Thread: Ebook - Publishing at Smashwords Results

This may be a long post but since it's my first, and I have been lurking around all year learning whatever I can from here, I wanted to give back what I have learned.

Last weekend I published my first ebook, Legacy of a King at Smashwords.com, but it took a lot of time to research where/how to publish an ebook and it was writingforums.com that led the way.

THANK YOU EVERYONE for posting your knowledge.

The most difficult process was the actual writing of my story but once it was time to upload, it only required the proper formatting of my Word document to successfully get it through the process.
My manuscript had very little formatting to begin with but the Smashwords Style Guide (a free download) is a step-by-step help-book that guides you through the process of formatting your Word document so it can pass through their "Meat Grinder" program. This program verifies that your manuscripts format can be read on all the eReaders so if your formatting doesn't pass this test then you may have to go back and correct the errors that it identifies before it can be uploaded.
The quickest way to remove any "hidden" formatting issues that the Word file may have is to copy all the text then paste it into a Text File like Note Pad (I did this and highly recommend it) then copy that text and paste it back into a New Word document and format it according to the Style Guide. It took about two hours to go through the Style Guide steps of formatting my manuscript but it passed through Meat Grinder the first time and was available for purchase within thirty minutes of trying to upload it.
Through Smashwords I also maintain 100% of the rights to my manuscript, it's mine, not theirs so I can take my RAW/Word file and upload it anywhere else I want.
However, when formatting the file for uploading at Smashwords there is info that MUST be added identifying it as a Smashwords Edition so these files that pass through Meat Grinder are NOT allowed to be uploaded anywhere else.
Smashwords is more like a distributor of efiles and they distribute to all the major ebook sellers, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Sony, etc, in many different formats and they make their money off a percentage of your sales. The price of your book is determined by you. I charge $3.99 and I earn a little over 3.00 off of a sale. I can also give it away for free if I want or offer a small percentage of the book for free. I offer 20% for free then the book must be purchased to continue reading.
I haven't seen a lot of info on ebooks so I hope some of this info helps someone else and I want to thank Smashwords for making the process easy for us.

Now I need to somehow get my book out in the publics eye so if anyone has any ideas on how to do that online please let us know.


Kevin Slaby

Interesting post and informative. I've read the Smashwords style guide and it seems very doable. Considered using them, but I understand that they don't support images very well. I'm still researching the whole process and appreciate you sharing your experience here. By the way, congratulations!

Thank You. I remember reading that in the Style Guide. I have no images in mine so I don't know how they look.

Kevin

Well, I found out that Kindle doesn't support graphics well, either. As it's meant to be a text reader, your images will all look gray scale in the Kindle.

Interesting. I've been looking into Smashwords as well, to publish my long awaited (by me, at least) novel. It is a great concept and they give you an ISBN number as well. The other place I'd check out is the Kindle store at Amazon. Smashwords doesn't yet use them. You can download at Kindle for a reasonable royalty; I believe they only ask that you don't underprice them elsewhere, ie at Smashwords.

I'm doing the very final edits now and should be attacking Smashwords and Kindle with my work in a week or so.

Originally Posted by J.R. MacLean

Interesting. I've been looking into Smashwords as well, to publish my long awaited (by me, at least) novel. It is a great concept and they give you an ISBN number as well. The other place I'd check out is the Kindle store at Amazon. Smashwords doesn't yet use them. You can download at Kindle for a reasonable royalty; I believe they only ask that you don't underprice them elsewhere, ie at Smashwords.

I'm doing the very final edits now and should be attacking Smashwords and Kindle with my work in a week or so.

Congratulations on getting it finished. I'll look forward to seeing it become available on Amazon. You'll find that Kindle require that you do not use an ISBN associated with a work that's published elsewhere so you'll need to acquire a separate one or publish the Kindle version without.

Thanks Baron.

Some considerable chunks of the journey have happened right here at WF, including meeting my editor Chris Miller. Guess I'll need two ISBNs because I would like to be on Kindle. I received one for a birthday recently and it convinced me that ebooks (and audiobooks) are the way of the future.

Originally Posted by J.R. MacLean

Thanks Baron.

Some considerable chunks of the journey have happened right here at WF, including meeting my editor Chris Miller. Guess I'll need two ISBNs because I would like to be on Kindle. I received one for a birthday recently and it convinced me that ebooks (and audiobooks) are the way of the future.

Once you get it online you can also promote it here. It's good to see that quite a few members are getting work out there.

Originally Posted by Baron

Once you get it online you can also promote it here. It's good to see that quite a few members are getting work out there.

This may be covered elsewhere, but what are the recommended means of promotion? Obviously one doesn't want to pollute the boards with hucksterism even if one were confident that many, if not most, readers would enjoy the work in question...

You can make a post in the Lounge to let people know you've published. There's no objection to active users doing that. If it's on Amazon I can also add it to the Bookstore and you can add it in the Classifieds section of the site. The link is on the main toolbar at the top of the page.

Congratulations on publishing. Both Smashwords and Kindle can handle images if they're inserted correctly - it's just that Kindle will display in greyscale on eReaders, due to the limitations of the eReader, and Smashwords will strip out images for some platforms - these are generally text-only, and therefore don't support images anyway. It's not actually down to a handling issue with either of the distribution channels; with Kindle it's a device limitation (hard to display colour images on an eInk device that physically cannot display colour), and with Smashwords it only cuts out images for copies of your book on text-only platforms that don't support images anyway.

Just a little follow-up regarding Smashwords. I did download my novel Waking Up Gilligan there and am quite pleased with their approach. I've only sold a handful, but realize it is up to me to generate interest. The good parts: easy conversion, the royalties at 80% are very worthwhile, and they have a direct link to podiobooks, which allows for spoken word presentation. I believe that this technology allows an author with something to say the potential to develop over time a worthwhile niche that could be quite profitable. Also, anyone can go and read the first chunk of your work for free in a number of download formats, including PDF.

On a side note, Amazon has just announced that it now sells more Kindle books than all the print ones combined. Futhermore, a self-published author- John Locke- yes, he does look suspiciously like the guy from LOST- has become the first of his kind to sell a million books on Kindle. At one point he was selling a book every 7 seconds, 24/7. Strangely enough he's come up with a $4.99 ebook on how to market your ebook. Yeah, the rich get richer. He's got my $4.99 anyway.

I plan to self publish an eBook at the end of May/early June.

On page 107 of Dan Poynter's Self-Publishing Manual Vol 2 is a page of 40 sites where you can have your book listed. Like Goodreads for instance.