Kobo e-book retailer is currently developing new expanded author services for its self-publishing platform Kobo Writing Life (KWL). In a posting on the KWL blog on Monday, the e-book retailer explained a new feature that had appeared for authors on their account dashboards:

Many of you have noticed a new “Author Services” tab popped up in your dashboard. This is a project we’ve been working towards for several years: offering a list of recommended professional services – cover design, editorial help, print on demand, and more – that we trust and believe offer good value for independent authors. When possible, we’ll negotiate a great discount so you’ll get more for your money.

The proposed new expanded services will include editing, print on demand, ISBN purchase and cover design, but the services will be outsourced from a recommended list of service providers. Kobo has already agreed a partnership with Publishers Weekly which will allow authors to submit their books for professional reviews.

At the moment Kobo is gauging author feedback on its proposed new author services, but it’s still unclear which services will be introduced or where they will be sourced from.

For the moment, we’re in Phase 1 of the project: measuring your interest in each service, so we can prioritize which opportunities are most important to our authors. Please feel free to go and click on which service or opportunity you’d like to see us focus on first. Don’t see what you want? Choose “Tell Us More” and tell us all about it.

Certainly, there is a growing demand from authors to have as many services available as possible from the one platform and management dashboard.