On October 8, I met Aya Knight. I forget which online publisher that she personally uses, but she did mention being able to self-publish on Amazon. Unfortunately, I forget the name of their service. Basically, she said it's free; Amazon takes a piece of whatever you want to charge and sends you a check for the rest. Can anyone give me some more information about this or any other self-publishing services?
Hi Mark, I think you're talking about "Create Space". The link to it is https://www.amazon.com/gp/seller-account/mm-product-page.html?topic=200354160. I believe it's only for soft cover binding. Grimm Bindery plans to get into the same thing this coming year - we're in the process of setting it up, but with hardcover binding instead using book cloth, full printed color covers or leather bindings. We would then list on Amazon for Author or you could set up your own sales that we fulfilled also. If anyone knows if the Create Space DOES do hardcover bindings also, I would be interested to find out. Take care, Tracy Lamphere Grimm Book Bindery, Inc. "Since 1854" Madison, WI www.grimmbindery.com
P.S. If anyone has ideas or recommendations on what you would like to see from an online publishing company. Also known as "on demand" meaning we list for you, then when an order comes in we bind one just one book at a time & send you a monthly check, etc. We would love to hear your opinions, what works, what you hate, etc. Since we're just in the development phase now, would love your opinions so we can develop a plan that best meets your needs. Take care, Tracy Lamphere, Bindery Manager Grimm Book Bindery, Inc. "Since 1854" Madison, WI www.grimmbindery.com
Yeah, it's Createspace. There's also Lulu.com, which I've heard good things about, but I haven't looked into either personally.
Thanks, everyone. I'll look into them. Right now, I'm looking to do just ebooks for the short stories (Aya had mentioned uploading a PDF file). Maybe I can do print for a collection later on.
I'd recommend Completelynovel.com for paperback self-publishing. I've had a good experience publishing my book with their POD service. Good quality print via Lightning Source. Various plans- some being free, others still much cheaper than Authorhouse and so forth. Think Lulu is OK too. Did my e-book via Kindle and Smashwords (whose premium catalogue gets you on every e-book retailer you'd want to be on! Drop me a line if u want more info Cheers Ross
After research for myself, I found Virtual Bookworm to be the best, all things considered. They do distribute through amazon as well if that is something you're concerned about.
There are three online publishers that you want to go with at the same time. Amazon is the most popular of the three. They also rank you as you sell so it's easy to see how well your book is doing on an hourly basis, but many authors don't recommend checking the numbers too often. It takes a few months to get anything going. The down side to putting your eBook on Amazon is the amount of time it requires to format your novel for Kindle. It's something you have to put up with. *Amazon takes 75% of your revenue if you're priced below $2.98 I believe. Once you hit $2.99 they take 35% of what you make. Don't price your book there if you haven't hired a professional editor or if you don't format the novel for Kindle. Smashwords is number two because you can sell to international folks without them being charged extra fees from Amazon. It's really easy to publish here. Formatting is the easiest thing in life for this. Simply upload your MS Word document and you're ready to go. Barnes & Noble is the last place you should publish, but make sure you do this along with the other two. The only way Nook readers can get your novel is if you publish with them. You have to format for the Nook as well, but I think it's the same as the Kindle. I think. There are other options like Lulu and FastPencil, but marketing for these is a lot harder. With the other three, as your book sells more, it starts to market itself. You can always use these other websites, but after research I've done, I realized that's with the big boys/girls do. Be warned! If you reduce your price on Smashwords, Amazon will price match.
