Self-publishing does get a poor name, but if you do it right, people can’t tell unless they really look into it and research the imprint.  If you have a beautiful book that has been professionally made, edited, and put out into the world, being made available through professional channels, people don’t know, and many bookstores do carry books such as these.  Now, if you bring in a book that contains images that look like your granddaughter’s artwork with a lot of mistakes if it’s just not up to standard, it’s going to be highly unlikely that the bookstore owner will want to carry it.

While publishing and self-publishing has become easier and more mainstream, it also allows people to put out shoddy work.  There are a lot of people out there putting out work that’s not proofread or edited correctly.  That’s why self-publishing has gotten a bad name.  When you’re working with bookstores and libraries, if you can show that you’ve had consistent sales, and big reviews from Kirkus or Library Journal, that gives your book credibility.  You can absolutely self-publish and get into bookstores and libraries, but you must do it well.

Traditional publishing definitely has its perks.  After all, when you get published in this way you have a whole team working for you, and you have people advertising or marketing for you. Many traditionally published authors still have to market their books.  Although there are plenty of great aspects of traditional publishing, you do lose a certain amount of control over your work, but you have a team supporting you.  Self-published authors and indie authors can make it, as long as they avail themselves of the tools and publish well.

If you are self-publishing, you want to get your book up on Amazon and on KDP, but your book does need to be put together professionally.  A Library of Congress number is part of that.  If you aren’t eligible because you don’t have enough authors or books in your imprint, you would go with a PCIP (Publisher’s Cataloging-In-Publication) block.  We get ours from the Donohue Group.

Obtaining your own ISBN, making sure that your book has been edited and proofread, and having a professional cover created are all important aspects of self-publishing properly.  People who have even a little experience in publishing can quickly scroll through Amazon and pick out the covers that were created at home. There is a huge difference between the ones that self-published authors have paid to have created, and the ones that were created by a professional designer.  It’s critical that you find someone that knows about graphic design, not just art.  They need to understand book cover design. 

It’s so important that you stay up to date with the trends for up and coming book covers, and it’s also imperative that you create a book cover that looks like a book cover.  It’s very hard to do that if you aren’t in that field already.  Even if you are a graphic artist or an artist, it’s not the same thing.  You can be sure that professionals in the industry can tell the difference.  Your cover is so very vital.

You can publish with Amazon because they have a number of imprints.  At the moment there are 16 of them so you can actually publish with Amazon as a traditional publisher.  They have one of the largest and fastest-growing imprints out there.  However, putting your book up on KDP doesn’t mean that you published with KDP.  You published your book and put it up on KDP, which is a platform for selling your book.

When we talk about reputable and well done self-publishing, that means your book has a nice cover and it’s edited correctly throughout.  Publishing is the act of getting your book all together and putting it up appropriately.  You should have your book up on IngramSpark and offer the full market discount.  On IngramSpark your discount should be set at 55%.  A lot of people think, “Wow.  How can I sell a book at that high of a discount?”  By the time IngramSpark and Ingram take their cut, it’s only going to be a 40% discount for bookstores.

Bookstores have to buy their books, pay their overhead, pay their employees, and still make a profit.  So your royalty on an Ingram book that is going to retailers like bookstores and gift shops, is only going to be about $1 when you use print-on-demand.  That’s the standard, and that’s okay.  It’s okay because they are marketing it for you, and they are spreading your name.  Every time your book is on a shelf it’s an opportunity for new readers to find you.

Of course you want to upload your book to KDP for Amazon sales too.  You’ll make more in royalties if you upload directly to KDP. Amazon sells just under half of all the books sold in the U.S. so it’s a great platform. Do you want to sell your books on Amazon, but you don’t want to only sell them on Amazon?  To sell them elsewhere, like to libraries and bookstores, you must have a well-done book.  That’s making sure your book meets professional standards.

Part of this is making sure your layout is correct.  Recently we had an experience, here at New Shelves, with a book that had a beautiful cover and was well edited, but it did not have a professional layout.  The page numbers were not where they were supposed to be, and the lines were not justified.  The footnotes were not done right either.  That sort of thing kills a book. 

If you were to bring a book like that into a bookstore, and a bookstore owner flipped through the book and saw that, they would immediately say, “No, thank you.”  They won’t give you a second chance after that either.  It’s crucial that you pay attention to all of the details that the publishing industry expects to find in a book.

Guest post by Keri Barnum