Before I begin today’s Shelf Life, let me wish a happy birthday (yesterday) to long-time Shelf Life reader and even longer time parent, My Dad. He is the best around.
Today’s Shelf Life is a clip show. Not really, because it contains a bunch of new information, but to be expeditious about imparting that information I’m going to conclude each section with a link to a prior Shelf Life article (or articles) that expand on that subtopic. If you’re getting ready to self publish a book and you want to make sure you’ve dotted your jays and crossed your eyes—okay, I’m not going to call this a comprehensive list or anything. There are lots of lists out there of things you should take of before self publishing. This is another. Perhaps with a mix of items unique to this list and items redundant to those on other lists.
So: You’ve decided to self publish—as opposed to publishing traditionally or going the hybrid route. (You can read more about self, trad, and hybrid publishing in Choose Your Own (Publishing) Adventure.) If you’re self-publishing, you’re going it alone. You may have helpers who have volunteered or who you have hired—editors, proofreaders, cover designers, typesetters, and so on—but you’re probably on your own when it comes to the mechanics of publishing. For example, where will you publish your book? How will you make it available to buyers? How will you make it discoverable? Do you know how to register your copyright claim? How to get an ISBN?
Look, you can Google all those things. There’s no aspect of self-publishing a book that isn’t described in detail somewhere online. The problem is, you don’t know what you don’t know. If you’re not aware that something needs to be done, you don’t know to Google how to do it. The idea behind today’s Shelf Life is to make you aware of these items so you can search for more information if you need it.
Perfect Your Book Cover
Maybe your book will have a print component, or maybe it won’t (that is, it may be ebook only). Maybe you have a professional cover designer working on your cover, or maybe a creative friend is pitching in, or maybe you’re doing it yourself. Your considerations will be different, depending on the combination of factors above.
Book covers are not all about the eye-catching illustrations, text treatments, and designs. There’s a lot more to them than the way they look. Even if you’re graphically inclined yourself, or have a friend who is and can help you, there are some considerations you (and your friend) may overlook if you haven’t designed covers for publication before.
First, if you’re doing a print edition, know whether you’ll need to provide your own barcode. The outlet through which you are publishing—for instance, BookBaby, Amazon Kindle Direct, IngramSpark, and so on—should be clear whether you need to provide a barcode based on your book’s ISBN or whether they can provide this for you. Second, again if you’re doing a print edition, you need to find out whether the outlet through which you are publishing can tell you the spine bulk or whether you’ll figure that out for yourself based on paper stock and page count. If you’re not using a middle man for publishing and you intend to sell units through your own website or another avenue, you’ll be working directly with a printer—talk to your printer about barcode and spine bulk. They can probably help.
If you’re going to have a print component, make sure your back cover has everything it ought to. In addition to the aforementioned barcode, this means things like endorsements, book description, author bio, price, categories (if nonfiction), and cover photo and designer credit if applicable. Likewise, your spine should be complete with your name (or just your surname, depending on available space), book title, and publishing company name and logo (if you have created your own imprint under which to publish).
If your book is e-only with no print component, you only have that front cover to worry about. All you need to have there is the title and your name, but you can also include additional selling points like “Author of Your Other Book Title,” “New York Times Bestselling Author, ” or “Now a Major Motion Picture”—if any of those things are true.
Before you click that publish button, stop and make sure the book title is identical on the front cover, spine, title page, and copyright page. Do the same with your name (or pen name). Don’t go to press with “John Public” in half the places and “John Q. Public” in the other half; or with Means to an End as your title on the cover and A Means to an End everywhere else.
For more information: Anatomy of a Book Cover
Optimize Your Metadata
Metadata are so boring; like a total snoozefest. If you’re publishing your own book, though, there’s probably nobody to take care of the metadata but you. Even if you have a willing helper, they’re going to be coming to you with so many questions—because the necessary information exists only in your brain—that you might as well do it yourself.
If you need an ISBN, make sure you have it handy. How do you know if you need an ISBN? Amazon supplies ASINs, which substitute for ISBNs, for books published through their KDP platform. The ASIN is only good for sales through Amazon; you can’t use an ASIN to sell your book at Barnes & Noble. If you intend to offer your book for sale through retailers other than Amazon, you will need an ISBN. Publishing partners like IngramSpark or BookBaby may supply you with an ISBN or sell you one. Alternately, you can get them direct from the source.
Decide in what territories your book will be available for sale—the whole world? Just North America? Just the United States?—and what your book’s price will be in the relevant currencies.
Review your book’s categories and keywords and make sure they are as relevant and specific as possible. This will make sure your book is shown to the largest possible number of likely buyers. It doesn’t pay to exaggerate your keywords or categories like you do with your resume—your title might initially be shown to more book buyers but if the categories and keywords aren’t faithful to the content, those buyers won’t buy your book.
Finally, go over your book’s description (the text you have on the back cover if you have a print edition) and make sure it’s perfect—no typos, no grammatical errors, no ambiguous or confusing sentences, and compelling as heck. If you have a friend who always notices typos on restaurant menus, make them read it for you before you go live.
For more information: Metadata, Part I and Metadata, Part II
Select Your Publishing Partners With Care
There are degrees of self-publishing. There’s publishing with a platform that holds your hand a bit like Lulu, BookBaby, Amazon KDP, or IngramSpark. There’s also putting the PDF and EPUB files up for sale on Gumroad and working with a book printer to secure stock you sell through Shopify and ship yourself. Regardless, you’re going to be working with some partner or partners—unless you have a printing press in your basement.
First: Weed out scammers. There are tons of companies out there offering to self-publish your book for you, which could mean anything from “we’re a full-service book packager” to “we’ll load your file into Amazon’s KDP platform for a fee.” If you’re connecting with any middleman to get your book to market, make sure you vet them carefully and understand exactly what services they’re providing you and in exchange for what. This includes Joe Schmoe Book Packager who came up at the top of the results when you Googled “help self publish” and it includes Amazon KDP. Understand the terms you are agreeing to.
Second: Shop around. If you’ll be working directly with a printer, get quotes from at least three and when you request the quote be specific about what they should include so you get quotes you can actually compare. One printer might quote you just the cost of printing services and paper and not include shipping while another includes shipping, or even warehousing and drop shipping.
For more information: The Grift Mill and Not So Many Happy Returns
Understand Your Interactions With the Library of Congress
Who doesn’t love dealing with the government? Everybody, that’s who doesn’t.
You probably already know that you own the copyright on your text the moment you’re done writing it. That’s a natural right. You do not have to apply for copyright, register copyright, or do anything else to secure that copyright for yourself. It’s yours.
However, if you want access to the court system of the United States to defend your copyright should it be infringed, you have to have registered that copyright with the Copyright Registrar of the Library of Congress.
Speaking of copyright: Do not sign it away to anyone else unless you really know what you’re doing (as in, you’ve spoken with a lawyer). You can grant limited exclusive or nonexclusive rights to someone else (like a publisher) without reassigning your copyright. Reassigning or transferring your copyright to another party is rarely necessary and likely a red flag that someone is trying to scam you.
Further, the Library of Congress is technically entitled to a couple free copies of every book published in the United States, so make sure you know how to send them their copy (digital) or copies (print) ahead of time—if you intend to supply them with their copies, that is. If you don’t send them their copies, chances are they never notice and if they do they’ll send you a demand letter and you can send their copies at that time.
For more information: Textual Congress, Part I and Textual Congress, Part II
Review the Big-Ticket Items One More Time
However many times you’ve already reviewed them, review them again. I mean, don’t get stuck in an infinite loop—but, when you think you’re completely, totally done and you’re ready to pull the trigger, stop. Check the most visible, most critical items just once more.
These items—in my considered opinion—are:
Book title—Title should be correct and exactly the same in every single spot. Front cover, spine, title page, copyright page, metadata, and anywhere else in the text it appears.
Author name—Again, make sure it’s correct and exactly the same everywhere it appears. Front cover, spine, back cover, title page, copyright page, about the author page, metadata, and anywhere else.
Copyright holder and year of copyright—Your book’s copyright holder is you even if you’ve created a publishing imprint under which to publish. Your book’s copyright year can be the year during which it publishes or, if you’re publishing late in the calendar year (September or later) your copyright year may be the next calendar year.
Cover—Your book’s cover is the most visible component to prospective buyers. Read the cover—the whole cover, every little bit—one more time. Is the price right? ISBN? No typos in the description? Read the spine if there is one. Now read it again.
Front matter—Read your title pages, copyright page, and table of contents one more time and make sure the information is true, correct, complete, and free of errors. A prospective buyer perusing your book in the store or using Amazon’s “Look Inside” feature will see these items. Make sure they’re perfect.
For more information: Burden of Proof
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