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Online Publishing Profits:
Digital Fulfillment Delivers

This is another in my series of articles that explain the Online Publishing Model and how small-time authors and/or self-publishers can use the OPM as a viable alternative to the often archaic and dysfunctional traditional book publishing model.

Typically, you will create your book/ebook in a source word processing program such as MS-Word or WordPerfect. Once you have converted it into PDF format you’ll be ready to start selling it via the three primary channels that make up the Online Publishing Model: 1. Sales-Mini-Sites, 2. Digital Download Distributors, 3. Print-On-Demand (POD) Distributors.

This article explains channel 2, Digital Download Distribution. It’s an excerpt from my book/ebook Instant Book Writing Kithttp://InstantBookWritingKit.com

Discovering exactly how the digital fulfillment channel works was a major breakthrough for me. That discovery alone has resulted in thousands of dollars in ebook sales that I otherwise wouldn’t have made. Really!

Based on my experience, the use of this one online distribution channel is guaranteed to add hundreds or thousands of dollars annually to your bottom line sales! That’s right — if you harness the digital fulfillment channel you’ll sell hundreds more ebooks than you would just selling them from your Web sites.

DIGITAL FULFILLMENT: DEFINITION

It’s important that you understand exactly what I’m talking about when I use the term “digital fulfillment”, as opposed to print-on-demand (POD) fulfillment.

Digital fulfillment refers to when your ebook is delivered strictly in electronic form as a “digital download” product. Essentially, it’s the same as when your ebook gets downloaded from your Web site, except that, the digital fulfillment is provided by a digital download distribution company through their distribution network.

A typical example of digital fulfillment in action would be when you provide your ebook electronic files (PDF) to a company that distributes digital download ebooks to amazon.com, for example. Amazon.com would then offer your ebook to its customers as a digital download product.

IMPORTANT: When I talk about “digital fulfillment” here I am NOT talking about delivering a downloadable ebook to your buyers from your own “sales-mini-site”. I’m referring to when one uses third party vendors and/or distributors to deliver a digital version of one’s book through their own channels.

THE SECRET OF DIGITAL FULFILLMENT

As I stated in the other parts of this series on the OPM, I have spent the past few years immersing myself in learning about the tools and techniques of successful Internet marketing to help me sell more of my ebooks/books.

In the process, I have purchased dozens of “must have” books from many heavy-hitter big-name Internet marketers. But NEVER have I read anything about the digital fulfillment strategy in ANY of those many books/ebooks from the gurus!

In fact, I basically stumbled across this largely unknown money-making publishing secret by accident when I asked a major book selling company if it would be possible to sell my ebooks through their Web sites in addition to my own.

They promptly answered that “yes”, there is indeed a way to do that… by using a digital fulfillment company. Although I didn’t fully realize it at the time, that was a breakthrough moment for me!

Typically, a digital fulfillment company maintains large digital libraries of books and ebooks. They deliver those products electronically “on demand” as digital download e-books in response to orders from publishers, distributors, booksellers, and libraries.

The major digital fulfillment companies offer a vast distribution network, folks. Exploiting this channel means much more than just getting your ebook and/or book listed on amazon.com. It means getting your title in front of the vast majority of all ebook wholesalers and retailers!

Why Digital Fulfillment when you already have a website?
That’s a good logical question, and you may be surprised by the answer.

I have found that there is very little cross-over between the people that buy ebooks at my Web sites and those who buy them through sites like amazon.com, and others. That’s right.

In fact, out of thousands of sales through both channels I have only received one e-mail that indicated a buyer had seen my ebooks at both places.

Another proof of this is that, although I use the same list price for my ebooks on my Web sites and at amazon.com, that company quite often chooses to offer a 30% discount, which actually makes it a much better deal to buy the ebook at their Web site.

In spite of this, sales at my Web sites remain strong. In fact I continue to sell more ebooks from my Web sites. So, it’s pretty clear that people aren’t doing cross-comparisons of prices.

They appear to be two mutually exclusive groups of shoppers!

(However, I should add that people who buy the ebook at my Web site also receive a number of bonuses that don’t come with the ebook when sold through a distributor).

The key point here being — if I didn’t offer my ebooks online through amazon.com and other digital download distributors, I would probably not make over 95% of those sales through my other distribution channels (i.e. my Web sites). Lucky for me, I now know this little secret!

DIGITAL FULFILLMENT – EASY TO SET-UP

If you’re careful, and plan ahead when you create the original version of your ebook that people will purchase and download from your Web site, you’ll also be able to provide the same efiles to your digital fulfillment distributor with few changes, if any.

Typically, it will take only 10 to 15 days from the time you submit your efiles until you will start seeing your ebook show up on book retailer Web sites as digital downloads.

This channel works folks! In fact, just this afternoon I checked my account and found that over 30 copies of my Recommendation Letter Kit ebook have sold so far this month, and this is one of the slower months for that product!

I’ve also sold more than 25 paperback versions (POD) of that same book this month through the same digital distributor, but I’ll get into the POD model in the next Part of this series.

The really exciting thing about these digital download sales is, as I explained above, they are IN ADDITION to any sales that you will make via your Web site.

Awesome! It’s almost like “found money”. You just have to know how to find it.

(C) Shaun Fawcett is the author of numerous how-to books on everyday practical writing help. He also writes about how to create and publish books and ebooks, including his popular book that explains all about how to implement and profit from the Online Publishing Model:
http://InstantBookWritingKit.com

Online Book Publishing: The Many Benefits of OPM

This is another in my series of articles that explain the Online Publishing Model and how small-time authors and/or self-publishers can use the OPM as a viable alternative to the often archaic and dysfunctional traditional book publishing model.

It’s an excerpt from my book/ebook, Instant Book Writing Kit:
InstantBookWritingKit.com

Typically, you will create your book/ebook in a source word processing program such as MS-Word or WordPerfect. Once you have converted it into PDF format you’ll be ready to start selling it via the three primary channels that make up the Online Publishing Model: 1. Sales-Mini-Sites, 2. Digital Download Distributors, 3. Print-On-Demand (POD) Distributors.

This article explains the numerous benefits of using the Online Publishing model (OPM).

Frankly, after my frustrating and disappointing experiences using the traditional book publishing model, I was truly blown away when I discovered the many benefits of the Online Publishing Model. I was thrilled to discover that there actually IS an alternative that will allow me to write and publish books and ebooks for a living.

BENEFITS OF ONLINE PUBLISHING MODEL

As I state on the Web site for the Instant Book Writing Kit, the benefits of the Online Publishing Model are numerous and compelling:

You’ll Make More Money
Instead of getting a paltry 3% to 35%, you’ll get somewhere between 60% and 90% of your cover price, depending on which of the three channels you’re using.

You Can Charge More
People are willing to pay more if they can get the information they are looking for almost immediately. Higher prices = more profits for you.

You’ll Get Paid Sooner
Many online payment processors will pay you within two weeks of making a sale. On the other hand, traditional publishers and distributors will make you wait 90 to 120 days for payment.

Your Costs Will Be Lower
With the online publishing model your up-front costs will be significantly lower than if you self-publish the traditional way.

You Won’t Have “Returns”
You can choose to NOT accept “returns”. Unlike the traditional publishing model, all sales onder the OPM will be final with minimal refunds. Returned “over-orders” will be a thing of the past.

Your Sales Will Be On Automatic Pilot
Once you have your Web site up and running and your files uploaded to the digital fulfillment and POD distributors, you’re ebooks/books will be selling automatically with little or no intervention by you.

You’ll Be In Charge
You’ll be in control of almost all aspects of the publishing and distribution of your book/ebook. You can publish or revise when you like. No more jumping to somebody else’s timetable.

You’ll Have No Inventory
You won’t have to keep track of an inventory and worry about shipping, storage, and damage hassles and costs. You’ll be completely inventory free.

You Can Revise Whenever You Like
Using online publishing channels you will have the freedom to make revisions to your books/ebooks whenever you like. You just update your book/ebook and post the new version at your convenience.

You Can Add Special Features
You can add value to your ebook by adding links to multi-media features and other hyper-linked bonuses.

You’ll Have Direct Access To Your Data
Dealing with online fulfillment houses and distributors you’ll have direct online access to current sales and earnings data.

BOTTOM LINE ON OPM

When I realized the full power of the online publishing model I truly was astounded! Discovering this new publishing model hit me like a breath of fresh air.

After all, using the conventional book publishing model, I had spent more than two years banging my head against the wall in frustration — getting nowhere and going broke fast.

That’s when I decided that I should write this information down and share it with other small-time authors and self publishers so they wouldn’t have to go through all of the trial-and-error and expense that I did. My goal was to create a turnkey, paint-by-number blueprint, that any aspiring author and/or self-publisher could easily implement. I believe I’ve done just that.

So, I finally wrote it all down in Instant Book Writing Kit for the express purpose of sharing the Online Publishing Model with anyone who is interested in writing a book/ebook and making some decent money by publishing and marketing it online. Essentially, anyone who wants to duplicate what I have done.

If you are a small-time author and/or publisher you owe it to yourself to look into the Online Publishing Model before you write and/or publish that next book.

(C) Shaun Fawcett is the author of numerous how-to books on everyday practical writing help. He also writes about how to create and publish books and ebooks, including his popular book that explains all about how to implement and profit from the Online Publishing Model:
http://InstantBookWritingKit.com

Online Publishing Profits:
Print-On-Demand Will Double Your Sales

This is another in my series of articles that explain the Online Publishing Model and how small-time authors and/or self-publishers can use the OPM as a viable alternative to the often archaic and dysfunctional traditional book publishing model.

Typically, you will create your book and/or ebook in a source word processing program such as MS-Word or WordPerfect. Once you have converted it into a PDF document, or other POD format you’ll be ready to start selling it via the three primary channels that make up the Online Publishing Model:

1. Sales-Mini-Sites.
2. Digital Download Distributors.
3. Print-On-Demand (POD) Distributors.

This article explains Channel 3, Print-On-Demand (POD) distribution.

I have to tell you that I was pretty darn excited, to say the least, when I found out about the digital fulfillment channel for publishing eBooks. However, when I found out about how I could ALSO take advantage of the print-on-demand model I was ecstatic!

POD FULFILLMENT: DEFINITION
It’s important that you understand exactly what I’m talking about when I use the term “POD fulfillment”, as opposed to “digital fulfillment” which I explained in another article that I have written about the OPM.

Print-on-demand (POD) fulfillment refers to when your book is delivered to the customer strictly in printed paper form as a standard book. With POD, when a single order (or low volume order) for your book is placed, just that small quantity is printed, bound, and drop-shipped directly to the customer by your POD fulfillment company. Hence the term, print-on-demand.

A typical example of POD fulfillment in action would be when you provide your POD electronic files to a digital fulfillment company that distributes POD books to booksellers like amazon.com, for example. Booksellers such as Amazon.com and Barnes&Noble.com would then offer your paperback POD book to those of its customers who want a standard printed version of your book.

POD FULFILLMENT: A REAL-LIFE EXAMPLE
For an example of this, take a look at my Instant Recommendation Letter Kit book as listed at amazon.com. To do this, go to the amazon.com Web site.

Do a “book search” on the phrase “recommendation letter”. Instant Recommendation Letter Kit will show up in the first few search results (usually number one or two). Click on the title to the right of the cover and it will take you to the details page. Look immediately below the cover and you will see the heading “Other Editions”. The link there will say “paperback” or “digital download”, depending on which version you are currently looking at.

The point here is that, via amazon.com customers can also order the paperback version of that book if they prefer it to the digital version.

Once the customer places their order online, the amazon.com electronic ordering system immediately sends an electronic order to my POD distribution company which instantly begins their internal print-on-demand process to produce ONE single copy of my paperback version for direct drop-shipping to the paying customer’s address.

This sure beats printing and storing into inventory, 1,000 or 2,000 copies, or more, up-front doesn’t it!

WHY CHOOSE POD FULFILLMENT?
As explained above, when people order a print-on-demand book they get a real hard copy paperback book that they can hold in their hands.

But why choose to produce a POD version when you already offer an ebook version? This is a good and logical question.

The main answer is this: an ebook is NOT a perfect substitute for a printed book.

This becomes particularly clear when marketing the two products through an online bookseller like amazon.com. It turns out that even when amazon offers a 30% discount on the digital download ebook version, about 50% of buyers of the same title still choose the more expensive POD paperback version.

So, not only are these people willing to pay more, but they are also willing to wait anywhere from 5 to 7 days for the POD book to be drop-shipped to them.

These are the traditional book buying people. They want a conventional paper book that they can hold in their hands. They want to be able to turn the pages. Many of these buyers don’t really understand what an ebook or digital download is all about.

And, even if they do understand the “e” part of ebook they don’t want to have anything to do with something that sounds so “techie”.

Clearly, if you do not provide a conventional paperback book option via POD for these traditional book buyers you will be leaving that money on the table. Those people will not buy your digital download products.

PODS LOOK AND FEEL LIKE REAL BOOKS
So, what does a POD book look like you might ask?

The quality of my POD books when printed is quite acceptable. The full-color glossy cover is printed on standard cover stock and the book is perfect bound. The interior is comprised of standard 8 1/2″ x 11″ paper stock, printed both sides. It’s like an excellent quality Xerox job between professionally designed full-color glossy covers. So, people who order them get a paperback of equivalent quality as to what one would normally find on the shelves at a bookstore.

That’s just the format I use for my “how-to” books. You can also have PODs produced in all kinds of sizes, shapes and bindings, including hard cover books!

BOTTOM LINE ON POD
If you want to sell books to the traditional book buying public you have to give them what they want – a printed book. Print-on-demand (POD) is a technology that lets you do just that — one copy at a time.

And, just like the situation with digital download fulfillment, these POD sales are IN ADDITION to any sales that you will make via your Web site or digital fulfillment channels.

Again! Just like with the digital fulfillment channel, using the POD channel of the OPM will be just like “found money”. You just have to know how to find it.

(C) Shaun Fawcett is the author of numerous how-to books on everyday practical writing help. He also writes about how to create and publish books and ebooks, including his popular book that explains all about how to implement and profit from the Online Publishing Model:
http://InstantBookWritingKit.com

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