TeleRead: News and views on e-books, libraries, publishing and related topics » Mark Coker

Long books, short titles sell best on Smashwords

Susan Lulgjuraj — Thu, 09 May 2013 15:23:07 +0000

Studying data can turn up surprising information, but it’s important to get the best results in what you do. Smashwords CEO Mark Coker recently released the results from data that was mined during an 11-month period from May 1, 2012 to March 31, 2013. This data studied trends of more than $12 million in sales for [...]

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Has the public perception of self-publishing finally changed?

Susan Lulgjuraj — Mon, 11 Feb 2013 17:00:50 +0000

Self-publishing a book can come with pre-conceived notions from readers, other writers and even publishers. People used to think self-publishing a book meant it wasn’t good enough to get picked up by traditional houses. However, the stigma of self-publishing is changing. Success stories have become more and more abundant, and the shock those successes caused [...]

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Breakout Books in the App Store highlights self-published e-books

Aggregated Content — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 15:00:51 +0000

By Arnold Zafra In a move to encourage more self-published authors to make their masterpieces available on the iBookstore, Apple has created an entirely new section, Breakout Books, where self-published e-books will be displayed prominently. According to Apple, Breakout Books is aimed at helping readers find the next reading sensation by way of this collection of [...]

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Morning Links: Mark Coker’s 2013 Publishing Predictions

Dan Eldridge — Mon, 24 Dec 2012 13:04:10 +0000

Mark Coker’s 2013 Book Publishing Industry Predictions (Smashwords) B&N will give away free ebooks in stores, including Big Six titles (Paid Content) Top 100 Business, Leadership and Technology Twitter Accounts You Must Follow (Huffington Post) The Ray Kurzweil era begins at Google (Digital Trends) Kindle Daily Deals: We the Animals by Justin Torres {and 3 [...]

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Beyond the Book podcast series covers uPublishU, a self-publishing event

Dan Eldridge — Fri, 31 Aug 2012 14:30:13 +0000

If you’re not familiar with the Copyright Clearance Center’s fantastic Beyond the Book podcast series, which focuses primarily on the business of writing and publishing, this is the perfect time to check it out. Earlier this summer, BTB recorded an episode at uPublishU, which is technically a pre-conference program of the annual BookExpo event. This [...]

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Four Smashwords authors make the New York Times Bestseller List

Dan Eldridge — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 04:49:39 +0000

“We knew this day was coming,” writes Smashwords founder Mark Coker, on his company’s blog. ”Self-published ebook authors are landing on the New York Times bestseller list in a big way.” As for myself, I cancelled my subscription to the Sunday Times ages ago (too expensive; impossible to read in one week), so I probably won’t [...]

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Q&A with Mark Coker

Paul Biba — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 12:36:57 +0000

Indies Unlimited has a good Q&A with Mark Coker. As usual he answers questions honestly. Here’s one of them: 2. Smashwords has come a long way very quickly. How do you see your role in the indie author movement? It’s tough for me to evaluate our role in the movement. I’d like to think we [...]

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Jonathan Maberry On The Convergence of Indie and Traditional Publishing

Mark Coker, founder of Smashwords — Mon, 16 Jul 2012 13:10:26 +0000

JONATHAN MABERRY is a New York Times best-selling and multiple Bram Stoker Award-winning horror and thriller author, comic book writer, magazine feature writer, playwright, content creator and writing teacher/lecturer. His books have been sold to more than a dozen countries. Besides writing fiction in multiple genres, he’s also written many non-fiction books as well. [...]

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Video interview with Mark Coker

Paul Biba — Fri, 22 Jun 2012 13:27:16 +0000

Thanks to Richard Herley for the heads up.

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Forbes interviews Smashwords’ Mark Coker – we get some dollar numbers

Paul Biba — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 13:15:21 +0000

Don’t you always want to know how much money people make? Well, in this Forbes interview Mark Coker gives us a bit of the inside story. Lots of other interesting stuff too. The company has grown at a steady clip since. Now a top supplier of titles to the iBookstore, Smashwords reached profitability in September [...]

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Smashwords Delivers Faster Shipments to Apple and Kobo

Mark Coker, founder of Smashwords — Tue, 05 Jun 2012 13:32:34 +0000

Until recently, Smashwords ‘shipped’ new book releases, new book updates and metadata updates to Smashwords retailers (Apple iBookstore, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Sony, Diesel, Baker & Taylor, etc) on a once-weekly basis. As promised in December, in the last couple weeks we’ve begun increasing shipment frequency for the retailers that can support it. About [...]

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How Smashwords smashed PayPal’s erotica publishing restrictions

Chris Meadows — Sat, 21 Apr 2012 03:31:07 +0000

Fast Company has an interview with Mark Coker of Smashwords in which he discusses the recent moves by PayPal to force removal from sale of certain categories of erotica, and how public pressure from writers, readers, the press, and others was able to make the company (and the credit card companies behind it) back down. [...]

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The Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success

Mark Coker, founder of Smashwords — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 13:15:03 +0000

I released a new ebook tonight, The Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success. It’s priced at FREE. The book represents my attempt to distill, organize, package and share the best practices of the most commercially successful Smashwords authors. The book is organized around 28 different “secrets,” in which I explain not only what a writer should [...]

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5 ebook publishing experts to watch

Paul Biba — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 13:54:23 +0000

That’s the title of an article in eBooknewsrer. Here’s the beginning: For some publishers, eBooks are a scary brave new world. To help these folks navigate the waters of the digital publishing revolution and learn by example, we’ve put together a list of some of the leaders in the eBook world. It is worth exploring [...]

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National Coalition Against Censorship, American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression scold PayPal for erotica decision

Chris Meadows — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 05:56:04 +0000

Paul forwarded to me an email from Michael O’Neil from the National Coalition Against Censorship, with a press release noting that the NCAC and the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE) are mobilizing to put pressure on PayPal to reverse its requirement that online bookshops stop carrying certain kinds of erotica. Scribd carries a [...]

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