html, etc. files so anyone with any e-reader can peruse your books). Once it’s been approved for the “premium catalog,” they will  distribute your ebook to Apple, Sony, Diesel, and a couple of others. Make sure to read their free style guide for tips on formatting your Word document.

5. Promote your ebook!

Ah, we could write whole books on this. What works? What’s a waste of time? There’s a lot to learn when it comes to marketing online. Here are some articles from my own site to get you started:

Further reading (ebooks from successful indie e-authors):

Posted in E-publishing | Tagged , | 18 Comments

Preparing to Launch the Emperor’s Edge Podiobook

Posted on August 6, 2011 by Lindsay

Podiobook UpdateIf you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you may remember that I started thinking of creating a podiobook (audiobook distributed in incremental podcasts/sections) back in February or so. It’s been a while since I mentioned it, so I thought I’d bring you up to date and let you know what the process has been like (the entire book is done now, and we’re going to get the first chapter online in another week or so).

I was originally inspired by the interview I’d done with full-time ebook author Nathan Lowell. Nathan started out podcasting his novels long before he prettied them up and turned them into books. In doing so, he built a fan base that was ready and waiting when he launched his first ebook.

I figured that creating podiobook versions of my novels would be another way to get my name out there and let people try my stories. After all, not everybody has jumped on the e-reader train yet, but many folks have iPods and other mp3 players, and some of those folks enjoy listening to audiobooks that way. I know I’ve listened to more than a few in the car and at the gym.

My plan isn’t to charge for the podiobook (those interested will be able to listen to each chapter as I release it, probably once a week), but maybe some of those listeners will want to go on to buy the ebook or print (coming soon!) versions.

For those who might be thinking of choosing this route as well, here’s a look at how the process has gone for me:

  • I decided whether I wanted to learn how to do this myself (which would include investing in good audio production equipment and spending quite a bit of time reading my book aloud and then editing it). The answer was no. I figured it would be a steep learning curve, and I wanted to invest my time in other things — like writing the next book!
  • I got in touch with the folks from Darkfire Productions. They gave me a quote on what it would cost to pay voice talent and put everything together, and I decided to go for it. (I wasn’t making the big e-publishing bucks back then, and they were nice enough to let me pay in installments.)
  • I sent off the manuscript and Starla Huchton started narrating it. It seemed like a good idea to get the whole book (100,000+ words!) recorded and finished before releasing episodes, and this took a good three months or so. She had to read the chapters, the DFP guys (Collin Earl and Chris Snelgrove) had to edit them, and then it was my turn to listen to the chapters to check for errors (I was probably the slowest link in this chain, heh).
  • I picked out some music for the introduction that will play at the beginning of each segment (as you’d guess, you can’t just grab music from some band you like; you have to buy a license from someone who puts out royalty-free music). I’m using Space Deep by Scott Hallgren.
  • The next step, which I’m working on now, is to get the book information over to Darkfire Productions, the stuff that will go into the listing at Podiobooks.com (genre, dust jacket blurb, cover art, keywords, etc.). I’d thought the guys might just send me the files when they were done, and I’d have to figure out where to upload them and what not, but they’re doing that for me too. Yay, thanks, gentlemen! (They’ve all done their own podiobooks, as well as work for clients, so they bring a lot of experience to the table.)
  • Once all that’s done, we should be ready to launch the first chapter (I believe we’re shooting for the 15th).

So, that’s the process!

I’ve already sent the DF fellows the Dark Currents (Emperor’s Edge 2) manuscript, and I’ll be having that one recorded this fall. I’m planning to do the whole series, as I get them written and published, and I’m hoping this will be a great way for me to gain some new fans.

I’ll post again when the first episode is up, and I’ll do an update later on to let you know if it seems worthwhile (insofar as earning new fans and selling books).

Posted in My Ebooks | Tagged , , , | 19 Comments

E-publishing Perk: The Ability to Make Changes

Posted on August 4, 2011 by Lindsay

One of the downsides of e-publishing and being an independent author is that you have to figure everything out for yourself: where to find an editor, how to get cover art done, how to format your work, how to promote it when it’s out, etc. etc. etc. There’s nobody you can hand the book off to and say, “Okay, I wrote it; you guys take care of the rest.”

That can be daunting, but the other side of the coin is that e-publishing on your own gives you a lot of freedom too. You get to choose your editor, your artist, how you promote, etc. And if something isn’t working, you can change it. That’s a pretty big perk.

Right now, I’m tinkering with my novel Encrypted. Oh, not the story itself, but the packaging, if you will.

Back in January, when I first published it, I wasn’t quite sure how to categorize it or what kind of cover art would work for the story. It was a little high fantasy, a little mystery/thriller, a little science fiction, and a little romance. Not a clothes-being-ripped-off-and-nekkid-bodies-contorting-in-wild-ways kind of romance, but there was definitely a love story. I wanted to try and get all the main ideas into the blurb, so I ended up writing one that was longer than necessary (and, as a couple of readers mentioned, revealed a secret that it probably shouldn’t have).

Yesterday, I went in and shaved a couple of sentences off of the blurb. It’s still on the long side compared to my other ones, but I’ve cut out that secret and taken some of the emphasis away from the love story (more than one male reader has said, “Hey, I liked this book, but could you please not call it a romance, because I don’t read romances?”).

I considered that for a while and decided it was much less of a romance than most that get tagged with that label (as I mentioned, no nekkid contorting bodies). And, as another lady mentioned, the body count is quite high for a pure love story. (Like I’d write a book where there were more kisses than monster attacks? As if… :D) So, I’m trying to emphasize the mystery/thriller aspect more in the new blurb and in the cover art as well.

Yup, I’m changing that too.

I’ve had a few folks mention that they weren’t crazy about the cover art, so, with Glendon’s help, I’m trying a different look. (Pictures of old and new below.)

I don’t know if the changes will affect sales at all, but right now a lot of the folks who buy Encrypted seem to do so because they read my Emperor’s Edge books (which I’ve put more effort into promoting). That’s great, of course, but I’ll be curious of maybe I can snag more readers out of the random Amazon ether. Since Encrypted stands alone, there’s no need to read my other stories before giving it a try.

My reason for sharing these ramblings is just to show one author’s path and point out that it’s nice (and useful!) that you can tinker when it comes to ebooks. You probably noticed that a lot of changes I’m making are based on reader feedback. People who publish under the traditional model don’t have the option to change up the packaging, and try different things, so e-publishing is one area where indies have an advantage.

Nothing is set in stone. You can revise the text, fix typos or formatting problems that slip through, re-do the cover art, the blurb, etc. And, of course, you can play around with price to see what works best too.

For the curious, here’s the old art and the new art:

Posted in E-publishing | 16 Comments

Rise of the Machines by Jared Sandmann

Posted on August 3, 2011 by Lindsay

LeviathanWondering what the future of books will look like? You’re not the only one. Today, indie author Jared Sandmann is joining us with a guest post on where things might be headed.

* * *

Now that Borders Books has gone out of business, many in the publishing industry wonder what the future holds.  Barnes & Noble is being kept afloat by its Nook, and Books-A-Million is cutting back on staff and operating hours.  So what will the bookselling landscape look like a decade from now?

While I don’t possess a crystal ball, I do have a few ideas.  The era of the mega-retailers is coming to a close; in the wake of these superstores, a new wave of independent bookshops will make a resurgence, the very type muscled out by chains like Borders and B&N over the past twenty years.

I think e-books will dominate sales within the next few years.  E-books sales are growing as quickly as mass market paperback sales are eroding; however, there will be holdouts who prefer a book’s physicality.  Some readers like to handle a novel and thumb through the pages before making a decision whether to buy it.  In that regard, online shopping cannot compare to brick and mortar stores.  These days many people use bookstores strictly for browsing (and that’s really the bookstores’ fault, a business strategy that backfired).  Readers make a mental note of which books look interesting, then later they buy them cheaper from some online outfit.  This combines the convenience of window shopping, the Internet’s biggest weakness, with the ease of finding a book’s best price.

In this sluggish economy, most public libraries are strapped for cash.  If they could broker a deal with major publishers, institute some system wherein readers peruse and purchase books on the spot (for a percentage of the profits, of course), I think both libraries and publishers can win.  After all, people are more apt to buy when they know each sale helps their library, their community.

Each book could come with a unique QR code that readers scan if they want to download a digital copy direct to their e-readers.  Or perhaps the QR code could be proprietary to the library system rather than the publisher, whichever is more beneficial.

In the long-term (maybe a generation from now), libraries and indie bookstores will be equipped with POD capabilities.  Print on demand technology like the Espresso Book Machine will be available to those who favor physical books.  Any file uploaded into the system can be printed and bound within minutes, ready for sale before the pages have even cooled.  The problem at the moment is that they’re prohibitively expensive (about $100,000 dollars per unit) and not widely available.  Once that price comes down, I think they’ll become popular with readers and booksellers alike.

An e-reader is like owning a portable bookstore that never closes.  Downloading a digital book is as easy as pressing a button.  I foresee a time when buying a physical copy will be just as simple.  One day I’ll be able to place an order with a local library or book dealer and pick up my freshly-printed books within minutes.

Jared Sandman’s Blogbuster Tour 2011 runs from July 1st through August 31st.  His novels include Leviathan, The Wild Hunt and Dreamland, all of which are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Smashwords.  His next book, The Shadow Wolves, will be released in August.  Follow him on Twitter (@JaredSandman) and be entered to win one of several $25 Amazon gift cards.  See rules at www.jaredsandman.com for eligibility.

Thoughts? Chime in below!

Posted in Guest Posts | Tagged | 6 Comments

How to Approach Book Bloggers for Reviews by Frida Fantastic

Posted on August 2, 2011 by Lindsay

Borges QuotationToday’s guest post isn’t from an author; it’s from a reviewer. My Twitter buddy, Frida Fantastic (it’s possible that’s not the name on her birth certificate, but we won’t pry) has agreed to give some tips on what reviewers want (and what will have them deleting your submission faster than spam emails promising body part enhancements).

Without further parenthetical comments, here’s Frida:

I’m a book blogger and I blog at Frida Fantastic: indie speculative fiction reviews. I review indie ebooks in the genres of science fiction, fantasy, pulp, and horror. Today I would like to share a few tips on the best ways for authors to approach book bloggers.

I define a book blogger as a reader who volunteers to blog about books on a regular basis. Book blogs come in all shapes and sizes. Some are more flexible in what they review, whereas others have a more defined focus like “indie ebooks” or “science fiction and fantasy books”.

Book blogs in all their forms are helpful in promoting books. If a popular book blogger reviews your book, their readers are far more likely to check it out. Many book bloggers cross-post their reviews to Amazon, Smashwords, and Goodreads. Positive reviews are best, but at minimum, a well-written book review will provide some useful information about a book and help other readers determine if the book is for them. Some book blogs also participate in blog tours, which can also help generate interest in a book. The tips here are more specific to requesting book reviews as that’s what book bloggers are most known for, but the same principles apply to requesting other services from book bloggers such as participating in a blog tour or hosting a guest post.

I started book blogging in early April so I’m still fairly new to this, but I have a good idea about what constitutes as good netiquette between authors and book bloggers. So listen up if you’re interested in getting a review from a book blogger 🙂

Tip #1: Before you ask a book blogger to review your book, check the book submission (or review policies) page on their website, and respect those guidelines.

Most of the blogs that accept review requests have a page like that, and some may have very detailed and specific requirements. Even if some of it seems idiosyncratic or unnecessary, follow it to the letter, because the blogger has their system set up to handle the flood of submissions. Many of us can’t review all the books we receive because there are so many books and we only have so much time. But we love books, and we review the ones that capture our interest.

Tip #2: Don’t request book reviews via Twitter, Facebook, forums, etc. Generally, book bloggers want you to send an email.

Just like you, we have six or more accounts at different places, and it’s too time-consuming to check them all. Follow our submission policies. Most of us want you to send your review request by email, so we have all our submissions in one place. Asking for a review through a non-standard route like Goodreads is akin to jumping the queue—that’s not fair, and many of us ignore these messages. Sending unsolicited Amazon gifts is also no-no, and book bloggers can’t reply to those messages as they are sent from an Amazon no-reply email address.

Tip #3: Book bloggers are on social media, but don’t spam them.

I like books, but if you message me and give me a link to your books, I generally will ignore them. I can’t speak for all book bloggers, but the way I see it, if you wanted to request a review, you would have sent me an email. If you’re trying to be a salesman, that doesn’t work on social media. Be friendly and personable without constantly plugging your book, and people will eventually get to know you.

Tip #4: When you email book bloggers your review request, make sure your book is ready.

I’ve received some review requests for books that had serious formatting problems in the first five pages, which probably doesn’t help sales either. I notified the authors about the issues I saw, but really, having an unfinished book is the quickest way to getting a review request rejected.

Tip #5: Don’t write emails that will get trapped in the spam folder.

If the book submission page specifies a subject line, follow that. If not, use a simple subject line like “Review request for (Title of Book)”. Weird subject lines get trapped in the spam folder.

Address book bloggers by name. If the name is not available, address the blogger by his or her online blogging pseudonym. Emails with generic greetings like “Hello sir/ma’am” look like the beginning of unsolicited spam mail, and my Gmail tends to trap those in the spam folder too.

Tip #6: Write short and clear review requests.

Book bloggers don’t want to know your life story, or all the business models you’ve tried, or which publisher we’ve never heard of has print rights to what. It depends on the blogger’s focus, but being published by an unknown small press means absolutely nothing to me. Being previously published by more well-known publisher like DAW or Tor Books could get the attention of a science fiction/fantasy blogger, but really, we just want to see if we’d be interested in reviewing your book. So tell us about your book, and don’t bore us with your experiments in publishing. We’re readers—we care about your book, not your business model.

Other book bloggers may be different, but my eyes glaze over whenever I see an email over a thousand words long and I don’t finish reading it. I choose which books to review on the basis of the description on Smashwords or Amazon, and whether I liked the sample or not. I don’t read press releases attached to a review request email, and I doubt other book bloggers do either, because well… we’d rather spend that time reading books.

Tip #7: Be patient. If you don’t hear from a book blogger for a while, depending on the book submission policy, you can still send a review request for another book.

We receive a lot of review requests. As I’m writing this, I have 40 unread emails requesting book reviews. Other bloggers receive 10-20 requests per day. We consider every request, but please understand that it could take us a while to get to your request. Many bloggers have long to-review queues, some as long as six months or a year. I keep mine relatively short at about a month long, and I add a new book to my review queue every week.

If you haven’t heard from us in a while, it doesn’t mean that we have ignored your request. It means that either we haven’t gotten to it yet, or that that particular book isn’t up our alley. Email correspondence is time-consuming so sometimes we can’t respond to everyone. While you should focus on book bloggers that tend to accept your review requests, perhaps the others that didn’t accept the request for this one will be interested in your next book.

* * *

I hope these tips are helpful. If you have any thoughts about approaching book bloggers or about book blogging in general, feel free to leave a comment. I’m happy to answer questions! 🙂

Posted in Guest Posts | Tagged , , | 19 Comments

Refunds for Amazon Ebook Sales, Should You Be Worried?

Posted on August 1, 2011 by Lindsay

Amazon Kindle Ebook Sales and RefundsWhen I first started selling ebooks on Amazon, I don’t remember noticing a “refunds” column. Then, as I started selling more books, a number appeared there. What? Someone returned one of my ebooks? How could they?

Actually, I just shrugged it off, but I’ve seen forum posts by indie authors asking what it means and if they should be worried.

The quick answer is probably not, but I’ll add a caveat at the end, so keep reading.

First off, speaking as someone who owns a Kindle, it’s very easy to buy ebooks (one-click) straight from your device. The Kindle also promptly asks you if it was a mistake and you want to return the ebook. My guess, based on the fact that my returns usually pop up simultaneously with corresponding new sales, is this is what happens most of the time.

It’s also possible for someone to write to Amazon and request a no-questions-asked refund (I believe you have 7 days). I did this once when the story took a steep downhill turn after the sample chapters and was much shorter than the product description implied (novella when I’d expected a novel). If it hadn’t been on the pricier side, I wouldn’t have bothered, but I felt a little betrayed. (In case you’re curious, this was a small press ebook, not one published by an independent author.)

Given how easy it is to return ebooks at Amazon, I’m surprised I don’t get more returns. It’s a lot less hassle than sending back a physical book.

So, to answer the original question (should you be worried about returns?), probably not. It’ll happen. If you have a high return rate, though, it may mean there’s something worth addressing.

Here are a few things to check:

  • If your ebook is not novel length, is that clear upfront? For short stories and novellas, it’s worth mentioning the word count and the corresponding paperback page count (assume about 250 words per page) because word count won’t necessarily mean anything to someone who’s not a writer.
  • Does the product description match up well with the story people get? If it’s described as an action-packed adventure, is there plenty of action throughout? If there are lots of explicit sex scenes, is it clear from the blurb that things will get hot and heavy?
  • Did you have a professional proofread for you? If you couldn’t afford it in the beginning, consider investing in this once you’re selling enough copies to cover the expense.
  • Is the formatting a nightmare? If you uploaded a Word file and let Amazon handle the conversion automatically, it might very well be.

If you’ve returned ebooks for other reasons, please let us know in the comments.

Posted in Amazon Kindle Sales | Tagged , , , | 50 Comments

Cover Art for Hunted (Flash Gold 2)

Posted on July 31, 2011 by Lindsay

I’ve been talking about the sequel to Flash Gold on Twitter for the last couple of weeks, and I’ve finally sent it off for editing, so I should get it back and have it online in another week or two. The cover art is already done, courtesy of Glendon Haddix, so I thought I’d share it:

The story ended up being about 27,500 words (~110 paperback pages), so longer than the first. I’ll be working on a blurb for it this week, but you can already guess from the cover that there will be some flying steampunk beasties to harass our heroes!

In the meantime, if you haven’t read the first adventure yet, here’s an excerpt and links to it.

Thanks for taking a look!

Posted in My Ebooks | Tagged , , , | 13 Comments

3 Reasons I’m Glad I Chose Self-Publishing

Posted on July 29, 2011 by Lindsay

Camus QuotationLast December, I was about an hour from uploading The Emperor’s Edge (my first full-length ebook) on Smashwords when I received an email from a literary agent.

I hadn’t actually bothered with the querying process, but I’d won a critique from this agent through a charity auction about six months prior. The gist of the email was that she’d ask for some changes to the manuscript, but she’d probably be willing to represent me.

If I’d received that email three months earlier, I would have jumped at the opportunity. But, at that point, I’d already paid for cover art and editing, and I’d set my mind on e-publishing (it’d been more than six months since the auction, and I’d kind of forgotten about the critique). From the title of this blog post, you can probably guess I decided to go ahead with e-publishing on my own, but there were times in those first few weeks where I wondered if I’d regret that decision.

It’s seven months later, and…I don’t.

In fact, I’m relieved that email didn’t come earlier. My guess is that I wouldn’t even have a deal with a publisher yet if I’d gone with the agent (remember, I was going to have to make some revisions before I signed on).

But here, on my own, I’ve now published three novels, and some shorter works, and I’m up to 2,000 ebook sales a month. If things continue to go well, I’d guess I’m 6-12 months from being able to do this for a living (gotta get more books in my series out first!).

And that’s the dream, ya know? To tell stories for a living. To entertain people. To encourage them to laugh and forget their problems for a while. And if you can make your work affordable for everyone? Even better.

I’m not the type to try and push an ideology on someone else, so I’m not going to say everyone should be self-publishing these days, but I thought I’d list a couple (okay, three) of the reasons I’m glad I chose this route:

1. The Time Was Right

If anything, I wish I’d become aware of the e-publishing revolution earlier, but I’m glad I jumped on board when I did. Between the increasing popularity of ebook reading devices and the ease with which you can get your work into the major stories (Amazon, B&N, iTunes, etc.), it’s the perfect time to be an independent author.

Not only is it relatively easy to get your ebooks out there, but there are more and more readers who are openly supporting “indie” authors. Even nine months ago, when e-publishing first came on my radar, it was hard to find a book blogger willing to review a self-published title (ewwww, as if!). Now, there are more and more blogs cropping up that are dedicated to reviewing indie offerings.

While some readers continue to prefer the safety of buying from traditionally published authors (whose work has been vetted by teams of professionals), others love the idea of supporting authors rather than The System. When you buy from an indie, the author typically earns 60-70% of the cover price, as opposed to the 8-25% an author in a traditional deal will get. And, hey, it doesn’t hurt that many self-published ebooks are under $5. Indies can afford to sell their work less expensively since they’re making a higher percentage.

2. Freedom

There are obvious freedoms that come with self-publishing: you can tell your story, your way, and you don’t need to worry about pleasing agents or publishers (just your fans!). You aren’t bound by industry standards when it comes to word count either. You can write all short stories if you like, or all novellas, or all 300,000-word doorstopper epics. You have a great deal of freedom with your writing.

It doesn’t stop with words though. If you reach a modicum of success, you can turn this into your day job. Then you have the freedom to work your own hours from anywhere in the world. You needn’t be chained to a certain city because that’s where your job is. Want to go where the cost of living is less and your modest author income goes further? Then by all means, do so. I hear it’s trendy to live in Buenos Aires and Thailand these days. 😉

3. The Possibility of Earning a Living (without being a bestseller)

Not everybody’s going to make substantial money if they self-publish. In fact, most people won’t. They’ll give up too soon, or perhaps their writing won’t be quite there yet. They won’t put enough effort into learning to promote themselves, or perhaps they won’t be prolific enough to publish often and stay in people’s mind.

But, for those who are dedicated to learning the crafts of writing and marketing, the possibility of turning this into a career exists. What’s heartening to me is that you don’t have to be a bestseller to reach that point.

I’m certainly not. If you check out my books, you’ll see there’s nothing hugely impressive about my sales rankings — many indie authors are selling a lot more books (and at higher prices). At best, you could call me a mid-list author.

If you have enough ebooks out (say 5-10), you can do pretty well for yourself even if you only sell 250 copies of each a month (assuming $2.99 or higher price tags). Under the traditional model, only a small percentage of authors at the top get to write for a living. As it stands right now, the dream is far more attainable as an indie.

Those are three of the reasons I’m glad I chose to self-publish. Do you have any you’d add to the list?

Posted in E-publishing | Tagged , | 45 Comments