Collection for Ghostwriters

Posted on September 30, 2011 by admin

Avoid Collection Problems

Collection 1 of 3

Avoid putting yourself in the position of trying to get reluctant clients to cough up the dinero they owe you. The problem is, you may raise some money in the collection process but the time you spend on collections is unpaid. Meaning it requires you to throw good writing time after bad. So you need to use quick methods. Create a set of collection emails that you will can speedily personalize to the the specific debtor. Keep at it until they pay up or pass on.

The most effective way to collect money is to start early. Do so by considering the collecting problem before you take on the assignment. Do it before your enthusiasm and need of the work over­whelms any concern you might have about getting paid. Not one in twenty of my clients have failed to pay approx­imately on time or in advance. The key to such results is to turn in good work on time. The downside to having a low rate of defaulters is that it made me complacent, thus setting me up to find myself in an unleveraged position with two clients when the recession tightened.

Get your CAGs signed by your client’s company rather than by the individual. Why? Because collection fees are far less for a company than for individuals. The collection industry knows individuals are more elusive. Fees are how much less? Could be as much as 40 percent less: 10 percent for the company debt vs. 50 percent for individual debt.

You may want to collect all of it by yourself. If so, load all your collection messages with courtesy and understanding. This is vital. Start off that way and continue on the high road. Sarcasm, attempts to shame them, or lashing out at them in anger will have the opposite effect of what you intended. Such tactics make them want to get back at you by not paying. Your purpose should be to make them want to pay. Here’s a key point you should never let slip far out of your sight: you have little or no leverage. You’re not a utility; you can’t shut off their water. In many collection cases, you have already submitted thr entire msnuscript so they don’t feel any strong need to pay you. This most recently happened to me with a client we’ll call “Walter” because it’s not his name. Walter stopped paying after he received the final chapters of my second book-writing assignment for him. This took me by surprise because Walter had always been a prompt payer.

The time to beef up your leverage is before you need it, not after. This generally means you should avoid delivering the last installment of the work until you receive everything they owe you. If you shoot yourself in the foot by handing in the ending and hoping for payment, don’t be surprised if it doesn’t arrive soon—or ever.

Okay, what works best on collecting money from reluctant or possibly hard-pressed clients?

In the beginning of your collection campaign, follow-up twice a month via email; always brief, always written in friendly understanding language, always polite but firm. A few brief comments about the weather can soften the message’s underlying harshness.

Gather your messages, organize them into a series of steps. Revise and perfect them every time you use them. Press your collection effort regardless of whether or not you have the leverage to force payment.

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Beware of Homophone Traps #1 of 4

Posted on June 21, 2011 by admin

 

Don’t have complete faith in spell checkers because they won’t detect homophone typos. This happens when people type sight when they mean cite, or based when they mean baste, or they confuse principle with principal. Such homophone traps lurk in every manuscript unless caught and corrected by careful revision.

Many common words are homophones (also called homonyms). This means one or more words are pronounced the same but have different definitions and spellings. The following list contains some of the most commonly seen homophones. These and other homophones are frequently sprinkled through rejected material.

air, err and heir

aisle, I’ll and isle

all, awl

ate, eight

aye (Navy talk for yes); aye (affirmative vote) eye and I

bail, bale

bald, bawled

bare, bear

based, baste

bask, Basque

bay, bey

be, bee

bight, bite

boar, bore

 

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SEVEN WAYS TO WRITE

Posted on June 10, 2011 by admin

An often-recurring subject in writer’s magazines, blogs and newsletters aims to energize a certain group of uncertain people. They want to write but somehow never put their butts to a chair, their minds to work on a specific writing concept and fix their words on paper or in a computer document. That’s all it takes to turn your thoughts into a copyrighted intellectual property, no registration required. Isn’t that wonderful? The simple act of writing means you own the piece you’ve written for as long as you live — or until you sell it.

Everyone who wants to write — but doesn’t — has their own mix of reasons. Lack of confi­dence in their writing ability probably figures prominently in the mix, as does the paralyzing conviction that they’ll never have time for it. This excuse is often coupled with an obscenely-strong commitment to watching professional athletes do things with balls, displaying skills the athletes have devoted their lives to developing. Why would you want to spend a slew of your life’s precious hours watching people perform their well-paid but actually inconsequential feats instead of using as much of your priceless free time to develop your own fame and fortune-winning ability to write?

I said obscenely-strong advisedly. No one can become a successful writer whose mental energies during free time are largely consumed by brain-rotting TV programs and sports — unless you aspire to write sit-coms or become a sports writer.

For those who can’t follow a routine that sets aside specific times they will devote to writing, forsaking all other temptations, there’s another way: Write in snatches. You may say, “Snatching bits of time here and there won’t work for me because I write on a computer, and one is never available when inspiration strikes.”

First, banish the idea that you can ‘t write until inspiration strikes—that’s an excuse for not doing anything. If you aspire to be a pro writer (defined as someone who makes her or his living by writing) start thinking like one. A pro writes whenever the circumstances make it possible—inspired or not. Second, get rid of the idea that keyboarding a computer is the only way you can write.

Learn to use other methods to capture words in snatches. Seven practical ways are available:

1. Write in Longhand. Ex Prez Nixon wrote his several heavy tomes with pen and pad. Many other writers do the same.

2.  Write in Shorthand. I’ve written a lot of stuff in Gregg shorthand. Transcribing Gregg on a computer provides the first revision that you can do at your best typing speed if you transcribe your shorthand notes soon after you wrote them, such as right after you get home from work. Otherwise you may not be able to decipher some of your shorthand notes very quickly. In our computer-saturated culture, shorthand may seem like a big step back towards the horse and buggy. Whether it’s worth investing the time to learn a shorthand system is a matter of individual choice. But if you want to know more about this method of capturing words, googling one word, shorthand , will show you what’s available.I happened to know Gregg shorthand before I started writing. The concept of learning shorthand appealed to me because the evening class met within walking distance—I didn’t have a car or much money—but few guys were expected to sign up for it. As it happened, I was the only male who did, a circumstance that had it’s own opportunities, challenges and rewards. Dictate to

3. Dictate to a person. This is how Winston Churchill wrote his prodigious output but he did it with stenographers in long sessions, not in brief snatches of time. Napoleon Bonaparte overcame the problem with the slower stenography of his time by putting up to 15 stenographers in a circle. He would then walk around and dictate letters, decrees and orders to each steno in turn. This required him to not only to remember which one was writing which document, but also to remember where he had left off. He was said to to this perfectly, which allowed him to exert his authority over his entire empire and push many enterprises forward at the same time.

4.  Dictate to a recording machine. You can transcribe it yourself, revising as you go, or have this done by a professional transcriber.

5. Dictate to a computer. Dragon has spent years perfecting software that will capture your words on screen. Excellent for snatching minutes if your Dragon-equipped computer is usually available and your work situation permits.

6. Keyboard a computer. While this and #5 are now the main methods of word capture for productive writers, they don’t work well for snatching minutes unless your job keeps you at your computer most of the day.

7. Type on a typewriter. Formerly almost universal, this method has largely gone the way of the Conestoga Wagon although a few productive writers still prefer their typewriters. <>

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Dodging the “Careless Writer” bullet

Posted on December 13, 2010 by admin

Redundant Writing

Using more words to express an idea than necessary marks you as a careless writer, something that can kill your chances of selling your work.

For this abridgment of his compilation of pleonasms (redundancies), I am indebted to Anu Garg’s intriguing free newsletter that every writer should read (subscribe at: words at wordsmith.org):­

preplan, advance planning, future planning, forward planning, past history, past experience, tuna fish, component part.

ATM machine, ISBN number, HIV virus, VIN number, RPMs per minute, please RSVP

The complete newsletter is available in Garg’s archives, Issue 441, December 12, 2010.

WARREN JAMISON www.warrenjamison.com W@Jamison.org

Member: *Authors Guild * American Society of Journalists and Authors*

 

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BEATING CATCH 22

Posted on December 1, 2010 by admin

Until you publish something, nobody wants to let you write their book. Nevertheless, collaboration is your best chance to get published. I’ll tell you how to do that.

  1. Somehow you just can’t seem to break through and see your stuff published by the trade and you aren’t interested in self-pubbing on the Net because you want the prestige that having your book sold in bookstores all over the nation.

  2. You are talented, you are determined—all you lack is writing credibility. That’s what it takes to convince any expert who has enough expertise to fill a book that you have what it takes to write their manuscript (MS)1 better than they can. So the first thing they ask is that same old weasel question, “What have you published?”

  3. My first published book was a joint venture (JV) with no money upfront; nevertheless, it has been one of my most lucrative books. My share of its earnings run well into six figures so far. Yes, it’s still selling, still earning royalties more than twenty years after publication.

  4. What had I published before? Nothing. Literally, not a word other than a handful of letters to the editor of local papers and national magazines—which added up to nothing when you’re talking to someone who might pay you money to work on their book.

  5. OK, so what was my writing credibility back then? Let’s examine the concept of writing credibility. First of all, it walks on two legs:
  6. (a) Your credibility to yourself. If you aren’t convinced that you have what it takes to complete a powerful MS, how can you expect to convince someone else? How you will overcome this vital challenge? If you don’t know instantly, think this one through. Here are three questions to help you decide what it will take to convince yourself that you are capable of writing a book about an expert’s niche in collaboration with this expert.

  7. 1. Do you have the following ready to go?

  8. a writing space in your home

  9. a computer and printer.

  10. Internet access, preferably high speed

  11. 2. Have you completed at least one MS? Could be fiction. The important thing is to have finished it, whether or not you were able to sell it.

  12. 3. Do you tell people you are a writer? Sure, you’ll get smirked at when they ask what you’ve published, but that just helps you develop the tough hide a pro writer must have. The vital thing is to internalize the concept that you are a professional writer.

  13. (b) Your credibility to experts so you can convince them to become your clients.

  14. The first expert I worked with was carefully chosen. And, though we didn’t know it then, our timing was right on. I say “we” because choosing this particular expert was my wife’s idea.

  15. Here’s how it worked. I knew I could write and complete a long MS because I had already written several novels, none of which were ever in any danger of being published. The important thing was that I had completed them. The first was 682 MS pages or about 170,000 words. The others were shorter. Counting all the rewrites, my first novel probably involved writing half a million words. Add in the other half-dozen novels and several abandoned projects, I must have written at least a million words during what turned out to be my writing apprenticeship.

  16. However, writing a large number of words is the least significant aspect of your all-important self-training apprenticeship. Improvement comes from constant study as you write. When you are uncertain about some detail of grammar, punc­tuation, spelling or formatting, research that item until you know how to handle it.

  17. My recommendations of the best five books for writers are listed in the Appendix. They will answer most questions so keep them handy. You can also search the Internet. Try both ways, print or Web, and use what’s quickest for you.

  18. Also, as you write your apprenticeship half million words, study the trade magazines and sign up on the Web for helpful newsletters. Several that I’ve found helpful are listed in—yep, you guessed it—in the Appendix. If you’ve already written some novels, you will already have gained confidence in your writing skills. Your challenge now is to convert confidence into cash.

1All the acronyms, abbreviations and trade jargon used in this book are explained in the Appendix.

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BOOK INDUSTRY REALITIES

Posted on August 16, 2010 by admin

A.      TRADE PUBLISHING.
If you’re going for traditional print publication with a legiti­mate trade publisher, you must have the complete manuscript or a strong book proposal ready to submit via priority mail. (Avoid overnight delivery or any submission method that requires a signature because it may inconvenience the recipient enough to prejudice her or him against you.)
Be ready to submit promptly. If you take weeks or months to supply what a particular agent wants—first 5 pages, first 30 pages, first three chapters—whatever they prefer. If you’re slow, the agent who showed interest will get involved in other things and forget about your project.
Now let’s look at the harsh realities of selling to the trade so your book will be on sale in bookstores throughout the nation.
1. Are you a public speaker now, or can you do public speaking to promote your book? This would involve contacting the right organi­zations and persuading them to hire you to address some of their meetings, or at least permit you to do so. Perfect your speech in your home state first, then take it nation wide.
Don’t want to do public speaking? Okay, but do you have a viable alternative way to promote your book? This question is life and death for it. An old saying in the bookwriting craft is, “You’ll get all the promotion that you do yourself.” It costs too much for publishers to promote debut novels, so they don’t do it. It’s different for established writers who have thousands of fans who guarantee a successful book.
Bottom line: unless your book will be vigorously and suc­cess­fully promoted by you, it will never find a publisher. Don’t wait until you have the BP ready to start planning how you will promote your book. If you aren’t willing to do this, it will kill my interest in working with you.
Public speakers whose primary occupation is conducting seminars, workshops and other events that draw crowds have a powerful built-in method of promoting their books. But those of us who don’t have that going for us have to find other ways. Fortunately, another way has recently opened up: for building a strong platform without relying on public speaking. at author-staged events. A client of mine demonstrated this forcefully by learning how to employ the social media so well that in a few weeks he had a list of 4,500 fans who want to read his book These numbers impress agents and publishers.
2. Many programs being sold online claim a book can be written in seven days or less if you buy and use their magical method. True, a short book for online distribution can be done quickly, but the seven-day wonders are BS in the trade publishing industry where most nonfiction manuscripts are 75,000 words or more.
3. Do you have the financial resources and the determination to see a large project like creating a book through to where it’s earning you money? Specifically, can you invest $3,860 in getting a strong book proposal (BP) written?
The odd number comes about in this way: $360 to get what AR & E calls a “Customized Fingerprint.”
The rest, $3,500, is my fee for writing a knock-their-socks-off BP.
However, the best BP won’t go far unless it’s sent to strong agents who specialize at representing books like yours.
AR&E is a firm (actually a husband and wife) who has tracked agents for more than 20 years. They have the largest database of agents in the nation. (check their website)
The customized fingerprint gives you a lot of background information that’s very helpful in writing effectivee query letters to each of five strong legitimate agents who handle your type of book. (They all specialize because the entire field of publishing is far too wide for anyone to cover more than a small slice of it).
I have used AR & E several times with outstanding results. It’s also possible to find a strong legitmate agent by trial and error—time-consuming but possible.
Why do I keep saying “legitimate agent” or “legitimate publisher?” Because there are a lot of crooks out there. Anybody claiming to be an agent who comes looking for you is only interested in prying the so-called “reading” fees out of you. These people never sell a book to a publisher—in fact they never even ry to sell books because they don’t have the contacts or the know-how.
By the way, a quick way to spot the crooks is to tell them you have three books you need agented. They’re in three greatly different fields. For example, one is a Hot-To book (How to talk to beautiful women, or How to grow your own food in your backyard—doesn’t matter what, Your second book is an edgy thriller for the adult market, the third is a book for children aged 3 to 5.
If they say they represent books in all three categories, you know they’re reading fee crooks. looking for the quick buck upfront. Never, ever pay an agent to read your work. Legitimate agents support themselves by selling books to publishers and collecting their commissions. Trade publishers won’t look at anything you send them unless it comes through an agent they know and respect. Therefore, getting a strong agent to represent your book is not a choice, it’s essential.
4. Can you live with the time frame of traditional publishing? This means that from where your project stands right now, it will be at least two years before your book shows up on bookstore shelves. And that’s if everything goes really well.
One of the many good things about trade publishing is that your agent will fight for the largest advance possible. Their commission on the advance (at the now universal rate of 15 percent) will come to them at least 18 months before any earned royalties are paid.
Figure your royalties at 7 1/2 % of the cover price. I know, I know, the pub agreement says 15 %, but that’s on their “net receipts.” Bookstores and wholesalers get between 48 and 52 % discount, so net receipts is about half of the cover price, which means your royalties are also cut about in half.
In the September 2010 issue of the Writers Digest, Jerry B. Jenkins said Nielsen tracked 1.2 million titles in a recent year. Most sold fewer than 3,000 copies, 950,000 sold fewer than 99 copies, only 25,000 titles sold more than 5,000 copies.
However, those numbers only reflect sales made in Nielsen tracked venues. The book sales of thousands of gift shops and other nontraditional sales outlets aggregate impressive numbers but Nielsen doesn’t take them into account.
It probably takes sales of over 10,000 copies to “earn out,” that is, to pay back the advance and open the way for earned royalties to be paid to the author.
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B.      IF YOU SELF-PUBLISH.    Although there are plenty of pitfalls in this method of publishing, for many authors the negatives are overwhelmingly outweighed by three positives:
(1) Getting books in days after the ms and cover are finalized
(2) Complete control of content
(3) Far higher earnings: Every every time you sell a copy, 70 or 80 percent of the cover price is yours. Not on Amazon sales, though. They take a bigger bite out of the cover price.
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C.      E-books. Since the cost to produce each copy is about zero, publishing E-books is growing rapidly. It’s also a large and rapidly evolving subject that many authors have found to be a highly lucrative field to explore.
Need help in getting your book written and published? If so, contact me and let’s see what our combined skills and knowledge can produce.

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Prospect Query Letter

Posted on August 12, 2010 by admin

Date
Customer’s name, title
Company
Street Address
City, State, Zip

Dear________________,

Handing a book that details your firm’s complete story is a powerful listing tool. In the initial interview, your associate is obliged to give prospective clients more informa­tion than they will remember. The impression you’ve made will begin to dim as soon as the interview ends, which often is your only chance to secure the listing.

We co-authored HOW TO LIST AND SELL REAL ESTATE with Danielle Kennedy. Its 30th Anniversary Edition came out from Cengage Learning in March, 2010.

When we wrote that book, my wife and I were real estate agents in Mission Viejo, California. So we have a deep understanding of this industry.

There are infinite advantages to having your own book. It will:

a. Instantly establish your company’s credibility and remove any doubts fearful prospects may have about what may be the largest transaction of their lives.

b. Describe in detail your best completed transactions with photos.

c. Give numerous examples of exactly how the numbers work out
.
d. Be kept. Unlike newspaper ads that stay out of the trash for just a day or two, most of your prospects will keep your book even if they first list with a six- percenter. Your book will be a constant reminder of the hard cash savings they signed away that your company provides. Unless they get a sale, they’re almost certain to come to your firm instead of renewing with the six-percenter.
e. Capture many pre-sold referrals for your firm. Every time one of your listings sells, your happy clients will give your book to a friend.

f. Rapidly recover its cost by securing additional listings.

(Comment here on your location and availability.)

Would you prefer to meet next Friday, or some convenient time next week, to discuss this opportunity to speed the growth of (firm name)?

Cordially,

(Be sure your letter will arrive a few days before “next Friday.”

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Posted on July 29, 2010 by admin

How Many Pages Will Your Manuscript Print To?

Let’s say your book manuscript (ms.) is 200 pages in the format agents and publishers prefer. This means your (ms.) is double-spaced on one side of 8 ½ by 11-inch paper with 1 inch or 1.25 inch margins all around. Each ms. page has 24 or 25 lines of 12 point Times New Roman type and averages about 250 words.

Multiply 250 by 200 gives you the approximate word count of 50,000. Well and good, but how many pages will your 50,000 word ms. require in a printed book?

Let’s also assume your ms. is a novel. If so, it will probably will come out in one of the popular sizes that are about 6 by 9-inches. Such books contain about 400 words per printed page (pp.) Dividing 50,000 by 400 equals 125. So your novel will print to about 125 pages in a 6 x 9 book. Nonfiction books are often about 6 x 9 in size too.

Many methods are available to the book designer make it easy to stretch or compress—within reason—a given number of manuscript pages into the desired number of printed pages.

Among the methods of stretching are: more white space between grafs (paragraphs); wider page margins; larger type; starting each chapter on the right hand (recto) page, leaving the verso (left hand page) blank or with only a few lines of type; using type fonts such as Garamond or dozens of others that require more space than Times New Roman; space-consuming artwork; elaborate running heads and running feet such as page number, book’s title, author’s full name, chapter title.

Methods of compressing ms. pages to fit in a desired pp count include: elimination of all running heads and feet except page number; little or no white space between the end of a chapter and the beginning of the next; 11 point or smaller Times New Roman type; narrower margins.

1. A standard ms. pg. contains about 250 words if formatted in 24 or 25 double- spaced lines with 1 inch or 1.25″ margins all around, using 12 point Times New Roman type. Agents and publishers prefer this format,

2. A 6 x 9 book usually prints to about 400 words of text per page.

3. Manuscript page word count of 250 multiplied by 1.6 equals 400.

4. Printed page word count of 400 multiplied by .6 equals 240 ms. pages—close enough for estimating purposes.

With these simple formulas, you can see that your epic novel, which can’t possibly be told in less than 775,000 words, will print to nearly two thousand pages. Here’s the cockroach in that kitchen: books in your genre never run to more than one thousand pages. If you don’t want to abandon your novel you can do the impossible and tell your epic in fewer than half as many pages; keep writing on other projects until your growing writing skills allow you to do the necessary, or hire a pro writer to trim it for you. <>

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Give Your Speaking Income a Huge Boost

Posted on December 16, 2008 by admin

Publishing your own book will give your public speaking career a tremendous boost in credibility, which is directly tied to the income that can be earned. Nothing validates your expertise quicker to more people with greater authority than a book. Besides being a profitable product for Internet and BOTR (Back Of The Room) sales, it's a powerful selling tool for scheduling more speaking dates at higher fees. Remember, your own book will be a 50 to 350 page advertisement of your expertise and services, and your readers pay you for it, rather than you paying to advertise to them.

You've heard it said about freebies, “You can't beat the price.” Well, matter of fact, you can beat “free.” It happens every time someone buys your book, which means they pay you so they can put your gigantic ad in their home or office. The beauty of this is, it will usually be there for many years because few people throw books away.

Here are some basic realities about book publishing you should consider before embarking on the challenging and rewarding project of creating your own book:

If you choose the trade publishing route but don't have a completed manuscript right now, it will take at least two years to get your book into the bookstores—and this is if everything goes well. Before your write the entire book, write—or hire a professional to write—a killer Book Proposal (BP from now on). Anything less won't get taken on by a legitimate trade publisher. A BP is a business plan to give prospective publishers the information they need to decide whether it can be a profitable project for them.

If you self-publish (selfpub from now on) with a Print On Demand (POD) company, you can have books within days. My son, Brian, recently received his 8 ½ by 11-inch book consisting of 300 pages. He supplied the artwork for the cover and four days later he held the book in his hand. Four days! The POD company did a superb job, full color covers and professional looking throughout. He ordered only two copies: at a cost of $10.21 each.

Quantity-ordered rules per copy cost. To make the most money on BOTR sales, you need to order at least a thousand copies, which will knock the per copy cost of most books down to somewhere between $1 and $3, and you can sell it for $14.95, 19.95, or more. The exciting thing is that half your audiences will usually take your book home with them. When you speak to 200 people, you will be able to take a profit of $1,000 or more from that single event.

But there's no need to rush into a quantity printing. POD enough copies for one speaking gig at a time, and go to regular book manufacturers after you get good at selling your book from the podium. You also need to have one or more people there to make credit card sales, a procedure that must be organized in advance.

The good news here is that selfpubbing can be an enormous help in securing trade publication—and will probably make that happen sooner. Not only do you get books two years sooner by selfpubbing, but you will also be on your way to having a market-proven product to offer trade publishers. This greatly reduces a publisher's perception of risk. And if you do it right, you can work out a deal to keep on selling hardcovers of your book BOTR while giving a trade publisher an exclusive on paperback sales to bookstores and their other outlets.

Your book will get all the promotion you give it yourself. This is true for both selfpubs and trade books. Major publishers will bust their budgets promoting somebody like Clancy or King. What will they do for your book.? If you don't have a strong audience, don't expect much—or even any—promotion. Why? Because they would lose money doing it. This is why a platform—which you have as a public speaker—is so important in finding a publisher.

Publishers don't sell books to bookstores, they ship them on consignment. Books that don't sell within a few weeks go back to the publishers to make room on the shelves for the flood of newer titles. The common saying is, “Books have the shelf life of yogurt.”

At least 500 new titles are published every working day by the American trade book industry, not including selfpubs. Since publishers can't justify spending money promoting most books it's no wonder that they look to the author for promotion so his or her book won't be returned by the bookstores.

    Ø

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HOW DO I GET THIS BABY ON THE STREET?

Posted on October 2, 2007 by admin

 

That’s how one of my clients put it when asking what stands between a finished manuscript and books in hand.

 

“How do I get my book printed?” is the obvious question. Hundreds of companies have sprung up in response to the tremendous surge in selfpublished books over the last twenty years. Some of these companies handle only one item in the bundle of services required, others offer to do everything.

 

Most complaints involve dissatisfaction with promises to promote the book. selfpublishers are advised to be wary of such promises, even from companies in business for a long time. Examine printing or publishing contracts carefully before entering into an agreement.

 

The second most common reported complaints concern the quality of the printed books. Some companies deliver a disappointing product, so you should ask for samples of their work before placing an order. The best way to ensure getting a book that looks like it came from Random House or Simon & Schuster is to work with a top notch book designer (see below) and an equally talented artist to prepare your cover. The book designer will be able to steer you toward a printer who does fine work.

 

As a public speaker, your events provide an ideal platform to sell your books. Hence, you have less need for the all-in-one printers/publishers/promoters (listed below) than other selfpublishers who have no built-in book-selling platform. Maintaining complete control of your book by contracting directly with a book manufacturer is the most profitable way to market your book.

 

There’s more to it than selecting who will press ink onto paper. To avoid delay, a few other things need to be in place by the time your manuscript is finalized.

 

ISBN. (International Standard Book Number) Even if you expect to sell your book only at your events, you should obtain an ISBN because you never know what opportunities may come your way.

 

Bookstores won’t touch a book that doesn’t have an ISBN printed on its back cover, neither will most of the so-called nontraditional outlets: gift shops, specialty stores, big box retailers, and so on.

 

Although some printers listed below will provide an ISBN as part of their printing service, I advise against this because all book orders will then go to them, not to you or your fulfillment firm. Contact isbn.org to obtain your own ISBN so you’ll retain control of your book. Allow a few weeks to get this done.

 

WHAT ABOUT BARCODES?

(This section (between the quotes) is by courtesy of Budget Book Design)

 

“The ISBN for your book is easily translated into a worldwide compatible bar code format called a Bookland EAN (European Article Number). Every bookstore chain and most smaller bookshops use bar code scanning at the checkout register.

 

Putting the bar code on your book is part of the book cover designer’s job, and it’s a simple one. Using a software program, the designer types in your ISBN and out pops the bar code in just the right place on your back cover. You can put your book’s retail price near the bar code on the back cover if you want to. Doesn’t mean retailers will always have to charge the full amount. Using their computers, they can tie your Bookland EAN code to a sale price, and that’s what will appear on the register when your book is scanned.

 

If you are using a bar code, it must be black or a color dark enough to be scanned. Keep this in mind when counting the number of colors on your cover.

 

Receive your barcode in less than 36 hours for only $25.00.”

 

COVER ARTWORK. Some printers have many stock covers you can choose among. However, these stock covers look canned to today’s sophisticated book buyers. Stock covers also lack much power to catch a prospective buyer’s attention. Since the cover influences most potential book buyers profoundly, paying for a good one is a sound investment. Many publishing professionals contend that a strong selling cover will double sales (most of the same people say a powerful title will double sales again). If you want something better than a printer’s stock cover, contact a graphic artist who specializes in book covers. Here are three highly talented cover design firms. All three have excellent websites you should check before making a decision.

 

Dunn+Associates Design

No one surpasses Dunn’s amazing portfolio of work, and I recommend this firm highly. www.Dunn+Associates Design.com

 

Hannus Design

dick@hannusdesign.com

I have referred clients to Hannus Design and they have all been pleased with cost and quality of the covers Dick created. He’s located in Massachusetts. He does the artwork for paperback covers, or the dust jackets for hardcovers.

 

1106 Design LLC

Michele DeFilippo, Owner

610 East Bell Road, #2-402

Phoenix, AZ 85022-2393

Phone: (602) 866-3226 Fax: (602) 866-8166

email: michele@1106design.com

This firm has an impressive portfolio of work to their credit.

 

BOOK DESIGN. John Reinhardt says, “I provide both the design and composition of the book. Proofs will be sent back and forth until the book is approved for printing. I then supply the printer with all of the necessary files, fonts, images, prepress info, and final set of laser proofs.”

 

John Reinhardt Book Design bookdesign.com

143 Grassy Brook Rd.
Brookline, Vermont 05345

email:john@bookdesign.com

phone:1-802-365-4909
toll-free:1-888-305-4710

fax:(802) 365-9273

 

Budget Book Design

9 Washington Ave.

Pleasantville, NY 10570

Phone: 800-754-7089

Fax: 914-741-6884

jg@budgetbookdesign.com

 

BOOK MANUFACTURERS/POD PRINTERS

Automated Graphic Services ags.com

AGS is located in Maryland. A California client of mine who had his book printed by AGS was delighted with the results.

 

Bang Printing bangprinting.com

Bang is located in Brainerd, Minnesota

 

PRINTERS/PUBLISHERS/PROMOTERS

The services offered by these firms vary. Check them out on the Internet to see if any of them seem to be exactly what you need. Then obtain their publishing agreement and review it carefully. Be sure to obtain your own ISBN from isbn.org so that you maintain control of your book.

 

Authorhouse.com

Booksurge.com

Infinitypublishing.com

iUniverse.com

Publish America.com

xLibris.com

 

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