On Tuesday, February 18, Bowker and DCL co-presented a webinar called Assuming the Risk for Your Own eBook. The white paper that accompanies this webinar is available here, or at the DCL website here.
Topics covered included:
- Types of editorial processes - developmental, fact-checking, copy-editing
- Designing your eBook - for different devices and platforms
- Marketing best practices - courtesy of Sandra Poirier-Diaz of Smith Publicity
- Distributing your ebook to different vendors
In the world of self-publishing, one critical component that's been missing has been reliable data about how self-published books are selling. Last week, the self-published author Hugh Howey released some data on 7,000 ebooks on the Amazon bestseller list, from the mystery/thriller, romance, and science fiction genres. He posts his report here:
The other eye-popper here is that indie authors are outselling the Big Five. That’s the entire Big Five. Combined. Indie and small-press books account for half of the e-book sales in the most popular and bestselling genres on Amazon.
Philip Jones, editor of The Bookseller's Futurebook blog, provides the following caution here:
Publishers Weekly just ran a piece surveying the self-publishing landscape for 2014, in which they note that authors are seeing that writing is only the beginning of the publishing process.
"It’s almost been a giddy feeling about all the new opportunities, but I think we’ve reached a slightly more mature period,” says Beat Barblan, director of identifier services for Bowker. “We are seeing more authors who say they want to be an author beyond just a hobby, and recognize that they have to be much more entrepreneurial.”
A new analysis of U.S. ISBN data by ProQuest affiliate Bowker reveals that the number of self-published titles in 2012 jumped to more than 391,000, up 59 percent over 2011 and 422 percent over 2007. Ebooks continue to gain on print, comprising 40 percent of the ISBNs that were self-published in 2012, up from just 11 percent in 2007.
“The most successful self-publishers don’t view themselves as writers only, but as business owners,” said Beat Barblan, Bowker Director of Identifier Services. “They invest in their businesses, hiring experts to fill skill gaps and that’s building a thriving new service infrastructure in publishing.”
Paul Aiken, who has long helmed the Authors Guild, announced today that he has ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease. Through treatment of allergies, he discovered his ALS symptoms lessened with steroid injections. He is embarking on that experimental treatment and posting updates about it at n=2.com.
Aiken said he expects skepticism about the remission of his symptoms and will begin posting pertinent medical records...on Monday to help answer questions. He admits he has no way of knowing whether his remission will continue or whether he has some odd strain of ALS, so his treatment might not apply to others. He's hoping to use the blog to help find out.
