All templates include a pre-made hyperlinked Table of Contents and exact directions on how to customize it.

There are a total of six Smashwords templates. They have been created using Arial, Times New Roman, and Garamond fonts. These are the basic fonts allowed by Smashwords. Each of these fonts has two available templates: one for people who want to use chapter numbers and chapter titles, and another for writers who don’t want to use the word ‘Chapter’, but would rather just name their chapters.

Great care has been to taken to set out easy to follow instructions. These instructions are not as in depth as the Smashwords Style Guide, so you shouldn’t have any difficulty.

Here’s what to do:

1. Download and read the instructions here: Smashwords Template Instructions

2. Download your choice of Smashwords Templates:

Arial: Chapter and Title
Arial: Chapter or Title
Garamond: Chapter and Title
Garamond: Chapter or Title
Times New Roman: Chapter and Title
Times New Roman: Chapter or Title

Start writing or copy and paste an existing manuscript (while following the instructions) into your new template.

Upload your work to Smashwords.

Congratulate yourself on getting in the Smashwords Premium Catalogue.

These are basic templates. There are things that have not been included, such as a place for dedications or acknowledgements or hyperlinks to your author page. One thing at a time.

If you need help or would like to suggest additions to future versions of these templates, either comment below or drop us an email.

Darla Mittler is President & CEO of Darla Mittler Document Magic. With a personal library of well over 1,000 physical books, over half a decade as a Mass Media Buyer for a major bookstore chain, and insights into e-publishing, Darla is ready to help authors bring their works to market.

Open both documents.

In Word 2007 and beyond, go to the ‘View’ tab. Click ‘View Side by Side’ in the ‘Window’ panel.

Turn off ‘Synchronous Scrolling’. If you have hit ‘Reset Window Position’ so the two documents are side-by-side instead of on top of each other, you will find the ‘Synchronous Scrolling’ button under ‘Window’.

In versions of Word prior to 2007 go to ‘Window’ (it’s just before ‘Help’ at the top of the screen) and select ‘Compare Side by Side’. A ‘Compare Side’ floating toolbar will appear. You use this to turn off synchronous scrolling.

The rest of this works in all versions of MS Word.

On your original document hit Ctrl + F. Choose ‘more’ to bring up more options. Choose ‘format’. Choose ‘font’. Click on ‘bold’ or ‘italic’ depending on what you’re after. Hit ‘okay’. Hit ‘enter’ or ‘find next’. When you’ve found the words in italics or bold, use Ctrl + C to copy them. For short or common words it is best to also copy a few of the surrounding words.

Click on the new document. Use Ctrl +F, but be sure click the ‘No Formatting’ button at the bottom of the find screen. Paste in (Ctrl +V) in the words you copied from your original file to find them in the new document. Apply the italics or bold and voila.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Now you know how to put back the bold and italics without missing any of it if you’ve used the Smashwords ‘nuclear’ method.

Darla Mittler is President & CEO of Darla Mittler Document Magic. With a personal library of well over 1,000 physical books, over half a decade as a Mass Media Buyer for a major bookstore chain, and insights into e-publishing, Darla is ready to help authors bring their works to market.

Here is how to adjust the language settings in MS Word:
1. Click on the round Microsoft button in the upper left corner.
2. Look at the bottom of the new menu for ‘Word Options’. Click that.
3. On the left side of this next menu, look for ‘Popular’ and click it if you aren’t already there.
4. At the bottom of this page you will find ‘Language Settings’ in a grey box. Click on the box to find where to change languages.
5. Simply scroll down the box on the left, highlight the language(s) you want and click ‘Add’ in the centre.
6. At the bottom of this box you will see ‘Primary editing language’. Just click on the little arrow on the right and choose your language from the drop down menu.
7. Make sure you hit ‘OK’ when you are done. Hit ‘OK’ until all the menus are closed.

Now if you look at the bottom of the Word screen (the main one where you create your documents; not inside any menus) you will see the name of the language you have set as your default. It’s to the right of the little proofing symbol that looks like a pencil writing in a book. If you click where it says ‘English (United Kingdom)’ (for example) it will now bring up a menu where you can switch between the languages you chose earlier.

If you are using an early version of MS Word, your language is tied to the language of your keyboard. Try this.

First try opening your normal.dot template and changing the default in there. Normal .dot can be found either:
Open Word | Tools | Options | File Locations tab | User templates
or
C:\Documents and Settings\your user name\Application Data\Microsoft\Templates

If saving the default language in the default template (normal.dot) doesn’t work, then you’ll have to resort to one of these methods. This comes straight from Microsoft.

Method 1: Remove All Additional Keyboard Layouts
This behaviour does not occur when only one keyboard layout is present. To remove all additional keyboard layouts, follow these steps:

Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.
In Control Panel, double-click Keyboard.
In the Keyboard Properties dialog box, click the Input Locales tab, and then click Change.
In the Select one of the installed input languages to use when you start your computer list, select the language that you want.
In the Installed Services list, click the Keyboard of the input language that you want to remove, and then click Remove.
Repeat step 5 for all languages except for the one that you selected in step 4, and then click OK two times.
Method 2: Install the Default Input Language
To specify the default input language that is used when Word starts, follow these steps:
Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.
In Control Panel, double-click Keyboard.
In the Keyboard Properties dialog box, click the Input Locales tab, and then click Change.
On the Settings tab, click Add.
In the Add Input language dialog box, in the Input Language list, select the language that you want, and then click OK.
In the Select one of the installed input languages to use when you start your computer list, select the language that you want, and then click OK two times.

Using one of these methods to define the language of your manuscript will save you time and frustration. As you can see, the newer versions of MS Word have made switching languages much easier.

Darla Mittler is President & CEO of Darla Mittler Document Magic. With a personal library of well over 1,000 physical books, over half a decade as a Mass Media Buyer for a major bookstore chain, and insights into e-publishing, Darla is ready to help authors bring their works to market.

Every month the telephone company sends me promotional offers. They tell me how much money I can save by bundling my telephone service with my internet connection and my television viewing. How am I saving money by paying them more money? I’m not. And neither are you.

What happens when you start encountering difficulties with one part of your bundled services? Confusion on the part of the company you are dealing with and frustration on your part are almost inevitable.

Spreading the wealth is another factor to consider. When one company holds the majority of the cash / customers they tend to do things ‘their way’ with no regard for what the general public want.

This is why monopolies are bad on so many levels. Remember when Bell was the only telephone company (at least in Canada)? The fewer companies there are in any given business, the fewer choices you, as an individual, will have.

Look at what your cable or satellite service provider offers you in the way of television channels. Is that the best they can do? No. Why don’t they offer you bundles of channels that you want without forcing you to take channels you’ll never watch? To increase their profits, that’s why.

From an author’s and reader’s perspective, this is why it is vitally important that there are more than just Amazon and Apple in the book selling arena. Once there are only those two companies shipping books you will find your choices severely limited. Authors will discover new forms of censorship. The recent court case of Apple Price-Fixing e-books should be our wake-up call.

Try not to beholden to just one company.

Always read the fine print. Find out how much you are going to be on the hook for each month once the 9.99 a month offer lapses.

It’s easier to pay a series of smaller bills than one big bill.

Help prevent large companies from becoming too powerful by supporting independent, smaller companies whenever you can. They are more open to giving you better deals and more choices. You will also find that their customer service is faster and friendlier.

Darla Mittler is President & CEO of Darla Mittler Document Magic. With a personal library of well over 1,000 physical books, over half a decade as a Mass Media Buyer for a major bookstore chain, and insights into e-publishing, Darla is ready to help authors bring their works to market.

Businesses need to keep their costs low in order to increase their profits. It is very tempting in this heat wave to crank up the A/C, but this will also cause a dramatic rise in your energy bill. These days we’re averaging about 38 C or 100.4 F. (You can do your own conversions here:
http://www.sciencemadesimple.com/conversions.html

You and your workers can stay cool without the high cost by using these 6 tips:

1. Drink water. Alcohol, sugar, and caffeine dehydrate the body. Avoid them.

2. Strip naked and run down the street while flailing your arms in the air. The police will arrest you and throw you in the cooler. Okay, I’m kidding. However, you should be wearing light-coloured, flowing clothing. Avoid dark, tight-fitting outfits. I once knew a man who stayed cool by duct taping freezer packs across his chest. This allowed him to be attired in his three-piece business suit even on the hottest days.

3. Stay in the shade. Close the curtains when the sun is blasting in.

4. Cool off your forearms by running them under cold water. Firefighters use this trick.
Use a cold washcloth on the back of your neck, especially at the base just above your shoulder blades.

5. Fill your bathtub with lukewarm water. Get in and rinse off the layer of sweat and grime that has built up. Relax for a couple of minutes. Dry only your feet when you get out (so you stick to the floor). Leave the water in the tub for future use unless it is really disgustingly dirty now. Go sit in front of a fan. It’ll be really chilly at first, but in this extreme heat it won’t take long before you warm up.

6. a) Get 6 or more plastic bottles. Bigger is better.
b) Fill them with salt water and freeze them.
c) Once they’re frozen place 3 (depending upon their size) in front of your fan.
Note: The bottles will sweat, so make sure you have them sitting in something that will collect the water unless you want a puddle in front of the fan. Perhaps a kitty litter pan. Just make sure the cat doesn’t need to use it or you’ll get a room filled with what eau de toilette really smells like.

Those 6 tips will help you keep cool. Share your own heat-beating advice with us. Leave a comment so others may benefit from your wisdom.

Darla Mittler is President & CEO of Darla Mittler Document Magic. With a personal library of well over 1,000 physical books, over half a decade as a Mass Media Buyer for a major bookstore chain, and insights into e-publishing, Darla is ready to help authors bring their works to market.

The hardest part about getting organized is getting started. What you need is a filtering system that allows you to put things where they belong.

Start simple. Grab some small boxes, folders, envelopes, and a magic marker, pen or pencil. You’d better grab a garbage bag or two while you’re at it. It’s great if you have fancy filing cabinets and other organizing materials, but they aren’t a necessity to get the ball rolling.

Now pick up the first item on your pile. You have two choices: 1.) put it in a box, folder, or envelope or 2.) toss it in the garbage bag. The size and importance of the item will determine which receptacle it goes in. If it wasn’t a piece of garbage, write what it was on the box, folder, or envelope. For example, if it was a receipt, write “receipts” on the container. Repeat this process until your pile has disappeared.

That’s all there is to it. Keep in mind that this is just a temporary solution. You’ll need to establish more permanent places for your items, but at least you have them ready to go.

Being physically organized is one thing. It is also important to be electronically organized. This is easily accomplished by creating specific folders on your hard drive or within your book marks. Keep like files and book marks together in folders with names that you’ll remember. You can even use sub-folders to keep things really tidy.

With these simple tips you are well on your way to becoming, and staying, organized.

Darla Mittler is President & CEO of Darla Mittler Document Magic. With a personal library of well over 1,000 physical books, over half a decade as a Mass Media Buyer for a major bookstore chain, and insights into e-publishing, Darla is ready to help authors bring their works to market.

The telephone is an integral tool for business. They are everywhere. Sadly, the proper use of this business instrument appears to be somewhat lacking. Adept use of the telephone can keep clients with your company and encourage new clients to use your services.

Here are some tips to keep your business in tip-top telephone shape:

1. When you answer the phone say, “Good Morning” (or ‘good afternoon’ or ‘good evening’ depending upon the time of day). Avoid simply saying, “Hello.” If you use your personal telephone line for your business, your personal callers will understand. Answering the phone with ‘yeah’ or ‘what’ sends the message that your company is not professional.

2. After the initial “Good Morning” be sure to identify your company. (‘Good Morning, Darla Mittler Document Magic.’) Even though the caller input the number, it is reassuring to them if they know immediately that they have reached you.

3. Once you have identified your company you may wish to add your own name and the query, “How may I help you?” This is completely optional. Some callers may not want to wait that long to start telling you why they called.

4. Speak clearly. Open your mouth wide enough to get the words out and make full use of your lips and tongue.

5. Speak at a reasonable level. Whispering or shouting will not endear you to the caller.

6. Keep your mouth clear of obstacles. Eating, drinking, or chewing on pens, etc. will inhibit your ability to communicate. Those activities will also annoy your caller.

7. Speak in a light, bright, professional manner. Keep your tone cheerful and helpful.

8. Use words that everyone understands. Slang expressions and swear words are to be avoided. Likewise it is best not to try to impress the caller with your bountiful vocabulary.

9. Listen attentively to what the caller is saying. Focus on the caller’s concerns. Steer clear of becoming distracted by events unfolding around you.

When you are calling someone on behalf of your business it is a good idea to:

A. Identify yourself
B. Identify your company
C. State who you are calling for
D. Remain discreet about the reason for the call if someone other than the intended person answers the telephone.

Use tips A – D above if you have to leave a message on an answering machine. Your message should be as brief as possible and should also include:

E. The date and time of your call
F. The best time of day for the person receiving the message to return your call.

By keeping these telephone tips at the top of your mind you will show that your business is professional, courteous, and willing to listen.

Darla Mittler is President & CEO of Darla Mittler Document Magic. With a personal library of well over 1,000 physical books, over half a decade as a Mass Media Buyer for a major bookstore chain, and insights into e-publishing, Darla is ready to help authors bring their works to market.

To take control of your formatting, you need to be able to see the formatting mark-up. Look for the pilcrow (it looks like a backwards capital ‘P’ and, unlike the Piltdown Man, it is real) in the ‘Paragraph’ section at the top of the ‘Home’ tab in MS Word. In earlier versions of MS Word, you will find it by going to Tools – Options – Formatting Marks; then click ‘All’. Now that you can see the funny formatting marks, we can move on to cleaning.

To read the rest of this article please visit Fireblade Publishers.

My two cats are very good at letting me know when they have done “business” in their litter box. These communications range from simple looks to loud vocalizations.

As I was cleaning up their “business” the other day it occurred to me that there are similarities between that activity and finding new clients.

Like feces in a litter box, crappy clients are always closer to the surface and easier to find. In most cases their odor wafts its way to you in the form of unrealistic enquiries or expectations.

Customers obtained through sources like Craigslist are among these. These businesses are in the habit of continuously hiring ‘interns’. [Quick note: In Ontario, Canada as well as in the United States, it is illegal to hire interns unless your company is doing so at the request of a learning institution. People working as interns must be able to learn something from your company and they must be able to report their education to their formal educators. There are six unique conditions that must all be met in order for your company to hire an intern. Learn more about the legality of unpaid workers here: Unpaid Internships Outed as Illegal?

Clients found through websites like Odesk and Elance also have a tendency to fall into this category. They usually want a ton of work done in a ridiculously short span of time and they want to pay about fifty cents for it. These are often people who have read the 4 Hour Work Week. Most have little regard for the true worth of a virtual assistant or any other person they outsource their work to. (Again I would urge any international virtual assistants to find out where the person who wants to hire you is located. Found out how much they would have to pay in their own country and charge them accordingly. By not demanding a fair wage you are helping these international crooks keep you in a low paying position.)

In order to find truly worthwhile clients you need to do more work. You have to dig down deeper to discover the golden nuggets. Like cat pee and kitty litter, it is always good to create a cohesive relationship with your clients. These are the mutually rewarding associations that form a lasting bond between businesses.

Gathering clients shouldn’t be akin to cleaning a cat’s litter box. When you answer an ad you are at the mercy of the person who placed the ad. It is to your advantage to have customers call on you rather than answering their ads.

You need clients to inquire about your services or products in order for you to establish a mutual understanding. This is why you need an advertising strategy. It is up to you whether you choose to use social media, radio, television, direct mail, or any of the other advertising venues. My only recommendation is that you use more than one method to attract your clients. Believe it or not there are still many people who are not online.

Dig down deep. Discard the refuse. Whatever you do, don’t do ‘business’ on your business.

Darla Mittler is President & CEO of Darla Mittler Document Magic. With a personal library of well over 1,000 physical books, over half a decade as a Mass Media Buyer for a major bookstore chain, and insights into e-publishing, Darla is ready to help authors bring their works to market.

As most of you already know, being an indie author comes with a certain amount of stigma, even in today’s world, where indie publishing is growing evermore popular and, in some cases, even out-selling traditionally published works.

With so many authors choosing to go the indie route without even attempting to be published traditionally, and with numerous traditionally published authors opting to go indie with their latest books, why is there still such a bias against indie authors? It’s certainly no longer a general case of ‘you aren’t good enough to be published’.

Industry politics aside, all that really matters is that your readers are happy. Of course, you can’t please everyone all the time, but there is a very real reason for this bias – too many indie authors don’t give their manuscripts a professional polish.

By the time your book is published with a traditional publisher, it’s gone through many edits and changes, resulting in a refined end product that you and the publishing company can be proud of. Yes, you do still find errors in traditionally published books, but it’s far from the disgrace of some indie books in which you might find so many glaring errors that you have to wonder if the author read his/her book even once before publishing it.

Have these authors no self-respect? This is why so many readers won’t purchase indie books – no one has money to waste in today’s economy, and if you want a good read, you’ll probably go where it’s almost guaranteed. Sure, even famous names like Koontz and King will find errors slipping into their published work, but those are few and far between. When readers sit there wondering if the author used an internet translation programme to convert the book to English, they feel cheated and that’s just not acceptable! Even if your book is free, you’ve then wasted that reader’s time, and time is one commodity that is almost as valuable as money and, in myriad cases, time is money.

Those who don’t put in the effort to produce an end product that’s the best it can be are not only selling themselves short and wasting their time – they’re giving all indie authors a bad name simply because they choose to be independent authors. Countless indie authors put in equally countless hours perfecting their work, self-editing and proofreading until they could recite half of the book in their sleep. Yet this effort seems wasted if others are sabotaging all indie authors by giving indies a bad reputation for atrocious use of grammar and spelling.

Concern for your ilk aside, you’re not doing yourself any favours and you aren’t likely to get good reviews or sales if you don’t put some effort into your work. It’s vital, no matter how you look at it – why else would traditional publishers put so much time and effort into this? They certainly aren’t doing it because they’re bored! Publishing is a business and, as such, the aim is to offer an excellent product that sells.

I do, of course, understand that it isn’t a case of laziness in many cases. I think part of the problem is that one can find a plethora of language advice online, yet one website will state something as fact and another will have a completely different ‘rule’ stated as fact for the same thing. How do you know which sites are trustworthy and which ones will only serve to embarrass you if you follow their advice?

The Solution

Use a trusted source of information. I recommend Oxford. Don’t worry if you can’t afford to purchase a dictionary – Oxford has a free online dictionary in which you can search for UK and USA English, amongst other versions.

You can find myriad writers’ resources on theFireblade Publishers website, relating to language and style, and more.

Grammar Girl’s blog is also accurate (from what I’ve read of it).

If you have the money, hire a professional editor. This is obviously the recommended option, as a professional works with language daily and doesn’t have to look up anything all that often, and, therefore, fewer errors are likely to slip past your editor’s keen eyes. You can also find some self-editing tips on the Fireblade Publishers website, which will help you to perfect your manuscript, and will make a professional edit cheaper.

A Gift for You

Until 15 June, post your language-related questions as a comment on this blog post, and a professional editor from Fireblade Publishers will answer them for you.

Fireblade Publishers is a publishing services company that offers clients a customised service that caters for individual needs. Whether you’re a traditional or self-publishing company, an up and coming novelist or an established writer, you decide which of our services you want to take advantage of and you only pay for those services. If you can’t afford to pay for services, visit the company website to take advantage of the numerous free writers’ resources.