In today’s Journal
* Pre-Publication Preparation
* Of Interest
* The Numbers
Pre-Publication Preparation (Saves Typos)
Again, this is a topic I shared way back in November of 2019. But I shared it only with the folks who followed me at Patreon. Don’t bother checking at Patreon now. They made a grab for rights and I was outta there. Anyway, I also updated the post. Here it is:
Again, back in 2019 I also took off on one of Dean’s posts and talked about creating an inventory spreadsheet. I’ll repost the updated “Post-Publication Organizing” in this space tomorrow. Watch for it.
Do you currently reinvent the wheel each time you upload a new work to a different store or distributor?
I currently only upload to Draft2Digital, Amazon and my StoneThread Publishing pages at Payhip. So only three places. And that’s only for longer works (novellas, novels, collections). For individual short stories, I currently omit Payhip.
In fact, more recently I’ve been publishing my short stories only on my Stanbrough Writes substack. Free. When I eventually publish my new stories wide, I’ll probably do so only in story collections.
But even uploading to only a few places, I find having a folder for each new title a huge time saver. One document (a text document) inside that folder is a promo file. Instead of retyping everything for each vendor or distributor, I simply copy-paste from that promo file.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Here’s what I do for each title, often before it’s even finished.
Create a new file folder. The name of the folder is the same as the title of the work. (Not even a shortened version. This saves a ton of time later when you have a few hundred titles. It’s easier to search full title names than keywords.)
In that folder, I put the original Word document. Again, the Word file is named the same as the title of the work. (The document also is already formatted and has front and back matter already included.)
As an aside, the front matter consists of the title followed by my name or pen name, then a space, then “a novel (short story, whatever) from StoneThread Publishing.
After that comes this statement: “To give the reader more of a sample, the front matter appears at the end.” (This doesn’t always work but it lets the reader know you’re trying to circumvent the sampling process at different vendors.)
You can see all of that in my free MS Word story template. I have one I use for short stories and one I use for novels. Email me and I’ll be happy to send you one or both.
Back when Smashwords was still a separate thing, I had a second Word document in the folder too (this one in .doc format, not .docx) with “the Smashwords edition of” on one line just below the title and my name. That file was titled the same as the first one but with “smash” appended to the end.
Also in the folder is the original photo I used for the cover. It’s titled “Title of Book base.jpg.”
Then comes the finished cover itself in four sizes:
- “Title of Book.jpg” (the original huge file at 6250x,9375 pixels),
- “Title of Book 2000.jpg” (2000×3000, this is the one I upload to vendors and distributors),
- “Title of Book 300.jpg” (300×450, the one that will go on the individual book page on my site and my publisher site), and
- “Title of Book 180.jpg” (180×270, the thumbnail that will go on the genre page on my site and the publisher site).
Next comes the promo doc.
For me, the promo doc is a text document (I’m a PC guy so I use Notepad). It contains the title of the work, my publisher name, and the book/story description. (You need both a long and short description if you upload to Smashwords).
Below that are seven Internet search terms. For my Blackwell Ops series, those are usually crime, mystery, murder, thriller, psychological suspense, assassin, and whatever else. If there isn’t another good keyword, I use novel series.
To round out the promo doc, below the search terms I add the universal book link from Books2Read (through Draft2Digital), the Amazon buy link and the discount Payhip buy link. I put the links there in case I need them for future reference.
I think it might also be useful to add the total word count somewhere in the promo doc, but I haven’t gotten into that habit yet. (grin)
See what I mean about organizing on the pre-pub side of things?
Now when I’m ready to publish the work, all I have to do is open the promo doc and copy-paste everything from it to the appropriate spaces on the platform.
I upload to Draft2Digital first, and from there I download the .mobi and .epub files. Those go into the book’s individual folder too.
Then when it comes time to send a .mobi or .epub file to a reader for a direct sale, I simply open the folder, drag the appropriate file to an email, and hit Send.
My individual book folders are what make it possible for me to publish a new work to D2D and Payhip in about 2 minutes each, to Amazon in about 3. Uploading to Smashwords when I still did that took about 10 minutes. That’s one reason I no longer use them. Ten minutes is a huge chunk of time. It equates to 200 to 300 words of new fiction.
Not only do I not have the hassle of rewriting everything at each vendor or distributor platform, but I lessen the chance of typos in what I’m uploading.
Try it, you’ll like it. (grin)
I hope this helps. Any questions on any of this, just email me.
Talk with you again soon.
Of Interest
BookFunnel I strongly encourage you to sign up for an account with BookFunnel even if only to receive their infrequent newsletter. They’re constantly offering webinars on all sorts of marketing strategies.
Episode 670: How to Lose Money
The Numbers
The Journal……………………………… 1000
Writing of The Darling Members Club (novel)
Brought forward…… 6632
Day 1…… 3601 words. To date…… 10233
Day 2…… 4137 words. To date…… 14370
Fiction for October…………………….. 7738
Fiction for 2024………………………… 756984
Nonfiction for October………………… 2960
Nonfiction for 2024…………………….. 306550
2024 consumable words……………… 879835
Average Fiction WPD (October)……… 3869
2024 Novels to Date………………………… 13
2024 Novellas to Date……………………… 1
2024 Short Stories to Date……………………. 15
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………..……. 95
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)………………. 10
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………..… 252
Short story collections…………………….….. 29
Disclaimer: I am a prolific professional fiction writer, but please try this at home. You can do it. On this blog I teach Writing Into the Dark and adherence to Heinlein’s Rules. Unreasoning fear and the myths of writing are lies. They will slow your progress as a writer or stop you cold. I will never teach the myths on this blog.
Please support TNDJ with a paid subscription. Thank you!