Saturday, January 17, 2015

Q&A Letter From An Aspiring Author

Dear Deirdra,
So I had some questions for you about publishing a book. I think sometime in the next three years I want to publish a book.
So where do I find an editor? Will I need to be self published? What will I be looking at spending for a small 100-500 book run? How do I get book stores interested in selling my book?


- Julia





Dear Julia,

There is a lot to cover here, so I'm just going to touch briefly on each one.

Beta Readers:
Before you find an editor, you need to find beta readers. These are people who read your book and give you feed back.

Editing:
After you have worked your book to death with your beta readers, and its as good as you can get it, then you can find an editor at www.EdenLiterary.com or another service company.
At Eden Literary, you have different editors to choose from and they will edit the first ten pages for free, so you can pick the editor and editing style you like the best

After your editing is done, you need to decide if you want to go ebook, print, or both
Most authors go ebook only to start with because its SOOO much cheaper. If the ebook does well, then they go print. Of course, if you do ebook only, you can't get into bookstores.


Formatting:
After your editing is done, then you need to format. Some authors do it on their own (especially if they have a professional program like InDesign.) Formatting usually cost around $120 per format for most novels, but can go up depending on graphics and type of book. (ebook and print are formatted differently.)
A lot of authors find it best to hire out the formatting as it can be frustrating, time consuming, and if not done right, look unprofessional.


Cover Design:
You've got to have a great cover.
If you have something very custom (like hiring and artist to do a painting) It could run up to $1,800 or more.
BUT most of our artist at Eden Literary don't charge more than $300 -$500 for custom work.


Stock art is a cheaper way to go. It's less expensive and can still be very customized. At Eden Literary covers usually are about $75 for ebook or $120 for print (front, back, spine, plus you get the ebook cover free.)


Printing:
Your book, for a standard novel length, would cost around $3-$7 per book to print paper backs, depending on how many you printed.
There are print on demand places (like CreateSpace) that have really worked out for authors, so they don't have to dump thousands into printing cost.
POD (print on demand) means you can print as the books are ordered, or you can order 20-50 books on your own for your distributor and just pay for what you need.


Distribution:
If you want to get into book stores, you need to impress a distributor. The distributor gets your books into stores. You can also distribute online through Amazon or even places like Etsy. Just get creative, and get the book out wherever you can.


Marketing:
This is where things get complicated, and you can spend nothing in advertising with social media free sites, or you can spend millions.
My book manager is going to start taking a few more clients on a subscription basis. By subscription, I mean, if you want to pay $50 a month, $100 a month, or thousands of dollars a month, she has a marketing program to fit the budget. She's worked on marketing for large companies like Brown-Foreman, so she really knows what she's doing.




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