Category: editing

Writing Professionalism: Learning from Criticism

Handling criticism is challenging no matter the situation, but it can be especially difficult when coming from a client. Dealing with feedback and suggestions from clients can be viewed as a great opportunity to grow and improve.

Growing through Criticism

Criticism helps uncover blind spots. Habits become deeply ingrained over time and are often hard to change. An outside perspective shows where the weak areas are and where we need to improve our skills, whether that be writing, design, editing, or communication. When you receive feedback, especially if on the same topic from multiple clients, take it to heart and work on further developing that skill.

Criticism pushes you to challenge yourself. It can be easy to fall into the trap of reproducing something you know does well without working to be more creative, innovative, or aware of trends. Extending yourself to meet a clients needs encourages you to try new things and learn more skills, which will increase your chance at success in growing your business.

Criticism helps you develop communication skills. When conflict or problems arise, the issue must be dealt with using professional communication. Talking through problems and issues will benefit you with every new client if you learn from each discussion. If you find yourself having the same communication issues, make note and better prepare for the next client by addressing the issue sooner in the process.

Criticism provides outside motivation. When a client wants something out of your comfort zone or skillset, push yourself to learn about a new topic or develop a new skill. This is increase your value to clients and boost your reputation for being adaptable.

Criticism also provides a lesson on humility. You’re not always right and learning from others helps you grow and improve in many areas.

The Subjective Nature of Criticism

Remember that art, in all its forms, is subjective. Just because a client wants something different that you do doesn’t make them wrong. Accept that they come from a different viewpoint or life experience and are trying to communicate that through a story or design. Dismissing the client’s ideas is dismissing them as a person.

Taking criticism with a positive attitude can help you see the project from a new perspective. Critique of a project is exactly that. It’s not a critique of you personally. Not taking criticism personally is difficult, but practicing this perspective helps remove you from the criticism and keeps the focus on the success of the project.

It can be helpful to rewrite a client’s comments and replace any pronouns with the name of the book or “project.” This provides added distance and lessens the potential sting of feeling personally rejected.

Learning from Criticism

Take note of criticism from clients and analyze what it it really saying.

Do you need to update your skills or expand your knowledge base? Are you familiar enough with genre conventions or tropes? Are there too many similarities between projects? Does your wording or editing suggestions seem repetitive?

If you are getting the same feedback from multiple clients, it’s highly likely that you need to make an adjustment or work work on improvement in a specific area. Having this pointed out can be difficult, but it will ultimately make you a better writer, editor, or designer.

Focus on not making the same mistakes twice.

Writing Professionalism: Avoiding Miscommunication

Much of client work happens virtually, increases the chances of miscommunication due to a lack of verbal cues, delays in communicating, differences in communication styles, and more. Consider these tactics for avoiding miscommunication when working with clients.

Asking Questions

Missing information, assuming understanding, and differences in connotation are just some of the ways misunderstandings can occur when working with clients. Asking clarifying questions is an important method of avoiding these pitfalls.

Never guess at what your client wants if the original project proposal or material is unclear. Clients may not have a full picture of what they want out of a project or what type of editing they might need. In order to fill in any gaps, ask specific questions about anything you feel is unclear. Moving forward on faulty assumptions leads to rewrites/redos and delays.

With a book cover design project, you may need to discuss the tone and genre and what current trends are to flesh out what the client wants. With editing, discuss what the client feels are the main weaknesses or what they need the most help with. If character development of improving storytelling is needed, that is more of a developmental edit while cleaning up typos and misplaced commas is more in line with a proofread.

If information is missing from a project plan, politely ask for clarification or for the client to provide the information that is lacking. If the information is missing because the client is unsure of the answer, discuss elements of the missing information by asking specific questions, such as where a book might be located in a physical bookstore if the genre or subgenre is unclear.

If a client wants you to fill in any gaps on your own, first suggest ideas or propose a specific path before moving forward. A client may be unsure of what they want, but they are often quite sure of what they don’t want when it is presented.

Paraphrase and Summarize

After a clarifying discussion, it is important to paraphrase and summarize the information discussed in order to make sure both parties understand what was discussed and what the conclusions are.

If you discussed project details or story elements, take a moment at the end of the conversation to summarize the topics discussed and what decisions were made in your own words. This makes sure you and the client are on the same page about what was discussed and how you will move forward.

Summarizing and paraphrasing the information helps prevent communication errors due to lack of nonverbal language, misunderstood humor, differences in connotations, etc. This tactic also shows the client that you were making a solid effort to understand what he or she wants and that you are truly listening. Making a client feel heard and understood helps build a stronger relationship.

Following Up

Miscommunication can also arise from lack of timely follow up. Not hearing back from a provider can cause a client to doubt that he or she understood the plan and create a sense of anxiety and overthinking or frustration.

Do not leave clients waiting for a response or a follow up on decisions made. Respond quickly with a thorough response or an update on your progress. Of course, delays do happen at times, but it is still important to communicate any delays to the client. If you are unable to fully respond in the moment, acknowledge that you received their message or email and give a specific time when you will be able to follow up.

When a client asks questions, be sure to answer each one fully. Answering some questions but not others or only partially answering a question makes a client feel they are not valued and creates confusion. If there are multiple questions to respond to, it can be helpful to reply by copy/pasting the questions into your reply and addressing them one by one.

After answering all questions, ask the client if everything is clear and invite him or her to follow up with any additional questions or clarification on any of the answers. Including the client in the process of clarification not only improves communication, but also shows that you value their input and insights, improving the overall relationship.

The process of clarifying a client’s needs can be a lengthy process, but it will improve the overall chances of success on the project and the relationship with the client.

Effective Outlining: Learning from the Outline

During the outlining process, take note of inconsistencies, missing information, and dangling plotlines. These are opportunities to improve the structure, characters, flow, or pacing of the story and should not be ignored.

Consider these questions while outlining and address each one before completing the outline:

  • Do any scenes present an idea that is left hanging?
  • Do any scenes need a bridge to improve the flow?
  • Are any scenes redundant or irrelevant?
  • Are there any plot holes?
  • Are any hints or questions left unanswered?
  • Are any character arcs left unfulfilled?
  • Does the ending provide a satisfying conclusion?
  • Are there any lagging sections where there is little to no progress?

Just as a story takes multiple drafts before reaching completion, so should an outline. Review the first draft of an outline for the issues mentioned above and rework those areas that aren’t working.

And remember…

Outlines should act as a guide, not a box.

Outlining is a great tool for developing all the big-picture aspects of the story, but the process should still leave room for flexibility while writing. The end goal is a great story, not a perfectly followed outline.

Indie Author Basics: Marketing

Whether an author hires out marketing duties or takes them on personally, it’s important to understand the basics.

Word of Mouth

Achieving good word of mouth requires having a professional, high quality product.

Word of mouth is still the best way to sell anything because the recommendation is coming from someone the person likes and trusts.

To get good word or mouth for your books, you need a professional, high quality product. Make sure your editing is clean and the book cover does not look homemade.

You should also actively encourage readers to share your book and talk about it publicly. This can be accomplished through street teams, contests that require sharing a post or writing a review, or putting a reminder the back matter of the book.

Social Media

Post on your social media platforms regularly to keep people engaged. Utilize a mix of informational, funny, promotional, or talking point types of posts.

Utilize social media ads to sell directly to interested readers who already like/follow you. You can also target lookalike audiences of similar authors and unique to reach new customers.

Free/Paid advertising

Free advertising options including posting to book-related Facebook groups (there are tons of these), newsletter swaps, blogging, creating Pinterest boards for your books or characters, and adding books to book sites like My Book Cave and Goodreads.

Paid advertising options include social media ads (pretty much all platforms are willing to take your money in the form of ads hosting), Amazon ads, book-related paid newsletters like FreeBooksy or BookBub, print ads in literary magazines or your local newspaper or circular, sponsorships, and paid online takeovers and parties.

DON’T pay for reviews, ever! It’s against retailers’ terms of service and you can be penalized. Paying a fee to have your book listed in a review catalogue is okay because you are not paying for individual reviews, just the listing.

Networking/Collaborating

Collaborate with other authors to expand your reach.
Photo by fauxels on Pexels.com

Get involved with group promos and events with other authors. You can usually find out about these by joining online authors groups like Alessandra Torre Inkers. These types of collaborations expands your reach and allows you to share fans with and of other authors.

Copywriting

Learn to write engaging ad copy and book cover copy in order to catch the interest of readers. Blurb writing is challenging, and can be hired out if you don’t feel comfortable writing in short form.

Test different ads through A/B testing and determine what type of wording and what styles work best with your audience. Update your ads often because tastes change frequently. Study blurbs for books in your genre to learn more about the style and conventions readers will look for.

Use professional graphics (Pixabay, Canva, Deposit Photos) in all promotional material. DO NOT pull images from a Google search, because the may be copyrighted and you could end up with legal action and fines. There are plenty of free options out there, like Pixabay, if you’re on a tight budget. The same rules apply to music if you post videos.

Planning

Plan according to the amount of time you can realistically put toward marketing.

Determine how much time you REALISTICALLY have each week to put toward marketing, and build your marketing plan around that. Set daily, weekly, monthly tasks AND stick to them. Good things to include are social media posts, submitting books to newsletters, reviewing and updating ads, and engaging with readers.

Plan major campaigns (new releases, holidays, etc.) at least a month in advance, more if possible. Holidays need advanced planning more than almost anything else because newsletter slots will fill up quickly and ad costs may be higher than usual. Bloggers are also much busier and so are readers.

Ideas for major campaigns include hosting virtual parties, running giveaways, participating in takeovers or having other authors takeover your pages (especially popular on Instagram lately), running sales on your books, or hosting a live or online event to celebrate new releases or writing milestones.

Host an online or in-person event to celebrate new releases or writing milestones.

Indie Author Basics: Production Costs

What does it cost to be an indie author? It’s question many new writers want to know. When you take on the production cost of a book, you need to know where those costs will fit into your budget.

***Quick note to say I will be moving my weekly posts to Tuesdays***

Editing

The cost of editing depends on what type of editing you need for your project.

Developmental editing is the most involved and the most expensive. A developmental editor will help you work out problems with the story/characters and help improve the flow and style . It will cost you about $0.08/word or $20/page.

Copyediting is less involved and doesn’t dig into story or character problems. It mainly deals with improving sentence structure and readability, as well as generally tightening up the writing. It will cost you about $0.02/word or $5/page.

Proofreading in the least involved and least expensive, but requires the writer (or a previous round of editing) to have cleaned up the manuscript as much as possible. Proofreading aims to catch typos and punctuation errors, not fix major issues. It will cost you about $0.01/word, $3/page.

Cover Design

The cost depends on whether you want an ebook cover only, a full wrap cover for a paperback, or both, as well as whether you want a customer cover (with stock or exclusive photos) or a premade cover.

Premade covers are the least expensive option, but offer the least ability to customize. Most quality premades are in the $30-$50 range. Most premades are only ebook covers, but many designers offer an add on option to turn it into a full wrap if you need it.

Stock photos in a custom cover will be less expensive than using exclusive photos. Custom covers are usually in the $50-$150 range for ebook covers and you can plan to add another $30-$50 to add a full wrap to the package. The range has to do with how many photos are need for the cover. More photos means more cost.

Exclusive images guarantee no one else will have your same cover, but you’ll pay for that privilege. Plan on $500 and up for a custom photo shoot.

Formatting

Formatting for ebooks and paperbacks can be learned by those with knowledge of Word or the willingness to learn software like Jutoh, Kindle Create, or Calibre. InDesign is a professional level software that has a steep learning curve, but is doable if you’re on a tight budget and willing to put the time in.

If you want to hire out formatting, the cost will depend on the type and difficulty. Images will up the difficulty in any project, as will graphics like charts, table, multiple frames, etc.

For fiction ebook formatting, plan on $150-$250. For print formatting, plan on $200-$300. Most formatters will offer package pricing to do both at once.

Setup and Extra Help

Most authors with basic computer skills will be able to create their accounts and upload their documents without help. Those who run into problems or have limited computer skills or access, having someone tackle this part of the publishing process is available. An average cost is around $20/hour.

Production on a Tight Budget

If you are working with a small budget and want to do as much yourself as possible, be honest with yourself about your skill level in each category.

Learning to format in Word is a great way to cut costs. Designing your own book cover when you have no design experience is not. Start with a premade cover and upgrade when your budget isn’t as tight.

Editing your own book is extremely difficult. If you can’t afford a professional editor yet, trade with another author or see if a local teacher could help out for a lower fee.

The goal is putting out a professional product. Save money where you can, but not at the cost of putting out a subpar book.

Indie Author Basics: Responsibilities of an Indie Author

Without a traditional publisher, what do indie authors need to handle on their own?

The list may be long, but it doesn’t have to be overwhelming. Breaking everything down can help you decide which tasks to learn to do yourself and which to hire out.

I’ll break these down in the coming weeks, but here’s a broad list of what indie authors devote their time to when not writing:

Production costs

These costs include editing (developmental, copy editing, proofreading), cover design, formatting, setup, distribution fees. Next week, I’ll break down costs for each of these as well as options for reducing the overall cost of book production.

Marketing

Marketing includes building a plan and carrying it out, learning about paid advertising and booking ads, setting up and managing social media accounts, participating in online and in-person events, writing and sending out press releases, and much more.

Networking

When it comes to networking, it’s important to engage with the author community, join groups and lists, make friends for support, find beta readers or critique partners, and learn from others in the industry.

Collaborate

Collaborations that are popular right now include box sets, worlds, promo groups, etc. These collaborations help authors expand their audience and reach, as well as learn more about marketing and promotion.

Reaching Out

Reaching out to media, stores, businesses, etc. is part of marketing, but for many people it’s a different skill than interacting on social media or booking ads. Different types of stores have different requirements for booking an author signing, and bookstores aren’t the only option for signings. Learning how to approach a business, radio station, newspaper, etc. the right way can make a difference in being accepted.

Events

Without an agent or publisher, indie authors are often responsible for organizing their own signings, publicity events, participation in books fairs, speaking engagements, conferences, etc. Learning about what types of events are worth while, how to get involved, or what type of classes to submit to a conference can help you make solid plan.

Over the next few weeks I’ll be discussing each of these topics in more detail. Follow the blog to make sure you don’t miss a topic!

Why dialogue is more than just characters talking to each other

The purpose of dialogue is to advance the plot, communicate information, develop character voice, illuminate the theme, provide conflict, and/or change the direction of the plot.

Dialogue can be used in a variety of ways to accomplish these goals.

Be evasive

Direct Q&A between characters can get boring very quickly. Sidestep answers, be roundabout with explanations, create mystery, and make the reader question what’s being said. Dialogue is a great opportunity for teasing out information and leading the reader toward an idea without expressing it directly.

Use silence

When a character needs a moment to consider what they’ve been told, use exposition to allow for internal thought, emotion, or observation. This is a great opportunity to add sensory details and flesh out the scene. Study how people talk and use natural pauses as opportunities to expand on what’s being discussed.

Make it a confrontation

Confrontational dialogue exchanges can convey a great deal of information without being lengthy. These types of exchanges give hints and lead the reader toward ideas and conclusions rather than openly telling them. Take this excerpt as an example of confrontation in dialogue:

“I know who you are,” Charles said.

“You know nothing,” John said.

“You’re that doctor.”

“If you don’t mind, I—”

“From Hopkins. You killed that woman because you were soused. Yeah, that’s it.”

This example gives the reader information about John’s past and the fact that many people are aware of what he did. It also gives a glimpse into his personality and how he feels about the situation and being known mainly for his mistake. The reader gets a few specific details about the event, but not enough to know the whole story. This exchange builds conflict and reveals important information.

Polish later

Just like it’s often a challenge to come up with the right response on the spot when in a conversation, getting the responses right in dialogue can also take time. Don’t be afraid to write out the dialogue to get the basic structure down, but come back later to fine tune and tweak.

Dialogue resources

If you struggle with punctuating dialogue properly, this is a great resource!

Studying dialogue from movies can also help writers improve their dialogue and use is more purposefully. Check out this fun link of great dialogue scenes from movies!

Improving your self-editing skills

Self-editing is not a skill that comes perfectly paired with great writing.

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Not all writers are good editors. Why?

  • It’s difficult to see your own errors
  • You’ve seen it too many times and practically have it memorized
  • You’re sick of looking at it by that point
  • It makes sense to you, or you wouldn’t have written it
  • You’re too close to it

The aspects of editing many writers are good at include:

  • They have the best overall understanding of the concept of their story
  • They know the characters best
  • They get what makes a good story
  • They are readers, and understand readers

Before you start editing, it’s important to understand what type of editing you’re undertaking.

  • Proofreading: Picking out typos, missed words, misplaced commas, etc.
  • Line editing/Copyediting: Critiquing sentence and paragraph structure, repetition, word choice, etc.
  • Content/Developmental Editing: Story, character, flow, cohesion, etc.

Bike with City

It’s also important to give yourself some time away from the project before you start editing

  • Begin the editing process by NOT editing
  • Step away for a while
  • Get fresh eyes
  • Read something in your genre
  • Read critically for style, flow, and pacing
  • Forget the details
  • Do something non-writing related!

The overall editing process is broken into several stages:

  1. Read the entire text and focus on plot/character issues
  2. Focus on wording and readability
  3. Focus on word choice and sentence structure
  4. Focus on grammar and punctuation
  5. Final review to polish

Make use of tools that can help make the editing process easier and more efficient:

  • Run Spellcheck
  • Run Autocrit, Grammarly, or ProWritingAid
  • Print it out if possible/change the format
  • Many authors edit better in hardcopy
  • Read in different format than the one you wrote it in (like on your Kindle)
  • Get out your Freshman Comp books (Elements of Style is a classic)

Before you dive into typos and comma usage, think big picture when it comes to editing

  • What is the point of your story?
  • What is your character meant to accomplish?
  • What do you hope the reader takes away at the end?
  • Why did you write this book?

As you start editing, think like a reader

  • Change your perspective: As you’re writing, it’s difficult to be objective, so you need to start thinking like a reader
  • Read the story critically like you would any other book: What do you like? What don’t you like? What stands out as out of place?

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Evaluate the plot as you read and identify weak areas

  • Create a timeline as you read: Is the timing consistent? Is the pacing consistent with the timeline?
  • Are there plot holes or unanswered questions? Don’t attempt to answer them yet, but write them down
  • Does the reveal of information come logically? Where do the characters find answers? When do they find answers?
  • Is there enough complexity to remain interesting? Is their too much filler to cover up loose plotting?

Great characters can make or break a story, so focus on characters and their growth and development while editing

  • Character Consistency: Character BIO (know the details), Who is this character on page 1? Who is this character on the last page? What does their dialogue sound like? Write down a sample from the beginning, middle, and end and compare. What is their world view, attitudes, and ethics?
  • When to break consistency: Situational (Events or knowledge drastically changes something and they act outside their norm, i.e. “Insanity is a perfectly natural reaction to an unreasonable situation.”) or Paradox (The reader thinks they know the character and later learns more that changes who they are)

Lastly, check the overall fit of your story elements

  • Point of View/Tense: Is this the best point of view or tense for this story?
  • Style: Does this style of writing fit the character and story type?
  • Structure: Does the way the character move through the plot make sense?

The purpose of this first, full edit is to identify major plot, story, character, and content issues that need to be addressed before any further editing is done.

 

Re-releasing the Date Shark series

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Earlier this year, I got the rights back to my Date Shark series, and I knew it wasn’t going to be as simple as simply republishing them for several reasons.

The editing on the first book had been horrible, and I realized when I started re-editing that the edits I had sent back to the publisher five years ago had been ignored. I’d received multiple complaints about the editing from readers when it first published, but it was out of my hands at that point.

The editing did improve over time as the publisher I was working with upgraded their editing staff, but there were still enough errors remaining that I knew the entire series needed to be re-edited. That process took me almost five months because I didn’t have a lot of spare time after starting a new job at the newspaper and taking on a few too many freelance projects.

I also needed new cover art before I could republish the series. I was happy to redo the first book’s cover, but I had chosen the model art for books two through four, so at least I didn’t have to start completely from scratch. My main challenge was not being able to use the cool shark fin A in the original cover art and trying to find something comparable. My husband helped me choose a new font and rightly steered me away from trying to include any water-like effects and just go with the sketched shark logo instead.

My next challenge was when to re-release each book. I asked other authors and got advice on scheduling, but in the end, it took me so long to format each book that they ended up spacing themselves out well enough, for the most part. Books two and three released within days of each other because, honestly, I was sick of working on them and just wanted to be done.

Going back through these books was actually a fun experience overall. I hadn’t chatted with these characters in almost three years and had forgotten how much I loved them! Sabine and Michael’s story is still my favorite of the series, and rereading the books reminded me that poor Leo never got to have his own story.

I had planned to give Leo a voice as the final book in the series, but because of issues with the publisher and limited writing time back then, I stored the idea away for later. I do have some other projects that need attention, but I want to eventually come back to Leo’s story and finish off the series by giving him his own happy ending.

For now, the series is back up on all the major retailers and ready to meet new readers!

You can find all the links here.

Choosing a #Publishing Track

Choosing what to do with your book baby is a tough choice. You have so many more options that you once did, and choosing the right one for you can be an agonizing decision. 

This is a topic that has been coming up a lot lately in groups I belong to and with other author friends who are nearing the point in their career where they have to make that decision. So, I thought I’d share some of the pros and cons of traditional and self-publishing I’ve experienced and why I’ve gone the way I have.

Let’s break this down by the most common pre-publishing aspects like editing, cover design, formatting, and marketing, and what you’ll get with both traditional and self-publishing.

Editing

 Traditional

Most reputable publishers will provide editing at no cost to the author. If a publisher wants to charge you for editing, that’s a big red flag that you should take your book elsewhere. HOWEVER, finding a good editor is like finding the Holy Grail, and that applies to publishers and indie authors. I’ve worked with many editors and I can honestly say that only two have done a good enough job that I would work with them again. Don’t think that going with a publisher means you’ll get a perfectly edited book unless you sign with one of the Big 6. Smaller publishers can’t afford multiple edits of a book, so you should plan to do a very thorough read through and possibly even hire an outside editor if the quality of the publisher’s editor isn’t what you were hoping.

Self-pub

Editing is all up to you when you self-publish. Editing your own work is tough. It’s hard to catch all your mistakes. So, what are your options for a well-edited book? Hire an editor, of course, although, really good editors are extremely hard to find. Vet your editor well. Ask for samples of their work, references, and request a short sample edit of your work to test their skills. Many editors are willing to do this.

You can also work out a trade. However, don’t just assume that another author can edit as well. Trades can be great, but do your research first. There’s also the option to ask a friend. Know a good technical writer, English teacher, etc? See what they would charge you or work out a trade.

Formatting

Traditional

Formatting varies by publisher. Some will put a lot of time into making the formatting look nice and others will just do the basics. For ebooks, there’s not a lot you can do as far as fancy formatting goes. Print books are different, but formatting is one of the easier areas of publishing (in my opinion), so it’s usually not a huge concern with choosing a publisher. If you’d like to see the quality of their formatting, download samples of some of their books to check them out.

Self-Pub

Formatting can be learned by anyone willing to put a little time into it. There are great tutorials online, and most ebook publishers have guides for authors that spell out what you need to do. It may be a little time consuming at first, but it gets easier the more you do it. All of your formatting can be done in Microsoft Word, but if you’re interested in trying some fancier paperback formatting, InDesign can do some really neat things.

Cover Design

Traditional

Cover design is hugely important no matter how you publish your book. Most publishers are willing to pony up for a good cover designer because they understand this very well. Even still, having a publisher does not a gaurantee that you’ll end up with an awesome cover, but most do a pretty good job. When shopping around, check out their previous covers, and ask about whether or not they’re willing to let authors have any say in the cover design. If you’re with a big publisher, chances are you will get zero input, but some of the smaller publishers are willing to listen to author input.

Self-Pub

Cover design is one of my favorite things to do, but I do have a background in art and graphic design. For those who are not artistic or aren’t familiar with GIMP or Photoshop, cover design will be a challenge in self-publishing. Createspace and now even Kindle KDP have cover creating software to help you put together a nicely formatted cover.

You’ll still need good pictures or stock photography, though. Fortunately, there are plenty of sites out their to find great stock art fvor reasonable prices. My personal favorites are Dollar Photo Club, Shutterstock, and iStock. If you know a photographer, you can get original photos as well. Just make sure to give credit to the photographer.

And if you’re not comfortable putting together a cover, there are some amazing designers out there who work for very reasonable prices, like Tirzah Goodwin. Having a great cover is extremely important, but self-publishing doesn’t mean you can’t have that.

Marketing

Traditional

Marketing. This is probably the area that most new authors will struggle with, and what will push them toward a traditional publisher, but authors need to have realistic expectations about marketing. Most publishers, small or Big 6, have a limited budget for marketing, especially if you’re not a top seller. Big 6 publishers will only put their money behind books they KNOW are going to sell tons of books. Newbies won’t get much help and will be expected to pull most of the marketing weight. A lot of small publishers (though certainly not all) will put more effort into helping authors market because they need the sales too, but they have very small budgets and most of the work will fall to the author.

Sel-Pub

Obviously, all the work of marketing is on the author in self-publishing, but you also get the full benefit of your efforts by not giving up royalties. Marketing is hard, no matter what publishing path you take. When you self-publish, you have control over how your book is marketed, how much free or paid advertising is done, and what audience you’re targeting. With self-publishing, you also have direct access to your sales numbers, so it’s a little easier to monitor how effective your marketing efforts are by watching changes in sales numbers. There’s a big learning curve to marketing if it’s new for you, but there are many articles and books available to help you figure it out, and other authors are a great resource and source of marketing help as well.

What does it all boil down to? 

For me, I’ve been doing this long enough and put out enough books, that I’m comfortable finding editors, doing my own formatting and cover design, and coming up with my own marketing plan. I have worked with four different publishers since I began publishing. Some have worked out, some haven’t. I currently still have my contemporary romances with a publisher, because that’s a new market for me and I felt the exchange of roaylties for their knowledge of the romance genre was worth it. For my YA books, that trade wasn’t worth it for me and now I have all my YA books published independently.

I also like having control over my covers, formatting, editing, and how my books are marketed. I put a lot of time into learning more about the publishing industry and increasing my skills in design and marketing. Self-publishing takes a lot of work, but I enjoy doing it, and it’s a good fit for me and my books.

Choosing a publishing path is a completely individual choice. What each author is comfortable with doing on their own will play a huge part. Break it down and see what you’re willing to do on your own and what you need help with, then decide whether or not that help is worth giving up the percent of royalties the publisher is asking for. Don’t jump into either option without knowing what you’re getting yourself into.

What aspects of publishing intimidate you most?