Chicken Scratchings

Archive for October, 2009

You’ve written a book. CONGRATULATIONS. 80% of adults dream of doing what you’ve done. A very small percentage actually do, so you are in an elite group. Hold your head high. You are now an author.

What, you don’t believe it? According to my Webster’s New Universal Unabridged Dictionary the act of writing is all it takes to become an author. If you wrote something, you are an author.

To become a published author is another thing altogether. For most of us the ultimate goal is to see our books in print and distributed to readers everywhere.  After all, what is a writer without a reader? It’s Yin and Yang. Two halves of the whole. As far as I’m concerned a manuscript in a desk drawer defines you as an author, but something definitely is missing.

There are only two approaches you can take to get published. You can do it yourself (self-publish) or find someone else to publish it for you (traditional publish). How do the two choices compare?

At first blush it appears that the easiest path is to sell your rights and let someone else publish your book. Let’s face it this is what most of us think of when we talk about being published. The biggest hurdle with the traditional publishing model is that  4% or less of manuscripts will ever become a book. And for that 4% there are probably thousands that never even make it to a publisher’s desk. It’s pretty obvious that if your manuscript doesn’t get read, it will not be published. I’ve said it before, if you are unknown, getting a book published through traditional channels is like winning the lottery. The odds are that bad.

Let’s compare the two methods and help you decide which way is best for you:

weigh your decisions carefully

1.  Who accepts the financial risk? If self-publishing you pay for all the costs involved in producing the book including the editors, artists, and printers. In traditional publishing the publisher takes on that burden.

2.   Who has creative control over the look and presentation of the book? If you do it yourself, you retain the rights. If you sell those rights to the publisher they can do whatever they think is best. That doesn’t seem important to you? It will if the publisher changes the meaning of the text through their editing, or comes up with a cover design that would lead readers to a totally opposite idea from what you meant. It happens.  Your only remedy you have is whining.  Selling your rights will give you money, but it may not give you peace of mind. Which is more important to you?

3.  Who arranges for distribution? If self-published, the burden is all yours. No matter how good the book is, please keep in-mind that some channels, like national bookstore chains, may not be available to you. Many booksellers have a policy against accepting self-published books, but If  your book is traditionally published, and your publisher pays for distribution, many of those guarded gates will be opened. It doesn’t seem fair, but that’s the game.

4.  What about marketing? Marketing is doing all of the things needed to promote the book, making fliers, public relations, appearing on TV talk shows, and radio programs. Issuing press releases, teaching seminars, speaking at schools, clubs, and wherever you can find an audience. You’d think that if traditionally published your publisher would handle all of this. Wrong. Most book contracts today require the author’s active involvement in promoting the book. That involvement is much more than showing up for the occasional book signing.  So, whether self-published or traditionally published, you dear author, must by contract, be hawking your book, mostly at your own expense.  If you don’t drum up sales your book won’t move, except from the shelves inside the store into the discount bins outside. If that happens, your chances of ever being traditionally published again are astronomical.

5.  Profits, ah profits, who gets the money? The one who takes the risk takes the money. If you are lucky you’ll earn between $.50 -$1.00 per book in royalties. Sell ten thousand books and you get $5 to $10 thousand dollars. That same book, if self-published, could generate $150 thousand dollars.

The self-publishing model is heaven made for those authors who believe in their product and are sure that they can find a market. It is costly and difficult to self-publish, but if you are right and you can successfully reach your readers, the amount of money you could make is much greater. You can have financial freedom and personal freedom as well.

Which way is best? It all depends on you. Either way, it will take energy, money, and lots of effort. After putting everything you have into it, it may not be enough. If the traditional route is the one you choose, the odds are that you will never be published. If you self-publish and can’t find your audience, your garage full of books will hang like albatross around your neck. But remember, that even though the odds are notoriously poor, someone always hits the lottery eventually. Who knows, maybe this time it might be you.

8 Must-Do Steps To Get Your Book Out In-Time

I’m preparing a seminar to present at the District 15 Toastmasters conference mid-November. The title is Why Every Speaker Needs a Book. It’s a good subject perfectly designed for the needs of my audience. The problem? My book I am writing for public speakers is far from ready. I have been working on it regularly but it isn’t complete enough to add the final touches, get it to an editor, and print it.

Some of the points I intend to hammer home have to do with speakers using their books as a way to gain credibility, and to generate income through back of the room sales. I wanted to have my book there to demonstrate how it is done. Instead, I’m feeling somewhat hypocritical. Does this hypocrisy diminish the value of the information? I hope not. We’ll see.

Even a Professional Can Fool Himself

In fairness when I announced my intention to have a book ready for the Fall Conference, my wife said that I didn’t have enough time. “I can do it!” I said in the most convincing cartoon super-hero voice I could muster.

Most of us need deadlines or we will procrastinate forever. Setting an unrealistic deadline really doesn’t help, it hurts. Now my dream of walking in with a box of freshly printed books and smiling as the attendees lined up to have me sign their books and tell me how much they enjoyed the seminar has gone poof.

Start Backwards to Go Forward

What is my point? Book production takes time and before you set an unrealistic deadline work backwards on a time line starting with the last step which is shipping. Ha, you thought I was going to say printing, didn’t you? No, in your planning you have to figure in the time to get the books to you. For example, if you are using a local printer same day is realistic. If you are printing overseas, plan on at least three weeks by boat and another week to get through customs. Then no matter what your realistic time line is, add more buffer to each and every step. In book production things rarely go as planned. Below are some points you need to consider to build a realistic time frame:

1. Shipping. allow one day to four weeks or more.
2. Printing. Expect two to five weeks. A soft cover book takes less time than a hard cover. Discuss time frame with the printer.
3. Typesetting and Layout. Should take two to four weeks for this stage. Expect to be actively involved during this step. Authors and editors must check, and recheck to make sure everything is right before going to press. It is cheaper to fix problems during this phase than it is at press. Scrutinize everything.
4. Proof Reading. Some consider proofreading to be part of the editor’s job and it is, but in my experience, you can’t have too many eyes on it. I once read that a new edition of Webster’s Dictionary goes through 132 proofing steps and they still find errors. Find a good proofreader you won’t regret it, but if you go to press with typo’s I guarantee that they will become glaringly obvious the second you crack open the book. Then the mistakes will haunt you. The only thing you will be able think about are the errors. Cut yourself a little slack. We’ve all been there. Remember that you didn’t see the problems after reading, re-reading, and reading your manuscript time and time again, so it is likely that most of your readers won’t see them either.
5. Editing. Check with your editor to determine the amount of time they will need. The type of book and size will make a lot of difference to the time frame. A fictional book will go faster than a technical treatise. With fiction, grammar, sentence structure, and spelling corrections will pretty much do it, but with non-fiction a re-check of the facts and understanding the technical terms takes time. My best guess is that an editor could do the job in three to eight weeks.
6. Cover Design. Here’s a piece of good news. Cover design can begin at the same time your editor starts and probably won’t add more time, with one caveat; you will want the editor to check the copy. Your cover, despite the old saw that says, “Don’t judge a book by its cover” is your first impression. If the cover doesn’t draw the reader, it doesn’t matter how good the text is. Time spent on cover design is worth it.
7. Marketing. It isn’t too soon to consult with book marketing professionals. You may hire them to give you general advice or have them work closely with the editor and artists. I recommend them, but you have to consider the price tag. Hourly rates, just like hiring an attorney, can quickly spin out of control. It doesn’t take long to rack up thousands of dollars.
8. Writing and Research. I’ve seen Internet ads saying that a book can be written in 14 days or less and I’m sure that some people could do it, but most can’t. Some manuscripts take six to eight months others can take years. Whatever the amount of time you need to take for writing and research is the time you need. Period. Again, add extra buffer because we all tend to underestimate what we can achieve and when.

I’m not saying that a book couldn’t be done much faster than the time frames I’ve outlined, but in preparing a good book, a book that will make you proud takes time. If you want a book to hit the marketplace in one year from now, it isn’t too early to get started. That’s what I’m saying. Get going, author, get going.

You may not believe this but after you have birthed a book, and getting a book out has much in common with birthing babies, the hard work begins. Finding readers is a difficult task indeed. Check out The Author’s Platform it’s a low cost, easy to use, step-by-step program to teach you everything you need to know about Internet marketing. I personally recommend it.

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Okay, I admit it; I am a printed book snob. I want my books printed on nice paper preferably with gilt edges and leather embossed hardbound covers, but that’s just me. When I buy a software upgrade I always pay extra for a disk. I have files full of paper backups from things I store on my computer. I just don’t trust electronics, I guess.

My wife, who is more technologically inclined than I am, insisted I buy a computer for my Print Brokering business some 18 years ago. So I went to my local Office Max, and spoke with their computer expert who looked to be all of fifteen years old. He advised that I buy the latest PC with the brand-spanking-new Windows Operating System. That sounded good, so I bought it and carted it home confident that my wife, who worked on computers at her office, would be able to teach me everything I needed to know. Wrong. She was working with DOS and knew nothing about Windows. I was on my own. It was like being on Survivor without a camera crew, producers, or other participants; I was all alone.

I read tutorials, hired teachers, bought “easy to use software” before I learned that it was easy to use for the programmers who created it, but not for me. Despite my reticence I slowly I started to gain ground on this beast of convenience.

But it wasn’t long before I discovered the meanings of my C Drive crashed, my hard disks collapsed, and the computer froze. The admonition to save often made sense after losing a day’s worth of work. Then I found out about gremlins. Somewhere in the bowels of the malicious computer machine exists an intelligent life form whose only purpose is to make sure that the actions you perform today, will not work tomorrow, even if you meticulously repeat them.

This is the long road around to saying that I like many of us in the 50+ generation; have difficulty accepting anything made of electronic blips as friendly. As soon as you rely on them they erase themselves, become unintelligible, or transform into gigantic city stomping lizards. Well, maybe I went too far with the lizard thing, but you know what I mean. Heaven forbid you slip and drop them on the floor. Whether you are reading through a Kindle, an iPhone, or some other device drop it and like magic you’ll discover whether your credit card is maxed. On the other hand I can drop my printed book, pick it up and go on with my life. My credit card is untouched.

Is it inevitable?

So the question remains, is an e-Book a real book?  Somebody out there thinks so; e-Books are racking up the biggest sales numbers in the entire book market averaging an astounding 55.7% annual growth since 2003.  Compare this with all the other types of books from Adult Hardbound and Paperback, Juvenile Hardbound and Paperback, Book Clubs, Higher Education, etc. which grew a mere 1.04% annually (excluding sales for the Harry Potter series) in the same time period.

Here’s the shocker, do you know who are buying Kindle Readers by the boatload? The 50+ crowd. My peers. e-Book sales grew 183% among seniors aged 65+ and 174% among seniors aged 55-65. And here I was counting on older folks to save printed books.

Must I raise the white flag and surrender? 1.04% annual growth against 55.7% growth in e-Book sales is persuasive. Imagine fighting a war where the odds were 55 to 1. Can anyone say General Custer? My punishment for doubt is to write on the board 500 times, “e-Books are real books, e-Books are real books, e-Books are real books…”

How do you market an e-Book? Use the Internet. How do you learn how to use the Internet to sell e-Books? You can do it the hard way or the easy way. The easy way is The Author Platform. And you can test it for no money down. How’s that for an offer?

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I’m not just talking through my hat here. Just today I received an email from a self-publishing author, and she asked, “Are these [books to be] printed in China and does it take 4 months as I have heard?”

My response was, “As for using Chinese printers, there is no doubt that you will save money, but there are some problems. You’ve already identified the first problem of turn around time. Few publishers can afford the long wait time for their products. The second problem is ink. Chinese printers use inks that are banned in the US. Normally that wouldn’t concern me, but because your book is a children’s book, I would urge caution. What if a baby got it in its mouth? It is also well known that much of the work will be done by Chinese children working in onerous conditions. It’s possible that hiring printers in China encourages the propagation of employment practices and human rights violations that are not permitted here. That being said, I will get prices for you on both US printing and China and let you decide which way you want to go.”

You need to understand that with every decision there are consequences. When I speak with Chinese or Indian printers they always tell me that they know of printers using child labor, but they swear that their particular shop does not. Haven’t you heard? Everyone is innocent in prison. What you don’t believe it? Just ask them. They also tell me that it isn’t their fault. People would die if they didn’t get the pittance they are paid. American companies demand cheap prices, so Americans are to blame.

If we are really interested in protecting children do we accomplish it by insisting that they not be employed? Would they starve? What do you think?

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Reprinted from Talking Through My Hat http://www.billprintbroker.com/?p=10

I’m not just talking through my hat here. I was speaking this morning with the production manager of a well-respected Utah printer. Their shop, like many others, was once exclusively offset, but they have begun adding digital. They are in the learning phase as is most of the industry. The question I asked is regarding durability. Since many digital presses use toners instead of inks I wondered how well the images would stand up under the kind of wear and tear that a children’s book might experience. Off the top of his head, he thought it compared favorably, but he didn’t know for sure. Since the toners are exposed to a high heat, he felt that this would fuse the toners into the sheet.

I have to say that digital printing has come a long way in the last few years, and it has a long way to go yet. The biggest problem with digital is quantity. It is excellent for short runs, say less than 500, but not so good at higher amounts. Somebody, somewhere will solve this problem and offset printing will go the way of the buggy whip.

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A good friend bought my lunch (isn’t that the definition of a good friend one who buys your lunch?) and over pasta he mentioned the book TRIBES by Seth Godin. It’s a small book with a big message. It addresses the changing social and business constructs and envisions a future already here and now, where power and influence are shifting from traditional hierarchies to groups united by common beliefs. The development of the Internet has facilitated this shift in a big way. Leadership is more defined by passion and faith than by wallet. For example in the last US presidential election Barack Obama raised almost 25% more in campaign contributions than Hillary Clinton, and John McCain combined and it flooded in from the Internet. Who would have thought that a relatively new face in Washington could pull together more financing than those two warhorses, an ex-president’s wife and a revered war hero? Why? Because of passion. Because of belief. The people wanted change and were willing to follow a leader who appeared able to create the change.

I’ve written a lot in my blogs about changes. The changes I’ve addressed mostly concern the printing industry, but change is happening on every front, in every field of endeavor. I’ve been sitting on the sidelines of the publishing business, observing, and occasionally commenting. Now, it appears, that I’ve been given the opportunity to lead a tribe of self-publishing authors. That was what the lunch was all about. Self-publishing, in my opinion, is on the verge of eclipsing traditional publishing. And with my background in writing, marketing, and printing I am the logical choice to contribute to this movement. I didn’t choose it, but by my preparation, it chose me. That’s another point that Seth makes is that Tribe leaders generally don’t go looking for leadership, instead they see a need and are compelled to fill it. It’s the leader’s faith and passion that attracts their followers.

Mr. Godin discusses the old factory model. Factory workers were hired by owners, who paid them to do a job. The jobs were generally routine and required bosses to make sure everyone stayed in line and did things exactly the way the boss wanted them done. Much like slaves on a galley ship. In this new world run by tribes, we join, or create tribes, because we are drawn to the ideal. We want to make a difference. We think that the purpose of the tribe is valuable, important, and worth giving of our time and effort. The tribe causes the change to happen. If this occurred on the factory floor it would be chaotic. The smooth production of products would be interrupted. Participating workers would be disciplined and might be in danger of forfeiting their jobs.

I have another friend who is fond of quoting Gandhi, “Be the change you want to see [in the world].” The most monumental changes always begin with one person, one person with a vision.

Again the concept isn’t really new. The founding fathers of the United States of America were drawn together because of a mutual belief in freedom and self-rule. The leaders stepped forward and the people followed. What’s new is the Internet. Tribes can be formed at lightening speed. Twitter, for example, provides a platform for a succinct idea of 140 words or less, to potentially reach millions of readers within seconds. Can you imagine what Paul Revere would have thought? Riding through the countryside, by horseback, required a commitment of hours and days. Too bad he didn’t have a laptop computer or even a cell phone.

What? You say that you don’t like this new world? You think that 140 character messages lack depth? Too bad for you. The Tribes rule and will only get stronger. Get on board or be left behind.

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