Frequently Asked Questions

The extent of the service we offer involves taking a book from a base position right through to a high quality, professional publication. Our self-publishing services cover both the eBook and printed editions, including book formatting, book cover design and formatting, ebook file conversion, uploading the files to KDP in digital and printed formats, and handling the technical aspects of publication.

There are over ten million Kindle users worldwide with the numbers increasing daily. But the market for your book goes far beyond that because Kindle provides apps so that your book can be read on virtually any eBook device such as iPads and the Android devices.

Yes, absolutely. Your book will be available to all the countries of the world where Amazon have a presence, including the UK, Europe, and the USA which has the biggest number of Kindle owners.

Certainly not. One of the disadvantages of Kindle is that it doesn’t have a strict editorial policy concerning which books are published. We do. All manuscripts submitted to us are read and thoroughly critiqued by independent readers. This critique is sent to the author together with either an offer of publication or a polite rejection. That said, we publish approximately 50% of manuscripts submitted to us – conventional ‘printed book’ publishers right now are accepting almost no books at all by new authors.

When publishing on Amazon, there are two ISBN options available for self-published authors. The first is a free ISBN assigned by Amazon (included in our offer), and the second is the author’s own ISBN purchased from NIELSEN. For a first-time author, there is no apparent advantage in purchasing an ISBN from NIELSEN when publishing on Amazon. As previously mentioned, a free Amazon ISBN is a popular choice, considering that more books are sold on Amazon. If you opt to purchase your own ISBN, you can do so through the NIELSEN ISBN store. Self-publishing with your own ISBN provides some freedom with distribution. However, this does not guarantee sales, and you will need to persuade wholesalers to sell your book through their chains.

You can find more information on ISBN options here.

We aim to complete publication within approximately ten weeks and have a very formulaic and systematic approach to the book production.

We consider all genres and types of books from short poetry books through conventional fiction and non-fiction to reference books, memoirs and family histories. In fact, we have published almost every type of book in the last ten years.

Kindle is a very forgiving medium where length is not of any great importance. For example, fiction of novella length and short stories are proving very popular on Kindle. This is in contrast to printed books where these genres were rarely published at all in recent years.

Because Kindle is owned by amazon.com, a US company, the retail price is set initially in US Dollars then automatically converted to the currency of the country in which it is on sale. Thus, in the UK it will appear for sale in British Pounds, in Europe, the Euro and so on. One thing you must remember is that ebooks are priced lower than conventional printed books. There are conventional ‘industry standard’ prices for different types of books to which we tend to adhere. But another advantage of Kindle is that the price of the book can be changed very quickly at any time depending on sales.

Royalties are paid by Amazon directly on a monthly basis, 60 days in arrears, by direct bank transfer. Authors receive 70% (eBook) and 60% (paperback edition) royalties of the retail price of their books direct from AMAZON, who keep the remaining % as their profit. We have no part in the payment of royalties.

Royalties are paid by Amazon directly on a monthly basis, by direct bank transfer. To ensure you receive your royalties for every copy of the book sold, it’s essential to set up your IBAN/BIC details in your KDP account.

Marketing an ebook is very different from marketing a printed book and we probably know more about this than any other company in the UK. If you take a look at the page on this website which deals specifically with marketing you will find all you need to know. Suffice it to say that our marketing strategy is specifically designed to maximize sales of your book.

We set up a KDP account for you on Amazon’s Kindle with your own username and password. This provides access to your account over which you will have full control. You can check sales as frequently as you want and change any element of the book when required, even down to the content and cover design! All of this is explained clearly in the documents we send to you upon publication.

We are aware that many readers still prefer a physical, printed book. In order to cater for this sector of the market, we will also publish a printed edition of the book through Kindle Direct Publishing. This allows you to have printed copies of your book on sale on Amazon without holding any stock at all. The printed edition is print on demand (POD) which is a printing technology and business process in which copies of a book are not printed until an order has been received, allowing books to be printed singly, or in small quantities. Printing on demand means your book will never be out of stock. The customer orders the book and pays for it, Amazon prints it and dispatches it to the customer within forty-eight hours, you receive a royalty payment for each book sold. This edition will be available alongside the Kindle edition on Amazon to maximise the book’s chances of success.

Both traditional and self-publishing offer distinct advantages. Traditional publishing is ideal for established authors seeking significant profits and exposure for their book. Self-publishing, however, is well-suited for first-time authors as publishers may be hesitant to take risks. Consequently, authors can format and upload their book onto various digital platforms with relative ease. In traditional publishing, publishers may request changes to your manuscript, and authors may relinquish certain rights.

Conversely, self-publishing provides greater autonomy and allows authors to retain their rights. In summary, traditional publishing is considered a more formal approach, as publishers bear the burden of marketing and distribution costs. Many new authors leverage self-publishing to showcase their talent and appeal to agents and publishers. Over time, self-publishing has been steadily gaining popularity in comparison to traditional publishing.