Cheap Self-Publishing

Cheap Publishing Websites, part 1

Loyal readers will note that I have come out strongly in favor of having your own publishing website even if you are driving most of your sales to Amazon. I often get push-back, though, that talks about how expensive having a website can be. Fair enough; let's talk about it.

I spend about $13 on a domain name (like, for example, DegreePress.com). I also pay for hosting that website. While it's hard to tell exactly how much I pay there because my hosting account covers more than a few websites. I can tell you that you can host a single domain at HostGator for about $5.50 a month (if you pay for a year). So, total for a year for the domain and hosting is $79.

Might I suggest that, if you cannot afford $79, you might not want to consider self-publishing.

However, let's continue. At this point, you would likely let me know that there is more to having a website than just a domain name and hosting service. And you would be right. There is the website development piece (i.e. making it look right for sales).

Do you know about Wordpress? Wordpress is the software used by many companies and individuals to create websites. What you may not know is that, as soon as you have paid for hosting, you likely have access to Wordpress for free. It is available in your cPanel as an option. From that, you can create a very plain website.

The "vanilla" version of Wordpress is ugly. It's not meant to be used for a website. You will want to select a WP theme to use. Many are free; some cost money.

What you may not know as well is that there are many resources available from which to learn how to use Wordpress. Youtube has many videos and there are many websites solely dedicated to teaching you how to create WP websites. Here is an example of a Wordpress site that I created myself. It's fairly good.

I should tell you that I have no great Wordpress or website development skills. For better, higher-profile websites, I hire someone to do the work for me. That being said, I feel that my skills would be enought to create an adequate publishing website doing exactly what I have described here.

And so can you.

Look for my next article where I show you one of the free ways to develop a publishing website. I also have an interview with my web developer coming up. You will be able to see what he has done for me and for others (and, I should note, he does it using Wordpress).

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Cheap Self-Publishing?

Cheap Self-Publishing Gone Wrong, Part 1

 

Cheap Self-Publishing Gone Wrong, Part 1

Early on in my publishing venture, I made most all of the mistakes that someone could make. Everyone makes mistakes when they first begin self-publishing. The difference is that I am willing to confess my sins. In this series of articles, I will point out those mistakes and tell you what I should have done (and what I have done).

When I first got started, I knew that I was interested in publishing more than one book. I thought then and think now that they best plan for publishing is to produce a significant number of books. At the time, I was thinking mostly about print books.

Therefore, I needed a website. A website where I could showcase dozens of books. Some of mine and some of other writers. Big dreams.

Now, and this is important, I had no books written.* While there is nothing inherently evil about having big dreams, it's also important to get some things down on paper. 

So, because I desperately needed a website for those non-existent books, I had one designed (by someone I found on eLance). I paid too much for it relative to its use. I did use it a little, but not much. Waste of money for the most part.

If you go to my publishing company website now, you would discover a site that has some books as well as clearly a plan for forthcoming works (both print and digital). I paid a very reasonable price, but, importantly, before it was developed, I already had content for it with a plan to develop further content. 

So what am I saying? 

Don't fall in love with the idea of being your own publishing company to the exclusion of making good business decisions. First, be the writer. Yes, you will most definitely need a publishing website and, yes, it will need to happen before you publish your book (even if most of your sales will be through Amazon), but best not to put carts before horses. There will be time.

This was my first mistake. Spending money that didn't need to be spent for that website. Trust me, there have been others. Stay tuned for my next big cheap self-publishing mistake!

******
*I should clarify that, prior to this, I had authored or co-authored three books with a mid-sized publisher, Ten Speed Press, in Berkeley, CA.

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Cheap Self-Publishing?

Since a couple readers have asked about that Cheap Self-Publishing newsletter invitation above. You are seeing what is the beginnings of the morphing of this site toward a new purpose. Eventually, the entire blog will move to its own domain (and, yes, I do own the CheapSelfPublishing.com domain).

So, as in my post below, why should you sign up? Not only will it allow you to know when the new website is up and running, but I will also give you a heads-up when the book is available this summer.

So sign up already!

Look what I have!!!!

Fresh from the mailbox courtesy of CreateSpace.

 

The Single-Greatest Publishing App

Yes, I know that it sounds rather odd to think about an app when you talk about writing or publishing, but I can tell you that this app has changed the way that I do all of this.

What is it?

It's DropBox.  What does DropBox do? It allows you to sync information across devices. So, for example, I am currently working on a book that makes great use of a database. In my DropBox folder, I have deposited both the front matter (the text) and the database. I have DropBox loaded on my iPad 2, on my netbook, on my Android phone, on my computer at home, and on my computer at the office.

From any of those devices, I can access my files for the book. Any changes I make on any of those devices syncs out to all of them as soon as I log on to that particular device.

In addition, it's an easy way to create a back-up. Once you have dropped your files into the DropBox folder, those files actually live in the cloud.

One thing to remember, though, is that when you are working on your book, make sure you are using the version in the DropBox.  It does not sync to your desktop. You want to make sure that you are using the most-up-date version.

No books for sale

Things continue to move forward. I received confirmation today from Lightning Source that my book will shortly no longer be available. It is my understanding that they have to wait until there are no orders to be filled and then they shut it down.

It seems odd that for a very short period of time I will have no books for sale anywhere. My three Ten Speed Press books are no longer available on Amazon except from outside sellers. At one point, I had four books all selling on Amazon and in bookstores. And then there were none.

Which is fine. By the summer, I will have at least five books and/or related products for sale on Amazon and elsewhere. That works for me.

I got the database back today. It is in even better condition than I would have hoped. It will be very helpful moving forward. That being said, I will be spending much of the next three days doing little else besides working with it. While all of the listings are in there and much of the additional text, I now must look at each of the close to 300 records and make adjustments where necessary. Some of those adjustments are editorial in nature and some are technological in nature.

I am excited about how this is all coming together!

Clearing the Sales Channel

As I noted yesterday, the second edition of Complete Guide to Online High Schools will be available within the next couple of weeks. This availability will include both the print and digital versions.

So what am I doing now?

Yesterday I sent an email to my rep at Lightning Source letting her know to suspend availability of the first edition. I don't want any further print copies sold now because I would prefer that people buy the new version. It will be better and more inclusive of the number of available schools now.

Part of the reason for closing down Lightning Source early is that there are sellers on Amazon still selling my book (although you will note that it is no longer available from Amazon). Where do they get the book from? From Lightning Source, for the most part. Some copies are used. I want that stopped because it is now all about sales for the second edition.

I also went to Payloadz.com to suspend sales of the digital version of my book. Truth be told, the second edition will never make its way there. It will start on Amazon in Kindle form and then, in a few months, I will push it out for sales elsewhere.* The world has changed a great deal since I began using Payloadz. To my thinking, there are now better ways to do digital. More on that later.

No turning back now.

The Ever-Elusive Database, Part 2

So I am not done with the database, but I did get an amazing amount of work done. It should be done by the end of the week and that works for this project. Considering that there are hundreds of listings with quite a bit of information on each, this is a time-consuming project.

One of the things that I discovered was that I need to get some work done to the database. I have a couple of ways that I would like the data to export that it is not now capable of doing. That's the sort of work that I can get done cheaply on eLance.

The Ever-Elusive Database

I am spending this long weekend working on the ever-elusive database. The rest of the book is done. However, the challenge with the database is:

1. Making sure that I have all of the schools that I can find and that are a good fit; and

2. Creating the text that goes with each listing. The listing information (address, telephone number, etc.) is relatively simple, but I do need to have a couple of sentences for the listing as well.

But this weekend I am ploughing ahead. I will let you know Sunday evening how it all went.

The Amazon Smack-Down

This was rather predictable. The State of California needs money. They decided to get some of that money from online sales by attempting to tax folks. In particular, they were looking at Amazon. Governor Brown signed legislation that allowed for this.

Amazon, of course, retaliated by shutting down the accounts of all of the California-based affiliates. This is in the neighborhood of 100,000 companies, charities, and individuals.

I do get California's point. They need money and local businesses can't compete with online sales (in part because what makes the online sales cheaper is the lack of sales tax). That being said, Amazon was very specific about what they were going to do if the legislation passed.

As it happens, I am one of those Amazon affiliates and my account has indeed been shut down. In my case, it was a relatively small amount of money per quarter. Still, every little bit helps. However, I know of a number of businesses that are predicated solely on being Amazon affiliates and selling books as an affiliate. I can only imagine what this will do to their ventures.

If it were me, I would be considering a relocation to Nevada. Perhaps ten feet across the border!