For two months, he tried to work with Apple, keeping a detailed record of his dealings.  But with Christmas days away, it appears the award-winning book, Dave Lieber’s Watchdog Nation: Bite Back When Businesses and Scammers Do You Wrong, isn’t going to be available through Apple. At least not yet.

Turns out Apple’s procedures for working with small publishers are so poorly organized that they are an embarrassment to this great, ground-breaking company. The company can’t seem to do what other ebook publishers do every day: place digital books on sale.

Here’s the new Dave Lieber Guide to ebook Self Publishing with the latest information on how to publish on Apple (not) and the other major ebook companies, which are easier:

My research on Apple was done as part of the creation of this ebook publishing guide. When I decided a few months ago to jump into this rapidly-growing market, I searched the Internet for an up-to-date guide showing  how to do it yourself, who to contact and what the difficulties are.

Couldn’t find one.

So I made my own – for you — because I believe every writer should live his or her dream. That’s what I’ve always taught authors as part of my popular Dave Lieber Guide to Self-Publishing. I show how to publish without the major publishing houses or the vanity presses taking all your profits.

More than a dozen books have been published by other authors who used my self-publishing system because they wanted to make more money. Now I want to lear how to do the same with ebooks. And, as always, I want to share the latest information that I learn with you. It’s here now, below, for free.

My goal was to take Dave Lieber’s Watchdog Nation: Bite Back When Businesses and Scammers Do You Wrong and convert it to the proper e-book formats. Then I wanted to upload them to the top ebook pubishers: Apple’s iBookstore; Barnes & Noble, Borders and Amazon’s Kindle. These four represent about 60 percent of the ebook market.

Important: You don’t need a physical book to create an ebook. You can skip that step and publish straight to ebook.

First, you need an ISBN (International Standard Book Number) for your ebook (separate from the ISBN you used for your printed book). You can buy the numbers from bowker.com either singly or in a group of 10 or larger. I suggest the bigger purchase since the price is better (around $200 for 10) and once you get your ebook business going, you won’t want to stop. (Note: Bowker tells customers to buy a separate ISBN number for each ebook file format; but I found that not to be the case.)

Next you have to get the book formatted the way it will appear on the screen. All ebooks must start as a Microsoft Word document. (I hired my book designer Janet Long to copy and paste the original book from her files into a Word doc.)

Checked with publishing expert Jerry Simmons, who creates the popular www.writersreaders.com website. He recommended firebirdwebdesigns.com to convert my Word document into the various formats. (Remember there’s no standardization in the industry; different ebook readers require different formats. Ugh.)

For less than $300, my Word doc was converted to these formats: PDB (Palm Database File); PDF, Mobi, LRF, ePub (the evolving standard), PRC (Palm Resource File) and HTML.

Firebird provided me with a starter sheet, too. Several of the platforms listed were no-go’s for me. I couldn’t make contact, let alone get e-published with Mobi Pocket Reader, Sony Reader, Microsoft Reader and Adobe Digital Editions. But they aren’t part of the top four anyway. Here’s how it worked with the major publishers  — and my grade for them:

Amazon.com/Kindle

Start the process at dtp.amazon.com. Open your account and provide bank account information for sales proceeds. Watch an instructional video at http://bit.ly/AmazonKindleVideo.

Uploading the file is easy. My submission was quickly accepted and placed on sale. There was one slight problem. The “Buy it on Kindle” label next to my hardcover book, also for sale on Amazon, was linked to the out-of-print 2008 edition and not the actual 2010 edition it’s based on. Eventually, after two tries, I got it fixed.

Grade: A

 

Yippee! Dave Lieber's book was published with the greatest of ease on Amazon's Kindle.

Apple/iBookstore

For degree of difficulty, Apple is as tough as Amazon is easy. Getting to the point, Apple has earned a failing grade. Why? Let me count the ways.

Information about the ebook process on Apple’s website is nearly impossible to find. When you call customer service, staffers don’t know much either. Apple is not responding to e-mail requests for help or information either.

But I kept calling and writing. When I finally got in the front door, I learned you must upload your book on a MAC, not a PC, using Apple’s iTunes Producer software. I borrowed a friend’s MAC.

After the upload, Apple did not acknowledge its arrival. My book was listed as “Pending” for a month, and nobody in Apple would answer my e-mails. Finally, it was listed as “Removed From Sale.” Apple never notified me.  Finally, when I pestered for an answer, Apple, taking its sweet time, alerted me that my cover image was too small.

It’s clear that Apple wasn’t ready to enter the book business. It got slammed, fell behind and keeps changing the way it runs this new business. I’m patient. I really want my book available on the iPad. That’s why I started this process. But as of this writing, no can do.

Learn about the process at apple.com/itunes/content-providers. To get the iBookstore Publisher User Guide and create an account, start at itunes.com/sellyourbooks. If you have problems, call 1-800-275-2273 and ask for a “senior adviser.” Or try this e-mail address: itunesmarketing@apple.com.

Grade: F

Barnes & Noble/NOOKbook

Gosh, this was easy. I opened an account at pubit.barnesandnoble.com, uploaded the book and it was immediately for sale on the website as a NOOKbook. Apple could take a few lessons from this enterprise. (E-mail help is available at support@ereader.com)

Grade: A+

Borders/Kobo

Kobo (the Borders platform) rejected me outright because they require vendors to have “a minimum of 10 titles.” A kobo.com staffer wrote me, “We have been known to settle for 9 or even 8 titles; however the point here is that the work required on your part and on ours to get set up as a vendor doesn’t always make sense for a small handful of titles.”

Grade: Incomplete

The Alternative

If you don’t want to do it yourself, “digital aggregator” companies can help you. The best-known is smashwords.com. Other digital aggregators include authorsolutions.com, fastpencil.com and ebookit.com. I can’t vouch for them, but wanted to present them to you as options.

Happy e-publishing.

Dave Lieber is an investigative columnist at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. This story appears on columnists.com, National Speakers Association blog and WatchdogNation.com. Find him on Twitter @DaveLieber and WatchdogNation.com. If you want to self-publish in either a hardback or paperback, creating your own company, doing it yourself with a great publishing house, you should check out the Dave Lieber Self-Publishing Guide.

Social media maven, blogger, and author, Chris Brogan

Prior to Web 2.0, NSA members had very traditional channels in which to market their books. Now, the ballgame is entirely different. With the advent of social media, authors can reach out to countless potential buyers, journalists, and other bloggers, in addition to building their speaker brands online.

In a recent blog post, social media maven, Chris Brogan, shares 19 tips authors can use when promoting their books through social media. Take note.

Do you have any tips to add to his list?

Message from NSA Member
BEWARE of anyone wanting to immediately book you for a keynote involving
a youth leadership, business and management seminar at a legit London university.
Follow this link for many more examples and my own posting:

http://www.engageselling.com/blog/?p=1137
Warning: Speak Scam on the loose!

Stephen Tweed has spent the past 25 years speaking, writing, and consulting in the home health care industry. He has become the “guru” of strategy and business development in this fast growing niche market. In this interactive Webinar, Stephen will demonstrate how he has built a business with seven distinct revenue streams, and how his visibility in this market sector makes it easier to sell repeat speaking engagements to associations and corporations in this marketplace.

Participants will learn:
-Determine the right number of speeches per year.
-Apply Stephen’s Business Model Matrix.
-Define multiple streams of revenue for your business model.
-Examine marketing methods for multiple streams of revenue.
-Measure and manage your business success.

Webinars are regularly $39 but with the $10 coupon code, NSA members can register for just $29!

While National Entrepreneurship Week falls in the last week of February in the USA, and the rest of the world who celebrates it, does so in November. This year may find the timing ripe to have entrepreneurs save economies around with the world, with joint ventures, and speakers are in one of the best positions for this. Whether it’s labeled joint venture, partnering, collaboration or cross-promotion, here are ten ways to get started:

1. Start out with a paper and pencil task, or use your word processing program. Give thought to, and write down, all the characteristics you want in your ideal joint venture partner. This will help guide your decision to partner or not as you begin to attract people whom also want joint venture partners.

2. If you are doing business online, you could dip your toes in and find someone with a blog about a similar topic. Then contact that person and ask about exchanging a guest blog post and include links to each other’s websites in the post. A blog is an ideal central point for getting someone found and when you leverage this with cross-promotion it can have a compound affect.

3. If your business is more often conducted face-to-face in the brick and mortar world, visit people who you know would have a similar target customer. Find mutually agreeable ways to help promote each other where both benefit. For example, a dentist and an artist: the dentist could offer the artist’s services with a display in their offices. The artist could offer the dentist services with coupons attached to any portrait kind of pictures, to go along with the smiles.

4. Back to online business, grab another piece of paper and pencil, or use your word processor. Look in the online networking venue or venues you enjoy the most. Find people who you are already connected with in these who might be talking to a similar audience. Write down their names and their product or service.

5. With this targeted list of possible collaborative partners, in the list you just created, email each with either an introduction or a re-introduction. Find out if they are considering any collaborating now or in the future. Move the conversation forward from there.

6. Communication is crucial to choose the right partner. Your entrepreneurial style may be to move from one idea to the next fairly quickly. Be certain to focus on the importance of in-depth conversation, as it’s this conversation that will help you understand shared values, goals and vision.

7. Collaborating is not a substitute for success if you are not finding success in your own business. As an entrepreneur a collaboration will be – one other idea for you to take your ideas and energy into.

8. You may have disparate goals than your partner. Your goals may be for a larger amount of revenue, your partners for a part time income. Contemplate and decide how you will work with this.

9. A benefit of a joint venture relationship is the shared risk. Accept that the risk is just as normal as other risks you take.

10. If you are starry eyed with the joint venture possibility, be sure that you keep those stars shining by putting an exit strategy in place. What happens if things don’t go as planned is something to take care of in pre-planning for success not in the heat of frustration.

View the article here http://www.examiner.com/x-33504-Scottsdale-Womens-Business-Examiner~y2010m1d19-Business-leaders-thrive-with-the-National-Speakers-Association.

Have you read the article entitled, “Branding or Marketing?” in the January/February 2010 issue of Speaker magazine? With all due respect to the writer, Michael A. Podolinsky, perhaps he should stick to his specialty in leadership development, not branding.

Of course, people and service businesses can have brands! What’s a brand anyway? I don’t think it’s what Podolinsky thinks it is. Here’s Seth Godin’s definition:

A brand is the set of expectations, memories, stories and relationships that, taken together, account for a consumer’s decision to choose one product or service over another. If the consumer (whether it’s a business, a buyer, a voter or a donor) doesn’t pay a premium, make a selection or spread the word, then no brand value exists for that consumer.

Any product, service, or individual can have a brand. From Tide detergent, Starbucks coffee, Roto Rooter, Merrill Lynch, Oprah, Tiger Woods… OK, so maybe that last one isn’t as strong a brand as it was. But, they are all brands.

In the speaker world, there are many people who have very positive and strong brands – Tony Robbins and Zig Zigler come to mind.

Every touchpoint is part of a speaker’s brand. Examples include:

• How responsive the speaker is to prospect/client calls and emails
• How professional in appearance the speaker’s Web site and marketing materials are
• How professional the speaker is during the booking process
• How the speaker greets the meeting planner and audience members
• How effective, professional, prepared, and well received the speaker is during the presentation
• How the speaker follows up after the engagement

Every single aspect of a speaker’s business is part of his/her brand, even if s/he isn’t a celebrity. When speakers build a strong brand over time, bookings are more inbound. Planners come to them! That’s the ultimate branding result for any product, service or person.

So, no offense to Mr. Podolinsky, but when he says, “Branding works for products like soup or tampons, but not for people – and definitely not for service businesses,” I wholeheartedly DISAGREE!

Do you?

www.YankeeCowboy.com

Photo courtesy of South Dakota magazine

The best public speaker I’ve seen is Garrison Keillor. He has a great voice, a great mind, a great memory and, of course, those eyebrows!

He appeared at the University of Texas at Arlington in late November. The host of the legendary public radio show Prairie Home Companion, author and newspaper columnist had canceled a previous appearance after a mild stroke. He said doctors told him to slow down and retire. The heck with that. He travels the country telling stories and selling books.

Here are 10 things Keillor did that night in Arlington that help make him one of the finest speakers in the world today:

1. His clothes sparkled. Even though I was in the upper tier and he looked like a Ken doll on stage, he stood out because he wore a bright red tie and red sneakers, along with his dark suit and white shirt.

2. He sang his own introduction.

3. He quickly flattered his audience: “I never felt more welcome than when I get to meet Texans in Texas.”

4. Throw in a reference to a local luminary to let the audience know you share reverence for one of their local heroes. He cited the late Molly Ivins.

5. Speak in sparse yet sharp language: “It was the most wonderful wake I ever attended, and the deceased was sitting right there.”

6. Self-deprecation whenever possible: “It’s my role to play a taciturn Norwegian – although I’m not really one.”

7. Use visual images punctuated with quippy lines: “Snow was a lot deeper when I was a kid.”

8. Introduce characters with strong imagery: “My father  was a low-thermostat man.”

9. Follow up introductory descriptions with more visual imagery to enhance your portrait: “If you couldn’t see steam coming out of your mouth, he thought you were wasting fuel.”

10. Use life experiences, especially recent ones, to show your hero’s journey: “In my case, I got lucky. This blood clot hit the part of the brain where not much is going on…. It was the North Dakota of the brain.”

Final notes: His closing was superb. During the question and answer period, someone asked, “Do you rehearse your material?”

He answered, “I don’t have to rehearse. I lived it. Life is the rehearsal. All you have to do is remember as much as you can.”

Then he said, “I will now sign autographs. I have a nice signature, very legible. I’m happy to have pictures taken, if that’s what you want, although I can see why you wouldn’t.”

The American literary superstar concluded by promising that he would “hang out and talk” until no one from the audience remained.

I imagined him helping to turn off the lights and lock the door.  It was a powerful commitment to his audience that I’ve never heard a star of his magnitude make before.

Dave Lieber is a columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and a member of NSA/North Texas.