Archive for the ‘Novels’ Category

Making Your Book Free on Amazon — Or Should I?

Posted by - Wednesday, December 14th, 2011

Making your book Free on Amazon — debate. So, yes, there’s a way to make your book Free…but the question is… should you?

Let’s take a look at the Terms and Conditions Pricing Page

According to Amazon… here’s the deal….

Matching Competitor Prices
From time to time your book may be made available through other sales channels as part of a free promotion. It is important that Digital Books made available through the Program have promotions that are on par with free promotions of the same book in another sales channel. Therefore, if your Digital Book is available through another sales channel for free, we may also make it available for free. If we match a free promotion of your Digital Book somewhere else, your Royalty during that promotion will be zero. (Unlike under the 70% Royalty Option, if we match a price for your Digital Book that is above zero, it won’t change the calculation of your Royalties indicated in C. above.)

Reading this, you might think that they’re saying if you want to put your book Free for promotional purposes, then they will match it. Nope. They’re saying that if the “sales channel” does it NOT you the author/publisher. So, if Barnes and Noble decides to put your book up for Free for prompotional puroses, THEN Amazon will price match.

Think about the List Price as the price you set at, let’s say, Lightning Source for your printed book. So, your printed book is $13.00, and Barnes and Noble wants to put on a promotional deal like: “All Books Are Now %30 Off”. Then Amazon’s robots (the bots) will see the price lowered at Barnes and Noble and then set their price the same.

If YOU, yourself, change your book to free, then you’re manipulating the “List Price,” and this circumvents the system, and the Terms and Conditions with Amazon as stated below.

Setting Your List Price
You must set your Digital Book’s List Price (and change it from time-to-time if necessary) so that it is no higher than the list price in any sales channel for any digital or physical edition of the Digital Book.

But if you choose the 70% Royalty Option, you must further set and adjust your List Price so that it is at least 20% below the list price in any sales channel for any physical edition of the Digital Book.

By “list price in any sales channel,” we mean the suggested or recommended retail price or, if you sell your book directly to end users, your own sales price, for an edition of the book available outside of our Program.

When you set your List Price for our EU websites, you have to factor in the additional 15% value-added taxes (the Luxembourg statutory rate) we will add for EU customers, so that your List Price complies with this section after adding these VAT taxes.

What that is saying is that you need to set your price for your book the same for all sale channels.

“BUT,” you say, “Amazon’s lowest price is $0.99″.
Yep. That’s as low as Amazon will go, and so you, according to these Terms, are NOT to place your book any lower than $0.99 at other sale channels, which includes making it Free.

“But,” you say, “I got an email from Amazon stating that’s the only way to make my book Free is to make it Free somewhere else!”
Yep, I know. But I think now, with the flood of authors doing this exact same thing, it’s gotten out of hand and Amazon has now changed their tune. Email them today and see if you get that same advice. Probably not.

Does this mean I can sale my book Free on my personal website since it’s not a distributor?
Hmmm…well…. I mean, the words “sales channel” seems to cover any where. I would think that would include your personal website as well.

Will I be penalized if I do “manipulate” the system and make it Free anyway so that Amazon’s Bots will make my book free on Amazon?
No. Not right now. You just won’t get any royalties, which, at one time, Amazon did give Royalties for Free books with the the 35% Royalty Option (meaning your book was listed as less than $2.99). But making your book Free means, for most authors, that they didn’t look to get paid anyway–however it did increase their sales with their other books.

But everyone I know is doing it!
Yep. They are. But, now you know. You would be violating the Terms & Conditions if you decide to manipulate the bots. Everybody I know drives over the speed limit, and cops don’t seem to give away tickets to those who are just over by 10 miles per hour. Yet, you really can get ticketed if you’re just ONE (1) mile over the speed limit. Yes. Really. It’s the law.

That decision is up to you:: Do it until there’s an actual penalty, or follow the terms that you agreed to.

What are YOU, Deana Zhollis, going to do?
Who? Me? Uh…. well… er… uh. I’m human just like the next person. Don’t ask me that question! That’s too much pressure!

Heh. Heh.

But, seriously, more than likely, I’ll wait for an opening, some other kind of way…because there’s ALWAYS another way to get to the same type of results, right? I want to be seen and get more fans. The Free thing was a fast option for that. There’s anyway, albeit, much slower, but it’s still to the path of the Emerald City. When I find that yellow brick road, I’ll let you know.

Until Next Time.

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Have A Thoughtful Mind…

Posted by - Sunday, November 20th, 2011

Sometimes Self-Publishers get carried away when we feel that self-empowerment. We march in our own parade, throw up picket signs of how digital is overcoming print. We scream how the Big 6 is goin’ DOWN, man! We tell our stories of the long months of waiting, and how we now have taken back our own power and WAIT NO MORE! We take pride of our power that we have over our own creativity–no one to answer to but ourselves. We can “DO IT YOURSELF” (DIY)!!

So, sometimes, we get a bit carried away and forget… forget that there are two sides to a story; two sides of a coin.

No one can really talk about someone, or something, else unless one has personally been involved in it. To say that such companies are going down without knowing someone, or being personally involved, in that business…well, one gets a bit carried away.

Now what a Self-Publisher can say is what they see as fact online. Yes, the top lists on Amazon are self-publishers…but there’s still an ENTIRE WORLD…Offline. Take note of the people around you: in your office, your friends, the neighbors, the parents you see when you pick you child up from school, the people next to you at the restaurant, at the dry cleaners, at the amusement park, at a concert, on the freeway, overseas…people everywhere. There are many, many people still not connected to the digital book. And they are reading…print.

Not everyone wants to read on a digital device, or on the small screen of their mobile phone, or can afford an eReader, or sit looking at a screen of a laptop or desktop…to read. And just like there was a change from tape cassettes, to CDs, to iPods, SD Card…there are some who still just use CDs.

Now, there is a change heading towards digital reading…but one must not think that the big companies WILL NOT be a part of that. They WILL be a part…as they have always been.

One company will fall, if they don’t change, and be replaced with another. It’s just the scheme of things. We’ll see how it goes. And we’ll see what part Self-Publishing will take.

Have a thoughtful mind about the other side, so one won’t have to regret words later.

Just sit back, and wait and see what happens. Then one can honestly form an opinion.

BE THANKFUL, especially during this special time of year, that there is now more options for those writers who want to SHOUT TO THE WORLD and share their stories!

For now…I’m just enjoying the Self-Publishing progress and what it has done for me. I’m excited about every sale, and do my happy dance whenever I complete another VERY BIG learning curve in this technical software stuff, and I’m optimistic of the future. It’s a wonderful journey! A path well taken. A self-realization of the fulfillment of my personal capacities.

I Enjoy it! I’m amazed by it! I’m Thankful.

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Lulu, CreateSpace, Lightning Source, Kindle, Smashwords…Oh My!

Posted by - Wednesday, October 5th, 2011



Lulu vs CreateSpace vs Lightning Source vs Kindle vs Smashwords…Oh My! Oh My!

In a previous blog in 2008, I couldn’t make up my mind on where to go! Now, almost 3 years later, I know what to do.

eBook before Paperback

Pricing: I’ve now decided to do the eBook thing BEFORE the paperback thing. Why? Well, for us self-publishers, doing the Print-On-Demand really costs. Meaning, the printer gets paid…a lot of PAID, before you do. The pricing for the printed book is just not reasonable. I would prefer to make my books less than $10.00, but I wouldn’t get any royalty if I did that.

Mistakes: Also, I can update immediately with eBook if there’s any mistakes. I know. I know. It’s suppose to be perfect BEFORE it’s published, but I’m Human, I’m just me, and my editor, and sometimes there’s mistakes. Even Trade Publishing books have mistakes. Every book is going to have mistakes. It’s just that with eBook publishing, you can fix them faster. AND IT’S THERE TO BE USED! No matter what anyone says, you can do it if you want to. So why the heck not?

MONEY!!: I have yet to sell any paperback books from an online store. Still waiting. But with eBooks, I’m getting PAID! Just 2-digit numbers, but paid nonetheless. Also, the royalties for eBooks are higher than paperbacks, and they are more of them selling.

eBook Publishing Reviews

Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP–Amazon) and Smashwords (distributes to Apple iBookstore, Barnes & Noble, Sony, Kobo and the Diesel eBook Store) are the major two sites that self-publishers talk about. Then there’s PubIt (Barnes And Noble NOOK eReader), where some go to directly instead of using Smashwords. I’m going to list just these three (3) formats, because, believe me, you would get tired from trying to conform your novel(s) to each company’s formatting requests. However, I have heard some use the Smashword format, take out the Smashword wording, and submit it to PubIt.

Kindle File Format: ePub, Microsoft Word (.doc), HTML (.zip, .htm, or .html), Plain Text (.txt), Adobe PDF, Plain Text Format (.txt)
PubIT File Format: ePub, Microsoft Word (.doc or .docx), HTML (.zip, .htm, or .html), Plain Text (.txt)
Smashwords: Microsoft Word (.doc or .docx) ONLY

For me, I formatted KDP with HTML so that I can make sure it would work with the Kindle with the Table Of Contents and Go To Cover options. See my Kindle Template. With Smashwords, if you know your way around MSWord, then you won’t have problems taking the hour, or two, formatting your book to their instructions. BIG SUGGESTION: Copy your ENTIRE novel and paste into Notepad and START FROM SCRATCH before formatting your book to Smashwords specifications. It will save you a lot of headache. Make sure you do Step 1 on my Kindle Format instructions FIRST to find your Bold and Italics and Underlines because you will loose your formatting when you copy your novel to Notepad…which is the point of doing that, so that the old formatting doesn’t get in the way, and you novel doesn’t get accepted by Smashwords, and you have to do EVERYTHING BACK OVER AGAIN.

Royalties:Smashwords is 60%. Kindle is 35% or 70% depending on your pricing. PubIt is 40% or 65% depending on your pricing. And, of course, any overseas sales are calculated differently. I’ve made my money on KDP, which most self-publishing author will tell you. Amazon is the largest online! I’ve also got money from Smashwords.
When do you get paid? PubIT is 60 days or more. Smashwords can by 3 months. Kindle is the same as PubIt, 60 days following the end of the calendar month.

Sooo…if you still want to do the Paperback, which is always good to do so that customers can have options, I would stick with just one and see how it goes for you. I would not recommend Lightning Source, unless you can do some major marketing to companies that would like to order your books…because they are expensive and it takes some time to do. HOWEVER, my paperbacks did get to Barnes and Noble, Books-A-Million, Indie Bound, and eBay (of all places), because of Lighting Source. As I said, I haven’t made any money on my paperbacks, so paying fees doesn’t benefit if you’re not recovering that cost. But…if you still want to do paperback, see my reviews below from the past years. I didn’t put the pricing or royalties because, like I said, I don’t get paid from them, and it all depends on what you want to price the book, and what you want in return, and how many pages your book is, what size (6×9 or 5×8) you want it to be, what type of binding, and what type of printing you want for the cover and inside paper, etc. etc. You can go to Lulu Royalty Calculators for more information and comparison with CreateSpace and Amazon.


Print-On-Demand Reviews

Below, you will see me lean more towards CreateSpace, because I like their print, price, look and ease of things. But if you’re just starting out, I would suggest using LuLu first, to get your feet wet, and then move on to CreateSpace. It will help you get a better understanding on formatting. I like to do the hard stuff first and then when you move on to easier pastures, it’s much more…well…easier. And you have a better understanding.

Packaging: Lightning Source they didn’t look too bad, though the packaging could be a bit better for my proof copies. It was just in a box and one of the books got bent (just a wee bit) during the shipping process. So the presentation wasn’t very nice…but maybe that’s just because they’re just proofs. CreateSpace and Lulu put like shrink wrapped and bubbled stuffing and things to keep the books from moving about, but Lightning Source, the most expensive one for proofs, mind you, just had a tight fitted box, not securely sealed (just had the tabs tucked in and it could just easily be pulled and the books taken out and tucked back in with no problem…then you could just get an empty box–but someone bothering to steal my book…I guess I wouldn’t have minded too much :) .

Print: The printing quality is okay on Lightning Source, but I still like CreateSpace overall for print quality. LuLu kind of squished the pictures in some of the book covers I’ve ordered from them. Besides that, between Lulu and Createspace there actually wasn’t much different. The front cover of LuLu’s was a bit sharper for my bookcover The Made novel (I liked LuLu’s cover better) but you really can’t tell that much of a difference. CreateSpace didn’t bleed slightly over from the front to the binding like LuLu, and the Title was printed in the middle of the Binder, whereas LuLu’s was more to the left edge and not centered. I think with LuLu that had something to do with my uploading my picture and doing that all myself. Oh well. It’s still decent. However, Createspace with The 9th Symbol just BLEW MY MIND with the cover. It was like CAKE ICING! It was beautiful!

I Like CreateSpace’s interior print. The paper is a bit darker than LuLu’s, but both LuLu and CreateSpace printed my illustrations wonderfully. CreateSpace did send me messages multiple times that the dpi of my interior pictures was 98 and that they suggest 300 dpi. Well, I couldn’t figure out how to change it, and since LuLu’s printed fine, I just said, “What the heck,” and I left it alone. Came out just the same!

I do LOVE that CreateSpace will put the ISBN barcode on your book for you, so you don’t have to worry about that, and Lightning Source provides a barcode too with their template. You can create your own barcode at Tux for LuLu and size it using Gimp.

Proofs Prices: Createspace’s price is cheaper than Lulu’s for proofs, but the book itself is much more expensive to buy off of their website. Lightning Source is expensive for their proofs and expensive for any updates (updates on LuLu and Createspace are free. Just need to buy the proof) and charges yearly. CreateSpace, however, is considering the option to bypass having to buy proofs, which would be great for corrections, and is cheapest on proofs. LuLu’s proof price is the same as buying the actual book.

Formats: PDF. PDF. PDF. Lightning Source has this really strict guidelines on how the Book Cover has to be in High Quality format and the interior has to be PDF/X-1a:2001. HOWEVER, if you can get LuLu to print your books, or CreateSpace to print them…just send the same files to Lightning Source and they will print them too. I would practice first with one of the other two before Lightning Source to make sure everything is okay, because the pricing for Lightning is high. All three will provide templates for sizing for the bookcover and, besides Lightning Source, there’s online preview to make sure it fits. NOTE: OpenOffice, which is FREE, can help with the PDF as well.


ALL-IN-ALL


I haven’t gone back to Lightning Source for my 4th book, The 9th Symbol,which was done in July 2011, nor have I gone back to LuLu. I did, however, download Lightning Source’s template to send to my Cover Designer to use for Createspace. I would at least have the files ready when I do send to Lightning Source…when I’m ready to do so. (The template worked fine, by the way, for CreateSpace…LOVED IT!!). I’ve worked strictly with Createspace for Paperback since it posts on Amazon, which goes along with the Kindles which are selling and are getting more exposure online than any other place. Smashwords sales are slowly creeping up as well.

That about sums up my experiences on printers and distribution centers.

Until Next Time!!

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