Thursday, 9 June 2011

Yemi stuff

Various meetings were made to discuss ideas for the Leap of Faith Cards

The cards are used as a tool to promote Leap of Faith and a resource of valuable information to assist with the understanding of the bible and story of Leap of Faith. The relevance of Leap of Faith and the gospel.

These cards can be turned into posters, bookmark cards etc.

06/05/11 - Meeting with Yemi
• To design a leaflet/cards to be inserted in a beautiful envelope inside the illustrated story book.
• Market research leaflets used in churches and what will attract the audience of today.
• For christians and non christians.
• Basic questions to be included in the promotion cards/leaflets
• Colour and intersting typeface.
• key scripture verses
•brainstorming ideas for cards. Snakes and Ladders appeal as one ventures on their path of christianity
• sinners prayer to be included.

• Question people what they want to know about Chrstianity. Market Research
• Action plan of producing cards.

Printing processes

Tuesday, 7 June 2011

Choosing name for business

Checking companies House if Leap of Faith can be used as a business name.

http://www.duport.co.uk/entry/company-name.php?gclid=CI-497fkpKkCFQoZ4QodThM1tg

choosing a company name

Naming your company is a very important decision. There are many different aspects to think of when choosing a company name, such as whether you want it to be descriptive, creative or to help you with branding. Here are some tips about the things you should consider when naming your company.

branding

Think of Google, Ford or Orange - three very successful brands with short, snappy and memorable names. Shorter names are easier to brand and if you are going to spend heavily on marketing, you will probably benefit from using a striking name that is easy to remember. You will also find short names advantageous when designing logos and business cards - simply because they take up less room!

being descriptive

If you are not interested in branding or have a more modest marketing budget, you may find that a descriptive name can bring you more clients. For example, if you were to look under “Takeaway” in a telephone directory, a name like “Google” would be of little use as it says nothing about your business. A name like “Perfect Pizzas” might be a little more helpful here as it would tell customers what your business provides without having to read a description.

thinking ahead

At some point you may want to put your company on the internet, whether as an online store or a company website. Most people want to register domains which contain their company’s name (i.e. Big Ugly Sofas Ltd would probably want to register biguglysofas.com). It is worth glancing at the availability of domain names just for future protection for your business, and see whether anyone else has taken the domain you may wish to use.

creative thinking

Many people call us to say they have thought of a name, but is has already been taken. However, there are lots of variations that you can make on a company name. For example, if the name Sandra’s Cars Limited was taken, you may want to consider Sandra’s Cars UK Ltd. You should be aware that a company may object to your using a company name if it is deemed too similar to an existing name, but this is a rare occurrence. Any objections must be made within 12 months, after that the name cannot be taken away from you.

If your preferred company name is already registered, feel free to call the office and we will be happy to discuss some variations with you. Please be aware that we cannot accept any responsibility for any decisions you make regarding the naming of your company.

play by the rules

Companies House will generally not register company names which could be considered offensive, so use your own judgement before applying. There is also a list of sensitive company name words that you may want to check out. Sensitive words include terms like “school” or “architect” for which you would need to acquire permission from the appropriate regulatory body.

How much does it cost to publish a Childrens book?

http://www.publishingbasics.com/2007/04/10/how-much-does-it-cost-to-publish-an-illustrated-children’s-book/

From this website one can determine how much it would cost to produce an illustrated children's book. But for the sake of this venture which as explained not for commercial gain but outreach. The costs still need to be covered. After producing book with CDs a sample may be distributed to an organisation that may provide funding for printing.

I have saved costs on producing illustrations and editing myself.

http://www.underdown.org/bookcost.htm

Interesting article research before deciding how much to price the book.

Why does a hardcover picture book cost $16?

It does seem hard to believe that a 32-page book should cost so much. Surprisingly, little of that consists of profit for the publisher. . . .

Half of the $16 is the wholesaler and bookseller's part--their overhead and profits. On average, the publisher receives $8, or perhaps a little more. Assuming that the publisher does a print run of 10,000 copies (this is fairly typical), of that $8.00,

$3.20 is overhead
1.60 is the royalty to author and illustrator
1.76 is the cost of paper, printing, and binding (binding is about half of that)
.64 is the cost of preparing the plates

This leaves 80 cents profit per book, assuming all goes well and that the entire printing is sold. And assuming, on the other hand, no subsidiary rights income, which would increase the amount of profit.

These costs are for an imaginary book, of course. Most books will vary from this, in a number of ways: this assumes a 10% royalty based on list price, but royalties can also be paid on net price, or with different percentages; overhead could be higher if the publisher spends more on marketing; paper can be more or less expensive; special features like fold-out pages or cut-outs add to production costs. But this gives you a sense of the costs involved, especially when you multiply these costs out by 10,000 to see what a publisher has to invest before a book is released: $17,600 for "PPB"; $6,400 for plates; overhead of $32,000; and an advance, which will be at least several thousand dollars. Just to break even, a book has to sell six to seven thousand copies. Many books, of course, do not reach that point. A few others go way beyond that. And some books provide additional revenue in subsidiary rights.

I don't claim that this information explains the financial side of the business in any detail, but I hope it gives a sense of why the process of committing to a book can be a lengthy one--publishers are taking a financial risk. And in almost all cases, they do an analysis of costs for the book, in more detail than I've gone into here, before making a decision.

Some more discussion of this subject can be found in

Promoting Leap of faith book on sites

publishing research

Digital Publishing

Create space is a good opportunity for publishing allowing book design, editing and marketing.

Steps

Self publishing is a broad topic. There are many ways to self publish, through: vanity presses, subsidy publishers, micro publishing, POD (print on demand) printing, also known as short run printing, and 'true' self publishing.

Vanity presses should typically be avoided; they market themselves as traditional or subsidy publishers, but charge high fees and do very little or no marketing/distribution for you. They don't make selections for the most part, and take whatever comes their way.

Subsidy publishers are not as selective as traditional publishers, but work in a similar manner in the form that they reject manuscripts often. However, they charge the author for binding and publishing; the upside is that they contribute to marketing and distribution, and publish under their name. Authors tend to have limited control over design and such, and receive royalties, while the publisher keeps an amount.

Micro publishing publishers in micro or niche markets, and tend - due to the risk of lack of appeal and low economic scale - to be published electronically.

POD, or print on demand printing, are such like Lulu and Blurb. These tend to be done for short run books. These are useful for small quantities of books, and are useful for samples or one-off books. The price is normally somewhat high and is not really for large amounts of printing. Many are based online; though some offer ISBN numbers for an extra price, and some can also be linked to sites like Amazon, it's generally not an encouraged form of self publishing, except for short run printing. A lot of the time, POD printers create side operations that run as subsidy or vanity publishers.

Then there is 'true' self publishing, in which the writer encounters and deals personally with the marketing, distribution, design and storage, and covers the entire cost. A writer might hire a designer for the cover, or simply do it themselves; as a result of all this, all profits made go straight to the writer. Steps for true self publishing are listed below.

Through a local printer

1
Get mentally prepared; self-publishing takes a lot of initiative and drive. Remember that it is your passion for getting the book out to the public that will carry you through frustrations along the way. That being said, self-publishing can be a profitable and exciting venture.
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2
Make sure that your book is complete, well-edited, and thoroughly proofread.
3
List out the reasons why you want this book to be self-published and get an estimate as to whether the reason is strong enough for you to keep going.
4
Create a good title that will pull people in. The title of your book can determine if people would like to buy your book or not.
5
Get a designer to do a professional cover design.
6
Next find a printer. Shop around and get quotes for anywhere between 500-2000 copies.
7
Get ISBN numbers so that your books can be listed in the Bowker database where bookstores pick up latest books for retailing. Warning: ISBN numbers are sold in blocks of at least 10, not per unit (www.isbn.org).

Through a Website

1
Microsoft Word
Find a good self-publishing website that allows you to publish a book free without set-up fees. Two such examples are featured in the external links below.
2
Set up an account with the program.
3
Create a good title that will pull in your prospective readers. Your book's title can make a huge difference in whether people will buy your book or not.
4
Write your book with a word processing program, such as Microsoft Word, or Word Perfect. It will make editing and revision a much easier job for you. Some self publish websites also provide service like online book builder, so you can make a book online by using the book templates and clip-arts of the site.
5
Make sure that your book is edited very well. Ask a trusted and credible individual toproofread your book. You can often ask the company to edit your work, if you choose.
6
Select the company that you want to publish your book. You must upload your document first. After this, you will have to design your cover (unless you prefer a pre-made cover from the company) and choose the price for customers and the type of book (such as bound, hard copy, or paperback). Once you finish the categories listed by the website, choose to finish publishing and your book is printed. You are now a published author!
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Childrens Book Publishing
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EditVideo

http://www.wikihow.com/Self-Publish-a-Book

How to Self Publish a Book

EditTips

Get a proof of your book before it goes to print. If you don't like how your book looks, you can make changes before you pay a lot of money for 1,000 flawed copies.
Make sure that your book is proofread thoroughly. You don't want your book to get bad reviews because of typing errors and/or poor layout. It's worth the money to hire a professional editor to read your book. You don't want people knowing that your book is a self-published book.
Add a great description to your book. That way, it will attract more customers. Use pithy descriptions to draw their interest.
Publicity is really the key. There are plenty of wonderful books in the world that sold 351 copies because they weren't properly promoted. And there are many ghastly, poorly written books that sold 43,000 copies because they were properly promoted.
Research shows that book-buying customers look at three things: The front cover, rear cover and table of contents. Spend the money to make these three places sing. Hire a graphic artist if necessary but think of this as the "kitchen and bath" sections of your book. Money spent in these areas will pay handsome dividends.
List your books on Amazon.com. Give yourself plenty of time to write the "publisher's comments" and make sure it is precise, grammatically flawless and well written. This is what potential book buyers will use to make a decision about buying your book.
Send two copies of the book to Amazon.com (following instructions at their site) so that the book can be scanned and made available on the "search inside this book" feature.
Write thoughtfully worded, intelligent and interesting reviews of similar subject books at amazon.com, and create a signature and/or tagline such as, "Rosemary Thornton, author,The Houses That Sears Built." Such a tagline generates tremendous free publicity to your target market!
Send free copies to anyone who may have an interest in this topic and ask that they write a review at amazon.com. Books with no reviews at amazon.com have a very, very low sales rank. Since potential buyers can't thumb through your book at amazon.com, they'll rely on other people's reviews.
Start a website and link it to the Amazon bookstore. Sell your books through your website.
You can also think of using services that offer POD fulfillment. These will make you pay a fee but eases the work for you. But keep in mind that POD (print on demand) is only for writers who are looking for a hobby, not a money-making career. Printing 1,000 copies of the average book costs about $3,500 to $5,000 or less than $5 per book. The cost to do this through POD would be about three times as much. Amazon (and most book buyers) will pay 50% of your cover price. It's hard to make money selling a $15 book for $10 (assuming a cover price of $19.95).
Don't over-purchase books, especially when easily avoided and/or when demand is uncertain. Too much extra stock means that you've paid too much and are unlikely to gain much from it.
Aggressively market your book through press releases, articles blogs, websites, and any other way that you can think of because marketing is the core activity that will ensure that people know and buy the book.
Get your book into book fairs like BookExpo America and the London Book Fair which will give you access to the traditional publishing industry - several third parties offer this kind of book marketing for a nominal fee.
http://www.ehow.com/video_2372060_printing-costs-publishing-children_s-book.html

Costing

To print a perfect bound

Path to publishing

Purchase ISBN
Editing
Illustration
Design and Layout
Digital Test Printing

Competition

The Action Bible
Illustrated by Sergio Cariello
Retail Price: ~~$24.99~~
CBD Price: $13.99
Buy 12 or more for $13.29 each.
( In Stock )

The Action Bible presents 215 fast-paced narratives in chronological order, making it easier to follow the Bible's historical flow and reinforcing the build-up to its thrilling climax.

The stories in The Action Bible communicate clearly and forcefully with a compelling blend of clear writing plus dramatic images—an appeal that crosses all age boundaries.

Internationally recognized artist Sergio Cariello has created attention-holding illustrations marked by rich coloring, dramatic shading and lighting, bold and energetic designs, and emotionally charged figures.

Let this epic rendition draw you into all the excitement of the world's most awesome story.

The Beginner's Bible: Timeless Children's Stories
Retail Price: ~~$16.99~~
CBD Price: $9.49
( In Stock )