On May 1, Carla King and Lisa Alpine, the force behind Good to Go Media will run another session of their Self-Publishing Boot Camp.
For seven hours, in historic Mechanic’s Library in San Francisco, you’ll “explore each destination on your self-publishing journey from conception to distribution.” Carla and Lisa think that “It’s time for you to get that book out of your head and into the marketplace.” Are you game?
I want to give you a complete picture of this workshop before getting into any opinion. They promise to “go through the details that make this 10-step process a successful strategy for any self-publisher,” and enumerate the steps that will form the backbone of the workshop.
The 10-Step Program
- State your mission and goals: Get a sanity-check on your life-work purpose and how the book fits in, for future decision-making processes. The importance of a tantalizing elevator speech.
- Develop your platform and start promoting: Why you, why now? Stand out in your genre, community, and on the internet using social media and other promotion activities.
- Take care of business: Check off the basic tasks for doing business as a publisher including getting a DBA, ISBNs, a SAN and bar codes, plus creating a realistic budget.
- Finish writing your book: Focus on completing a quality end-product, including why you really need to outsource editing and proofreading.
- Design your book: Using graphics, photography, and typography to create an attention-grabbing cover design and an enjoyable reading experience. Gather assets for your book, and learn how to hire a designer.
- Get your book into the system: Identify the national information systems you need to participate in so that your book is recorded in the proper databases.
- Print your book: Print proofs, short runs, advance copies, and quantities of books using Print On Demand (POD), short run, and offset vendors.
- Sell your book: Use your website and social media tools to the max for keeping the book sales coming, and get ideas for taking advantage of non-bookstore markets for maximum profits.
- Distribute your book: Get distribution for effortless sales into brick-and-mortar bookstores and online bookstores nationally and internationally.
- Ongoing promotion: Continue to develop your platform to assert your presence and expertise in the marketplace and keep selling for a long time.
Here are the details:
Saturday, May 1, 2010
9:30 to 4:30 pm
$155 workshop fee includes the 87-page Self-Publishing Boot Camp Workbook. And check out my review of the workbook too.
Opinion
I haven’t been to the Self-Publishing Book Camp workshop, but I plan to spend some time there. If I were starting out and trying to make sense of the dynamic and confusing world of independent publishing, I would make a point to find a workshop like this in my area. The biggest need coming into this challenge is getting oriented and having a guide who understands the process.
I’ve reviewed the Workbook, and I really like its organization. It gives you a kind of “top-down” view of the whole process that helps orient each task within a larger framework. It should be a valuable day.
Special for readers of TheBookDesigner.com: If you order the Workbook and enter code JoelFBK in the code bar on the order page, Carla and Lisa will take $1.00 off the price of the book.
If you sign up for the workshop itself, enter the code JoelFWS and they’ll take $5.00 off the price.
Takeaway: If you’re in the San Francisco area May 1, and you are thinking about self publishing, give this opportunity some serious consideration. One intense day of learning can energize your whole publishing project.
This is a revised version of a post originally published in January, 2010. It has been updated with the latest information about the Workshop. Photo: Flickr.com / gruntzooki. Post contains affiliate links.
