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I had originally planned to give a tutorial on
how to use Create Space to publish your book and distribute it through
the Internet market for the smallest amount of money, but a cheaper and
more attractive alternative came along. How does free sound?
How’d you like to forego paying setup and maintenance fees and
instead spend more money in getting a quality edit and scintillating
cover for your book? If you’re considering using one of those
publication assistance companies that collect several hundred or
thousand dollars for each title, you could be making a big mistake.
Publishing your books shouldn’t cost you an arm and a leg, because,
frankly, it is a lot easier to type with two hands. The companies
taking your hard-earned money to publish your book are making a lot of
money, something very few authors are doing. Do yourself a favor and
look into learning to do as much as you can yourself and outsourcing
those other tasks to people who specialize in those areas—like the
following companies I’d like to introduce.
Last September in this column,
I featured a new printing company called Snowfall Press, about which I
said that if it could distribute to Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and
many other outlets, it would become a force in the industry. We are
about to see if my prediction comes true. Snowfall Press has connected
with a distribution company called Advocate Distribution Services,
which is a child company of STL, Send the Light. The best news is that
STL is a Christian organization that is working to further the kingdom.
How great is that? You get a wonderful deal and become part of an army
that is distributing materials that will challenge the Devil and the
corps of writers he has employed (see more on this in next month’s
column). This coordinated effort is a kingdom principle. You can help
Snowfall and STL by using them to print and distribute your books, and
they can help you by offering their services at no setup cost. It’s a
win-win situation.
STL
has connections with bookstores, distributes a catalog of products they
have available, provides print on demand (POD), and offers other
options such as warehousing. Check them out!
Here’s the process: Create (or pay someone to do it for you) pdf
files for the cover and manuscript, upload your book to Snowfall, and
register that book with ADS (STL) for print on demand service. (You
must be approved before using their services.) Two to four weeks after
you submit to ADS, your book will appear on the sales outlets. (I
submitted my books to ADS last week and already the books are listed on
Amazon—just no picture yet and shows not in stock.)
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Now I can have the best of both worlds because
I don’t risk any up-front money, and my books will be for sale from
many outlets. The only cost is an ISBN number. I need to print proofs
to make sure everything looks good. I can pay $8 for a proof copy.
There is no charge at this time to keep my book available for print on
demand distribution. This means my books will never go out of print and
yet don’t cost anything to keep available. Everything is stored
on a computer, and the process is automated (or soon will be) from
start to finish. Eliminating manual labor reduces costs.
Adazing produces
covers for $450 . Though I’ve not worked with the following companies
that produce covers, you might check with them about their services: Mike Bennett Graphics, and Christian Book Design.
I’d love to hear from anyone who knows of other quality providers of these services at reasonable prices. E-mail me at scaramouche9999@yahoo.com. I’ll share that information in future articles.
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