I went with Lulu, a POD (Print on Demand) service for both books because there is no initial investment required (none, only your time) which allows you to make changes and improvements to your book on the fly. I can't tell you how important that is!
Once you've got your book written, edited, formatted and released to the public via Lulu, Lulu (for a fee) will get you into the big online retailers like Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble and a bunch of small ones. I've seen Zero to Superhero in online stores based in Norway (or was in Finland?) and niche online vendors elsewhere in the world.
And you can have it both ways. You can have a conventional run done as well from Lulu (pricier though). It's a win/win.
I probably sound like a pitchman for Lulu, but it's a great service. I can't understand why someone would take a big upfront risk and do a traditional launch without testing the market first (and a POD soft launch is perfect for that). You'd have to be pretty darn sure that you've got pre-built demand for the book, and that your marketing plan is a solid multi-channel one (you'll need that anyway).
Good luck to you.
How do you promote your books? And if you're willing to share: How many have you sold?
To date, I've sold maybe 500-600 of Zero to Superhero, mostly the ebook format. I marketed Zero to Superhero through the website and blog (won't mention the urls because I'm not trying to sell anything), and answered questions on related discussion forums (I put a link to my website in my sig).
The most sucessful of these marketing vehicles was the blog. I "linkbaited' posts I thought were compelling on Digg (which was huge at the time).
Sales for Economtricks, on the other hand, have been quiet. I've sold maybe a dozen. Then again, I never marketed it in any serious way - just a landing page and some SEO.
How much of the potential audience do you think your marketing channel(s) can reach and how high a conversion rate do you expect to get? From that point, how many books do you expect to sell? Only once you have a ball-park figure for the market can you run a title P & L sheet and use it to do what-if modeling considering different printing technologies (POD, conventional offset, or whatever).
Intro to P & L calculations:
http://www.bizmark.net/publishing.htm
Hint: marketing and distribution are key. The distribution tail eats around 60-70% of a conventional publisher's lunch -- the SRP for which books are sold -- and it you don't pay very close attention to your distribution chain you'll run the risk of seeing it eat your profit margin.
(As the old joke puts it, the easiest way to make a small fortune in publishing is to start with a large one.)
Visit : http://www.newselfpublishing.com/ and http://www.newselfpublishing.com/books/PODProfit.html
I would also suggest to go with Lightning Source as your POD provider as most of the big names go to them directly or indirectly (very few people know this and that's the reason you should read that book by Aaron) - Good Luck
Additionally, anyone interested in publishing should probably subscribe to "Book Business" magazine, a free trade publication.
1. EBook or print + eBoook - If you are open to starting out with an ebook only, options get a lot bigger. I'd move beyond Lulu.com and look at http://www.smashwords.com/ and http://www.fastpencil.com// as fast, very affordable alternatives who can also help get your ebook listed at major online sellers. FastPencil can also help with book design and packaging and I believe they can do print books as well.
2. Cover/Jacket Design - Depending how serious you are and what genre the books are in, the cover can become hugely important. Cover design can cost anywhere from a few hundred to thousands, depending on the quality of the designer. I'd do two things. First, just google "book cover designer" or "book jacket design" and you'll find the sites of a bunch of designers with portfolios. Second, go to the bookstore and write down the names of the jacket designers for the books that really jump out at you, then search for them online. You can usually find their names in small print on the bottom of the inside fold of the back cover. Many are findable and will freelance.
3. If You Build It...They'll Rarely Come - Writing the book first, then figuring out you're going to market it after it's done is a giant mistake. Start building your platform, if you haven't already NOW! There is nothing more important (beyond writing a phenomenal book) in making your book succeed than having already developed relationships with a sizable, rabid community of potential readers and second-wave influencers who line up to not only buy your books when they come out, but champion them.
At a bare minimum, for authors these days, that should include a blog, FB fan page, twitter and potentially a 4th community that is topic relevant. And, yes, this is still mandatory for fiction writers today as well. You just have to go about sharing in a different way.
I spent nearly two years just building my online platform before my first book was published, then piled on a bunch of more tactical launch strategies in the months leading to publication. But, truth is, in the end, even that's just kindling designed to build enough momentum to get your book to tip into a word of mouth phenomenon. And, for that to happen, you've also got to write or hire someone capable of writing a fantastic book.
Hope that helps!
Editing costs will depend on how far along the book is. If it needs major structural work or substantive editing, expect to pay more; if you just need copyediting, then you will be able to find it on a fairly reasonable hourly basis. (Many "vanity" POD services like Lulu or Xlibris offer editing services, but you can also find it through other freelancing sources.) Design and layout are also frequently offered by POD services, and Amazon's CreateSpace has pre-made templates you can use.
Kindle/iBooks release as a gauge of interest would depend on your target audience. Who are you trying to reach? If you're looking mostly for tech-savvy early adopters, it's probably useful. If you have a built-in platform already, like Seth Godin, also probably useful. If you are trying to capture a more traditional segment, it may not show you a true indication of potential reach.
You should also state whether you intend to publish solely online or also sell through brick and mortar. The latter makes Lulu a lot less attractive. Otherwise, Lulu are a great choice for an online PoD store.
Another thing to consider is that if this is your first time publishing, you will look a lot less attractive to a publisher in the future, because they can't promote you as a debut author. I have a bookmark about this somewhere, I'm sure, but it's on another computer.
One thing I did for a book done by my brother [1] was to create a quick heroku app that displays a lulu preview, a "buy" button and more informations about the book, on a dedicated domain.
[1] http://www.zoo-imaginaire.com/ french book for kids
That said, I'm a professional editor (as well as writer) who has bid $4,000 or so for a project that sounds similar to what you describe (though that was a full-length book). I'm an eensy bit well-known ::cough:: so I expect you can pay less; depending on the expertise of the book editor, you might need to pay more. (And I'm too busy right now, so that's not an offer of assistance -- just a ballpark number.)
I'd be happy to offer you a free trial subscription.
Also, I'm a co-founder of Fifobooks.com, so please consider selling your ebooks there (we're non-exclusive, so you can still try Lulu or Amazon, but we give you a higher percentage of every sale).
EDIT: It looks like the same is the case with fifobooks.com. It asks me to fill in tax and payment information before I can publish a book. I understand it must be a legal requirement, but I think it's a bad idea to not even let the user see what you are able to provide them. At least let me go through the process to see how you process my book. Then don't publish it until I give you the necessary details. Seriously, I think this is a really bad user experience.
I do intend to charge for it, though I may have to experiment with the pricing.
As for Fifobooks, we need that info b/c of taxes we file on your behalf if you sell anything.
It's difficult to ask that after the fact, since there's no way of knowing if you'd provide it (and FWIW, it's the same setup as the iphone app store).
(Disclaimer: I used to work with with Henry at Lulu, and he is a friend. This plug was not solicited by him however, and I have no financial interest in publishandsell.com)