Quote:
Originally Posted by Steven Lake
I did self publishing to start, but quickly found out that it just doesn't work. You really need the power of a publisher behind you to get anywhere. And I'm not saying that others couldn't get somewhere by themselves doing self publishing, but the experience of a publisher will get you into a lot more places. Especially if your publisher cares about you like mine does.  |
Well, I won't diss real publishing. (As I said, I am only looking at self-publishing for certain things that I wrote specifically for it. May main career is all traditional.) But I do know a few people who are doing well. All of them, so far, however, have already proven themselves in the traditional publishing world. Also, they often have some kind of editorial or design experience, or they hire professionals, so that their covers look good and their books are well edited.
I assume that support is what you mean by the power of a real publisher. People overlook the importance of real editing and book design. And for paper, the power of a real publisher in getting distribution is critical. You've GOT to get an attractive product in front of the audience.
But so far nearly everyone I've met who actually has much in the way of self-published sales are having their success with inexpensive ebooks, not paper, and most publishers seem to be falling down on the job on marketing ebooks. They don't price them well at all, and they just depend on the traditional book channels to do the work of marketing.
But.... I think those successes are still pretty rare, too. But that's a part of my experiment. Things are growing and changing so fast, it's really hard to see what is really going on.