During a five-week period in 2014, 116 freshman high school students collaborated to professionally write, produce, publish, promote and sell an anthology of original poetry. At the start of the project, Mark Coker, one of the originators of the project, presented a one-hour talk introducing students to the project and the process of professional ebook publishing. The following week, he presented a talk on ebook publishing best practices (how to publish like a pro). These two presentations have been combined here into a single Slideshare deck. Educators seeking to incorporate ebook publishing into their classroom are invited to download these presentations and modify them for their own purposes.

1. Introduction to Ebook Publishing
How to Produce, Publish, Price, Distribute,
Promote and Sell an Ebook
March 28, 2014
Mark Coker
Founder, Smashwords

2. About this Presentation
• During a five-week period in 2014, 116 high school students collaborated to
professionally produce, publish, distribute and promote Windows to the
Teenage Soul, an anthology of original poetry.
• Purchase the ebook at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/431588
and at most major ebook retailers. The book includes a Teacher’s Guide in
the appendix designed to help fellow educators bring ebook publishing to
their classrooms. It includes project plans, timelines and other guidance.
• To kick off the project, Mark Coker presented this introduction to ebook
publishing to students. The week after, he presented a talk on ebook
publishing best practices, integrated into this Slideshare deck as Part II.
• Educators interested to incorporate an ebook publishing project into their
classroom have Mark Coker’s permission to download these presentations
from Slideshare and modify them for their own purposes. Or, contact
Smashwords for more recent versions.

3. My Backstory

4. The Smashwords Backstory
• Met wife-to-be
• Wrote a novel
 got great agent
 got rejected by publishers
 decided to try to fix the
problem

5. The Problem: Why Traditional
Book Publishing is Broken
• Publishers judge books based on
perceived commercial merit
• they can only guess what readers want to
read
• Publishers unable to take a risk on every
author
• millions of writers rejected
• Print books are too expensive
• limits affordability and accessibily

6. Back in the Dark Ages (6 yrs
ago), Publishers Controlled
Everything
• They controlled the …
• printing press
• distribution
• knowledge to professionally publish

7. My Answer: Smashwords
• * FREE * eBook Publishing Platform
 Free ebook printing press
 Distribution to major ebook retailers and
libraries
 Free learning materials help writers
become professional publishers

8. Ebooks published at Smashwords
140
6,000
28,800
92,000
191,000
276,000

9. How Smashwords Works
• UPLOAD
• Word .doc or .epub
• Instant, free ebook conversion
• Instantly for sale
• DISTRIBUTE
• Distribution to retailers and
libraries
• GET PAID
• Author earns 60-80% list

10. Quick Overview of The Ebook Market

11. Source: Association of American Publishers, publishers.org. 2012-13 Smashwords estimate

12. Publishers losing their monopoly
• Writers no longer need publishers to
publish, distribute and sell books
• Writers asking two questions:
1. “What can a publisher do for me that I can’t
do for myself?”
2. “Will a publisher actually harm my ability to
reach readers?”

13. Indies are hitting the bestseller
lists
• Self-published ebooks scaling all the
bestseller lists
• Self-published titles on the NYT list
nearly every week
• Prediction: Within three years, over ½ of
ebook bestsellers on NYT list will be indie
ebooks

14. Advantages of Indie Authorship
• Indie ebook author advantages
• faster time to market
• creative control
• better distribution to global market
• immortal ebooks never go out of print
• lower expenses
• lower prices to consumers
• earn more per book

15. QUADRUPLE +

16. Indie Ebook Authors Earn Higher
Percentage of List Price
• Indies earn more at lower prices
• At $2.99, indies earn ~$2.00. Traditional author
would have to price over $10 to earn $2.00
• Lower price = reach more readers = more sales at
higher profits per sale
60-80% 12-17%
Indie Traditional

17. Let’s learn how to publish, distribute and
sell an ebook!

18. Checklist for Publishing an Ebook
 Finish a super-awesome book
 Format the book prior to conversion
 Prepare cover image
 Prepare the metadata
 Ebook conversion to multiple formats
 Pricing
 ISBNs
 Copyright
 Distribution to retailers, libraries
 Piracy
 Marketing

19. Finish Your Super-Awesome Book
• Ebook publishing tools make
publishing fast, free and easy …
• … but they don’t make it easy to write
a great book
• Your book must move the reader to an emotionally
satisfying extreme
• You are the author and the publisher
• Edit, revise, edit, revise
• Involve beta readers (then revise again)

20. Ebook Formatting

21. Formatting is the layout and design
process to prepare your book for
publication

22. Formatting for Smashwords
350,000+
downloads!
It’s FREE!

23. Formatting Secrets
• Forget (some of) what you know
• Don’t try to make e- look like p-
• Ebooks consumed differently than print
• Design for reflowability, small screens
• Less = more with ebooks

24. Reflowability: Ebook devices
(and customers) shape shift text
• Example of Smashwords novel, Heller
by JD Nixon as viewed in iBooks e-
reading app
• Users can select font style, font size and
nightime mode, or view in portrait or
landscape mode. Reflowability enables
this!

25. Cover Image

26. Create Your Ebook Cover
• Covers are important
• First impression
• Great covers make a promise
• Make it:
 engaging, matched to target audience
 professional
 good as thumbnail

27. What’s this book about?

28. Don’t be sloppy

29. Don’t do this either

30. Great covers make a promise

31. Great covers make a promise

32. Great covers make a promise

33. Great covers make a promise

34. Great covers make a promise

35. Great covers make a promise

36. Great covers make a promise

37. Metadata

38. Metadata is data that makes your
book discoverable in a store
Book title
Book description
Author name
Book category
Price
Publication dateISBN
Language Tags

39. Ebook Conversion

40. Conversion = Turning your formatted
manuscript into an ebook file readable on
multiple ebook reading devices

41. E-reading Devices

42. Automated Ebook Conversion
Works at Smashwords

43. Pricing

44. How Price Impacts Units Sold

45. What Price Yields the Greatest
Author Earnings?

46. ISBN

47. What’s an ISBN?
• What it is:
• Unique digital identifier
• A 13-digit number
• Helps supply chain communicate about book
• Required for Smashwords distribution to Apple,
Kobo, others
• Where to get an ISBN:
• FREE at Smashwords

48. Copyright

49. Copyright Simplified
• By publishing something you created,
you have copyright
• Copyright entitles you to an exclusive
bundle of rights
• The notation of © is optional
• For best legal protection, go to
Copyright.gov and register copyright
online

50. Distribution to retailers and libraries

51. Smashwords Distribution Network

52. Piracy

53. Everything you need to know
about piracy
• Don’t worry about piracy
• Obscurity is your biggest risk
• Black hat pirates who steal your book
wouldn’t have purchased it anyway
• Most piracy is accidental – think of it
as enthusiastic fans marketing your
book for you
• Combat piracy by making the ebook
easier to buy than steal

54. Marketing

55. Marketing
• Marketing is a catalyst, not fuel
• Your book is your best marketing
• Reader word of mouth determines your success
• Focus on discoverability
• Viral catalysts amplify word of mouth

56. What’s a Viral Catalyst?
• A viral catalyst is something that makes your
book more available, accessible, desirable
and enjoyable to readers
• Read the Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success (it’s
FREE!) to learn how viral catalysts spur word-of-mouth

57. Viral Catalysts
• Every thing you do right increases
virality
Great cover
Great book
Broad distribution
Fair price
Good categorization
Professionally edited
Great formatting
Great title
Great book description
Great marketing
Social media enabled
Sampling enabled
Multiple formats
LUCK!
• Fall short anywhere and you create
unnecessary friction

58. The Plan Forward

59. YOU have a right to publish

60. YOU are your own gatekeeper
YOU decide when your writing
graduates to published book

61. Honor your readers
Give them a great book
(and do it faster with lower prices)

62. Why this LGHS/LGPL/Smashwords
Project is Important
This Project will Inspire the Next
Generation of Writers – Your Peers –
to Write and Publish Great Books
This project will likely be duplicated
in thousands of other classrooms
around the world

63. Let’s Change the World

64. Free Ebook Publishing Resources
• NEW! Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success (best
practices of successful authors)
• Smashwords Book Marketing Guide (how to market any
book)
• Smashwords Style Guide (how to format an ebook)

65. Learn how to e-publish like a pro with
Smashwords Tutorials at Youtube at
youtube.com/user/Smashwords
65

66. Thanks for Listening!
Connect with Mark Coker and Smashwords:
Web: www.smashwords.com
Blog: blog.smashwords.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/markcoker
Facebook: facebook.com/markcoker
HuffPo: huffingtonpost.com/mark-coker
Twitter: @markcoker

68. About Part II
• During a five-week period in 2014, 116 high school students
collaborated to professionally produce, publish, distribute and
promote an anthology of original poetry.
• View the ebook at
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/431588
• This is part II of the presentation, in which he discussed ebook
publishing best practices (how to publish like a professional).
• Educators interested to incorporate an ebook publishing
project into their classroom are invited to download these
presentations from Slideshare and modify them for their own
purposes. Or, contact Smashwords for more recent versions.

69. Let’s talk best practices

70. Q:
What’s a best practice?
A:
It’s the secret to accomplishing your
goal

71. Most Common Writer
Goals:
Reach readers
Earn income

72. Platforms like Smashwords make
ePublishing and eDistribution Easy…

73. Reaching Readers is Still Difficult *
* but achievable if you emulate best practices

74. Let’s review the best practices of
the best-selling indie authors

75. Secret One

76. #1 Your best marketing is a
great book
• With the power to publish comes the
responsibility to be a great publisher
• Honor your reader with a great book
• Move reader to a satisfying emotional extreme
• Turns readers into evangelists
• Be fanatical about quality
• Edit, revise, edit, revise, repeat, proof
• Leverage beta readers

77. Secret Two

78. #2 Create a Great Cover image
• Invest in a quality cover image
• Your first impression on path to discovery
• Look professional
• Resonate with target audience
• Should arrest reader with thumb nail
• Makes a promise to the reader

79. What’s this book about?

80. Don’t be sloppy

81. Don’t do this either

82. Would you buy this book?

83. Or dimmer

84. Great covers make a promise

85. A case study…
The evolution of one cover

86. to this cover

87. … to this cover…

88. The cover sparked a breakout at
Apple

89. And landed her on the NY Times Bestseller
List

90. Secret Three

91. #3 Publish Another Great Book
• The best-selling authors on
Smashwords offer deep backlists
• Each new ebook offers
opportunity to
• cross-promote other titles
• build trust with your reader
• build your brand

92. Secret Four

93. #4 Give (some of) Your Books
away for Free
• If you have a deep backlist, offer at
least one full-length book for free
• Eliminates financial risk for first-time
readers
• ~91X more downloads
• Turbocharges a series
• Free works for standalone promos too
• The highest grossing authors at
Smashwords offer at least one free
book

94. Secret Five

95. #5 Patience is a Virtue
• Ebooks are immortal
• Never go out of print
• When your book lands at retailer, it’s a
seedling, nourish it
• Never remove
• Ebooks develop differently
• Traditional print books – big sell-in, then yanked
from shelves, then sales go to zero
• Ebooks – can start small and grow slowly before
breakout
• Let’s look at some examples…

96. Slow boil, breakout, slow boil,
bigger breakout

97. Slow boil, breakout, slow boil,
smaller breakouts

98. Slow boil to breakout
Ruth Ann Nordin’s An Inconvenient Marriage

99. Secret Six

100. #6 Maximize Distribution, Avoid
Exclusivity
• Ebook retailing is not like sports, politics or
religion
• If your book is not available at every retailer,
it’s not discoverable or purchasable
• Exclusivity
• angers fans
• limits audience
• limits merchandising opportunities
• increases your dependence upon a
single sales outlet

101. Smashwords Distribution Network

102. Secret Seven

103. #7 Build a Platform You Control
• Platform is your ability to reach and cultivate
fans
• Platform gives you control, leverage
• Let fans decide how to connect
• Facebook
• Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn
• Blog and/or website
• Mailing list subscription
• Include “Connect with the author” links at the
end of every book (more on this later!)

104. Secret Eight

105. Secret #8 Use Viral Catalysts to
Drive Word of Mouth
• Books have always been a word of
mouth business
• Think about the first reader
• Every reader represents a chance to reach
more readers
• How they react determines your success
• Viral catalysts improve your odds of
sparking word of mouth

106. What’s a Viral Catalyst?
• A viral catalyst is anything that makes your
book more available, accessible, desirable
and enjoyable to readers
• Read the Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success (it’s
FREE!) to learn how viral catalysts spur word-of-mouth

107. Viral Catalysts
• Every thing you do right increases
virality
Great cover
Great book
Broad distribution
Fair price
Good categorization
Professionally edited
Great formatting
Great title
Great book description
Great marketing
Sampling enabled
Multiple formats
Patience
LUCK!
• Fall short anywhere, and you
undermine true potential

108. The Viral Dream
First reader
More Readers

109. Viral Decay, The Reality
First reader
Readers

110. Negative Virality
First reader
This book
sucks!!!!
= Last reader
Fun fact: 29 of 30 Apple bestsellers
had rating of 4.5 stars

111. Secret Nine

112. Secret #9 Leverage Preorders!
• A preorder allows you to collect orders
before the book officially goes onsale
• At Apple and Kobo, accumulated sales
credit all at once on “onsale” date
• Budget 4-6 week preorder “runway”
• Execute multi-part advance marketing plan
• Increases retailer merchandising opps
• Smashwords delivers preorders to
Apple, B&N and Kobo!

113. A Smashwords Preorder at B&N

114. A Smashwords Preorder at
iBooks

115. A Smashwords Preorder at Kobo

116. Apple iBooks Merchandising (1)
Your preorder is automatically
merchandized alongside all your
other titles, making it easy for
fans to reserve a copy now,
before they forget.

117. Apple iBooks Australia Home
Page Preorder Merchandising (2)
Cool beans. Three
Smashwords
preorders featured on
iBooks homepage.
Huge! Thank you
Apple iBooks
Australia, and
congrats to
Smashwords authors
Lili Saint Germain,
Kirsty Moseley and
Amy Miles!

118. WHEN ENJOYING THE CHASE WENT
ONSALE, IT HIT #1 IN MULTIPLE
COUNTRIES

119. Secret Ten

120. Secret #10 Collaborate with
Fellow Authors
• Authors working together to reach
more readers
• Publish collaborations
• Short story collections
• Box sets of full-length
• Joint promos
• They have fans you don’t reach, you have
fans they don’t reach
• Everyone wins

121. Secret Eleven

122. Secret #11 Add three sections to
backmatter
1. About Yourname Lastname
• Short bio
1. Other books by Yourname Lastname
• Title 1
• Title 2
1. Connect with Yourname Lastname
• Facebook:
• Twitter:
• Web site:
• Blog:
• Smashwords author page:

123. Secret Twelve

124. Secret #12 Pinch Your Pennies
• You’re running a business
• Profit = Sales minus Expenses
• Most books don’t sell well (!!!!)
• NEVER borrow money to publish a
book
• NEVER spend or invest money you
need for food and shelter
• DIY then reinvest

125. Secret Thirteen

126. Secret #13 Think Globally

127. Apple, B&N, Kobo, Amazon and
others are going global
You Have the Tools to Reach a
Worldwide Market Today
The tools are FREE

128. The market for your English-language books
outside the US will soon dwarf the US market
Apple operates iBooks in 51 countries. We
distribute to Apple. In 2013, over 40% of
Smashwords Apple iBooks sales were outside
the US

129. NOW GO FINISH YOUR SUPER-
AWESOME BOOK

130. Q&A
Connect with Mark Coker and Smashwords:
Web: www.smashwords.com
Blog: blog.smashwords.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/markcoker
Facebook: facebook.com/markcoker
HuffPo: huffingtonpost.com/mark-coker
Twitter: @markcoker

131. Free Ebook Publishing Resources
• Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success (best practices of
successful authors)
• Smashwords Book Marketing Guide (how to market any
book)
• Smashwords Style Guide (how to format an ebook)