Library presentation 2015 ebook publishing

Introduction to Ebook Publishing
How to Produce, Publish, Price,
Distribute, Promote and Sell an Ebook
Hasbrouck Heights Public Library
January 13, 2015
Patrick McCarthy
Owner, Benefit Communications, Ltd.
This event is free and open to all.
To register call 201 288 0488

Let’s start with a definition: e-book
Wikipedia
• An electronic book (variously: e-book, eBook,
e-Book, ebook, digital book, or even e-edition) is a book-
length publication in digital form, consisting of text, images, or
both, readable on computers or other electronic
devices.[1] Although sometimes defined as "an electronic
version of a printed book",[2] many e-books exist without any
printed equivalent. Commercially produced and sold e-books
are usually intended to be read on dedicated e-book readers,
however, almost any sophisticated electronic device that
features a controllable viewing screen,
including computers, tablet computers, and smartphones can
also be used to read e-books.

Another definition: Publishing
Wikipedia
• Publishing is the process of production
and dissemination of literature, music, or information —
the activity of making information available to the general
public. In some cases, authors may be their own
publishers, meaning: originators and developers
of content also provide media to deliver and display the
content for the same.
Publishing includes the stages of the development,
acquisition, copy editing, graphic design, production –
printing (and its electronic equivalents),
and marketing and distribution … including the electronic
media.

Backstory
of Mark Coker, Founder of
Smashwords
(online ebook distributor and free
conversion service)

The Smashwords Backstory
• Met wife-to-be
• Wrote a novel
 got great agent
 got rejected by publishers
 decided to try to fix the
problem

The Problem: Why Traditional
Book Publishing is Broken
• Publishers judge books based on
perceived commercial merit
• they can only guess what readers want to
read
• Publishers unable to take a risk on every
author
• millions of writers rejected
• Print books are too expensive
• limits affordability and accessibily

Back in the Dark Ages (7 yrs
ago), Publishers Controlled
Everything
• They controlled the …
• printing press
• distribution
• knowledge to professionally publish

Coker’s Answer: Smashwords
• * FREE * eBook Publishing Platform
 Free ebook printing press
 Distribution to major ebook retailers and
libraries
 Free learning materials help writers
become professional publishers

Amazon
• * FREE * eBook Publishing Platform
 Free ebook printing press
 Distribution to Amazon ebook devices

An Amazon company
• Print paperback books on demand POD
 Cost: Free to costly depending on services
and pricing you set.
 Books have to sell for at least $5.00+ for a
70 page book to cover all distribution costs.
An Amazon company
Distribute audio books
 Cost: Free to costly depending on
services and pricing you set.
 Audiobooks have to sell at $10 to $12
just to cover distribution costs at
Amazon

Ebooks published at Smashwords
Amazon data not available

How Smashwords and Amazon
Work
• UPLOAD
 Word .doc or .epub Word .docx
 Instant, free ebook conversion Same
 Instantly for sale Same
• DISTRIBUTE
 Distribution to retailers and Distribution
libraries to Amazon
devices
• GET PAID
 Author earns 60-80% list 35 – 75%
Smashwords Amazon

Quick Overview of The Ebook Market

Source: Association of American Publishers, publishers.org. 2012-13 Smashwords estimate

Publishers losing their monopoly
• Writers no longer need publishers to
publish, distribute and sell books
• Writers asking two questions:
1. “What can a publisher do for me that I can’t
do for myself?”
2. “Will a publisher actually harm my ability to
reach readers?”

Indies are hitting the bestseller
lists
• Self-published ebooks scaling all the
bestseller lists
• Self-published titles on the NYT list
nearly every week
• Prediction: Within three years, over ½ of
ebook bestsellers on NYT list will be indie
ebooks

Advantages of Indie Authorship
• Indie ebook author advantages
• faster time to market
• creative control
• better distribution to global market
• immortal ebooks never go out of print
• lower expenses
• lower prices to consumers
• earn more per book

Indie Ebook Authors Earn Higher
Percentage of List Price
• Indies earn more at lower prices
• At $2.99, indies earn ~$2.00. Traditional author
would have to price over $10 to earn $2.00
• Lower price = reach more readers = more sales at
higher profits per sale
60-80%
35-75%
12-17%
Indie Traditional

Let’s learn how to publish, distribute and
sell an ebook!

Checklist for Publishing an Ebook
 Finish a super-awesome book
 Format the book prior to conversion
 Prepare cover image
 Prepare the metadata
 Ebook conversion to multiple formats
 Pricing
 ISBNs
 Copyright
 Distribution to retailers, libraries
 Piracy
 Marketing

Finish Your Super-Awesome Book
• Ebook publishing tools make
publishing fast, free and easy …
• … but they don’t make it easy to
write a great book
• Your book must move the reader to an emotionally
satisfying extreme
• You are the author and the publisher
• Edit, revise, edit, revise
• Involve beta readers (then revise again)

Formatting is the layout and design
process to prepare your book for
publication

Formatting for Smashwords
350,000+
downloads!

Formatting Secrets
• Forget (some of) what you know
• Don’t try to make e- look like p-
• Ebooks consumed differently than print
• Design for reflowability, small screens
• Less = more with ebooks

Reflowability: Ebook devices
(and customers) shape shift text
• Example of Smashwords novel, Heller
by JD Nixon as viewed in iBooks e-
reading app
• Users can select font style, font size and
nightime mode, or view in portrait or
landscape mode. Reflowability enables
this!

Create Your Ebook Cover
• Covers are important
• First impression
• Great covers make a promise
• Make it:
 engaging, matched to target audience
 professional
 good as thumbnail

Evolution of the 36 Week Jam
Session cover
• Start with a good image
• Speak to the promise of what the
reader will experience.
• Following slides show the development
of 36 Week Jam Session cover

Which Book Cover Do
You Love?
This is a potential e-book
cover for an anthology of
36 short stories targeting
the young adult market

36 WeekJamSession
byAimeeMcCarthy
Race
Yi Yi
Yippee
Yi Yo!
Graffiti
Friendship
Weird
Cooking
Ultimate
Courage
True
Character
There’s Gold
in the
Backyard!
The Red
Evidence
¿Animales!
The
Nearly-
Permanent
Label
Manufacturing
Mommy
How to
Marry
Stubborn
For the
Fans
Blorange
Around the
World at
Hare Speed
…

Follow link to Survey to cast your vote:
• https://www.surveymonkey.com/
s/MDPPJSX
• This the survey question:
Flower
Stack of books 1
White paper
Circles
Stack of books 2
Open book small
Open book large
Band
1. Which Book Cover Do You Like?
This is a potential e-book cover for an anthology of 36
short stories targeting the young adult market.
Review the images below and select one.

A case study…
The evolution of one cover

The cover sparked a breakout at Apple

And landed her on the NY Times Bestseller List

Metadata is data that makes your
book discoverable in a store
Book title
Book description
Author name
Book category
Price
Publication dateISBN
Language Tags

Metadata for 36 Week Jam
Session
• Smashwords:
 girl scouts, gold award, homeschool,
emotions, surprise, shock, suspense, joy,
love, contentment
• Amazon:
 surprise, shock, suspense, joy, love,
contentment

Conversion = Turning your formatted
manuscript into an ebook file readable on
multiple ebook reading devices

Automated Ebook Conversion
Smashwords Amazon
•Your masterpiece uploaded
as a Word 2013 docx plus
Word (DOC)
•HTML (ZIP, HTM, or HTML)
•MOBI (MOBI)
•ePub (EPUB)
•Rich Text Format (RTF)
•Plain Text (TXT)
•Adobe PDF (PDF
KDP
Conversion
MOBI
)
Your masterpiece
uploaded as an epub or
Word .doc document

What Price Yields the Greatest
Author Earnings?

ISBN
Amazon
(ASIN: B00P0CCQ78)

What’s an ISBN and ASIN?
• ISBM is:
 Unique digital identifier
 A 13-digit number
 Helps supply chain communicate about book
 Required for Smashwords distribution to Apple,
Kobo, others
• Where to get an ISBN:
 FREE at Smashwords
• ASIN
 Amazon’s unique 10 digit identifier
 FREE at Amazon
 Automatically assigned by Amazon

Copyright Simplified
• By publishing something you created,
you have copyright
• Copyright entitles you to an exclusive
bundle of rights
• The notation of © is optional
• For best legal protection, go to
Copyright.gov and register copyright
online

Distribution to retailers and libraries

Smashwords Distribution Network

Everything you need to know
about piracy
• Don’t worry about piracy
• Obscurity is your biggest risk
• Black hat pirates who steal your book
wouldn’t have purchased it anyway
• Most piracy is accidental – think of it
as enthusiastic fans marketing your
book for you
• Combat piracy by making the ebook
easier to buy than steal

Marketing
• Marketing is a catalyst, not fuel
• Your book is your best marketing
• Reader word of mouth determines your success
• Focus on discoverability
• Viral catalysts amplify word of mouth

What’s a Viral Catalyst?
• A viral catalyst is something that makes your
book more available, accessible, desirable
and enjoyable to readers
• Read the Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success (it’s
FREE!) to learn how viral catalysts spur word-of-mouth

Viral Catalysts
• Every thing you do right increases
virality
Great cover
Great book
Broad distribution
Fair price
Good categorization
Professionally edited
Great formatting
Great title
Great author biography
Great book description
Great marketing
Social media enabled
Sampling enabled
Multiple formats
• Fall short anywhere and you create
unnecessary friction
LUCK!

YOU are your own gatekeeper
YOU decide when your writing
graduates to published book

Honor your readers
Give them a great book
(and do it faster with lower prices)

Thanks for Listening!
Connect with Patrick McCarthy and Benefit Communications, Ltd.:
Web:
https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/Patrick0
7604
LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=11675627
&trk=spm_pic
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Patrick07604
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Patrick07604
E-mail: pat.mccarthy10@gmail.com

Q:
What’s a best practice?
A:
It’s the secret to accomplishing your
goal

Most Common Writer
Goals:
Reach readers
Earn income

Platforms like Smashwords make
ePublishing and eDistribution Easy…

Reaching Readers is Still Difficult *
* but achievable if you emulate best practices

Let’s review the best practices of
the best-selling indie authors

#1 Your best marketing is a
great book
• With the power to publish comes the
responsibility to be a great publisher
• Honor your reader with a great book
• Move reader to a satisfying emotional extreme
• Turns readers into evangelists
• Be fanatical about quality
• Edit, revise, edit, revise, repeat, proof
• Leverage beta readers

#2 Create a Great Cover image
• Invest in a quality cover image
• Your first impression on path to discovery
• Look professional
• Resonate with target audience
• Should arrest reader with thumb nail
• Makes a promise to the reader

#3 Publish Another Great Book
• The best-selling authors on
Smashwords offer deep backlists
• Each new ebook offers
opportunity to
• cross-promote other titles
• build trust with your reader
• build your brand

#4 Give (some of) Your Books
away for Free
• If you have a deep backlist, offer at
least one full-length book for free
• Eliminates financial risk for first-time
readers
• ~91X more downloads
• Turbocharges a series
• Free works for standalone promos too
• The highest grossing authors at
Smashwords offer at least one free
book

#5 Patience is a Virtue
• Ebooks are immortal
• Never go out of print
• When your book lands at retailer, it’s a
seedling, nourish it
• Never remove
• Ebooks develop differently
• Traditional print books – big sell-in, then yanked
from shelves, then sales go to zero
• Ebooks – can start small and grow slowly before
breakout
• Let’s look at some examples…

Slow boil, breakout, slow boil,
bigger breakout

Slow boil, breakout, slow boil,
smaller breakouts

Slow boil to breakout
Ruth Ann Nordin’s An Inconvenient Marriage

#6 Maximize Distribution, Avoid
Exclusivity
• Ebook retailing is not like sports, politics or
religion
• If your book is not available at every retailer,
it’s not discoverable or purchasable
• Exclusivity
• angers fans
• limits audience
• limits merchandising opportunities
• increases your dependence upon a single
sales outlet

#7 Build a Platform You Control
• Platform is your ability to reach and cultivate
fans
• Platform gives you control, leverage
• Let fans decide how to connect
• Facebook
• Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn
• Blog and/or website
• Mailing list subscription
• Include “Connect with the author” links at the
end of every book (more on this later!)

Secret #8 Use Viral Catalysts to
Drive Word of Mouth
• Books have always been a word of
mouth business
• Think about the first reader
• Every reader represents a chance to reach
more readers
• How they react determines your success
• Viral catalysts improve your odds of
sparking word of mouth

Secret #9 Leverage Preorders!
• A preorder allows you to collect orders
before the book officially goes onsale
• At Apple and Kobo, accumulated sales
credit all at once on “onsale” date
• Budget 4-6 week preorder “runway”
• Execute multi-part advance marketing plan
• Increases retailer merchandising opps
• Smashwords delivers preorders to
Apple, B&N and Kobo!

A Smashwords Preorder at
iBooks

Apple iBooks Merchandising (1)
Your preorder is automatically
merchandized alongside all your
other titles, making it easy for
fans to reserve a copy now,
before they forget.

Apple iBooks Australia Home
Page Preorder Merchandising (2)
Cool beans. Three
Smashwords
preorders featured on
iBooks homepage.
Huge! Thank you
Apple iBooks
Australia, and
congrats to
Smashwords authors
Lili Saint Germain,
Kirsty Moseley and
Amy Miles!

WHEN ENJOYING THE CHASE WENT
ONSALE, IT HIT #1 IN MULTIPLE
COUNTRIES

Secret #10 Collaborate with
Fellow Authors
• Authors working together to reach
more readers
• Publish collaborations
• Short story collections
• Box sets of full-length
• Joint promos
• They have fans you don’t reach, you have
fans they don’t reach
• Everyone wins

Secret #11 Add three sections to
backmatter
1. About Yourname Lastname
• Short bio
2. Other books by Yourname Lastname
• Title 1
• Title 2
3. Connect with Yourname Lastname
• Facebook:
• Twitter:
• Web site:
• Blog:
• Smashwords author page:

Secret #12 Pinch Your Pennies
• You’re running a business
• Profit = Sales minus Expenses
• Most books don’t sell well (!!!!)
• NEVER borrow money to publish a book
• NEVER spend or invest money you
need for food and shelter
• DIY then reinvest

Apple, B&N, Kobo, Amazon and
others are going global
You Have the Tools to Reach a
Worldwide Market Today
The tools are FREE

The market for your English-language books
outside the US will soon dwarf the US market
Apple operates iBooks in 51 countries. In
2013, over 40% of Smashwords Apple iBooks
sales were outside the US. Amazon has
multipule country based web sites for
downloading eBooks.

NOW GO FINISH YOUR SUPER-
AWESOME BOOK

Free Ebook Publishing Resources
• Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success (best practices of
successful authors)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jnd7jYcjqm8
• Smashwords Book Marketing Guide (how to market any
book)
• Smashwords Style Guide (how to format an ebook)

Library presentation 2015 ebook publishing

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