Occasionally someone will ask me, what is the difference between self publishers and traditional publishers? Today I'm going to take a stab at presenting a condensed answer to that question.
Let's first give attention to the self publisher. I'm sure it's an over simplification, but, nevertheless, true that a self publishing company is one that for a fee will accept your material, and using print on demand technology will in most cases have your book printed and bound in a few weeks. The volume of editing and other project details which they will do for you is determined by the amount of money you are willing to dish out to them. Most of these companies will allow one to choose from several canned packages. This seems to be an up and coming industry. I am told that today the majority of the books being turned out are coming from self publishing companies. The fact is that just about anyone who has a couple thousand dollars to spend can get a book published.
The traditional publishing company is one that gives the author a contract in which they, the publisher, agrees to bear all the cost of producing the book and putting into place steps that enable the author to market his work. The contract calls for the author to be paid royalties for copies sold. The traditional company requires absolutely no payment from the author. The traditional publisher makes copies of the book available to the writer at approximately the same price they will charge retail businesses. The fact is, unless the average author takes advantage of this and aggressively markets his own books, he will make very little money even with the traditional companies, especially the smaller ones. I guess we could say that the bottom line is that with the self publisher, the author bears the expense of getting the book in print, while with the traditional company, all such expenses are the responsibility of the publisher.
I have had experience with both sides of the industry. Early in my and Wanda's writing careers, when we were writing non-fiction (inspiration & educational), we would not even have considered using what we, in those days, called vanity presses. My first book was published by traditional publisher Accent Books, long since eaten up by a larger company. Wanda wrote for such companies as Moody Press. We didn't have the help of agents. We dealt directly with acquisitions editors. As time went on, we got busy with other things and did not write for a time. When we came back to it, everything had changed. In order to avoid having to secure an agent we went to self publishing for our first Davis Morgan mystery. My next project was a local history and knowing the interest would be limited to a small geographic area, we felt it would be necessary to again go with that approach. Let me say that with a lot of hard work, self publishing worked out for us. We had three more Davis Morgan mysteries to get in print and were fortunate to receive contracts for all three of those from a traditional company, CrossLink Publishing. Our association with them has been a good experience. There are, of course, pros and cons for both approaches which we will not go into now, but perhaps later.
Which do I prefer? It means a great deal to me to know that someone, a professional in the industry, likes my book enough to bear the cost of getting it out. There are other reasons, but that confirmation of my work alone is enough to keep me aggressively seeking a traditional publishing partner for my future writing endeavors.
Let's first give attention to the self publisher. I'm sure it's an over simplification, but, nevertheless, true that a self publishing company is one that for a fee will accept your material, and using print on demand technology will in most cases have your book printed and bound in a few weeks. The volume of editing and other project details which they will do for you is determined by the amount of money you are willing to dish out to them. Most of these companies will allow one to choose from several canned packages. This seems to be an up and coming industry. I am told that today the majority of the books being turned out are coming from self publishing companies. The fact is that just about anyone who has a couple thousand dollars to spend can get a book published.
The traditional publishing company is one that gives the author a contract in which they, the publisher, agrees to bear all the cost of producing the book and putting into place steps that enable the author to market his work. The contract calls for the author to be paid royalties for copies sold. The traditional company requires absolutely no payment from the author. The traditional publisher makes copies of the book available to the writer at approximately the same price they will charge retail businesses. The fact is, unless the average author takes advantage of this and aggressively markets his own books, he will make very little money even with the traditional companies, especially the smaller ones. I guess we could say that the bottom line is that with the self publisher, the author bears the expense of getting the book in print, while with the traditional company, all such expenses are the responsibility of the publisher.
I have had experience with both sides of the industry. Early in my and Wanda's writing careers, when we were writing non-fiction (inspiration & educational), we would not even have considered using what we, in those days, called vanity presses. My first book was published by traditional publisher Accent Books, long since eaten up by a larger company. Wanda wrote for such companies as Moody Press. We didn't have the help of agents. We dealt directly with acquisitions editors. As time went on, we got busy with other things and did not write for a time. When we came back to it, everything had changed. In order to avoid having to secure an agent we went to self publishing for our first Davis Morgan mystery. My next project was a local history and knowing the interest would be limited to a small geographic area, we felt it would be necessary to again go with that approach. Let me say that with a lot of hard work, self publishing worked out for us. We had three more Davis Morgan mysteries to get in print and were fortunate to receive contracts for all three of those from a traditional company, CrossLink Publishing. Our association with them has been a good experience. There are, of course, pros and cons for both approaches which we will not go into now, but perhaps later.
Which do I prefer? It means a great deal to me to know that someone, a professional in the industry, likes my book enough to bear the cost of getting it out. There are other reasons, but that confirmation of my work alone is enough to keep me aggressively seeking a traditional publishing partner for my future writing endeavors.
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