The Long Tail: E-Book Self-Publishing for a Sustainable Career

Well, it’s not the Good Book, but I hope my novel is decent.

I have been thinking a lot about the drama of changing publishing business models lately, since my manuscript is nearly ready to send out to agents. My husband surprised me last week by sending me this well-written article on how there could actually be a decent income for midlist authors using the new models for self-publishing. The article is encouraging, for sure, actually putting some math to the problem of how much an author can make if they can attract the same 10,000 readers a publisher would require to give them a chance. So should I send my novel to agents first and then self-publish if I don’t find a home and a good contract for the book? Or should I follow my husband’s advice and skip the traditional model altogether? After all, that is the model that has made it nearly impossible for new authors like me to make a sustainable living for the last 20 years.

I think the decision will come down to one thing.

The new self-publishing options still rely on minimal online marketing and storefronts that require readers to know which genre they’re looking for in order to find these new authors’ books. So, if my book can easily be funneled into a category like romance or sci-fi can, I may be able to connect with readers without spending my whole life promoting my books. But if my novel or future novels don’t fit into genres where readers always know they want more of the same, I may be stuck between the difficulties of the inefficient old publishing model and a new model that isn’t ready for every kind of book.

What do you think? Should I try agents first and then self-publish and get on with writing the next book? Should I skip the old-fashioned model entirely? I would love your thoughts on this as I will be charging into this issue head-on in just a few weeks or months. Wish me luck!

Close to Being a Self-published Author….

Well, I finally did it. I submitted my nonfiction book, Ecofrugal Baby: How To Save 70% Off Baby’s First Year, to Amazon for self-publishing. I’m still pursuing traditional publishers, but I’m happy to get the book out there in the meantime. I’ll post pics and a link as soon as the review and publishing process is complete. This is a pretty cool milestone for me. Of course I hope the book does well, but just getting it out there is an accomplishment. Hooray!

Self-Publishers Flourish

The New York Times just posted a piece about how self-publishers are doing well in the current economy, while traditional book publishers are struggling. I work for a couple of book publishers that are considered a hybrid of independent publishing and self-publishing, and this article lines up with my recent experience: one of my clients seems to have as many projects for me as I have time to complete, though the pay is lower than with bigger publishers.

What do you think about this trend? Obviously many self-published or co-published books have little to no audience, either because of poor quality or just because they appeal to such a niche audience, but we keep hearing stories of people who had to self-publish, only to be discovered after self-publishing by a traditional house and ending up on best-seller lists. Case in point: The Shack, a self-published book that sold over 4 million copies based largely on innovative word-of-mouth marketing.

Has book publishing become so saturated with content and so log-jammed by its traditional methods that even the agents and publishers can’t find the good content anymore? That certainly puts a new perspective on self-publishing, which used to be regarded as loser-ville for writers. This trend seems to parallel the move toward self-published videos on YouTube, self-published podcasts, and using Twitter to market a project or service, or even the difficulties that large companies in other industries (ahem, automotive) have with innovation when they pass critical mass and become too large to stay nimble. Where do you think this is going? If you publish a book in the future, what services would you like to have provided to you, and which would you be willing or able to do yourself?