marketing

How to Become an Apple Developer – Part 3

So once we completed step 1, which was registering at http://developer.apple.com/programs/start/standard/create.php and once we completed step 2, which was (for us) indicating that we were a company interested in becoming a developer, we waited…. Apple needed more information to complete their review of our application. 

7 days later… (yes, days), we received this from Apple:

“We are currently in the process of reviewing your iOS Developer Program enrollment information. Please fax one of the following forms of identity for your business. To assist with this process, please ensure your business documents match your enrollment information. Fax your submission to <their fax number>. Please include your Enrollment ID <our enrollment ID> that was provided to you upon submission.

Please include your main company corporate telephone number with your faxed documents.

Articles of incorporation
Business license
Certificate of Formation
Charter documents
Operating Agreement
Partnership papers
Reseller or vendor license

Best regards,

Apple Developer Support”

We submitted our Articles of Incorporation. That was exactly 1 week ago. We’re still waiting…. I’ll keep you posted, and then we can continue with the next steps of the application process which includes, among other things, paying Apple (of course).

marketing

Apple Developer Program – Applying for – Part 2

Don’t expect to become a certified Apple developer overnight.  Completing step 1 takes a matter of minutes. Completing step 2 takes…. well, I can’t tell you how long it takes, because we’re still waiting.

HOW TO Create an iPhone Developer Account (IOS)

1. Register as a new Apple developer at  http://developer.apple.com/programs/start/standard/create.php

2. Confirm whether you are an individual or a company

When we indicated that Outskirts Press was a company registering to become an Apple Developer, we were notified that our application was under review. All developer registrations under-go a review process, and the review process for an “individual” (which is also a choice) is presumably faster than the review process for a “company” (which is the choice we selected).  Individuals, I have been told by others, are reviewed and/or approved within 1-2 days, although that estimate came before Apple development was at the state of popularity it is today, so that could be a short estimate now. 

As for our review as a company, it took Apple 7 days to send a request for more information.    In a couple hours I’ll report on the message we received from Apple and what we sent them and how long it took (is taking)…

marketing

How to Apply for Apple Developer Certification – Part 1

Outskirts Press has some exciting products in store for the near future, including an Ipad/iBookstore edition and an “Author App” which will offer authors the opportunity to add a personal iPhone application to their marketing mix.  We’re also working on a free Outskirts Press application which should be ready relatively soon. And we’re in preliminary development for a mobile version of our website.

Well, all of this requires some ground work with Apple, and to be honest, it’s kind of a big pain in the butt.  Apple appears to be buckling under their own popularity.  Approval processes that should take days end up taking weeks.  But, be that as it may, if you’re motivated to become an Apple Developer, there are certain things you must do. And here they are:

HOW TO Create an iPhone Developer Account (IOS)

1. Register as a new Apple developer at  http://developer.apple.com/programs/start/standard/create.php

It will ask you if you are a new developer or an existing developer, and ask you to further define your intention with Apple. This is pretty easy.

2. Confirm whether you are an individual or a company

Individuals get approved faster. Companies usually have to submit some form of additional documentation to prove they are a business. In our case, Outskirts Press submitted our Articles of Incorporation to Apple.

… more to come next time…

self publishing, self publishing a book

Congratulations ForeWord Book of the Year Finalists 2010

When comparing the finalists in the ForeWord Book of the Year Awards (not to be confused with our own BEST Book of the Year Award — I know, it’s confusing), Publishers A, U, and X are a little more competitive – but not by much when you consider that jointly, these three competitors (all operating in one office with the same personnel) publish roughly 1,000 books a month or more.   Publisher X has one finalist and Publisher A has 5. Publisher U has 21.  But then again, Publisher U published over 3 times the number of books we did at Outskirts Press, so from a statistical standpoint (and that’s really all success is,  a matter of statistics), Outskirts Press stands out as the most award-winning publisher among the five major self-publishing firms.  Yes, yes, there are three other companies that could be considered “major” based solely upon the number of books they publish a year, but not one of them has a single Book of the Year finalist. And all that is a long preamble to congratulating our own ForeWord Book of the Year finalists from Outskirts Press, who are:

self publishing, self publishing a book

ForeWord Book of the Year Finalists

I always enjoy comparing the success of our authors with the success of authors from our competitors.  And fortunately, ForeWord Reviews makes that pretty easy with the announcement of their Book of the Year Finalists for 2010 at http://www.bookoftheyearawards.com/finalists/2010/ – You can search for any publisher and see how they perform.

Competitive analysis is something I don’t spend an enormous amount of time on, but I do try to keep up with other self-publishing firms as much as I can.  In general, I only bother to keep a close eye on our five major competitors and they are, respectively, Publisher A, Publisher C, Publisher L, Publisher U, and Publisher X.  

As I’ve mentioned in the past, I don’t mention other publishers by name in my blog, but it’s not difficult to unravel my super secret naming convention.  Of course, if you were to agree with one rather vocal member of our Board, we don’t actually compete with Publisher C or L. To paraphrase:  “That’s like saying Perrier competes with swamp water.”  Meow.

But he has a point. Publisher C has a grand total of 3 finalists and if you are to believe their marketing claims, they publish roughly 1 trillion books a day (slight hyperbole), making for an award-winning percentage of approximately 0%.  Similarly, Publisher L publishes so many books the Library of Congress had to open a whole another wing just to accommodate their volume (if you’re to believe a press release from April 1 that they distributed a few years back), and yet they published exactly zero ForeWord Book of the Year finalists in 2010.   Their April Fool’s day release notwithstanding, that’s not a very high winning percentage.  Perhaps this goes to show that publishing with one of those cheapo do-it-yourself outfits isn’t exactly the route to an award-winning book…. And interestingly, if you actually look at the “services” they’re starting to offer, they’re becoming pretty expensive, which is basically like adding insult TO  injury.

More on the Book of the Year finalists and our other 3 competitors in a few hours…

self publishing, self publishing a book

Best Book of the Year votes – update

Last time I mentioned I would discuss some of our award-winners. First and foremost is the current poll for the Outskirts Press 2010 Best Book of the Year award.  The polls are open through the end of this month and then we’ll crown the winner. It’s a close race! As I write this, Frank and Doris are dead-even with 48.43% each.  That’s impressive, and speaks directly to each of their respective marketing efforts.  Doris started strong out of the gate, capturing in excess of 60% of the votes when the polls first opened on the 15th.  In the days that followed, however, Frank launched what appeared to be an effective marketing campaign of his own and brought his total percentage above Doris’ for a few days.  Now they’re neck and neck. What would be really interesting would be to ask them what marketing tactics they are pursuing. Hmm… we might do that, at least for the winner once the polls closed.   It might shed some valuable information on “platform building” for other writers.  Following in the footsteps of successfully published authors is part of what we embrace at Outskirts Press.

Watch the polls and vote for your favorite here (yes, WordPress allows you to share polls across multiple blogs — cool, huh?)  For details about the three finalists, visit the Outskirts Press Blog.

marketing, self publishing a book

Market Research for Self Publishing Cover Design

While our upcoming Market Research, Social Style option is designed to help authors within the process receive honest feedback on a variety of elements of their book, our main purpose is to help authors with cover design decisions.

Book covers are extremely important, and the topic comes with quite a bit of emotional fervor.   Many authors approach the publishing process with a very set idea regarding their covers.  As a custom  publisher, our first goal at Outskirts Press is to deliver the books our authors want, followed very closely by our secondary goal to deliver an extremely high-quality publication.  Issues arise when, in some instances, that first goal conflicts with the second.  It’s sometimes easy to see why. Authors who can receive a high-quality publishing service with our $399 Sapphire package often find it difficult to justify an additional $299 for a professional, unique custom cover design. After all, that’s nearly the cost of the entire publishing service!  

Of course, that’s a little like stepping over a dollar to pick up a penny.  And we expect when we launch our Market Research, Social Style option, more authors will receive 3rd party unbiased recommendations that lead to improvements with their books. After all, everyone wants the same thing — award-winning books published by award-winning authors.

Speaking of awards, our authors have received quite a few lately, and that sounds like a good topic for next time.

ceo, marketing, self publishing

Power to the people

Speaking of polls, Outskirts Press will soon start offering “market research” to our authors to help them improve their books and/or solicit honest, valuable feedback from our social community – which is also comprised of writers and other business professionals.  People helping people publish better, that’s our goal.  We are in the beta-testing process of launching  a new option called Market Research, Social Style, which gives our authors in the publishing process access to ask a specific question of our social community and “put it to a vote.” 

Our preliminary steps in launching this option involved our very own Fandemonium Anthology, which we published on behalf of our Facebook community.  During that process in the first quarter of 2011, we solicited feedback and votes on a number of publishing decisions, including the cover design, the title of the book, the pricing, and the charity to receive the royalties.  Each time, a poll was created to solicit votes, and the “winning” selection was available for everyone to see and comment on. 

Now, we will turn over this same offering to our authors to help them collect “market research” on any number of publishing considerations they may have, including book titles, cover design options, imprint logo designs, or whatever else they want “outside opinions” on.

More on “social publishing” in a few hours…

blogging

The power of public polls on blogs

As of today, over 250 people have voted for the winner in the Outskirts Press Best Book of the Year Award on this poll:

If you haven’t voted yet, now is the time. It has been interesting watching the results change as a result of specific marketing efforts.  When the poll first opened on the 15th, it was publicized to our social community and a part of our widely-distributed e-mail newsletter.  After that initial salvo, preliminary polling results had Doris in the lead, followed by Frank, and Robert in the #3 position.

Then, a couple of days ago, it seems Frank made some specific marketing efforts to increase his votes.  Perhaps he conducted his own email campaign, or perhaps he notified his own circle of friends, family, colleagues, etc.   He hasn’t informed us specifically what he has done, but the proof of his efforts is in the pudding of the polls. As of today, when I write this, his book has surpassed Doris’ in the public poll percentages.  Congratulations, Frank!  An author’s publishing platform is determined largely by marketing prowess. We shall see if Robert and Doris can keep pace with marketing efforts of their own through the rest of April.

By the way, this is a good lesson for marketing books in general.  If you make a marketing effort, you will see tangible sales results. Just like the authors of our Top 10 bestselling books in March.

More about polls and their use on blogs in a few hours…

blogging, self publishing, self publishing a book

Vote for the Best Book of the Year 2010

You may have noticed with the previous poll that the very right-hand edge of it was “cut off” by the width dimensions of this blog’s theme.  WordPress allows you to set three different poll sizes, and that poll was set to the maximum, which does fit on our Outskirts Press blog, but doesn’t fit in its entirety here.

The next poll, however, fits on both. This is the poll for the Best Book of the Year Award 2010 and its $1,500 Grand Prize.  I summarized the finalists in a previous posting here.

Or for more details, you can visit each of these respective blog postings for details about…

Now it’s time to vote.  We’re taking votes through the end of April and the winner will be notified in the first week of May. Good luck to them!