Support for Indie Authors discussion

I wonder how many hire out the formatting when uploading to publishers like Amazon or Smashwords.

I completed the formatting process myself. You can purchase a formatting template for only $34 and download it to your computer. Once you've downloaded the template, all you have to do is copy your chapters and enter it into the downloaded template.

It's hard for me to explain the process, but it is very easy, very cheap, efficient, and it gets the job done. Here's a link for CreateSpace and Kindle templates. http://www.coverdesignstudio.com/prod...

Also, there is a video within the link that further explains the process of formatting your book once you've purchased and downloaded the format. I hope this helps.

if you follow the instruction from their free manual, it's really easy to do. You mostly need to be careful if you used tabs, space, and enters (to name a few) instead of the styling and formatting tool in Office Word.

I have skills as an editor/formatter for eBooks. Don't waste my time with Smashwords. I had my book on them and pulled it and deleted all my SW copies of my book. I posted an offer to do my first two conversion jobs for free, provided it is not porn or something objectionable. I never got anyone take me up on it. Still available. Right now I'm restoring/formatting/editing old classics.

Morris E. Graham

Formatting is easy to learn, if you're willing to follow instructions, and it can save you a lot of money in the long run, plus give you better control over your own books. The Smashwords guide is the best I've found. I use Libre-Office (free download) to write the book. I run the HTML version through Calibre (free download) and then through the Kindle Previewer (free download from Amazon) for a converted doc (MOBI), and upload that to Amazon. For Smashwords I convert the original LibreOffice doc to a Word doc., delete the extraneous bookmarks that are generated by Word and then upload that to Smashwords. No problem.

That is a load of good information. I have found such good info on these forums that I now copy/paste useful bits into a word file for reference.

I too found the SW guide to formatting an excellent guide to working with word.

I'm curious if anyone has posted on Kindle Singles, and, if so, whether the formatting is the same as with kindle traditional.

k