BlogHop4Writers 29th Sept '11

BlogHop4Writers
Question provided by author: Lark LaTroy

With the advancement of e-publishing and e-books, what new methods of marketing do you think authors should employ?

With both the market and the internet constantly upgrading themselves, for some it is hard to keep up, but, if you don't make the effor, your name, or 'brand' if you like, will fall below the reading publics' horizon.

When sites like Facebook make changes, the consequences rumble round the globe and some people search for alternatives, but can you completely desert something a big a as facebook?  However much you may wish to, starting to rebuild yourself on a new site is hard.

Joining every social network on the planet may not be the answer either, as many specialise and your genre of book simply may not appeal.  So, the question becomes, do i try to crack that nut, or continue building my base at networking sites that do cover my genre.  And I don't mean readers, other writers and publishers.  They are the subjects you touch on in your book, look for their facebook and twitter tags and so much more.

Is any of this new?  No, not really, it is how you keep adapting to reinvent yourself as the net and e-publishing marches on.

What is new is the pace of change.  The net, by its very nature is a fast moving chamealon, as authors we have to learn to keep up.  If anything is new, it is the mind blowing pace writers have to maintain to keep themselves in the main frame.

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The ins and outs of publishing continued

But there are also cons to going with a new, untried publisher. Obviously, it’s much easier to start a fly-by-night outfit with no intention of making good on any promises than it is to start a genuine, hard-working company. And it’s very difficult to tell at first glance which is which. So while you shouldn’t be afraid to sign with a new publishing company if they offer a contract, you should proceed with caution.

If the publisher asks you for up-front money, they are most likely not legit. A legitimate, non-vanity publisher does not charge reading or editing fees. Nor do they try to sell their authors any paid services. If a manuscript is accepted at a legitimate publisher, the reading and editing is paid for by the publisher. The only up front fee that an author should ever expect to pay is the $35 copyright fee to the US Copyright Office. Many publishers are now requiring authors to pay this fee. If the publisher does not ask you to pay this, be sure to check that they will, in fact, pay the fee themselves and register the copyright, as some publishers are no longer even copyrighting their shorter books. They’re just inserting a copyright notice and calling it good.

And make sure to read your contract very, very carefully. Some authors have recently discovered to their dismay that their publisher has inserted a clause into the contract giving the publisher ownership of the characters and series of authors contracted with them. This means if your book is popular and readers demand a sequel, the publisher can hire someone else to write the next book in the series, leaving the original author out in the cold. More than one author has had to sit back and watch what should have been their next book come out in someone else’s name. Also be sure your contract includes specific terms for when and how your rights to your book are returned to you. With so many publishers failing and/or changing hands, a lot of authors are finding it difficult to get their publishing rights returned after the publisher has stopped producing their book.

If you can’t understand the legalese and complex wording in the contract you’re offered, you should get a competent attorney to review it. Yes, attorneys are expensive, but the consequences of a bad contract can haunt you for years. One of the pros of going with a new publisher is that they can be a little easier to negoitiate contract clauses with than some of the traditional publishers. So if something in the contract bothers you, speak up and see if you can negotiate better terms. If not, you’ve haven’t lost anything.

And if possible, talk to some of the publisher’s other authors before you sign a contract. If the authors who have come before you have had bad experiences with the publisher, chances are you will, too. Most authors have websites with a contact form. Contact them and ask how they like the publisher. It could save you some headaches in the future.

And remember, although you may be a newbie author and thrilled to finally have a manuscript accepted and a contract offered by a publisher—any publisher—if the book is really good enough to be published, you can find a legitimate publisher to take it. If the book is not good enough to be published, chances are the publisher who accepted it—usually the one asking you for up-front fees—is not really going to publish the book anyway. At least not until they’ve bled you for as much as they can get.

So should you go with a new publisher? If they appear to be legitimate, are willing to offer a contract you can live with, and other authors have had good experiences with them, then you’ve nothing to lose by giving them a try. But if not, run as fast as you can in the other direction.

Lauri Blasch,
Acquisitions Editor
Black Opal Books
http://www.blackopalbooks.com/

Publishing - The ins and outs by Lauri Blasch

At Black Opal Books, we’re often asked two main questions. The first: why did we start a new publishing company when so many publishing companies are failing? The second: should an author really go with a new, untried publishing company?

The answer first question is simple. Black Opal was started by four authors—who were also friends and business associates—who believed that authors were getting a raw deal from the publishing industry at large. Authors today are required not only to write the book, but also to revise, edit, and polish it on their own without much help from the publisher. And then if they are lucky enough to get the book published, they are also responsible for 99% of the promotion and selling. But after all this, they only get a small percentage of the income from the book while the publisher keeps the lion’s share.

Black Opal’s founders felt this was this was unfair. If you think about it, writing a book is a lot of work. From story concept to finished product, a novel takes most authors the better part of a year, if not more. So it seems only right that, after all the work the author puts forth to create the book, the biggest share of the profit, if any, from the book should go to the author. A lot of authors agree and have turned to self-publishing as the only way to make this happen. But as many self-published authors have discovered, there’s a downside to self-publishing.

Which brings us to the answer to the second question. Here’s the rub: although, it is slowly changing, a lot of venues do not consider self-publishing legitimate, so a lot of doors are closed to these authors. For example, some contests held for published authors do not allow self-published books. And some book distributors won’t allow self-published authors to list their books for sale with them. Even among other authors, self-publishing is not considered really being Published. Despite the fact that some self-published authors have not only created quality books, readers have rewarded their efforts by buying enough of their books to give these authors a great deal more money than most old-school published authors will ever make. At least not without a runaway best seller.

Another problem is that authors want to write. That’s why they became authors in the first place. To write. They don’t want to spend all the hours and effort it takes to learn how to correctly format all the versions of ebooks, find a good POD company, and deal with all the myriad of other business details that a publisher must deal with. They just want to write.

Black Opal’s founders understood all this. They decided to start a publishing company that offered higher royalties to start with, and then after the initial investment required to publish the book was recovered, royalties would increase so that the lion’s share of the income from the book would go to the author.

Still, there are pros and cons to going with a new publisher. On the pro side, a new small publisher such as Black Opal doesn’t have the backlog of books to schedule, so the time from acceptance of a manuscript to release as a published book is considerably shorter. New publishers are also often more lenient about the types of manuscripts they will take. Not that you can get by with submitting a poorly written manuscript and expect it to be accepted. But it does mean that new authors without publishing credits can get their manuscripts considered more easily at a new publisher. For example, because Black Opal was founded by authors, our policy is that we don’t judge a manuscript on the basis of the query letter or synopsis. Although we do require submissions to include both a query letter and a brief synopsis, we also promise to read at least the full first chapter of the manuscript before rejecting it. That way the author at least has a chance to prove they know how to write a novel, if not a query letter.

Lauri Blasch,
Acquisitions Editor
Black Opal Books
http://www.blackopalbooks.com

To be contniued on Friday 25th March