The Author-izer

Posts Tagged ‘bookmarketing’

These are my links for February 11th from 08:14 to 16:49:

• Independent Book Publishers Association – Member Benefits –
• Planned Television Arts –
• Virtual Author’s Assistant course $499 –
• Elgan: Here comes the e-book revolution –
• Seeking book endorsements may cause nausea, shortness of breath « Online Community Strategist –
• PR-USA.net – Top 5 Self-Publishing Authors Earn $60,000 in 4th Quarter Royalties from Outskirts Press – That's an average of $12,000 each–much higher than your usual self-published book, but probably not enough to let you quit your day job.
• Be a Ghostwriter — Welsh Scribe –

These are my links for February 1st through February 3rd:

• Book Marketing Maven: 12 Ways to Keep Your Nonfiction Book in the News –
• iPods and iPhones: death for the book trade – IPHONETOUCH.BLORGE –
• U.S. Copyright Office – Forms –
• Grasping for the Book Marketing | The Crotchety Old Fan –
• Ghostwriting Uncovered – How To Become A Ghostwriter –
• The Write Place –

These are my links for January 14th through January 17th:

• January 29—How to Lasso Amazon and Make it Do Tricks»Arizona Book Publishing Association –
• Author shares tips on getting your writing published – Phoenix Arizona news, breaking news, local news, weather radar, traffic from ABC15 News | ABC15.com –
• Ghostwriting, Social Media and Ethics | Marketing Profs Daily Fix Blog –
• ISTC – International Standard Text Code –
• Are publishers still acquiring books? The answer is YES –
• An Autopsy of the Book Business – The Daily Beast –

These are my links for January 3rd through January 8th:

• iUniverse Bookstore Premier Pro offer –
• John Kremer’s Birthday Bash January 16 at 5 PM Pacific –
• iUniverse Launches Bookstore Premier Pro publishing package –
• A Splash of Color for Your Whitepapers –
• How Commenting Can Lead to Book Sales « Book Marketing Buzz –

These are my links for December 24th through January 1st:

• The right way and the wrong way to approach publicists « Book Marketing Buzz –
• Self-Published Book Distributors – Compilation from SpeakerNet News
• The Writers’ Union of Canada : Ghost Writing –
• ‘Plug Your Book!’: Steve Weber’s free online book marketing guide is Amazon-centric—but still useful | TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home –
• Publishize – The Book That Explains How You Can Quickly and Affordably Self-Publish a Book That Promotes Your Expertise – What a gruesome title

These are my links for December 14th through December 19th:

• Bestseller -
• Book Publishing’s Month of the Long Knives « Future Perfect Publishing -
• When PR Ghostwriters Get Busted « THE SAME ROWDY CROWD -
• Social Media for Small Business ebook: Microsoft Office Live Small Business -
• Google Settles Book Suits to Expand Online Publishing -

These are my links for December 14th from 18:44 to 19:04:

• Amazon Windowshop Beta -
• With Big Exception, Trade Sales Slowed in September   – 11/5/2008 7:57:00 AM – Publishers Weekly -
• Digital Textbooks Gaining Favor – BusinessWeek -
• AdaptiveBlue’s Book Widgets -
• Digital Publishing Solutions – Electronic Publishing Software -
• Cover That Book: Bestselling Book Cover System -
• Write To Your Market :: Marketing copywriting and bestselling book covers -
• Random House to digitize thousands of books – USATODAY.com -
• Book Publishers, Book Publishing, Self Publishing Companies, Print on Demand Publishing – Home -
• The Book Connection — Your Link to Publishing Professionals and Trade Quality Books -
• Book Marketing Maven: eZines for Authors -

These are my links for December 5th through December 13th:

• Wyeth’s Use of Medical Ghostwriters Questioned – NYTimes.com -
• scott westerfeld – ghostwriting -
• Learn to Write Fiction » Blog Archive » Book Marketing 2.0 -
• Give the gift of publishing from iUniverse – For the first time ever, gift buyers can purchase any iUniverse publishing package as gifts for the aspiring authors in their lives.
• Successful Self-Publishing: Cooking with Trader Joe’s -

No, really. Nancy Fulton asked �Do you know how to publish a profitable book (and get it on Amazon) in days?� on LinkedIn. She was hoping for additions to a list of POD she had in a blog post on HubSpot that�s no longer available (I�ve made the publish date of this post the date that I answered the original question, but it�s really September 2009 as I type this).

There was a point I made in my response that I think it�s worth making again here:

The process of getting a book printed is very simple these days. Profiting, on the other hand, is more challenging, because of the increase in the number of books printed: there�s a lot of competition for readers. And even though producing a book through, say, Lulu, costs very little, there are still enough costs associated with making the book publishable (your time in writing it, hiring an editor, hiring a designer) that you�ll need to sell quite a few copies in order to realize a profit from book sales.

On the other hand, if having that book gets you $50,000 of new business in the next year, it could be very profitable even if you give copies away.

In any case, profit doesn’t depend on how you publish, but on the quality of the book and�much more�your own marketing skills.

It�s also worth mentioning the Best Answer for this question, provided by Inna Red. Authors who use a POD house like Lulu or Amazon�s own BookSurge automatically get their books on Amazon, but if you print your books yourself, you need to sign up with Amazon.com Advantage or Amazon.com Advantage Professional, depending on the type of books you produce.

A colleague recently put this question in the bluntest of terms: “If publishers won’t promote your book and they take a huge percentage, what exactly do they do for the author?”

I wouldn’t say that publishing houses won’t promote your book, but first-time authors get a very small piece of the marketing pie—and publishers have smaller marketing budgets than they used to. They have smaller everything budgets than they used to, which means less personal attention, and that’s one reason someone could legitimately ask “Well, what good are they, then?”

Another reason is the increasing availability of print-on-demand technology and self-publishing resources. No longer does a would-be self publisher have to start a publishing business and spend thousands of dollars to get into print. Authors have more options than they did 20 years ago.

For many non-fiction authors (and even some novelists), self-publishing and POD are valid options. There’s no question that authors who use these methods of publishing get to keep more of the book’s cover price. And there are still a number of small, independent presses out there who provide more support to their authors because they take on only a few books each year. But there are still some advantages to getting your book published by one of the giants.

They Know What Sells

Before you can get your book published, you have to submit a proposal with an outline of your book and a marketing plan. Acquisitions editors at the big houses know what’s selling and what isn’t. If you get repeated rejections that all cite the same problems, it’s a sign that you need to retool your idea before you go to all the trouble of writing the book. And if they accept your proposal, it’s because they believe there’s a large enough market for your book to justify their investment in producing it.

They Pay in Advance

Admittedly, the advance you get for your first book isn’t likely to allow you to quit your day job, since it’s likely to be in the low five figures. And it doesn’t arrive the minute you sign the contract, either. But that money can cover many of the costs associated with writing and marketing the book, such as travel for research, a local direct mail campaign, or the services of a ghostwriter.

They Have More Resources

When you self-publish or use a POD house, you have to locate, and pay for, all kinds of professionals, or spend extra time doing the many jobs of publishing yourself. You may be the top expert in your field and a good writer on top of it, but creating a book also requires copyediting, book design, typesetting (though no actual type is involved anymore), proof reading, and cover art, among other things. Large publishers already have all these people either on staff or working for them as contractors, and they’ve had decades to learn things like which fonts are most readable and how much white space you need on a page.

Many POD houses offer editing, book layout, and cover design services, but they charge you for them. If you’re truly self-publishing, you have to find and pay all these people yourself, in addition to your actual printing and shipping costs. (And much as I admire self-publishing guru Dan Poynter, I don’t hold with his theory that you can use clip art for your book cover and still look professional.)

They Get You into Bookstores

Very few self-published authors can get their books onto the shelves of large chain bookstores like Barnes and Noble and Borders. These companies have strict policies about which distributors they deal with and require return policies which no sane person would stand for.

And, of course, if a chain won’t carry your book, it’s not likely you’ll be able to hold an author event there. What’s more, the publisher takes care of shipping extra copies of your book to the store when you do the signing, so you don’t have to drag books around with you. (You do have to notify them that you’re doing the event and ask them to send the books.)

Publishers also have booths at major publishing conventions like Book Expo America. Your book might not get star billing, but they’ll be pushing all their new titles.

So yes, traditional publishers do still provide their authors with valuable services. And the “huge percentage” they take rarely amounts to a huge profit: it goes to covering their very considerable costs in preparing, printing, and distributing your book (not to mention offering those killer return policies to the bookstores). Despite the increasing ease and respectability of self-publishing, pitching your book to Random House or HarperCollins may still be your best option.