Freelance Writing & Business Communication

Print on demand: Self-publishing getting started primer

With the growth in Print on Demand (POD), public speakers, seminar leaders, consultants, trainers, financial planners, real estate agents, lawyers, nutritionists and fitness experts, cooks and chefs, people who have lived interesting, and not so interesting, lives, are all self-publishing non-fiction books like never before. Creative writers are using POD to self-publish novels and collections of short stories and poetry. In short, we are in the midst of a POD publishing revolution.

Just what is POD?
Print on demand, sometimes called publish on demand, is a system of printing very small runs of a book (as few as one copy). Books are not printed until an order has been received. This means authors do not have to carry a basement full of inventory; instead, they can order a few books when they need them. Readers can order books online or from the author; the POD company prints the book upon receiving the order and ships it. In some cases, it can make an electronic copy available for downloading. It is not economical to print single copies of books using letterpress and offset printing; POD uses digital printing.

While POD is growing exponentially, allow me to say this upfront: If you want to find the best possible price for printing your book, don’t use POD. Find a printer that can give you a decent break on printing a large quantity of books. However, if you don’t want to carry inventory (or you only want to carry a modest inventory) and you want potential readers to be able to order your books, one at a time, when they are ready to buy, use POD.

Note: If you are thinking of writing a non-fiction book, consider purchasing: How To Write A Non-Fiction Book in 60 Days. As the book title implies, it will help you write a solid first draft of your non-fiction book in 60 days.

What is your purpose?
Before you write, let alone publish, a book, you should determine your purpose. If you want to write a book that you will give to family and friends, using a low-cost or no-cost POD publisher might be right for you. If you want to sell books, but profit is not an issue (getting your message out is more important than making money), you will want to go with the POD company that gives you the widest possible distribution. You will also need to have an effective marketing strategy in place — one that gets your message out to your target audience (the people most likely to be interested in the topic of your book) If you want to sell books at a profit, then you need to look at every possible cost. Your goal will be to minimize costs so you can maximize revenue.

Mind you, if you really want to make money selling books, you will want to:
- minimize costs so you can maximize revenue
- go with the POD company that gives you the widest possible distribution at the best possible price
- have an effective marketing strategy in place.

In other words, if you simply write a book and hope people will find out about it and buy it by the truckload, you may be setting yourself up for disappointment. Having said that, writing and self-publishing a book can feel like a real accomplishment, and every sale is a joy giving you a sense of self-fulfillment.

There are three basic ways to get books published:
– Find a publisher who pays you an advance and does all the work but the writing. “The work” generally includes the final edit/proofreading, page layout, cover design, printing (sourcing the printer), distribution and some marketing. It’s not impossible to find a publisher but it is difficult to do so (and becoming more difficult) unless you have some kind of writing/publishing track record.
- Find an agent who looks for a publisher for you and takes a cut of your royalty. It can be difficult to find agents who are actively seeking new clients but they are out there. Beware of fraudulent agents who charge you a reading fee and suggest revisions, but never find you a publisher.
- Use Print on Demand. This is for those who can do the page layout and design the cover themselves, or can find friends or fee-based (professional) to do the design work.

There are three main types of POD:
- Fee-based. You pay $1,000 or (considerably) more to get your book into the POD system. It will be sold direct to the public through the POD company’s website and generally through Amazon and (perhaps) other online book retailers. You might be given some manuscript editing and/or formatting assistance (not guaranteed) and a web page you can direct people to if they want to buy your book from your POD company. You can also set up a website and sell direct to the public or send people to Amazon.com or Amazon.ca or your POD company online storefront.
- Free. You pay nothing to get your book into the POD system. It will be sold through the POD company only from a POD web page to which you can direct people. Lulu.com is a prime example of a free POD service. You pay nothing to make your book available through your Lulu storefront. (Lulu also has a fee-based service that will put your book in Amazon.) You are fully responsible for formatting your manuscript and cover and uploading your book to Lulu.
- POD printing company. You pay a modest fee to Lightning Source Inc. (LSI), which distributes your book to online retailers like Amazon and others (not Chapters). You can buy books through LSI, but customers must buy from you or online retailers. You are fully responsible for formatting your manuscript and cover. The book must meet LSI standards, so you need to know a fair bit about formatting your book and cover (more than if you use Lulu or a fee-based POD company).

There are a number of POD companies out there. A partial list includes the aforementioned Lulu and LSI, as well as iUniverse, Trafford Publishing, AuthorHouse, CreateSpace, Hard Shell Word Factory, Xlibris and others. If you want the widest possible distribution through online retailers at the lowest possible price, use LSI. However, be prepared to do a fair amount of work to get your book and cover ready for printing (or pay someone to do it for you). If you want to sell your book from a POD company website (no online retailer distribution), consider Lulu. But shop around.

No matter which company you choose, you will have to set up your book, but it is easier to set up a book for a company like Lulu than it is for LSI. As mentioned, Lulu also sells online retailer distribution packages. However, if you really want to go that way, you are better off with LSI – even if you have to pay someone to set up your book for you.

Summary: Lulu vs. LSI
Although I will be moving to LSI once I finish my next book (Harness the Business Writing Process), I have to say that Lulu has been a profitable introduction to POD for me. Call it the lazy person’s POD, but it works.

What do I like about Lulu?
- The quality has been good. LSI is better, from what I’ve seen. But Lulu’s quality has been more than fine. I’ve had no complaints, and lots of praise.
- The books have been simple to create/upload: Lulu accepts Word or PDF files for the ‘guts’ of the book and JPG and other image files for the covers, or you can make your covers online. My Lulu covers are nowhere near as good as my LSI cover (for How to Write a Non-Fiction Book in 60 Days) because I found a graphics person to to do the cover design.
- Best of all: Lulu processes credit card orders and prints/ships books or makes PDFs available for downloading. I link to my Lulu book URL from my website, and Lulu does the rest, which is why I call it the lazy person’s POD. And, as long as you don’t want to be in Amazon, it costs nothing but time to do POD with Lulu.

Is there a downside?
- If you are going to order copies of your books and flog them at seminars and events, you are better off using LSI or a dedicated local printer (if you are printing in quantity enough to get a print price break) than you are using Lulu.
- Lulu’s shipping prices are high, ridiculously so if you live in Canada. That deters some shoppers, I’m sure. (However, most of my book sales have been PDFs – no shipping charges at all.)
- Lulu’s prices are in US dollars. Some Canadian shoppers don’t want to pay in US currency. But if you live in the U.S., the shipping prices are more reasonable and you are paying for your books in your currency.
- If you sell PDFs through Lulu, they are not copy protected; people can ’share’ your books. Still, if you want to test the waters, Lulu is a great way to do so.

When using POD, you are responsible for:
- Writing and editing the book (or working with a ghostwriter and/or editor)
- Obtaining an ISBN*
- Formatting the look of the manuscript (or working with a designer)
- Creating the front and back cover (or working with a designer)
- Selecting the POD company
- Uploading your manuscript and cover to the POD company
- Marketing your book using various online and off-line means

* Many POD companies will help you obtain an ISBN (International Standard Book Number, a unique, numerical commercial book identifier based upon the 9-digit Standard Book Numbering). However, if your POD company does not do this, you will have to obtain an ISBN. There is no cost to do this in Canada, but you will have to register with the Canadian ISBN Service System (CISS) first. In the U.S., you have to pay for your ISBN. You can find out more from the U.S. ISBN Agency, the official source for ISBNs in the United States. (If you are planning on giving away your book and not selling it through bookstores, you don’t really need an ISBN.)

Can I use color in my POD book?
If you are thinking of using POD for a book with colour images on the inside pages, you should know the cost — to you and to your readers — will be high. POD includes colour covers but if you have colour on the inside pages it increases your book cost dramatically. You might want to consider finding a local printer and printing your book in volume (which means inventory) to get a per book price break. That, of course, defeats the purpose of POD. Your best bet, if you want color inside your book, is to price the book on various POD sites and compare that to printer quotes.

POD words of advice:
- Have a professional editor proof your book, unless you are supremely confident in your writing and proofreading ability.
- Do not use a POD company that charges $1,000+ to get your book out there. You are better off spending money on editing, manuscript formatting and cover design with a third party that can get your book up on LSI or Lulu (if you can’t do the above yourself).
- Be prepared to do your own marketing. POD companies do not do marketing for you. If you want to sell your POD book, you have to promote it. (Mind you, these days most traditional publishers do very little marketing for you, so either way you will have to blow your own horn to promote your book.)

Speaking of promotion:
Many people ask me about marketing. So much depends on the nature of your book and the audience you think it would appeal to. Promotion is not easy unless your book appeals to a niche market.

Most POD authors send media releases to local, regional and national newspapers and magazines, as well as TV and radio stations. However, in most instances, the media does not take POD books seriously (even though many of them are excellent and some have won awards). Occasionally, a POD author will make a breakthrough in a trade publication that appeals to the same audience that the book is aimed at.

Many POD authors do talks to groups representing their target audience. It is up to you to arrange talks to groups that might be interested in your book and to arrange book signings at bookstores (that will often sell your book on consignment, and will take a big chunk of the retail price).

Of course, you should set up a website to promote your book and consider setting up a blog and Facebook page and using Twitter. However, all of this will not guarantee you a best seller; it will not even assure you of decent sales. That is why some POD authors hire publicists. I am not saying don’t try to promote your book and I am not saying hire a publicist; I am saying expect to work hard if you want to get news about your book out there. If you have marketing questions (or any POD questions), I suggest you join one or both of the email lists below. People on the lists might be able to answer your marketing and/or specific POD questions.

If you live in Canada and want to join a Canadian POD list where you can ask questions, send an email to:
- CDN_POD-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

If you want to join a larger, primarily American POD list, send an email to:
- Print-On-Demand-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Note: If you are thinking of writing a non-fiction book, consider purchasing: How To Write A Non-Fiction Book in 60 Days. As the book title implies, it will help you write a solid first draft of your non-fiction book in 60 days.

In summary: What does it take to write and self-publish a book?
- interviews or research (for non-fiction and some types of fiction)
- write an outline
- write the first draft of your book
- edit and revise your first draft
- write a second draft – edit/revise the second (and often third or fourth) draft
- final proofreading (or hire a professional proofreader)
- obtain an ISBN (see ISBN note above)
- source and select a POD company
- design and format inside pages for printing
- design and create front cover and back cover
- convert your designed book and covers into files required by the POD company
- upload your book to the POD company – market and promote your book.

Read more about POD:
- POD article that I wrote for Costco Connection. Go to: www.paullima.com/articles. Look for: “Writing a book? Here’s one way to get published” [Full article; opens as a PDF file]
- Read my other POD blog posts: www.paullima.com/blog/?cat=19
- Buy Dan Poynter’s Self Publishing Manual (do a Google search)
- Pick from the 30 POD books described here: http://wexfordpress.com/tex/shortlist.pdf (opens as a PDF).
- Read this POD article and have fun surfing the POD links – www.sfwa.org/beware/printondemand.html

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Paul Lima is a freelance writer, copywriter, business writing instructor and media interview trainer. He is also the author of several books on business writing and the business of freelance writing. His latest book is How To Write A Non-Fiction Book in 60 Days.