I stumbled onto Smashwords when I first decided to self-publish my collection of short stories (called “Equinox – Six Declinations”). I’d already learned a bit about publishing for the Amazon Kindle, although I hadn’t attempted to translate Amazon’s confusing (at that time) instructions on how to do it. Later, I wound up ordering an ebook on formatting for the Kindle that better explained the process. But when I found Smashwords and explored their site and their offerings, I immediately jumped in with both feet.
It took me 2 days (working on and off) to get my manuscript through the process and into distribution with Smashwords (not including the wait for my cover designer to get me a cover). Now, as a Smashword’s veteran, I can get one up and to market in about twenty minutes.
Smashwords is not the be-all, end-all solution for all your distribution needs. For one, they still don’t have a standard agreement with Amazon for distributing ebooks for the Kindle (though they’re making progress – they CAN distribute in certain situations). You still have to format and upload your work to that premium market separately. But, with a little effort, you can learn the “Smashword’s Way” and get your book or story out to most of the other major markets in record time and with little hassle.
So just why do I love Smashwords? Here are five reasons.
1) Smashword’s Meatgrinder
Technology can be a beautiful thing. Smashword’s proprietary software, lovingly dubbed the “Meatgrinder”, lets authors publish their work in multiple formats that can be read on any e-reader device. Your ebook can easily be read from devices with small screens like an iPhone, on up to larger screened iPads and the like.
While Meatgrinder works well with non-fiction, it shines at formatting straight-form narrative works, like most fiction.
It’s not so good at converting manuscripts that include tables and columns, however, but it’s limitations are more than offset by the cost for using it. Meatgrinder is FREE!
2) Smashword’s Distribution
If wide distribution across many retailers is one of your goals (and it should be – why put all your eggs in one Amazon basket?), then you’ll salivate over how many outlets you can reach with one push of a button.
Smashwords distributes your work to Apple retailers, Barnes & Noble, the Diesel eBook Store, Kobo, the Sony Reader Store, Baker & Taylor’s Blio, and more.
Your work can appear in up to three Catalogs. The instant your work is converted via Smashword’s Meatgrinder, it will appear in their Standard Catalog, and is available for sampling and sale at the Smashwords website.
Smashword’s Premium catalog goes out to major retailers and other outlets. A manuscript must meet certain standards to be accepted into the Premium catalog. For example, Apple and Sony both require that ebooks distributed to them have an ISBN.
The Atom/OPDS Catalog makes your work available to major mobile app platforms, and contains all the books Smashwords has for sale at their site. Stanza (for iPhone) and Aldiko (Android) are two of these. There are many others.
Of course, your manuscript must be formatted correctly in order to avoid conversion problems and exclusion from Smashword’s Premium catalog. This can be a daunting process, but never fear. Smashword’s has many resources to help you with the learning process.
3) Smashword’s Knowledge Base
Founder Mark Coker has authored three free reference books for authors planning to publish through Smashwords.
The Smashword’s Style Guide covers everything you need to know to set up your manuscript, format it correctly and upload it to Smashwords, whether you’ve written fiction or non-fiction. I used this book to completely format and publish “Equinox – Six Delcinations” within two days. Now I’ve set up templates to use based on what Mark teaches in his manual, and only use the ebook as a reference as needed.
Smashwords wants authors to succeed, not only in publishing their work, but in selling it. To this end, Mark has written the Smashwords Book Marketing Guide, full of tips and tactics for getting your ebook before the buying public.
Further expanding on the ebook marketing theme, Mark followed that popular guide with The Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success, which introduces 25 best practices used by successful self-published authors.
Best of all, all of these amazing resources are FREE!
4) Smashword’s Author Support
Smashwords doesn’t stop with author education. It offers a plethora of support items.
- Royalties. Authors earn 60% of list price from major retailer sales, and 85% of net sales occurring at the Smashwords site.
- Each author publishing on Smashwords receives a personal Author Page, where he can set up a profile and a pen name if he wants. All of an author’s books are shown on the Author Page, with short descriptions and review rankings.
- Each book has its own Standard Catalog page. This page shows your cover, a short and a long description of the book, and tags. It also highlights the available ebook reading formats, and allows customers to download a version that will work on their e-reader device or devices. Reviews for the book are shown at the bottom of the page. The page also depicts sales and download data, lets you create a coupon for any promotions you might want to run, and lets you link to paper and audio copies of the book.
- The Dashboard is where authors will perform most of their book management tasks. All your books are listed here. You can check their status, adjust settings, upload new versions, see the price and how many books were sold, how many were downloaded, and whether the book has been granted Premium status. You can also assign an ISBN number from your Dashboard.
- Smashwords also sponsors several Special Promotions, such as their popular “Read an Ebook Week”, held in March.
- Need a competent ebook cover designer? Leary of formatting your own manuscript and want help? Email Mark and he’ll send you a vetted list of low-cost independent contractors for this task.
- Check out the Smashword’s Blog for information and breaking news pertinent to authors.
5) Smashword’s Affiliate Program
Want to make even more money on Smashwords? Join their Affiliate Program. Sell your fellow author’s books for commissions ranging from 11% to 70.5% of the net sales price.
Mark Coker and the folks at Smashwords work hard to keep the engine tuned and purring for the authors who choose to work with them. Even if the majority of your sales are through Amazon, you might want to consider distribution through Smashwords to expand your reach to markets across the board. After all, you never know when and where a potential fan will encounter your book, so make it easy for them to find it through Smashwords
