In Part 1
and Part 2 we learned how to write our story, establish an author brand and publish
our book.
Now we just
need to get the book into the eager hands of our waiting readers!
Choosing an eBook Distributor
You
can find eBook distributors in South Africa, such as Little White Bakkie, eReads South Africa and Publisher.co.za, but a wider audience can be reached by using the international sites
listed below, which allow you to publish and distribute your eBooks. If you
have decided against hiring a professional eBook formatter, remember when
choosing an eBook distributor to look at what options they offer to help you
professionally format your eBook.
a. Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing: with all the advantages of a big company, KDP
now allows an author to directly convert to MOBI, the Amazon only file format.
There are also informative and useful KDP forums and communities, with people willing to help a
newbie along at no cost. Royalties are
fair and regularly paid, although only by cheque if you do not have a USA bank
account.
b. Smashwords:
Have their own free formatter, and distribute to those international sites that
don’t allow international authors, such as Barnes and Noble Nook, Apple’s
iBooks and Kobo. But the Smashwords “meatgrinder” is difficult, although the
site does offer the facility to do special promotions and offer free book
coupons.
c. Draft2Digital:
Similar to Smashwords, but much easier to use. Also distribute to Nook, Apple
and Kobo, and currently seeking distribution agreements with other major
on-line eBook retailers. You can upload
an already formatted ePub file, or you can use their free conversion tool for
simply formatted books.
d. XinXii:
Calling themselves “Europe's leading indie eBook publishing and
distribution platform”, XinXii offers distribution to the usual US websites but
also to a large
number of European and other on-line bookstores.
They also offer coupon codes for free review copies.
e.
PublishGreen: Offering eBook publishing and/or eBook
distribution, they convert PDF’s to EPUBs and offer book cover design, editing and
marketing packages. If you look in the side bar, they also offer a download
called The Basics of eBook Publishing. There’s upfront costs involved, so review your
PublishGreen choices carefully
f.
There’s
also Google Books, Scribd, BookBaby and many others available. Choose
the eBook publisher that is right for you.
Once you’ve
chosen your distributor you’ll have to follow specific steps to load your book
into their catalogue. Each publisher/distributor has easy-to-follow guidelines
dealing with (order may differ per site):
a. Creating an author/publisher profile
b. Adding your book details (such as
the book blurb, ISBN and publisher imprint)
c. Uploading/converting your book
content
d. Uploading your book’s cover
e. Choosing a category for your book
(eg crime fiction)
f. Previewing the finished product
g. Setting pricing
h. Choosing distribution channels
i.
Going
“live” on sales channels
Marketing your Book
Industry
experts say that being a published author consists of 15% writing and
publishing and 85% marketing. Developing
a marketing strategy is vital, even if that strategy consists of keeping
marketing to a minimum. Ultimately, all
the marketing in the world won’t sell your book if it’s not something that the
readers want to read. Your number one
marketing strategy must be to write your books. After that you can decide which
of the many on-line marketing tools to use. Here are a few to get you started:
a. Book Trailer:
i.
Having a book trailer to promote your book is a quick and
effective way to raise awareness.
ii.
I
make my own book trailers (you can view them here)
iii.
You
can read how I did it in my article 12 Easy Steps to Making a Book
Trailer which was published on The Book Designer.
b. Social Media:
i.
You
must at least have a “home” where readers who google your name can find out
where to buy your books, for example, a website, a blog, a facebook author page, a Google+ page and a Who’s Who profile.
ii.
It’s
advisable to use the same author brand (separate accounts for your publishing
imprint and author name, if you have both) across all the social media sites,
so that readers can find you on their own favourite social media site.
iii.
I
have an account with as many social media sites as possible but I’m most active
on Twitter as that suits my personality.
iv.
I
visit the other social media sites occasionally, but I do make sure that my author
details are always up to date.
v.
Here’s
a great article on 10 Social Media Marketing Musts
c.On-line Book Clubs:
i.
Goodreads, BookLikes, Shelfari and LibraryThing offer two levels of benefits.
ii.
Firstly,
you can connect with real readers, not just other writers. The caution here is
that these are reader social media
sites and they quickly take offence at authors who use the sites purely for
book promotion. So interact with others as a reader, and be interesting enough
that they voluntarily decide to follow you as an author.
iii.
Secondly,
you can use these sites for book giveaways (to get reviews) and for advertising.
iv.
As
soon as you publish a new book, remember to go to these reader sites and load
your book’s information (also called metadata.)
A reader is giving up enough time to post a review – they may not go to
the trouble if they have to spend even more time finding and loading all the metadata of your book.
d. Book Blog Tours:
i.
An
efficient way of garnering reviews and getting your book exposed to readers.
ii.
Make
sure the blog tour you choose has participants who read your type of book.
iii.
For a (usually) small fee, book blog tours are offered by FabulousityReads in South Africa and other blog tours overseas
e.
Guest Blog Posts:
i.
Find blogs that have good followings, study their topics and write an
article.
ii.
Pitch it to them in a professional manner. If the post is accepted, it’s
great exposure. If not, you still have an article for your own blog/website.
iii.
This takes time and effort, but you gain writing experience and brand exposure.
iv.
Interact with other bloggers and if asked to do guest posts, carefully
consider if the blog is in line with your author brand and target audience
before accepting the guest spot. Once accepted, honour that commitment and
submit the guest post when promised.
f. Offer Free Samples:
i.
There
are two types of free samples you can offer to promote your books.
ii.
Full
copies of your books sent for free to people who undertake to review them.
Understand that when they accept the book for review it doesn’t necessarily
mean that they will either read it or post a review about it.
iii.
Distribution
sites usually require that you offer a free sample of your book for potential
readers to download before buying the whole book.
iv.
When
you’re loading your eBook file to the distribution site, you will be able to
allocate the amount of pages you offer as a free sample.
v.
Some
sites may have a minimum % of text that must be offered for free. Remember in
Part 1 I spoke of backmatter? To make full use of your chance to bag a reader,
make sure your sample only includes the text of the book (e.g for a novel the
first chapter or for non-fiction a list of contents and some text.
vi. You will also need to decide whether to apply Digital Rights Management (DRM) to your eBooks.
vi. You will also need to decide whether to apply Digital Rights Management (DRM) to your eBooks.
Royalties and Taxes
The royalty
% that you earn from the eBook distributor will be based on your price. Each
distributor has their own terms so before choosing your distributor, carefully
examine the terms and conditions around royalty payments.
If you use
an American distributor such as Amazon, Draft2Digital or Smashwords, you’ll
have to apply for an ITIN from the Internal Revenue Services. You can read my articles on this topic here to find out more about the process
of obtaining an ITIN and submitting a W8-BEN form to avoid paying 30%
withholding taxes in the USA.
Are you
already registered with SARS (South African Revenue Services) for your day job?
If not, once you start earning reasonable royalties, you’ll have to register as
a taxpayer with SARS.
Keeping up to Date
The most
exciting aspect of being an independent author is the freedom and flexibility
this route offers an author.
The most
daunting aspect is how quickly everything changes and the overwhelming amount
of information and misinformation that’s available to the independent author.
As an
independent author, responsible for all aspects of your book, you need to find
the balance between these two extremes.
Keep up to
date with the independent publishing industry, check your sources to make sure
the information is valid and find the point where you can comfortably balance
the different elements of successfully publishing an eBook with your everyday
life.
Managing your Expectations
Publishing
your own book is, as you’ve seen, not for sissies!
At every stage of the process – from the writing to the royalties - your dream
will, at times, seem impossible. In my Letter to a Young Writer I explain why it’s important to
overcome these doubts and write anyway.
The biggest
challenge in publishing your own book is keeping your expectations
realistic.
If you
begin your journey to becoming a published author with the expectation of a lot
of hard work to gain even the smallest victory, then anything extra (like
becoming a best-seller) is a cause for celebration. If you start off with the expectation of
retiring off the proceeds of your first book, there’s a greater chance that
you’ll be disappointed.
Ultimately,
publishing your own eBook is about finding satisfaction in a personal dream
fulfilled. Your eBook may be one-in-a-million-eBooks for sale, but you -- as an
author who had the courage to follow your dream and publish your own eBook --
you are a one-in-a-million shining star: you are A Published Author.
***
You can
read How to Publish your eBook in South Africa - Part 1 here
You can
read How to Publish your eBook in South Africa - Part 2 here
***