Signing a Distributor Contract

Today I received a question from one of our clients about signing an agreement with a distributor. Here are the basics of my reply:

"The contract seems quite standard but I do have some questions:

1. The contract needs to state that the distributor holds your books on consignment (if the distributor should go out of business, you still own your books and they will not be seized by the receiver).
2. How often does the distributor pay you? That needs to be stated in the contract.
3. How often does the distributor report sales to you?
4. Does the distributor tell you where your books were sold? This is good to know so that you have a way of monitoring the effectiveness of your publicity campaign.
5. Do they tell you which stores returned books?
6. Do they have a sales force or are they only sending out catalogs?
7. Do they pay the shipping to the bookstores?

Some distributors have many fees on top of the commission that they charge. Be sure to compare contracts from several distributors before you agree to sign anything."

I hope that this helps some publishers avoid a few pitfalls.

Denise

Publishing all over the World

Here's a question that I recently received: "Can I self publish if I move to another country?" Of course you can. The basics are the same:
- write interesting content that people are looking for
- know why you are writing a book
- know who you are writing for (who will buy it?)
- have your writing professionally edited
- come up with a great title
- have the book professionally designed
- get it printed at the lowest rate you can
- have a great publicity and marketing campaign

Get out there and sell!

Denise

Digital Printing and Off Set Printing

We wrote about digital printing and off set printing in our latest newsletter because we hear from so many people who want to sell their books to book stores or they want to sell to large volume buyers, but they just can't. They paid too much per book for the printing. The biggest problem is that the publishers do not have a strong marketing plan and they really don't know who their target market is.

Knowing that target market makes all the difference. If you don't know who you are targeting to sell books, it's difficult to decide upon the retail price point and you don't know what kind of discounts you can afford to offer volume buyers.

It just can't be said often enough - do your research, educate yourself on the publishing and marketing processes and make wise decisions.

We really hate having to tell people that they don't qualify for marketing programs because they paid too much for their book printing, and now they don't have enough room for the required discounts.

Think long term before you print books - know where you plan to sell them and choose your printer accordingly. Don't decide after the deed is done that you want to sell books in other markets. It's too late.

Thanks for letting me rant.

Denise

Get a Sponsor

Our friend Mike Volkin recommends the following:


Authors, want to make money? Get a Sponsor

Authors can have a variety of extracurricular activities. Depending on how involved the author wants to be with his/her book, radio shows, speaking tours and other activities can create extra income. Each of these activities could have a sponsor associated with it. For example, if you have an online radio show at BlogTalkRadio.com, you could have sponsors advertise on your show. Doing this is a great compliment to book sales and can provide a good source of income. A good sponsor will not only pay you, but also help you sell books, so the partnership might be beneficial in more ways than one.

To find a sponsor, I would recommend going to the website GetYourSponsor.com, simply fill out a profile and other companies or entities wanting to provide a sponsorship might see a match.

If you want to learn how to sell books online, just get my new paperback Social Networking for Authors, it will be the best $18 you ever spent. I have a couple sponsors that even asked to sell my books for me! It doesn’t get any better than that.

Time for Reflection

It has been a difficult time in the Ink Tree office. Linda, our Office Manager, recently lost her Father to a severe illness and a week later I lost my Father-in-law (Joni's Grandfather) to old age and illness. We are now in the process of trying to heal. The loss of a loved one causes one to think more about the important things in life. This time of loss and healing makes one focus on why we do the things we do and what are the results of those actions.

This might be a good time to ask you, a person who is interested in writing and/or publishing a book an important question: "Why do you want to write a book?" There are reasons too numerous to even discuss, but you need to be very clear about why you want to write and most importantly why you want to publish.

From my observations, most people don't really know what a publisher is. Briefly, it is the person/company who edits, designs, has printed and sells the book. Sometimes that person is even the author. The publisher is the one who actually owns and profits from the book.

In our publishing course, we emphasize the "Why?" question so that people are clear about their goals. This time of relection has brought this question to mind again so I ask it of you once more, "Why do you want to write a book and what do you hope to gain from it?"

Take a moment to write your answers down. They might surprise you.

Denise