brielleskye

Hi,

I'm really interested in self-publishing but I'm not sure how to go about it as far as getting an ISBN, barcode, getting it distributed and so on. Any advice or information will help. Thanks!

Mike C

Why? How much thought have you given it, why did you decide to self publish rather then go the traditional route, and have you given any thought to how you'll sell books?

It's all very pertinent stuff.

__________________
My writing
Photography
Web design for Writers
The Oddville Press

SeattleCPA

I don't remember where you get ISBNs, but I remember that you buy them in blocks of 10, 100 and so on. (I bet you can google on this.)

When you (internally) assign an ISBN to your book, you either yourself generate the barcode using the ISBN, price and maybe some other data... or you just have a service do it for a very modest price.

It was all very easy, as I remember it. (It's been five years or more since I published paper books.)

__________________
Steve Nelson, CPA, Dummies author
Downloadable Do-it-yourself Kits
limited liability corporation, forming an s corp and incorporating a business

lin

Much of this has been gone over before on this forum, try searching for threads using the SEARCH tab.

Tell us a little more about what you're planning and you might get some help.

Also, stop by SELF PUBLISHER'S PLACE and poke around, ask a few questions.

__________________

Non Serviam

If you're Canadian, it's free. If you're British, you'll pay for it. If you're American, you'll pay for it through the nose. Unless you use Createspace, who'll allocate you a free ISBN (though it's kinda fake).

__________________
Born naked, helpless, unable to care for himself and completely open-minded, Non Serviam has subsequently surmounted all these difficulties and gone on to become a decently-clothed, self-sufficient, close-minded sod.

brielleskye

I decided to self-publish because I eventually want to start my own publishing company. Someone suggested I form an LLC for my publishing company. As far as selling the books, I'm going to focus on the independent bookstores for now because I know they support independent publishers the most. Later on I want to try to get them in big bookstores but I'm not sure how that works. I've been told I have to contact a distributor. Anyway, thanks for the info and suggested links.

flashgordon

If you are going to start your own publishing company, buy a block of 10 ISBNs from Bowker (they administer the US ISBNs - cost about 200 bucks), then set up an LLC and use Lighting Source for your printing. That will get you into Ingrams, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Baker & Taylor, etc. It is the same printers that Random House and many others use these days.

If you go this route, you can get into independents and chains alike, but you will have to give a 40-60% discount (standard industry practice) and make sure there is enough demand for your books. You will also have to make them returnable.

Self-publishing is a great way to go, but just remember to really look into it and do your research. The rewards can be great, but it does require work.

__________________
Director: Bauu Institute and Press
Editor: Indigenous People's Issues Blog
Publisher: New Great Books Reviewed
Editor: Indigenous Peoples Issues & Resources

flashgordon

If you are going to start your own publishing company, buy a block of 10 ISBNs from Bowker (they administer the US ISBNs - cost about 200 bucks), then set up an LLC and use Lighting Source for your printing. That will get you into Ingrams, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Baker & Taylor, etc. It is the same printers that Random House and many others use these days.

If you go this route, you can get into independents and chains alike, but you will have to give a 40-60% discount (standard industry practice) and make sure there is enough demand for your books. You will also have to make them returnable.

Self-publishing is a great way to go, but just remember to really look into it and do your research. The rewards can be great, but it does require work.

__________________
Director: Bauu Institute and Press
Editor: Indigenous People's Issues Blog
Publisher: New Great Books Reviewed
Editor: Indigenous Peoples Issues & Resources

lin

Well, that advice is worth reading twice. Let me add that flash knows whereof he speaks. He's a moderator at Self Publisher's Place, by the way, and I repeat the invitation to take a look there.

A modern business model is to do as he suggests and publish your work...then start looking for other writers to join your "stable". You have those extra ISBN's and can essentially get somebody into print pretty cheap. How you share the income or how much, if any, you ask upfront from writers is up to you.

A variation on that would be a co-operative press with like-minded writers sharing expenses and contributing on promoting the websites and titles. Baron is doing something similar to that.

I did this with a poetry line similar to Ferlinghetti's City Lights Books, using cheap covers and Xerox pages years before POD came along.

This puts you in the position of being a businessman. Your success depends on how well you can do that. Many writers overlook that.

__________________

lin

Steve, do you really need and LLC for this? Can't you just be a sole proprietor, use your own SSN?

__________________

SeattleCPA

You can use an LLC for self-publishing... (and remember or note that I sell do-it-yourself kits for setting up an LLC so you might think I'd push this option)...

But I think, as Lin suggests, that you can just do this as a sole proprietorship using your SSN if you want...

An LLC with one owner, btw, is treated for US tax purposes as a sole proprietorship so setting up the LLC won't cause you any additional headache, work, etc.

But you also won't get much benefit either, IMHO...

Steve

__________________
Steve Nelson, CPA, Dummies author
Downloadable Do-it-yourself Kits
limited liability corporation, forming an s corp and incorporating a business

SeattleCPA

Another sort of related point:

Someone asked me this in a private message... (though person suggested I share answers/comments publicly)

"<Steve> I can repost these in the forum for your answers if you wish. If you don't mind two questions about pdf sales.
1. Do your pdf docs have links in them? If so, does that require more expensive pdf-rendering programs?
2. When you sell them, does paypal notify you of payment, then you ship them (or send a download password) or is there some automatic means of releasing the download upon payment?"

My pdfs do have links in them. I don't use anything special to do this. I just write and edit the documents in word and then use Word's Insert Hyperlink command. Bam. I'm done. (I just print or output the document to a pdf writer that came with some long-forgotten software program.)

Also, I use PayPal. In the beginning (when I would sell a copy every 2-3 days), I would just watch for the email message from PayPal notifying me that someone had paid. I'd then quickly email the person the pdf. (I would still recommend this option as the starter step.)

When the volume picked up a wee bit more, I started using www.payloadz.com, a service which basically takes care of the download for you. (They work with PayPal so that when someone pays, payloadz knows about it and then presents a web page to the buyer so they can download the pdf. Payloadz also sends the buyer an email message with a link the buyer can click to do the download.

Costs? I think PayPal grabs maybe 2-3%? And then payloads charges you a fee that in the beginning always sounds like it's slightly more than 2.5% but always seems to end up closer to 5%. Also, note that you'll have returns (maybe 1 in 20 buyers?)

I kind of figure I keep about 85% of what I sell... but that's pretty good as compared to the maybe 10% of the 50% wholesale price an author gets for a regular trade book.

Gotta run.

__________________
Steve Nelson, CPA, Dummies author
Downloadable Do-it-yourself Kits
limited liability corporation, forming an s corp and incorporating a business

Non Serviam

Re: Free .pdf creation programs

I heartily recommend OpenOffice.org.

If for some weird reason you still like to type stuff in Word, you can convert them to .pdf with a single click in OpenOffice. (OO will open a Word document).

If for some even weirder reason you don't want OpenOffice on your machine, you can convert word documents directly to .pdf using a free program called CutePDF. Find it on google.

__________________
Born naked, helpless, unable to care for himself and completely open-minded, Non Serviam has subsequently surmounted all these difficulties and gone on to become a decently-clothed, self-sufficient, close-minded sod.

brielleskye

can anyone explain why ISBNs are sold in blocks? I don't know so I'm not sure how many to purchase.


I posted a whole new message about ISBNs but I don't know how to delete threads.

SeattleCPA

I don't know why they're sold in blocks, but buying them ten or a hundred at a time is way cheaper (per ISBN) than buying them one at a time. Or at least, it used to be that way.

__________________
Steve Nelson, CPA, Dummies author
Downloadable Do-it-yourself Kits
limited liability corporation, forming an s corp and incorporating a business