Self-Publishing Without Paying Upfront

It's long been held by writers that 'publishers pay you - you don't pay publishers.' Unfortunately, there are many vanity presses and near-vanity presses out there (including several of what's known as 'print on demand') that are quite ready to take your cash in exchange for the hope of selling your books to the masses.

First off, is self-publishing worth it? If you have a story idea that would appeal to a lot of readers, or is considered more mainstream or genre (think romance, science fiction, mystery), or if you have a non-fiction story that many people can relate to, then you should try to find a publisher. And an agent.

Finding a publisher (or agent) is admittedly hard for an unpublished author - but it does happen. After all, go back far enough and you'll find a point where Stephen King and J.K. Rowling were unpublished nobodies. They got their chance and so can you. It's easy enough to get dispirited when you see the likes of Nichole Ritchie or Madonna getting book deals just because they're famous - but publishers also like to take chances on unknowns, often because it costs them a lot less to sign.

Having said that, if your book will only appeal to a very small market, or if you have plans to sell it yourself (as an adjunct to lectures, for example, or in conjunction with your crafts), it may make more sense to self-publish.

There are four basic methods to self-publishing your book:

1. Lay out the book yourself, design the cover yourself, and pay a printer to print 200-1,000 copies which you'll then have to keep on hand while you try to get them stocked in bookstores or sell them yourself.

2. Pay a vanity press a lot of money for them to lay the book out, design the cover, and print a small number of copies. Why a small number? Well, they don't think you'll be selling (or giving away) more than a few.

3. Pay a print-on-demand company like iUniverse or Xlibris some money for them to layout the book and design the cover, and have it ready to be printed whenever someone buys a copy ('on demand').

4. Sell it electronically.

You may not have considered selling an electronic version of your book, but you should. Here's why:

1. No upfront costs. You can download templates to format your manuscript, and you can also download free software that will convert your word processing document into Adobe PDF (portable document format) files, the most common type of files for ebooks.

2. No worry about printing or reprinting. You can sell as many or as few copies of your ebook without having to figure out how many books to print ahead of time. It simply doesn't cost anything to duplicate an electronic file.

3. Easy to set up. There's no need to contract with booksellers or distributors; sell the ebookyourself on your own Web site or blog, or even your Facebook or MySpace page.

What's the easiest, fastest way to get started selling your ebooks? CybaSumo (http://www.cybasumo.com).

With CybaSumo, you simply create an account and upload your ebook (all for free). CybaSumo handles the transaction, fulfillment, and billing - leaving you free to work on your writing.

You can sell your ebook wherever you want to with CybaSumo. First, at www.cybasumo.com you'll find an attractive set of stores you can join with your products. But there's also the CybaSumo portable store, a Flash widget you can embed on your own Web site, blog, or social networking site (think MySpace or Facebook).

While publishers pay you only a fraction of the cover price, and vanity presses and print-on-demand firms require substantial upfront fees, there's no fee ever to list your ebook with CybaSumo, and aside from a tiny percentage taken off for administration, you get all the profit from your work.More and more authors are releasing works via ebook, including Stephen King, Cory Doctorow, and Scott Sigler. Join the twenty-first century publishing revolution and sell your ebooks to your fans today - wherever they are. Join CybaSumo!