Which Are More Legible: Serif or Sans Serif Typefaces?

by

Introduction

An argument has been raging for decades within the scientific and typographic communities on what seems a very insignificant issue: Do serifs contribute to the legibility of typefaces, and by definition, are sans serif typefaces less legible? To date, no one has managed to provide a conclusive answer to this issue.

Part 1 provides typographical definitions.

Part 2 reviews the evidence for and against the legibility of serif and sans serif typefaces.

1. Definitions

Legibility vs. readability

Legibility is concerned with the very fine details of typeface design, and in an operational context this usually means the ability to recognise individual letters or words. Readability however concerns the optimum arrangement and layout of whole bodies of text:

"An illegible type, set it how you will, cannot be made readable. But the most legible of types can be made unreadable if it is set to too wide a measure, or in too large or too small a size for a particular purpose". ( Dowding 1957, p.5; in Lund, 1999 )

Typographical features

There are many elements in the design of a typeface which can contribute to its legibility.

Serif / Sans Serif

"Serifs" are the small finishing strokes on the end of a character. "Sans serif" fonts do not have these small finishing strokes.

Figure 1
Examples of serif and sans serif letters

Examples of serif and sans serif letters

Point size

Point size is perhaps the element most used to describe the legibility of a type face, but it can also be the most deceptive. Point size is a legacy from the letterpress system, where each letter is held on a small metal block. The point size actually refers to the size of this metal block, and not the actual size of the letter. The letter does not have to take up the full area of the block face, so two fonts with the same nominal point size can quite easily have different actual sizes. ( Bix, 2002)

Figure 2
The difference between point size and actual letter size (Image © Bix, 2002 )

'Point size' refers to the block of metal that letters were mounted on in letterpress system, and can be bigger than the letter itself

X-height

X-height refers to the height of the lower case "x" in a typeface. It is often a better indicator of the apparent size of a typeface than point size ( Poulton, 1972 ; Bix, 2002 ).

Figure 3
X-height

X-height for Arial is higher than that for Times New Roman at the same point size

Counters

Counters are the "negative spaces" inside a character. They are also good indicators of the actual size of the type.

Figure 4
Counters

Arial Black has a smaller counter size than that of Arial

Ascenders and descenders

Ascenders and are the vertical strokes which rise above the body of a character or x-height. Descenders are strokes which fall below the baseline of the x-height.

Figure 5
Ascenders and descenders

'y' has a descender, 'h' has an ascender

2. Evidence

Overview of legibility research: serif vs. sans serif

There are plenty of studies that show no difference between the legibility of serif and sans serif typefaces ( Tinker, 1932 ; Zachrisson, 1965 ; Bernard et al., 2001 ; Tullis et al., 1995 ; De Lange et al., 1993 ; Moriarty & Scheiner, 1984 ; Poulton, 1965 ; Coghill, 1980) ).

There are some high profile studies which claim to show the superiority of serif typefaces ( Robinson et al., 1983 ; Burt, 1959 ; Weildon, 1995 ) but these have been soundly criticised on points of methodology. ( Lund, 1997, 1998, 1999 ).

Particularly interesting is the case of Sir Cyril Burt, well known in psychology circles for being accused of fabricating his results. It turns out that he is likely to have continued this deceptive behaviour in his typographical work ( Hartley & Rooum, 1983).

Unfortunately, many researchers, typographers and graphic designers continue to cite Burt and Weildon uncritically, meaning that many of the informal resources on typography found on the web today continues to propagate unsubstantiated claims on the utility of serifs.

Most disappointing however, is that in more than one hundred years of legibility research, researchers have failed to form a concrete body of theoretical knowledge on the part that serifs may play in legibility ( Lund, 1999 ). Nor have they managed to make their work sufficiently known in the typographic community ( Spencer, 1968, p.6 ).

Arguments in favour of serif typefaces

Serifs are used to guide the horizontal "flow" of the eyes; The lack of serifs is said to contribute to a vertical stress in sans serifs, which is supposed to compete with the horizontal flow of reading ( De Lange et al., 1993 )

These are the most common claims when trying to make a case for the utility of serifs. However, serifs cannot in any way be said to "guide the eye". In 1878 Professor Emile Javal of the University of Paris established that the eyes did not move along a line of text in one smooth sweep but in a series of quick jerks which he called saccadic movements ( Spencer, 1968, p. 13 ; Rayner & Pollatsek, 1989, pp. 113-123 ). Unfortunately many graphic designers and typographers continue to use this rationale for the existence of serifs, due to a lack of communication and cooperation with the research community.

Serifs are used to increase spacing between letters and words to aid legibility

Serifs are not required to control letter and word spacing – in fact, serifs would be woefully inadequate for this purpose. In traditional letterpress systems, spacing is achieved with small pieces of metal inserted between the letters, and by the spacing between the letter form and the edge of the print block. Spacing is even easier to manipulate with modern computerised typesetting equipment. ( Sassoon, 1993 ; Rubinstein, 1988 )

Serifs are used to increase contrast (and irregularity) between different letters to improve identification

Well established research has shown that whole words can be recognised just as quickly as letters during an eye fixation and that single letters can be identified quicker when embedded in a word. Such a ‘Word superiority effect’ would indicate that serifs are not needed for distinguishing between single letters ( Reynolds, 1979 ).

Serifs are used to bind characters into cohesive ‘word wholes’

The simple Gestalt created by spaces between words would be enough to bind letters into ‘wholes’. Furthermore, other features such as character ascenders and descenders should have a much greater effect on word recognition than serifs ( Poulton, 1965).

Readers prefer body text set in serif typefaces, so they must be more legible

Many studies conducted in the past did indeed find a preference for serif typefaces ( Tinker, 1963 ; Zachrisson, 1965 ). However, Tinker commented that perceived legibility was due to a great extent to familiarity with the typeface. 40 years ago sans serif typefaces were not as common as they are now, and if these studies were repeated, it would not be surprising to find completely different results. Indeed, more recent studies have shown that computer users prefer sans serif typefaces for body text online ( Boyarski et al., 1998 , Bernard et al., 2000-2001 , Tullis et al., 1995 , Reynolds, 1979 ).

What is important to bear in mind is that in almost all legibility studies, reader preference or perceived legibility tends to be inconsistent with user performance ( Lund, 1999 ).

Serifs are used for body text because sans serif causes fatigue

It is often claimed that reading large amounts of body text set in sans serif causes fatigue, but there is no evidence to support this, as measuring fatigue has not been a concern in the vast majority of legibility research comparing serif and sans serif typefaces.

Furthermore, "no satisfactory objective method of measurement has been devised. Subjective assessments of fatigue are subject to modification by a great many factors which may be totally unrelated to the experimental situation". (Reynolds 1979, p313)

Arguments in favour of sans serif typefaces

Serifs are just an historical artefact

This could be true to a great extent, especially since claims attempting to justify serifs in retrospect have been less than convincing.

Many researchers attribute the origin of serifs to the Romans, some claiming that "Roman masons … terminated each stroke in a slab of stone with a serif to correct the uneven appearance made by their tools". ( Craig, 1980; in Bix, 2002 ). Others state that "design by brush before execution in stone gave rise to … tapering serifs at the terminals of many strokes". (Bigelow, 1981; in Rubinstein, 1988, p10).

What ever their origin, serifs have been around for so long that perceived legibility is very likely to have been affected by familiarity – readers tend to rate as more legible the typefaces they are most used to ( Tinker, 1963 ; Zachrisson, 1965 ).

Sans serif are better on the web

Although studies of screen reading show no difference between reading from screen and from paper ( Dillon, 1992 ; Bernard, 2001 ), there could be some validity to this argument.

When typefaces are digitised for use on computers, the letter forms have to fit within a relatively small pixel grid, often leading to what are called the "jaggies" ( Rubinstein, 1988 ). Many web professionals such as graphic designers claim that this relatively low resolution cannot render effectively enough the fine finishing strokes of serif typefaces, and that sans serif typefaces lend themselves more naturally to being digitised, and come out cleaner and thus more legible.

Figure 6
Digitised typefaces have to fit into a relatively small pixel grid (image © Gillespie )

The jagged curves of a digitised typeface can be seen close-up

However, this has not been borne out by recent evidence ( Bernard, 2001 , Boyarski et al., 1998 , Tullis et al., 1995 , De Lange ), that shows no difference in legibility between serif and sans serif font on the web.

Sans serif is better at small sizes. Sans serif fonts survive reproduction and smearing because of their simple forms

Some research has shown that serifs may actually become visual noise at very small sizes, detracting from the main body shape of the letter form ( Morris, et al., 2001 ). However, this has not been confirmed in tests of continuous reading ( Poulton, 1972 ). Other factors such as stroke thickness, counter size and x-height are likely to have a far greater effect in preserving the overall identity of a letter form whether it be through smearing or size reduction ( Poulton, 1972 ; Reynolds, 1979 ).

Sans serif is better for children learning to read

Books produced for children are often printed with sans serif text as teachers claim that the simplicity of the letter shapes makes them more recognisable ( Coghill, 1980) , Walker, 2001 ). But studies with child participants have found no difference in their ability to read either style of typeface. ( Coghill, 1980) ; Zachrisson, 1965 , Walker, 2001 )

3. Conclusion

What initially seemed a neat dichotomous question of serif versus sans serif has resulted in a body of research consisting of weak claims and counter-claims, and study after study with findings of "no difference". Is it the case that more than one hundred years of research has been marred by repeated methodological flaws, or are serifs simply a typographical "red herring"?

It is of course possible that serifs or the lack of them have an effect on legibility, but it is very likely that they are so peripheral to the reading process that this effect is not even worth measuring ( Lund, 1999 ).

Indeed, a greater difference in legibility can easily be found within members of the same type family than between a serif and a sans serif typeface. ( Tinker, 1963 , Zachrisson, 1965 ). There are also other factors such as x-height, counter size, letter spacing and stroke width which are more significant for legibility than the presence or absence of serifs. Poulton, 1972 ; Reynolds, 1979 )

Finally, we should accept that most reasonably designed typefaces in mainstream use will be equally legible, and that it makes much more sense to argue in favour of serif or sans serif typefaces on aesthetic grounds than on the question of legibility. (Bernard, 2001 ; Tinker, 1963)

Publetariat Editor’s Note: What do you think? Use the ‘add new comment’ link (below the following references) to weigh in.

4. References

Bell R.C., Sullivan J.L.F. (1981). Student preferences in typography. Programmed Learning and Educational Technology18(2), 57-61.

Comment about this source:

A typical study on the aesthetic quality of fonts – these types of studies are only useful for a short time before fashion or technology changes the whims of readers. That said, they do need to be done from time to time if what I say in the conclusion is true.

Bernard, M., Mills, M. (2000). So, what size and type of font should I use on my website? Usability News 2.2[Online]. http://psychology.wichita.edu/surl/usabilitynews/2S/font.htm

Bernard, M., Mills, M., Frank, T., McKown, J. (2001). Which font do children prefer to read online? Usability News 3.1[Online]. http://psychology.wichita.edu/surl/usabilitynews/3W/fontJR.htm

Bernard, M., Liao, C., Mills, M. (2001). Determining the best online font for older adults. Usability News 3.1[Online]. http://psychology.wichita.edu/surl/usabilitynews/3W/fontSR.htm

Bernard, M., Mills, M., Peterson, M., Storrer, K. (2001). A Comparison of Popular Online Fonts: Which is Best and When? Usability News 3.2[Online]. http://psychology.wichita.edu/surl/usabilitynews/3S/font.htm

Comment about this source:

A collection of well thought out, up to date studies from Bernard et al concentrating on fonts for the web, though it is not clear if they have been published in a peer-reviewed periodical.

Bix, L. (2002). The Elements of Text and Message Design and Their Impact on Message Legibility: A Literature Review. Journal of Design Communication, No. 4. Available at: http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JDC/Spring-2002/bix.html

Comment about this source:

A nice balanced review of the elements of legibility and readability of typefaces, although does not explicitly mention readability, choosing to talk about how text is set and laid out under the "umbrella" term of legibility.

Acknowledges that the serif/sans serif debate is divided and inconclusive but refers to Burt uncritically and wheels out the old argument about serifs reinforcing horizontal eye flow.

Still, implies correctly that x-height, colour contrast, counter size and other factors are more significant for legibility than the presence or absence of serifs, and that the combination of all factors is the most important thing.

Boyarski, D., Neuwirth, C., Forlizzi, J., Regli, S.H. (1998). A Study of Fonts Designed for Screen Display. Proceedings of ACM CHI 98 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems.1, 87-94.

Comment about this source:

Pits Times Roman against Georgia and Georgia against Verdana.

Burt, C. (1959). A psychological study of typography. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Coghill, V. (1980). Can children read familiar words in unfamiliar type? Information Design Journal 1(4), 254-260

Comment about this source:

Very interesting study which implies that because young children have not had the time or the ability to become accustomed to certain fonts, this confounding factor can be eliminated from the experiment. Coghill finds that there is no significant difference between serif and sans serif fonts although some methodological issues are worrying. For example, being a teacher she states that sometimes she couldn’t stop herself from helping the children if they couldn’t read a word, although she claims that this does not affect the validity of her study.

Dillon, A. (1992). Reading from paper versus screens: a critical review of the empirical literature. Ergonomics, 35(10), 1297-1326.

Gaultney, V. (2000). Balancing typeface legibility and economy: practical techniques for the type designer. [Online] http://www.sil.org/~gaultney/research.html

Gillespie, J. (n.d.) Web page design for designers. [Online]http://www.wpdfd.com/wpdtypo.htm

Hartley, J. (1987). Designing electronic text: the role of print-based research.Educational Communication and Technology, 35(1), 3-17.

Hartley J. and Rooum D. (1983). Sir Cyril Burt and typography: A re-evaluation, British Journal of Psychology 74(2), 203-212.

Comment about this source:

A remarkable study showing that Burt’s habit of deception also extended into his typographical research. Lund comments that:

Donald Rooum and James Hartley have convincingly shown that Burt’s well-known dubious practices also extended into his work on legibility and typography. They point out that of 123 statements about typography in Burt’s book, only three – 3 – were either supported by data or by reference to named sources (Rooum, 1981; Hartley and Rooum, 1983; in Lund, 1995 ).

Scary! Even more scary is the fact that so many researchers cite Burt uncritically …

Humphreys, Glyn W. (1989). Visual cognition: computational, experimental, and neuropsychological perspectives. Hove : Lawrence Erlbaum. pp. 273-286.

Julie A. Jacko & Andrew Sears. 2002. The Human-Computer Interaction Handbook: Fundamentals, Evolving Technologies and Emerging Applications. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Kahn, P., Lenk, K. (1995). Screen Typography: Applying Lessons of Print to Computer Displays. Seybold Report on Desktop Publishing, 7(3).

De Lange, R. W., Esterhuizen, H. L., Beatty, D. (1993). Performance differences between Times and Helvetica in a reading task.Electronic Publishing, 6(3), 241-248.

Comment about this source:

Very good section going through the arguments for and against serifs.

Lansdale, M.W., Ormerod, T.C. (1994). Understanding interfaces: A Handbook of human-computer interaction. London: Academic Press. pp. 53-59.

Comment about this source:

Some good basic information on spatial frequency.

Lund, O. (1995). In black and white: an r&d report on typography and legibility. Review article. Information design journal, 8(1), 91-95.

Lund, O. (1997). Why serifs are (still) important.Typography Papers, 2, 91-104.

Lund, O. (1998). Type and layout: how typography and design can get your message across – or get in the way. Review article. Information design journal, 9(1), 74-77.

Lund, O. (1999). Knowledge Construction in Typography: The case of legibility research and the legibility of sans serif typefaces. Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Reading: The University of Reading, Department of Typography & Graphic Communication.

Comment about this source:

The masterwork of the whole serif / sans serif debate. Reviews a selection of 28 legibility studies (from a total of 72) since the first one in 1896 to the late 90’s, inspecting each one for holes in its internal validity. Other issues are explored such as the lack of real theory after a century of empirical research and the philosophical and historical movements affecting this strand of research.

Considering that aesthetic preference is supposed to have a significant effect upon the results of legibility studies, it would have been an ideal space to compare the results of the many preference studies conducted at the same time as the empirical studies. An analysis could have been made to see if there was a correlation with the more positive results for sans serif typefaces and the growing existence and acceptance of these same typefaces.

Includes a fascinating look behind the scenes in the history of legibility research, with Pyke’s disappointment in 1926, The scandal of Burt’s deceptions and bitter arguments over traffic signs in the 70’s.

States explicitly, however, that the thesis does not attempt to be just another legibility study, but uses serif / sans serif debate as a "lense" through which to examine the process and philosophy of scientific enquiry. A great shame that he stops there, since he is probably the most able researcher to be able to resolve the debate once and for all.

Marcus, A. (1992). Graphic design for electronic documents and user interfaces. ACM Press.

Mills, C.B., Weldon, L. J. (1987). Reading text from computer screens, ACM Computing Surveys (CSUR), 19(4), 329-357.

Moriarty, S., Scheiner, E. (1984). A study of close-set type. Journal of Applied Psychology,69, 700-702.

Morris, R. A., Berry, K., Hargreaves, K. A., Liarokapis, D. (1991). How typeface variation and typographic variation affect readability at small sizes.IS&T’s Seventh International Congress on Advances in Non-impact Printing Technologies, volume 2, edited by Ken Pietrowski, Portland, OR, USA.

Morris, R. A., Aquilante, K., et al. (2001). Serifs slow RSVP reading at very small sizes, but don"t matter at larger sizes. Submitted

Oborne, D., Holton, D. (1998). Reading from screen versus paper: there is no difference. International Journal of Man-Machine Studies, 28, 1-9.

Poulton, E.C. (1965). Letter differentiation and rate of comprehension in reading. Journal of Applied Psychology, 49(5), 358-362.

Poulton, E.C. (1972). Size, style, and vertical spacing in the legibility of small typefaces. Journal of Applied Psychology, 56(2), 156-161.

Pyke, R.L. (1926). Report on the Legibility of Print. Medical Research Council: Special Report. Series No. 10. UK.

Comment about this source:

Pyke give a clue to the nature of the the serif debate when he lamented: "the problem of legibility seemed simple at the outset; it is in fact complex and elusive".

Rayner, K. & Pollatsek, A.. (1989). The Psychology of Reading. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall Inc. pp. 113-187.

Comment about this source:

Excellent general resource on many issues on reading, including eye movements

Reynolds, L. (1979). Legibility studies: Their relevance to present-day documentation methods. Journal of Documentation, 35(4), 307-340.

Robinson, D.O, Abbamonte, M., Evans, S.H. (1971). Why serifs are important: the perception of small print.Visible Language, 4, 353-359.

Rubinstein, R. (1988). Digital Typography. Addison Wesley Longman.

Sassoon, R. (1993). Computers and Typography.Oxford: Intellect Books.

Spencer, H. (1968). The Visible Word. London: Lund Humphries.

Tinker, M.A. (1963). Legibility of Print, 3rd edition. Iowa: Iowa State University Press.

Comment about this source:

The most prolific and respected researcher in legibility. The study cited below is the only one that deals specifically with serifs and is reprinted in this book.

Tinker, M. A., Paterson, D.G. (1932). Studies of typographical factors influencing speed of reading: X. Style of typeface. Journal of Applied Psychology, 16(6), 605-613.

Comment about this source:

A landmark study in many ways, although often misinterpreted. Tinker described his results as showing more or less equal legibility for most of the typefaces, although a slightly longer reading time for Kabel Light, the only sans serif typeface in the study, has been claimed by others to show the superiority of serif typefaces. There are problems however, as in having only one sans serif typeface, you cannot be claiming to be comparing serifs and sans serifs, but only that specific typeface – Kabel Light. Furthermore, no one is saying that Kabel Light is a particularly good example of a sans serif typeface. Thirdly, chances are that if you performed the study today, the results could easily go in the favour of Kabel Light, since people are simply more used to sans serif typefaces.

Tullis, T. S., Boynton, J. L., Hersh, H. (1995). Readability of Fonts in the Windows Environment (Interactive Poster). Proceedings of ACM CHI’95 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2, 127-128.

Walker, S. (2001). Typography for children: serif or sans?. Department of Typography & Graphic Communication, The University of Reading [Online] http://www.textmatters.com/kidstype/serif_or_sans_.html

White, J.V. (1988). Graphic Design for the Electronic Age. New York: Watson-Guptill Publishers.

Weildon, C. (1995). Type and layout: How typography and design can get your message across–or get in your way. Berkeley: Strathmoor.

Zachrisson, B. (1965). Studies in the Legibility of Printed Text. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell.

Comment about this source:

A contemporary of Tinker, disagreed often on methods but found largely similar results in terms of legibility differences between serif and sans serif typefaces.

This article was written by Alex Poole and published on Alex Poole’s Literature Review: 7 April, 2005
 

Why I Decided To Form An Indie Press

by

I self-published my first novel, RealmShift, at the start of 2006 through Lulu.com. It was an interesting exercise. I learned a great deal about producing a quality book and I learned a lot about the nature of Recommended Retail Price, bookstore discounts, international postage and shipping costs and the stigma that stops people taking self-published work seriously. But the book sold modestly, got a lot of great reviews and generated a bit of buzz. I even had people randomly emailing me with praise and asking for more, which was very flattering. As it happened I was already working on the sequel. Once that was ready to publish I decided to take the whole process more seriously and, rather than use an author service POD company again, I wanted to go directly to source.

I investigated cutting out the middleman and dealing directly with Lightning Source International (LSI), the POD printer used by many author service companies. I discovered that LSI don’t deal directly with authors – they deal only with publishers. Now, the semantics of indie author/publisher aside, this actually gave me an idea. Why not become a boutique version of something like Lulu or iUniverse? Why not become a publisher? I saw an opportunity here to take the indie publishing process a step further. So I slowly put together a plan.

I would create a POD publishing company that would be essentially exactly the same as the big POD author service companies mentioned above but with the following caveats:

Genre Specific – my work is dark fantasy, sometimes classified as horror or urban fantasy. I decided to form a publisher that would specialise only in science fiction, fantasy and horror, with a preference for the darker, more adult works in those genres.

Quality Control – I wouldn’t just let anyone publish anything. While the work would need to be done largely by the author, especially all the marketing and promotion post release, I would firstly only take well written, well edited, quality stories and I would do the typesetting, formatting, layout and cover design myself (in deep consultation with the author) to ensure that the books we produced were both good writing and professionally put together. Small

Catalogue – the publisher would only have a small number of authors on board, keeping to the specifications above.

Cost Neutral – the publisher itself would not be designed to make a profit. The publisher will recover costs from the authors from their sales and subsequent sales profits then all go back to the authors – it’s up to them to market the work, so they should get the proceeds. I’ll have to make my profits from the sale of my own books.

Anthologies – some money can come back to the press by way of anthologies. I would pay for the stories included, buying first print and online rights for one year, and hopefully cover costs with anthology sales and maybe put a bit of money back into the publishing company this way. Any profits made here could be used to market the press as a whole and generate interest in all the work published. This is also an opportunity to give emerging writers another market for their work.

There are two fundamental points to this approach: As this publisher is not out to turn a profit, I could offer my books and those of anyone else I take on at a retail price very close to the cost price from the POD printer; With quality control and a limited catalogue, we could work towards shattering the indie publishing stigma – a stigma that is slowly dissolving, but that can certainly do with an injection of quality work!

Any books put out through this publisher would also have a stable of other work to stand up with. All the books would carry the logo and all would be featured on the publisher’s website. The catalogue of work as a whole could be marketed and any sales from one author would expose the other authors to those readers. This idea is basically taking the technology that we have available today, that is used so successfully and profitably by the author service POD companies, and distilling it back down to something smaller and more targeted.

Being genre specific and having a degree of quality control means that the publisher can be grown as a brand within the indie publishing world and within the greater publishing world as a whole. And so Blade Red Press was born. I started pulling in favours and getting things organised. My “day job” is as a martial arts instructor. One of my students at the time was a graphic designer. He put me onto a friend of his that designed the Blade Red Press logo for me at mate’s rates.

logo_shadow-small-lo.jpg

With the help of another friend and his IT skills I put together the Blade Red Press website. I registered the company name and set up a publisher account with LSI and I was ready to go. I started with my own books, re-issuing RealmShift along with the new book, MageSign. With everything I’d learned about cover design, promotion and so on I was able put together two excellent quality books. I had some reviews done in advance and was able to include the review comments on the cover and inside the books. I got another author friend of mine to give me a blurb. The work was all uploaded to LSI and Blade Red Press had its first two titles.

old-new-covers-compare.jpg The original cover of RealmShift (left) and the new Blade Red Press edition, along with the sequel (centre and right)

Everything is new and still growing at the moment. We’ve put out one more title, an alternate history of ancient Baghdad, called Maggots Of Heresy, by Michael Fridman. The website still needs some development. But it’s all up and running. I’ll be opening a submission window soon for short stories for our first anthology and also for novel submissions for our next title release. I intend to use the press to release one or two anthologies and one or two novels per year. It will stay small and offer a quality product at a decent price.

POD is always going to face its hardest challenge with pricing. But when I first released RealmShift through Lulu it was US$23.95 at amazon.com. Now, through Blade Red Press, it’s US$15.95, as is the sequel, MageSign. Both books are close to 400 pages. So we’re heading in the right direction.

However, a word of warning. If you choose to do something like this, it will take up a lot of your time! Using the author service companies takes a lot of time and effort as well, producing a quality book and then marketing it. But adding in the extra work of managing your own small company online is something that needs to be seriously considered before you dive in. I’m enjoying the challenge but don’t be fooled into thinking it’s easy. There’s nothing easy about the world of indie publishing, but it certainly is worth it if you’re prepared to take on that challenge.

Alan is an indie author and publisher with two dark fantasy novels in print – RealmShift and MageSign. You can learn all about him at his website.

Big Chain Bookstore Deathwatch

by

If you’re still focusing significant efforts on raising your visibility in Borders or Barnes & Noble, or if the difficulty of getting your self-published book into these chains is a major reason for your refusal to self-publish in the first place, the results of a Random House/Zogby Poll released May 29 will be a real eye-opener.

When asked to name the one type of retailer from which they most frequently bought books in the past year, 43% of respondents said online, 32% named chain bookstores, and 9% specified small, independent bookstores. A specific breakdown isn’t provided for the remaining 16%, but that 16% definitely aren’t buying most of their books in chain bookstores.

Some quick math on these numbers shows that 68% of respondents buy the majority of their books from outlets other than chain booksellers. Conversely, only 32% of respondents buy the majority of their books in chain bookstores.

In the same poll, respondents were asked to name all the places they’d bought books in the past year. Outlets most often named were online retailers (77%), chain bookstores (76%) and independent bookstores (49%). In other words, respondents were just as likely to buy online as in chain bookstores, and nearly half are also buying from independent booksellers—retailers generally more receptive to carrying indie books.

Drug stores, supermarkets, warehouse clubs, big box stores and airports were also named, in percentages ranging from 16-39%, but retailers such as these usually only carry current bestsellers, discounted/remaindered titles, and gift books, so they’re not typically receptive to carrying self-published works.

Parse these figures any way you like, but the truth is unavoidable: chain bookstores no longer dominate the bookselling landscape, and in fact are losing ground all the time. None of this should be surprising, and in fact it’s just a case of retail history repeating.

Do you remember precisely when you stopped going to chain music stores like Musicland, Licorice Pizza and Tower Records, and why? For me, a music fan with eclectic tastes, most often looking for artists not represented on Billboard’s charts, the birth of online retailer CDNow (later absorbed by Amazon) was the beginning of the end. No brick-and-mortar store could hope to match CDNow’s selection or prices, and if I wanted something really obscure, I knew I’d sooner find it at an indie/used record store than a chain store.

For people seeking chart-toppers, the widening selection of music available at discount stores, big box stores and warehouse clubs like Target, Best Buy and CostCo sounded the music chains’ first death knell. Department and discount stores couldn’t match the selection of a dedicated record store, but it didn’t matter because their customers were only interested in the most popular current albums, greatest-hits collections and compilations of past hits. Not only could these retailers easily offer a good selection of these low-risk offerings, they could price their titles lower than those in dedicated record stores.

Record stores responded by diversifying their product mix with the introduction of videogames, VHS movies and eventually, DVDs, but it was a hopeless strategy built on an already failing business model. There were simply too many other places to get these same items more conveniently, at a lower cost, and in the case of online retailers, with a wider selection. By the time digital downloading became a mainstream phenomenon thanks to Napster, the iPod and iTunes, it was merely the last nail in a coffin already built by other powerful market forces.

Compare this death of an entire industry to chain bookstores’ current situation. Greater selection of books can be had online, at lower prices? Check. Bestsellers, gift books and discount books can be bought more conveniently at other stores, for lower prices? Check. Obscure and out-of-print books can only be found online, or in indie/used bookstores? Check. Attempts are being made to diversify product mix by introducing DVDs, CDs, toys and other products, but none of these products are being offered at lower prices or in a wider selection than through other, pre-existing retail outlets? Check.

Now, explain it to me again: why do publishers and writers continue to believe big chain bookstores still have the power to make or break careers in authorship? Why do indie authors invest in catalog listings with companies like Ingram, or choose to work with higher-priced self-publication outfits on the basis of that outfit’s ability to get catalog listings?

True, without the listing your book won’t be accessible to the big bookstore chains’ corporate purchasers, nor those of any other major chain retailer that is not an Amazon affiliate (i.e., Best Buy, WalMart), but none of them were ever likely to stock your book anyway. Most of an indie author’s sales will be from efforts and outlets that aren’t in any way dependent on, nor even necessarily helped by, catalog listings. Worse yet, paying for catalog listings or working with a costlier publisher typically forces an indie author to raise the retail price of his book. This makes the book less attractive to all potential buyers while forcing those who do buy the book to subsidize the cost of its exposure in retail markets that are both small and generally outside the indie author’s reach anyway.

The bottom line is this: even if you succeed in getting a big chain bookstore to carry your self-published book, the maximum market segment you can possibly capture there now stands at 32%, and it’s shrinking all the time.

Does it really make sense to let 32% of book buyers dictate your choice of whether or not to self-publish, or your choice of publisher, or if you’ve already self-published, claim the bulk of your promotional resources?

This piece originally appeared on The Indie Author Blog.

April L. Hamilton is the founder of Publetariat, the author of The IndieAuthor Guide, a blogger and Technorati BlogCritic on topics related to indie authorship and publishing.

Writing Contest Open to All

by

Writing contests are often great ways to get started for writers. The Society of Southwestern Authors (SSA) runs its Annual Writing Contest from January 01 through May 31 – this year, entries may be postmarked no later than June 1, 2009 as the 31st falls on a Sunday.

Content must be previously unpublished and length varies per category. Four categories are available: Memoir/Personal Essay, Short Story, Poetry, and Short Stories Appropriate for Children Ages 6-12.

Full rules and requirements as well as entry forms are available for download on SSA’s website: http://ssa-az.org/contest.html.

Each category awards a First, Second, Third, and Honorable Mention monetary prize. All winning entries will be published in SSA’s yearly publication, The Storyteller.

What’s different about this contest? Well, it’s only $10 USD per piece entry fee and you will receive comments from the judges. You may also request a more in-depth "appraisal" – aka critique – for $25 per piece.

You do not have to be a member of The Society of Southwestern Authors to enter, nor does your work have to be about or set in the Southwest. You don’t even have to live in the United States. You DO, however, have to use snail mail. NO EMAIL SUBMISSIONS are accepted. Check it out, think about it, give it a go. You might just win!

What is Publishing 2.0 and why is it great news for writers?

by

Publishing 2.0 is changing the way books are written, published, sold and promoted over the internet utilising Web 2.0 technologies.

Authors can now use these tools to self publish and get their message out there themselves. You do not need a publisher to write and sell your books, and you are not confined anymore by space or somewhere to store your books. You are not confined by price either. Here’s why.

Writing your book has changed

Traditional publishers will assign you an editor and proof-readers, as well as a cover designer and type-setter. They have professionals to do this for you. However, these people also work as freelancers and there are people all over the world who you can employ to do this for you as a self-publisher writer. Sites like http://www.Elance.com and http://www.Guru.com have people who can do these jobs for you so your book is as professional as a “real” publishing house.

The ways of writing have also changed with technology. You can speak your book into a hand-held recorder and send it to a transcriber to put into words, then send that to a freelance editor. You can use a tool like Dragons which turns your words into text as you speak.

You can blog your book now. Write a post every day of 500 words on a related topic and in 6 months you will have substantial book. Setting up a blog is now so easy anyone can do it for free at sites like Blogger.com or WordPress.com.

Printing your book has changed

Print-on-demand (POD) technology is when you load a print-ready file to a POD publisher online. When an order comes in for your book, they print the book and send it to the customer directly. You get a smaller cut of the sale price but you have no stock to store, no postage hassle or costs and no up-front print costs. If you are a self-published author, you have the global rights to your book. You can have multiple POD publishers in order to lower costs from postage e.g. use http://www.Lulu.com in USA and http://www.Pothi.com in India.

Another new technology is the Espresso Book Machine that enables a book to be printed and bound in about 7 minutes. As these machines become cheaper and easier to use, people will be able to download and print books on demand. If you think that these machines could be hooked up to Google Book Search online and print anything, people may print your book just as easily as a traditionally published book.

Alternatively, you don’t have to print your book at all. You can sell it as an ebook on one of the many ebook sites, or from your own website. The pricing of ebooks does vary but the information is still the same and sales are starting to rise. Ebook readers are available in many different formats and with the popularity of the iPhone with Stanza software, most people will soon have ebook readers in their mobile phones.

Selling your book has changed

Online book sales have changed the way people browse and buy books. Even small independent bookstores now have online sales, as well as huge stores like Amazon.com and BN.com. With Print-on-demand technology you can now have your book on these megastores alongside traditionally published books. The page is formatted the same, the availability is the same and to the public, there is no difference. When you have an Amazon page, other online booksellers will also pick up your book for their website so you get even more exposure.

You can also sell your book on your own website using PayPal to take credit card payments globally without the need for a merchant account. You can sell your ebook on Clickbank and have affiliates sell it for you. You can upload your ebook to Kindle so people can read it on Oprah’s favourite ebook reader. You can sell your book on the iPhone through http://www.Smashwords.com

Think bigger than just your local bookstore!

Promoting your book has changed

Traditional publishers have focussed on “in-person” promotion like book signings, book tours and traditional media like newspapers and TV. This is still valid promotion but can cost you time and a lot of money.

Web 2.0 changes the way authors can promote themselves for very little money.
Here are just a few ideas:

* Write a blog about your book so search engines can find you. Include links to Buy your book now.

* Submit press releases online to free (or paid) PR services that are syndicated around the world

*Make a podcast on your book that people can download to hear your voice and get to know you

* Make a video book trailer and post it on YouTube

*Do a virtual book tour and visit websites in countries all over the world

* Submit your book to Google Book Search for even more search engine traffic

*Join general social networking sites and build up a group of people interested in your topic

*Join specific social networking sites for authors or groups about your topic

*Gain a following on Twitter

*Post articles on your topic at article sites with links back to your main site

*Upload your book and author details to Amazon and syndicate your blog there

*Build your email list with a free report and market to your hungry crowd

*Make your own pages on Web 2.0 sites like Squidoo and Hubpages with links to your own website

Publishing 2.0 is the broad term that encompasses all of these new developments. It is the future of publishing and it’s here right now for those authors who go online.

The rise of ebooks: IDPF reports sales up 108% in November

by

The IDPF on January 21 reported ebook sales were up 108% for the month of November, 2008 compared to the same period a year ago. The data is provided in conjunction with surveys conducted by the American Association of Publishers, and represent wholesale sales from only 13 US-based ebook publishers, so total reported sales figures understate actual sales.

For the first eleven months of 2008, ebook sales were up about 64%, according to the IDPF.

Dig beneath the surface, and the numbers are striking. Ebook sales are surging while the entire trade book industry suffers a decline. Are print sales suffering at the hands of ebook sales? Unlikely. Something else is happening.

For the five years between 2002 and 2007 (Click here for data, opens a PDF), overall trade book sales averaged an annual increase of 2.5% (lower than inflation, which means unit sales probably decreased), while ebooks for the same period turned in a 55.7% average annualized increase.

Granted, the robust sales growth for ebooks was off of a tiny base to begin with. But…fast forward to October of 2008, the date for which year-to-date sales are reported on the AAP web site , and you see overall trade book sales for the first 9 months of the year were down 3.4% while ebook sales were up about 58%. So the rate of ebook sales accelerated during the first 9 months of 2008 compared to the previous five years.

More interesting, for the month of October the AAP reported overall trade book sales suffered a 20% drop in the year over year monthly comparison, while ebook sales accelerated to 73% growth.

Numbers for November and December aren’t yet published on the AAP site, though today’s numbers from the IDPF, which are supplied by the AAP, indicated that ebook sales have accelerated yet again, up 108% for November.

As any numbers guy or gal will tell you, it’s easy to show great sales growth when you’re growing off of a small base. But when sales show sequential acceleration off of sequentially increasing bases (meaning, you grow faster as you grow larger), then something really interesting is taking place.

If we conservatively estimate that overall trade sales for 2008 declined 3%, and ebooks sales increased 70%, then wholesale ebook sales will rise to $114 million and overall trade book sales will decline to $24.21 billion. In other words, ebooks will still only represent 1/2 of 1% of book industry sales, at least here in the US.

If you extrapolate the 70% growth for five more years (and I would argue 70% is a relatively conservative number), then ebooks rise to $1.6 billion, and assuming a 2% growth rate of the overall trade book sales to $26.7 billion (generous), ebooks would then represent a respectable 6% of sales.

If you’re attending the Tools of Change conference February 9-11, I invite you to attend a panel I’m moderating entitled, “The Rise of ebooks,” where we’ll explore the past, present and future of ebooks and try to understand the implications of these numbers for publishers and authors alike.

In the meantime, if you’re an author, you need to start exposing your books to the digital realm. Clearly, as the numbers above indicate, you should continue to publish in print because ebook sales will account for only a small percentage of your overall sales. In the years ahead, however, ebooks will become an increasingly important format for book consumption.

Ebooks also give authors the opportunity to dramatically increase their available audience in a short period of time. With our Smashwords ebook distribution deal with Lexcyle the other week, for example, the books of Smashwords authors are now available in the native Stanza catalog. Stanza has been downloaded by approximately one million people to read ebooks on the iPhone and iPod Touch.

As physical book shelves disappear due to bookseller consolidation, authors and publishers need to expand their distribution to digital shelves.

— Mark Coker is founder of Smashwords, a digital publishing platform for self-published ebooks. This post originally appear at http://blog.smashwords.com/2009/01/rise-of-ebooks-idpf-reports-ebook-sales.html

Penguin Says Self-Publishing No Longer A Dirty Word

by

Excerpted from a NY Times Books article entitled “Self-Publishers Flourish as Writers Pay the Tab”:

“Louise Burke, publisher of Pocket Books, said publishers now trawl for new material by looking at reader comments about self-published books sold online. Self-publishing, she said, is “no longer a dirty word.” ”

This bit comes near the end of the article, most of which is about the fact that while mainstream presses are struggling, biz is booming among self-pub providers. The negatively-slanted title is misleading, because the author of the article acknowledges it’s possible to publish on a shoestring when you go POD or e. I think either the author or the paper just went with the most provocative-sounding title possible.

Read the whole article here.

Amazon Marketing Strategies – Tags and Lists

by

Once my novels became available on Amazon.com I ramped up the viral marketing on those Amazon pages in the hope of getting them to show up more often in book searches and hopefully sell more copies. If you want people to know your books are out there, you have to work hard to get them noticed. Probably the two most powerful tools on Amazon for making a book stand out are Tags and Listmania lists.

Tags As you probably know, tagging is the practice of adding keywords to a book that then get caught by searches, like metatags on web pages. Book tags on Amazon can be pretty much anything, but the more often a tag is added to a book, the more likely that book is to show near the top of a keyword search. The real rub is that the tags added by Joe Public get more weight than the tags added by the author or publisher. After all, if tagging is supposed to reflect community impressions, there’s no point in letting the writer or publisher try to sway that opinion.

It’s a good idea to start off by adding all the tags you can think of to your own work, then ask family, friends, your blog readers and so on to go in and add their tags. They can repeat the tags you’ve made, raising the chances of your book being shown in a search for those words, or add new tags of their own. By hitting the ‘T’ key twice on your Amazon page, a quick tag box will appear making it easy for people to add their tags to your book. It only takes a few seconds. An example of the tags section of an Amazon page (after double tapping the ‘T’ key)

Try to encourage people to build up the numbers of existing tags rather than just adding loads more. The more times a book is hit with a particular tag, the more relevant it will appear to Amazon searches.

Listmania This is something for those people with a bit more time to devote to you, which is a big ask. Listmania is like a refined search on Amazon where someone has already gone to the trouble of doing a search and listing the top results. Naturally, they’ve searched with their own bias (and in their own minds) and their tastes shine through any given list, but it’s altogether possible that their tastes and yours will be similar.

Hence, if you search Listmania for “urban fantasy” today you get:

1. Urban and new-age fantasy for chicks

2. Upcoming Urban Fantasy 2008 – Part I

3. Hot Urban Fantasy with Vampires, Shapeshifters, Paranormal & More

4. Urban Fantasy Romance Series

5. Private Investigators and Crime Solvers in Urban Fantasy …and so on.

This is a method that puts similar books with each other and helps to raise any given book’s profile by comparing it to others that people may know. For example, there were a couple of Listmania lists for the original edition of RealmShift that included books like Neil Gaiman’s American Gods. Aside from being very high praise, it gives people the idea that if they enjoyed American Gods, they’ll probably enjoy RealmShift too. It can put your books on a similar standing to something people already know.

If you get your readers to make Listmania lists using this method then your book will crop up in all kinds of searches and be indistinguishable from the other books on that list. If the lists are carefully constructed to appeal to fans of your genre or subject matter, then random sales can occur to people that would never have known your book existed otherwise.

Listmania, like Tags, are far more effective when they’re made by readers rather than by writers or publishers. So try to convince some friends and/or fans to put aside a few minutes and knock up a Listmania or two for your books. They should include your work on a list with a variety of other similar (well known) books. You can learn about Listmania and make a new list by clicking here. These are two very simple tools on Amazon that anyone can use and that can greatly increase the profile of your books.

Alan is an indie author and publisher with two dark fantasy novels in print – RealmShift and MageSign. You can learn all about him at his website.

If Your Book Is Listed On Amazon And You’re Not An Amazon Associate, You’re Throwing Money Away

by

The Amazon Associate program allows anyone with an Amazon account to display ads for Amazon products—like books, for instance—on their websites and earn a commission of 4 – 15% of the total sale anytime one of their site visitors clicks through one of the Amazon ads.

That means that even if your site visitor doesn’t buy the specific item you’ve listed in your Associate ad, you still get a commission on anything else they buy while shopping on Amazon after clicking through your ad.

The minimum commission percentage you earn on each sale is 4% of the price at which the item sold, and it can go all the way up to 15% based on your total quantity of items sold via your associate links in any given month; read more about that at the Associates site (link provided later in this article). Signup is free and setting up the ads is easy.

The real beauty of this program for indie authors and small imprints is that you can set up Associate ads for your own books, and whenever you sell a copy via your Associate ad, you’ll get your author royalty as per usual plus your Amazon Associate commission. Publetarians have even more reason to cheer, because even if you don’t have a website of your own, you can set up Amazon Associate text-only ads right here on Publetariat in your user profile. Let’s get started!

First, you must have an Amazon customer account and have at least one book listed for sale on Amazon. Next, sign up for the Amazon Associates program, here. Once you’re signed up, login to your Associates account. You can use the same link as above to access the Associates home page – bookmark it for future use. Click on the Links & Banners tab. From there, click on Add Product Links Now.

On the Add Product Links page, you can look up your book by keyword, title, ASIN or ISBN.

A list of search results is returned. Click the Get Link button for the product you want in your ad.

 

On the Customize & Get HTML page, select “Text Only (basic display)”, and customize the Link Text if you wish. Changes you make are immediately reflected in the Preview at the right-hand side of the screen and the snippet of HTML code beneath.

 

When everything looks good, highlight and copy the HTML code snippet, then paste the block into Notepad or any other simple text editor program. Do not copy the Product Previews script, which appears beneath the HTML code snippet. Scripts are not supported in your user profile, but the text-only ad will be just fine.

Now, go to your Publetariat user profile (My Account link), click on the Edit tab, and from there click on the Writing link.

 

In the Writing area, scroll down to the appropriate content type for your book: Hard Copy for hard copy books, Electronic for ebooks and Kindle books, Audio for audiobooks and podcasts. Copy the HTML snippet from your text editor and paste it into the box, as shown, then save your changes.

Now click on the View tab of your profile and – presto! A clickable link for site visitors to buy your book on Amazon and give you an extra 2 – 15% commission in the process!