FAQ with the ISBN team
29 June 2018
How do I buy and apply barcodes for my books? Barcodes are a separate purchase to ISBNs. They are usually purchased individually when your book is ready to go to...
Selling books at Comic-Con: The self-publisher perspective
28 June 2018
While most marketing and promotional strategies are directed online these days, fan conventions can offer self-published authors a way to meet and sell directly to potential readers and add a...
Comic-Con author profile: Marianna Shek
28 June 2018
Describe your latest book in under 50 words. The Stolen Button is a fairytale picture book about a spoilt girl, Mei Ling, who gets lost inside a mirror maze and...
Comic-Con author profile: Felix Long
28 June 2018
Describe your latest book in under 50 words. My latest book is To Conquer Heaven. It follows Jeremy Wang, who has found a clue to the location of the lost...
Comic-Con author profile: Marissa Price
28 June 2018
Describe your latest book in under 50 words. Into the Abyss is Shakespeare meets Outlander. The latest instalment, Scourge of Scotland, is a magical realism novel where worlds collide, based...
FAQ with the ISBN team
28 May 2018
What is MyIdentifiers.com.au? MyIdentifiers.com.au is a Bowker platform that provides publishers with tools and resources to purchase and assign book identifiers such as ISBNs, SANs, QR codes and others. MyIdentifiers.com.au provides...
Publishing as a business: how to set up a small business in Australia
28 May 2018
You’ve now decided to self-publish so the first question you need to ask yourself is, are you a hobby or are you a business? It’s important to establish whether you’re...
Self-publishing essentials with Ellie Marney: Money matters for self-publishers
25 May 2018
Dealing with money and totting up figures … It’s not exactly the first thing a writer imagines when they’re thinking about their next book. But if you’re self-publishing, you’re not...
Michelle Morgan on ‘Flying through Clouds’
25 May 2018
The Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) Spark Award recognizes excellence in children’s books published through an independent or non-traditional route. Michelle Morgan, who won the 2017 SCBWI Spark Award in the Books...
Indie book reviews: why you need them and 5 top tips for getting them
26 April 2018
When it comes to promoting an indie book, you don’t have a whole marketing team behind you like a traditionally published author does. Authors on contracts with publishing houses generally have...
Helen Prochazka on ‘The Mathematics Book’
26 April 2018
Teacher and former president of the Mathematical Association of Tasmania, Helen Prochazka, has an enduring love for mathematics that has seen her author a series of high school maths textbooks,...
Self-publishing essentials with Ellie Marney: the legal checklist
26 April 2018
New to self-publishing? Then it’s important to tick all the legal boxes related to releasing your work, so you don’t run into trouble. It’s particularly worth noting for hybrid authors,...
FAQ with the ISBN team
26 April 2018
Does MyIdentifiers provide 'e-ISBNs' for ebooks? There is a common misconception that there are 'e-ISBNs'. This is not the case. Once you have purchased your 'normal' ISBNs from MyIdentifiers, you...
10 reasons to avoid using Microsoft Word for your print book layout
23 March 2018
While there is a lot you can do with Microsoft Word, it was never created to be a page-layout program. It was meant to be a word-processing program—something you can...
Nelly Thomas on her picture book ‘Some Girls’
23 March 2018
Describe your latest book in under 50 words. An early childhood picture book that instils confidence in little girls by challenging gender and other stereotypes. Why self-publish? For creative control...
FAQ with the ISBN team
23 March 2018
What is a ‘publisher imprint’, and why does Amazon ask me for one? An imprint of a publisher is a trade name under which it publishes a work. A single...
Self-publishing essentials with Ellie Marney: hybrid authorship
23 March 2018
The publishing industry has gone through big changes in the last few years—and perhaps the biggest change has been the emergence of a new model of authorship. What is a...
FAQ with the ISBN team
22 February 2018
Why doesn’t my ISBN come up in an internet search? All publisher and title information that is supplied to us via our MyIdentifiers website is included in our publications: Bowker...
Self-publisher essentials with Ellie Marney: tackling distribution
22 February 2018
Author Ellie Marney has experienced two sides of the publishing process, both as a traditionally published author and a self-publisher. Her first book, Every Breath (2013, Allen & Unwin), was...
Sue Liu on ‘Accidental Aid Worker’
22 February 2018
Author and communications professional Sue Liu self-published her travel memoir in 2015. She has since released two new editions of her book, and has run self-publishing workshops through the State...
4 things you need to know about publishing a children’s book
20 February 2018
1. It takes time and effort—then more time and effort. Have realistic expectations about the time it will take to publish your book. Illustrations—let me rephrase this—good illustrations, take a...
Louise Merrington on ‘The Iron Line’ and ‘Greythorne’
24 January 2018
Describe your latest book in under 50 words. The Iron Line is a Gothic mystery set in 1880s NSW. Jane Adams takes a job on the railway in the small...
The POD process explained in 8 simple steps
24 January 2018
Many authors and self-publishers would have come across the term 'print on demand (POD)' during the course of publishing, but there may be some confusion around what the term means...
FAQ with the ISBN team
17 January 2018
This month, the ISBN team address questions on how to use the MyIdentifiers website to manage your account and title information. Here are two questions that they often get asked:...
Alison Croggon on ‘New and Selected Poems 1991-2017’
18 December 2017
Alison Croggon, award-winning novelist, poet, librettist and critic, self-published a collection of poetry, New and Selected Poems 1991-2017, in August 2017. Croggon spoke with Australian Self-Publisher about her decision to...
Book formatting: From your screen to IngramSpark’s POD platform
18 December 2017
Julie-Ann Harper, self-publishing expert and founder of the Pick-a-WooWoo Publishing Group, regularly assists authors who encounter problems with uploading their files to IngramSpark’s print-on-demand and distribution platform. Here, she shares...
Double act: Hybrid authors on publishing both ways
18 December 2017
A new breed of hybrid authors are experimenting with self-publishing alongside traditional publishing. Jackie Tang and Andrea Hanke, editors of book industry newsletter Books+Publishing, spoke to John Birmingham, Judy Horacek...
8 ways to change a failing sales strategy
18 December 2017
Does your sales strategy need some sprucing-up for the new year? Brian Jud, marketing consultant and executive director of the Association of Publishers for Special Sales (US), shares some insights...
FAQs with the ISBN team
5 December 2017
Why do I need a barcode? The assignment of a unique ISBN (International Standard Book Number) to each title is often a requirement for selling your titles through major retailers...
Talkback: Authors and booksellers on stocking self-published books
9 November 2017
With a number of traditionally published authors moving into self-publishing, there’s never been a greater demand for bricks-and-mortar bookstores to stock self-published titles. Books+Publishing's editor-in-chief Andrea Hanke asked hybrid author...
