Lulu Blog

As the sun beamed down, LA locals came out to the LA Times’ 28th Annual Book Festival on the UCLA campus.

From children to the elderly everyone was excited to learn new things about reading and writing. This was Lulu’s second year exhibiting at the festival and it was another great turnout. With the enhanced Border’s Partnership giveaway (http://publish.bordersstores.com/publish_public.html) and some featured authors in the booth we attracted much attention.

Realizing that some of our authors are LA based, we invited them to spend some time in the booth to talk about their Lulu experience with potential authors. Below you will find exclusive interviews with all four of our LA authors: Audrey La Chance and Frances Rostick (authors of Miss Match: A Seriously Funny Look at Dating), Robin Kilgore (author of In Her Bathrobe She Blogged), and Mitch Earle (author of Discovering Self-Worth Through Love Lost, One Man’s Journey). These authors played a large role in explaining the ease of Lulu’s services.

We’ll be looking for more local authors while visiting Austin, TX, San Diego, CA, and Cincinnati, OH.  See you then!

Make your Book Green – eBooks for earth friendly publishing!

eBooks are books in electronic format. Like other electronic data, they can be distributed easily across networks, downloaded immediately and viewed on a screen. With several eBook readers now on the market, making your book available to a wider audience just got easier.

With this month’s installment of tips and tricks, here are some things to keep in mind when publishing your eBook.

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So you’re standing at the local newsstand or the periodicals section, you’ve got your Writer’s Magazine, Blender, a gossip mag and you’re on your way to check out… WAIT! Don’t skip over Every Day with Rachael Ray or you might miss out on her calling Lulu.com “The Real Deal”!

Featured in the May 2008 issue, your very own Lulu is highlighted as a way to publish a “Book of Love” for Mother’s Day. So thumb to the “Yum!” section and check us out.

John from the web development team here. Do you use iGoogle? If you haven’t used it yet, iGoogle is a customizable start page similar to Netvibes, Pageflakes, and My Yahoo. It allows you to customize your own home page with news and information from a variety of sources and it’s updated in real time. It’s a great way to keep up with your favorite blogs (such as this one!) and news.

Here’s a screenshot of one of my iGoogle tabs set up with Lulu news and information:

So what does this have to do with Lulu?

We have a new gadget on iGoogle to use! It has tabs displaying the following:

• Official Lulu blog
• Featured content from the blog
• Newly published fiction
• Top sellers this week
• Lulu in the news

And here’s a screenshot of it in action:

Like what you see? Add it to your iGoogle home page.

We are currently looking at other ways to use Google Gadgets to help our creator and buyer community. We’d like to do things such as offer our Mini-Storefronts there, too.

Do you use iGoogle or any of the other personal start pages? Have something you’d like to see? Please let us know by commenting on this post.

-John

Due to the success of self-publishing, the Library of Congress has found it necessary to dedicate a new wing to Lulu.com. This “Lulu wing” is to house all self-published works. Ground was broken yesterday with CEO Bob Young and COO Bryce Boothby on hand with their shovels.

As he shoveled a pile of dirt, Bob Young said, “Self-publishing has hit the big time now. I wish this new wing could be named after each of our one million members. Their innovative ideas and creativity deserve this recognition from the Library of Congress.”

So be sure to send in your name so we can submit it for the official naming ceremony of the Lulu wing.

How many people can honestly say that they don’t have a bunch of Spring Break pictures lying round in a box somewhere around the house? I know I can’t! That’s why Lulu has decided to hold a contest to see who has the best, craziest, most hilarious Spring Break pictures ever! This contest isn’t just for college students either-everyone is welcome to participate.

The first ever Lulu.com Spring Break Photo Book Contest will begin now (March 28, 2008) until April 30^th, 2008! We will be taking completed photo book submissions, and include them on the list of competitors for the contest. All photos must follow Lulu’s guidelines in our member agreement (http://www.lulu.com/about/member_agreement.php), and be submitted before midnight on April 30^th. Your submissions need to be sent via email to springphotos@lulu.com, and should include your Lulu CID and contact information such as an email address, phone number and a best contact time. At the end of the contest we will sit down and determine who’s got the best, and most creative Spring Break Photo Book!

A contest winner will be chosen and spotlighted on the Lulu site. A prize of a free copy of your first book or an amazing miniature camera will be given to the winner. Not only will they win one of these prizes but they will go down in history as Lulu’s first ever Spring Break Photo Book Contest winner!

Get started now! (http://www.lulu.com/en/products/photo_books/)

Last night Lulu released several changes to the site, introducing some interesting new features, enhancements and fixes. Here’s the scope:

Lulu’s Homepage

If you haven’t noticed already, much of Lulu’s homepage and marketplace has undergone quite a facelift.

Lulu Marketplace, and Featured Content

With more and more unique, extraordinary, interesting, or just plain unusual content being published on Lulu every day, it’s about time a small portion of it gets the recognition it deserves. In the recent changes we’ve made to Lulu, a greater emphasis has been made to highlight and feature a small portion of what we consider as some of best content in Lulu’s marketplace.

With so much great content out there, choosing the features for our marketplace can be quite challenge. But don’t take my word for it. To view some of this great content yourself, check out Lulu’s Buy page to access the Lulu Marketplace. You never know what you’ll find.

Bringing back an old classic – The Services tab is back on Lulu

We understand that each author has different needs, each facing their own unique set of challenges. Everyone, regardless of their skill level could use some extra help from time to time, and whether it’s just about seeking some professional advice, editing your manuscript, designing an eye-catching cover, or simplygetting your book into electronic form, Lulu provides a wide variety of services tailored to suit your needs.

In addition to the tried and true distribution services we offer such as “Published By Lulu” and “Published By You” which helps get your book into online bookstores, or the free marketing tools that serve a wide variety of the do-it-yourself authors, Lulu offers a wide variety of individual services in pre-publishing, marketing, and distribution. Here are just a few of the new service offerings available on Lulu. Please note that many of these services are only available in the United States.

• Library Visibility – Gets your book included in the Library of Congress

• Book Scanning / Vintage Publishing – digital reproduction and reprint of original books.

• Online Search Engine Marketing – Gets your book prominently listed on major online search engines such as Google, Yahoo! Or MSN.

• PDF Conversion – Takes the guesswork out of converting your manuscript to digital PDF format for print on demand.

And much, much more…

For increased value, Lulu also offers heavily discounted bundled service packages which include a number of individual services starting at just $300.00.

And don’t forget, Lulu still offers a wide variety of high quality publishing services provided by our official Lulu Service providers. For more details please check out of Services page.

Distribution – 40% off revision fees for PBY and PBL books

Those of you who have a distribution package associated to your book will be happy to know that the cost ofrevision fees for books in distribution just got cheaper! Revisions to books with Published By You or Published By Lulu distribution are now only $49.95.

Lulu Celebrates the The National Cherry Blossom Festival

The National Cherry Blossom Festival, taking place in Washington, DC is just around the corner. To celebrate this occasion, Lulu has created a new theme for our Lulu Studio™ Photobooks.

Celebrate the occasion by creating and sharing your own Photobook on Lulu.

As always, we hope that you like what’s going on at Lulu. Please let us know what you think about these new changes by commenting in Lulu’s Community Forums.

Regards,

Adam

The eighty degree temperatures didn’t deter students and teachers from coming out to this year’s Miami-Dade Day Conference. There was a recorded 2,600 attendees at this year’s event. Dedicated to bring new technology to the college, the conference turned out to be the colleges best one yet.

Our events team, having experience with other educational shows, understood the importance that Lulu can play in the classroom. Giving students the ability to gather theses in a professional manner was a huge appeal to those who stopped by the booth. There were even some who came prepared with written manuscripts! As the day went on it was evident that attendees were happy to see us there.

The show lasted for just a day but in that short time we managed to spread an awareness of Lulu to all who stopped by. As people left the booth more would stop by and we certainly acknowledged the fact that it was a great indication of where we’re going in the educational world.Take a look at who we met at the show!

You’re a self-published author (Thanks Lulu!) but are you wondering how to take your book to the next level? What if you were an award winning self-published author? Yeah, that has a nice ring to it.If you are interested in earning some accolades, here are a few contest and award opportunities for self-published, independent publishers (this is great for Lulus with a “Published By You” ISBN – you’re the publisher), or niche books.The 2008 News Generation Indie Book Awards:

• Open to independent authors and publishers worldwide
• Cash prizes and fabulous awards!
• Click here for more information and to enter
• Deadline: March 21, 2008 (you need to hurry and publish your book if you already haven’t!)

The “IPPY” Awards (Independent Publisher Book Awards)

• All independent, university, small press, and self-publishers who produce books intended for the North American market are eligible to enter titles copyrighted or released in 2007. Independent authors using print-on-demand publishing services are welcome to enter their books themselves.
• Regional and National level awards in 65 different categories
• Click here for the scoop and how to enter
• Deadline: April 1, 2008 (a few more weeks… but still you might want to get a move on it)

16th Annual Writer’s Digest International Self-Published Book Awards

• Searching for the best self-published books form the past few years
• Over $15,000 in prizes
• Click here for the details and how to enter
• Deadline: May 1, 2008 (you have a month and some change to get your book together).

So don’t hide your light (or in this case, your book) under a bushel. Enter and see what happens. We’re rooting for you here at Lulu!

The Texas Community College Teacher’s Association (TCCTA) had its 61^st annual convention and Lulu was one of the show’s main attractions. With over 80 colleges participating, teachers from all backgrounds were interested to see what Lulu could do for them.

As most of you know Lulu’s services not only attract individual authors/creators but can appeal to many others; like teachers. So here’s the scenario, you’re a teacher and you use the same old tired textbook every year. You’re not only tired of it, but your students are too. So why not create your own? Lulu enables teachers to be able to compile course materials and any other relevant matter in one central piece versus using the same irrelevant materials over and over again.

With this being our first time at TCCTA, teachers were surprised to see us there but understood the perfect placement we have at such an educational show. With over 6,000 members it was a great opportunity for Lulu to continue to reach out to the educational world full of potential Lulus! We want to make sure that at each conference Lulu attends we continue to stress our free services and easy applications. TCCTA has now been added to the list of successful educational conferences that we’ve attended and we’re excited to see what the next one brings.

If you know of any educational shows (or any other shows for that matter) feel free to let us know where you’d like to see us. Respond to this blog with your ideas.

Kenia Caze