Types of Publishing: Traditional, Indie and Everything in Between

Hail and welcome to the second installment of the self-publishing Q&A series! Read Week 1’s post if you haven’t already. This week we are talking about that most formidable of challenges- deciding how exactly you will deliver books to readers once you’ve turned down traditional publishing (or vice versa).

Indie writer Ellyana asks:

Through talking with you I know you work through Createspace Amazon. (Please correct me if something has changed.)

This may be my most-asked publishing question: how exactly do you publish your books? Elly probably remembers asking it some months ago when she was just starting to publish her novel. Yes, I do use CreateSpace (I’ll explain that in a minute), but we have a variety of self-publishing options open to us, and we will look at all of them presently.

But have you ever considered using a Literary Agent for advertisement and the like? And if you know anything about Literary Agents that would be of assistance.

Ooh, here it is- the Agent Question. I confess that I have never been interested in working with one. I did some research and learned that most of them at least are experts who have done wonders for some people, but I also heard that other people have hired agents and regretted it. I decided that, since my goal was to get better at publishing my own books and not necessarily to make lots of money, I preferred to remain my own boss. So I will direct you to indie author Roger Colby: he knows a thing or two about literary agents. (Also check out the links at the bottom.)

Anyway, I happen to have a list of self-publishing options (which, of course, I certainly did not put together just for the sake of this post). We will go through that today and dive into the details next week. Get it? Got it? Good.

First, normal or “true” self-publishing requires you to do your own set-up work, including buying (or making) your own cover, formatting the book, paying for it to be printed, and promoting it yourself. At the same time, you retain all autonomy and control over the process. This, by the way, is what Christopher Paolini did with Eragon. True self-publishers hire a publishing company to print many copies of their book, and then they go around promoting and selling the book themselves. It’s hard and often quite expensive, but I know of some people who swear by this approach. 

Then there’s Print-On-Demand (POD) publishing. POD is a technology that allows the publisher to print books one at a time, as customers order them. This is what Amazon’s CreateSpace does. It’s less expensive than printing hundreds of books at once, but in most services the author has less control over the more detailed processes- after all, the POD company has to keep your files around to print them when necessary. 

Then you have various eBook publishers, Amazon Kindle being the obvious one. Lots of indie authors love this approach. Ebooks eliminate the cost of paper and production entirely, only requiring you to get a book cover and upload your files. Lower production costs result in lower prices and no shipping fees, which means some people are more inclined to buy them. The downsides: Kindle books are cheaper, and while you may sell more of them, you earn less royalty money. And is it worth mentioning that you risk being rejected by a handful of book extremists like this guy?

Finally, some authors publish their works on writing networks like Wattpad or Figment. Even though a lot of people are inclined to overlook it, these networks are a legitimate option if you want to get the word out about your book. They’re basically online magazines crossed with forums. Writing networks allow writers to upload stories or chapters of books that they’re writing and get feedback on their plot structure, characterization, etc. from other authors and readers. And the best part? You can hear from a real audience and make changes even after publishing the story.

While we’re on the subject of options, though, beware of vanity publishers. They will buy the actual rights to your book, meaning that you retain little or no autonomy, and they will publish any book, so they are generally considered less credible. And some of them are downright sleazy, stealing your intellectual property for their own- which is very much illegal. If you do opt to publish with a vanity publisher (which may be fine), do some careful research, and be aware that you may not make as much money.

So… how do you pick just one option? When it comes down to it, you just have to set some goals for yourself. Are you trying to share a good book with other fantasy lovers? Build a following for your business? Become famous?  Once you know what you want to achieve, you can read up on the options and decide what works best for you. Read and research, read and research. My list of resources below should get you started.

Oh, and have fun. Because learning about how writers can speak to the world, increasing the number of wrinkles in your brain, gaining some business smarts, and maybe making new connections along the way isn’t exactly torture.

Do you have a self-publishing question? We all would like to hear it, no matter whether you’re about to publish a book or are simply curious about how your favorite authors do it. Share in the comments!

Want to know more?

AgentQuery. Not just for finding an agent; these professionals have all sorts of good advice on publishing.

A helpful article on all manner of self-publishing 

Costs: How much do you need to pay to self-publish?

Print-On-Demand: CreateSpace’s website, forums and all

Ebooks: Good stuff on the variety of eBook companies

Ebooks: Amazon Kindle’s official site, complete with tutorials and FAQs

Vanity publishing: Get the lowdown on vanity/subsidy publishing

ISBN: Are you buying your own ISBN?