Using Both Traditional Publishing and Self-Publishing

As a writer, I don’t say, traditional publishing is dead, and Self-Publishing has taken over. I am a user of both, to get my written words into books, published and presented to the world.

I have books published in both ways, and while I have made the most money from a traditionally published book, my self-published book sales have done far better that just paying for themselves.

• 

So books … with traditionally published books, somebody else, the publisher, is the one who does most of the work to bring the books into the world, putting it all together, and getting in printed, then doing some book promotion, one hopes so anyway. The author may or may not be involved in the promotion of the book, but in the interests of book sales, it’s best if they do …

With self-publishing, it is the author who takes on all of the roles of the traditional publisher, as well as the writing of the words that make the book. And they then take over all of the marketing and promotion of that book too.

Book marketing, getting books into libraries and book stores is not an easy thing, but bit by bit, I’m slowly learning a little bit about it, and I know I am capable of speaking to an audience about my books and writing, so that aspect of promotion doesn’t scare me, I enjoy it, in fact.

At the moment, I have two books on the verge of being published. One is a self-published anthology, on the subject of Covid-19, titled “Plague Invasion”. It is a fine book, and will be launched at the Gawler and Adelaide Plains Festival of Words (Recovery), an annual event my writing group, Adelaide Plains Poets Chapter and Verse, is running for the sixth year, in late July.

The other book is one I submitted to a traditional publisher, Ginninderra Press, who have published two of my poetry collections so far. I am happy with the results of their work, with those two books, and look forward to working with them again, when my new collection “Leonard Cohen is dead” comes out in the first half of next year.

In my self-publishing role, I worked hard at getting the new book put together, asking for submissions last year, and considering all received, to make a worthy collection showing many aspects of this horror pandemic the world is suffering … It will be an important book, historically, and I hope I can do it justice … I’ve had good people working with me, and will have more assistance into the future in promoting the book, I am sure.

I have a printer, a local business, who I’ve worked with getting my self-published books printed, and I am completely happy with their work, so am using them again for the anthology. Next week, or the week after, I expect I will visit them, and hand over the final draft of the book, and then they will do their work, and not too long after, I will have books, as many as I can afford, and expect to sell …

That is the difficult part of being a self-publisher for me, being able to afford paying for the books to come into be printed. My time taken in producing the books, though the hours are many, doesn’t cost me any actual money, I do the work because I enjoy doing it, and I hope to reap benefits from book sales.

The best part about having books to sell though, whether traditionally published ones or self-published, is actually talking to the people who are purchasing a book from me. Obviously, I do a lot more of that, with the self-published books, because I am the one selling the book to them, not a more anonymous book shop.

That first traditionally published book of mine, which first came out many years ago, still brings me money, in the form of Educational Lending Rights, every year, based on the number of that book (titled “My Dog”), are held in school libraries. And easy way to make passive income, if the book gets purchased by the schools …

The books in the photograph, are from my Writer in Residence gig, which I do every Monday morning (not public holidays), and I get occasional book sales doing that. The books there are some of my books, not quite all of them, and I’ve been wondering whether or not I should be having more copies of one of my books published …

I might wait a bit longer on that decision, and see if I make money to do that, from the anthology coming out in July … Ah decisions, decisions! Money in, money out!

So overall, I can’t say which is the better publishing method, both are different, and the type of book may do better with one over the other. Self-publishing is frustrating when there problems, but it’s fun, when it goes well!

I’d love to hear from other writers about their experiences with both of these two forms of publishing, please leave comments!