Formatting your self published book

Theyre also cover design experts, customer service expertsand the list goes on. Self publishing for bloggers setting your timeline and budget 5 ways to sell your selfpublished book designing and formatting your book 11 ways to market your book when selfpublishing a book, writing and editing is often the only step people really think about but designing and. Before, you were at the mercy of your publisher on how your book format looked, but today, you have control over this entire process. In faact, if budget permits, you may consider hiring a professional formatter. Print and publish highquality books using the same worldwide distribution networks used by traditional publishers. There is no shame in leaving these tasks to the professionals, and our free book on how to self publish your book will. The fast fingers book formatting service design of pod. Jul 02, 2017 selfpublish completely on your own, hiring only the freelance assistance you need, and work directly with retailers and distributors to sell your book.

Aug 30, 2019 a selfpublished author can quickly get their print and ebook distributed to the most important online retailers by using just a couple services, all of which have no or very low upfront costs. How to format your book for amazon kindle using microsoft word in only 30 minutes 0 comments one of the factors that decides whether your book will be successful or. Selfpublish by hiring a service company to basically act as your publisher. You can promote and sell your self published book in a range of ways, including in the blurb bookstore, on amazon, and with worldwide online retailers.

There are many options available to authors these days, for both print and ebook formatting. Usa today bestselling author, nina pierce, talks about formatting, creating a table of contents and designing a selling book cover for your selfpublished book. How to format a novel in microsoft word selfpublishing. Sep 10, 2019 formatting your book blurb for amazon by shawn p. For more information on formatting your manuscript for publication you can request a free copy of professional self publishing made easy published by bookstand publishing.

How to format your book for amazon kindle using microsoft word in only 30 minutes 0 comments one of the factors that decides whether your book will be successful or a flop on amazon kindle is the formatting. Having an isbn barcode on the back of your book that includes the book price allows bookstores to scan your book directly into their point of sale. As youll know, books are typically printed with smaller pages, so if you are selfpublishing the first thing youll need to do is adjust your page size. How to selfpublish your book through amazon forbes.

When many firsttime self publishers consider the design elements of their book they only think of the front cover. Your completed selfpublished book should convey professionalism in all aspects including with its book format. Choose one and this will automatically create table of contents for your book. The goal when youre self publishing is to always make your book look as traditionally published as possible, so im giving you a stepby0step guide on formatting. This stepbystep guide shows you how to turn a manuscript written in microsoft word into a file ready to be uploaded to kdp. Jun 25, 2015 this is a short introduction to formatting your manuscript for print. Book formatting is that design touch that makes a book. When it comes to formatting your self published book, your wheels may fall off your wagon.

Now that createspace is no longer offering formatting assistance for its. You have the choice of figuring out how to format your book for the various self publishing platforms or you can pay a professional book formatting company to do it for you or you could simply buy an. Your books are your products, and to sell well, they must rival books produced by traditional publishers. Whether your book is published by a traditional publisher or you are an indie. Download our free guide to typesetting and uploading your book on completelynovel. How to get your selfpublished book edited and formatted and. Note that you need to make your pages slightly bigger in your document than the finished book size. One telltale sign of a self published book is tiny, tiny margins. One telltale sign of a selfpublished book is tiny, tiny margins. Our specialty is book formatting and interior layout, and wed love to help you get your book into professional condition. Jun 29, 2017 editors note this article is part of our 5series how to selfpublish your book guide.

The best way to start working on this is to check a couple of traditionally published books and see how they set all this up. Then apply this to your book and create something that fits the established format. First things first, decide upon the size you want your book to be. Book layout book format design a book cover bookbaby. Writing, self publishing, book marketing, making a living with your writing. Creating table of contents for the first draft of how to self publish your book. This will open three inbuilt table of contents formatting options you can choose from. Complete self publishing assistance for firsttime authors. Self publishing your kindle book with microsoft word, or tips on formatting your document so your ebook wont look terrible. Copyright page example of copyright pages free copyright. Good formatting and a great cover design bring it all together and theyre the goto guys for all your book formatting and cover design needs.

When selfpublishing a book, writing and editing is often the only step people really think about but designing and formatting your book for publication can take just as long, if not longer. Truth to be told, most new selfpublished authors wont get their first books into major bookstores anyway, but properly designed and formatted. Before i was in the book publishing business, my mother, who was close to 90, decided to selfpublish a novel. Turn your completed manuscript into a formatted ebook with kindle create. Formatting your book blurb for amazon self publishing on a. The detachable outer cover, usually made of paper and printed with text and illustrations. Robinson published september 10, 2019 updated september 16, 2019 the book blurb, or the book description, is one of the most important marketing issues an author needs to address. How to properly format and selfpublish your book toughnickel. How to organize your books front matter by joel friedlander on february 8, 2012 50 comments many writers who think about selfpublishing are taken aback when they start to put their book together for publication. Dont be fooled by expensive selfpublishing packages that claim to distribute your book to thousands of outlets. Here are the measurements that you need to know about.

Consider cost and timings for publication, as well as options for updates later as there will be an inevitable typo or two. Formatting print books with word selfpublishing advice. By subscribing to completelynovel, you only ever pay one low, monthly or annual fee to publish your book, meaning you can keep every penny of your book royalties. The fast fingers is a book formatting service that will prepare or format your manuscript according to the formatting guidelines set by ingramspark, lulu, kindle direct publishing, smashwords or. At completelynovel we use the two most popular sizes for our books.

I have personally created and published five paperback books using the self publishing methods that ill explain in this article. The book publishing hub self publish, printondemand, read. This post will expand on how to selfpublish completely on your own. Nov 01, 2017 when done, go to references tab and click table of contents on the far left. Publishing has become so easy in recent years that the biggest challenge for selfpublished authors is putting the effort and expertise into publishing books at the same level as the big traditional publishers. Exterior top, bottom, and outer edge and interior or gutter, where the book is bound. Therefore, knowing the proper book format you need is crucial. When writing your book you should separate the writing from the formatting. Our unique approach gives you all the tools, help and information you need to create outstanding books and enable you to keep every penny of your book royalties. The information we give is specific to the 2016 version of word, but the steps are similar in most versions. Design includes not just your book cover, but the page layout, typography, and more. Registering will also give you access to our preformatted ms word templates that you can download to your computer. You can do it yourself and keep control, or you can hire others to do it for you. Typesetting and formatting your book self publish, print.

Typesetting and formatting your book self publish, printon. Jan 15, 2010 samples of a long page and a short page are provided so readers can copy and paste them into their own book files, ready for customization. Book formatting for ebook and print books the creative penn. Complete selfpublishing assistance for firsttime authors. Mar 14, 2016 usa today bestselling author, nina pierce, talks about formatting, creating a table of contents and designing a selling book cover for your self published book. However, there are some steps you can make when writing your book in microsoft word that will make the job of formatting your book easier and help prevent errors in the book formatting process. See our guides for formatting your manuscript and creating a cover. Before, you were at the mercy of your publisher on how your book format looked, but today, you have.

This is often a headache for many or even most writers who decide to go down the self publishing route. How to format your book for amazon kindle using microsoft. But the design of the pages inside those covers have just as much impact and require the same amount of careful consideration. Formatting your self published book author nina pierce. Measure it and set your page size in word to be just that. The international standard book number isbn is a digit number that uniquely identifies books and book like products published internationally. Before you submit your book to kdp, you need to format it so it meets our quality standards. When preparing your selfpublished book for printing, your chosen printer will be able to advise on file types and the format required. This is a short introduction to formatting your manuscript for print. Book formatting for ebooks and print the creative penn. We pride ourselves in being a wellrounded bunch here at tck publishing, and while we may not offer paid publishing services, we will teach you how to format your selfpublished book for createspaceabsolutely free.

Find a book on your bookshelf that you want your book to be like. Using word to prepare a kindle book isnt nearly as difficult as many will tell you, but its also not as simple and straightforward as others claim. In fact, you have the final say over everything in your finished manuscript is displayed. Copyright page samples you can copy and paste into your book. Sep 06, 2019 theres more to selfpublishing than throwing your book up on amazon and calling it a day. Choosing a book formatting design book hub how to format.

Youve written a book, and now you need to figure out the manuscript format. These are the things that complete a great book, and many self published authors just dont have the diy skills or the time to pull them off. The goal when youre selfpublishing is to always make your book look as traditionally published as possible, so im giving you a stepby0step guide on formatting. Rather than fall victim to analysisparalysis, lets break down the most popular ways that selfpublished authors produce their books, beginning. I discuss things to avoid and how to make sure you design a professional looking pdf document that will print beautifully. You will need a different isbn for each format of your book. Find out more about what we can do for your book below. Formatting experts are more than what their name implies. Jim krukal knows that is takes a village to get your self published book off the ground. Depending on your ebook, some steps may be unnecessary e. This is the 10 or digit number that identifies all books published since 1970.