If you fancy the idea of making money from creating your own books, then Blurb might be of interest to you. It follows a DIY model of publishing books (similar to self-publishing). But, without all the hassle of coming up with a huge capital and plenty of unsold books in your garage.
In a nutshell, this is how Blurb works: You write your book. You take care of the typesetting and layout. You make sure the whole document is publication-ready. Then, upload your book on to the system. Once it’s ready to be published, you set a price if you wish to sell your book.
Then, you can order a book (or more) from your account, paying the base price. You can just mark-up the price if you wish to sell your book in person.
Or, if you don’t want the hassle of ordering too many books and selling them yourself, you just get people to buy your book directly from Blurb. Then, you get whatever profit/mark-up that you provide when you set your price. You keep the profit.
Some of the things that I like about Blurb:
- Clean interface; really pleasant site to look at;
- You can have your own little Blurb shop, if you wish. You can then share that link to people so that they can buy your books there;
- They have a free software application (called Blurb Booksmart, available both for Windows and Mac) that you can use to create your book – really handy if you want to make sure that your book is formatted for publication. It even has a built-in function that gives you warning signs if your image is not going to be publishable, etc.
- If you prefer to format your own book, that’s okay too;
- Basic books starting price is reasonable (approx. $5 for a 20-page Black and White Text book with coloured soft cover), prices go up from there, depending on the number of pages, etc;
- There are a number of options and pricing available – soft cover / hardcover, 4-colour/BW, etc.;
- Bulk discounts are available (if you buy 10 or more, you can buy your book at a lower price; the more books you buy, the higher your discount); and
- They seem to cater for a number of countries.
In any case, yes, it works pretty much like Lulu.com.
Since I haven’t tried using Blurb yet, I’m not sure about the printing quality of the books. I hope to be able to try it out one of these days and report my findings back here at some stage.
If you have given Blurb a try, do let us know what you think of it. Do you like it? What’s the quality of the printed books like? What about the service?
Right now, they’re currently running the 2009 Best Blurb Photo Books Contest. The grand prize winner gets to win $3,000. The runner-up wins $1,000. Then, there will be honourable mentions, who will then win $50 gift cards from Blurb.
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
It’s affordable, powerful & easy. That’s the first impression. Great idea!
i think now a days Blurb can do a great job in the selling of our books online easily and more profitable also.
I was thinking about using Lulu.com services for a book that I’m working on. But after reading your article about Blurb.com, can I sell my book on both sites?
Thanks!