Self-Publishers Online Conference News

SPOC organizer and Web site developer James Byrd is guest posting today over on speaker Sandra Beckwith's blog "Build Book Buzz." His article, "15 easy and evergreen SEO tips for authors," is all about how to integrate search engine optimization techniques into your normal writing routines. Come check it out! You'll be surprised at how easy SEO can be. 15 easy and evergreen SEO tips for authors

[Editor’s Note: This is a guest post from Elinor Stutz who will be speaking at SPOC on May 11 at 3 pm (Pacific). As you can see, Elinor really walks her talk!] Have you ever noticed when you finally conquer the pile on your desk you feel renewed energy and motivation kicking in?  What if you were to do this every working day, would it make a big difference in your success? Today, I had a conversation with two other authors...

[Editor’s Note: This is a guest post from Karen Robertson, who graciously offered to share her experience self-publishing material for children with the SPOC audience. Thank you Karen!] Do you have books or stories that you know kids of the world would love, if only they could see them? What if I told you there is now a cost effective way to reach a global market without the need to pay a fortune in printing, binding, warehousing and shipping? No inventory to manage. No returns to deal with. If you are a self-published or unpublished children’s writer or illustrator, or if you’re published...

By James Byrd I recently saw a question on a blog and just had to respond. These so-called "Self Publishing Companies" (which are actually subsidy presses) really burn me with their misleading advertising, draconian contracts, and unreasonable fee/royalty structures. Here's the question the distraught author asked: What does a new author do when they cannot control the price of their books? I am publishing through a self-publishing house which has set a minimum price of $9.99 on the ebook. Unfortunately, I did not realize this. Is there a way around this? My Response Wow! $9.99? That's even higher than the price...

By James Byrd I've been seeing a lot of angst lately about the 99-cent price point undervaluing the hard work authors put into their novels. That concern implies that authors have some kind of value in mind in the first place, but rarely do you see anyone do the math to figure out exactly what that value is. I personally believe authors get a lot more out of writing a book than money. If that weren't true, I can guarantee you that there'd be a lot fewer authors out there right now. However, a new breed of author is coming...

By James Byrd More traditionally-published authors are making the switch to self publishing, and more unpublished authors now see self publishing as a profitable alternative. If you've wondered what's behind this trend, click the link below to read the full article on The Book Consultant web site.    7 Reasons to Give Up on Traditional Publishing Don't Forget! Tomorrow, April 26 at 10:00 AM Pacific, I'll be interviewing Mark Coker, founder of Smashwords. Mark will share best practices for producing, publishing, distributing, and marketing an ebook. Don't miss out on this information packed interview!   Sign up for the Mark...

By James Byrd, SPOC Organizer The buzz relating to ebooks has exploded in the past year as Amazon continues to ship Kindle reading devices by the truckload. Other reading devices like the Barnes & Nobel Nook and Apple iPad are also logging impressive sales. Of course the electronic devices are just a gateway to the digital reading material that they render. Consequently, we've also seen an explosion in the number of ebooks purchased by the owners of these devices. While ebook sales still account for a minority percentage of overall book sales, the ebook market share is growing daily. Self...

Over the next few weeks before the Self-Publishers Online Conference (SPOC), we're going to profile the speakers you'll hear during the event. Since we (James Byrd and Susan Daffron) are both hosting and speaking at SPOC, we figured we should start with us. So without further ado, here's an interview with the questions we often get about our background and SPOC. How did you get involved in book publishing? I (Susan) graduated from college with an English major. As any English major will tell you, the first question you hear is "are you going to teach?" My...