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Offering a paperback or not?

461 Views 5 Replies 5 Participants Last post by  Jim Johnson
After I read a post here that by making a paperback the length of the novella became a bit longer, I wonder as to whether to make a paperback available or not?
I don't expect to make any money out of it (at least not a lot) but length plays a role by applying to certain advertisers like BookBub and ENT. I totally agree with the previous topic that a story is a story no mater the length but if I  pass 125 pages, I will be eligible for ENT.
I must of course pay somebody on Fiverr to convert the doc file.
Your thoughts?
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I can only repeat what I have heard from other authors...a paperback version makes your work on Amazon look more professional (as opposed to having only an ebook version available).  The paperback will appear alongside your ebook plus it really does not cost much to do the paperback too.  Upload to Createspace is free and you can even use the free online cover templates they have, though a professionally designed paperback cover is more pleasing. So why not?
The paperback doesn't actually make your work longer.  However, the page length can vary depending on the trim you choose.  i.e. I print at 5x8, thus the page count for my paperbacks is always higher than the size KDP estimates for my mobi file. 

So for example, my latest is about 130K words long.  I print at 5x8 trim using Adobe Garamond Pro 11pt.  This translates to a paperback about 500 pages long.
I've got about seven or eight of my e-books out through Createspace. Every month I sell one or maybe two - but it wasn't that hard a task to convert to Createspace format - and that is one or two sales that I might not have received had the book NOT been available in paperback.

So I convert whenever I think of it. And I would recommend you do likewise.

As for paying somebody to convert - well, if I can figure how to do it you can too.

I found this Youtube video VERY helpful.

Steve Vernon said:
I've got about seven or eight of my e-books out through Createspace. Every month I sell one or maybe two - but it wasn't that hard a task to convert to Createspace format - and that is one or two sales that I might not have received had the book NOT been available in paperback.

So I convert whenever I think of it. And I would recommend you do likewise.

As for paying somebody to convert - well, if I can figure how to do it you can too.

I found this Youtube video VERY helpful.

Thanks, I will watch it; is Scrivener possible to convert paperbacks too?
Antara Man said:
Thanks, I will watch it; is Scrivener possible to convert paperbacks too?
Sure, though neither Word nor Scrivener are ideal interior print layout programs. They can certainly get the job done, though, if you're willing to take the time to be fiddly with the details.
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