The eBook was produced by Knowledge@Wharton, the online business analysis journal of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and sponsored by Ernst & Young, best known as one of the largest tax and auditing firms in the world. It is an enhanced eBook complete with text, images and video segments.

4 things I like:

1. Quality information. It is educational and free of self-promotion, as fact-based as any other resource you might find.
2. Engaging. The video content was nicely produced, relevant and supportive of the content. (I watched it on an iPad using both iBooks and Kindle for iPad.)
3. Device support disclosure. The landing page to learn about the enhanced eBook as well as the online retailer pages made it clear what devices would play enhanced features, specifically video. Not all devices or eReader software support enhanced eBook video playback. I noticed that one Amazon reviewer was upset that the video didn’t play on his or her Galaxy but they obviously didn’t read the fine print. This is going to be a common problem so publishers beware: be clear regarding device support!
4. Functionality and content consistency across platforms. Unlike another enhanced eBooks I reviewed Mobile Banking was the same product on all the major platforms. It’s pretty easy to use the Apple iBook Author tool but the final eBook can only be read on Apple devices. At least with the proprietary Kindle format you can still read the eBook on any number of third party devices, including Apple.

4 areas I found lacking:

1. The developer (Vook) should have caught a problem reading with a black background on the Kindle. The colors are not programmed right. This is not a problem on the iPad’s EPUB edition.
2. The Kindle version has a master menu, a media list menu, a table of contents and something they call a video list. This is too many menus/indexes and they should have been consolidated. Oddly this is not an issue with the EPUB edition.
3. The cover seems like an afterthought. After going through all this effort why not something more interesting and worthy of the great content?
4. Why not Kobo? This book appeals to an international audience and Kobo is one of the largest multi-country eBook retailers, and a growing presence in theU.S. 

But all in all, it’s a terrific effort and one I suggest business self-publishers look at for ideas. It is currently available for free from:

Amazon, Apple and Barnes & Noble

Interested in learning more about business self-publishing? Click here to schedule a conversation. You might also be interested in reading these:

How Businesses Can Reach a Larger Audience by Redefining the PDF eBook

Free on Your Website, Charge on Amazon-An eBook Publishing Strategy for Businesses

Mobile Device Sales Dwarf PC and Mac Sales: Can People Read Your PDF eBook on Tiny Screens?

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• eBook fiction sales up 42% to $1.8 billion
• eBook non-fiction sales up 22% to $484.2 million
• eBooks for children and young-adults up 117% to $469.2 million
• eBook sales are up 45% since 2011
• eBooks now contribute 20% of Trade publisher revenue
• Trade publisher net revenue growth rose 7% to $15 billion
• Trade publisher unit sales growth: 8%
• Audiobook revenue growth up 22% to $240.7 million

• Physical bookstore revenue dropped 7% to $7.5 billion
• Online bookstore revenue increased 21% to $6.9 billion

Sources: NY Times, Bookstats
 
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This is a guest post by D’vorah Lansky. D’vorah recently finished her 11^th book and joins us today to share one of the tips from 21 Ways to Launch a Successful Virtual Book Tour.

I’d like to thank David for graciously hosting me, as a guest blogger, in celebration of the launch of my newest book, 21 Ways to Launch a Successful Virtual Book Tour.

In this blog post, I’d like to share with you one of “21 Ways” to launch a successful virtual book tour. This tip comes from “Way #10: Create and Enhance Your Amazon Author Central Page.”

Amazon Author Central is a free service provided by Amazon to allow authors to reach more readers, promote their books, and interact with the community. Having a well-developed author page on Amazon will provide you with increased visibility and access to more readers. In preparation for your virtual book tour, you’ll want to make the most of your Author Central page on Amazon. This is your place to shine! On Amazon Author Central you can:

• List your author biography
• Display your bibliography
• Post videos
• Highlight positive reviews of your book
• Add images
• Pull in your Twitter feed and your blog RSS feed
• Set up your custom Amazon Central URL
• Create opportunities for community interaction by initiating and participating in discussions

Set up your Amazon Author Central page

The first thing you’ll want to do is set up your free Amazon Author Central account at AuthorCentral.Amazon.com. Next, add your photograph, biography, and books to your bibliography.

See my Amazon Author Central page at www.DvorahOnAmazon.com for an example. For branding purposes, you may want to use the same professional photograph on Amazon as you use for your social networking profiles. When adding your biography, keep it focused on your role as an author. Focus on sharing the information you most want your readers to know about you, your book, your work, and your journey as an author.

Add your Twitter feed and blog RSS feed

On your Author Central page, you’ll easily be able to add your Twitter feed and the RSS feed from your blog. This free opportunity provides you with even more visibility and credibility, as readers will be able to view your Twitter stream and read excerpts of posts from your blog. Consequently, visitors to your author page will learn more about you and your work, and they may even visit your blog or follow you on Twitter.

Create events related to your book

You can easily list upcoming events, speaking engagements, book signings, and bookstore appearances on your Amazon Author Page. You can list both in-person and virtual events. For a virtual event, you’ll want to enter the name of your event in the “Venue Name” field and “N/A” or “Online Event” in the “Address” fields. Also, you can list the URL and details about the event in the “Description” field. After you’ve created an event, it will be displayed in the scheduled events section on your profile page.

Add images and videos to your profile

It’s very easy to add images and videos to your profile. Having an attractive and engaging profile will keep people on your author page longer and that extra browsing time will increase the likelihood of their purchasing your book or making contact with you.

Developing your Amazon Author Central page will increase your credibility, your accessibility, and your book sales. Which of these strategies did you find most intriguing? Scroll down to share your thoughts in the comments section below.

This post is being written in honor of a virtual book tour celebrating the publication of my third print book. You can enjoy the festivities by joining us on the tour to 21 blogs, in honor of 21 Ways to Launch a Successful Virtual Book Tour. Scroll down to access the virtual book tour schedule as well as a link to the book on Amazon. Thank you and enjoy!

D’vorah Lansky, M.Ed., is the author of 21 Ways to Launch a Successful Virtual Book Tour. Visit her book blog and check out the full schedule for the virtual book tour, celebrating the launch of this exciting new book: www.VirtualBookTour21Ways.com

D’vorah offers virtual book tour workshops and courses for authors, entrepreneurs, and virtual professionals. She has taught hundreds of people, across the globe, how to conduct successful virtual book tours. You can purchase her newest book on Amazon at: www.VirtualBookTour21Ways.com/amazon

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Anyone writing blog posts or articles—for your own website or your employer’s—should read this book. I’m not a lawyer but my sense is that the author covers all the key issues you need to be familiar with to stay out of trouble. And if you do like to push the envelope, The Legal Side of Blogging will make you aware of consequences and serve as a guide for when you should seek legal counsel.

Ruth Carter is both an experienced blogger and a practicing attorney. Her writing style is clear, concise and filled with relevant examples. Carter does not add a lot of fluff to pad the book—89 pages feels just right. I paid $3.99 and feel I got a lot of value. I consider myself “dangerously familiar” with business law and yet learned a few new things such as:

• “Fair use does not give you permission to use another person’s work, but rather it gives you a defense that you can use if you’re accused of infringing on someone else’s copyright.” (News to me.) 

• “When you select images for your blog from Creative Commons, always pick images that you can modify and commercialize. This license gives you the most freedom. You want to have the ability to modify images so you can crop them to fit your needs. You may not be making any money on your blog now, but you might in the future. You don’t want to have to go back and figure out which images you have to replace and find substitutes so you can commercialize your work.” (Great advice.) 

• Once you release your work into the public domain, i.e. remove the copyright, you can’t take it back. 

• “…if you have ads on your blog, even if you don’t earn much money from them, your use of another’s work could be characterized as commercial.” (According to Amazon’s Popular Highlights feature this is the most frequently underlined phrase in the book…so far.)

Carter also stressed what I call the Golden Rule of online behavior: “Don’t post anything on the internet that you wouldn’t put on the front page of the newspaper.” And the related reminder, “never say anything online about someone that you wouldn’t say to their face.”

I have only a couple quibbles and those have to do with the design and formatting of the eBook. One is that the endnotes link to the note but don’t link back. So if you find yourself interested in the citation you’ll have to search for where you left off reading before clicking to the endnote. The second issue is that it is not formatted for the black background reading mode in a couple sections of the book. I wouldn’t be surprised if it is fixed soon. It’s the same issue I spoke about here back in February. 

If you do a lot of writing, and you are not a lawyer, this book could help you sleep more soundly at night. It’s a great investment of both time and money.

SELLBOX SERVICES: eBook conversion

About the book: In Cows Save the Planet, journalist Judith D. Schwartz looks at soil as a crucible for our many overlapping environmental, economic, and social crises. Schwartz reveals that for many of these problems—climate change, desertification, biodiversity loss, droughts, floods, wildfires, rural poverty, malnutrition, and obesity—there are positive, alternative scenarios to the degradation and devastation we face. In each case, our ability to turn these crises into opportunities depends on how we treat the soil.

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Who is Kobo? is often the reaction I get from clients when I suggest they distribute their eBooks through Kobo. I then explain that:

• Kobo is one of the largest eBook reading device manufactures and eBook sellers in Canada, a serious rival to Amazon in that country
• Kobo is owned by the “Amazon of Japan”, Rakuten. In the U.S. Rakuten also owns Buy.com.
• Kobo competes with Apple and Amazon in dozens of international markets (they recently opened a store in Brazil before Amazon)
• Kobo has a partnership with the American Booksellers Association to offer eBook support services to independent booksellers

Obviously they do not have the name recognition of the other major players but the game is still early and in non-U.S. markets they are a contender (in contrast Barnes and Noble is in two markets—the U.S.and the U.K.as of this writing).

Feedback from publishers

Considering sales are admittedly small in the U.S.(low single digits according to their CEO) I thought I’d ask a few publishers to share their experience with Kobo. Specific feedback is below but here are the consensus views:

1. Every publisher I speak to is firmly committed to making their eBooks available in as many stores as possible. No one likes the idea of letting Amazon dominate.
2. Kobo is universally praised for customer support. I’ve had the same experience: staff is friendly, responsive and eager to help.
3. Sales are small relative to the major players, especially Amazon, but they are growing. Publishers are pleased.

Here are some specific comments from some of the publishers I spoke with via email:

Harrison Demchick with Bancroft Press shared that they “work with Kobo directly, compiling our own images, ebooks, and metadata and sending all directly to Kobo. It’s been a positive experience all around—Kobo is quick and responsive, and if anything goes wrong, they’re on top of it.” Bancroft currently distributes more than 60 titles via Kobo.

Jay Nadeau at Biting Duck Press spoke highly of the ease of working with Kobo—from ingestion to customer service. Unlike Amazon where you rarely speak with someone Jay says they deal directly with live people, and it’s often the same few individuals. They have about 150 titles on two imprints. Even though they currently have only about a dozen available on Kobo the channel accounts for 5% of sales which is comparable or better than other channels.

Biting Duck has offices in both the U.S and Canada and feels that “Kobo is probably the best way to sell eBooks in Canada right now and for the foreseeable future.”

James Lewis reports that Smashwords can be a viable distributor for smaller publishers looking for international presence without the cost and added work of managing numerous direct channels. Lewis’ Pantheon Collective distributes their 12 eBooks via Smashwords and shared that Kobo is fourth in sales out of nine stores.

How to get started

As readers of my blog know I’m a fan of direct distribution whenever possible. You maximize your revenue and maintain the most control. Publishers have three options to distribute direct via Kobo.

1. Self-publishers can use the Kobo Writing Life portal.

2. Publishers releasing more than a handful of titles can apply here.

3. Sellbox offers managed distribution to Kobo. Accounts are setup in the name of the publisher and we assist with metadata development, data entry and title management. Contact us if you’d like to learn more.

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My friend Kelly, co-directory of Publishers and Writers of Las Vegas, attended the 2013 ASCAP Expo two weeks ago in Los Angeles and shared important metrics gleaned from three days listening to music executives describe the music acts they’ll consider signing:

In a world already filled with music, the acts that get their attention have a minimum 2,500 email subscribers and at least 1,000 social media connections.

Think about those numbers. That takes some work and means you are popular.

The panelists stressed that it mattered less which social media outlet was being used just as long as it was at least 1,000 connections. It got me wondering whether we in publishing would settle on similar metrics considering the two industries are so similar and music was the first to experience the effects of digital media disintermediation. After all, there are only so many E.L. James’, Amanda Hockings and Hugh Howeys, right?

The days of hoping to be signed by a major publisher simply on the merits of your writing are over. For one thing the publishers are going to have less money to offer as an advance. That’s because the big names are turning to self-publishing thereby denying the publishers an ROI on the careers they’ve nurtured to stardom. 

You need great writing AND an addressable audience to get noticed

Unless the goal for your book is more consulting engagements, or posterity, you need to be building your addressable audience. I’ve talked about it before but your addressable audience are all the people you can reach via an announcement. 

The first group are subscribers. These people signed-up; they asked you to contact them; they gave you permission: Mailing list subscribers (email or snail mail), RSS subscribers and Meetup members are good examples.

Social media connections are the next level. With this class of connections you can announce something but they need to be paying attention or they’ll never see it. A good way to distinguish these connections from subscribers is that it is unlikely you will know when your message is seen unless someone comments. These include: blog readers, Facebook fans, Twitter followers, LinkedIn connections, YouTube viewers, Pinterest followers and Google + friends.

These are just examples, but when you add up all the contacts you can reach through your various lists and social network connections, how many names do you get? This would be your addressable audience.

When people talk about creating a platform this is a critical element. How are you building your lists? What tools make the most sense for your genre or personal goals? That’s our specialty—give me a call and I can quickly tell you if you are on the right track and whether or not I can help you.

SELLBOX SERVICES: eBook conversion, distribution

About the book: This book was written for those who want to become ultra Top Producers in the profession of selling. It has been developed for those who desire the lifestyle that only a successful sales career can afford.

What makes the message of this book unique from all others of its kind is how it teaches the critical integration of the four distinct personality styles into a proven consultative sales process. The result of this harmony is not only top-of-the-charts sales production, but also a deep satisfaction for the client and sales professional alike. Selling is the greatest profession on the planet. If you can hear the encore of the crowd, it’s time to answer their call, and join the ranks of the ROCKSTARS who are restoring the fame and prestige to this great career that we call Selling.

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In a presentation last week to the San Diego Entertainment and Sports Lawyers I was asked the question: “Do eBook authors that self-publish submit their books for some kind of legal review?” (You can see the presentation here on Slideshare.)

I had to admit that I’ve rarely heard this topic discussed in any detail in the forums or meetings I’ve frequented much less been asked my opinion by one of my clients. On the other hand is it possible that most self-publishers engage a lawyer? I’m not sure but my sense is that the majority of authors going the self-publishing route give it only passing attention unless perhaps they have a large exposure—i.e. they have a lot to loose financially. (Not that this should be the only reason.)

Laws and business practices change; a disclosure or disclaimer that used to be “standard” may no longer protect you from defamation or some other claim. I am not a lawyer but doesn’t common sense and respect for fellow rights holders dictate that we authors consult an attorney versed in publishing law before we take our work public?

Thinking generally about book publishing I’ve identified 5 areas that deserve special focus by self-publishers. Regardless of your subject matter or exposure I suggest you seek legal advice before you click the submit button.

1. Book covers: title, images (if any), trademarks and the statements you make on the back cover in the case of a print book. Are you making any claims that may need a disclosure? Keep in mind that some images are licensed for specific uses and/or can be used a limited number of times before they need to be re-licensed. One of my non-profit clients found a terrific image in Creative Commons but the license did not provide for commercial use. He explained his situation and the France-based rights holder said fine, but she still wanted payment. So he proposed $25 (lower than I would have offered) and she accepted. His honesty was rewarded with a lower-than-expected licensing cost.

2. Images: speaking of images, is each one properly credited? And are they licensed for how you are using them? Perhaps it was a non-commercial license image that you first used as part of a blog post. Now is the time to either get a license, written permission, or find a new image.

3. Attribution/Credit. Depending on what you are crediting, the rights holder may have their own requirements for attribution. Respect these and credit the work exactly as you’ve been asked. In some cases, such as brief quotes, it is a simple exercise. As an author how would you feel if someone quoted you without or with limited attribution?

4. Trademarks. Sometimes adding a ® or ™ is sufficient, but it may also be necessary to add specific language to your copyright page. For my own book my attorney suggested I contact Amazon because I use the trademarks Amazon and Kindle in the title plus I was showing images of their Kindle reading apps. Amazon responded in less than 18 hours that the title was fine as long as I referenced their ownership of the trademarks on my copyright page.

Note: many of the larger trademark holders have a section on their website that addresses issues like this so make that your first stop.

5. Copyright. You can copyright your own works, but did you include any third-party content? If yes it’s time to call your lawyer. In fact if this is part of your editorial plan you should consider talking with an attorney before you begin writing your book.

These are just the more common issues that arise in publishing a book but there are many others such has how the author references events, companies or people. A small investment before you publish can be valuable insurance against future claims. To find a qualified attorney consult a trade association such as the Independent Book Publishers Association or Google “publishing law.”

Related link:

Copyright Essentials: An FAQ for eBook Publishers

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Orchestrating a book bomb to launch or promote an eBook can be a great marketing strategy for authors. If you are not familiar with the term, a book bomb is when a group of people purchase a specific book, on a specific day, from Amazon (although there is no technical reason why it couldn’t be another eBook retailer).

So far book bombs seem to be organized in one of two ways: author-initiated or community-initiated. I read about a couple such community organized events on Teleread (Rise of the Fundraiser Book). In one case the eBook was conceived as a fundraising event and in the second case it was to help an author (Dave Wolverton) whose son was injured in a sports accident.  

Why does this work?

The idea is simple and not unlike using KDP Select “free days” to help a book achieve higher rankings. A surge in sales increases online visibility and often unleashes its own momentum which (ideally) propels the eBook to ever higher sales. The difference is that with a book bomb the eBooks are purchased instead of given away.

It’s simply focused marketing

Leaving the charity angle aside for the moment a book bomb initiated by the author is a great promotional tactic. You might think of it the same way you think of an author signing. Just like with a signing you and/or your publicist need to reach out to your addressable audience—social media contacts, subscribers, blog readers, etc.—and invite them to a specific location (your Amazon book page) on a specific day.

Another point worth mentioning is that a book bomb is not just for new books. It can give life to an old book, or obviously a series of books. This is a boon for all those authors who didn’t get around to building their platform until after their book or books were released. It’s never too late to build your social network.

Book bomb consultants?

I think it’s only a matter of time before we see publicists or consultants offering to organize book bombs as a marketing service. It’s happened with blog tours, why not book bombs? They might even recruit readers with large social networks to help promote the events. This is a viable alternative to KDP Select—you don’t have to give Amazon exclusivity and you get paid for all those purchases. After all, these are likely purchases that would have taken place anyway but now they are concentrated on a single day.

I’ve started a discussion topic on our Linkedin Group, Marketing on Amazon. Please join me there or in the comments below if you want to promote your book bomb or engage with others about this great marketing tactic.