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Today, I have a great guest post by Penny Sansevieri of Author Marketing Expert, and it's about self-publishing safely.

Smart Self-Publishing: How to Get Published Without Getting Scammed  
By Penny Sanseveri

Something I learned early on in this industry is that publishing, like any other industry, is full of scams. Not everyone is unethical; however, there are a certain number of people who prey on someone's desire for success by offering them pie-in-the-sky promises they can never fulfill. In our series on Smart Self-Publishing, we're going to look at a few different industry segments, starting first with publishers and finding the right one for you.

These days, there are more choices than ever to get published. Because of this, the options and opportunities within each can seen a bit overwhelming. Here are some quick tips:

1) Research, research, research: as I mentioned earlier, there are a lot of choices. Take your time and do your research. If a publisher is unethical or has a bad reputation, you'll find this pretty easily online. Some great sites for finding unethical publishers and other industry providers are:
Writer Beware: http://accrispin.blogspot.com/
Predators & Editors: http://pred-ed.com/
Absolute Write: http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/

2) Ask other authors: if your research hasn't turned up anything consistent, it might be that the publisher (like any vendor) has had a couple of bad experiences, but that doesn't always make them a bad publisher. I recommend that you look at the store page on their website and Google some of the authors listed. If you email these authors through their own personal web pages, asking them about their experience with the publisher, I'm sure you'll be pleasantly surprised at how helpful they are. Publishing, unlike some other markets, is a very helpful industry. You can even ask some professionals you admire if you're unsure. Most of us are always eager to help!

3) Check your contract: there are a variety of reasons for an author to self-publish, one of them is being able to keep their rights and creative license. Regardless of the publisher, you should be able to keep all rights. If they keep any rights for any length of time, move on to a company that will allow you to keep all of your rights. This includes: movie, audio, foreign, and electronic.

4) Promises, promises: don't believe the hype. Yes, we are all selling services but there is only so much that a publisher can promise you. They can promise you a finished book. Beyond that it's a lot of hard work and a little luck.

5) The truth about returns: Many of the print-on-demand/self-publishers offer you a returns program. I haven't found this to be very helpful. It costs the author to get in and then the bookstores have to participate, and few of them do. If you're not sure, ask your local Barnes & Noble if they accept returns from this publisher, their answer will tell you whether a returns program is a good investment of your money.

6) Book sales: much like point #4, no one can promise you book sales, least of all the publisher. So be wary of any publisher who is promising you sales or a guarantee of book sales of any kind.

7) Cost to publish: in most cases, it should cost you less than $2,000 to publish your book. This will include the cover design, interior design, ISBN, bar code, ebook (in many cases) and anything else that needs to happen to turn this into a book. Like anything else,

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I’m back with Part 3 of How to Improve Your Website. I know this was suppose to be posted a week or so ago, but we’ve been implementing new and improved strategies at VBT – Writers on the Move and time just slipped away.

Since your ultimate goal is to sell your product or service I’ll start with the Call to Action. Every page of your website should have a call to action with ‘buy now’ buttons. And, when it comes to ‘buy now’ buttons, classy beats flashy every time. These buttons should be at the top and left of your pages since readers usually start reading there. Remember, you don’t have to hit your readers over the head; you need to draw them in by providing valuable information, something they need or want. You can also draw in readers by providing freebees, possibly an ebook. And, don’t forget, good action colors are red, orange and yellow.

Another aspect of your site is imagery. I know in the first post of this series I mentioned the importance of creating a desired affect, well the use of 3D imagery should be included. In the myriad of research and studies that are done, it’s been determined that a 3D image is more effective for selling than flat imagery. To see if there was any validity to this determination, I did my own test. I have been promoting my book with a flat image, but after learning about this new information I took a picture of my book with it standing up and open. Well, this new data is correct; the 3D image is much more appealing than the flat image. So, when able use 3D imagery.

Now that you’ve improved your site, how do you bring traffic to it? One marketing strategy is viral marketing. Viral marketing is an internet term taken from the old ‘word of mouth’ strategy. With the computer age, the ‘word of mouth’ term needed to take on a global quality and be more descriptive of the results it can afford, thus viral marketing.

So, how does viral marketing work. This is very simple: I have a product or offer a service that others need or want. I write informative articles on the topic and offer freebees – this peaks my readers’ interest. They think it’s worthwhile and tell their friends via the internet. Their friends tell their friends and so on and so forth. Allowing reprint permission on my articles and including an Email a Friend button on my posts this information can spread like wild fire! With the click of a button my articles can travel the world. This is what makes viral marketing so effective.

An excellent example of viral marketing in action is Penny Sansevieri’s articles. I’m a huge fan of Penny’s marketing articles. She is the creator of Author Marketing Experts. When I read one of Penny’s articles I usually find it so informative I want to pass it on to the readers on my sites. This is viral marketing. By allowing reprint permission Penny not only reaches me, she reaches my readers and their readers (if they chose to reprint it also). This ultimately leads visitors seeking the kind of information Penny is providing back to her site. So, she’s not just getting visitors, she’s getting visitors who are interested in her products and services.

This type of viral marketing is just one of many. Other forms of viral marketing can be video clips, flash games, ebooks and so on. The amount of marketing information available seems to be unending. The time needed to read it all seems to be unending also. I’ll periodically provide posts sorting some of this information out.

Se1e you in blog world,
Karen Cioffi

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I am posting this again as a reminder: I have exciting news: On March 18th and 19th at 4pm PST (7pm EST) Penny Sansevieri, CEO and founder of Author Marketing Experts, Inc., will be giving two marketing teleclasses for Virtual Book Tours, but everyone is welcome to join in.

If you don't know who Penny is, she is a marketing guru. Her articles, blogs, teleclasses and lectures are jammed packed with timely, pertinent and valuable marketing and promotional advice and tips. I have attended a number of Penny's teleclasses and read a number of her articles. The best way to describe the information Penny provides is it's useful, practical and doable.

The first teleclass on Wednesday, March 18th is:

Red Hot Internet Basics: Touring Yourself Online
If you’re ready to market your book online but don’t know where to start you’ll love this class. We’ll look at creating and launching your very own Virtual Author Tour. During this class we’ll look at:

• How to find sites to pitch yourself to
• How to set up a social networking page
• How to find bloggers and contact them
• Crafting your pitch
• Networking online, how to do it and why you *must* network with bloggers
• What is social book marketing and how to use it

Come with ALL of your Internet questions, this class will get them answered!

The second teleclass on, Thursday, March 19th is:

Red Hot Internet Publicity 2.0

If you think you have your Internet marketing covered with just a web site, you might be missing out on a bucket of Internet gold. This class is packed with information with everything from understanding social media to monetizing sites like Facebook, Squidoo, and Twitter. We’ll also talk about what you should never do on your web site and why a blog is a must-have part of any Internet campaign. We’ll also look at some of the hottest online trends too!

• The secret to getting thousands of hits on your web site and then converting them into sales!
• Top internet promotion techniques that won’t cost you a dime!
• The Virtual Author Tour™, how you can “tour” yourself on the net
• How to use site like Facebook and Squidoo to build your customer base
• What is Twitter? We’ll talk about Twitter and how to use it to drive more sales to your web site
• How to create a web site that sells your book
• Simple steps to blogging effectively!

Bonus: We’ll even include some time-saving hints to maximize your online efforts without spending HOURS online!

Sign up now by simply sending an email to [email protected] with ‘sign up’ as the subject. An email will be sent to all those who sign up - it will include the dial in information, and any other information needed to participate in these great teleclasses.

See you in blog world,
Karen

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