Gordon Burgett’s Newsletter
for Writers, Speakers, Publishers, and
Empire Builders
June 15, 2010
Goodbye Google Ad Words
I’m fed up with all of
the big webfirms that sell services but have no way
for their clients to get back to talk to a live, functioning,
able-to-do-something contact who speaks understandable English.
Most irksome is
Google’s Ad Words, which simply is too good (or virtuous or busy or greedy) to
even bother to tell me how I can contact them so they can rectify (an apology
is beyond my expectations) taking $100 from my account and spending it on a
discontinued ad campaign. Then have the gall to come back for more money!
So
goodbye, Google. Lulu is getting close to that DO NOT USE OR RECOMMEND list too,
and while I’m at it, I’m putting three more firms on my managed-by-arrogance,
my MBA, list. What kind of idiocy (or business model) proposes service to paid
clientele, then hides so those clients can’t find
them? Maybe the same kind of logic that says if your book is just sitting
around long enough, they will make copies of it (your property) and give it
away free to libraries!
--------
Why would you bother to write articles
any more?
Not too many years ago
that question, to me, would have been heresy since I put two daughters through
grad school by writing and selling articles, and selling them again, while
telling others how to do the same!
Yet I’m asked that
question more and more now. Understandably. The pay is
low, the query and prep time higher, newspaper markets are fleeing, more folks
are banging on the editor’s door, there are fewer second rights selling
outlets, and on a penny-per-minute ratio it alone is hard to justify.
Still,
if seen from a different perspective, articles are still big moneymakers. And they
are still the belt notches that show that you can write, have selling power,
and know the system. Here’s why I would include them in one’s writing packet:
*
Nothing gets out faster to the right eyes and points at your expertise better
than a niche piece that everybody in that field needs to know or know about. It
leads directly to you building on that copy through workshops, breakout
sessions, or seminars that the niche readers will attend and for which
associations will gladly pay well.
*
In the same vein, if you have a new book in print (or soon to be), articles are a great way to share your material. Tell in the bio slug
how the reader can contact your website or buy your book.
*
An article in print has long legs, and a reprint or copy can quickly expand the
depth of your credentials, resume, or digital bio (with link). The more
prestigious the publication, the longer the legs, although any printed article
trumps none, presuming it’s well written, honest, and is a testament to your
articulation.
*
One good article can lead to many related pieces, which in turn become a book.
Or prove your expertise, which is the stuff from which committee membership,
consultation, association leadership, and requested collaboration often come.
A
last thought: don’t just think of 2,000-word masterpieces. Think of four
500-word masterpieces. If positioning is the best tender for your articles,
these have a far better chance of being used—and of putting your name, words,
thoughts, and help in front of four times as many eyes.
--------
Will I offer new manuscript services for
ancillary-published books?
Since the bound copy
of How to Get Your Book
Published Free in Minutes and Marketed Worldwide in Days has crept into
the general selling market, I’ve had a surprise bevy of questions about whether
I will offer editing services to help would-be publishers prep and submit their
books to (and publish through) LSI, Lulu, CreateSpace,
Blurb, and Smashwords (to get into Kindle and iPad). Three immediate responses:
(1) It costs a lot
less, and is fastest, if you buy (or at least read) my
new book to see if you need help at all. It’s written to make all of that
quickly doable and free by you!
(2)
Yet I know there are cases where it’s wiser and much faster to get professional
help so you can focus your time elsewhere, where your uniqueness is far more
valuable. So yes, I will help a couple of new clients at a time.
(3)
I see my help particularly valuable in strategizing an empire built around a
book published many ways, with support products and services integrated early
into that empire. That and my possibly helping ease the books
through the ancillary publishing venue(s) faster.
My
problem is time since I’m already doing this kind of consulting often and
enjoyably for standard non-fiction to-be publishers through my Pathfinder program, plus other
publishing and speaking.
This
new kind of manuscript service, for ancillary publishing, will be rather
customized at the outset until I see who needs what! If you are exploring this
kind of assistance, let me know what you have in mind to see if I’m the right
person, how I can help you best realize your goals, and what that might cost. All in strict confidence, of course.
I
will likely define the program more fully in coming newsletters, after I know
where it works best.
--------
You may need more book cover artwork now
It’s certainly easiest
when we just send a book to another publisher for them to publish. All they
want is our book text in some sensible Word format, and from that they will
create the interior design and the book cover. Oh yes, our suggestions about
what that book should look like will fall on profoundly deaf ears, they won’t
pay us much or often, and they will also change our title!
One cure is
self-publishing and/or working through ancillary publishers. But then we are
responsible for the cover artwork. If we publish through Lulu, CreateSpace, or Blurb, we can create acceptable covers
through each, though they will differ from each other.
So most of us will
probably have a cover designer create a cover that can be adjusted a bit from
the bound book to the digital version, to which an ISBN and the appropriate
price can be added, if needed. That way the same book can be published by many
houses and it will have the same external appearance.
Yet
to do that you now need many different cover files from your designer.
Not
too many years back, I only needed two kinds of covers from my cover designer:
a full cover .jpg (front, back, and spine) and a front cover (also .jpg) for
the digital version. When it came to promo materials, mostly fliers and cover downloads,
I also requested .pdf copies of the both covers.
These were in addition to the designer sending the approved cover artwork to
the printer. He called his counterpart, I presume, at the printing firm so that
when I sent my book text as an email attachment (in .pdf
format), he also sent the cover(s) the same day so
that both were linked to the same proof!
Lately,
with ancillary publishers added to the submission mix, we also need cover files
that are 600 pixels or larger (up to 1,000 pixels is fine) so the covers can
also be used (and easily read) in thumbnail formats.
That’s
the core of the work-for-hire agreement I have with a cover designer: possible
designs for the cover, my selection, my final artwork OK, its submission to the
primary bound book printer (I will submit it to the ancillary houses), and the
additional files mentioned above that I keep on disc and at the book file on my
computer. That way, with the choices at hand, I can paste and submit as needed
without becoming a pest.
Some
add postcard and
bookmarker artwork in the same package. A friend also has poster art included.
Ask cover designers you are considering if they have any other cover file ideas
they can add to the package.
--------
A good free source for book publishing
and marketing info
CreateSpace (from Amazon.com)
offers a monthly webinar, usually by my friend and
marketing guru Brian Jud. (We co-presented a niche
marketing program a couple of years back to the then
You
can see Brian’s last six webinars, with their
valuable download handouts at their respective links, in the CreateSpace newsletter archives.
In
How to Get Your Book
Published Free in Minutes and Marketed Worldwide in Days I explain,
step-by-step, how you submit your book to CreateSpace
(and six other houses) for ancillary publishing.
CreateSpace also conducts
frequent polls of those whose books they have published and are selling. The
most recent poll asked “What has been the most successful means for promoting
your (book)?” So far, 64 answered this way: social networking 30%, word of
mouth 25%, own website or blog 16%, press releases
and media outreach 5%, paid ads 2%, other 2%, and none at trade shows.
An
earlier poll, with 139 respondents, asked “How long did it take you to complete
your work, from concept start to available for sale?” The replies: under 3
months, 19%; 3-6 months, 14%; 6 months to a year, 20%; 1-2 years, 14%; 2-5
years, 19%; 5-10 years, 8%, and 10+ years, 6%. One factor must be added: the ancillary
publishing outlets, like Create
Space, have only been available for a couple of years. Earlier, it was
considerably more difficult and expensive to publish your own book, and that
must have had a negative effect on quick completion. That is, those who took
the longest may not have known what they could do to put it in print. No such
excuse now.
Best
wishes,
Gordon
Burgett