New Publishing Wizard

Our revamped publishing wizard should be more informative and easier to use. Combined steps speed up the publishing process. A checklist, formatting tips, and information about PDFs provide more help while you are creating the project.

Over the next month or so, we plan to continue tweaking this process, implementing new ideas with the goal of making it even better.

Meanwhile, if we update the site while you are taking a break from creating your book, you may reopen your project to a different page than the one you expected. Don’t worry. The files you already successfully uploaded to our system are still there, and you will see the filenames as you move through the Wizard.

As always, use the Live Help button on the left side of the screen if you need a hand.

Next: a step-by-step tutorial about the new wizard prepares you for the changes.

New Publishing Wizard

All of the figures can be downloaded here

1. Title and Intent.

   Complete the Title and Author text boxes in this first step. Click the plus sign next to the Author field to provide names of additional authors.

   Indicate whether this publication ultimately will be available only to you or provided for sale through the Lulu marketplace. If you plan to purchase a distribution package or get an ISBN for this project, choose Lulu Marketplace. See Figure 1.

2. Book options.

   Choose the book size, binding, and color. We distribute sizes among three categories: tall, wide, and square. Select the category by clicking the appropriate tab. Binding and color options remain unchanged. See Figure 2.

3. Upload.

   In this step, we wanted to help you make better decisions about how to create and format your book. The formatting tips button provides a diagram illustrating margins and bleed. Find basic information on do’s and don’ts in the checklist, followed by a list of accepted file formats and discussion about creating PDFs that work with our printers.

   A cool feature in this new wizard is an improved method to reorder files once you upload them. Click on a file name and drag it to place it in a particular order in the list.

   Click the Save and continue button to move to the next step. See Figures 3, 4, and 5.

4. Project creation.

   A pop-up appears, with an indicator showing the document conversion percentage. If you do not see the pop-up, check your browser settings to ensure that the browser allows pop-up windows, and that they are turned on.

   Once conversion completes, information displays in the pop-up to indicate whether your PDF converted successfully. Error messages describe any problem that may have occurred.

   From here you can go back and upload another file or continue. See Figure 6.

5. The cover wizard. This wizard remains unchanged, for the time being.

6. Basic information, such as the publisher and keywords.

   Our new Access level system (which replaces the old rating system) also displays on this page. The new options are Private access, Direct Access, and General Access. See Figure 7.

7. Price your book, set a license and you are done!

   We hope this helps. If you have any other questions or concerns please go to our Live Help. All of the figures can be downloaded here

Thank you for using Lulu!