Left Field Inspiration

When I work up this morning, I didn't know that I was about to be inspired, and validated, and encouraged, and changed...But that's kind of the whole point behind blessings. Tonya Kappes's post changed my course.

For her inspiring post HOW BAD DO YOU WANT SELF PUBLISHING SUCCESS, click here.

I have a new short story out!!! THE WAY LIFE WAS FOREVER
It's  $.99 at Amazon, B&N, and Smashwords. I'll talk more about the business rationale in a few weeks.

Today I want to know HOW BAD DO YOU WANT IT?

Going Indie - Is it worth it?

Time to talk results.

I take this giant leap of faith - so necessary to gain forward momentum in my career - and three months have passed. Some authors are selling tens of thousands, some authors are making thousands a month, and a very lucky few are doing both.

And me?

My results have exceeded my expectations. I have recouped my initial expenses. And most importantly, I have taken the next step in my career. No regrets.

So lets talk Dollars and Cents:

THE HALO CHRONICLES: THE GUARDIAN sells for $2.99 eBook and $14.99 print (discounted at B&N but with very little margin for me).

	Sales	Earned
MAY 24th
Amazon	36	$36
B&N	24	$46
JUNE
Amazon	19	$32
B&N	27	$52
JULY
Amazon	24	$45
B&N	20	$38
Print	6	$35
AUGUST
Amazon	19	$35	est.
B&N	5	$9
Print	2	$7
Smashwords (3mo. total)	10	$23
TOTAL	192	$358

A good friend of mine, who published about the same time, has sold in the thousands. While ecstatic for her, for like a second I was jealous of her sales. (LOL Tonya).

Keep in Mind at my Pricing structure: 100 = 700

I considered dropping my book to $.99. While $.99 price point does tend to explode sales, the margin is very low.

$2.99 (70% is $2.093) x100sales = $209.30

$.99 (30% is $.297) x100sales= $29.70;  700sales= $207.90

My choice, earnings at $2.99 or sales at $.99? The authors who are really doing well have a tiered approach (that I plan to model). When their subsequent book releases for $2.99 or $3.99, their current title drops to $.99. That way they are accomplishing both sales and earning. So I'm hard at work on the sequel THE HALO CHRONICLES: THE KEEPER. :)

Here are some other AMAZING indie authors who have transparently shared results:

Norah Wilson

Debra Holland

* Debra also has a great post on price point

Debra's August sales information

Theresa Ragan

Gemma Halliday's results (1 year 600k and counting)

D.D. Scott (on Right side of page)

Cate Rowan on The Ruby Slippered Sisterhood site

Julianne MacLean's promotion experiment (How important are cover and price?)

Know of any other indies disclosing sales? Post a link in comments and I will update this post. :)

Got it Covered? I thought I did…

I really like my cover. I designed it myself with a Shutter stock image on PowerPoint. It worked great for digital. For print, it did not. (Read about my cover design, here.)

Being an ambitious DIYer, I determined I could handle the print cover. Just like my digital to print manuscript experience, my digital to print cover experience was plagued with issues. It was complete trial and error and error and error.

Like any good indie, I did my research. I got a cover template. I did my best to absorb info about spines (so Greek to the mathematically impaired girl). I spent a couple of hours laying out my cover and I uploaded to Createspace.

I thought I did a pretty good job until CS kicked it back to me:

Files for THE HALO CHRONICLES: T..., require your attention

The cover file does not meet our submission requirements for the reason(s) listed below.

The cover file contains live elements that may be trimmed during the production process. Please make sure that all text appears .375" away from the outer edges. Additionally, all elements you wish to appear on the cover, such as text and graphics, need to appear within the live graphics area. Only background that can be cut off should extend through the bleed area.

The spine text is too large for the page count. We recommend reducing the font size and centering the spine text so there is at least .0625" of room on either side. Otherwise, the spine text may wrap to the front or back cover.

Additionally, we have noted the concerns listed below. You may choose to move forward with the below issues as-is; however, we wanted to bring them to your attention.

The cover file contains transparency  which will be manually flattened during our processing and may cause a color shift.

The cover file contains images that range from 70 to 93 DPI, which may appear blurry and pixelated in print. For optimal printing, we recommend all images be at least 300 DPI.

So I tried again. I Googled how to flatten the file. I downloaded higher res images. I tweaked my layout, said a prayer, and uploaded.

Files for THE HALO CHRONICLES: T..., require your attention

The cover file contains images at 92 DPI, which may appear blurry and pixelated in print. For optimal printing, we recommend all images be at least 300 DPI.

Better but I still had image issues. It was one of those moments where I grudgingly admitted, “This is why people don’t do cover design on PowerPoint.” I’d spent a lot of time on my cover and still wasn’t getting the results I needed. I was behind schedule, out of my design depth and knew that I needed a professional. Problematic, since I had no budget.

One of my chapter mates, Jennette Marie Powell, is going indie in August with Time’s Enemy, a time travel romance. When she showed me her great cover, she’d mentioned her design background.

So, I approached her for help. I might have begged and pleaded a bit. Now’s the part where I give Jennette my UNDYING THANKS! She quickly fixed my resolution issues and I finally had a cover that CS accepted.

Here’s the digital eBook (my) version:

Here’s the professional print version (Jennette had to make some minor tweaks, mostly in font):

Again a HUGE THANKS to Jennette for rescuing my cover!

Jennette Marie Powell

Author of Time's Enemy, American time-travel romance, coming in August, 2011
http://www.jenpowell.com/ | Twitter |  Facebook

Conclusion: My most important take-away is even if I want to design my own cover, I need to collaborate with a design expert for set up. For the next book, I will not hesitate to work with a professional.

Also, I appreciated CreateSpace rejecting what would be a substandard cover with very specific feedback –for free. J

Mood: Grateful

Related topics: A Cover is a Promise

Next steps: Working on revisions for DOON

Your turn: Do you like to design your own covers?

My Self-Pub Journey to Date - My blog version of a clip show

Next week I'll be wrapping up my journey to publication with my final post on process. Then we'll get into the results. Sales, royalties, and such...

Indie Curious? Self Publishing Made Easy: step by step from manuscript to eBook

Edward Cullen has nothing to do with my cover: Designing my digital cover

Digital to Print - Do the math or suffer the consequences: from eBook formatted to Print

POD Part 1 - The Screwup: Why print formatting was harder than I thought.

Got it Covered? I thought I did... How my cover held up my print process

Coming soon: Numbers don't lie

And for fun (in case you didn't see) Lucas-schmookas! I wrote Star Wars: The first book I wrote

Digital to Print - Do the math or suffer the consequences!

If you have been following my journey, you may have picked up that Print on Demand formatting is giving me FITS. L I expected this process to be simpler than digital formatting. It so wasn’t. It didn’t help that I neglected my due diligence in thoroughly researching the POD process. I spent a lot of time comparing Print on Demand providers (see here), but not the formatting and cover processes.

Here’s my digital manuscript to POD print ready manuscript step by step process:

Step 1 Make a Create Space account

            Create Space give you step by step tasks to follow. Easy Peasy—mostly…

Step 2 Choose a Trim Size

·         Standard sizes range from 5 x 8 to 6 x 9. Most of the YAs and POD books I have are either 5.06 x 7.81 or 5.25 x 8. If you have a book or two you like around the house, measure their sizes.

·         Also choose white or cream paper.

Step 3 Do the math or suffer the consequences

·         I am sooo not a math girl. So figuring out gutter and outside margins made my brain bleed. You see, they are off center, and right side pages have opposite gutters than left.

·         So, I opted to use a preformatted template. Here’s where my lack of math hurt me. I tried many templates and no matter what I tried (Create Space; Lulu; or other) the results were wonky. Crazy headers and footers; ghost lines impossible to remove; and other strange formatting junk. I worried that it was my manuscript, but I tried other manuscripts and even format stripped wordpad documents with the same results. My best results were with these particular CS templates, but even then I had to do some ghetto formatting to make it work (i.e. stripping page breaks and hitting the return like 20 times to create faux page breaks to remedy inconsistent headers.

·         Here’s what I did. I took my Smashwords perfected digital manuscript and deleted “Smashwords” copyright. I mirrored the copyrights of printed books I have.

·         Then I cut and pasted into the CS template for the size book I wanted. I chose 6x9 and although I considered downsizing, the amount of template trauma I experienced dissuaded me from making changes once I had a print ready PDF.

·         Then I “fixed” wonky formatting, crazy header spacing. I added odd/even headers with book title on one side and my name on the other. I added page numbers at the bottom. (You have to format both odd and even page numbers and select “link to previous” EXCEPT on page one.

·         Once your manuscript looks right (keep in mind you may have to ghetto format to get spacing and other thing) save it as a PDF.

·         Review your PDF to ensure continuity of formatting, headers, and footers.

      ·         Mine the Create Space community for answers and general problem solving.

You now have an Internal PDF - half of what you need for POD print copies of your book. The other half is a cover PDF. Next week I will dissect the flaws of my digital to print cover.

Conclusion: POD formatting is harder than it ought to be. If only there were a perfect template out there. *sigh*

Mood: Perseverant

Related topics: To read my POD provider posting click here.

Next steps: Waiting for cover fix… In deep revision on another project.

Your turn: Have you had better success with POD formatting templates? Please share! Also ask any questions you might have. J

Indie-curious? Self-publishing made easy

As promised, here’s my easy peasy step-by-step guide to self-publishing.

(note: Do not buy an expensive ISBN or set of ISBNs before starting.)

Before you start, make sure you have a finished, professionally edited manuscript and a professionally designed cover. These two things will make or break your career.

For editing perspective, please see my post Who Should See Your Book Before You Self-Publish?

Also invest in a professionally designed cover. Not only will it look great, most designers will deliver final content in fortmats needed for Smashwords, PubIt, Amazon Kindle Direct, and your preferred Print on Demand (usually Create Space or Lightning Source). Find some indie covers you like and ask the authors who did their cover.

On to Self-Publishing DIY

I found the digital formatting process pretty detailed, but simple. But there are some great, reasonable services that will deliver finished, ready to upload formats, like Formatting 4 U.

SMASHWORDS:

·         Download Smashwords Formatting Guide

o   Follow the guide step-by-step (all 68 pages)

o   Don’t do nuclear formatting method unless you have a ton of rogue html code or unfixable formatting issues.

o   Save as MANUSCRIPT_SmashwordsEdition.doc

·         Make Smashwords account

o   Upload MANUSCRIPT_SmashwordsEdition.doc to Smashwords & wait for confirmation of success.

o   Smashwords will generate in multiple forms including Epub (Nook compatible) mobi (Kindle compatible)

·         Download Kindle for PC and NOOK for PC

o   Download MANUSCRIPT.mobi (Kindle) and check formatting

o   Download MANUSCRIPT.Epub (NOOK) and check formatting

·         If you find formatting errors, fix and re-upload to Smashwords
·        Go To Smashwords Dashboard > Distribution Channel Manager

o   Opt out of Amazon and B&N distribution

o   Yes, really – Opt out of Amazon and B&N distribution!!!

*update* Smashwords now requires cover images to be min. 1400 pixels.

AMAZON KINDLE:
              (Make sure you follow the final SW "opt out" step above.)

·         Download MobiPocket Creator

o   Open MANUSCRIPT_SmashwordsEdition.doc

o   Delete “Smashwords” from copyright page (2 or 3 places – covered in SW formatting guide)

o   Replace “Smashwords” with "Kindle" & "Amazon"

o   Save as MANUSCRIPT_KindleEdition.doc

o   For copyright page example download THE HALO CHRONICLES: THE GUARDIAN free excerpt.

o   Open Mobipocket Creator

o   Upload Cover (do not add as first page of MANUSCRIPT_KindleEdition.doc or it will show up twice on Kindle) 600x800 min. pixels for mobi discussion thread here

*Amazon recommends a 1.6 width/height ratio, and their recommended height is 2,500 pixels.
Upload MANUSCRIPT_KindleEdition.doc – Mobipocket Creator will create a .mobi file

o   Save as MANUSCRIPT_KindleEdition.mobi

·         Make Kindle Account

o   Upload your Manuscript cover

o   Upload MANUSCRIPT_KindleEdition.mobi

BARNES & NOBLE NOOK:

(the easiest one)

·         Make B&N Pubit Account

o   Upload Manuscript Cover

o   Upload MANUSCRIPT.Epub (downloaded from Smashwords earlier – I didn’t worry about uploading a version w/o “Smashwords” on coverpage since distribution is typically much smaller at B&N.)

·         NOW YOU HAVE YOUR BOOK AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE AT Amazon     Barnes & Noble AND   Smashwords!

·         Stop and pat yourself on the back

FOLLOWUP:

·         Continue to check Smashwords Dashboard to confirm MANUSCRIPT is approved for premium status (2—3 weeks)

o   Once approved – get Smashwords ISBN # (Follow SW ISBN Manager on Dashboard) – Must have ISBN to be eligible for Sony (eReader) and iBookstore (iPad/iPhone/iTouch) catalog distribution.

·         Create Author Page on Amazon, B&N, Goodreads, & LibraryThing (minimum)

AMAZON example

·         Add purchase  links to your email signature:  Buy THE HALO CHRONICLES: THE GUARDIAN (a 2010 RWA Golden Heart® finalist for young adult fiction) at Amazon     Barnes & Noble    Smashwords    coming soon to iBookstore Turn your computer into a free eReader: Kindle for PC  NOOK for PC

o   more information at www.careycorp.com

·         Use Smashwords Dashboard to generate discount and free coupons. Free codes can be used for giveaways, ARCs, and review copies. SW allows recipient to choose whichever form is compatible with their eReader or PC software.

NEXT THURSDAY: Print copies – Are all Print on Demand Providers Created Equal?

Don’t forget the Kindle Indie-pendence Contest ends on July 4^th. Win you kid a Kindle loaded with hot YA and MG titles.

YOUR TURN: What tips or questions do you have about digital publishing?