Think of the index as a roadmap for your book. Just as a roadmap gives you directions to reach your destination, an index gives you information in the form of headings, subheadings, and cross-references to answer your questions or help provide knowledge.

A Table of Contents will provide a quick overview of your book; but, an index will identify all important terms, concepts, and ideas and put them in an easy-to-use alphabetical format at the back of the book.

Indexes enhance sales and revenue for books. Readers who are happy with your book are more likely to purchase future editions.

A professional indexer will work with the author and publisher to create an index that reaches the target audience for your book. By identifying your target audience, the indexer is able to use terms and phrases well suited for the knowledge and experience level of your readers.

A professional indexer uses software specially designed to create indexes. Many word-processing software programs can automatically generate an index. However, this index is usually a string of page references that many times doesn’t help the reader in his or her search. Would you rather have this:

FBI, 3, 8, 24, 35, 42, 45, 60, 128

Or this:

FBI

Cold War and, 42, 45

history of, 3, 8

Hoover’s involvement with, 24, 128

qualifications necessary for joining, 35, 60

A reader who uses the automatically generated index to learn about “joining the FBI” will waste time looking on pages 3, 8, 24, 42, 45, and 128. However, the professionally created index directs them immediately to pages 35 and 60.

Lastly, a professional indexer is available to update your index should you have revisions, deletions, or additions to your text. The dedicated indexing software helps make these corrections and additions a seamless, easily completed task.

The following indexes were written by Ferreira Indexing:

Download sample pages in .pdf format for some of our recent projects:

Upper Respiratory System Surgery Sample Index

Caregiving Sample Index

Dentistry Sample Index

Pet Care Sample Index

The index often contains various levels of subheadings. These allow the reader to refine their search from a very general topic to a more specific discussion about that topic. For example, if we wanted to learn more about “Arteries of the Heart,” we could look up the general term “Arteries.” However, a more time-efficient method would be to look up the subheading “arteries” under the discussion of “Heart”:

Heart, 209-235
arteries of, 209, 215, 222
conduction system of, 236, 259
shape of, 89, 102

This refined search has helped us quickly find the information we were searching for rather than reading the entire chapter from pages 209 to 235.

The toughest job for an indexer is knowing what information NOT to include in the index. Most books are filled with thousands and thousands of words. If an indexer is not selective, the index could end up being as large as the book. A good indexer sifts through these thousands and thousands of words to find the terms, concepts, and ideas important to your students, colleagues, and lay audience.

It sounds complicated, but it’s not.

Publishers like XML indexing because it saves them time and money. Costly revisions to the index are avoided because new text is given new coding. These new codes do not change the existing coding.

XML indexing does require more work by the indexer. Rates are usually higher for these projects because every element in the book (e.g., paragraphs, headings, tables, figures, boxes) needs a separate code.

Confused? Give us a call, and we’ll answer any questions you have.

We have specialty software to convert your old index into a workable index file. From there, we will update the old index to match the new edition.

Although rates can vary, they are usually 40-50% cheaper than creating a completely new index.

To get started, we’ll need a couple of things: (1) an editable PDF, text, or Word file; (2) a PDF copy of the new edition; (3) a hard copy of the last edition; and (4) a due date.

It’s that simple.

• Medical indexing, including cardiology, pharmacology, psychiatry, rheumatology, ophthalmology, oncology, plastic surgery, hematology,  general surgery, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology, and many other subspecialties

• Nursing

• Dentistry

• Legal indexing

• Pet care

• History

• Guide books

• Outdoor recreation, such as mountaineering, canoeing, fishing, hiking, and climbing

• Test-preparation manuals for high school and college

• Speech therapy

• Psychology

• Sociology

• Forensics

• Resource conservation

• Economics

• Oil and gas drilling

• Pollution prevention

• Hazardous waste management

• Indexing Specialties
• Updating An Existing Index
• XML Indexing

Q: Isn’t the Table of Contents the same as the Index?

A: No. Although similar, the Table of Contents gives the reader a general overview of the book, whereas the Index identifies specific terms, concepts, and elements within the book that the reader cannot easily find. If you rely solely on the Table of Contents, your reader will have to hunt and peck through the book looking for important information.

Q:  Can’t I create the index using my word processing software’s index creation feature?

A: Yes, you could. However, these index creation tools often search for pre-determined keywords and list EVERY page number the keyword appears on.  This creates a long string of numbers that often frustrate readers who may be searching for a specific discussion about the keyword. A professional indexer will also find the important keywords but will add subheadings to help your reader find the discussion relevant to them.

For example

(a)  FBI, 3, 14, 20, 25, 45, 48, 62, 65

or

(b) FBI

history of, 3, 14

Hoover’s involvement with, 20, 25

reports by, 62, 65

scandals involving, 45,48

Q: How long does it take to create an index?

A: It depends on the page count of the book and on the density of the text. Books less than 500 pages usually take approximately 10-12 days; those 500 pages and higher usually take 14-21 days. If you’ve got less time than that, give us a call, and we can discuss our rates for RUSH jobs.

Q: Do I need all of the book pages ready to start the indexing process?

A: No. We can get started on your book with as little as one chapter. We just need a schedule from you letting us know when the remaining chapters will be available.

Q: Can you use PDFs instead of paper pages?

A: Yes. You can either send us your PDFs through e-mail, or we can download them from a FTP site.

If you have trouble using this form or additional questions, you can email mferria [at] flash.net, or call us at (760) 744-1445.