Do You Want to Write a Book? (Traditional Publishing Vs Self Publishing)
By Amber Lisa Maiden
Do you want to write (and sell) a book? Well you’re not alone. There are literally millions of us out there who want to (and now, due to technology) we actually can. The good news? If you want to write a book, yay! Whoever you are, it is now quite possible, (and in the case of the e-book-easy) to write and actually publish a real book! Hooray!
The Bad News
The bad news… the technology is moving so fast that the book as we know it is quickly becoming obsolete! (That hasn’t happened yet, but, you best believe that in the next twenty or so years, paper books will be a thing of the past.) The other bad news? There are millions of us (really good writers out there blogging, publishing traditional books and e-books) so the competition (if you are hoping to make a buck off of your writing) is ferocious. The even more bad news? The publishing industry is in such a state of transition and confusion, that getting a book deal from a traditional publisher, (if you’re a first time author) is nearly impossible. But here’s some good news: there are other options. Self-publishing is quickly becoming one of the best!
The Good News
I personally think, (given the state of the publishing industry) self-publishing is the way to go. Let’s take a look at why traditional publishing is such a limited option for first time authors.
The Deal with Traditional Publishers
Traditional publishers hate first time authors. They consider them a huge risk, so it takes anywhere from two to five years to even get a deal with a traditional publisher.
What They Do
Once you get a deal, the advances for first-time authors are really small: $1000 to $10,000. Once they pay you that advance, the traditional publisher takes ownership over certain parts of the publishing process: they will edit the book, they will format the book, they will title the book, they will have their designers design a cover for the book, they will print a certain number of copies of the book, and they will be responsible for distribution of the book. (Distribution is a huge part of the publishing process.) While traditional publishers will take on a limited amount of marketing for the book, they still expect the author to do most of the marketing for it. (Marketing makes or breaks the book. It’s also the most expensive and time-consuming part of the publishing process.) Finally, if you can’t sell a certain amount of books, (typically 25,000) in a certain amount of time, (typically three months), a traditional publisher will consider your book a failure. They won’t be offering you any additional book deals.
What it Costs
The down side to going with a traditional publisher? You lose control of your book. You no longer own the book, you share the rights to the book with a publisher, who is going to make the most profit off the book. And, with a traditional publishers, this is understandable because they are bearing a greater amount of risk in the publishing process. They take on all the costs of publishing the book, from editing to marketing, and quite honestly all of that stuff is pretty expensive. Due to technology, these costs have gone down. But anything that requires live human effort: (editing, book formatting, cover design, distribution, marketing) is going to be expensive.
Why They Do It
So, why do they do it? Why do publishers take the risk? Well, much like everyone else looking to make a buck in the entertainment industry, publishers are looking for the next big thing. And, in order to get it, the will act like bullies. If your book becomes a huge commercial success, publishers will bully you into playing by their rules. Even if your work doesn’t become a huge commercial success, publishers will still bully you into playing by their rules. Once they pay you that advance, they really want you to dance to their music. They push you to sell the book on their terms, not your own. They expect you to invest in your own marketing. (I’ve known authors who spent over $20,000 on marketing, when they only got a $5000 advance. That just doesn’t make any sense to me!) But, they did it because they were pressured into it by the publisher. After all the money these authors spend on marketing, the publisher makes the most off of every book sold. Most authors with traditional publishers only get $1 to $2 per a book in royalties, some times even less than that. So, if you’re thinking of pursuing a traditional deal with a traditional publishing house, just remember, all that glitters is not gold.
The Deal with Self-Publishers
Now, let’s compare traditional publishing to self-publishing.
What They Do
With self-publishing the author does and pays for everything themselves: editing, formatting, ISBN purchase, cover design, printing, distribution, marketing… all of it.
What it Costs
It used to be nearly impossible to do this without a huge investment of time and money, (at least $25,000) but now, publishing your own book is much more affordable due to advances in publishing technology (Print on Demand) technology and E-book technology, for starters. It’s still not cheap – well it can be, if you eliminate certain steps. But if you do that, you’ll probably end up with a crappy book that won’t really sell. So what’s the point? (If you hope to make money.) To do it right, you do need to spend some money, but it is something that is within reach for most professional people. (You can probably publish a print book for about $5,000 to $10,000, and you can follow up with an e-book version for a few hundred more dollars.)
Why They Do It
So after you go through all of these steps, and pay for all of this money for various services, what’s the benefit? You completely own and control the work. All of the profits from the book will be yours and yours alone. If you build a substantial platform (and audience for your book and future books). (For more on platforms, check out my article on Publisher’s Weekly), you can actually expect to recoup your initial investment of $5,000 to $10,000 and begin making a profit- your own profits for you to keep- on your book! These days, traditional publishers won’t even look at authors who can’t prove that they can move 100,000 books.
Here’s my question: If you can move 100,000 books, why do you even need a traditional publisher? I guess for the wider distribution. I decided to go the self-publishing route, because I wondered if traditional publisher doesn’t invest much in marketing, and they want you to build your audience before they sign you – what are they doing exactly for you (the author) exactly? Yes, it’s true they do pay for many different aspects that go into creating a print book – editing, formatting, cover-design, etc. But is that worth all of the rights and control and profit that you, as the writer, give up to the traditional publisher? I don’t think so! It just didn’t make sense to me, to give up control of my book if my publisher would require me to invest so much of my own money into it anyway. I figure, just go all out and pay for all of it. History shows that self publishers who have done that, and have made it big on their own terms had the traditional publishers coming after them. At that point, they could negotiate on their own terms. When and if that happens, to you, as an author, you must be very careful. Always remember traditional publishers want to get as much work out of you and money from your book, while paying you the smallest percentage of profits that they possibly can.
So, after researching the traditional publishing industry, I decided, I just didn’t want to go that route. I decided that I wanted to self-publish, simply because I wanted to be in control of the product, by selling it on my own terms, my own way. I’ve done my research and I’ve finally decided on how to go about self-publishing my own book. But, I haven’t actually done it yet. (I’m still in the process.) I purchased a publishing package from Lulu, a print on demand publisher. (POD) I decided on Lulu, because honestly, there are very few reputable “self-publishing” companies who will actually allow you to “self-publish.” Out of all of the self-publishing companies out there: Lulu is one of the biggest and arguably cheapest, though, probably not the best. But they have a fairly good relationship with Amazon…and that is key in the world of book publishing.
Oh that Vanity! (Watch Out for Scamming Vanity Presses)
Most of the so called “self-publishing” companies are vanity presses, who do everything that a traditional publisher does, (including con you out of your rights to the your book) and to add insult to injury… they make you pay for everything! (And I do mean everything, editing, book-formatting, cover design, distribution, marketing.) What happens with a lot of vanity presses, is that they make you spend thousands of dollars on these services, which they do not perform all that well. I actually had an author complain about how, after a $4000 edit, her manuscript came back from a vanity press editor with even more errors! Not only did she end up editing her manuscript herself, she even had to fix the errors the vanity press made! What a clever scam! You pay for everything. You clean up the messes! You lose all of your rights! You end up paying thousands of dollars in time and money trying to buy your work back from the horrid vanity press. That’s why vanity publishing is such a dirty word in the publishing industry.
Amazon is King!
In my next article, I’ll go into more details on which vanity presses to avoid, and why. Also, sooner or later we are going to have to discuss the beast that is Amazon. Right now, AMAZON IS KING, not only in the book-selling world, but also, in retail as well. As a result, as most Kings do, Amazon has everyone frightened: traditional publishers, booksellers, (Amazon took Borders out!), writers… Amazon is pretty much feared by all in the publishing world at this point. Why? Because you really can’t publish without Amazon… not if you hope to do it effectively… and so… Amazon knowing this… power trips! But anyway, more on all of that later. For now, if you’re thinking about publishing a book, I say, go for it! If you simply want to publish an e-book, that can be done for hundreds, instead of thousands of dollars. (More on that later.) And, if you need help with any part of the self-publishing process, remember, that’s what I’m here for! Remember my motto: read, write and relax!