This post was originally published at Novelicious.com and is now at WritingTipsOasis.com. WritingTipsOasis.com acquired Novelicious.com in June 2022.
Last year, 18 million self-published titles were bought by readers, to a value of £300 million. In 2014, self-publishing has continued to boom with the DIY approach to books gaining more writers and readers than ever before. We know that many of you are amongst the writers who have or are hoping to self-publish so, at your request, we’ve invited Bibliocrunch CEO Miral Sattar to share her expertise in this brand new and very educational self-publishing series.
Have a subject you’re especially keen to see Miral cover? Leave your suggestions in the comments!
by Miral Sattar
In the last post we talked about defining your goals before you embark on your self-publishing journey.
Once you’ve defined your goals, you should begin your research on vendors. This is a step that a lot of authors forget about until they have had a negative experience with a particular vendor. A lot of companies promise to publish your book under the guise of a 'publisher’. They will give you a publishing package that you can purchase for an exorbitant price. Be wary. These 'publishers' are called vanity presses who are known to prey on authors.
Before you choose a vendor or press, make sure you Google “[Name of Press/Vendor] Reviews” or “[Name of Press/Vendor] Bad Reviews.” The results will tell you what you need to know about the press or vendor before you sign up.
There are a lot of ways to do a background check on your potential vendor or freelancer. They have LinkedIn pages, check them on BBB (Better Business Bureau), and read their testimonials.
Picking Your Retailers
There are so many options for authors to self-publish nowadays, that it's wise to do a retailer inventory and decide where you want to publish your book. Do you just want to sell your book on Amazon? Do you want to publish an eBook? A print book? Or both? 
The dish on retailers:
A few years ago, you had to use a distributor to get your books into all the major retailers. Now, most retailers allow authors to directly upload their books. This is great because you can also maximize royalties this way.
When uploading an eBook or a book for print on demand we recommend uploading your book to the following retailers: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, and Kobo.
As you may already know, different retailers require you to upload different file forms for readable conversion on their devices. The file conversions for each device are as follows:
• MOBI/PRC: Amazon (Kindle)
• EPUB: Barnes & Noble (Nook Press), Apple iBooks, Kobo (also now Sony)
• PRINT READY PDF: CreateSpace
My blog post has more information about the file types for each retailer.
Amazon
• Known as KDP, Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing
• Over 60% of market* (guesstimate)
• Royalties: 70% if your book is between $2.99 and $9.99
• PRC or MOBI file: 50MB
• Cover: at least 1000 pixels on longest size, JPEG or TIFF, 1.6 height-width ratio
• To sell your book you will need to submit tax and bank information
Barnes & Noble
• Known as Nook Press
• Formerly PubIt!
• Roughly 25% of eBook market* (guesstimate)
• Royalties: about 65%
• EPUB File: 20MB
• Cover: between 750 pixels and 2000 pixels in length, JPEG, 5KB to 2MB
• To sell your book you will need to submit tax and bank information
iBooks
• Roughly 25% of eBook market* (guesstimate)
• EPUB File: 2 GB
• Royalties: 70%
• Cover: minimum 1400 pixels along smaller side, JPEG or PNG file
• To sell your book you need to input your bank and tax information
• Great for enhanced eBooks
• Mac and an iTunes Connect account
• Download iTunes Producer
Kobo
• Single digits market share* (guesstimate)
• Royalties: 70%
• EPUB File: 200 MB
• Cover: 600 pixels x 860 pixels, JPEG or PNG
• To sell your book you need to input your bank and tax information
* The market share percentages don’t add up to 100%. That’s because they are guesstimates. No retailers actually reveal their market share, and since a lot of authors have stopped using ISBN numbers, the REAL numbers are not really known.
If you want to do a print book you might want to consider print on demand.
The largest print-on-demand retailers are CreateSpace (an Amazon company) and Ingram Spark.
ABOUT MIRAL SATTAR:
Miral Sattar is CEO of Bibliocrunch, a platform that matches writers with trusted, vetted book publishing professionals. Miral loves books and loves helping authors fulfill their publishing dream. Her company Bibliocrunch has helped numerous authors hit the Amazon best-seller list.