Author Interview with Dina Al Hidiq Zebib: 7 Questions about Book Publishing Process & Mindset
Creating the necessary buzz about your book should be the main focus for self-publishing authors, says Dina
In this exclusive author interview series, “7 questions to ask an aligned author“, Dina Al Hidiq Zebib–award-winning author of several fiction and nonfiction books will educate and empower us with her book publishing process and mindset strategies shedding light on what has worked for her during the course of her author journey. Read her very inspiring preceding interview on the book writing process in case you missed out before.
Dina has self-published three books up till now and two of them have received various awards. She has written both fiction and non-fiction. Crossroads is an award-winning contemporary romance novel, whereas The Complete Model is an educational guidebook. She has also published a poetry book titled Love Me in My Chaos.
Dina’s achievements have provided her a sound foundation and strong foothold in the writer’s arena. Her soft and subtle touches with her extremely sensitive and creative eyes speak volumes about her work quality. She’s gifted with an eloquent style that most reading these genres will find quite enjoyable. Highly balanced between her yin and yang, she knows how to maneuver between fiction and nonfiction effortlessly.
Here are her seven awesome tips for book publishing process and mindset you must not miss out on.
7 Author Interview Questions about Book Publishing Process & Mindset Answered
#1 What type of publishing i.e. self-publishing or traditional do you recommend and why?
Personally, I would never want to publish in any other way than self-publishing!
It’s very important to me to be in charge of any decision related to the publishing of my books. Deciding on interior formatting, book size, cover design, pricing, royalty, etc. are all very important decisions that I want to make. So far, I have published four books: my three books and my youngest son’s book which he wrote when he was eight.
The only challenge in the self-publishing route is book marketing and publicity. Usually, traditional publishers announce the publishing of a book and are able to get books stocked into brick and mortar stores. With self-publishers, however, we have to announce our book launch ourselves, as well as communicate with bookshops to ask them to stock our books on their shelves. However, the world in the past few years has changed a lot, and most of the book shopping people do is online either through Amazon or other resellers. So, stocking books on shelves should no longer be a major interest for self-publishers, I believe.
If you publish via Amazon KDP and IngramSpark, then they will make your book available in most major book stores around the world (only online though—not on their store shelves). When you publish with IngramSpark, they include your book in their whole sale catalogue that goes out to all the bookshops and libraries worldwide. What authors should focus on now is announcing their book launch, marketing their books, and clearly communicating where their books could be purchased from (i.e. links to their Amazon book page or others). Creating the necessary buzz about your book should be the main focus for self-publishing authors.
#2 What’s the best marketing tip you can provide from your experience? How did it help your book sales?
There are so many things you could do to market your books and boost your book sales. Using social media regularly to announce your book launch and to share information about your book is very important in creating the necessary buzz around your book.
The best tip I could give you is one that really helped boost the book sales of one of my books—The COMPLETE Model for Positive Behavior Management—is to create a high-quality YouTube video that includes valuable and interesting content that could go viral, and include in it information about your book (include a clickable purchase link). When people get hooked onto your video, they will definitely want to check out (and buy) your book!
#3 I heard a published author once say that it was pretty normal to have proof-reading errors in the first print edition. What’s your opinion on this and what would you recommend aspiring authors in this regard?
I find it unacceptable to have several proofreading errors in the first print edition. If professional editing was done and several rounds of meticulous proofreading were conducted, then there should not be any major errors.
In all my published books, I edited them myself first, then had them edited by a professional editor. Afterwards, I did countless proof-reads myself to make sure there were no errors. I did not submit my books for publishing until I was sure they were 100% error-free. After they were published, I discovered just ONE tiny error in only one of my books. I have seen horrendous errors in published books. I find that this reflects negatively on the quality of the work which I feel affects the image of the author. So, extra time spent proofreading prior to clicking ‘Publish’ is time worth spent!
#4 How much does the layout and design such as fonts, text size and spacing etc. matter and on what basis shall one choose these elements? Describe your own layout and design process with your books.
Have you ever seen a badly formatted published book? I have, and it was then that I realized how important it is to put a great amount of effort into a book’s layout, design, and interior formatting. It is honestly not too difficult to make a book look beautiful; it just requires some extra time, an awareness of how important this process is, as well as exposure to high quality book designs. I feel that many people miss out on the importance and value of this.
First of all, writers should be exposed to good quality book interiors. They should go to book shops and browse different books and their layouts. This helps them get inspired as to how they want their books to look like, and allow them to learn about high quality designs. Second, you could find a lot of layout ideas online, many of which you could purchase for a small fee.
I invested a lot of time learning how to create high quality book interiors. I can honestly say that I am very proud of the layout, design and formatting of all of my books!
#5 What are the considerations you kept in mind when considering the size of your book and why? Any helpful tips you would like to share from experience regarding book sizing?
Decisions about book size is guided by the book genre. For example, an educational book or another nonfiction book which includes usable tools should be slightly bigger than a novel. As for novels, these are books that should be of a smaller size since they are books that readers would need to carry around easily to the beach, on the train, in their bag, etc. I am personally not fond of big size books just for the sake of impracticality. Smaller books are easier to carry around, fit into our personal bags or purses, and are lighter to carry around.
#6 How much of this metaphorical phase, “Don’t judge a book by its cover” actually applies to book publishing? Why or why not?
The book cover is actually one of the most important elements of a book. Books with badly designed covers rarely get picked up, while beautiful covers are attractive, are more appealing and are more sellable.
#7 How important is it to invest in book awards and why? Which awards did you enroll in and has any of your books won an award?
Book awards are very important for book publicity, especially for first time authors. They allow the book to be exposed and visible for thousands of potential readers, and are also valuable opportunities for the author to market their books and create more buzz around their books.
I enrolled my first and second book in several book award competitions and they both won awards. (For a list of the best book award competitions, you could conduct a search on Google and easily find a list which you could choose from.)
These are the awards that my books won:
- The COMPLETE Model for Positive Behavior Management: A Transformational Guide for Parents and Educators won Global Award Best From Asia, as well as First Place Winner for Parenting/Family/Relationships in the Reader Views Literary Award Competition. This book also won Finalist in the Eric Hoffer Book Award.
- Crosswords (A contemporary women’s fiction novel) won Honorable Mention in the Reader Views Literary Award Competition.
Answer #2 & 3 are my personal favorites. What about you? Have more questions regarding self-publishing or have a question for the author? Comment below to get them answered. #thealignedauthor
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Website http://www.dinaalhidiq.com/
Blog http://www.dinaalhidiq.com/blog-posts-by-coach-and-author-dina-al-hidiq-zebib/
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