While we’re busy moving over the next three weeks, Angela will be updating her most popular columns.

Is customer service and fulfillment devouring your writing and marketing time? At BookLocker.com, we are frequently approached by authors who are weary of all the problems they’ve encountered while trying to sell their books themselves. While they started out wanting to write for a living, they now find they’re spending most of their time on website repairs and upgrades, customer service, troubleshooting, fulfillment, and even dealing with credit card fraud and bounced checks.

If you list your book with a reputable POD publisher that pays high royalties, you can avoid hours of administrative headaches each week. And, those hours can be spent on tasks that are a lot more fulfilling and fun, like concocting creative marketing ideas and writing more books!

Top 10 Reasons NOT to Sell Your Own Book

10. You won’t need to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to build and maintain a website with a shopping cart system and database. You can have a simple website with just a few information pages if you choose, and simply refer buyers to the POD publisher for purchasing your book(s) via a link.

9. No need to apply for a merchant account, which is more difficult than applying for a credit card.

8. You won’t need to give your bank account information to processing firms like Paypal. (Paypal doesn’t have a great reputation for security. See https://www.paypalsucks.com and https://www.aboutpaypal.org.)

7. No more setting up automated downloads, manually emailing ebooks, or packaging and mailing print books to customers with daily runs to the post office! Reputable POD and ebook publishers allow customers to instantly download their ebooks, and arrange for all print book orders to be drop-shipped directly to the author’s customers.

6. No more chargebacks! When a crook orders a book from you, finding him or her, and getting your money back, can be impossible, especially for foreign orders. You lose not only the product you sold and the transaction processing fees (averaging 3%-4%), but also your valuable time dealing with the headache. And…

5. No more chargeback fees! Visa, Mastercard and the others may charge you around $25 or more for every fraudulent credit card order you process. Yes, that’s PER TRANSACTION. Some people forget they ordered a book and later claim you used their card fraudulently. People with merchant accounts must spend time dealing with those messes, too.

4. No more troubleshooting when your website or merchant account system goes down. If your shopping cart or database breaks, you lose 100% of your website’s business until you get it back up. Reputable POD publishers (including BookLocker.com) have technicians maintaining their sites 24 hours/day. Backup systems are in place and downtimes are rare and brief.

3. No more troubleshooting with customers who are new to computers. You’ll never again need to walk a reader through the steps of your shopping cart system, downloads, email attachments, zipped files that won’t open, pdf comprehension, Mobi and ePub problems…the list go on, and on, and on. Reputable POD and ebook publishers handle all these incidents for you.

2. Reputable POD publishers generally have a site with a higher-profile in the search engines. Even though you may have just one page on their site, large POD and ebook publishers’ pages get indexed by the search engines regularly. This means information about your book will likely get into the search engines faster than if you create a brand new site.

1. And the #1 reason to list your book with a reputable POD publisher – You can spend all the time you’ve saved above promoting your current book(s), and writing new ones!

Comparing the Top POD Publishing Companies

Did you know most of the major POD publishers use the same printer? So, why are their prices so different??? Click HERE for more info.

Angela Hoy is the co-owner of WritersWeekly.com and BookLocker.com. WritersWeekly.com is the free marketing ezine for writers, which features new paying markets and freelance job listings every Wednesday. According to attorney Mark Levine, author of The Fine Print, BookLocker.com is: “As close to perfection as you’re going to find in the world of ebook and POD publishing. The ebook royalties are the highest I’ve ever seen, and the print royalties are better than average. BookLocker understands what new authors experience, and have put together a package that is the best in the business. You can’t go wrong here. Plus, they’re selective and won’t publish any manuscript just because it’s accompanied by a check. Also, the web site is well trafficked. If you can find a POD or epublisher with as much integrity and dedication to selling authors’ books, but with lower POD publishing fees, please let me know.”

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