Budget Book Printing Tips When You’re Just Starting Out

When you self-publish a book, you are in control, and therefore responsible for paying for everything needed to get your book in people’s hands. The costs of self-publishing a book can add up when you’re just getting started, but there are some ways to curb those costs without affecting the quality of your book. Here are some book budgeting tips to take note of when you print with 48 Hour Books.

Print your book with standard options:

If you can’t afford flashy add-ons, stick to the basics. For your book binding style, perfect binding (paperback) is an affordable option and the most popular. You can always print a special edition hardcover when you’ve accumulated profits down the road! But for now, printing a paperback book is the way to go. Plus, we print paperback books in just 2 business days, so you won’t have to wait long before you get to see your finished book for the first time.

Another way to keep printing costs low is to print your interior pages in black and white. Printing color pages is more expensive than printing in black and white. If you do want to include color pages in your book, a good tip is to limit the number of color pages. For example, say you are printing a family history book and want to include photos. Instead of printing photos throughout your book, you could create a collage of photos on a page or two, limiting the actual number of pages printed in color. A full-color cover is included in your order, so no need to worry about that! You can include as much color as you want when designing your cover.

Keep in mind - the smaller the book, the lower the cost. If you were planning to print a 6” x 9” book, you can save some money by committing to a 5.5” x 8.5” book instead!

Need design assistance? Choose our Create-a-Cover service:

A lot of self-publishers turn to a professional designer to create their cover art. This is smart because your book cover is one of the best ways to market your book. The more attractive and eye-catching your cover is, the more it will stand out on the shelf for potential readers. We recommend that if you are going to spend some extra money on your book, then it should go to creating your cover and editing. Luckily, at 48 Hour Books, we offer a service that is only $100. Our Create-a-Cover option allows you to choose from a selection of design templates, background colors, and more to craft how you want your cover to look. Our designers will take those options and create your cover for you. If you have design elements, like art and photography that you want to include on your cover, you can send it to us, and we will incorporate it in the design.

Another inexpensive way to spruce up your book cover is by adding our Diamond 3D Printing. The shiny, raised texture of a Diamond 3D book cover beautifully captures the light as potential readers walk by. This shimmery detail on your title or your cover design makes your self-published book look like a best seller.

Utilize our free resources, including book templates:

If you need help formatting your book files, we offer free book templates at our website that you can download in different standard sizes. We also have a cover size calculator on the same webpage that you can use to layout your book cover. These resources are great for the self-publishing novice and come with instructions for use.

Our self-publisher checklist is a great way to organize your plan of attack when you’re just getting started. We also created a free formatting tips guide if you need to review some formatting basics.

Take advantage of deals and offers:

Did you know that if you order 100 books or more you get 25 free? So, if you are planning to sell at least 100 copies, then this is a great deal to take advantage of. This promotion also will lower your per-book costs since you are technically only paying for 100 books (or 200, 300, and so on) but are receiving 125 books. Our handy price calculator is an extremely helpful tool when determining your per-book cost. We recommend messing with different quantities to see where you get the best price breaks!

Keep an eye on our social media and subscribe to our newsletter to stay in the loop about offers, contests, and giveaways. We regularly post discount codes and run giveaways and writing contests throughout the year.

We offer free help:

At 48 Hour Books, we take helping customers seriously. We want to make sure you feel confident uploading your files to us to print your masterpiece. Our other competitors don’t excel in this area and will send cryptic emails with no resolution to your file issues, making you wait anxiously for a response to your questions. We answer your emails as soon as we can, sometimes only a few minutes after they come in! If you have questions about your files, our expert prepress technicians will walk you through fixing them or offer solutions for fixing them on our end. Our customer service reps will make sure you get your books on time and answer all of your questions about timing, pricing, and more. In summary, our friendly, helpful team is on your side and ready to help. If you have questions before placing an order, contact us and we can help you get started self-publishing your book!