Self-Publishing @ LOTONtech

Praise from a Customer

2009-12-13T00:34:00.000-08:00

Today I was pleased to receive the following praise for our Publishing Assistance from Robert Pacilio, author of Meetings at the Metaphor Cafe. Robert said...

LOTONtech made publishing my first novel possible, but that is not why one should contact them for self-publishing. The reason to to use them are many, but primarily it boils down to personal service and professionalism. Tony and his wife corresponded with me on a daily basis for over a month in order to make absolutely sure every aspect on the novel was exactly as I wished it to be; not only that but they priced their services reasonably-- so much so that I felt I was part of their team and not just a customer. Over and over Tony made sure the cover design fit the demensions that would work for Create Space--and I was very exacting in what I wanted. LOTONtech took care of ever single worry I had from pagination to font design to uploading new materials to ordering proof copies.

Simply put, I felt I did not self publish, I felt LOTONtech was my designer, artistic editor and advisor all in one--anyone sitting at their computer frustrated with the complexities of self-publishing whether with Create Space or Lulu would be wise to contact Tony--and when they do they will feel empowered."

Thank you Robert, and good luck with your book.

CreateSpace Expanded Distribution Channel (EDC)

2009-12-05T09:03:00.000-08:00

For those of you who haven't noticed yet: CreateSpace can now make your book available to a wider range of international on-line and off-line book sellers in addition to Amazon.com, via the Expanded Distribution Channel (EDC) option.

For USA-based self publishers, the case for using Lulu instead of CreateSpace is now much less compelling; and from a UK point of view: when the day comes that CreateSpace offers direct deposit, or PayPal deposit, of royalties in UK Pounds Sterling (GBP) without deduction of withholding tax then my association with Lulu will sadly come to an end :-(

Self-publishing on a shoestring

2009-11-20T10:10:00.001-08:00

Tony Loton shows how you can prepare, publish and promote your work on a small budget... while still not compromising on quality.

This article can be found in the latest issue (Issue #13) of the Self Publishing Magazine.

Lulu's new Distribution Plans for UK publishers

2009-09-27T23:24:00.000-07:00

A little while ago Lulu changed the way it puts your books into distribution with an ISBN. Out went the Published by You (UK) program that I really liked.

The good news is that if you have some remaining unused ISBNs from the block of ten UK PBY ISBNs that you purchased, you can email Lulu to find out what those ISBNs are -- and you can then enter them as valid ISBNs for the new GlobalReach distribution plan described at http://www.lulu.com/services/marketing/isbn/.

If you need more UK ISBNs in future, you can get these from http://www.isbn.nielsenbook.co.uk or http://www.myidentifiers.com.

CreateSpace Cover using your Front and Back Images

2009-09-22T01:16:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since I've posted to this blog, so here's something that CreateSpace self-publishers might find useful:

If you choose their Palm design in the Cover Creator you can upload your own images for the entire front and back covers. It means you can create your covers as JPG or PNG images using a program like Paint.NET, and then let CS worry about the spine width and outside trim.

Generate PDF from Microsoft Word 2007

2009-03-07T00:36:00.001-08:00

In a few posts on the CreateSpace forums recently, I have noticed people saying "..but I can't find a Save As PDF feature in Word 2007". And I find myself replying with the download link for the 2007 Microsoft Office Add-in: Microsoft Save as PDF or XPS.

Download it, install it, and hey presto you can save Office 2007 documents (not just Word documents) in PDF format. It works great, but here are a couple of caveats:

1) For documents destined from POD printing, check the option labeled Optimize for Standard (publishing online and printing) on the Save dialog. So that fonts are embedded.

2) Manuscripts intended for retail distribution via Lulu.com must be distilled using the bona fide Adobe Acrobat. But you could try this: upload your Microsoft-generated PDF along with another PDF, for example containing only a blank page (which is mandatory for Lulu retail distribution anyway). When the Lulu processor combines the two files, I understand that the end result should be a proper Adobe Acrobat file -- which you could check by looking at the Properties when you open the Lulu Print-Ready PDF in Adobe Reader. I could try it for you, but I have to dash...

Taking PayPal payments on a Lulu Storefront or CreateSpace eStore

2009-02-25T01:43:00.000-08:00

In chapter 5 of my book Book Publishing DIY : The Do It Yourself Guide to Self-Publishing using Lulu and CreateSpace I described how you could sell books and e-books directly by adding PayPal buttons to your web site or blog.

I said that unfortunately you could not add PayPal buttons to your Lulu Storefront. You could paste the button's HTML code into a Storefront HTML block okay, but the button would not work. And although I didn't state it explicitly, there is also no obvious way to add a PayPal button to a CreateSpace eStore.

The answer in both cases is to select the Email tab when you select your button's code on PayPal, as shown in the image below. By default, the Website tab is selected and you are presented with several lines of HTML code for the button.

The Email tab presents a simple hyperlink URL, like this one:

https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=1354588

You can paste this URL (well, your version of it) into the Continue Shopping URL field of your CreateSpace storefront, and label it with "Buy Now using PayPal". I've tried this and it works.

As for your Lulu Storefront; you would need to drag a HTML block onto the Storefront and formulate a HTML anchor tag like this:

I've tried this, and it works just fine. See a real-life example here.

Of course, any orders taken via PayPal will have to be fulfilled by you from your private stock of books (or by emailing the e-book PDF) .

I hope this information is useful.

You can find more tips for using Lulu and CreateSpace in Book Publishing DIY : The Do It Yourself Guide to Self-Publishing using Lulu and CreateSpace.

Copyright, Fair Use, and Fan Fiction

2009-01-31T09:13:00.000-08:00

As a self-published author I need to understand issues of copyright and fair use from two points of view:

As a poacher (well, not exactly, but it sounds good) who wishes to make limited fair use of, or make reference to, previously published materials.
As a gamekeeper who wishes to be afforded the protection of copyright legislation.

While researching this topic I recently came across a great web site called Chilling Effects. Don't be put off by the name; it's not at all frightening! In fact, it's very enlightening.

I particularly like the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) sections on Copyright and Fair Use, Fan Fiction (not that I publish any), not to mention Protest, Parody, and Criticism..

Another good source of information is, of course, Wikipedia. It has some very detailed pages dealing with Copyright, Fair Use (USA), and Fair Dealing (the equivalent in the UK and some other countries).

I'm not affiliated in any way with these web sites, but I hope you find them as useful as I do.

Reviews of "Book Publishing DIY : The Do It Yourself Guide to Self-Publishing using Lulu and CreateSpace"

2009-01-24T01:50:00.001-08:00

I'm pleased to say that some readers have already posted nice reviews of our book Book Publishing DIY : The Do It Yourself Guide to Self-Publishing using Lulu and CreateSpace on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk.

Click the links to see what readers have said.

The Three Levels of Publishing Enlightenment

2009-01-04T02:50:00.000-08:00

My own personal experiences, combined with the apparent experiences of fellow Lulu and CreateSpace authors, has prompted me to write this short article about The Three Levels of Publishing Enlightenment.

It takes the form of a "tale of three authors".

The Published Author

This author is an expert in her field. Her work has been included as feature articles in respected trade journals, and this encourages a traditional publisher to approach her with a book project; which would be her first. She signs the contract (offering a 10% royalty on net revenues), submits her manuscript on time, and then waits.... and waits.... and waits for her book to work its way through the publisher's long publishing cycle.

Several months later, the first set of figures come in. The book has sold 1,000 copies in the first six months. The cover price is $30, so the net revenue per book is $15 (she didn't realise this) , and her share is 10% of the $15; i.e. $1.50 per copy sold. Total royalties = $1,500.

Our author acknowledges that this isn't a great payback (so far) for the time spent writing the book, but she is quietly optimistic about future sales at this rate. The publisher is not so optimistic, and quietly halts its marketing efforts. Not that it applied much effort to marketing this title anyway; which is a point made by Dan Poynter, Peter Bowerman and others.

The author receives about $15 per month for ongoing book sales.

The First-Time "Self-Published" Author

With the experience described above already under his belt, our second author decides to self-publish. Not because he has to (the mainstream publishers are still interested) but because he wants to. The appeal is obvious. By self-publishing, he can:

Get his book published quicker.
Retain creative control over his work.
Achieve a better rate of return; of $10 per book rather than $1.50 per book.

He writes the book in double-quick time, he has it professional edited (for a high fee, but worth it -- he thinks), he purchases a custom-designed cover (again, worth the cost), and orders an initial batch from the offset printer of 1,000 copies @ $2 per copy. His total outlay is $2,000 (for the printed copies) plus $500 (for the editing, cover design, and purchase of an ISBN) = $2,500.

The numbers still work, since he needs to sell only 250 copies (at $10 each) from his web site in order to break even. In the first month, total sales via his web site: ZERO. In the second month, total sales: ONE (someone found the web site by accident). At this rate, it could take twenty years to recoup the initial investment; so in a desperate attempt to kick start sales, he enrols in the Google Adwords program. This has the desired affect of increasing the number of clicks through to his web site; each click costing him $1. One visitor in every twenty goes on to make a purchase, which our author understands to be a good conversion rate. Therefore each sale costs him $20 in AdWords fees, and for each sale he receives $10. He's selling more books, but every one of them at a loss!

The "Enlightened" Self-Published Author

This author has made all the mistakes there are to make, and suddenly the penny drops. He realises that writing a book won't make him rich. He realises that publishing a book (via a mainstream publisher, or by self-publishing) won't make him rich. He realises that he will only get rich -- or at least pay the bills -- by selling as many books as possible at the highest possible profit. He realises that this is a business, not a hobby. So he does what all successful businesses do:

He makes sure that his product has a unique selling point (USP) before starting work on it. Can his book be really be the first, the best, or the cheapest (ideally all three) in its class?
He keeps costs to a minimum, by not paying for expensive editorial and design assistance (there are plenty of low-cost options). And by publishing initially using Print on Demand (POD) web sites like Lulu and CreateSpace, so that he holds no inventory.
He markets his book relentlessly: using some of Amazon's features, via his web site and blog, and by writing related (paid for) feature articles for magazines. He never pays to advertise; not even using Adwords. In fact, he earns additional revenue by advertising for other people -- using Google Adsense and Amazon Associates widgets on his web site and blog.

Do you recognize this enlightened self-publisher? If it's you, congratulations! If it's not you, the don't worry -- it's not too late to become enlightened.

Tony Loton is author of Book Publishing DIY : The Do It Yourself Guide to Self-Publishing using Lulu and CreateSpace as well as many other self-published and traditionally-published titles.

Maximize your Revenues by Guiding Your Book Buyers

2008-12-27T05:31:00.001-08:00

I'm sure you take every available opportunity to plug your book(s). But do you maximize your revenues by guiding your potential readers to buy your book(s) in a particular way? If you do it right, you can increase your chances of a sale (by adding value on the way to the sale), and you can pick up additional revenues along the way.

While wearing one of my hats (I have three) I write financial articles for a stockbroker's magazine. You can see an example here, if it's still live. Not only did I get paid for writing this article, but I was also allowed to mention my finance book(s) at the end of the article. A proportion of you who followed the link to my article might have been sufficiently interested to purchase the book(s) that I mentioned. The original readers of the article certainly would have been.

So far: I have been paid to write an article and I have had one opportunity to sell a book. Why pay to advertise when you can get paid to advertise?

In my early articles I merely mentioned my books by name, and perhaps gave the ISBNs. In later articles I provided a direct link to Amazon; so that all purchases would help to improve my Amazon sales ranking. In later articles I provided a hyperlink like this one (click it and see). Ok, so it's not a finance book in this case, but one that I think you might be interested in. If you purchased my book after following that link, I would have received my royalty on the book sale and a credit to my Amazon Associates account.

So far: I have been paid to write an article, and had the opportunity to sell a book, and potentially received an affiliate fee for selling the book.

I'll ditch the finance books example now, and concentrate solely on my book Book Publishing DIY : The Do It Yourself Guide to Self-Publishing using Lulu and CreateSpace . (Another opportunity to get you hooked, you see?).

Now, it might be that you are not in the market for my book specifically; but you might be interested in the fact that I am a wizard at formatting book manuscripts in Microsoft Word and OpenOffice writer. I wouldn't want to say so blatantly -- oops, I just did -- but I would like to subtly make you aware of this fact when you look at my book. So rather than linking from my magazine article(s) or blog (in this case) direct to my book on Amazon; I would rather send you to my web page at www.lotontech.com/publishing. On this page, you can still click the book's cover picture or Amazon.com link (containing my affiliate tag) to buy the book, but you will also be aware that you can ask me for Publishing Assistance at reasonable rates.

So far: I have been paid to write an article, and had the opportunity to sell a book, and potentially received an affiliate fee for selling the book, and maybe got you interested in my publishing assistance.

If all else fails, and you don't buy my book or my Publishing Assistance, you might just have been curious enough to click one of the "get your book published" adverts at the bottom of the web page; in which case, your curiosity would have generated some Google Adsense revenue for me.

In total: I have been paid to write an article, and had the opportunity to sell a book, and potentially received an affiliate fee for selling the book, and maybe got you interested in my publishing assistance, and -- if all else fails -- perhaps picked up a few cents because you click on an advertisement.

In this scenario, everyone can be a winner. The potential reader has received additional useful information (about the topic I wrote on initially, about my related services and other books, and about other related web sites). At any point, the reader is just one click away from buying the book (good for him or her) and I will receive a royalty plus an affiliate payment (good for me) at no extra cost to the reader.

These ideas are not totally new, and are well known to Internet Marketeers. Some of them have been expressed in various forms in books like these:

Plug Your Book! Online Book Marketing for Authors, Book Publicity through Social Networking

Sell Your Book on Amazon: The Book Marketing COACH Reveals Top-Secret "How-to" Tips Guaranteed to Increase Sales for Print-on-Demand and Self-Publishing Writers

Publicize Your Book (Updated): An Insider's Guide to Getting Your Book the Attention It Deserves

Book Publishing DIY: The Do It Yourself Guide to Self-Publishing using Lulu and CreateSpace

CreateSpace Microsoft Word to PDF Converter

2008-12-17T00:15:00.000-08:00

I'm a big fan of Lulu's Microsoft Word to PDF converter. It means you can upload your book manuscript directly to the Lulu web site and have it generate the print-ready PDF for you. So you don't need to buy Adobe Acrobat, and you don't need to worry about things like PDF transparency settings. Best of all -- in most if not all cases the Lulu-generated PDF is suitable for uploading to CreateSpace. This is one of the themes of my book Book Publishing DIY : The Do It Yourself Guide to Self-Publishing using Lulu and CreateSpace.

So what about the brand new Word-to-PDF converter provided by CreateSpace? Is it as good as the Lulu's? In a word, No! At least, not yet.

I uploaded the original Microsoft Word manuscript for my book onto CreateSpace as a test. Remember that this document converted perfectly on Lulu, and I even used the result for the interior of my book on CreateSpace.

Some people have asked whether CreateSpace provides a preview of your generated PDF, so that you can see if it worked out ok. The answer is yes, as you can see below.

What's wrong with this picture?

To start with, it has the the words For Preview Only stamped across it -- which means you can't use the CreateSpace-generated PDF elsewhere. So beware that if you upload a Word document to CreateSpace, you will be locked in. It makes sense for them, I suppose, but maybe not for you. Not if you want to sell the same PDF as an e-book from your web site.

Actually, I wouldn't want to use it elsewhere -- because it confirms my worst fears about the conversion process:

The headers and footers that you can see in the picture are not my originals. My originals had the author name and book title in mirrored headers. My originals had the page number to the right or left in mirrored footers.

Figure 1 in the picture has been shrunk, which, along with some other conversion anomalies, affects the pagination of the document... which messes up the Contents Page and Index of mybook.

Oh, and the Roman numeral page numbers in my front matter (not shown) have been replaced with Arabic numerals.

I could go on.

The bottom line is that this conversion is currently only suitable for very simple fiction books with no images, no self-made headers and footers, no Contents and Index, and so on.

So I'll be generating my own PDFs, or using the trusty Lulu Word-to-PDF converter -- even for the interiors of my CreateSpace books. And if I'm going to use Lulu for my CreateSpace PDF conversions, then I might as well go ahead and publish the same book on Lulu too, hadn't I? Two publishing platforms for the price of one, you might say.

(if you try this at home, note that you would need to run the conversion twice; so as to incorporate the CreateSpace and Lulu ISBNs in their respective print-ready PDFs)

Message to CreateSpace: This Word-to-PDF conversion feature will be an invaluable feature for some authors, when you get it right.

Tony Loton is author of Book Publishing DIY : The Do It Yourself Guide to Self-Publishing using Lulu and CreateSpace

HOW TO -- Display all your CreateSpace eStores on One Web Page

2008-12-16T06:12:00.000-08:00

One of the minor irritations of CreateSpace is that it does not provide a store front web page for all (or some) of your content. What I mean is: it doesn't provide the equivalent of a Lulu Storefront. Sure, it provides separate eStore web pages like this one, this one, and this one, but I'd like to direct my potential purchasers to a single page that acts rather like my Amazon aStore.

So here it is: my CreateSpace SuperStore (the link) and embedded in this blog using a HTML Inline Frame.

It's an experimental prototype, which I'm using to test the concept. Or, by the time you read this, it might be fully operational. From day 1, you should find that the links such as Add to Cart work as expected.

So how did I do it?

The answer is that I created a simple Yahoo! Pipe named LOTONtech_CreateSpaceSuperStore, which takes a list of CreateSpace content IDs (try it with your own) and converts the separate eStores into items of an RSS feed. The RSS feed URL, which you could view in Internet Explorer, or Firefox or your favorite feed reader, is:

http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/pipe.run?_id=VF8ofW3I3RGaOosgpwt1Yg&_render=rss&CreateSpaceIDs=3359148|3359212|3359214

Try substituting your own CreateSpace IDs. It works!

I then created a clever HTML web page that uses some JavaScript to display the Yahoo! Pipe's JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) output rather than its RSS output. On the CreateSpace Superstore web page, right click and choose View Source in your browser to see how it is done.

Alternatively, from the page for this Yahoo! Pipe at http://pipes.yahoo.com/lotontech/createspace, you can click the Get as a Badge link so as to add your CreateSpace Superstore as a gadget in Blogger, Wordpress, iGoogle, Typepad, or your own web page.

Want to use it?

You are free to play around with my example using the links provided, but here is a word of warning:

If you rely on my Yahoo! Pipe, you will find that your superstore will be affected if I ever make a change to the Pipe; including deleting it! To avoid this, you will need to create a Yahoo! Pipes account for free at http://pipes.yahoo.com, copy / clone my Pipe named LOTONtech_CreateSpaceSuperStore and its sub-Pipe named LOTONtech-CreateSpaceEstore, and use your own copies. This book will help you.

Or, I could help you by setting you up with a Yahoo! Pipes account, cloning the Pipes, creating your HTML web page, and maybe customizing the way that the eStore content is displayed. For a modest fee, obviously. CLICK HERE for more information.

Tony Loton