Many budding authors get a bit confused when it comes to thinking about publishing a book and there are plenty who assume that they have to get approved by a big publishing company to get their book out there so read this article so that you never ever get beyond just the dream stage of writing your story.
The fantastic reality is that you can become your own publishing agent if that is what you want though there is a lot of work involved – if you’re determined enough though, you can achieve it.
Let’s take a look at the pros and cons of deciding whether to go through the traditional route of finding a publishing agent against making the decision to publish your own book.
Who’s In Control?
The first thing you need to consider is the most important – who controls the book once it is published?
When you publish your own book – you are in total control of the book and take responsibility of all the decisions made for both the production and marketing of the entire process. There can be heavy costs involved but at the end of the day, the book is entirely yours and you get all the profits from it.
Finding someone to do all the work for you can be extremely expensive and you can ultimately lose control of many aspects of the book writing and publishing process.
Before you throw your hands up in horror though, there are some upsides. The publisher takes control of the book but they also take charge of paying for editing, graphic design, the printing and the initial publicity of the book. You need to take over the marketing after this point.
The Timeline
Self-Publishing – well the timeline pretty much is what you want it to be! Obviously there is a time factor in writing, editing and designing the book but if you have got your plans in place, you should be able to keep things moving along at a steady rate.
Using a Publisher – you are pretty much at the time-mercy of others. You have to submit your manuscript and to many publishing houses to sit and wait it out – it can take a long time before someone even has a look at your idea only for it to be rejected. Once you do strike lucky it can be months or even years before your book is ready for launch.
The Rewards
As a Self-Publisher – you can choose where your book is sold and how much for. Once you have paid for all of the costs of producing and marketing your book the profits are yours though you will have to pay some commissions depending how your book is sold.
When you find a Publisher – payment is given to you in two lots. First of all, you will receive an advance for the expected sales of your book then once it is in the book stores, you will receive royalties on sales. It’s important to note though that any advance payments are advance payments on sales – if your book doesn’t make those sales, then you will have to pay the publisher back!
Is there another alternative? Well we are happy to say that, ‘Yes, there is!’ We at the East Book Blueprint give you the best of both worlds – for a fraction of the cost (and time) of going through a traditional publishing agency, we will help you plan, write and market your book (including providing you with a professional search engine ready website) – and what’s more – you are the author AND we take away all the pain and drag from hiring the right people and waiting for others to take action – your book can be published on Amazon.com within six weeks of beginning the project – you can’t get better than that!