Notes from Minnesota

Hey Freelancer! 

If you've recently e-mailed me, hang tight. I'm behind in my correspondence... again. But I have a darn good reason this time. I've experienced my first scooter accident.

Heading down McDermott Avenue, I slowed down and was promptly rear ended by my wonderful husband. Both scoots went down. Mine spun with my knee acting as the axle.

Scoots look a little rough, but still work beautiful. My knee got twisted but gets better every day. Doc says I'll be right as rain very soon.

Sucks, though. I'm not a good patient and an even worse convalescent.

But I've figured out a few things while my leg's been elevated:

1. I still love writing. The warm laptop feels sooooo good on that tired little knee.

2. I don't need to check my e-mail as often as I have. Most e-mails can wait. I'm a writer, not a professional e-mail answerer.

3. I've started working on my novels again. What FUN! It's terribly satisfying to feel that strange jolt when I re-enter reality once again. The world of fiction sure is enticing. :)

4. I was too busy. I've been weeding out projects right and left, holding tight to the ones that are near and dear to my heart, the ones that'll enhance my ultimate dream.

5. Finally, I still LOVE scooting! It may take me a long time to get my riding boots on, but I still manage and really enjoy getting back at it. There's something about quieting your mind, concentrating on the task at hand, and experiencing life that's just way too fun.

As you read this, I hope you take stock of your own life. It's so easy to get off track. Work on a project you love... and do it every day. Enjoy life. Have fun.

Onward and upward!

Beth

P.S. Be sure to check out our best sellers. Here's the link.

Mindset Moment

Hey Freelancer,

What do you suppose would happen if...

You worked on a project you loved each and every day?


You gently sent a regular stream of queries to targeted publications?


You allowed yourself to experience the joy of this marvelous profession?


You didn't focus on results, but instead enjoyed the process?

Wow. Talk about developing powerful habits.

(Mindset Moment)

Beth's Hot Pick of the Week

I hear rumblings about the economy. And the news isn't good. Wall Street's tumbling. Publishers are tightening their belts in anticipation of lean times ahead.

Isn't it time you diversified your writing income so it will remain steady (and perhaps even climb) during the coming months? I explain everything in 101 No Cost (and Low Cost) Techniques to Turbo Charge Your Freelance Income. And now you can instantly download this invaluable recession-busting guide when you click here.

This is an excerpt from my book, “Filbert's Fast Guide to Getting Published Without Falling For Hooks, Lines, and Sinkers” It's available here.

Step One: Choose Your Publisher Carefully

Types of Publishers

Let’s begin by talking about book publishers. Don’t worry, if you’re into the magazine market, we’ll get there in a minute. Much of what we’re about to discuss applies to both short and long manuscripts.

Because this section isn’t intended to be an exhaustive study of various types of publishers, my intent here is to give you a general overview of the industry so you’ll know how to target your efforts and increase your chances for success.

The Big Wigs

I’ll bet you didn’t know that there are only around seven major book publishers world-wide. Yup. Just seven.

Now, these seven major companies have a gazillion subsidiaries, enough to create a pretty big dent in the annual “Writer’s Market.”

What does this mean to you?

It means that unless you’ve got a pretty big portfolio, unless you’ve got a great deal of success under your belt, unless you’re a fairly big name, your chances of cracking into this market is pretty small. Not impossible… just really small.

Big publishers tend to eye profitability and marketability as major contributors determining whether they’ll accept a book for publication.

Big publishing houses receive thousands of unsolicited manuscripts and queries each week. Unless you have an inside contact in the house, the chances your query/manuscript will receive any attention whatsoever is slim.

If a big publisher accepts your manuscript, you can expect a small advance and can earn between a 6% to 10% royalty based on the net receipts. For example, if your $20 book wholesales for $10, you’d receive between .60 and $1.00 per book sold based on this type of arrangement.

Beware… some writers have complained that their books never earned back their “advance on royalties” and were asked to return some of their advance. Other writers never earned anything beyond their advance. Be aware of this situation and carefully read any contract before you sign it.

But I digress….

If you aren’t a celebrity, don’t expect much promotional effort put into your book. Publishers tend to follow the 80/20 rule… 80 percent of their promo dollars go into the top 20 percent of their books. The remaining 20 percent of their promo dollars go into 80 percent of their titles.

Also, you can expect that your book will be available for between 6 months and one year. After that it’ll be “remaindered” into discount bins.

Medium and Small Publishers

Medium and small publishers generally serve a niche market and often have a built-in audience for that market.

For example, Filbert Publishing specializes in publishing books for writers. Using Writing Etc. (our free e-mag for writers) as a big part of our promo plan, we’re able to effectively sell these types of titles. We also publish a small amount of fiction… after all, great writers tend to be voracious readers.

However, give us a book about fishing, and we’d be sunk (no pun intended). We like to stick to our specialty and our authors know this.

Don’t expect much of an advance from a small and medium publisher. Many don’t give advances at all.

With a strong, targeted book proposal, you’re almost assured to receive an educated read from many of these houses.

Read any contract carefully, find out if your royalty schedule is based on the retail price of the book (this is best) or “net receipts” (not as good), or “net profits” (you don’t want this).

Your book will enjoy a longer life at a medium to small publisher… many times your book will live on as long as you’d like it to.

You won’t pay fees of any kind at a legitimate publishing house. If they begin asking for money for any reason, politely pull out of the negotiations.

When you contact a small or medium sized publisher, do your homework. Order a couple of their books and see what they look like. Are they full of errors? What do the covers look like? Will they produce something you’ll be proud of?

Thoroughly research their current title list, their submission guidelines, and read through their contract. If they appear to be someone you’d like to work with, contact them.
Subsidy and Vanity Publishing

Not many publishing houses will fess up to being a subsidy or vanity house anymore. A ton of new terms have popped up in an attempt to remove the stigma of “subsidy/vanity publisher” on their label.

You can easily spot a “subsidy/vanity publisher” by asking yourself one question:

Does this company charge me money to get published?

Does this company demand that I purchase a ton of books or they won’t publish me?

If the answer’s “Yes” to either of these questions, then they’re a subsidy publisher and you’d do best to avoid them.

To get legitimately published, you shouldn’t have to provide the publishing company with any money. Period. A legit house will lay out, edit, design a cover, promote the book, everything… for free… because they believe your book will sell enough to recoup their investment.

After all, if your publisher doesn’t believe your book will sell, why would you allow them to publish it? You need a publisher who believes in your project lock, stock, and barrel… and is willing to invest the time and money in promoting it correctly.

Bottom line: Unless you plan on self publishing your work, never pay to get published.

Subsidy and vanity publishers don’t have a good reputation in the book selling business. If your book holds their label, you’ll have a very difficult time selling it to anyone beyond your local community.

POD

POD is the new buzzword in the publishing biz.

Actually POD has been around for a long time.

POD stands for “Print On Demand.” In the past, this term has been used to describe the use of new printing equipment capable of printing one book at a time.

For example, a customer orders one book, the machine prints one book, the customer goes home happy with their purchase.

Technically speaking, this business model should work. And it does. Sometimes.

After all, every book is (technically speaking again) printed “one at a time.” Even in the days of scribes and monks, books were printed “one at a time.”

However, a number of problems have cropped up with this new POD business model.

First, I need to clarify the term POD. “Print on Demand” has (for some unknown reason) evolved from focusing on this marvelous new technology to becoming this new “buzz word” in the publishing community.

Today, the term POD often refers to a business model where virtually anyone can set up a “publishing house,” contract with a company like Lightning Source or Create Space to print their books, and start selling books.

Two of the biggest POD publishing companies today are iUniverse and Xlibris.

Although there are definite benefits to having your book published by one of these companies… benefits like higher royalties, more control over your book edits, you don’t have to go through any manuscript submission process… there are definite liabilities to this type of publishing house.

First, many people view POD companies as vanity/subsidy publishers because the author has often paid to get their book in print.

Your books will cost more. Where a traditional publishing house can order print runs large enough to keep their price per book at around a couple bucks per. Printing one book will cost you between six and seven dollars… not counting postage to get it to the bookstore or customer.

Your books will receive limited distribution. Yeah, they’ll be available online at nearly every online bookstore. But booksellers (the brick and mortar kind) are reluctant to order POD books. This happens because POD publishing companies are unable to reduce the wholesale price of the book to give bookstores a decent discount. Also, many of these companies do not have bookstore-friendly terms.

Here's an example, a book retailing for 12.95 will be discounted 55 percent for the privilege of being stocked at a Baker and Taylor warehouse. Baker and Taylor (along with Ingrams) is a major wholesaler of books… you need to get your book into one of these warehouses or you will not receive wide-spread distribution.

Sooooo, Baker and Taylor warehouses your book until a few orders start coming in. After the orders come in, they’ll fill them and contact your publisher when they need more books.

But here’s the hitch: a 55 percent discount on a $12.95 book equals a $7.12. This means your publisher earns 5.83 (minus postage to get the book to Baker and Taylor) for each book.

Subtract the author royalty and the profit margin gets slimmer.

If your POD book costs more than a couple dollars per book to print, your publisher has to reduce the bookstore discount. That makes bookstores not purchase your book because they’re in the business to make money.

They’ll stick to stocking profitable books, squeezing your chances of obtaining a readership.

But there are also other disadvantages to going with a POD publisher:

Your book will not receive any pre-publication publicity. You simply sign a contract and, voila… you’ve got a book.

Traditional publishers take anywhere from six to 12 months to send out galleys to reviewers, obtain Library of Congress numbers, send out press releases, and such. Often the lion’s share of publicity occurs before the book even hits bookstores. You lose out on a lot of publicity when you go with a POD publisher.

You may wind up with an odd contract. Some POD contracts are incomplete, exploitative, and even abusive. Watch for no termination clause, no rights reverting back to you, worldwide (long term) rights to your work, and terms changing without notice.

Be wary of the POD business model. These types of businesses are evolving daily. Approach with caution.

Self Publishing

If you choose to self publish, you’ll lay out your own book, design the cover (or have someone do this for you), and deal directly with the printer to order as many copies as you’d like.

You’ll promote your title nonstop, retain all the profits, and maintain total control over your book.

Self publishing is a viable option for the entrepreneurial side of your personality. Gone are the days of rejection letters. Forget polishing the queries.

Today your free time is spent nosing out new markets and making your new book a success.

If you choose this option, be sure to research the process thoroughly. Books by Dan Poynter and Tom and Marilyn Ross are a great place to start.

Whew! I've gone on forever. This is a pretty huge subject, so we'll talk more on this later. Til then, happy writing!

~~~

Beth Ann Erickson is the “Queen Bee” of Filbert Publishing. She’s also the author of numerous titles including “101 No Cost and Low Cost Secrets To Turbo Charge Your Freelance Income.” Pick up your copy today at http://filbertpublishing.com/101.html   She’s also a busy copywriter, speaker, and publisher of Writing Etc., the free e-mag for writers.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

I Recommend:

Writing For Dollars! The FREE ezine for writers featuring tips, tricks and ideas for selling what you write. Receive the FREE ebook, 83 WAYS TO MAKE MONEY WRITING when you subscribe. Email to subscribe@writingfordollars.com -*-

http://www.WritingForDollars.com 

WRITERS FIND MARKETS EASILY - Worldwide Freelance has a NEW fully-searchable Markets Database. Discover writing markets from North America, Europe, Australia and other places. It's free, so come and try it out

here: http://www.worldwidefreelance.com

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~