I don’t personally have anything enrolled in Kindle Unlimited (or Kindle Select, or anything else exclusive), so I can only share what I’ve read.
Apparently Amazon has expanded the Unlimited subscription service (which normally allows subscribed readers to read as many enrolled ebooks as they want for the $9.99 monthly fee) to India where they are only charging $3.00 a month to subscribers, meaning that authors will make less on an enrolled book read in India than if the same book was read in the United States or another country. (I don’t have Amazon’s numbers but I would guess since the fee is roughly 1/3 the cost of the normal subscription, reads would be worth 1/3 as well – again, this is only a guess on my part.)
Am I advocating jumping ship from Amazon? No. I don’t advocate abandoning ANY platform.
Exclusivity is a personal decision for an author, and while I refuse to ever do it, someone else may be happy that way – and that’s great. What I think is sad, however, is how many authors I’ve spoken to who AREN’T happy but feel like they have no choice. “Amazon is the biggest.” That’s true, but Amazon is only the biggest because we make them the biggest – not just as readers (quick, and be honest, where do you buy books at?) but as authors. When we list our links most of us (myself included) list Amazon first. We submit books to email lists that cater exclusively to Amazon links. When we post a link on our twitter profile (or our tweets) we use the Amazon link rather than a personal webpage that has links to all retailers. And I know, if I’m in a hurry in an email message or Facebook comment, I will ONLY give someone the Amazon link because I think “It’s the biggest. Everyone buys there”. Much like reading Twilight, we’re all doing it because “everyone else is” – and everyone else is because that’s where all the links point – that’s where the top link is, that’s where we’re told is the best place to go – either literally or subliminally.
If you’re happy reading Twilight (and some people are – there’s nothing wrong with that!), then you should keep doing it – stay exclusive and post Amazon links everywhere. But, if you’re only doing it because “you have no choice” or “everyone else is”, remind yourself that you DO have a choice. Either way, go check out Mark Coker’s great article.
Recently I wondered what the best time to release a new book was. Obviously you would want to release something scary prior to Halloween, something romantic right before Valentine’s Day, something full of snow and holiday cheer right before Christmas, etc. But what about the rest of the year? Are there days that are lucky for self-published authors? Is there a time of year that can help you get more copies into people’s hands? I was determined to find out.
Now despite my best efforts, I only have three books out at the moment (though I am working on getting more out soon), so I couldn’t rely on just my own experience ot answer this question. So when in doubt, I do what I normally do: ask the writing groups I belong to on Facebook. The answers I got were quite informative.
Of course there were the tips to release seasonal stuff around their seasons, but there was a ton more advice that I found quite interesting. One author’s observations was that people prefer introspective works in the summer (makes sense, seeing as I just read Go Set a Watchman) and mysteries and thrillers in the fall (that is when JK Rowling is releasing her next detective novel). Another author liked to follow the movie release schedule, releasing books whenever there’s a movie coming out in the same genre as his book. He also felt that people prefer laughter in winter months, “light and airy reads” in spring, adventure stories in the summer, and scary stuff in autumn.
Probably the most helpful advice I got from a woman who had recently read an article on the subject (which I wish I had a link for, but so far I have been unable to find the article). According to the article she read, the best time of year to run a promotion was the two weeks after Christmas. According to her, something about a free or discounted book after the holidays gets people buying, and that allowed her to retire from her day job and pick up writing full-time (which is something I’ll have to try).
Some other tips she gave included:
The best days of the month to release a book is between the 7th and the 14th.
If you’re self-publishing, don’t release your book on a Tuesday, because most big publishing houses release on Tuesday and you’d be in direct competition with them (wish I’d known that when I released my second novel). Instead, try to release on the weekend if you want good sales. Those days seem to be good days to publish for independent authors.
And if you’re trying to hit some bestseller list, release on Sunday or Monday. According to industry data, that’s a good time for self-published authors.
The one thing that all these authors seemed to agree on is that there was never a bad time to release a book. It was never directly stated in any of the comments I got, but it seemed to be implied. Sure, apparently Tuesdays might not be the wisest day of the week to release a book, but other than that there aren’t any days or times of the year when authors will doom themselves publishing a book.
And you know, I can’t help but see that as a good thing. Just means there are plenty of opportunities for authors to publish their books and maybe pull out a bestseller from them. And we all want that for our books, don’t we?
Does the advice here match your own experiences with publishing?
What advice do you have on the best time to publish a book?
I got an interesting email this morning over breakfast. Apparently KDP Amazon has added a new feature or two which is supposed to help market your e-books. You can now select an age-range and (if you’re marketing your books to schools) a grade-range for your works. The former goes from 0 to 18+, the latter from “Board books” and “Picture books” to “Teen and young adult chapter books”. The people who wrote the email recommend you generally space your minimum and maximum ages or grades within 3 to 4 years.
I have to say, it sounded intriguing and decided to try it. Neither the email nor the new options on KDP (listed where you can put and change your e-book’s general information) list how exactly these ranges help get your books to your customers, but I think Amazon probably knows the ages of its customers, and can target books to their customers based on age and past buying experiences. In any case, I thought I’d give it a try and see if anything happens.
The one thing I can see wrong with this new feature is that they don’t go higher than 18+ or “Teen and young adult chapter books”. It would be convenient to have options that go higher, seeing as 18+ is a pretty wide range and I’m sure plenty of people would like to put a range on their books that’s closer to college-level or higher.
Then again, this is the early stages of these options and there’s room for improvements. Maybe in a few months they’ll adjust the ranges to allow for more diverse ranges.
In the meantime, I’m looking forward to seeing how author’s book sales are affected by this. Will you be doing these age ranges? Do you see any problems with these new options? And do you think they’ll affect sales that much? Let me know, I’d love to hear your thoughts.
The last time I posted an article, I wrote about submitting a short story to a magazine. And as promised, I’m following it up…with an article on following up on those submissions when a lot of time has passed.
Most magazines promise on their websites that they’ll get back to you on your submission in 2-6 months. What they don’t tell you is that work and submissions tend to pile up, especially when the magazine may be an operation run by only a few or even just one person. And imagine getting several submissions at the very least every month for short stories, articles, art pieces, and just about everything else under the sun. Your submission could be lost underneath all that.
So if you find a magazine has been taking its time getting to your submission, it can be helpful to send them an email and ask politely if your story has been looked at yet. Here’s what I normally put down in an email when I’m following up on a submission:
Dear [Insert magazine name here],
I am writing to follow up on my submission [insert story name here] which I sent in [insert how long ago or date you sent it in] to see if it is still being considered for publication. If you could please get back to me when it is convenient for you, that would be great, and thank you for your time and consideration.
Hoping you are well,
[Insert name, pen name if applicable, and contact information]
It’s also a good idea to attach your short story to the email in case it got lost somewhere among the submissions.
Normally a magazine will get back to you pretty quickly after this sort of email is sent. Even then though, it may take some time for the magazine editors to get back to you on your short story. If that’s the case, it may work in your favor to send an email every month or so inquiring about the status of your short story. That way it’ll stay in the forefront of the editors’ minds.
Also, remember to always be courteous and polite in your emails. They could just send you a form rejection letter right away, so the fact that they are taking the time to actually look at your story, no matter how long that time is, to possibly publish it is worth staying on the magazine’s good side. And when the magazine finally does take a look at your short story, no matter what the result is, be courteous and thank them for the time they took to read the story you sent them. That way, if you send them something in the future, they’ll be inclined to work with you and show you the same kindness and understanding you showed them.
Do you have any tips on following up on submissions?
I’ve been using WattPad for the past couple of weeks, and I thought that an article about it would be fun to write. Also, I found out this blog doesn’t have an article on WattPad yet, so I thought I’d break the ground and do a piece on it.
Throughout this article, I will try to give some sound advice on using WattPad and possibly getting some success through it. If any WattPad users have any additional tips they would like to…well, add in, please let us know. I’ll do a follow-up article with your words of wisdom.
So, first things first: What is WattPad? WattPad is a website where writers can upload and share stories with the public. It’s been in operation since 2006 and it’s been nicknamed the YouTube of storytelling. Writers can upload stories, gain feedback, create covers, and enter contests with their short stories or novels.
What sort of work is published on WattPad? Just about anything is published on WattPad. Novels, novellas, short stories, poems, non-fiction pieces, of all types and genres. Science fiction, fantasy, and YA stories tend to be the most popular, with horror and romance in a close second. There’s also a sizable amount of erotic fiction on the site, though I haven’t personally browsed that in any great detail. And technically erotica isn’t allowed on the website, but I won’t tell if you won’t.
Is it possible to get success through WattPad? Depends on what you mean by success. It is possible to spread your work to other writers and readers, maybe get feedback, and learn something from other writers by both reading and being read. And it is also possible to get the success that every author only dreams about (there’s an example of that in a recent issue of TIME magazine), but like anything in fiction, that is very hard to achieve and what can cause it is very difficult to predict.
How do you spread your work through WattPad? Tags and categorizing your work is very important, because it allows people with similar interests to search out and find your stories (and on that note, make sure to also rate your short stories appropriately. At the very least, an R-rating might deter some nine-year-old from reading a wildly inappropriate story). Also, networking with other authors, commenting on their stories, and even recommending works to authors you make friends with can be very helpful.
What are some ways to keep your readers interested in your work? Besides having interesting work, there are a couple of ways. One is to post frequently new stories or updates. Another is to post a novel on the site, but to do it in serial form. Posting new chapters on a regular basis keeps our readership up and it keeps them wanting to know more (especially if you end every chapter on a cliffhanger).
Should one copyright their work before posting? Well, that depends. Copyrights cost money and take time to process, so if you don’t mind waiting and shelling out money for the fees, then by all means get copyrights. At the very least, you should get copyrights for novels or for works you plan to sell in the future, and do it before you post it on WattPad.
I should also mention that WattPad allows users to post whether a story is copyrighted or not, so take advantage of that when you post a story. It could be seriously helpful.
If you publish a story on WattPad, can you put it on your resume as a publication? Again, that depends. This is a website where anyone can upload a story, so whether or not you want to include uploading stories onto an author’s YouTube on your resume is up to you. Some authors are comfortable, some aren’t. I know a few of both. If you are comfortable with it though, then only do it for stories that you’ve never published before in any way, shape, or form. And if you’re shopping for a publisher, definitely don’t do it!
What are these contests through WattPad you mentioned earlier? Wattpad holds a number of contests throughout the year. Most are small, but there are some big ones, including the Wattys, which are held once a year, and the Attys, which are for poetry and were started by author Margaret Atwood (yeah, she’s on the site. How cool is that?). The contests are open to all users with a WattPad account and who follow the rules of those contests.
If you are a regular WattPad user and have any other tips you’d like to mention, then please let us know. If I get enough tips, I’ll do a follow-up article on the subject with your tips in it.
Recently, CreateSpace added several new free distribution options to their distribution channels. This includes distribution to bookstores like Barnes & Noble and your local bookshop, academic institutions and libraries, and to CreateSpace Direct. These options, once available only to authors who were able to afford them, are now available to self-published authors with all sorts of incomes, writing styles, and fan followings.
Now there are definite perks to doing this. Authors would love more readers, and if they are able to reach readers in places previously unavailable to them due to monetary concerns, this can only be good for them. And bookstores, which have been suffering with the rise of the e-book and online distributors, will probably benefit being able to cater to the fans of authors whose works were before only available on certain online retailers. In a way, it’s a symbiotic relationship, both for authors and booksellers.
Not only that, but the books of self-published authors are sometimes rejected by libraries and academic institutions because they are self-publsihed in the first place, or their self-published status means that the books don’t come from certain distributors. If authors are able to get their works into libraries, that means people who don’t own e-readers or who can’t afford to buy books online can now read the books of self-published authors through this new distribution system.
And, using the expanded distribution channels means a potentially higher royalty rate for every copy sold.
However, there are drawbacks to this. Amazon, which owns CreateSpace and it’s print-on-demand services, determines minimum prices for all works published through them. They calculate these minimum prices by determining the length of the book, how much it’ll cost to print, how much they get from the sale of the book, and how much they need to give the author. Recently when I published my novel Reborn City, I saw that the minimum price they gave me was a little less than nine dollars, much higher than I’d expected. I wasn’t happy about it, but I decided to go with it and make the best of it.
When today I decided to try these expanded distribution options on RC, I found out that in order to use these expanded distribution channels, the list price would go up to at least thirteen dollars. In other words, the increase didn’t cost anything for the author, but it did cost extra for the reader.
I decided not to take these extra distribution channels because of the price hike it’d require. Some of my friends and family would not be able to afford a paperback copy because of a list price, or they’d be much more reluctant to buy it because is it not their genre in addition to being over thirteen dollars. Plus, I’m the kind of guy who doesn’t want to make people pay too much for his work more than he wants them to actually read his work. Terrible character flaw, I know, but I live with it.
However that’s my own personal choice. If you wish to, go right ahead and sign up for these new channels. It’s your choice, which as I’ve said before is one of the best perks of self-pbulishing.
And who knows? You could see your sales go up dramatically, and your fanbase expand like a hot-air balloon. Not to mention the joy of telling friends and family that your work is now available in bookstores and libraries. That’s always something to make you feel good. And for some books, the increase in the list price might not be too high, so if you have my problem with pricing books too high, it may not be so bad after all. I might still use these channels for my collection of short stories, which is already very low-priced.
What do you think of these new distribution options? Are you planning on use them? If so, why or why not?
*Note: Since this post’s publication, I’ve had a change of heart and I’ve decided to try distributing my books through these new channels in the hope of reaching more readers. Whether or not I’m successful, we shall see. Wish me luck, as well as everyone else using these options for the first time.
You’ve edited your book and reuploaded it. Maybe there were a lot of typos, maybe you had some bad reviews, maybe it just needed a touch up. No matter the reason, the new version is sitting on Amazon’s servers, all shiny and new, and you wish you could let the people who’ve bought it know. After all, if they bought the old version and haven’t read it yet, when they finally get to it and leave their review, their criticisms may not even apply. Or it could be a nice “hey remember you downloaded me? You might want to read me now,” reminder to people who got your book in a flurry of free day promotions.
If Amazon judges the changes to be significant enough they may actually notify all your customers for you. But first you have to send them an email and let them know you want it done.
I used the “Contact Us” link at the bottom of my KDP dashboard page, and choose the “topic” of “Making Corrections”. Is this necessary? I have no idea. Then I wrote something like this:
Please fill in the following information:
ASIN or name of book: Shades of Gray / B002RHP5D6
I recently uploaded a second edition of Shades of Gray. Changes include rewriting multiple scenes, correcting information, changing conversations, for instance to better explain character’s motives, to explain how Katelina was able to recover after the fight at Claudius’ etc., and removing roughly 2,000 words (after all the additions). I would appreciate if you could make the new version available to past customers if possible.
Thanks
As I mentioned, the changes must be considered “significant” for them to notify customers, so you want to list them out. Obviously you don’t want to lie just to make it seem like a huge change so that people will get the notice, but you do want it to seem like they should be notified.
In a day or so you’ll get a reply like this:
Hello,
We received your request to provide updated content to customers who purchased your book. Thanks for providing specific details about the changes made. We’ll perform a review of the changes to determine the most appropriate way to describe the updates to your customers. This review will complete within four weeks, and the possible results of our review are listed below.
1. If the changes made to your content are considered critical, we’ll send an email to all customers who own the book to notify them of the update and improvements made. These customers will be able to choose to opt in to receive the update through the Manage Your Kindle page on Amazon.com. www.amazon.com/gp/digital/fiona/manage
2. If the changes made to your content are considered minor, we won’t be able to notify all customers by email, but we will activate their ability to update the content through the Manage Your Kindle page on Amazon.com.
3. If the changes made to your content have caused unexpected critical issues with the book content, we’ll temporarily remove your book from sale. We’ll notify you of any issues found so you can fix them. Once the improvements are made, just let us know and we’ll then email customers as in case 1.
I hope this helps. Thanks for using Amazon KDP.
And then you wait. I honestly don’t know how significant your changes need to be for an email notice; I’ve never received one for any of the books on my kindle, however, I do know what it looks like to customers when there is simply an update available (aka the minor changes)
Have you ever requested that Amazon notify your customers of a new edition? What were the results? Do you know of a way to do this on Barnes and Noble or other retailers? Please share your experiences in the comments below.
UPDATE:
Thanks to a one-click buy mishap a year or two ago, I actually own a copy of my own book, and so since posting this I got the “Updated content” letter from Amazon.
Hello Joleene Naylor,
An updated version of your past Kindle purchase of Shades of Gray (Amaranthine) by Joleene Naylor is now available.
The updated version contains the following changes:
Significant editorial changes have been made.
You can receive the improved versions of all your books by opting in to receive book updates automatically. You can do this by going to Manage Your Kindle and clicking on the Manage Your Devices section. You will find the option labeled Automatic Book Update.
Alternatively, you can get the updated version of this book by going to Manage Your Kindle. Find the book in your Kindle Library, click on the “Update Available” link next to the book’s title, and then follow the update prompts. All your devices that have the eBook currently downloaded will be updated automatically the next time they connect to wireless.
We thank you for your business with Amazon.
Sincerely,
Customer Service Department Amazon.com
Go to http://kdp.amazon.com and sign in with the big yellow sign in button. You will want to use your amazon account for this, even if you have never used KDP before. I accidentally made a new account and now have two amazon accounts that use the same email address (originally they had the same password, too!) and it created quite a mess. Don’t make my mistake.
Once you’ve logged in you’ll be taken to your dashboard. Depending on whether you have books published or not, your may look slightly different. Click the yellow “Add New Title” button.
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This will open a new page. The first option you’re confronted with is whether or not to enroll your book in KDP select. There are a lot of divided opinions on this, and you should do some research before deciding, but the run down is that if you join KDP select your ebook must be available ONLY on Amazon for three months and in return you get some marketing “tools” including five days that you can set your book to “Free”. There’s a lot more to it, and a lot to consider such as whether you will lose sales from other channel (again, your ebook can only be on Amazon and no where else), and I’m not going to cover all of that here, or tell you which is better. It’s a personal decision and you should do what is best for you. If you want it, check mark the box. If you don’t then do NOT check mark the box.
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Scroll down and enter your book title. If your book is part of a series then check mark the series option, otherwise skip it. If you have an edition number (such as second edition) then fill it in, and if you have a publishing imprint put that under “Publisher”. I don’t, so I leave it blank.
The next option is your description, which you should have prepared. You can see the < p > in mine; this is HTML code that will make it skip a line. you can do some light html code in your description, such as bold or italics.
Scroll down and click the “Add Contributors” button
This will give you a pop up. Type in your author name and then use the drop down button to select “author”.
If you have other contributors to list then choose “Add Another”, otherwise click “Save”.
The contributors will now be listed on the page. make sure you’ve spelled them correctly, and then select the language your book is in by using the drop down box. English is default, so if it’s in English you can skip to publication date. I always leave this blank, as the publication date is whenever I publish it, but you can set it if you want to by clicking the calendar.
You’ll notice that the available days to click are today and BEFORE, not after, so this does NOT work to pre-publish or make your book available for pre-order. You can’t choose a day in the future.
Once you pick your day, be sure to drop a check mark in the “This is not a public domain work” (unless it is) and then click the “Add categories” button.
This will give you a pop up. Some categories have sub categories, for instance, under FICTION you can see that African-American has a plus sign. If we click that it will drop down with more choices such as general, christian, etc.
If you’re not sure what to classify it as then look around; go ahead and add as many as you want because you can remove them before you hit save. My particular book is Fiction>Fantasy>Paranormal. You can actually choose TWO final categories, but there isn’t another one that fits this book (I usually also file under Romance> Paranormal, but there’s not really any romance in this as it is a freebie of shorts), so I am only going to choose one. I recommend that if you can find two categories that fit to choose two. The more you have, the more lists your book will be in.
Choose them by check marking the box next to the final sub category. When you’ve got your list, use remove to whittle it down to two, if necessary, and then click save.
Your categories now appear above the button. Fill in up to seven key words that describe your book. For instance this is a collection of flash fiction “prologues” that take place the day before Heart of the Raven, my novel, takes place, so I used the series name (Amaranthine), Heart of the Raven (the novel title), short, flash-fiction (because that’s what it is), vampires and paranormal (because it’s about vampires) and add free because it is free on the other channels, so Amazon should make it free too (I will cover this later).
Now it’s time to add our cover. You have two options: Browse for your cover or use a cover creator (currently in beta). I will “cover” the cover creator in another post (ha ha!) so fir the point of this we’re going to upload our cover.
Clicking browse will open a dialog box where you can navigate to the image saved on your computer. It MUST be a .jpg or a .tiff (these are file extensions) and should be between 1000 and 2500 pixels on the longest side.
In this box click browse again to get a pop up and navigate through your files. Select the cover file and click open
Once it has the file path in the text box, hit the upload button
When it finishes you will see a thumbnail view of the cover. It will look pretty rough – this is NOT what your “official” cover thumbnail will look like, but rather a rough version so that you can make sure you’ve uploaded the right picture. The final thumbnail will be smoother.
If it looks good, hit the x in the upper right corner.
Now it’s time to upload your book and choose whether you want DRM enabled. DRM means Digital Rights Management, and is something that amazon will put in the “code” of your book to keep people from pirating, think of the old VCR tapes that used to turn the movie a rainbow color if you tried to tape them to a second tape, or DVDs that won;t copy if you try to rip them. DRM is a hot button issue, some people feel it is a waste and only makes it harder for consumers and others think it is a great idea. You will have to choose what is right for you.
Once you do, use the browse button to find your book file, the same way that you found your cover. It should be a .doc file.
After it uploads, you’ll get a little box that says:
This may take a few moments. If you have completed all required fields above, click “Save and Continue” to move forward while conversion continues.
However, I just stay there until it’s done.
When it is finished converting you will get a screen saying that it was successful, and you may get “suggested” spelling errors.
Click “view them” and a pop up will show them to you, then you can decide if they are really typos or not:
After a double check, I have determined that Hikaru is the correct spelling of his name, and free online dictionary states that “woosh” is a valid form of “whoosh”, so, for good or bad, I am going to leave them by clicking “Ignore All” (please no comments on whether you agree or disagree about woosh/whoosh). However, if you have errors you want or need to change, then you shouldn’t do that. If there’s a lot you might want to mail them to yourself, and if there are only a few then just leave the screen up, open your document and use the “find” feature of your word processing program to find and then fix them. Once you’re done, close the pop up out with the x in the upper right corner of it and reupload.
Now we’re ready to preview the book. You can either use the online previewer, or you can download and install a previewer application. I am just going to use the online feature.
The preview will pop up. Because I have been doing this for so long (taking screen caps and hopping back and forth) I had to sign in again. If you’ve taken a long time setting up, you may, too.
The previewer “looks” like a Kindle:
You can scroll through the pages and make sure they look the way you want. This is where some authors (Ruth Ann Nordin, for example) read through the whole book. I am going to admit that I don’t because by the publishing stage I have usually read it thirty times or more, and have it memorized anyway. But at the very least you should check your chapter headings and endings and your opening pages to make sure there are no strange page breaks or weird formatting.
You can use the drop down box to select different devices, such as the paper white, etc.
It’s up to you how thorough you want to be. But, when you’re finished, choose Back to Book details in the upper left of the screen. you can then upload a new version if you need to and preview again, etc. I am happy with mine, so we’re moving on.
At the bottom of the book setup page select Save and Continue to go to the next page of steps.
Now it’s time to tell Amazon where you have the rights to publish this book. If it’s yours and has never been published by another publisher, then you have worldwide rights. Mark that dot and move on. But, if your book has been published previously by a publisher, you may not have all the rights, as your publisher may still own some of them. For instance a book published through a small press in the United States may have had rights for the UK and US in the contract but not for India or other countries, in which case you would select the second option and then choose only those countries that that publisher does not have rights for. If you’re unsure, you may need to speak to your previous publisher and/or a lawyer.
My book has never been published by anyone else, so I am picking the easy option.
Now we’re going to choose our royalty – 35% or 70%. As with the other big choices, the decision depends on what is right for you. If your book will be priced below 2.99 (mine will) you have to choose the 35% option, but if it will be priced $2.99 or higher you can go for the 70% option. I will say that I have chosen 70% for those books I have published that cost more than $2.99, but the choice is yours.
In this case I have to go 35%. So I will check mark it and I will put in the price.
I just check mark the “set price automatically” feature for all the other channels, but you can set them individually if you want.
Now it’s time to decide if you want Kindle lending or not (this allows someone who has bought your book to loan it to anther person’s kindle once). If you opted for 70% royalties this will be grayed out.
Make sure to check mark that you are confirming all rights, then hit Save and Publish.
A pop up let’s you know that it’s being published and that’s it – time to go back to your dashboard and wait until you get your “congratulations” email.
But wait. Didn’t I say that I wanted this book to be free? Why did I then set the price to $.99?
Because Amazon won’t let you choose free as an option. What you have to do is use a price match. In other words, that book has to be on another retailer’s site for free. At the moment, that book is on Smashwords, B&N, and others for the low, low price of nothing. Now, I can wait until Amazon notices it and sends me that nasty little “Tut, tut,” email (which might take days) or I can speed things along by “reporting it” myself.
But, I need to wait until it’s published. I doubt you want to stare at this spot for twelve hours, so I am going to use my magic wand to fast forward time.
BLING!
And look at that! The book is published! For some reason they have done something odd and linked it to Heart of the Raven the novel, but I’ll suss that out with an email later. In the meantime, let’s report that price.
Go to your book’s page and scroll down to the Product Details and click on “tell us about a lower price”.
Now you’ll get a little pop up. Click the mark next to “website”.
the box will expand with an area to paste a link into. At this point you need the link from the lower listing page – i am going to use Smashwords. Enter the url, the price (in this case 0) and the date, I dropped it back to August 1st but you don’t need to. Then click Submit Feedback.
It will then say “Thank you for your feedback” and give you a “close window” button – and that’s it. Now we just wait for Amazon to get it and say “tut-tut”.
If you set a book free via price match and later want to charge for it, can you get it switched back? I assume so, but I have never tried it, so if someone with more experience wants to chime in in the comments, that would be great!
Are you an author aspiring to undertake the big challenge of self publishing your book? Then it is indeed a great challenge to put your own efforts and dedication to publish your creation. Several authors, worldwide, try their hands at self publishing as it allows them considerable freedom to exhibit their research and skills. Also, many authors who want to have full control over their written work and are particular with the artistic expressions opt for self publishing their book. While some go for it since this kind of publishing involves less expenses. If you intend to self publish your written book, then you need to have knowledge and take charge of the complete process.
As a matter of fact, self publishing a book is very stressful process since you are in charge of every step involved in the process. You are supposed to be responsible for everything right from writing your book to marketing it. However, this process has become easy by following some guidelines, in the recent times. It is important that you should never get discouraged and keep in mind your target and profits that you are expecting from publishing your book.
How to Self Publish
The first essential step for successful self publication of your book is to write your manuscripts effectively. Be it a novel, short story book, poetry book to memoir create it in one specific electronic manuscript. Insert relevant pictures of high resolution into the manuscript. The self publishing companies do not impose additional charges for inserting pictures in manuscripts. Make use of alignment tools to align and indent text. This will help you to properly format your written work.
If you are about to publish a hard copy of your written book, then you should first ensure that your book is fully complete, properly edited and also effectively proofread. Make efforts to get contacts of reputed freelance editors and proofreaders who can efficiently do this task at a fixed rate. One of the most important things you need to give your book is a catchy title that can draw the reader’s attention. If you happen to have any contacts with graphic designers or some good cover designers make use of their specialization in order to design the cover of your written book. Or else you can even hire a professional freelancer for this if it fits in your budget.
Be it a comic book or a children’s book, including good designing in your book will greatly help you to win the half battle of self publishing a book. Once you have got edited manuscript with outstanding cover page, contact good printing services for quotations. The rate of printing will differ depending on the number of copies you tend to order and the quality of the printed book that you are publishing in the market. You can even try to contact vanity presses that will offer you an excellent option of print on demand. This option will not have any interference with the content of your book. One of the most important things you need to take care of is to get ISBN numbers for your written books. You should keep in mind that these numbers can only be purchased in blocks of ten and not according to per book.
Invest efforts to self publish your book by making use of the internet. You can approach a great resource of self publishing companies over the web. Such a resource will also offer you the companies that can translate your written book in any desired language so that people can find books written by you in language they are comfortable with. Such companies even reduce the expenses involved in printing and related expenses and handover to you the effective amount that equals 80% of the total amount earned from publishing your book. In the modern times, with the e-book gaining good popularity, self publishing your book over the web makes a good sense since it tend to reach greater number of readers, worldwide. This is even a beneficial option for people looking for self publishing their books for free without shelling out even cent from their pocket.
Last but not the least, while self publishing your written book you might have to face some prejudices. Keep in mind that you should not get adversely affected due to it. Several popular authors, once upon a time, even had faced rejections before being selected by an efficient mainstream publisher. Moreover, self publishing is a great platform for the authors, who have been facing constant rejections, to display before the world their unique writings.
Thus, with the advent of internet, technology and good resource of self publishing companies, self publishing a book has become quite convenient.
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Author Bio :- Jasmine Roy is a expert writer with rich experience in writing books, blogs, and articles on a wide range of topics. Through her years of writing and publication she has come to believe that Pubmatch is a great resource of book publishing companies for writers all over the world. She has complete faith in the book publishing companies over here as they offer various exclusive services such as offset printing services, valuable and up-to-date information in the favor of the book authors and also allow them to have a creative control on various aspects of publishing and promoting their books.
The short answer is “yes,” but the real question is why are they?
Even after attending several of these, you wonder if you will learn anything new. But as usual, your doubts are put to rest after a conference speaker or two has presented.
Perhaps you are interested in taking the traditional route. Conferences allow you to meet with literary agents on a one-to-one basis. You can pitch your work and see if they believe your story has prospects either in the marketplace or in your ability to tell a good story. Often you bring a synopsis and at least a chapter for them to examine, but other times you just pitch your story. One writer I know has been pursuing this path for a number of years, and an agent at last week’s Nebraska Writers Guild conference requested to see more of her work.
However, today’s conferences also include a lot of advantages for the self-published author. They put you in touch with professionals in the business, such as in graphic design and marketing. One such speaker was a publishing guru and book designer Joel Friedlander.
He spoke on the benefits of each online social media from Facebook, to Twitter, to Goodreads, to YouTube, to LinkedIn to having a blog, stating blogs are the best resource. It is your hub where you can promote, post new ideas, conduct surveys and more, he said. Additionally, he believed LinkedIn to be extremely value in “gaining reputations” through its discussion formats, in being able to ask questions and in building a niche network.
Additionally, these professionals asked the audience which sold better e-books or print books? The audience replied, “e-books.” But these experts said the opposite. Thus, those brick and mortar bookstores are not going out of business soon. In fact, young people prefer print books, but adults favor e-books for their ability to enlarge print size, turn pages for those with arthritis and other e-book features, the field representatives said.
Conferences also allow attendees to interact with their cohorts – writers published or new to the craft. At this conference, there was a Friday night event where those who wanted to could read from their works. You cannot believe the great talent and variety of genres exhibited, such as poetry, memoirs, fancies, romances and humorous pieces. In addition, you got time to sell your books if you wished to do so on Saturday. If going to attend, why not sell your book(s)? You have nothing to lose since you are there anyway.
One thing I loved was putting a face to names seen on the e-mail loop. Nothing is better then talking with other writers, finding out where they are in the writing process and sharing experiences.
Finally, thank those who did the volunteer work to put the conference together. It takes time and a lot of effort from registering participants, preparing name tags, finding speakers, securing a facility and setting up the room.
So once again, get yourself to a conference even if you think there is nothing new to ascertain. You will not be disappointed. See you there and God bless.
I don’t personally have anything enrolled in Kindle Unlimited (or Kindle Select, or anything else exclusive), so I can only share what I’ve read.
Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors 
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