Joel Friedlander - The Self-Publisher’s Ultimate Resource Guide: Every Indie Author’s Essential Directory—To Help You Prepare, Publish, and Promote Professional Looking Books

Praise for
The Self-Publishers Ultimate Resource Guide

An essential reference to the best publishing resources for every self published author. Highly recommended!

Mark Coker, Smashwords founder

Independent authors need a team to help create a fantastic finished product, and finding the right people can be a challenge when you first start out. This book will help authors to locate professionals to edit, publish and market their workhelping them to stand out in the crowded marketplace.

Joanna Penn, The Creative Penn

Time is money. Youll save a lot of both by referring to this easy-to-use resource. Ill be promoting this valuable guide and urging my own author clients to use it.

Joan Stewart, The Publicity Hound

Wish this guide existed when I started self-publishing. It outlines the process beautifully, directs you where to go and saves months of research. A treasure chest I plan to open often.

Jason Matthews, How to Make, Market and Sell Ebooks

This reference is for every author because, whether you sell out to a large publisher or publish yourself, the author must do the promoting. Publishers do not promote books.

Dan Poynter, The Book Futurist

As a marketing person and publishing instructor, a guide like this is long overdue. Its a much needed resource and guide for authors and publishers to help them find high quality industry professionals. Thoroughly researched and curated by two people I greatly respect and admire, this book will take the guesswork out of self-publishing. This short-cut to the top proseditors, designers, marketers, bloggers, distributorsis just exactly what weve all been waiting for. This book is a must-have for any author or publisher!

Penny Sansevieri, Author Marketing Experts

There are countless self-publishing guides telling you how you should self-publish. With The Self-Publishers Ultimate Resource Guide , theres finally a definitive source getting to the nuts and bolts of the process. In one book, authors have all they need to self-publish professionally and successfully.

Henry Baum, Self-Publishing Review

Awesome is not profound enough a word for this resource. In my consults with struggling authors, one of the most common questions I receive is who can I get to help me. Why anyone hasnt created this resource before now befuddles me. Now we have The Self-Publishers Ultimate Resource Guide from the masterminds of self-publishing, and I endorse it wholeheartedly times ten. Ill be recommending this to all my readers.

C. Hope Clark, Founder Funds for Writers and Author The Carolina Slade Mysteries and The Edisto Island Mysteries

Wowwhat an amazing resource! Finally theres one place where anyone who wants to self-publish can find top editors, designers, printers and more. This is a real life-saver, a must-have guide for every indie author.

Alexis Grant, founder of The Write Life

Wow... what an amazing wealth of resources for authors. This is a great reference book for any author to add to their library. I highly recommend this book!

Shelley Hitz, owner of Training Authors

Finally, hundreds of the resources you need compiled conveniently under one cover. This rich resource should be at every authors elbow.

Patricia Fry, author of 47 books, speaker, book editor and former executive director of SPAWN (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network)

This is a comprehensive, must-have reference for anyone writing a book or thinking about it. Joel provides a thorough and thoughtful approach to the hundreds of vendors offering services to writers at all stages of their projects.

Patricia Benesh, Author Assist

This book is a living document

Although we have tried to gather the most valuable resources for indie authors, its inevitable that some have been missed, and new products and services are constantly being introduced. We want your help to make it even better. If you know of a person, company, product, or service of value to independent authors thats not included in this guide, please let us know. You can send submissions to be included in the next edition of The Self-Publishers Ultimate Resource Guide to:

Thank you

Copyright 20142016 Joel Friedlander and Betty Kelly Sargent

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed Attention: Permissions Coordinator, at the address below.

Marin Bookworks

369-B Third Street, #572

San Rafael, CA 94901

Quantity sales: Special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations, and others. For details, contact the Special Sales Department at the publishers address above.

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN 978-0-936385-38-9 - Trade paper

ISBN 978-0-936385-39-6 - ePub

2nd Edition

Credits:

Research: Josslyn Shapiro
Fact checking and production: Christi Love, Kate Tilton
Copyediting: Wyn Hilty
Design: Marin Bookworks, http://www.thebookdesigner.com

For our friends, and families,
and self-publishers everywhere.

Author a great book, Publish it quickly and Entrepreneur your way to success. Self-publishing isnt easy, but its fun and sometimes even lucrative. Plus, your book could change the world.

Guy Kawasaki, APE: Author, Publisher,
Entrepreneur: How to Publish a Book

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction

Whats the hardest part of becoming a self-publisher? Figuring out whos who, whats what, and where and how to find the right resources to make your book the best it can be. Traditional publishers know all this. They work with some of the best editors, designers, copy editors, proofreaders, publicists, marketers, ad agencies, and salespeople in the country. Thats their job, and they do it well. But for indie authors who dont have access to these people, and often dont even know who they are, trying to find top freelance professionals to help them write, produce, and sell their book can be a nightmare.

We had no idea how urgent the need for a curated, comprehensive resource guide for indie authors was until, much to our surprise, the 2015 edition of The Self-Publishers Ultimate Resource Guide launched at number one in its category on Amazon. Once we started getting positive feedback from hundreds of readers and began to realize just how essential this Resource Guide was, we decided to expand it significantly in the new, 2016 edition. Heres what weve done:

• Invited a select group of self-publishing industry leaders to share their expertise by writing a cutting-edge, thought-provoking introduction to the section of the guide that pertains to their expertise. For example, Penny Sansevieri tells us what really matters when it comes to Marketing and Publicity, Carla King explains shortcuts to E-book Conversion, and Ingrams Robin Cutler demystifies the confusing world of Book Distribution.
• Added two new categories: Book Shepherds and Author Assistants, bringing the total number of categories up to thirty-five.
• Increased the number of listings significantly and deleted any out-of-date or questionable listings. As many of you know, we already update the e-book version of The Self-Publishers Ultimate Resource Guide every four months to keep it the most comprehensive and up-to-date resource guide on the market. For this 2016 edition we are providing our readers with a major revision.