How to Self Publish your Book on a Budget…
The Internet has created a wealth of opportunity to each and every one of us. For some of us it is our livelihood, for others it is a source of enjoyment and knowledge.
If you are an author the Internet can boost your reach all over the world. Gone are the days when you have to send your manuscript off to dozens of publishing houses and wait patiently every day for that letter of acceptance. You can now publish your own book and from experience it doesn’t have to cost a lot of money.
Research
When I was looking to publish a family member’s book I initially did a lot of research online to see how I could go about it on with a small budget. The book had been in publication since 1995 but it was costing a lot to print the book which meant having to sell the book at quite a high price. The company I decided to re-publish the book with is CompletelyNovel. The process was simple and by following some important formatting rules I only needed to order a couple of copies to proofread before it was made available to the public to buy.
Marketing
Some of the costs involved in self publishing are dependent on how you want your book to be marketed. I suggest purchasing an ISBN so the book can be stocked in traditional retail and mainstream online channels. Purchasing an ISBN through CompletelyNovel means you can purchase them individually, whereas if you self publish completely on your own you will need to purchase a batch of 10. This is ok if you plan to write a lot of books, but for a one off, going through a company such as CN means you have little initial outlay. CN offer subscription packages depending on how far you want to take the book, there is a free subscription and then prices start from £7.99 a month.
Social Media
Of course you can use Facebook and Twitter to market your book, there are many author’s who use these to advertise their books, even top selling authors are using social media to generate interest for their new bestseller. I am an avid reader so I follow authors on Twitter a lot, with more and more following me back, it’s a good marketing strategy.
As part of my virtual assistant business I offer document formatting as one of my services, so if you would like more time to write but need help formatting your book or general administration assistance, then please get in touch for a competitive quote.
One of my next blog entries will be a follow on to this post, talking about eBooks and how you can easily get your book on Amazon Kindle and other distribution channels such as Nook and Apple.
Hey Jo, I’m not sure if it is available where you are but https://www.myidentifiers.com/ sells individual ISBNs. The advantage, though, of purchasing multiples is that each “version” of your book will need a different ISBN. If you plan to sell it in kindle, audio, paperback, hardback, e-book… Each version will require it’s own ISBN. It’s far less expensive to purchase them as a package.
Nicole Bandes recently posted..Story Friday – The Man and the Butterfly
Thanks Nicole… I’ll check out the website. The company I use buys the ISBN’s and you purchase them individually from them. I think if you put your eBook on Smashwords the ISBN is free, but I’ll need to check that, it might be Amazon I’m thinking of.