Publishing and Promoting Your Book
20 Publish Your Book
When is your book considered published? Whenever you decide!
You can make your book publicly available online and export it in one of the available export formats at any point. It’s easy to make changes and updates, so you can “publish” as many times as you need to.
That said, there are some factors that should be considered if you are hoping to make your book more widely available. The following table presents an overview (in no particular order) of these considerations and the circumstances in which they might be relevant to your needs and goals.
| Step | Library Service? | Purpose | Guidance |
| Proofreading and copyediting | No | Finalize text for publication | |
| Add subject areas | No | Facilitate discoverability if book is featured in the catalog | Add terms in Pressbooks in Book Info > Subjects |
| Get set up to sell your book online | No | Provide students and/or other readers with an option to purchase a hard copy via print on demand services | Pressbooks recommends IngramSpark or Amazon’s CreateSpace. |
| Get an ISBN (International Standard Book Number) | Maybe | Unique identifier for published books, used for distribution in libraries and bookstores | Request via email to libpubs@umn.edu. |
| Create a MARC record | Maybe | Enable book to be discoverable in the U of MN library catalog | Request via email to libpubs@umn.edu. |
| Integrate your work into Canvas | No | Enable students to access the book from your course page. | Use the instructions for using Common Cartridge with Canvas. |
| Deposit the work in the UDC. | No | Exposure beyond campus. | Download PDF from Pressbooks and upload to the UDC (read more). |
| Get an ARK identifier | Automatic | Get a persistent URL for the UDC version of the book (if applicable) | Deposit in UDC (see above) |
| List the work in the Open Textbook Library | Yes | Exposure beyond campus. Encourage other textbook authors to adopt or adapt your work. | Four requisite criteria for listing (Notably: Must be Creative Commons licensed and allow derivatives). Request via email to libpubs@umn.edu. |
| List the work in the Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB) | No | Exposure beyond campus. Support scholarly credibility. | Book must be peer reviewed and your department will need to qualify as a publisher. |
