You may have read about a certain kind of publishing that is called custom publishing. What is custom publishing?

Custom publishing means the creation of media like magazines or brochures or websites specific to the services offered by company or organization and specific to the needs of the consumers of that company or organization. The purpose of custom publishing is to strengthen the loyalty and trust with its customers/consumers. Since it is a custom publication, the information offered or provided is geared for the right market.

The most successful branch of custom media is customer magazine. The best and the most common example of customer magazine and one of the oldest form of custom publishing is an in-flight magazine that is sponsored by airlines. With an in-flight magazine, customers will find different travel information about the best places to visit, reviews and recommendations on food and any other topics about airline travel. In this example, the brand is offering a means of communication that is perfectly suitable to the needs of its consumers.

This form of publishing is distinctive from mainstream publishing because while with the traditional way wherein marketing or advertising is very much highlighted, custom publishing is more into providing information and helpful tips or ideas to its consumers than advertising products. It is one way for a brand to establish a relationship with its customers. Since it is more editorial and informational than marketing, the stories are carefully laid out and edited so that consumers will perceive the material as something that is useful to them and the source as credible. In custom publishing, the information provided echoes the consumers’ way of lives, needs and interests and at the same time emphasizes the company’s standards. Of course, with custom publishing, the brand still advertises products but not in an obvious manner. A form of their advertisement can be made by providing recommendations or reviews; thus it creates confidence and loyalty in the brand, when consumers see that it serves their best interest. The goals for custom publishing are:

1) to meet the interests of the brand’s larger market

2) build up brand trust and loyalty

3) increase brand awareness by proper positioning of the company and ultimately,

4) boost sales or profit from existing and new customers

There are many available custom publishers that specialize in this kind of media. Just like with other services-provider, of course, you can expect that there will be a fee to have this done. I will be talking about it in a different article.

I have put together the steps that you, as an author, can do to publish your own book. Now, these steps best describe the do- it- yourself process when you publish your own book. Read on.

1. After you have completed your final draft, unless you are an editor, you have to find and pay a copyeditor or a content editor to get rid of typos and grammatical errors.

2. You have to find and pay a cover artist or a layout designer to help you create a cover design of the book, add a barcode on the back of the book with the ISBN.

3. You have to purchase a block of ISBN. You can obtain this from Bowker.

4. Process the paperworks for copyrighting your book. Two (2) copies of your printed book is needed to support the papers and a certain amount of money that you can pay to the US Copyright Office for registration.

5. Get the design files saved as camera- ready files or print ready files.

6. Find and pay a printer who will print a set of copies of your book. These printers usually print in bulk, so there is a need for you to come up with another amount of money as your upfront payment for the production process and prepare a storage space that has climate control for these books.

7. You have to secure a web domain to set up a selling/ information site.

8. You have to find and pay a web designer to set up a website about you and about your book.

9. Set up an account with a credit card company to process payments for orders of your book.

10. Stock shipping/ packaging materials or open an account with a shipper who provides package tracking services.

11. You have to contact major book resellers like Amazon or Barnes and Noble to have them sell your book.

12. You have to contact bookstores to talk to them about having your book displayed on their shelves.

13. Keep track of your sales, for accounting purposes.

14. Hire a publicist to help you market your book.

These steps are some of the ways that you can follow if you are hell- bent on doing the publishing of your own book yourself. Of course, if you want to publish your own book, just like with making that concept into a written material, it requires great effort and time from you, and although this looks like too much work, once you have overcome this, the results can be to your advantage.

After you have written your children’s books, you are now contemplating on your next action plan. How do you get your children’s book published? Well all know that there are a lot of publishers out there, but the question is, how do you get to them and turn that probably small chance to your advantage?

Since we have already talked about some ideas about writing children’s books, in this article, I will talk about basic ideas on how to publish children’s books.

What you need to do first is to seek out potential publishers. Now, there are a lot of houses that publishes children’s books but you can start with your research by checking out SCBWI or Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Just like how their acronym stands for, they are a professional organization for writers and illustrators. They provide suggestions, guidelines and information to illustrators and writers of children’s books. This should help you get started.

Once you have sought out the possible publisher/s for the type of children’s book you have written, verify if there is a need for you to hire a literary agent. Although not all, but many publishing houses do not accept manuscripts that are unsolicited. When you have determined their guidelines for submission, follow it. There’s a reason why it’s called guidelines.

You can write a query letter and book proposal that you can send either to your literary agent or publisher. For illustrations, it is usually the publisher who finds an illustrator for your children’s book. You can inform them beforehand if there is a need for your children’s book to be illustrated. The response will take some time. These houses get a lot of manuscripts, so you can’t expect them to get back with you immediately. If your potential publisher is OK with multiple submissions, you can freely submit your proposal to other houses, but if they require exclusive submission, wait first for their response before considering other publishers.

Let me tell you in advance that you will get rejection slips, but do not let that get you down. It’s normal. Even J.K. Rowling had received dozens of rejection slips but she did not give up, and look at where her unshakable determination got her. If ever you get rejection slips, work harder with your goal. Maybe, you need to do some improvement on your work. Whatever feedback you get from publishers, learn from it.

When a publisher decides to work with you and publish your children’s book, you have to review your contract. If you have an agent, he or she will help you with it. Make sure that both parties understand the parameters and agree to everything before making any decisions.

You may have read this in my previous entry and you may have already gotten the picture as to what print on demand means. In this article, however, not only will I elaborate on this kind of technology, but I will also include some advantages as well as disadvantages, when you go with print on demand.

The simple definition of print on demand (POD) is to print or publish copies of a book when there is an order made. That means, the books are not printed in large quantities and there is no need for a warehouse full of stocked books. Print on demand is also called digital printing, because unlike offset printing where there is a need for plates, this technology uses a digital file for both the interior and the cover of the book. Once the books are set up in a digital format, the files are then stored in a database, that is linked to its online channels and resellers. When an order is made on a particular book, the file is then forwarded to the printer. The book is then printed, bound and shipped to whoever made the order. If an order of 500 copies or even 1 copy of a book is made, it can be done easily because of this print on demand technology.

I have listed some advantages as well as disadvantages with this technology. Let me start with the advantages:

- Given that there are no plates needed and the books are printed directly from a computer file, this allows the printer to save time and money by not needing to create plates, a faster set-up time and the cost of labor is far less than offset printing.

- There no need to keep inventory.

- The books never go out of print.

- No need to come up with an upfront investment to cover the cost to print a warehouse-full of books.

- Books are reasonably priced if it is for a specialized market (niche).

- Booksellers can present more titles without the need for warehouses.

- Eco- friendly because, less books means less need for papers; less need for papers means less need to cut down trees.

Now for the disadvantages:

- The cost of producing a single book is higher than the cost of per book for a mass printing of thousands of copies at once.

- The print quality of the book may not be as good as the offset printing.

- Bookstores will not stock print- on- demand books on the shelves. There may be books that are tagged as returnable (meaning, if there are unsold copies of a book, the bookstore can return it to the distributor for a refund) but will not always be a guarantee that bookstore owners will want to display the book.

- Print- on- demand publishers will require you to pay more money to market and promote your book. Otherwise, you have to set up your own way of marketing and promoting your book.

If you are an author wanting to self-publish a book, and is on a careful budget, then you may want to consider this print on demand technology. It has its own pros and cons, but so as with any other industry. What’s important is that you are secured with your decision, after careful analysis has been made.

Assuming you plan to pursue a different route when it comes to publishing your book. Suppose you want to own all the rights to your work, be in command of the entire publication process, manage the marketing steps, and be in charge of the distribution of your book, then you may want to take a look at self-publishing, as a different avenue available on how to publish a book. In this article, I will talk about the general idea when it comes to self-publishing a book.

How to Publish a Book 1.2 The Self- Publishing Way

When you want to know how to self-publish a book through the self- publishing way, just make sure that you are equipped with, if not all, the necessary information that will come in handy when you tread this route.

Self- publishing, in its essence, means to do it yourself. After you have written your book, you have to determine what kind of self- publishing company and services are you willing to pursue. There are several types but just to keep it brief, there are those that we call Vanity publishing, wherein you pay them for every little thing you want to get done. That means, they charge you possible exorbitant amount for a service that may be poorly executed. Also, they don’t reject any manuscripts, as long as you are able to pay the services. There is another type called Subsidy publishing, which works kind of like a traditional publishing company, although not quite. Publishers pay a portion for the production but you as the author will be mostly responsible for the printing and binding cost, as well as additional services needed. Another kind is called Micro Publishing wherein the publication of a work is proposed to a particular market. This type is also called Niche Marketing. Another kind is the kind of self- publishing company that uses the Print-on-Demand technology (POD), wherein, just like how its called, copies of the book are printed each time there is an order or a demand made. These companies provide services according to rates, and vice versa; will provide publication services, marketing and distribution to online resellers such as Amazon.com; and pay royalties to authors based on the sales of the book.

You should be willing and be ready for anything when you want to self-publish your book. It requires your effort too, and you have to be able to identify which type you are going with, so that, in the long run, there won’t be any regrets.

As a motivated writer, you have to know the fundamentals when you are planning to pursue the publishing route. It is not enough that you have written a manuscript, you also have to do a great deal of research on what you need to do before and after you have written your work. Before making any decisions that will have an impact on your venture, it is very beneficial that you have an idea on how to publish a book. Just like the different categories of book publishing, there are also different avenues present when you publish your book. However, I have narrowed it down to 2 (two) to make it easier. In this article, I will be talking about the first kind on how to publish a book.