The self-publishing frenzy : a view from this side of the pond
Monday, March 21, 2011 at 4:44PM Scarcely a day goes by without yet another article announcing the death of ‘legacy publishing’ (the business I’ve been in for sixteen years I guess) and its replacement by digital self-publishing straight to ebook. Here’s the latest entry, a fascinating conversation between Joe Konrath, the digital evangelist, and Barry Eisler, who reveals he’s taking the same path after turning down a half million dollar conventional publishing contract.
There’s such a frenzy in this field at the moment that it behoves someone to pour a touch of cold water on things. Oh go on then. Let it be me. Here are a few little-spoken of issues to consider before dissing that half million dollar deal yourself…
- First, this stuff is taking off big time in America which, in case you hadn’t noticed, is a very big country (population 307 million) with a very high take-up of new digital technologies. There are more potential customers for ebooks in the US than in the rest of the world put together. The UK (population 62 million) likes gadgets too but has nothing like the penetration of ereaders. A few people can be big in self-pubbed ebooks in America and make a tidy living. A few people can be big in self-pubbed ebooks in the UK and do… ok. Most self-pubbed ebooks do nothing at all, of course.
- If you do go the self-pubbed route you lose, I assume, your conventional agent. Why would they continue to represent someone who’s shifting the lion’s share of their work outside the field in which an agent works? Let’s count what you lose when your agent disappears… Anyone pushing your books into translation (which for UK-based authors can be a very steady source of income). Anyone pushing you for audio, TV and movie deals. Anyone giving you good feedback and advice about what’s going on in the industry, how your books are being received, what new opportunities might come along, and a slap round the cheek when you have a really stupid idea. If you don’t have an agent you lose nothing, I guess. But if you do, and it’s a good agent, you lose money and opportunity.
- Ebooks may be selling like crazy but print books are still very popular too. If you go self-pubbed into digital it’s hard to see a meaningful way in which you can take part in that game any more. Retailers won’t deal with self-pubbed titles. You won’t be in airports. You won’t be in the High Street. To many people (hate them for this all you like but it’s true) you won’t be a real author at all.
- To hell with the people who think you’re not real. That you can deal with. But we’re back to money again. No printed book means you won’t be in libraries either. So European authors will lose any income from public lending right and other copyright schemes (which, based on popularity, can bring in up to £8,000 or more each year in the UK).
- Your margins are likely to become very slim indeed, very quickly. Best-selling titles on Kindle tend to be there largely through price. It’s one thing to price back list titles, that have no need of further work, at 99p or 99 cents (I do that myself). But if you start pricing original work at that level you’ll be receiving a mere thirty odd pence or cents per sale. The current legal minimum adult wage in the UK is £232 per week. You are going to have to sell 662 of those 99p books each and every week to reach the same pay level as someone behind the counter of McDonalds. To reach the median weekly wage of £499 you will need to shift more than twice as many, more than 1,400 copies. That’s a lot.
- We’re talking gross income here. Not net. Yes, I know people always say to themselves, ‘But I’m working for myself from home so I have no overheads.’ You do. A web site and broadband connection. Cover costs, editing and formatting advice. Barry Eisler estimates $600 for the cover and formatting for his short story, which sounds on the low side to me. For a full length novel I’d expect to be paying at least three times that, and paying it up front before you’ve sold a single copy. Then there’s the question of…
- Promotion and marketing. You’re on your own now, remember? No publicist. No marketing department. You have to generate interest in your work, through constant activity on social media such as Facebook and Twitter. Or you have to find someone who will do this for you in return for a fee (and there seem to be more of them every day). Either way this will cost you time and/or money. With editing, cover design, promotion and marketing I doubt a properly-launched full-length ebook can come out for less than £3,000 and stand a chance of making it. You need to sell ten thousand 99p copies just to cover that cost, before you start to earn anything for yourself.
- Your promotional opportunities have now narrowed greatly. Festivals and other public events aren’t going to be so interested in a self-published author. Nor will the media. If you’re an established writer, well known and with a track record, it may be different. But for a newcomer… it’s going to be tough to stand out among the crowd.
Is it impossible to make these economics work? No. But it’s going to be a lot easier in the vast US market where a writer can be a formidable success simply by being popular in the state of California alone. In the UK it’s going to be a struggle for all but a handful. One answer is there in the Konrath-Eisler exchange. You’re going to have to write more. Short stories. Novellas. And dig out stuff from the back list (which will eventually run out, of course). One book a year used to be considered healthy and quite prolific output. Not any more. If you can get six new 99 cents or 99p titles into the market a year your chances of making a living improve a lot. But that’s six things you’ve got to write. There you go, folks. A big hand for the return of pulp fiction, which doesn’t worry me in the slightest, in fact I welcome it.
But…
Who’s talking about books here? All we hear about all too often is ‘product’ and ‘margins’. Very little about quality and breadth and innovation in terms of editorial. Here are the top ten free and paid-for titles on Kindle UK as I write…
No criticism of any of the books on the lists here. I’m sure they all deserve to be there. But it’s a pretty narrow range, don’t you think? Mainly mainstream thrillers with the odd chicklit and horror title. No science fiction title, no fantasy, no general fiction. ‘Legacy’ publishers often get criticised for putting out down market titles that sell in their millions but don’t carry much literary weight. One reason they do this is to subsidise works of more ‘merit’ that don’t sell as well and may one day build a worthwhile career. The ebook market is as ruthless as it gets. If you sell you’re there. If you’re not, you’re lost. Worthy, literary, modest sale publishing seems to have little place here.
Don’t get me wrong. I think ebooks are a good thing. I’ve put up some of my backlist and one new short story on Kindle. I’ll doubtless add a few things in future. If I lived in the US then perhaps I’d be mulling the route others are taking over there. But I don’t, and I fear a lot of people will get burned outside the US thinking the healthy sales available there can be easily replicated in smaller, more difficult markets.
I worry, too, that people who ought to be writing are being diverted into other things, endless conversations on Twitter and Facebook, constant sorties into forums to try to establish some kind of foothold in this new world, attempts at marketing, often pursued in ignorance and in a ham-fisted fashion. A lot of this is just plain tedious. I’d rather be working on a book.
I wish Joe and Barry — two bright and very entertaining people I’ve met at many conventions — well. It’s working for Joe already and I don’t doubt it will work for Barry too. That doesn’t mean this model is going to be a success for lots of others who copy the same route to the market.
A few people get rich by being early into a cycle of technical innovation. Most are better served by waiting until the dust settles then learning the lessons of those who went before. So if someone offers you a half a million dollar deal my advice is… bite their hand off. By the time you’re out of it you could be looking to enter a very different publishing environment, and with some money still in the bank.
David Hewson
Seems both Barry and Joe Konrath have now signed conventional publishing deals - well near conventional ones given they’re with Amazon’s new publishing houses. Read into that what you will. But I guess self-pubbing isn’t that attractive then?
Reader Comments (18)
The advantage UK self-pubs have is with only a little basic Americanizing, they can to tap into much of that huge US market. Some online outlets are pose a challenge as they need a US bank account to receive payments, but that's not entirely impossible to solve.
Where UK self-pubs are more likely to come unstuck, I think, is in publishing to non English speaking countries as the translations costs are going to be prohibitively high in most cases.
I don't think you need to Americanise UK English for the US. Most people don't mind and some actually like UK English (which is why imports are popular). A much bigger issue is how on earth you make yourself known amidst all that noise.... Everyone seems to be publishing to Kindle right now.
I can’t imagine paying for translations of my own work and putting them into 'print'. Leaving the costs aside, how would you know if it was a decent translation?
Yes - will be interesting to know what he thinks in a couple of years.
Agreed. Americans are tolerant, word usage is the main pitfall . I work with Americans (and am married to one), and we've had, and continue to have, a number of entertaining exchanges on that front.
Interesting to read your thoughts as always David.
For me self-publishing is part of a longer game plan. I would, one day, like to make a modest living from writing. I often joke about that bestseller that's going to make my fortune, but I know that's probably unlikely.
For me self-publishing is an opportunity to test the water if you like. Put my writing and ideas out there simply and cheaply, whilst at the same time doing the day job that pays the mortgage and the other bills.
Now I know that I could do that simply on a blog, and I do post some of my work on my blog, but for "books" this really has to be a little bit more conventional. E-publishing is but one method, but there are opportunities out there for conventional paper based self-publishing as well. For the latter this also entails having an ISBN if you really want to "publish" your work, but one of my current projects will really only work in a "conventional" format. It just won't work on a kindle.
I said that this is part of a longer game plan, and in that sense what I hope to gain by self-publishing are a few things. Firstly a reputation, and an ability to demonstrate a demand for what I have written. Secondly, a sense of satisfaction. I think that's fairly self-explanatory. Thirdly, confidence. Knowing that when I approach an agent it is with something to back up those first few chapters, and that then might open up more doors in terms of translation opportunities, oh and of course that bestseller that makes my fortune ;)
Anyway, just my take. Slightly naive I suspect, but I write because I enjoy it and at least for the time being something else pays those bills, and I won't have to pull a Lee Child anytime soon.
I think that's a very sensible way to approach it. The business will be very different in five years anyway. I had a lot of early success, including a movie. But I didn't give up the day job until ten years after I started writing. Being cautious and having reasonable expectations is the way to go....
Very interesting. The attraction for so many writers is the additional money. Take my example, I've had a publisher discount my exports to the US by 85%. That means since I'm paid royalties on net receipts, I get pennies per book. Although my sales have risen, my income has plummeted. And no, I wasn't consulted when they arranged this deal.
The idea of 25% or more royalties per sale on books priced sensibly is very appealing in comparison. But I know that I would have to write even more than my present two books a year, which is daunting. Or rather, unlikely to be achievable.
However, the biggest killer for me is not just the money and marketing - it's the fact that I depend on editors and copyeditors. I write fast and moderately well, but I am very bad at editing. If I could afford to work for a half day at a time, I would be happy, but I cannot afford that on my income. I have to work too many hours a week as it is.
If I was to self-publish, the editing time would necessarily increase, I'd have to market and publicise even more than I already do, and I don't see that I'd be able to command the sales and visibility necessary.
So I'll carry on trying to scrape a living as a mid-lister with the hope that one day someone will make a film of one of my books and I'll be able to invest in a pension. I can dream.
Sounds very realistic to me Mike. Lots of us in a similar position. Like you my royalty per book has been steadily falling along with book prices generally for the past ten years or so. A bigger per sale royalty through self publishing sounds attractive. But not if books are supposed to be priced at 99p a pop. And there are those extra costs. I don't think anyone can edit themselves so you will have to find someone to do it for you - and good ones won't be cheap.
Excellent post, David! Also: "it behoves someone to pour a touch of cold water on things. Oh go on then. Let it be me." - classic Hewson!
Barry and Joe Konrath are in atypical positions as proselytizers for their position, Konrath because he's been banging the drum so long and so loudly on this that he's become the figurehead of the movement, Barry because he's an established bestseller who can enter the epublishing market with a solid fanbase and easy access to publicity. While Stephen King really should plunge whole-heartedly into self-publishing, I think midlist or unpublished authors would be wise to be more circumspect.
But really, I don't know - I have no clue what the future will look five years from now. The biggest issue, I think, will be competition: as self-publishers flood the market, supply will soar, flooding demand. Prices will (have already) take a hit, as established writers compete with beginners offering their work for free. But hardest of all will be establishing your own brand in a sea of hundreds of thousands of other writers. I genuinely believe that marketing/branding will be the biggest challenge here, and it'll be increasingly different not only because of the competition, but because of the dilution of traditional publicity options - fewer newsprint pages with book reviews, a huge proliferation of book bloggers etc.
Still, while self-publishing/epublishing represent a problematic future, the approaches of the various legacy publishers to epublishing seems just as problematic. They really seem to be tightening the screws on authors in terms of rights and royalties. And as revenues from traditional publishing has withered, their promotional services for authors, always pretty weak, have become almost risible.
I think you may be right Jonathan. What will set us apart won't be our books but our ability to schmooze and beg and bleat our way across the bloody social media landscape trying to scrape up some interest in our work. Not only am I no good at that stuff I have absolutely no interest in it. If that's a prerequisite of being a published author I may well go and write something else.
The most worrying thing of all is the perception this is being put in the public's mind that the going rate for a novel (new or otherwise) is 99p or 99 cents. At that level no one can make any money out of this business unless they slavishly pile out pulp every month or so.
David,
Good post, and I don't think it does any harm (I suspect the opposite) to pour some cold water on proceedings.
I am in the same boat as Alan, so won't rehash his comments.
My biggest concern (as someone who has take the self-publishing plunge) is that I believe a lot of writers don't fully grasp the danger of the free market and the race to the bottom. I really don't think they understand just how many future careers they are probably extinguishing (including their own). Some know, and simply don't care. But those can't be educated.
I don't worry about the day all books become 99c. I worry about the day that the worth of those books will amount to exactly that.
Uh... as far as I know, at least four writers that I can name off the top of my head have GAINED agents as a result of self-publishing: Kait Nolan, H. P. Mallory, Karen McQuestion, and of course Amanda Hocking, though there are a few who were on Konrath's blog who actually went traditional after self-pubbing who also got agents.
I think your point about international markets being different than the U.S. market is solid. I haven't tried to list any fiction books on the UK Amazon site, so I don't know what the market's like there. I did hear that Steven Leather was doing pretty well at self-publishing, though he is traditionally published, so he's an outlier/exception/etc.
Four? Am I meant to be impressed? And haven't you noticed... those four will be seeking traditional publishing deals. Not staying self-pubbed in ebooks. If you see self-pubbing as a route into conventional publishing fine. But the buzz right now is 'conventional publishing is dead'. So which is it?
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David, I agree with your conclusion. This is a burgeoning market, and a fast moving one at that. What's particularly encouraging about the self publishing trend in the US, is the amount of help and advice that is already available for free online. While it's not a 1:1 substitute for professional assistance, there's enough to take the sting out of the self publishing for beginners.
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