Publishing For Profits Checklist

I am an admitted planner and management tool nut. I have about 7 business planners. I have appointment managers. I have the best books, software, notebooks and planning systems from Franklin Covey, Day Runner and just about anyone else on the market.

I have a lot of things to balance -- ministry, family, business, golf ... usually in that order :o) and I need planners and reminders to keep me on track.

Emphasis is on the REMINDERS.

I even have a software program that sends me emails each day reminding me of important appointments and activities.

Reminders are a good thing. Sometimes they jar us back to reality like a bone-shaking tackle by a middle linebacker, but, still, they are a good thing.

And publishing this article has been a "good thing" for me. It's been a reminder. A reminder of the important things about publishing.

You see, if we're not careful, we get into a "rut" when it comes to publishing, specifically in publishing our NEWSLETTERS. While I am no longer publishing an ezine, opting to devote my content to articles, reports and mini-courses, many of my subscribers ARE newsletter publishers.

So, I've put together this "checklist" of reminders that I have personally experienced during the past few days as my focus has been refreshed.

Ask yourself these 5 questions before publishing your next newsletter issue...

1. Are you PASSIONATE? One of the things that has drawn me to blogging is the amazing passion of most bloggers. Those who publish a blog are usually those who just love to talk about their particular interest. It's what they talk about when they are OFFLINE. It's what they think about. It's a part of their lives. And they just want to share it with anyone who is willing to listen.

When newsletters "began", that was driving force... passion. And, for many, the passion is still alive. And they'd publish their ezine even if they only had a handful of subscribers who were mostly relatives. Doesn't matter. If someone is willing to listen, they'll talk via a newsletter.

The focus isn't on the "numbers" (I.E. How many subscribers do I have on my list) but rather is on the "topic", the thing that they can't seem to get enough of, or give enough of.

What about you? Is the passion still there?

2. Are you PERSONABLE? Spend enough time here and you'll get to know me. More than what I KNOW as a marketer, you'll learn about what I BELIEVE as a fellow human. You'll also get to know about me and my life. Maybe more than you want to know. You'll learn that I am a committed Christian, that I absolutely love to play golf, I have a wonderful wife and little boy and I can quote just about every episode of the Andy Griffith Show.

And, to the great dismay and terror of my buddy Ryan Deiss, I will occasionally eat a potted meat sandwich.

See, I told you it might be more than you want to know. :o)

The point is this: we're going to connect. Sooner or later, you'll get to know me. And I'll become a part of your life, hopefully as a good, positive source of encouragement and guidance.

I don't hide behind a mask. I don't pretend to be something that I'm not. You get the real me. There will be times you love me, there will be times you won't love me as much. But, one thing will be certain, you'll see a real person that you can connect with.

More than a publisher, I'm a person.

That's what folks want. They don't want a "newsletter publisher" sending them mailings every week. They want a "newsletter person" who will be real with them. Someone who can be personal. Someone they can relate to.

Someone like themselves.

Will you be that person?

3. Are you PROVIDING? Let's be honest here: the only thing that will BRING YOU BACK to a site is whether or not you feel like you have gained something in going there. If you've been educated, you'll be back. If you've been entertained, you'll be back. If you have found something to be beneficial to you, then you'll come back over and over again. And you'll stay as long as you continue to gain something.

Newsletters should PROVIDE something to their readers. And that's QUALITY content. That's something that either EDUCATES or ENTERTAINS. Or, preferably, BOTH.

As a publisher of a newsletter, do you give of yourself to your readers? More than just trying to get them to buy something or do something... are you doing something for them?

4. Are you PROVOCATIVE? Learn this truth right now: the most read newsletters are the ones who are hosted by the most opinionated authors. Those who stand up and share their thoughts, even when those thoughts are controversial and go against popular opinion will always get attention.

Working With Major Publishing Houses

Publishing a book is one of the best ways to build credibility and gain exposure. Not only can it position you as an expert in your field but it could also open the door to entirely new opportunities just because you are now an author. Indeed, almost any author will tell you the best thing they ever did was publish their first book.

There are three primary options for getting your book published. The easiest way is to self-publish the book yourself, meaning you complete the work and send it to a printer. Done. The second option is to use an independent publisher. These are legitimate publishers but they’re smaller than the big boys and tend to specialize in one area or another. The last option is the most ambitious and it involves the industry majors like Penguin and Random House.

Any aspiring author would prefer to get their book published by a major publishing house. It gives you far more credibility and enhances your chances of selling the book once it’s on retail shelves. But getting one of the big publishers to publish your book is no easy task. There are a number of things you need to keep in mind before you even get started.

Most importantly, the big publishing houses only work with proven authors. That means it’s extremely difficult to get them to work with you on your first book. They want to know you’ve successfully sold books before. And if it’s your first book, you better have an impressive platform and an audience you can easily tap into to promote sales. Bottom line; they don’t really care what your book is about. Their top priority is your ability to sell it.

The big publishers generally don’t deal directly with the author anyway. They prefer to deal through Literary Agents. These are basically screeners who receive hundreds of book proposals each month and sift through them looking for those with real potential. Getting a Literary Agent is step one if you hope to get your book published by one of the big publishing houses.

A great way to find Literary Agents is to go to a book store and find books similar to the one you’d like to write. Then look at the acknowledgments. In most cases, the authors will thank their agents in that section and you can simply make note of their names and then look them up on Google. Then contact them and see if they’re accepting new proposals.

Book proposals for the big publishing houses are generally quite large. It’s not unusual for the proposal to be 100 pages long. In fact, you’re almost better off writing the entire book ahead of time and then putting the proposal together afterwards. You’ll end up including a sample chapter in the proposal anyway and there are plenty of other things it should include. You can find more information about what needs to be included by doing a Google search for book proposal.

Getting your first book published by one of the industry majors is difficult but it’s not impossible. Do your research on the front end and learn how the system works. That will be your greatest asset when starting the process. You can find a lot more tips and tricks for getting books published on my website and I hope you take advantage of the free information available there.

Web Publishing

Till last year, if you weren't someone.something.com , you were perhaps still somebody. Today, if you don't have an Internet address, you are nobody. The Web address has become more of a business necessity than just a prestige issue for organisations. Corporate houses are looking at the World Wide Web as another medium for advertising their presence.

For institutions and public sector organisations, it is a new mode of disseminating information about themselves. For individuals, it is a meeting point. It's time to take a look at how you make yourself present on the Web. Not as a viewer or browser, but as a publisher.

Need for a Web Page

Sensing the urge of the companies to be present on the Web, over the past two years, a new breed of Web service providers have come up. These "publishers" offer corporate houses the facility for putting up pages on the Web. While they are still a small number, countable on a few fingers, they indicate a trend among businesses of regarding the Web as an advertisement medium, at the very least.

For public sector and nonprofit organisations, the Web represents a medium to disseminate information about themselves. And for newspapers and magazines, the Web is yet another medium of expression.

Quite many reasons for you, as a private individual or if you own a business--even a small office/home office--or for your corporation, to think of venturing onto the Web.

Once the decision is made, you need to consider about the infrastructure and tools required for putting up a home page on the Web.

Ways and Means

To become part of the World Wide Web, you could either set up a Web page yourself, or let your company's IS team handle it, or outsource the job to a Web service provider. While the decision to set up a site (or page) on the Web could be a business decision, designing a page is not. For that you need application development skills, a good eye for design, and most importantly, a good idea of what it is you want your site to convey.

If it is to be a personal home page, all you may need to post could be information about yourself, photographs of your family, and so on. For instance, a fruit-seller from Singapore has a home page on the Web, which gives the advantages of eating jackfruits, the price of jackfruit, et al.

This is a project that you could handle with your word-processor, if it has a Web publishing module as an add-on. Microsoft Corp.'s Word 7 for Windows 95, Word Pro 96 and Corel WordPerfect 7 are some packages that provide Web publishing modules as add-ons. Their advantages are that they are simple to learn. Finally, they are familiar to work with, since the toolbars and menus are identical.

Using the word-processor, you can create pages that include text, graphics, similar to the documents (reports, presentations) you would create in the ordinary way. These conversion utilities do well for lengthy documents that are primarily text, for inserting drafts, or for preexisting text documents.

Certainly the use of a conversion tool makes a rational step in handling long text documents. But these conversion tools do not necessarily get the job done completely, and additional HTML editing may be necessary. About the HTML editing or authoring tool, a little later.

Book Publishing From A Book Publisher's Point Of View

Many writers aspire to write books. Writing a book is a long, involved, difficult process. Book publishing is harder. A writer may submit his book repeatedly only to be turned down. The writer may eventually succeed. Wouldn't it have been easier to get published the first time? Is that possible?

You can improve your chances of a publisher accepting your book manuscript if you understand more about what happens at the publisher's desk. Book publishers are busy people with several projects bombarding their desks every day. They must decide quickly about what will sell. They must also delegate their time efficiently to keep the business running. Only occasionally do publishers actually seek out work. Let's look at a typical work day of a publisher to help you understand book acceptance and book publishing.

PERSIST AND PERSEVERE

Writers must be persistent. Regardless of how many times a publisher rejects your book manuscript and throws your ideas in the trash, you have to keep going back for more discouragement. Eventually you'll make it in the door. If you can get all the way through, you will finally get to a place where publishers accept more of your work. When working with a book publisher, the rule is the same. If you have a book that you know will sell, you must persevere to get the publisher's attention. Most likely, you will be sending excerpts of your book, not the entire book, to a publisher. As you continually send your manuscript or book excerpts to publisher after publisher, you should try to market it in different ways. Publishers seek a particular kind of writing; they will dismiss anything that doesn't meet their criteria and high standards. Variation in your marketing techniques may turn a rejected book into an accepted book.

WHAT DO BOOK PUBLISHERS WANT?

Book publishing is a strange business. People's tastes are somewhat fickle. A book publisher has to keep up with what kinds of books will sell. It seems mysteries will always have a place on the bookshelves. Crichton and Grisham may tie up the book market until they are finished. That is just one example from one genre of books. Publishers have to keep track of what is selling in all areas of literature. The best way for you to get your work noticed is to make it look similar to what is already selling in the marketplace. Be careful not to imitate style or voice of another author. Write with your own unique words while imitating the use of popular public opinion. Another way to improve your chances of getting published is to find out who's publishing what.

ARE YOU MARKETING TO THE RIGHT PUBLISHER?

Some publishers specialize in a certain kind of writing. If you are writing a novel, you'll look stupid (and get rejected) if you send it to publishers who publish technical manuals. How do you find out who is the most likely candidate to publish your work? There are reference manuals, such as Writer's Market, at your library that will tell you who's publishing what and what publishers are seeking. It will contain valuable information leading you to children's book publishers, novel publishers, and textbook publishers. If the handbook at your library is not up to date, your next option is to check out the new releases and best sellers rack at the bookstore. Buy a few books and read them. You'll have a much better feel for the book market as a consumer first, and book writer second.

Book publishing is difficult to break into. It can be helpful to approach the issue from the direction of the publisher. Before you submit your manuscript again, improve your chances of acceptance by following these tips:

1) Change your marketing style so that you grab attention;

2) Make sure you are a book consumer yourself. You'll get a better feel for what's selling and what a publisher will buy. You'll also find out who is publishing which types of books.

3) Finally, by buying the product you are trying to sell, you will improve the book economy all together. Publishers need to see people buying books before they can commit to publishing more.

Many authors begin their careers with the single goal of getting their book published by a reputable publisher. Book publishing is difficult to accomplish. It takes many months of work and extensive preparation. Writing a book involves intricately woven ideas. A book is a project, and it may contain many other projects that involve research, development, and marketing. Most authors are disillusioned about the intensive process of creating a full, coherent book. Writing a book and finding a publisher is like nothing you have ever done before. It will take extensive and intensive work and development. It will also probably include much of everything you know, and more.

Make Money With PPC Publishing In 5 Easy Steps

PPC publishing is one of the greatest and easiest way to make money online which involves minimum risk. Let us see how we can go about this simple money making method in 5 easy steps. However you must have the basic knowledge of building a website, using some HTML editor like FrontPage, web hosting services and any good FTP program. These are very simple programs and you can learn about them without much difficulty.

1. Find a Niche.

The first step is to select a niche topic for the website. Niche topic is preferred as it has lesser competition. A niche is a subset of any main topic or subject, for example if 'gardening' is a main topic then 'bonsai' could be a niche. It is desirable that you are already knowledgeable in the niche or at least have great interest in it. This will make your job more enjoyable.

2. Decide a domain name

Search for keywords relevant the niche, starting with some basic keywords and then using some keyword tools like overture, google, keyword discovery or any other keyword tool. Sort out the keywords which have some moderate search volume or at least have some search volume. Placing them on a notepad, remove the spaces between words and have one keyword in a line. Copy the entire list, paste them on an excel sheet, sort it alphabetically. This way it is easier to find and delete duplicate entries. Next open the page in some hosting site like 'Yahoo small business' to check the availability of the domain name (.com) for each keyword, with no spaces between words. If you find a domain name available, check for the number of search result pages in say Google search. If the number of SERPs are around 1-2 million, that is a good candidate for a domain name for us, as it will be easier to optimize the homepage.

3. Build the website.

After registering the domain name, get it hosted and build the homepage, keeping the keyword density of 4-20%. Similarly build 4-5 pages with other relevant keywords. Apply for a PPC publishing if you are not a member already. Place PPC ads at prominent places on the pages like on top, left and bottom portions of the pages. Link all the pages with one-another using a menu. Add contact details and a sitemap. It is important to place PPC ads only on pages where there are some content.

4. Advertise the website

Now the website is ready. It is time get some free traffic to it. Use all known methods to build back links to your website, like submitting in website directories, placing ads, writing and submitting articles, book marking, participating in relevant forums etc. Within 2-3 months you should see the result of your hard work. You can be earning a few dollars daily from this website if your site reaches the first page of search result for the main keyword. You can also add some of your relevant affiliate links to earn more in event of possible sales.

5. Welcome the profits.

Repeat the above steps and build 1-2 new websites every month. In a few months time you will be pleasantly surprised to see the outcome of your efforts. Eventually you may become addicted to building more and more websites and see the profits rolling in.

Free Ebook Publishing Guide

The Current State of the Market

In my first article, I outlined the massive advantages to eBook publishing, particularly for the author! Now you have become excited by that, it is time to inject a little realism! Ever since the emergence of personal digital assistants (or ‘PDAs’) and the growth of the Internet, market enthusiasts have been predicting the ultimate demise of the printed book.

This is, of course, nonsense! Traditional books do not require a power supply or batteries and can be read even when badly damaged (so called “graceful degradation”). Printed pages have better contrast and fonts are serifed, to aid the eye in scanning the text. Readers do not need technical skills or expensive and fragile devices to access them. Traditional printed books are here to stay!

Over time – and as technology improves – some of these differences will be eroded. However, at the moment, eBook sales are still only a tiny fraction of overall book sales wordwide and electronic publishing remains a very immature industry. There are many companies, testing different possible business models. There are also competing software formats and handheld device manufacturers (as well as traditional PCs). This diversity will, in the short term, hamper progress.

Future Growth Prospects

It is also wrong to dismiss eBooks as an idea that will never take off (as several industry stalwarts seem wont to do). Why? Well, because that fact is that (a) eBooks are already doing pretty well and (b) the major players are still investing!

Lightning Source, the eBook distributor used by Amazon in the US, sold its millionth print-on-demand book in April 2004. Try telling them that it’s an idea that’ll never work! In 2005, Amazon recently bought French company Mobipocket from Franklin for $2.5 million (to distribute eBooks) and BookSurge.com (to cover print-on-demand books). Look at the Amazon PageRank of eBooks on Amazon’s site and you might be surprised how well many are doing!

In fact, eBooks are particularly suited to the distribution of business, computing and academic works (with a small but high value niche market). They have also proved to be a viable complimentary channel for popular mass-market paperback titles. Members of the Open eBook Forum (OeBF) reported $3.2m of sales in Q3 2004, a 25% increase over the same period in 2003. The equivalent volume increase was 11%, so eBooks are commanding higher prices as consumer acceptance grows.

Features of the eBook market

At a basic level, one can distinguish five main components to the emerging ePublishing market:

1) Free distribution - epitomised by Project Gutenberg; started in 1971 (in the very earliest days of the internet) and now maintained by an army of volunteers. At time of writing, there are 16,700 free etexts in it’s catalogue and approx. 1.8 million downloads a month. Top 20 downloads include the War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells and Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Peer-to-peer (free and generally illegal) distribution using Internet Relay Chat (IRC), Usenet and file sharing software (like Kazaa, BitTorrent & Limeware) has yet to take off in the book market as it has in recorded music. It might be easy to burn MP3s from a CD, but scanning a book, page-by-page to create a text file is beyond the skills and patience of almost everyone! Everyone, that is, other than the dedicated volunteers at Gutenberg!

2) Own distribution - all about selling your eBooks via your own website. I recommend this option as a complementary channel to Booksellers, Distributors and Aggregators. At the basic level, you register a domain name via a hosting agency (e.g. 1&1 Internet Ltd) and create some pages using Net Objects Fusion or similar design software. PayPal is emerging as the simplest and most widely accepted payment interface (with 71 million users worldwide).

3) Bookseller distribution - the biggest and most confusing component of the marketplace. At one end of the spectrum is the online equivalent of the traditional ‘vanity publisher’ companies; where you are charged an up-front fee to list your book but then get 100% of the sales receipts. Examples include ebookpalace.com and ebookomatic.com. With Alexa PageRanks over 170,000, there are just not enough users regularly visiting these site to make them worth your while (especially when one excludes the hapless authors admiring their works).

In the middle of the spectrum is the royalty bookseller who does not levy an up-front charge but instead pays you a %age royalty on each eBook they sell for you. Examples include lulu.com, ebookad.com and cyberread.com. Unlike some less reputable operators, Lulu do not levy hidden up-front charges on top of royalty percentages. They also generate reasonable web traffic, with an Alexa rank of 5,421 – so I would consider Lulu but ditch the rest in this category.

Writing & Publishing Tips

Top literary agents get about 400-1000 unsolicited queries every month from hopeful book authors. Publishing houses sometimes juggle 5000. Most of my private clients and participants in my seminar, How To Get A Six-Figure Book Advance, ask me “how is an author supposed to get an agent’s attention when there is so much competition?”

First of all, don’t write a book -- write a book proposal. Publishers buy ideas not books. To capture a reputable literary agent’s attention you’ll need to show that you’re a media star, or a star in the making. Good writing can be bought but star power can’t.

Here are 5 more tips to landing a top literary agent & a six-figure advance:

1. Do your research.

Literary agents specialize in very specific interests. For example, my agent loves tearjerkers but won’t take on books that involve children in peril. You want an agent who has represented books similar to yours, who sells books on a regular basis, who is devoted to you, and has the time to give you a little guidance through the literary labyrinth.

Sometimes a newer, less experienced literary agent who is hungry for business is more dedicated and has more time to spend with you than an established one with a reputable cadre of authors. I recommend 2 ways to find the literary agent right for you:

- Look in the acknowledgements of books similar to your topic. A happy author always thanks his literary agent. Once you’ve located your ideal agents become familiar with their tastes, learn everything you can about their interests, pet peeves and preferences, and review their websites for submission guidelines. Show that knowledge in your query letter or initial phone conversation.

- Read Publisher's Weekly, Publisher’s Lunch, and Variety to see who sold what and for how much. You will get a sense of an agent’s sensibility and be able to speak knowledgeably about the types of books they prefer when you know what’s happening in the industry in general and in your area of expertise in particular. You’ll know more than most people who submit proposals as you’ll be apprised of books that aren’t even published yet and movie deals in the making. And you’ll get a sense of market trends.

2. Write a book proposal that reads like a thriller.

After you’ve located the agents you want to approach, the next step is to complete your book proposal. Once interested by your call or query letter the very best literary agents move at hyper speed. They’ll want to see your book proposal--now. They’ll either ask you to Fed Ex or email it.

There is a real art to writing a best-selling book proposal that makes the literary agent you’ve chosen say, “I want this person as a client”. To make your book proposal read in one sitting you’ll want to write in short paragraphs with strong headlines. Be sure to give the chosen agent an immediate impression of how your book will read by writing the proposal in the same style as your book.

Find unusual, quirky, provocative tidbits about your subject that will entice the literary agent to say, “Wow, I never knew this.” Imagine the kind of tips that a terrific magazine article would include. When an editor at a top New York publishing house is reading your book proposal they are thinking, what kind of media exposure will we be able to get for this book? Can we get magazine feature articles, newspaper pieces, radio shows? Will the subject matter and the author interest the producers of Good Morning America, the Today Show, CNN, or Oprah?

3. Prove you have a platform.

The one thing that thrills a New York publisher the most is your platform. Your platform is simply your reach. How many people are influenced by your ideas worldwide? To simplify this even further, a publisher wants to know one thing and one thing only (once they are interested in the subject matter of your book), and that is...how many books are you going to sell and to whom. You’ll need to demonstrate that you’re a great media guest, that you have an audience eager to snap up your books and that you have a proven track record for selling your books or wares.

4. Reveal how your past performance predicts future behavior.

Map out each venue and determine how many people are in attendance and how many of those people will buy your book. Include workshops, seminars, fairs, media appearances, book signings, keynotes, teleseminars, webinars, events, newsletter lists, blogs, partnerships etc. Quantify everything in great detail. Estimate and base potential sales on past sales you’ve completed.

5. Show you are the one.

Show that there is a clear need for your book and that you are the only one who can write it. In other words what problem are you solving and why are you the undisputed expert? What gap in the market are you filling? One of my clients whose topic was about how to be the very best at what you do and who you are, had a black belt, was a concert violinist and had given seminars at The White House. She walked her talk, and lived her words. You need to have top-notch skills in order to gain the interest of a high caliber literary agent.