Insiders Guide to Vanity Publishers

Expressions like co-operative publishing, joint venture publishing, subsidy publishing, and self-publishing are misleading to say the least. They all mean the same thing, ‘vanity’ publishing. Yet scores of small publishers advertise their services on the web. Some publishers go to great lengths to conceal from the author, all the costs involved, which suddenly escalate half way through production of a book.

There are good vanity publishers just as there are bad. How does an author tell the difference? Here’s some clues.

• A good vanity publisher will not tell an author their book is a well-written masterpiece. Instead they will discuss the true market potential of a book and the best way to proffer it to the public.
• Good vanity publishers don’t say their service is better than competitors and swamp a new author with copies of revue cuttings, which are often little more than colour photocopies. Instead, they describe their service they offer, and leave an author to decide.
• Good vanity publishers do not offer subsidised service or give the impression of being philanthropic.
• They do not offer to publish books as the market demands (like Lulu). Instead they agree to publish X number of books at a fixed price and say more copies are optional at a later date.
• Good vanity publishers don’t claim to have a marvellous marketing department and say the author stands to recoup the financial outlay through royalties, which far exceed everyone else’s.
• Good vanity publishers do a lot of work on behalf of an author. They get maximum publicity, gain an ISBN, proof-read the manuscript and work closely with the author. Good vanity publishers will design the cover, provide typesetting and proofs before printing, ensure distribution and get the book placed on legal deposit in national libraries.

So to recap, good vanity publishers are candid and reliable.

Of course the next step is marketing – www.DragonCub.com can help there of course.

Five tips to boost your book sales on the web

 

Instead of stacking rejection slips by touting your manuscript around agents and traditional publishing houses, a podding agreement will let a publisher take your manuscript, edit and format the text ready for firing out paperback or hardback copies as soon as the orders come in.

DragonCub will also help with marketing the book, but because DragonCub cuts the overheads, you earn a bigger royalty on each sale.

You can also help yourself sell more books online with these five simple steps:

• Team up with a podding partner like DragonCub
• Set up a website – call the site <yourbooktitle>.com. This is easy to do with a blogging tool alled WordPress. Then, write one or two articles a week for your blog inking to your book page on the podding site.
• Let people know about your blog by setting up accounts on social networking sites – the type of site depend on your readers
• Join forums and online communities that specialise in your niche and offer free articles based on snippets of your book in return for links back to your site or your book sales page.
• Politely ask any readers who comment on your book to post their comments on your book sales page. Reader recommendations are valuable resources that drive sales.
• The objective is to raise the profile of your book by raising your profile on the internet. Every site that carries one of your articles, blogs or comments with a link back to your sales page makes your book easier to find for interested readers.

  Your readers are out there – you just need to team up with online publishing experts like DragonCub to help you find them.

How to sell your book and receive 100% of the sales price

DIY publishing is now considered trendy as opposed to thirty years ago, when mainstream publishers invited new and unknown authors along to preview prospective works.

Assuming an author has X number of books printed either through a vanity publisher or even a small press, the next step is to get the book out there, to be read. Take time to decide the best strategy.

• Identify the target audience, age, income, career and residential location of prospective readers.
• Look at the competition and evaluate the market demand and prices.
• Devise a statement that spells out why this new book is special (often called the unique selling point or USP).
• Develop a market plan, work out the financial outlay required, and whether sales will recoup the cost of printing, binding etc.
• Advertise the publication in local papers, magazines, newsletters etc. Convince news editors to publish press releases about the new book.
• Get postcards, leaflets or flyers printed (fairly cheap these days) at a copy shop.

Caution, almost no self-published book gives a significant return on an author’s investment in time and effort, so don’t give up the day job.

So where does it all end? Hopefully like the effort of one, now famous author, who initially made little profit from a self-published book but gained loads of publicity. Then one day a copy ended up on the desk of a creative consultant. The result, a well-known 3202 mainstream publisher snapped up the work. By the year 2000, the book sold over 300,000 copies and became a best seller. It can happen. How? Sign up at www.DragonCub.com today for free and sell your book, for free! DragonCub is the new kid on the block – a force to be reckoned with in the area of online books sales. They are offering a special deal where 100% of the sales profit goes to the author / publisher. No gimmicks, no sales spiel, just pure marketing heaven for your new book.

Boosting you book sales on the web with podding

Podding is a relationship between an author/writer and a ‘print on demand’ publisher. It is effective way for writers to increase book sales on internet. In Podding, writer cuts out all the middlemen costs and go to a Podding publisher like DragonCub who takes a manuscript, edit and format the text ready for firing out paperback or hardback copies as soon as the orders come in.