tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8920724053382808800.post4929581893139603469..comments2023-03-21T04:06:48.813-04:00Comments on Bob Baker's Book Promotion & Marketing Blog: Attack of the Self-Publishing NaysayersBob Bakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11563335433483737454noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8920724053382808800.post-18555869528628773452007-01-22T16:05:00.000-05:002007-01-22T16:05:00.000-05:00My POD company, BookLocker, is mentioned by Bob in...My POD company, BookLocker, is mentioned by Bob in his post as a "best bet."<br /><br />I wrote a formal response on my blog here:<br />http://publishing.booklocker.com/2007/01/19/the-supposed-problems-with-self-publishing/<br /><br />But here is the summary - basically, Kent assumes, incorrectly, that the book has to be “stocked” in a bookstore in order be a commercial success. Not true. We sell lots of books direct to the public.<br /><br />Here is the elephant in the room no one wants to talk about - the traditional publishing process sucks. Many manuscripts go unpublished every year not because they are bad, but because traditional publishers don’t know how to find the book’s market in a cost-effective manner. That is where POD publishers like BookLocker can provide a real service, as long as the return on investment is good. And the return on investment is good if, and only if, the upfront costs to get into the market are kept low.<br /><br />Unfortunately, I have to concede to Kent that many POD companies offer a poor return on investment for authors.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8920724053382808800.post-6136868750173238502007-01-20T15:32:00.000-05:002007-01-20T15:32:00.000-05:00As a post-script, I realise my remark about findin...As a post-script, I realise my remark about finding other "readers around the world" may have sounded contradictory to what I'd said a moment before (about not seeking fame and approval through numbers).<br /><br />My existing readers 'get' what I'm trying to do, and are, I realise, my audience. Having the micropress has helped me see that if someone doesn't like my work at this point, they're just not my audience. Of course I'm going to keep working to get better at what I do, but there's no value in my going for a vague, scattershot appeal to everyone.<br /><br />So the trick now is finding other pockets of similar-minded readers. That's harder for me than laying out, printing, binding, and finishing a book.<br /><br />Most self-publishing material is geared toward non-fiction, instructional books. It's trickier to say who the audience is for a particular type of fiction.<br /><br />Anyway... thinking aloud on your soapbox. Thanks for the indulgence, and all your helpful articles.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8920724053382808800.post-68909172035232774442007-01-20T12:50:00.000-05:002007-01-20T12:50:00.000-05:00An important consideration is why you want to self...An important consideration is <i>why</i> you want to self-publish, too. The people who dismiss indie publishing quickly tend to have bought into the same mass-culture obsessions that make people think <I>The daVinci Code</I> must be a good book because it's sold a majillion copies. If you can't sell a majillion yourself, the thinking goes, why publish?<br /><br />Um, because it's <I>art</i>. Because you've been moved by something inside you to create an original work from the stuff of your imagination.<br /><br />If you focus on outcome ("I want to be rich and famous") when writing, people will smell it and stay away -- and they should stay away. Focusing on the response you want is also a perfect formula for generating writer's block -- which doesn't otherwise exist; writer's block is <I>always</i> a matter of putting the frilly cart of expectations and fears before the workhorse of your ability.<br /><br />Last year, I started my own micropress, producing books start to finish from home and selling them online (<a href="http://www.hamishmacdonald.com">hamishmacdonald.com</a>). All the equipment cost a fraction of what the 500-copy print run of my first book cost back in 1999, and now I can publish anything and everything I want. This allowed me to release two of my novels, a book of short stories, and even a full-colour 'zine last year.<br /><br />I have <I>tens</I> of readers, maybe a hundred. Kind of funny, eh?<br /><br />But you know what? I'm really happy. Much happier than when I was mailing manuscripts around to editors who weren't interested in anything that wasn't a guaranteed sale or a tie-in to some outside media thing, or who were so busy being consolidated into another company that they lost the manuscript, or, in the case of the one editor who starting championing my last novel, getting fired: the press shut its fiction imprint to focus instead on joke books and tourist attraction books.<br /><br />Meanwhile, an old university friend of mine has written a book that's selling really well in Canada, and her publisher is totally dropping the ball on it. She's scoring all kinds of media attention and people are loving the book, and the marketing director of the press won't even return her e-mails. So "getting published" isn't necessarily the answer we tend to think it is.<br /><br />As you say in one of your excellent articles, Bob, there's no point fighting against the gravity of what's so about the publishing industry. What's been beautifully liberating this past year, what's buoyed my spirits, is connecting my work with <I>actual readers</I>, putting my focus on them instead of publishers. No more bitterness, no more frustration, just lots and lots of things to learn and do.<br /><br />Too much of our focus is on reaching countless strangers and yearning after status that's supposed to be some sort of salvation. Reaching real readers, people you can see and meet -- I think that's a far better beginning for an author than playing a numbers game and trying to reverse-engineer existing work, seeking success instead of substance.<br /><br />The big challenge for me, what I now need to learn about most as a writer and self-publisher, is how to find other readers around the world, people beyond the community of my existing readers.<br /><br />Yikes! Sorry for the diatribe.<br /><br />~<br /><br />If anyone would like to know more, I wrote an article outlining my process for creating books, both saddle-stitched and perfect-bound, which you can read <a href="http://nomediakings.org/doityourself/doityourself_book_press.html">here</a> on the NoMediaKings.org website.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8920724053382808800.post-84489675031751639112007-01-19T16:08:00.000-05:002007-01-19T16:08:00.000-05:00Bob . . . One of the best reasons for self-publish...Bob . . . One of the best reasons for self-publishing is to build the market so you can sell the rights -- in as many formats as possible. Not just as a book, but as an audio, an ebook, a seminar, an online course, etc. Self-publishing can be fun, but it is a lot of work. Or at least, persistence.Book Marketing Bestsellershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16486115512048790419noreply@blogger.com