Printers, Trade-Shows and Email Blasts

So today I'm meeting with a new printer. Well, a source for a new printer. We have a printer in our own small town, Penn Print and Graphics. However, they mostly do advertising for businesses and organizations. Logos on t-shirts and mugs, banners, brochures, menus, etc, etc. What do they have to do with books? Well, not much. Yet. They do have the capability of doing small books (page length wise - their dimensions are quite flexible), but haven't dipped their toes into the realm of full length fiction and non-fiction. Yet.

What they currently can offer me is resources. They're tuned in to a large network of other printers, some in primarily the same line as themselves (think Kinkos, but independently owned), but many others in their network are already doing books. So its their mission in the short term to 'hook us up'. In the long term...well, that's to be discussed. I've spoken with the owner on the phone, we've shot some emails back and forth, and today Neal and I are running down to see what's in the offing in person. Quality and flexibility are our top two requirements. Cost effectiveness ranks just below.

If this is a workable solution, it will be a great solution for us. First of all, the printing HQ will be about two stones throw from our own home. The advantages to that are obvious and many. Second, we would be able to get rid of the pod tagging in the distributor systems, which would more widely open doors that we've pried open in the past to bookstores. Thirdly, we would save on shipping. Fourthly, I expect the price per unit to be better than what we are currently paying.

So we're in the process and I'm hoping for a good meeting.

In the meantime, I received the proofs for Sunny Serafino's Finding Amy and Chuck Dowling's First to Fight late yesterday afternoon. They look GREAT! So this morning I approved them, put in their orders for their copies, and can now expect to see them popping up in stores all over the web in the coming days.

Their two books, along with DL Havlin's The Cross on Cotton Creek as well as Bart Tuma's The Kingdom Land will be headed for our first trade show in Florida in July; one of the benefits of belonging to CSPA. This will allow them to be presented to purchasers of many Christian Book stores and book store chains. I think with our covers, we look very competitive, and I'll be highly interested in the results we're able to garner from that exercise. Meanwhile, we'll continue to push our wares on some other regional distributors.

I expect email blasts for the three new titles to go out to our new subscriber list and to blogger reviewers on the fifteenth. This should allow a comfortable lead-time for our new titles to be available in most outlets that consumers are likely to try.

So those are the updates - all good, all promising. I'm thinking its going to be a great spring and summer.

The Future's So Bright, I Gotta Wear...Shades

So yesterday, all three of our books went live on Kindle. Within hours of their appearance, two out of three of them were garnering sales, one of them within an hour. Can you say, YES!

Usually the tough part is letting people know that the books are available so they can be found. But before even one item of marketing has gone out, they're being found on their own.

Gotta like that.

Where's my sunglasses. The future is looking bright!

Three Uppers and a Downer

The downer:

It's hard for an author to hear that their book is being delayed. They've already put in a tremendous amount of work (as have I, btw), busted their butts to meet deadlines, told their friends and family, and in essence are like expectant parents with a due date on the calendar. Suddenly the doc tells them, nope, kid's not coming for another few months. But what we put out there is going to be out there for a long, long time. I really need to feel confident that it's 'ready', and in the instance of one of our pending titles, I'm just not. Rewrites and proofing have revealed more problems than can be readily fixed in the remaining time frame we have. So with great regret, I have to announce that Kweli - The Truth Unmasked is going to be delayed.

The three uppers are:

DL Havlin's The Cross on Cotton Creek has had it's published proof generated and I expect to have it in hand today. I'm currently working on ebook conversions and it should be available on Kindle within the next couple of days and on other reading devices within the next couple of weeks.

   

Sunny Serafino's is green-lighted and on the way to the printer as soon as I'm done writing this blog.

And, lastly, but certainly not leastly, Chuck Dowlings First to Fight will be on its way to the printer the same time as Sunny's.

Normally, I would say three out of four 'ain't' bad, but honestly, I just feel really, really disappointed with the one that almost made it, and at the last minute just wasn't quite ready.

So...where are we at, exactly?

First, here is the cover of Finding Amy in its entirety:

 I'm still making a couple of tweaks on the back cover blurb.

Updates: Chuck Dowling is home from the hospital, has been for a couple of days. Yay! Trooper that he is, he turned in his worksheet for his proof and is, as of today, teaching a workshop at the FWA mini-conference.

As far as book progress goes, DL Havlin's The Cross on Cotton Creek was the first to make it to the printer, and I had notification this morning that the proof has been generated already. I expect that I will receive it Monday or Tuesday, depending on when they mail it out. His went first because we already have a sizable order from a book store for it.

First to Fight by Chuck Dowling and Kweli-The Truth Unmasked are 'this' (very small space between finger and thumb) close to going to the printer. They should be there by the end of the weekend. Sunny's Finding Amy will probably be just a day or two afterward, if not simultaneously.

All in all, I'm a bit in awe at how smoothly this production cycle has gone. It helped that three of our authors were already established with us with prior books, and knew what to expect (and what was expected of them). The fourth, Chuck, although First to Fight is his first book with us, was still pretty well seasoned in how publishing works having had prior books published elsewhere. They all worked tremendously hard to meet our schedule and I want to take a moment now to thank them: Thank You, Joe and Jane, Chuck, DL, and Sunny! It goes without saying that a publishing house is only as good as the works it puts out and the authors that write them. God has blessed us with a great group of authors, both in this production cycle and in previous ones.

So how does this all stack up if the remaining three books are submitted to the printer by Sunday or Monday at the latest? We should be able to start printing by the 30th and shipping just a few days after. I would have preferred to be shipping by the 30th, but I am still a happy camper. I think we 'did good'.

After the books are at the printer, what will I be doing then? Well, just a couple million things. Books will need added to the website (two I placed on last night, First to Fight and The Cross on Cotton Creek, because the authors are both at the afore-mentioned mini-conference and have flyers for taking orders, which also has the alternative of visiting the site to order information - so it behooved me to actually have the books available for order on site as of this a.m.). I'll be making up the email blast for our new title info subscribers (a list that continues to grow). I'll be submitting the titles to CSPA's list of blogger reviewers (a new list for us and one that I'm excited about) as well as our own list of blogger reveiwers. I'll be reaching out to media contacts that we've had success with in the past and new ones that we haven't tried yet. I'll be converting the text blocks into ebooks and uploading those to Kindle and other ebook reading outlets that include B&N's Nook and Apple's iBooks. And I'll be filling orders.

Then, in about a month, we'll be starting the process all over again, for the four books coming out the end of August.

Everyone have a great weekend!

The Unveiling - Part IV - The Final One

The final book coming out the end of this month is Sunny Serafino's Finding Amy, which won (unpublished) Book of the Year at the 10th Annual Royal Palm Awards last October.

And here's the front: