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BUSINESSES

MKK Publishing.

Helping aspiring authors get their manuscripts into print.

Writing a book is a life ambition for a lot of people.

We can help with the producton, publishing and marketing, to try to make your book a success!

Publish for £499 inc. VAT

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Having produced and published my own books, I can help produce yours.

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In 2021, I received the attention of several publishers for my book, "Diary of a Little Dog". I chose a publisher offering a hybrid model, where I paid £2,200, for production costs up-front and then a share the royalities from sales.

 

I expected help producing and marketing the book. I was sadly disappointed. I got no help with marketing.

But then I realised, the money wasn't wasted.  I learned how to commercially publish a book. Proof-reading and editing, cover design, production and printing, registering with the book depositories who bookshops buy from.

 

I learned how to produce and publish a book and do it giving much better 'value of money'.

How do we do it?

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It's not a mystery. We work in a very transparent way.

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1

Submit your manuscript

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  1. Send us your manuscript.

  2. We review your manuscript

    • The review process can take a month, but we'll go as fast as we can.

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2

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  1. We make you a contractual offer

    • If we think your manuscript has potential, we will offer you a contract that clearly states what we will do for you, how much it will cost and how royalties will be shared. 

    • If we decide not to make you an offer, the process stops here.

  2. You sign and return the contract.

    • You review the contract and if you are happy, sign, date and return it.

  3. You make payment

    • Once you have made the payment, we move onto the next step.

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Contract offer

3

Author questionnaire

 

We send you a questionnaire to fill in and return to us.
 

  1. Personal Information

    • Contact information and address

    • Hobbies

    • Professional qualifications

    • Short autobiography - this will go in the 'about the author' section in the book and on websites

    • What do you hope to achieve from publishing this book?

    • Email a photo of yourself - we will use this on websites.

  2. About Your Book

    • Brief description about your book - this is known as the 'blurb' to grab the potential readers attentions and make them want to buy and read your book.

    • Are there any books similar to yours?

  3. Target Audience

  4. Publicity and Promotion

    • Names and addresses of any bookshops that you frequent, or are local to you.

    • Local newspaper

    • Local radio station

    • Magazines you think could be interested in your book

    • Websites that you think could be interested in your book

  5. Author Promotion

    • Do you have a website?

    • What social media accounts do you have? ​

    • Can you attend promotional events?

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4


We transform your manuscript and make it into a book.
 

  1. We add your manuscript

    • We add your manuscript to our book template.

  2. We add your additional text

    • We add the 'About the Author', the blurb, the acknowledgement and the introduction to our book template.

  3. We give your book it’s ISBN.

    • We assign an ISBN number to your book.

    • The International Standard Book Number (ISBN) is a 13-digit number that uniquely identifies books and book-like products published internationally.

  4. We create the publishing page

    • This includes legal statements about your rights as the author, it states your name as the author, the book's ISBN, it lists us as the publisher (name, address, web address).

  5. We choose the font and style

    • Our default font style and size are “Times New Roman, 12”. 

    • This is a very common font used by books, newspapers and magazines, because we the readers, are so used to this font.  

    • However, the book’s genre can impact the font style and size, e.g., children’s books with lots of pictures, often use much bigger and ‘sans-serif’ style fonts.

  6. We choose the book size

    • Our default book size is 5” (13 cm) wide x 8” (20 cm) high.

    • This can be changed if you had a specific size in mind, e.g., children’s books that are full of pictures, are often much larger.

  7. We send you a draft document to review

    • We send you a copy of the book as a Microsoft Word document (or a PDF if you do not have Word), so you can check and confirm you like the layout, font style and size.

    • We can print and post you a draft book on A4 paper, if you prefer to have a paper copy to review.

    • REMEMBER: This is just to check the visual layout of the text. We haven’t proof-read it yet. That comes next.


       

Format and layout

5

 

  1. We proof-read your book

    • We read the text, again and again and again, looking for spelling mistakes, typos and grammatical errors.

    • We use automated tools and real people reading your book, looking for mistakes.

  2. We make corrections, edits and changes

    • We amend the draft book with any changes we recommend and send you a new draft to review and approve (or reject).

    • We take our time on this step, to ensure your book is as perfect as it can be. There's no harm having multiple edits.

  3. You sign-off the draft book

    • When you are happy with the contents of the book, we ask you sign-off the draft.  

    • We then consider the draft ‘locked’ and don’t make any more changes to the content.

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Proof-read. Amend. Repeat.

6

 

  1. Discuss our thoughts about the book cover

    • We work on book cover ideas together.

  2. We create, review and edit the book cover

    • We produce the first draft of the book cover

    • We add your ‘blurb’ to the back cover.

    • We add publishing information, ISBN number and barcode to the back cover, along with our name and logo (discreetly).

    • Reviewing and editing the book cover continues until you are happy with it.

  3. You sign-off the draft book cover

    • When you are happy with the contents of the book, we ask you sign-off the draft.  

    • We then consider the draft ‘locked’ and don’t make any more changes to the content.

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Design the Cover

7

 

Congratulations! Your book is going to the printers.

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  1. Printing

    • We instruct our printer to produce the first run.

  2. Registration

    • We register your book with:

    • Neilson's (the UK' national database of all books with an ISBN), and

    • Gardners Books (the UK’s largest wholesaler - this is where Waterstones buy their books from).

    • Waterstones.

    • Foyles.

  3. Distribution

    • We send you 20 copies of the book.

    • We send copies of your book to reviewers and book clubs, to generate interest. 

    • We send copies of your books to your local newspaper and radio station, to generate interest.

    • Gardners Books will only buy your book in volume, when their customers start to order them (independent, chain (e.g., Waterstones), specialist and online retailers and school & library suppliers).

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Publication Day!

8

 

The electronic world of books is just as important as physical books. Amazon has a huge market share, but there are other significant online retailers too. We submit your eBook to all of them.

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  1. We produce your eBooks

    • We produce an eBook version for Kindle and publish it on Amazon.

    • We produce an eBook version for Apple Books.

  2. We submit your eBooks to

    • Amazon

    • Apple

    • Barnes & Noble, Blackwell's, Goodreads, Nook, Rakuten Kobo, The Book Depository, World of Books

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eBooks

9

 

This stage never ends. Continual promotion to keep pushing your book. 
This is where you can assist too, self-promoting on your own social media accounts.

This is the hardest part of the entire process - selling and marketing your book!
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  1. Websites

    • We add your book to our library of publications, so that visitors to MKK Books will find your book.

    • We link your book on our page to your Amazon listing, making it easy for customers to buy your book.

  2. Social Media

    • Using social media is now very important for generating interest and a following.

    • MKK’s Social Media

      • We add messages to our social media accounts to promote you and your book.

      • We use Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok.

    • Twitter

      • Twitter is so simple to use on your smart phone.

      • If you don’t have a Twitter account, we can create one for you and set it up.

      • We can make your Tweets appear automatically on your website and on your Author page, on our website.

      • We can link our Tweets with your Twitter account to generate interest.

    • Videos

      • We will create a video, talking about your book and post that onto our social media accounts.

  3. We send you a promotion plan

    • We send you a promotional plan, giving you ideas how you can help promote and market your book.

  4. Press release

    • We create press releases, informing your (a) local bookshops, (b) newspapers and (c) radio station about you and your book. See if they want to interview you, the local author.

  5. Reviewers and book clubs

    • We send copies of the book to reviewers and book clubs to generate interest.

    • The aim is they add their comments and links about your book on their social media, expanding your reach to an online audience.  This is why having your own website is useful.

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Social Media and Promotion

 

What does £499 inc VAT get you?

  • Reviewing, editing and proofreading your manuscript (unlimited times until you are happy).

  • Designing the cover.

  • Paying for an ISBN number.

  • Printing and distributing copies of your book to you.​

  • Registering your book with the big book wholesalers who Waterstones and WH Smiths buy from.

  • Uploading your book onto Amazon and Apple Books, as print-on-demand paperback books and eBooks.

  • Adding your book to our MKK Lion website.

  • Promotion and marketing your book.

Cost


How much does this all cost?

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£499 inc. VAT

 

We are so much cheaper than other hybrid publishers, but we still provide an excellent level of customer service that you expect.
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Our philosophy is "keep production costs down and we will both make money from the royalties".

Remove the VAT, pay the printer, take off 20% for Corporation Tax, take off 20% for Income Tax. We make about £200 for producing your book.

As a comparison, in 2021, when a hybrid publisher produced and published my book, "Diary of a Little Dog", I paid £2,200 inc VAT.

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Sharing Royalty Payments

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We have two models for sharing royalties depending on who prints and distributes the book...​


eBooks and "print on demand"

MKK print & distribution

When books are sold online as an eBook or 'print-on-demand' by the retailer, then the online retailer does all the work. The online retailer sends the VAT to HMRC (if applicable), takes its profit and pays for print and distribution (eBooks have a tiny distribution cost). The online retailer sends us the remainder, which we then share with you, the author.
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Because we produced your book for free, to keep initial costs and risks down to a minimum, we ask that royalties are split 50/50.

When high street bookstores and book wholesalers buy your book from us, they pay what is called the "Net Sales Price". This is typically the book price that Joe Public pays in the shop, minus (upto) 60%, to cover the bookshop's costs and desired profit. We pay for the books to be printed and distributed, further reducing profit levels which can be shared as royalties.  We pay you a percentage of the "Net Sales Price". Seeing you book on the shelves in a high street bookshop is really cool, but it is actually the least profitable sales channel per book. You need a greater volume of sales to really earn good money from bookstore sales.​

 


Author's Royalty for eBooks &
Print-on-Demand books

 


Author's Royalty for books
sold in high street bookshops

50%

20%


Here is an example for a 150 page book (assuming 0% VAT)...

  • cover: no additional cost for a colour image on the cover.

  • interior: no additional cost for black text on white pages.

  • Prices are per book.

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Here is how the money is divided up (per book)​


Here is an example for a 150 page book (assuming 0% VAT)...

  • cover: no additional cost for a colour image on the cover.

  • interior: no additional cost for black text on white pages.

  • Prices are per book.

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Here is how the money is divided up (per book)​

MKK Publishing - royalty sharing.png

You can see from these three examples, the size of your royalty depends on

the 'Net Sales Price' and how the book is printed / distributed.

1st

2nd

3rd

eBooks

are the most profitable because there are no printing costs and distribution costs are negligible. You make almost the same royalty but for a much lower price to the customer.

Print-on-Demand

books come second because you don't have to pay for the high-street retailer's costs and profit margin.​

High Street Bookshops

are the least profitable, due to the high street retailer's costs and printing costs taking 80-90% of the list price.

Income Tax

 

For UK-taxpayers, all royalities received are subject to HMRC Income Tax.

It is YOUR responsibility to report the income we send to you with HMRC and pay the tax due.

MKK Lion will not collect or pay any tax on your behalf.

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For author's located outside the United Kingdom, please seek advice in your country about your tax liability.

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