Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Lin A. Lacombe on March 20, 2011 at 12:33pm

First, congratulations, Todd! Great achievement!

I'm a literary publicist, if you would like to chat offline.

 

Lin A. Lacombe

Communications Consultants

llacombe@earthlink.net

http://www.frompassiontopublicity.com

 

 

 

Permalink Reply by Todd Baker on March 20, 2011 at 2:37pm

I love to speak on this subject, and have at a few venues so far, all before publishing. Now that I've got books to sell, I'm even more enthuiastic about speaking. I'll check out RWA, thanks Tambra for your help!

Todd

Permalink Reply by 1106 Design on March 21, 2011 at 10:12am

Your book cover is excellent, Todd. That's the first necessary step to successfully marketing a book.

 LightningSource.com is an excellent source for distribution and fulfillment. Most of the other "POD publishers" print there and mark up the price to you. At LSI, you keep the difference between the manufacturing cost and the cover price, less retail discounts, and you have the option to set your retail discount as low as 20% (unlike CreateSpace, which requires a 40% discount).

Selling books from your website to avoid paying retail discounts may be tempting but it's almost impossible for an individual publisher to draw the same crowd as Amazon and other online retailers.

Michele DeFilippo
1106 Design
Your book. Designed. With hand-holding.

 

 

Permalink Reply by Todd Baker on March 21, 2011 at 10:35am

Thanks Michele, and I'm strongly considering doing so.  Does anyone know about THOR POD distribution?  It apparently uses Lightening Source, but I think it requires a 50% discount. 

Thanks

Permalink Reply by Todd Baker on March 21, 2011 at 10:51am

Michele, does Lightening Source charge per book sold, or do they have other fees?  I went to the website and have interest, but they don't list pricing anywhere...makes me wonder.

 

Thanks again

Todd

Permalink Reply by 1106 Design on March 21, 2011 at 11:40am

Hi Todd,

Why use THOR, or anyone else who subcontracts the work to Lightning Source, when you can sign up there as a publisher yourself and keep more money in your pocket?

Lightning Source prints the book when it is ordered and charges you after it is printed. The printing is charged by the page plus some other nominal setup fees. The important thing is that LSI is owned by Ingram, the major book wholesaler, so setting up your title at LSI lists it in the Ingram Database.

Please send me an email to office@1106design.com and I'll send you the LSI price lists I have. We send books to LSI almost every day.

 

Permalink Reply by Brad Poulson on March 24, 2011 at 11:47am

Dr. Baker,
First and most importantly, thank you for your service to our country!

Next, welcome to SPANnet and I hope you find our community resouceful in your publishing efforts. 

Of course, it starts with defining your target market and then understanding how you can reach that market.

This is a good thread, started by SPANpro Members Margi Taber, that talks about getting started and it was commented on by some indy publishing pros – it includes a brief discussion on LSI, Cerate Space and marketing.

http://www.spannet.org/forum/topics/thoughts-to-share-with-a-new

As an alternative to LSI, SPAN Sponsor, BookMasters is offer what I consider a turn key solution to print on demand and distribution, and here is a link to recent blog post from their representative.

http://www.spannet.org/profiles/blogs/mps-limited-and-the?xg_source...

 

A huge benefit of SPANnet is networking. Here is member of  SPANnet  who is publishing to markets that might be similar to yours.

http://www.spannet.org/profile/ReguloZapataJr

Of course there are a lot of great discussion regarding marketing in the groups you’ll find on SPANnet. Here is a list pertaining to Book Marketing in general:

http://www.spannet.org/group/bookmarketing/forum

Here is a list pertaining to On Line Marketing:

http://www.spannet.org/group/onlinemarketing/forum 

Also, here a two resources from our SPANpro archive…

This article talks about speaking with some ideas about how to find engagements (don’t forget the Toast Masters and the National Speakers Association): 

http://www.spanpro.org/platform-shoes-lee 

This is a Webinar Recording with Beyond the Bookstore Marketing Expert, Brian Jud on…Selling to the Military.

For a growing list of Monthly Theme – Course Outlines available to SPANpro Members (Much of which are oriented to book marketing subjects), please visit this link - http://www.spanpro.org/monthly-theme-archive.

I hope this information is helpful, and if I can answer any questions you have about the nonprofit Small Publishers Association (SPAN) please don’t hesitate to contact me. 

Highest Regards,

Brad Poulson
SPAN Executive Director

bradpoulson@spannet.org