Should you go indie? Should you pursue the traditional publishing route?
I thought I’d go over some of the pros and cons today for those on the fence. I’m obviously biased since I chose to e-publish, but I’ll try to “keep it real.” Please chime in below if you want to disagree (or agree!).
What It Means to Be an Indie Author:
More money…maybe
As things stand today, thanks to the economics of e-publishing and the royalty rates the big booksellers offer, you’ll make a lot more money on each book sold. I mentioned this blog post last week, and I’m sure I’ll reference it often because it’s definitely worth a look: Robin Sullivan at Write2Publish does the numbers, comparing the earnings of two mid-list fantasy authors, one self-pubbed and one traditionally pubbed, with a similar number of books out. We’re talking in the neighborhood of $2,000 a month vs $10,000 a month.
That said, you are completely and utterly on your own for selling your books. Especially in the beginning, you’ll feel like you’re putting way more effort into promotion than you’re getting back in sales. It’ll seem like you have to personally sell each and every copy because nobody’s finding your work on Amazon on their own. Certainly, nobody’s going to chance across your book on a shelf in a local bookstore.
As I’m learning, you don’t have to master every marketing avenue, but you do need to find some tactics you don’t mind pursuing and…pursue them. Relentlessly. And hope that some day you reach a tipping point where your books are high enough on sales charts that readers find them on their own. Not everybody gets to that point.
The freedom to write whatever you want at whatever length you want…maybe
As an indie author, you don’t have to make sure your paranormal romance falls between 70,000 and 90,000 words because that’s what agents want, thank you very much. If you’re publishing ebooks, you don’t even have to stick to novels. My 18,000-word fantasy story, Flash Gold, is about a quarter of the length of a novel, so I’ve priced it at 99 cents (as an e-publisher you can choose whatever sales price you wish) and many folks are checking it out (thank you). Other indie ebook authors are publishing even shorter stories.
When it comes to content, you needn’t stick to formulas or write to a potential agent’s wishlist either. There’s a big world out there, and just because your book might not have bestseller written all over it, that doesn’t mean you won’t find a readership.
That said, if you want to sell books and continue to sell books, you do have to please your readers. Unfortunately, I can’t give you the secret formula on how to do that. You’ll know, when you start getting reviews from people you don’t know, if you’re hitting the mark.
Total control over your destiny…maybe
Because you are on your own for the story and the marketing, much of whether you succeed or fail lies in your own hands. This is comforting for some (those with the entrepreneurial spirit) and terrifying for others.
But even the entrepreneurs must realize that luck is going to play a role at some point. Sure, you can help things along by working hard at promotion and writing great stories, but there will be times that luck helps (or hinders) you: an influential reviewer writing up your book, an A-list blogger linking to your site, a bargain books site mentioning your 99-cent ebook, etc.
The more you put your work out there and make people aware of it, the more likely it is good luck will find you, but some people can do everything right and never “get lucky” (though, thanks to those higher royalties I mentioned, even modest sales can lead to a nice part-time income).
Being taken advantage of…maybe
When you’re struggling to get your book noticed, you’ll see a lot of opportunities that sound great but that might end up costing you far more money than they’re worth in sales.
There are lots of new companies cropping up that are jumping at the chance to help you get your ebooks published and out to the world. And there are tons of forums, book sites, and blogs that offer advertising options. None of these guys are out to scam anyone, but there’s doubtlessly a lot of truth to that old saying that the most money made during the Gold Rush was by the folks selling picks and shovels to the prospectors.
If you’re choosing to be an indie, you’re choosing to be in business for yourself, and (successful) businesses track their spending carefully. To stay afloat, they must ensure earnings outweigh expenses.
A beating on your ego…probably
- You’re going to get bad reviews. (Hopefully you get plenty of good ones to balance things out, but it’s still hard to read criticism, especially when you sense there’s truth to it).
- You’re going to see other indies who started at the same time or after you making it big while you’re still struggling to make sales. (Maybe you feel you’re doing well when you measure month-to-month progress, but it’s hard not to get down when you see others doing so much better.)
- Somebody’s going to say bad things about you somewhere online. (This is especially true if you have a blog and state your opinions on it — chances are you’re going to rub someone the wrong way sooner or later.)
Of course, those points about ego are relative to traditionally published authors too. For good or ill, when you choose to put yourself out there, you put yourself at risk. But, hey, we all know it’s the people who take risks who reap the rewards.
Whichever publishing path you take, good luck!
I think you’ll catch. Keep at it. I’ve really been enjoying Encrypted. You put out a good product unlike others I’ve read.
Good advice.
There is a lot of truth in what you say. Especially about luck :o)
A great summary Lindsay! I agree with MPax, you put out a good product and it’s a pleasure to read it.
Great post as usual. It feels like such a huge decision to go the self-pub route, but the more I read and talk to people the more I feel like there’s nothing to lose in giving it a shot! Thanks for helping, Lindsay!
Thanks, MPax and Raelyn! I can’t complain about how things are going so far. 🙂
Definitely, Lexi! Didn’t you have your first mini success when the KUF people made your novel the read of the month for their book club? Good stuff.
I haven’t regretted it thus far, Syd. Even if I’d signed with an agent, I’m sure Encrypted and Emperor’s Edge wouldn’t have been out until 2012 (if they caught any publisher’s eye, that is). I love how quickly you can get things out there as an indie.
Great post. I think you covered some pretty good points. Going indie won’t be easy but it can be worth it if you’re willing to put the time and effort into it. Thanks.
I’ll give one more pro and con. If you go with tradpub and you are fortunate, you will be a member of a team that can give you a lot of assistance and guidance. As an indie, you have to build that yourself.
On the other hand, for a tradpub submission to agents done properly, you will spend multiple hundred hours. That’s enough to write another book. Personally, I have no particular problem with the idea of going tradpub, but my limited time is now better spent indie publishing than submitting to agents. It increases my chances of succeeding – I’d argue that I even have a better chance of landing a tradpub deal by selling the lights out as an indie than I do of winning the slushpile lottery.
Excellent post, Lindsay. I love the freedom being an indie author provides. I remember when I started writing Shadow Cat… the idea of putting 70k+ words in a book was daunting. Holy cow… did I even have a story that long.
It was a real turning point to encounter indie authors and realize I wasn’t confined to a word count. It was hard to believe people were writing novellas, and people were buying them. Heck! I was purchasing and loving them. Taking a chance on a debut author with a 30K work versus 90K work, I’ll go with the smaller time investment. 🙂
@Edward ~ I’m with you on the benefits of not having to query. I spent 9 months querying with mix responses but no offers. During that time, I produced all of one short story. 🙂 It’s been 7 months since then and I’ve published the work I’d been querying and the short story plus I’ve written the first draft of 3 more novels/novellas.
From what I’ve seen of other indie gone traditional, you seem to be totally on the mark. Being a successful indie author increases the chances of a traditional publisher or agent finding you. It makes sense to put your efforts toward producing new works rather than 57 versions of the same query letter. 🙂
Reaching a tipping point is really key, though just where that is will remain a mystery until you get there.
For those who want inspiration, our novel (a crime thriller – good commercial decision) languished three months on Kindle UK barely selling at all. It was two months before we got our first review.
Thanks to some hard work on the promo we started to build sales and at some point in early February we reached a tipping point. In the space of six weeks we went from nowhere to, literally, the top five (reaching # 2 briefly) and still hold a top five rank today.
That’s a debut novel without an agent or publisher, that sold 20,000 in April alone.
As for querying… Our mss has been with a very keen agent now for what seems like an eternity. She still hasn’t finally made up her mind if she wants to represent us, let alone get us a “real” contract.
We’ve sold over 30,000 ebooks just in the time she’s been considering her options…
That’s not a criticism. Just a fact. That’s how traditional publishing works. And why it just doesn’t pay to wait.
Be inspired. It can be done!
As a new-minted indie publisher I find all this analysis heartening–although honesty compels me to admit that half my motivation for self-publishing was so I could stop obsessing and endlessly rewriting and move on to my next book!
Great post Lindsay – I really believe epubbing allowed me to connect with readers when I probably never would have if I’d stuck to the traditional route. A friend of mine was fortunate to have a paranormal romance picked up by a publisher, but it will be over a year before it comes out. Being an indie has been a very satisfying experience for me, especially because I’ve been able to connect with other indie authors.
Cheers!
Michael
Thanks for reading, Patricia!
Reena and Edward, yes, querying those agents (and writing the synopsis and letter itself) is a real time sink. Honestly, I think you could write another entire novel in the hours all that takes!
Very inspiring, Mark! Yup, the traditional publishing world doesn’t seem to move too speedily.
Sounds like a good enough reason to me, Marion. 🙂
Glad to hear it, Michael. Thanks for commenting!
Although I’m already definitely going indie, it’s always motivating to hear other people’s stories. Thanks for the post and for the inspiring comments too! 🙂
I stumbled upon your blog this morning killing time before my day really begins. You really hit the nail on the head. Being an indie author is hard. I don’t think people really understand what’s required in order to make your book a success. Thank you for writing this. I feel a little less alone in the world.
If your blog is any indication of the quality of your e-books than your record already speaks for itself. Thanks for the tips.