EPUBBING with NICOLA FURLONG

I ended my previous post (Publishing an Ebook Using Smashwords (2)) on a classic cliffhanger: click Publish.

So, then what happens?

It may take awhile for the famous meatgrinder to convert your file. You’ll probably see a screen that tells you that “Your book has been received and is #X in the queue”. Over time, the page will refresh and the queue number will go down until your publication is ready. I’ve never been higher than 14 in the queue and that conversion only took about 7 minutes.

You don’t have to sit and wait, you may upload another file or leave altogether, returning later to visit your “Dashboard” (on the blue toolbar) to determine the status of your uploaded file. You’ll receive an email from Smashwords letting you know your publication is online and offering marketing suggestions.

If you do hang around, you’ll eventually see a new title “Your book is converting” and the status of each listed format changes from “converting” to “complete”. Finally, a new page appears saying “Your book upload and conversion is complete”, and you are encouraged to review the publication and check for any conversion errors. You do so by clicking “Proceed to the New Page for your Work”.

You are now taken to your publication’s “home” page, which offers information like title, rating, category, publication date, description, categories, tags and available ebook reading formats. This is where you test your publication. If you are like me and lack a mobile reading device, you are only able to test/view a few of the formats, such as HTML, PDF, RTF and plain text. If you own a Kindle, other e-reading device, you may check other formats.

So, first off: test your new publication’s format by clicking VIEW beside “Online Reading (HTML)”.

You’ll be taken to a new page where you should see the first page of your spanking new publication! Click your way through it to make sure the conversion is successful. Pay CAREFUL attention to formatting issues like indents, bullets, spacing, etc. Reviewing page by page is a drag but essential, especially if you wish you and your publication to be taken seriously (not to mention purchased).

Now, have a quick look at another format like PDF or RTF to find similar or other formatting gremlins.

Reality is that you’ll probably have a few issues but making changes is easy. Go to your “Dashboard”. This is command central for your publication so spend some time getting introduced to the toolbar and reading this entire page. It contains a lot of information and offers a variety of options.

As an example, you’ll note that there is an opportunity to have your work listed with other distributors, like Barnes and Nobles and the Sony Store, or to create affiliates or sales coupons. More info in the How Smashwords Distributes E-books.

So, presuming you have a few changes to make to your newly launched publication, click “Settings”. This new page gives you an overview of this publication, from publication status to sales figures. Click “Operations” for modifications; you may upload a new version or a new cover and/or make changes to any/all of the information you previously provided. Just remember to click “Save” at the very bottom when you’re finished.

You may also unpublish your work but note: this doesn’t completely remove it. This is an interesting quirk of ALL digital publishing; once published, an e-book will remain available for download to anyone who purchased it.

Smashwords logo

Now, review the excellent tips in the Smashwords Book Marketing Guide and start selling.

Over the next few posts, I’ll review my exploits in ebook publishing on mobipocket.com, shortcovers.com, iTunes and the granddaddy of all, amazon.com.