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| Photo Courtesy of : Ambro@freedigitalphotos.net |
Here is a video that shows you just how costly this can become if you let it: (Note: This video was done on July 31, 2013 and a lot has changed since then).
So I'm sure after watching this you might actually be wondering how I can say that it costs basically nothing to self-publish, right? Like I said, it will depend on what you are willing to do for your book, or what you are willing to pay someone else to do for you. Personally, I never spent anything close to what the young lady above spent. My biggest expense came during the first time I self-published back in 2012'. This is what I totally spent back then.
Book Template: $29.99
Grammarly.com: $139.99 yearly
Images (2): $11.95
Grand Total: $181.93
After my first book, I have basically paid nothing other than the yearly Grammarly.com program for $139.99. The reason I have kept my self-publishing costs down is that I've learned to do a lot of things for myself, and I have had other people around me willing to help me where I needed it. And, of course, the internet has come a long way with helping a person get published today for a lot less.
Now, if you know some people who have certain skills around you, this can be an advantage to you to keep this virtually free. When I say people who are skilled, I mean someone that has an English Major background and would be willing to edit your book just for a chance to read it. If you are a high school or college student you might find a teacher or professor who might be willing to do this for you for free just because they know that you are planning on self-publishing a book. Then again, they might want to charge you something, but it might be a lot lesser than what other people have paid for in editing services.
You might be wondering exactly all that you need if you are self-publishing for the first time, right? (Here is a list based on an eBook). These are the basic things:
- Book Template
- Your manuscript typed inside the template
- Book Cover - (Front is the only requirement for an eBook)
- Editing
Now there are other things, but it will be up to you if you want them such as; Beta Readers and Reviewers for your book, and if you want your book in Paperback which you will need to create another type of template for this. (The eBook and Paperback have two different types of formatting). You can get the template for free at Createspace.com whether you use their service or not. I have to admit that formatting a Paperback can be quite challenging more so than an eBook.
If you do a paperback then you might want to buy some copies of it. I don't think you need 100 copies like the young woman in the video above talked about unless you become a highly, famous author, or you are going to do a book signing at a writer's conference or bookstore, but even at that, I don't think you need as many copies. In the end, this is something you will have to decide.
If you don't want to do some of these things I can always recommend fiverr.com . There are many people out there willing to format your book, design a book cover, and help you with editing your book for reasonable rates. Just make sure if you use this site that you check out the person thoroughly by their ratings and see what people who have used their service say before purchasing anything from them.
The self-publishing costs is always something that I see highly debated online, but just understand, like I said, that if you are self-publishing what you spend is really up to you!
One last thing, it does not cost anything to download your book to a book publishing site like: amazon, draft2digital, pronoun, or smashwords.
In my next blog article, I am going to talk about how to format a Paperback book for print.
So stay tuned.
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