The One-hour Read
This is the time for the little book, a one-hour read, which seems like a lot of time to ask for someone’s attention when we are so busy with our personal and business lives. It’s a quick read. At 20,000 words, it is short enough to be read in one sitting, on a plane from Toronto to New York, but long enough to let you develop your idea.
It’s only 120 pages. Yet we want it to feel like a book, not a pamphlet, so we use heavy stock and a hardcover, covered with a handsome paper jacket that gives you room to describe yourself and your book.
It’s a great little book for those of you who want to tell your story or share your idea as a way of deepening your business brand.
If you’re giving speeches, it’s a terrific way to increase your credibility and get the word out about what you offer your audiences. The payoff is more renown, and more speeches at a higher price.
With Barlow Books, you can be sure we will deliver top quality in editing, design and production. Our experts have all worked at traditional publishing houses and bring that commitment to fine quality to your book. This is your brand, your book. Would you want it any other way?
Steps to Publish Your Book
1. Write Your Book
We start with strategy.
What is your book about? What argument are you making in this book? Who is your target audience?
Why will they buy or read your book? What does your book offer that’s different and better than the competition? Why are you writing this book? How does it fit into your market strategy?
As part of this package, you will get a two-hour consult with the publisher to help you answer these critical questions.
Then you can write your manuscript yourself, or work with our editors and writers to bring your book to life. If you need help, we will estimate a price to help you write your manuscript.
Once you submit your manuscript, we will evaluate it to see whether it meets Barlow’s publication standards. If we accept your manuscript, we will send you a note of congratulations. If we think your manuscript needs more work, we will propose a price for a structural edit that will bring your manuscript up to our standard of publication.
2. Design and Produce Your Book
We will turn your 20,000-word manuscript into a 120-page book, ready for the printer. This process includes:
3. Sell Your Book
How do you want to sell your book? In stores, or on amazon only? We’ll help you make the best decision for your budget and your ambitions.
Option 1: Limited Distribution
We set you up for sale on Amazon and other major online retailers. You can sell your book in print and electronic formats. We will also set you up so that your local independent store, or even a big store like Indigo, can order your book. To make this happen, we’ll set your book up for sale on IngramSpark.
We’ll create the key information, or metadata, that helps book buyers find your book. This includes the book description, ISBN, BISAC codes, and keywords.
Note: If you choose the limited distribution option, you do not have to pay to print books in advance. They will be printed on demand when customers order your book. The printing fee will be deducted from your revenues from IngramSpark.
If you choose this option, the revenues from the sale of your book will go directly to you.
Option 2: Full Distribution
We can get your book onto shelves of physical stores in Canada and the U.S., in addition to Amazon and other online stores. This will give you the opportunity to sell far more books than you would on online stores alone. Getting your books into physical stores is a powerful sign of credibility and will help to differentiate yourself from the huge number of authors selling books online.
We work with our sales and distribution partners in Canada and the U.S. to handle all aspects of sales and distribution to get your book the best possible placement on shelves of stores like Indigo or Barnes & Noble.
Our distributors handle the heavy work of warehousing your book, selling your book to store buyers, shipping your book to stores, and handling returns from stores.
We help them pitch your book to stores in Canada and the U.S. To do this, we create sell sheets about your book for the book trade. We also create the metadata — including the book description, keywords, BISAC codes and ISBN — that will help book buyers discover your book.
If you opt for full distribution, we will give you expert advice on positioning your book — and especially your cover and title — for the book market.
It’s a serious investment for people who are ambitious about their books and their mission. We’ll help you evaluate your investment from the very beginning by providing you with a statement that shows both the upfront costs and potential revenues from the sale of your book.
4. Tell the World About Your Book
If you are investing in the sale of books in stores, you need publicity to let customers know your book exists. We hire the best PR for each project, and they reach out to major media to book interviews to publicize your book. They also work with the publisher and sales reps to inform book store buyers of media hits, upcoming interviews and events. This encourages stores to buy more books. You can see the results on our authors’ pages.
If you have chosen the limited distribution model, publicity is still important to make your book (and you) stand apart from the crowd.
5. Printing Your Book
If you choose full distribution, you’ll have to print books in advance. We will arrange printing for you and help you decide how many to print after getting feedback from our sales reps. We will arrange printing of a hardcover 5X7 book, with a color jacket.
If you run out of copies, we can print more in a month, as long as we receive advance notice.
The price of printing depends on the number of books we print at any one time. We’ll seek the best price for you, and you’ll approve the price before we print.
If you’ve chosen the limited distribution model, you don’t need to print in advance. CreateSpace and IngramSparks print copies when customers (including you) demand them. Print on Demand is a great service, which spares you the cost of advance printing and warehousing, but if you want more than 500 copies at any one time, we can probably print at a better cost for you.
6. Collect Your Revenues
If you are selling books in stores, you will earn 100% of the revenues we receive for the sale of your book.
We’ll handle revenues from the distributor and give you reports on book sales four times a year, along with your author payments.
If you have opted for limited distribution, you will be getting your revenues directly from CreateSpace and IngramSparks.
Are You Interested?
Please contact Barlow Books Publisher Sarah Scott for prices, and answers to any questions you may have.
