How to get published on the internet.

There are web sites such as this where you can publish your book in electronic format or e-book. An arrangement can be made whereby a prospective client can read a synopsis or prologue of your work before committing to a purchase. For an unknown author, this is a good way for people to get a taster of your work. If they like it, they can pay by credit card or PayPal to get a download of your full book. The sale price is set by you, and a commission is paid to the site for the sale. To do this, your work will need to be available in either pdf. doc. or rtf. file format. Most people will have software that will read all of these formats. If they don't have the software; it is freely available for download. Pdf. is a good format to use because some publishers(Particularly self publishers) use pdf. files as the final files for printing. Before submitting work for download, you will need to have your work proofread. This needs to be done by someone other than you. You would not necessarily notice any faults yourself. The spell checker on your computer will handle that task; but it will not notice missing words, or repeated phrases etc. You will also need some artwork for the cover of your book. You could do this yourself; but make sure that any images you use are either yours or copyright free. Do not use any images that you are not sure about. You wouldn't want anyone copying your work without paying you. The same applies to artists. An artist may do the cover work for you and charge a one off fee, assigning the copyright to you; or your artist may want to retain copyright, and give/sell you a non exclusive license for use of the artwork. Publishing on another site.You may want to publish on a similar site to this, or a more specialist site. The above procedures need to be considered. Check the contract that you will be provided with, and make sure that you understand it, and what fees or commissions you will have to pay.Publishing in e-book format.There is specialist e-book formatting software available which will allow your book to be read on the new electronic book readers such as those produced by Sony and Amazon. The Amazon Kindle reader is now available for use in the U.K. at a reasonable price. The Kindle downloads books via a mobile connection.Building your own web site.Many authors use a web site dedicated to themselves or their work. If you cannot do this yourself, then get someone to do it for you. It will promote you and your work online, around the world. A basic two or three page web site can be set up for as little as £400.00 including the Domain Name registration. The Domain Name is the name you choose for your site. No two web site addresses can be the same anywhere in the world. If you have a fairly common name, the chances are that someone else has already registered it. I would suggest that you try out various name and name combinations on the SEDO link at the top of this page. You can check dozens, or even hundreds if you wish completely free of charge. If the name you want is registered by someone else, SEDO will let you know if it is for sale. If you find an unregistered name that you like, I would suggest that you register it with the .com extension plus the extension for your country. (e.g. .co.uk) I can do all this for you if you wish including the registration process. The title of your book may be the name you want to register. You can register any name you want to, so long as nobody else has done it before you. When you have your web site; include a biography, photographs, anything that will attract visitors to your site, and get them coming back to check for new information. Obviously, you will include details of all your creations, and perhaps comments from other authors. I hope that all this information has been helpful to you, and possibly inspired you to do more to promote your work. If you would like to contact me at any time; this is where I am :- ralph@ralphcockrell.co.uk © Copyright Ralph Cockrell 2009