When it comes to the details of publishing books, planners, card decks and other products, some of the most frequent questions we hear are about things like ISBNs, LCCNs, and copyrighting. We know, all those acronyms can get confusing! So we put together this quick guide for understanding what they are and how they apply to your products to help you with this important part of your next publishing project.
ISBN: An ISBN number (International Standard Book Number) is a unique identifier that is assigned to your book or product. The barcode is required to sell products in a physical bookstore. If you are planning to sell your product on your site and on Amazon, you do not need to print or include a barcode on your product. The ISBN is only required for creating the listing on Amazon. You can easily purchase ISBNs through your Vervante author account or directly from Bowker.com. When you purchase an ISBN from us and we list the product on Amazon, Vervante must be listed as the publisher. You are welcome to purchase and supply your own ISBN purchased from Bowker.
Including the price in your barcode or printing the price on your book/product is not required. In fact, we don’t recommend printing a price on your book. This gives you flexibility to change the price, if necessary, without effecting the printed product.
LCCN: Libraries use the Library of Congress database to stay up-to-date on available titles. You can make it easier for libraries to purchase your book by registering for a Library of Congress Control Number (LCCN) - a unique identification number that the Library of Congress assigns and uses for cataloging and other book-processing activities. You need an LCCN if you have a book that you would like to be carried by a library. You can file for an LCCN online, or Vervante can provide that service for you. Click on the link that says "LCCN Assignment" on your Vervante author home page.
COPYRIGHT: We are often asked if its necessary to copyright books and information products. Technically, under U.S. copyright law, your self-published work is protected as soon as you put the pen to paper. Official Copyright Registration, however, gives you a higher level of security when it comes to protecting your work. When you register your work with the U.S. Copyright office, you create a public record of your authorship and are officially recognized as the copyright holder in a court of law. (You can find more details about copyright requirements and protections here.)
Filing for copyright is not a requirement to publish with Vervante but we recommend this step to protect your work. You can register for a copyright yourself or we are happy to provide this service for you. Just click on the "Copyright Registration" link on your Vervante author home page to learn more. You do not need to wait for the application to the US Copyright Office to be accepted in order to include the copyright protected statement on your document.
COPYRIGHT PAGE: This is not a requirement, however it is a commonly-used page in your product to collect and provide elements such as: full title, subtitle, author’s name, editor, illustrator, etc., published date, ISBN, LCCN, date of publication and copyright.
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing, 2021
ISBN 0-9000000-0-0
Your Publishing Name*
123 Main Street
City, State 00000
www.YourWebsite.com
* As a Vervante customer, you are welcome to list Vervante as your publisher, it is not required. Our products are printed and distributed from our printing and distribution facility in Utah, all products proudly made in the USA. If you use Vervante as your publishing name, you can use the following address:
Vervante
224 South Main St #202
Springville, Utah 84663
For more information about copyrights, check out these articles:
The biggest thing to remember is that we provide services for all of the above. Just log into your author account home page and click on the links under the "Product Labeling and Professional Service" section to get started. Or send us an email at [email protected], we're here to help!
If you’ve been thinking about creating a daily planner, the right time to start is right now. Over the last few years here at Vervante, we’ve helped hundreds of clients create and sell the daily planners of their dreams. We want you to have a successful experience, too, so this year we are committed to providing step-by-step guidance for planning, creating and launching daily planners for any year - or even undated planners too!
Planning ahead is the key. Understanding the steps it takes to create a planner will help avoid last-minute stress if you’re launching for the new year. So for today, we wanted to share with you a simple 7-step overview of the process with suggested timelines for creating a daily planner.
Step 1 | Know Your Timeline If you are creating a planner for a specific year and would like your planner to ship and arrive by a specific time, be sure to find out what the deadline is with your printer. Planning ahead for steps in the process such as design turnaround, ordering samples, beta testing, and print times is also essential to know.
Step 2 | Select Your Topic, Size & Specs
The sky is the limit when it comes to topics and types. Start by asking yourself: Who is your audience and what type of planner would best serve their needs? The size and specs for your planner are the foundation of what you’re building. For ideas and inspirations, check out the Vervante Video Vault.
Step 3 | Time to Design
Design matters. If you want to do it yourself, you can use programs like Canva or InDesign to create your planner pages. Or you can hire a professional graphic designer. Just make sure your planner design is both beautiful and functional for a high-quality look and feel.
Step 4 | Decide on the Details: Extras & Add-Ons
It’s all the little extras that can make a planner extra special. Check out the Vervante Video Vault showcasing features that can add both fun and functionality, such as colors of wire-o and spiral binding, metal corners, elastic straps, stickers, and more.
If your planner is intended to be used for more than 90 days, we encourage you to use a board cover or hardcover. A printed softcover is great, however, with daily use it probably won’t hold up.
Cover options
Board covers
Hardcovers can be printed, faux/vegan leather or linen. The faux/vegan and linen options are generally also foil stamped. We have color options on our site HERE.
Laminated softcovers
Softcovers or softcovers with poly overlays
Binding options
Metal wire-o binding
Metal spiral binding
Plastic spiral binding
Casebound hardcover
Punched for disc binding
Step 5 | Pricing & Production
Use the free quote tool on our website home page for free printing quotes and information. We provide a wide range of cost-effective, customized options for printing daily planners so you can get what you need, when you need it, and exactly how you want.
Step 6 | Presentation
A beautiful planner deserves beautiful packaging. If you want to make a great impression right from the start, we can help by providing custom boxes, shipping labels, message cards, stickers or bookmarks that can be included with your planners to give it a personal touch that will really impress customers.
Step 7 | Orders, Shipping and Fulfillment
Successful launches and happy customers depend on having a streamlined sales and shipping process. We can list your planners on Amazon, help you sell from your own website, or list your planner in our online Bookstore where we can handle credit card payments for you. Fulfillment and shipping are also done for you as we print, package and ship your planners anywhere in the world.
We hope this helps you to avoid that “I’m not sure where to start” feeling that many people often have. We’re excited to help you create new planners and are here to help every step of the way.
If you're ready to send in your print files, but not sure exactly how they need to be formatted - this email is for you. Print file preparation is extremely important, so even if you're not ready to start printing just yet, be sure to save these instructions to help you down the road.
How to prepare your files for printing
We know you’re excited to get your new product printed and we want to expedite the process as quickly as possible for you. All files must be submitted as print-ready PDFs using the "Upload Files" link on your Author Dashboard. When you upload your PDFs, our team downloads your files and reviews them to ensure that they are set up properly for printing. Many of our customers create their own print files using applications such as Canva, while others hire a professional graphic designer. Both methods are fine, just remember that your PDFs must contain bleed and crop marks in order to be considered print-ready.
Please note that there is a charge of $35 for file uploads. This includes new files as well as updates or changes to existing products. We recommend that you double-check your files before uploading to ensure that they are print-ready.
If your PDFs contain bleed and crop marks and our team confirms that they are print-ready, your product will be added to your Author account quickly. If your files are not print-ready we’ll let you know what needs to be corrected. When you’re ready to upload your correct PDFs, please re-submit all of your files again using the "Upload Files" link in your Author Dashboard and completing the specification document.
Please review our print specs page HERE. We provide specs for softcovers, hardcovers, kiss cut stickers, foil stamp, binders, USB flash drives, etc. We do not have specs for interior files (the content for inside books, planners, journals, etc.). The only recommendation we have for text is ½” margins on the gutter/binding edge. We have found that ½” margins are enough to prevent punching through text or images for spiral, wire-o, and 3-hole/6-hole drill.
Missing bleed and crop marks seem to be the most popular reason for rejected print files. If your PDF has edge-to-edge printing, then you need bleed. This means the image should be slightly larger than the finished page size so that when we trim to the crop marks, we will cut through the image so that the printing actually prints edge to edge. Without bleed, your page/cover/document will have a white border all of the way around and the color will not print to the edge of the sheet. We have a document HERE with additional information about bleed and crop marks.
(If you're using Canva, here's a useful link describing how to add bleed and crop marks: https://www.canva.com/help/article/margins-bleed-crop-marks.)
When uploading your files, please check for these items:
Bleed and crop marks on all sides of the image
One set of crop marks on PDF
If you send more than one PDF from Canva that needs to be merged into a single print file, please make sure the Canva files are the same page size.
All pages need to be oriented the same way
Tabs are placed before odd numbered pages
Covers are the correct size for the text PDF
If you are adding tabs, the tabs and covers are ½” wider than text
If you need assistance, we are happy to help with your print files. We have a graphic design team that is available to put the finishing touches on your files if you need assistance. Tabs seem to be a bit tricky so our graphic designers can help prepare the tabs for printing. We charge $75 per hour and you can work directly with the designer to receive a quote and make the changes. If you’d like our designers to make the changes, please let our customer service team know and we’ll hand-off your project to our designers to finalize your print files. We’ll review your initial upload and give you feedback on the changes.
In order for our customer service team to be efficient and quickly add or update your product, we need print-ready PDFs. You can avoid delays and streamline the process by reviewing the documentation and checking your print files before uploading them. This will also ensure that your project will be added to your account when you upload your PDFs, rather than waiting at the back of the queue for corrections and re-uploading.
Here is a list of helpful resources for file preparation:
We know you're excited to turn your design files into real-life products - and we hope these tips will help you with a very important part of the process as you prepare to send them to us.
When it comes to the details of publishing books, planners, card decks and other products, some of the most frequent questions we hear are about things like ISBNs, LCCNs, and copyrighting. We know, all those acronyms can get confusing! So we put together this quick guide for understanding what they are and how they apply to your products to help you with this important part of your next publishing project.
If you're ready to send in your print files, but not sure exactly how they need to be formatted - this email is for you. Print file preparation is extremely important, so even if you're not ready to start printing just yet, be sure to save these instructions to help you down the road.