My Self Publishing Journey

Deciding to self-publish is an option that many modern writers choose  to get their workout in the world. Gone are the days when self-publishing was an expensive process that involved a variety of professionals or vanity presses. Also, gone are the days of getting your book accepted by a publisher in order to get distribution and build a readership. Alongside social media, many authors have been building their own readership through self-publishing. In this post, I wanted to talk about my own self-publishing journey and what it actually takes to put your book in your hands.

Self-publishing industry exposed

If you spend any time in self-publishing, you’ll realize that there are many people who are selling various courses on how to do it. You’ll also see various book promotional services promising to get your book in front of people. The effectiveness of these services and courses is very dependent on a variety of factors.

However, some of the biggest problems will come from far more legitimate places. One of the reasons I do not do Amazon exclusive titles, is because Amazon regularly changes the rules on authors. In recent memory, payouts have decreased and with Kindle Unlimited they are paying people by how many pages they read. This means that authors are encouraged to write things that pull people in early and keep them reading so that authors can get paid. As one recent article put it, “the author is dead, long live the content service provider.”

The competition is quite high. Even popular sites like Joanna Penn will have you believing that the path to self-publishing mastery is easy and straight-forward. That’s not quite right, to be honest. Self-publishing is just as complicated as traditional publishing, just in different ways. It took me a while to understand both system, and I had to try and fail at both before I found a way to actually get my books in front of people.

People make it sound effortless. Successful people won’t tell you about the amount of money they spend on advertising to get ahold of that success. I was in a writing group at one time and one woman, who wrote professionally, confessed that she spent $1,500 a month on advertising with Amazon to keep her books top ranked. I took this bit of information and hung onto it and kept researching. After a few more conversations, I realized that this was a common practice. It was just one of the secrets that no one will really tell you.

Secrets no one will tell you

There are some secrets that no one will tell you about self-publish, and I’m here to reveal three of them to you. There are far too many people hawking courses on self-publishing, and there are innumerable blogs on self-publishing. I have followed Joanna Penn for years and I trust her advice. That being said, even she doesn’t really reveal how the self-publishing game is played.

Self-publishing is not cheap or free

Self-publishing is billed as a cheaper or possibly free option to get your book out into the world. This isn’t necessarily true. Any service you use, especially for print (less so for electronic only) has fees. There are set up fees at a minimum. This also doesn’t account for editing, layout, and cover design. If you don’t have the skills for those things, then you have to hire them out if you want to compete at all. Myself, I picked up design skills, asked friends for advice and much more to be able to do much of this myself. I still pay for editing services because I desperately need a second pair of eyes on my work. The point is this: if you would like to put out a quality product you’re going to need some help and that help will cost some money.

Everyone pays for advertising

One of the things I did not understand in the early days of my career but that I learned by the time I put out my first book in 2019, was that everyone who is serious in the book business pays for advertising. I have paid for advertising in multiple places to promote my work. Those people who say they just put out a book, and it was successful, are likely lying. There are 200,000 books published through Amazon a year. If you think that yours is so good to beat out that many books, that is simply not the case. If you write something extremely niche or specialized to a specific group you might get some sales because it is specific, but for most people this is not their situation and will not be the case.

The Money is Not Great

Anyone who says that there is boat loads of money to be made in books via self-publishing is probably trying to sell you a course on how to self-publish. That’s simply not the case. Although the margins are better than traditional publishing (all things being relative) per book, you’ll be bringing in seven to none dollars per book. This means that to make any real money you’ll need to sell a variety of copies and that will only begin to happen when you have several books. Keep that in mind when we get to how competitive the book market is for everyone regardless of how they publish.

The competition is just as cut-throat

Selling books is cut-throat, no matter if you’re a large publisher or just a fellow on the digital streets like me. One of the reasons that large publishers like to go for books that are a “sure thing” is because getting people convinced to read is no easy thing. A book is a huge time commitment and investment. People have their preferences when it comes to reading. Getting your book in reader’s hands faces the same troubles.

Publishers rarely spend money on new authors or new releases, which makes the competition even more difficult. Many books are being published every year and in order to make sales, any single title has to stand out. That being said, the situation is no better in the self-published world. Those who self-publish face the same challenge as anyone selling books at a big publisher. This is why everyone advertises: it’s simply another way to compete.

Not everything is hopeless for the self-publisher. There are some things you can do to compete. Personally, I have avoided Amazon exclusivity, and I’ve decided to release my titles on a variety of services. This has been to my benefit. I don’t have to be dependent on Amazon for my book sales. I don’t have to worry about how Amazon might change the payment schedule or terms (as they like to do). It also gives me a chance to sell books to people in places that I would never think to spend marketing dollars.

One of the biggest lessons I learned from Joanna Penn and others is that it is easier to sell a book when you have a library of books. I only have three books out, but the third definitely helped bolster sales of the other two. The point being that your career as an author will take time, and it will develop over time as you earn your audience and continue to delight them with your words. Being an author is playing a very long game. Don’t buy into stories of overnight success. I can almost guarantee that behind very overnight success, there’s a history of years of work. I know that is true in my case.

My Decision to Go Indie

Ultimately, I decided to go the indie route because I was dissatisfied with the traditional publishing route. I certainly tried. Submitting to traditional publishers is painful, emotional, and often just degrading. I have pitched agents in person at conferences, and I’ve been humiliated for my storylines. I’ve pitched agents over email or on submittable and had more success (two full manuscript requests) but I did not get an acceptance by those major New York agencies.

I had to decide. How much energy did I want to put in that effort? How much longer did I want to wait to get an agent, wait for the book to sale and then come out 2-3 years later? Instead, I decided to go my own way and leverage the audience I have here at The Cameron Journal and release my books myself. My decision was not easy. I resisted going indie for a long time. Ironically, just went I went indie, I managed to land a major literary publication. Occasionally, you can play in both worlds (it’s called being a hybrid author, another story for another time).

The business of books has changed. Getting published is not the career-making achievement that it once was for authors. New books tend not to get marketing budgets, advances have become paltry, and often authors are responsible for their marketing. Agents and publishers both take their cuts, and most books don’t even earn back their advance. I decided to keep all the money for myself and do the work myself. I get to make all the decisions and set my release schedule. I’m not saying that this is for everybody, but it is a viable option. That being said, anyone who chooses this path should go into self-publishing with their eyes open.