Tag: Print on Demand

[Self Publishing Guide] Self Publishing your Book – Step 3: Printing

This post is an excerpt from our Self Publishing Guide for Indian Market. If you have not, you may want to read the following post in this series before starting on this one

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In an earlier post on this series we had discussed the printing process and the two options available – bulk printing with offset or one-off/short run printing with Print on Demand.

Your decision needs to be based on three main factors –

  • Estimate of the market size. If you are confident that the demand for your book is more than 500 copies, go for offset printing. In the event of a smaller demand, POD is a better option. To put things in perspective, a book selling more than 5000 copies in India is considered a success by traditional publishing houses. Remember to factor in your actual marketing abilities when you are estimating the demand. Most well-known authors have a large specialised promotion and marketing team working behind the scenes. As a self publisher, you will mostly be your own promoter and marketer. Self promotion is something which many of us Indians are not very good at given our upbringing where humility is highly valued. Marketing your book successfully will require a lot of aggressive self promotion,without which book will be read only by your close friends and family. So shake off the humility and get going.
  • Genre of the book. In case the book is essentially a photo book or what is called a ‘coffee-table book’, you should go in for offset printing to ensure print clarity of the photographs. For a normal book, POD may be a better option.
  • Distribution options. If you see a possibility of getting a distributor, then, to get the prices right bulk printing is more suitable. If you are selling directly, through your own website or through the website of self publishing companies (like Pothi.com) then you are better off with Print on Demand and short run printing. Read more about distribution options in the next post of this series.

One good thing to try could be to print a short run by POD, test market it, probably scout for publishers/distributors by showing it to them and depending on the response, go for bulk printing.

[Self Publishing Guide] Self Publishing and Print on Demand (are not the same)

A meaningless word that is used very often, not just by newbies, but also by several industry insiders is on-demand publishing. On-demand publishing really does not mean anything. It is the printing that is done on demand. Self publishing is not the same thing as print on demand. This excerpt from our self publishing guide explains the same. It also talks about the two printing options available to publishers in the form of Print on Demand (POD) and Offset Printing.

If you have not already done so, you may want to read the following articles from this series before reading this one.

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Self Publishing and Print on Demand (POD)

There is a difference between self publishing and Print on Demand. The two terms are often used interchangeably by most of us since POD is the most prevalent technology used by self publishers. But the two are not the same.

Publishing is the entire process of preparing the manuscript, editing, designing the cover, printing, distribution and marketing. Printing is only one step in the process of publishing. At the printing stage, the publisher has to choose between two technologies – offset printing and POD. If the publisher is confident of selling a large number of copies (500+), then he may opt for offset printing. If the sale is not expected to be in large numbers, then even a normal publisher may prefer POD. In short, publishing is the entire process whereas POD is a technology which can be used by a full-fledged publisher as well as a self publisher.

POD versus Offset Printing

POD is a relatively new printing technology where the cost of printing does not depend on the number of copies being printed. This is essentially digital printing, where each copy is printed independent of the other.

POD has its advantages and disadvantages.

Advantages of POD

  • Flexibility to print even a single copy at a time. The unit cost of printing one copy and 1,000 copies does not vary much.
  • Each copy can be personalised. You can even dedicate different copies to your different bosses or friends and earn brownie points, for instance.
  • The content can be updated over time at no cost since the printing is done directly from a soft copy.
  • Since one can print exactly the number of copies ordered for, with no significant addition to costs, there is no need to maintain dead inventory (unsold copies).
  • The entire process is faster.

Disadvantages of POD

  • The cost per copy is slightly higher as compared to bulk printing done by offset.
  • Although black and white/grayscale printing quality is now at par with offset, accurate colour reproduction may be an issue in some cases.

Offset printing is a more prevalent and older technology. This involves setting the book in certain specialised software and cutting a plate of the image. The inked image is transferred (or ‘offset’) from a plate to a rubber blanket, then to the printing surface. The plate making process is costly and once made, the plates cannot be corrected or changed. Revision in the book requires cutting new plates. But once you create a plate, you can use it to generate a large number of copies. Therefore, one needs to print a large number of copies (typically 1,000+, minimum 500+) to distribute the cost of plates over all those copies. As a result, printing just a few copies is not cost-effective with offset printing; the cost per copy decreases with increase in the number of copies printed.

Offset printing too has its advantages and disadvantages.

Advantages of Offset Printing

  • Per copy cost is low if number of copies is high. Works well with the current distribution setup in the industry.
  • Quality may be better, especially for coloured printing/photo books.
  • Wider choice of printing paper and other production options are available.

Disadvantages of Offset Printing

  • Large upfront investment in bulk printing. Because of high setup costs, short print runs are not feasible
  • Need to maintain the inventory and logistics

So, you are not a publisher?

And don’t want to be one either?

Hmm…

This is how a lengthy conversation explaining what Pothi.com is ends with many people.

Yes – one problem of our business is that it takes lot of time to explain to people that we do not fit into any pre-defined category from traditional publishing. Most importantly, Pothi.com is not a publisher!

What does this mean?

  • Books published through Pothi.com are published by their authors or other people/organizations behind them – not by Pothi.com.
  • Pothi.com does not do any ‘selection’ of the content except to ensure that it is technically fir for printing and that it is not against the law or our terms and conditions.
  • The entire responsibility of content, its accuracy and quality, its preparation lies with the author/publisher, not with Pothi.com. Same is the case with Book Design, Marketing, Promotion and Sales.

What does Pothi.com do then?

Pothi.com provides tools and services to help you through all these steps of publishing. Meaning

  • There are detailed information and guidelines on preparing your book
  • There are tools for formatting and cover design (e.g. blog to book tool, cover design wizard)
  • There are reasonably priced services for editing, designing etc. if you need help in preparing the book
  • There is an e-commerce store where you can list your book for free and sell it without bothering about logistic hassles of printing, maintaining inventory and shipping them
  • etc.

What’s the future direction Pothi.com will take in that case?

  • Create More technological tools to make the publishing process easier and financial burden minimal
  • Figure out some innovative ways to help authors widen the reach of their books
  • Develop Technological Solutions for filtering out good content from bad

Ouch! So, you will never, never be a publisher?

Pothi.com – the platform will remain Pothi.com the platform. It will not become a publisher. We may or may not have a parallel business as a publisher, but that would be under a separate imprint most likely. We haven’t decided anything on that front yet.

That’s sad! Pothi.com can’t help me become the next Chetan Bhagat.

In all likelihood you are right. Exceptions can occur, but Print on Demand based self publishing model is not optimized for creating best-sellers. It works better for books with niche audience or publications for small, targeted audiences. It is also good for casual publishing.