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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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