New and Exciting Market for eBooks
By Jerry D. Simmons | March 19th, 2010 | No Comments » (Click to add yours!)
The demographics for eBooks clearly illustrate there is much to learn about who buys and reads them but we do know that the average age is above 40. We also know that the market has barely scratched the surface and as eReaders become widely available and hit the shelves of mass merchants, the market will likely explode. Where was music before the MP3 and iPhone? It seems that eBooks are heading in the same direction.
Success as an author in the digital marketplace still boils down to finding an audience and marketing your writing. Niche musical groups have managed to find ways to promote their music and themselves via social networks and the Internet so it seems logical that writers will do the same. I don’t believe that publishing mirrors music but I do think that writers have some advantages over musicians and that has to do with the plethora of writing groups and forums.
Although it is frowned upon to join a group or forum and promote you’re writing there are free formats for promotion such as NothingBinding.com.
There are lessons to be learned and information to share but in the meantime, you have to be in the game to play and if you’ve ever considered an eBook, now is the time to move forward and explore your options.
The Economics of Print versus Digital Publishing
By Jerry D. Simmons | March 18th, 2010 | No Comments » (Click to add yours!)
Over the course of the past fifty years, the major book publishers of this country have created a system where they have systematically eliminated competition for retail book sales. They have managed to monopolize booksellers by offering an assortment of incentives, fees and discounts that capitalize on their deep pockets and prevent small and niche publishers from finding shelf space for their own titles.
Quality independently published books are having a difficult time finding adequate distribution for the print edition simply because the major houses continue to pour money into the retail sector. They will pay for anything from newsletter placement to author book tours and signings to advertising allowances for anything and everything. This has created a distribution system for print books that grossly limits quality small press titles from competing.
Retailers take a straight 50 percent off the top of every book they sell. Consider a $15.00 trade paperback, the bookstore will take $7.50, distributor will take another 30 percent or $4.50 leaving the independent author with 20 percent of $3.00. If you cannot print enough books to cover the cost of the $3.00 per copy printing then you will lose money on each copy sold. My best guess is that you would need to print roughly 3,000 copies to meet that threshold. The problem is that the quality independently published book rarely achieves a 3,000 copy advanced order.
Now consider the eBook market which is still so new that the major publishers haven’t figured out how to flex their muscles. The distributors for eBooks are not in bed with print publishers, they are digital companies who are willing to give quality small companies a fair chance to sell product. This favors the independent author over print in a number of ways. Plus, retailers for digital content have not set discounts that run standard like the print market because they are all still trying to find a competitive advantage. Another plus that favors the independent author and their eBooks.
Marketing and selling digital content is still faced with the massive problem of how to reach an audience and unfortunately there are no special formulas or secrets that will solve that issue. However, it appears that consumers or digital content are more likely to read about content via social networks, blogs and eBook reviews that are just starting to emerge. My prediction is that marketing for eBooks will start to shift from the traditional methods to more advanced ways of finding an audience through the Internet.
The cost of converting a word document original manuscript to an eBook that is compatible with all formats of eReading devices is a fraction of the cost to produce a quality print book. The eBook market is one where all sales are final which means no returns and no printing costs or warehousing, shipping and handling. Convert a manuscript to an eBook and concentrate on marketing, rather than reprinting and all that goes with that process.
As long as the major book publishers continue to focus on hardcover and trade paper print while delaying release of their eBooks the independent author has a clear advantage. By launching in eBook followed by print, after achieving a significant audience is the perfect strategy for the independent author. The low cost for entry into the marketplace allows more resources to be devoted to marketing which makes digital content the preferred choice over print editions for the independent author.
If you have a print edition and have been discouraged by the process and success, eBooks are not necessarily the answer. You should step back and look closely at your entire publishing program before deciding to move forward with an eBook edition. The emergence of eBooks and the growing market does not mean your content will suddenly find an audience it merely provides another opportunity for sales. In my thirty plus years of publishing experience, the emergence of the digital market is clearly one of the most exciting. If I can help answer your questions about eBooks, please send me an email jerry@writersreaders.com.
The New Hybrid Publishing Model
By Jerry D. Simmons | March 15th, 2010 | No Comments » (Click to add yours!)
As the major publishing companies evaluate their current situation, one thing becomes clear, what they are doing is not working. You cannot stem the tide of falling unit sales when your strategy is to produce more of the same. Propping up a broken system that makes it difficult for new talent to break in and reprinting less-than-stellar writing from old tried-and-true authors is the best way to drive your customers away, and that strategy seems to be working!
The reading public is screaming for a new approach. This is my conclusion after seeing a decade long slide in single copy sales. How can an industry constantly fly in the face of the basic law of supply and demand? When demand goes down in publishing, the big companies increase supply by shipping more books and raise cover prices at the same time. This does not make sense.
The time is right for an entirely new approach, and it’s called the hybrid publishing model—combining the experience and vast knowledge of former New York publishing executives with top quality production to assist writers in publishing their own manuscript. In the end, the finished product is made available to booksellers via direct sales to book buyers at top retailers. The advantages are considerable.
Remember, publishing is about perception—publish with the wrong company and the quality of your writing will forever be judged before your title has a chance at success.
Making the Right Publishing Decisions
By Jerry D. Simmons | March 5th, 2010 | No Comments » (Click to add yours!)
It’s interesting to note that many of the self-publishing mills (the big POD companies that market aggressively and often distort the facts) are offering writers a menu of options for publishing their manuscript. The question I have is, how can any writer know what is best for their book? Success in publishing is selling books, there is no other gauge. In order to sell copies, you need to know and understand the market for bookselling. In my opinion, you cannot make the right publishing decisions if you order your trim size, cover design, interior layout, price and page count from a menu of options. Your newly published book must fit the genre in which you write, and be positioned within that category to compete with all similar titles. Can you get that information from a menu? I don’t think so, not if you expect success, which translates into selling books.
Writers and Authors in Control
By Jerry D. Simmons | March 4th, 2010 | No Comments » (Click to add yours!)
Book publishing has always favored the big companies and only a select few of the mega-bestselling authors have real input on how their titles are handled in the marketplace. For everyone else they are merely a name and title on a pub sheet and the difficulty of separating themselves and their book from all other authors under contract is difficult. Adding insult is the fact that authors under contract do not own the rights to their own content.
Along come the print-on-demand companies and the surge in new titles exploded which unfortunately did not give the author any more leverage or control over their writing. The status quo was entrenched and unsuspecting writers who turned manuscripts over to these printers found them with less money in their pocket and no market to sell their book.
Left with few options and no way to sell large quantities of books, independent authors found it difficult to compete with published titles from the big companies.
Entering the market was the new hybrid model for publishing offering independent writers a real opportunity to compete on the same level with all published books. In response and faced with mounting competition from small and niche publishers the big six New York based behemoths decided to up and ante and begin offering booksellers huge incentives, discounts and fees for anything from placement to advertising in newsletters to subsidizing author appearances. The playing field once again was stacked against the small guy and favored the deeper pocket publishers.
Then along came a new reading device called iPad from a company named Apple and the big publishing industry was knocked back on their heels. The iPad will open doors and create opportunities for independent authors never before possible in the print world of book publishing. Technology is a wonderful thing and the time will come when authors will be able to control their own destiny with the emergence of the eBook market.
The eBook is nothing new; they’ve been around for many years. When Amazon introduced the Kindle it opened up the market for eBooks however Amazon remained the 800 pound gorilla in the room that major publishers detested having to work with. Suddenly introduction of the iPad has been a major break in the stalemate over the market for eBooks. The economics have changed and the advantage is finally shifting to the independent author.
For information on how you can take advantage of the emerging eBook market, send me an email Jerry@WritersReaders.com.
Publish the Professional Way
By Jerry D. Simmons | March 3rd, 2010 | No Comments » (Click to add yours!)
There are more opportunities to publish a book than ever, including print and eBook, and the cost is going down. However, I’m not sure this is a good thing.
You may have heard the old saying “there are good lawyers, and there are cheap lawyers, but there are no good cheap lawyers.” This is definitely true for publishing, you can publish professionally or you can publish cheaply, but you cannot expect to have a professionally produced book for a few hundred dollars.
If you invest countless hours writing then the least you can do is have your manuscript professionally edited and produced. Your book is your resume; make it the best it can be. All the marketing in the world will not help you sell a poorly written or produced book.
Independently Published Books
By Jerry D. Simmons | March 2nd, 2010 | 1 Comment » (Click to add yours!)
There are lots of good books that are independently or self-published and most use digital or print-on-demand technology. No doubt, if you take the entire self-published or POD community and read all the books available, you would find vast amounts of titles that would not only hold their own in sales but had the potential to become bestsellers if displayed and merchandised in bookstores. The problem is negative perception of POD and no ACCESS to the bookstore market.
Let’s examine some facts about the independent or self-publishing marketplace.
(1) The success of many self-published titles such as THE SHACK indicates there are good books that started as independently published. However, this book would not be on The New York Times bestseller list without the help of a corporate publisher who bought the book after it had sold over 300,000 copies.
(2) A recent article in Publishers Weekly titled “Big Houses Benefit from Savvy Self-Publishers clearly indicated that the success of a handful of self-published books that made it into the hands of the big corporate publishers has made that New York publishing world take notice.
(3) According to statistics provided by Ingram Books, the owner of Lightening Source, the self-published market will grow at 15-20% each year for many years to come. This of course crowds the market, but creates opportunities for authors who are self-promoters and write really good books.
(4) As the corporate publishers sell fewer copies each year, retail booksellers will search for new opportunities to sell a variety of new categories, and will welcome new unproven authors. If the New York corporate publishers won’t do it, then it’s time for a new publishing model to be introduced to the market.
For authors who want control over their writing, the ability to retain all rights, realize a royalty payment much greater than any corporate publisher would offer, and be willing to take suggestions on how best to package and price their book to maximize its potential in the market, then your time is here. This new hybrid publishing model is ready and available.
What’s wrong with Print-On-Demand?
By Jerry D. Simmons | February 27th, 2010 | 4 Comments » (Click to add yours!)
Nothing as a technology, but plenty as a publishing business model. Unfortunately for those who publish with a POD their books will not be accepted in the stores or warehouses of booksellers. What this means is that corporate and large independent bookstores will not purchase books in quantity for display in their stores that are printed by a POD publisher. That is not my rule, but the rule of the marketplace.
The reason is lack of editorial control which results in a negative perception of all published books by a POD. These companies publish anything that comes their way. There is nothing wrong with that, as long as the writer understands the limitations before they sign a contract and pay money to publish. POD’s are in the business of printing books for their authors and they do not control the editorial quality of the authors they print. They make money by selling products, services and programs to large quantities of writers and not upon selling books. This is the problem with print-on-demand as a publishing model.
The technology is wonderful, allowing authors and publishers to print small quantities of books in an instant to meet market demand. The problem is market access and the negative perception of the quality of the content based solely on the publisher. Until a company using print-on-demand technology as a form of printing exercises some editorial control over what they publish and not accept anything that walks in the door, the marketplace will continue to turn their back on these books.
Ask the Tough Questions
By Jerry D. Simmons | February 26th, 2010 | No Comments » (Click to add yours!)
Many of my blogs have to do with “so-called experts” who try and secure money from unsuspecting writers and authors. As much as I wish could write about more positive, constructive things, it becomes necessary for me to warn my readers that there are lots of people calling themselves “publishing experts” who are nothing of the kind. I find it once again important to give you some advice, and that is – ask the tough questions.
When someone tries to sell you a product or service, ask them about their success rate? Ask them to give you references? Go to their web sites and locate authors and titles, then do your best to inquire about the product or service? Network with me and other writers, members of your writing or critique group for advice. If you cannot find authors, titles, or anyone who seems to know anything about the product or service, then you really have to be careful.
The second thing you should inquire about is the person or company’s background, experience, and qualifications as an “expert.” When someone tells you they have been in publishing for 20 years, does that really qualify them to sell you their product or service? You need to dig deeper and find out the names of the companies they worked for? In what capacity, what was their job? What were their responsibilities? What were their successes in the business? Let them give you the names of the authors and titles with which they worked. Again, if this information is unavailable, then are they really experts?
If you dig deep before you buy, complete your due diligence with regard to the product or service, and ask for proof of the success, then you stand a good chance of saving lots of money and plenty of time. Ask the tough questions and it will serve you well, don‘t allow yourself to become a victim of these “experts.”
Too Good to Be True Sales Offers
By Jerry D. Simmons | February 24th, 2010 | No Comments » (Click to add yours!)
When you run across an email with a marketing pitch that offers an “incredible sales opportunity,” or some other verbiage that sounds too good to be true, well it probably is too good to be true. I’ve written about knowing the questions to ask before you make a purchase of a product or service. Warning you about companies that are slow to respond to emails, fail to provide key executives background or experience and those that offer no contact information such as a phone number in their correspondence, as companies you should stay far away from.
When the offer sounds intriguing and the price is right, but you get to the small print and discover there are “hidden fees” then stop right there and move on, it’s not worth it. If you manage to work past the small print and agree with paying the “hidden fees” and find the web site is, shall we say, less than credible in appearance, then run the other way. If a legitimate company cannot give you (1) biographies of the principles of the company, (2) phone numbers or contact numbers besides a mere email address, or (3) a web site that looks like it was created by a ten year-old, then folks, you are not going to get what you think you are getting.
People and companies that offer products and services to writers and authors that fail to meet these minimum of standards, don’t belong in the business. Their claim to fame is making money off your desire to sell books! Don’t buy it! Remember, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
