'Vanity' press questions about publishing my own book (or booklet) cheaply.

Factual Questions
1

I have a rather large art tutorial website (nothing too artsy-fartsy, just about specific techniques). Anyway, I am starting to get some really good reactions from my web visitors, and one question that has come up more than once is “where do I get your book?” So, I’m looking into publishing a book. But I’m cheap (well, broke) so I can’t afford to spend more than $100-$250 on this right now. I think the book will be about 50-80 pages, will have a lot of pen and ink illustrations, along with halftone illustrations. Very little color, if any. (Maybe a color cover.)

I already have a pretty decent suggestion from a friend who does a lot of booklets and brochures for church. He has the inside of his brochures simply xeroxed, only having the cover printed a little more professionally (on an offset printer, I assume). He says that the benefit of this is that you can print more copies as you need them, and won’t be stuck with a lot of extra books (that you may not sell). I think I will probably take some of his advice, at least for now. (If this book thing takes off, then I’ll have it printed like a regular “book”.)

I’ve seen my friend’s brochures, they look fine, not fancy, but not screaming “cheap xeroxed brochure”.

I thought I’d ask some of the esteemed Dopers here if you have any experience with inexpensive vanity publications. I don’t even know how to start this thing. I have all my tutorials in HTML format, so at least the basic guts of the “book” are already worked out. But I really don’t know my way around a word processor (I just do simple letters) and I don’t know squat about any of this stuff! I suppose I need to learn, huh?

So, how would I start this? And, how much of it can be done digitally? I have made some very crude xeroxed brochure things in the past, where I used paste up techniques (this is before my computer) and I SUCKED at it. I’d much prefer to have almost everything done digitally (then printed out on a good printer) before the xeroxing is done. Can that be done? Am I making any sense here?

Any advice? Any alternative suggestions? My gratitude for all advice!

2

Have you considered actually trying to get it published “for real?” I mean, actually have someone else pay you money for it? If you don’t think you have something salable, then what about making a .pdf book that you can distribute online only? Or what about something like iUniverse.com?

3

I my gosh, throatshot - I had no idea that such a thing as iUniverse.com existed! It looks like it will be IDEAL for me (and will be within my budget!). And it will be all digital! (I will have to finally figure out how to use Word, though!)

Thanks so much for telling me about it!

4

A caution about iUniverse: they are a vanity press, not self-publishing. Also there is a strong possibility that they may go under, which means they’ll have your book until the bankruptcy court says you can have it back.

Still, in your case it may be an option. Just don’t expect to make any money on it; it’s likely you won’t make back your costs.

The fact that you will have no copies on hand is going to hurt your efforts to market it. In other words, if you print 100 copies yourself, you can hand the copies to people and have they pay you for it. You can put copies in bookstores on consignment and sell some that way. But if it’s POD on iUniverse, they’re going to have to go to the site – and no one will.

If you would like to get paid for your time and effort, do what your friend does and photocopy small batches. It’s a sure bet that no iUniverse title is ever going to earn you any money (and has zero chance of “taking off”).

5

Yup yosemitebabe I have to agree with Realitychuck iUniverse will not be much help to you, especially for what you are looking at doing. Why don’t you go onto the Writers Market Website and look around there for publishing tips, they have a wealth of information for the novice for those already published. I utilize them quite often for quick reference things. I don’t really know that much about publishing brochures but I am published and the site does help…:slight_smile:

6

Hm, sounds like RealityChuck and Phlosphr know more about iUniverse than I do. Maybe you should take their advice instead.

7

I’d chime in with throatshot’s first comment - why not try to get a real publisher interested in your work? That way, they pay you, which is the way it’s supposed to work. If you’ve got people already asking where they can find your stuff in print, that’s probably a good selling point (especially if, as I’d guess from your post, you’d be talking to a small-press and/or specialist publisher).

Failing that, self-publish - avoid the “vanity” publishers, find a printer (or go the web route and produce .pdf’s) and market the product yourself. You can’t rely on a vanity press to do any marketing for you.

8

Think very carefully about how much time you’re willing to put into this, what you want to get out of it, how much you enjoy the business end of publishing, etc.

I self-published two books:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0966604415

It was fun, but, boy, was the distribution end a LOT of work. Filling orders, sending them out, etc., was not a lot of fun. Soliciting distributors and dealing with their returns was even less fun.

If you do self-publish (and go the real way–getting an ISBN, etc.), try to hook up with Amazon.com’s Advantage program. It’s the least painful method to sell stuff, and you can just refer people to Amazon to buy your book.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/subst/partners/direct/direct-application.html/102-1208254-3693731
In an ideal world, you’d have someone else publish your stuff … but in reality, there’s thousands and thousands of authors who want to get their books published. It’s a tough, tough market.

What, exactly, do you hope to get out of publishing a book? Just the satisfaction of seeing it in print? Money? Are you more concerned about creative control (that’s why I self-published … plus I was getting tired of publisher rejections…)? Each reason may have a different publishing solution (printing and distributing a booklet yourself on the cheap; starting your own co. to publish a “real” book with an ISBN; soliciting other publishers to do it for you for no money; soliciting other publishers to do it for you and actually pay you…)

In all honesty, I think you’ll have a very hard time getting it printed for under $250. You MIGHT be able to get it done through a local print shop using a high-end photocopier (don’t scoff at that … the quality is often comparable to offset printing), but even photocopying can get expensive. Even at $0.05 per page, for 50 pages we’re talking $2.50 per book, not including covers, binding, etc. If you’re very careful and find a good printer who’ll work with you (or even a cheap photocopy joint!) you might be able to do it.

9

OK, OK, I am so glad I posted this question. Obviously there are a lot of options open to me! I so appreciate everyone’s advice!

I was really excited about iUniverse, until I got an email from them about my inquiry about graphics. I want a lot of graphics, and it’s just too difficult for them to publish the amount I want. So, that seems to be out. And, from what some of the rest of you have said about iUniverse, I’d probably regret going with them anyway.

I obviously need more help and information about what option is best for me.

To answer toadspittle’s question, I want to do this book because - well, it’s sort of busting to come out. When I wrote the website tutorials in a relatively short amount of time, it amazed me. I didn’t know I had all that stuff in me, but come to think of it, it’s been a long time coming. I’ve wanted to do this since I was very young. (So I guess there’s a part of me that feels compelled to do this!) I think I have a somewhat unique perspective on the topic I am covering, and I am guessing that my site visitors think so too. (Not that I am that great, or anything.)

It never occurred to me to get someone else to publish the book, partly because I want complete editorial control, partly because - well, it never occured to me! I guess that comes from having too many friends who are waiting to get their first script published (I know a lot of aspiring screenwriters) and I just don’t want to wait, and deal with all of that frustration.

I’m not terribly worried about making a profit right away, I just want to get the thing done. If I don’t take a terrible loss, that will satisfy me for now. I think I can spend a little more to publish my book (maybe $500) but I’ll have to wait a little longer. But that’s OK, I will need the time to edit the book. (I have some friends who will help me on grammar. I KNOW I will need help with that! ;))

Toadspittle: How do I get an ISBN number? I’d really want to get one, if it’s practical to do so. How did you go about getting your books published? (They look great, by the way.) I will definitely use Amazon’s Advantage program (thanks for the suggestion) if I ever get this thing published.

Any more information about approaching a small press? I am totally and utterly clueless. I will visit the Writer’s Market website and see what I can glean from them. Obviously I need a lot of further assistance and information before I can make this a reality!

10

ISBN info:

http://www.isbn.org/standards/home/isbn/us/application.asp

The application for 10 ISBNs (the minimum allowed) costs $225. Any “publisher” is eligible. If you call yourself a publisher, you are one. AFter the book is printed (or, while it’s at press, etc.) you’ll need to inform RR Bowker that you’ve assigned one of the ISBNs to a particular title. Read the FAQs on that site above.

You’ll also likely need an EAN barcode. There are links at that same site (in the FAQs, I think) that list some vendors who can print out a film master of the barcode. Basically, you need to have someone do it for you so that it actually works correctly when the checkout laser scans it. It’s not the sort of thing you can make up yourself in Adobe Illustrator (how I wish … ).

We published our books through Morris Publishing ( http://www.morrispublishing.com ). We REALLY wanted creative control, though, so we butted heads with them a few times, and they failed to correct some errors they introduced into our Quark files. So I don’t know if I’d RECOMMEND them, … but there they are. Morris may be best suited to people who don’t want to design the books themselves (we did) and don’t have a lot of illustrations (leaves you out, most likely), as they add expense.

11

If you put everything onto a CD that is readable
in HTML, you can produce the “book” for about
$2 each, and make them on your computer one at a
time. (Price includes label and sleeve/case.)

http://hotwired.lycos.com/webmonkey/02/06/index1a.html?tw=multimedia

gives a few details. You basically put your website on a CD.

12

Has anyone checked out virtualbookworm.com? My mom and I have a book that we want to get reprinted and we did some looking at publishers. Virtualbookworm.com seemed pretty reasonable. It is a print on demand, vanity press.

13

Daamn Toadspittle, it looks like people are selling your book for $55.00, are you getting a cut of that? (sorry for going off topic)

14

FYI:

http://www.draknetdigital.com

DrakNet Digital is having a pilot offering where you can get your title published free in exchange for helping them work out the kinks in their system. They’re only doing it for nine titles, though, so you’d want to submit soon.

DrakNet is my webhost, and I’ve been very happy with their service and staff, so don’t have any qualms about recommending them. Their digital publishing arm is brand new, and will likely have some kinks, but I doubt anything too headache-inducing (and they’re very friendly/helpful).

15

Hey! I am so glad I started this topic. Thanks to all of you, I have done some research and learned A LOT more (but obviously not everything). Toadspittle and everyone else, you are an inspiration to me! :slight_smile:

I have thought about it a lot, and I think that I may end up with vanity press (Print On Demand) after all. I KNOW that I don’t want to store all of my books around in boxes (I already own a big book collection), and I don’t want to deal with taking orders and shipping books. The little research I’ve done tells me that to truly self-publish would be outside of my price range, considering all the graphics I want for the book. Also, I’d probably have to do the paste-up thing if I went the high-quality xerox route (which wouldnt be a bad idea, in most cases). It wouldn’t be a problem to do paste up if all I had was text, but I have a LOT of graphics, so paste up sounds like a huge hassle.

So far, I think I’ve found something promising with http://www.llumina.com/. They don’t charge extra for graphics, their prices are within my range ($300). So far, Llumina.com seems to be OK. I discovered them from a “POD” review page, who gave them a pretty good review. And, they’ll throw in an e-Book too, do the ISBN and barcode thing. So far, I think I want to go with them, but since I will need a while to get my manuscript in shape, I have plenty of time to change my mind.

My recent “research” has taught me a lot. I didn’t know that these POD outfits were out there! And during my Internet searches, I’ve found some companies that seemed a little too “infomercial” or “Get Rich Quick”. Like they were running a scam. I feel sorry for anyone who thinks they’ll write their book and immediately get rich off of it. It’s obvious to me that a lot don’t. I am glad I have fairly low expectations! :smiley:

One thing that did encourage me was an article I read somewhere - it said that non-fiction books, covering some specialized topic that the author was an “expert” in were very good candidates for self-publishing. And that’s me. I figure that I’ll sell most of my books through links from my website. I’ll also probably get a few buyers from Amazon.com and BN.com who happen to be interested in the topic I am covering, and stumble upon my book listing. (In my not-so-humble opinion, the books on the topic I am covering are not a dime-a-dozen, and some of them aren’t very good. I am not going to be competing with 300 other books that cover the identical topic!) And, if the mail to my website is any indication, people seem to think I am explaining myself well, the information I give is helpful, my level of expertise is good, yadda, yadda. So I don’t feel like too much of a silly fool for wanting to do this.

Kaio: Wow! Thanks for the link! What a great opportunity! I doubt my manuscript will be done in time, but wow! I’ll see if I can meet the deadline!

DarkMika: virtualbookworm.com sounds really great, but they limit the graphics on a paperback book. Bummer. But if I decide to only do an e-book (and I might decide that, it’s too soon to know yet) then I’d definitely go with them!

16

As far as Draknet is concerned, you may want to take a look at This conversation

Like I say, you can try one of the PODs, but it’ll cost you less in the long run to actually self-publish: handle all the publishing yourself and don’t use a POD to “help” you.

17

Holy crap. Let me say

  1. no, I’m not getting a cut of that

  2. I can’t believe that anyone would buy it at that price … I mean, the book isn’t THAT good…

I have to tell Jon about this. Too funny.

18

chuckle go to the bottom of the DrakNet Digital page to see Jen disclaim any responsibility for editing. That’s why they hired a real editor. :smiley:

19

Well, this has all been so interesting! I have started to change my mind again - it’s obvious that I will have to do a lot more research before I make a final decision!

While using a POD is still an option, I worry about not being able to see the book in print before I pay my fee. If I knew that the printing process would handle all the graphics well, I’d be OK with it. But what if they look sucky? For this reason, self-publishing sounds better. But, I am not crazy about having those boxes of books, and handling orders, and all that. But maybe I’ll have to decide to cope with that.

I think what I might end up doing is getting an inexpensive e-Book first (virtualbookworm.com will do it for $50, including an ISBN number, which means it can be listed on Amazon.com). That’ll allow my site visitors to buy a copy, I can see what kind of reception I get, and maybe take more time to save up for a proper self-publishing.

Oh yeah, I ordered a much-touted self-publishing book, so I look forward to reading it, and finding out even more about this whole process!

20

Ummm… why not just use MS desktop publisher and break the book into chapter (files) and dump it on a good, high res 1200 DPI laser ( 500 - 600 or so investment) for the interior and use a nice color inket output on gossy paper for the cover. I assume you have the scanning hardware taken care of as you indicate this stuff is already on your web site. If not, email me and I can solve your high res scanner needs gratis if you’ll pay the shipping from MD. You can get some nice little lasers for as little as
$ 300.00 but they’re not really built for cranking out a lot of books.

Assuming you can find a reasonably good looking binding solution, your output cost per book, excluding the hardware investment, shouldn’t be more than a few dollars per copy as needed and you can have as many graphics as you want.