Publishing Through Lulu.com

For anyone who’s looking for a place to self publish a book, calendar, comic book, music CD, e-book etc., there are several places you can do this online now days but the best one I’ve found is Lulu.com. It’s been around a few years and has changed a lot from when I first started using it. Lulu now has a lot more services and help chats to help you when you don’t understand how things are done. Lulu is actually quite easy to use and most of it is self explanatory.

Some online publishers charge a fee for their publishing. Lulu is easy to use, free, has several marketing services (of course these cost something), a community so you can get to know other people that have published through them as well as fantastic online help. I can’t think of anything I would say negative about this publishing company. They have been great for me and I’ve published quite a few things through them.

With Lulu you write your book using something like Microsoft word and then download it onto the Lulu website. You then get to choose a cover for your book. You can use one of their many photos they have to offer for your cover or you can download one of your own photos or drawings etc. to use for the front cover. The cover is a little confusing because of the sizing and all, but with the help of the online help it becomes quite easy. They are very informative and seem to really know what they are talking about.

When publishing a book you can have it edited by lulu for a fee. You can choose to have an ISBN put on the back of your book so it can be sold other places than just Lulu. This service is free if you choose for Lulu to be listed as your publisher. If you choose to be the publisher yourself, it is $99 for each title.

If you want you can create a calendar. Of course you will need to use your own photos or artwork for this. I’ve not done this particular thing through lulu yet but plan to in the future. I’m sure it is really easy to do.

You can even publish a photo or artwork and sell it with the option of purchasing it with or without a frame.

Lulu gives you a website where all your published works are displayed. You can choose to keep some work from the public if you want. Let’s say you are publishing a family cookbook or a family calendar etc. and you want only your family to purchase it, you can choose to keep this item from your website and from the public eye and offer it by sending an email with a link to that particular item.

With Lulu they give you a base price that it costs to print your work and you can choose the price above that to put on your creations. When someone buys the item you are selling, Lulu keeps the amount that it costs to print it and you receive the rest. If you choose to do this through paypal and your revenues are more than $5 you will receive this once a month. If you choose to be paid with a paper check and your revenues amount to $20 or more you will receive payments quarterly.

There are so many things you can publish on Lulu that I haven’t even mentioned here so if you are interested in publishing something through Lulu.com I suggest you go to the website yourself and read their FAQ’s section after clicking “Publish”. There are many questions asked and answered there that I have not covered here and you will find a list of all the things you can publish through Lulu.