Could a Traditional Publisher Harm Your Career

[Steerpike]

Mark Coker argues that eBook pricing by traditional publishers leads to a bit less revenue and a lot fewer readers for an author than would the same books at a $2.99 price point. He believes that as eBooks gain more of the market, it will be harder for traditional publishers to provide enough benefit to authors to offset those differences. of course, Mark Coker is the founder of Smashwords, so he has a dog in the hunt. What do you think:

How a Traditional Publisher Could Harm a Writer's Career - The Digital Reader

[danr62]

There are a lot of authors who agree with these views. Dean Wesley Smith is one of the more outspoken writters on this font.

And royalties and sales volume aren't the only reason he's turned away from trade publishers. It has to do with rights, contracts, and creative control. It's about the lack of accurate sales data and payments that are issued few and far between. It's about the extremely slow to market time for books.

Everything I've been reading about trade publishers makes me think that whatever benefits they provide are not worth the hassle of dealing with these issues.

[Devor]

I think it depends on how big you can be. If a trade publisher can do your marketing, schedule your signings and place your books in WalMart, you can't top that. We know they play favorites with their authors, sometimes with good reason, and if they're going to ignore you, and leave you to do most of the work yourself, you've made a mistake by using them. I'm hoping there's an in between, but certainly there's a scale with two ends in terms of the treatment you receive.

[The Dark One]

Seriously...are you really going to say no if a big publisher comes calling?

A career in writing is hopefully decades. Obviously, there are exceptions, but the general rule is that the bigger your publisher the greater your cache that can be exploited later...if not now. I've had two books published by two comparatively small commercial publishers - one reasonably successful. That small success has interested agents and bigger publishers. I need a bigger publisher with strong marketing and distribution. The smaller ones don't have that much and self-publishing doesn't have it at all unless you win the 'strange gods of publishing' lottery. (Like 50 Shades)

I recently signed with one of the biggest agents in Australia which ought to increase my prospects a thousand-fold...but the whole industry is in so much flux, I've got no idea whether my 20 years of hard work is going to pay off. Ten years ago I would have been a shoe in with this particular agent.

Now...

[TWErvin2]

Going with a traditional publisher enables an author access to a different set of readers than self-publishing. My experience with a small publisher is that a percentage of those readers who try my books have enjoyed other titles released by my publisher. It's not a huge %, but it's there. I think author brand is far stronger than publisher brand, but it's still a factor. And with a larger publisher, that # of readers possibly attracted can add up.

Pricing is something that I am not sure one can say what works for one title will work for the majority of titles, but I do agree with Mark Kolker that it's better to have a lower price and earn roughly the same while having attracted more readers.

For me, I'm not keen on paying more for an ebook than it costs in mass market paperback. That's my price point, and for a small press/self-pubbed auithor, I'm far less inclined to pay $7.99 than I am $2.99.

The big publishers may be slower to recognize trends, but once they react and get moving in the right direction, they potentially have a momentum that can have an impact.

As far as the Author Solutions discussed, one of the things I've noticed with the few authors I've met who went with them, they seem happy and loyal. Why, I am not sure. But that is part of what the purchase was about. Maybe Penguin will do better for them. I hope so.

[Devor]

Seriously...are you really going to say no if a big publisher comes calling?

There's definitely a case for some people saying no to a big publisher, even if the arguments are often exaggerated in both directions. Royalties are lower, for instance, and they don't price ebooks in your best interest. Their marketing benefits are often exaggerated. They will pitch your book to stores, but that pitch will last thirty seconds and be buried amid a hundred others. Many of the people who do well with a publisher do so by doing all the same promotional techniques it would take to do well being self-published. Plenty of people don't do well, even with a big publisher.

[Steerpike]

There has been at least one author who said no to one of the big publishers and self published. I linked the story a few weeks back.

[Mindfire]

Doesn't e-publishing actually make it less likely that someone's going to find your book and read it? I mean the e-book pool is HUGE even compared to the traditional book pool, so it'll be even harder to fight for attention. An e-book reader will be sifting through literally billions of books, many of which are likely to be garbage because there isn't really a quality filter in e-publishing, and will probably miss your one voice among the billion others. Also, since e-books are mainly about convenience, I don't see e-book buyers having the same kind of investment/interest/brand loyalty to writers that traditional book buyers do, which makes them less likely to buy sequels, visit your website, etc. This is a bigger problem if you've just started and no one knows who you are.

Granted, I know jack all about publishing. And granted, traditional publishing has these problems as well. But it seems that with e-books those problems are multiplied exponentially, making e-books are a lot harder going, for first-timers especially, when it comes to things like distribution, publicity, marketing, etc.

[Devor]

Again, Mindfire, it depends. If your work is good enough to stand out among a hundred in their catalogue, and you don't know how to handle promotions, then they're probably the way to go. If your work is for a niche market and you know how to promote yourself online - so that most of your sales will be ebooks anyways - then traditional publishers will only serve to cut into your margins.

There's different ways to succeed, and the most important thing is to find the one that's right for you.

[Steerpike]

Again, Mindfire, it depends. If your work is good enough to stand out among a hundred in their catalogue, and you don't know how to handle promotions, then they're probably the way to go. If your work is for a niche market and you know how to promote yourself online - so that most of your sales will be ebooks anyways - then traditional publishers will only serve to cut into your margins.

There's different ways to succeed, and the most important thing is to find the one that's right for you.

Yep. A year or two ago it would have been a no-brainer for me. Now, if I had something complete that was good enough to sell to a major publisher, I'd have to think about it.