I've Got The Illustrations, I Have The Words, Now What

A lot of beginning self-publishers think the Holy Grail is getting their book on Amazon.

Nope. Just another sad bus station on the selling-your-own-book highway. Almost anybody with an ISBN number can get listed on Amazon with a picture of their very own book cover. Amazon has several ways a self-publisher can do this. But the bottom line is if your target market doesn't know it's there, well, you'll be one of about a million people selling one book a month.

That gets me back to my first publishing attempt. As a newbie I was intrigued by LuLu.com's marketing pitch. Low upfront fees and they have a website where they will sell your book for you. Now there are a thousand print-on-demand (POD) shops and they almost all offer that service.

But it's the same deal as Amazon. If you don't have a very specific niche where you can tell all your built-in customers where to buy, you have a significant problem. Nobody is going to these websites to casually buy a book. So please don't think that will happen. The only way you sell books is by a strong, well-financed marketing plan. Honest. Or if you have that built-in market.

If your doing a full-color children's book the correct reason to use a company like LuLu is for testing. PODs are good places to do many kinds of books but not a full-color children's book. Not yet. The quality isn't there and neither is the price. But it is a cheap way to find out what you did wrong.

But don't make the mistake that I did.

I needed an ISBN number. And at that time I wasn't clear on all the nuances surrounding ISBN numbers. LuLu offered to sell me one so I wouldn't have to figure it out on my own. So I bought one. And the smart guy that I am, I didn't read the fine print.

Turns out LuLu was selling me the number but I didn't own it. I could only use that ISBN number if LuLu was selling the book. They absolutely did not make that clear to me and it really pissed me off because I didn't realize it until I went to publish that book on my own. Caused me problems. That was intentionally disingenious.

There's a lot of that going around in the self-publishing world. That's why you need to fully understand important steps like getting ISBN numbers.

Michael LaLumiere