Questions for self-published authors picked up by the big 5 publishers

FUwriting said:

Hi everyone! As the title suggests, I have a few questions for self-published authors who have been picked up by one of the big 5 publishers.

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I'm not a self-published author but I can answer a few of these questions.

1. What did they offer to you that you couldn't accomplish through self-publishing? Did the deal help your career as an author?

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Trade publishers can produce print books at a much lower cost than most self publishers manage, which makes a print edition more viable.

Trade publishers can then get your books into bookshops nationwide, which is almost impossible for self-published authors because they generally have no access to distributors.

Literary agents (or trade publishers, if you license them the appropriate rights) can sell foreign and subsidiary rights which again, are difficult to impossible for self published writers to exploit on their own.

So working with an agent and a trade publisher will enable your book to appear in more formats, more languages, more countries, and will get it in front of more of your potential readers, thus maximising sales.

I hear so many people saying that you have to do all the marketing yourself anyway, so I'm just wondering what specifically they contributed to the experience?

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It's not true that writers with trade publishers have to do all their marketing themselves. This is a huge misconception.

2. What frustrated you about the transition? Did you feel that you lost some of your creative control?

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Editing isn't designed to take away creative control: and if the author disagrees with the editor, the author should get the final say. So creative control here shouldn't be an issue. (Smaller presses run by people with less experience might not be so supportive, but in my experience this has always been the case in dealing with large publishers.) Cover design is a different thing: few writers are experts here, so they don't often get the power of veto on their covers. But if you have a useful point to make about the cover of your book, and can provide reasonable examples and so on which support your opinion, you will be listened to.

Did you feel that the contract was fair?

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If the contract offered isn't fair I would imagine that the author wouldn't sign it.

3. What were your sales numbers as a self-published author compared to the numbers after making the jump? eBook prices are usually much lower for self-published authors, I'm wondering if the price increase can hurt a book's sales, to the point where sales actually decline with the big publisher?

4. If you're comfortable answering this: With royalties and advances included, did you ultimately end up making more or less money with the big house?

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It's not just a question of how self publishers and trade publishers do with one edition. Trade publishers can publish and sell books in different formats far more easily than self publishers. Print, audio, large print, foreign and translation editions? Self publishers tend not to do these, or not to do them well, but trade publishers do them brilliantly, and there's a huge amount of money to be made here; so there's a huge chunk of sales which only trade publishers can access. Which makes your question a bit tricky to answer accurately.

FUwriting said:

I often see celebratory blog posts about indie books being picked up by big houses

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I think these very rare exceptions tend to generate a lot of publicity, and that it's therefore comparatively easy to get the impression that this is much more common than it really is.

Overall, I'm confident that the chances of "being picked up by a big house" are significantly reduced, not increased, by self-publication.

FUwriting said:

<snip> I hear so many people saying that you have to do all the marketing yourself anyway, so I'm just wondering what specifically they contributed to the experience?

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I hear this all the time, too, except never from Big 5-published authors.

I'm published by Simon & Schuster. I have never been asked to do my own marketing or spend my own money in promotion of my books. They supplied all the marketing and promotion expertise, arranged all the advertising and interviews and giveaways.

Like I said in a thread recently, they are certainly happy if you get yourself to conferences and whatnot, but S&S has only been a huge help to me in anything like that - setting up signings, getting books where they need to be, getting me on panels, printing up bookmarks, designing little graphics for my website and social media, and all at zero cost to me.

I have been to many conferences and, through various channels, have had the opportunity to talk to well more than a hundred Big 5-published authors and I've never heard even one of them say that they were expected to pay for and manage marketing and promotion for their book.

(Now this is not to say that I haven't talked to a few who have decided to hire on an additional publicist to hopefully get even more reach than what the publisher provided. To that end, I'll say I've only ever met one who would do it again.)

Other than that, I'd be interested to hear the answers!

I've seen Perks's brilliant book (Three Graves Full, buy it now!) in bookshops all over northern England and north Wales. It's been in bookshop window displays, it's been included in several promotions (it was one of Waterstones' books of the month in April, for example, which got it a place on special tables and shelf displays in Waterstones throughout the UK), and it's had a high visibility here. If Perks had been required to do her own promotions she'd have had trouble setting that up for herself, from the other side of the Atlantic.

Small publishers might require that their authors do their own promotion and marketing, but the better ones just don't.

That's very kind, both of you. Thank you.

As far as your brain mugging you from time to time, sloshing self doubt down your throat until you're quite convinced this is never going to turn out in any good form, well, I raise my glass to you. Welcome! Always more room at the neurotic table, even though it's way crowded over here.

AW is a great place to ask questions and get answers and find out how you want to assess your options.

I know Amanda Hocking said she wanted to spend more time writing (rather than doing the business stuff) and had trouble finding good editors. A trade publisher can take on a lot of the tedious stuff, freeing up more time.

FUwriting said:

I don't know where all my doubts suddenly came from.

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Doubts are good as long as you don’t let them overpower your common sense.

No artist is ever perfect; it’s always good to be able to criticize your works. You should learn how to do this as objectively as you can (you can never do it 100%). Artists use a number of ways to get this distance from their work. One is simply time; put it away for a week or month. Another is to work on another project; when you come to a natural breaking point, spend a little time with the older work. Another is to get someone you respect and trust to critique your work. And so on.

Doubt is bad when it paralyzes you from doing anything at all for a long time. It’s bad when you decide to completely destroy your work; at the very least put it away. Some day you may get a new perspective which lets you rework it productively. Or you may steal useful parts of it for a future work.

Doubt is a natural part of being an artist. Or a human. Endure it if you must. Use it if you can.

I'm not self-published (yet) OR "picked up by a big publishing house", but I've done my research prior to deciding to self-pub my New Adult books. There are definitely tons of perks to being picked up (or originally published) by a Big Five imprint, but there's also that thing where you might not be allowed to self-pub anything else while you're under contract with them (not under the same penname anyway). So if the trade deal suits your needs perfectly, awesome. But if you think you might want to continue to self-pub in the same genre, I'd think before jumping on the opportunity.

Personally, the reason I'm bypassing the whole trade thing with my NA books is because I might die of old age before trade decides to take notice. I tried it the legit way and I'm sick of my writing life and career stagnating while trade editors take ten months to send me a rejection letter. (And this is what I mean by control--not even the content or the cover, although that's nice too. But knowing that for once I'm calling the shots and I don't need to wait for anyone's permission.)

Then again, self-pub will ALWAYS be there to fall back on. So if you really have your heart set on a Big Five logo gracing the spine of your book, TRY THAT FIRST and don't bet all your money on being picked up after you self-publish. As people here already said, it's not the majority. And you can still be a mega-bestseller and never get picked up (either because you don't want to or you just... aren't).

Something like that.

Nicole River said:

There are definitely tons of perks to being picked up (or originally published) by a Big Five imprint, but there's also that thing where you might not be allowed to self-pub anything else while you're under contract with them (not under the same penname anyway).

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I've not seen any contracts or requests that writers don't self-publish while under contract to a publishing house.

There are non-compete clauses out there but I doubt they're going to be this stringent.

If such a contract were to be offered, all points are negotiable; and if the publisher refused to budge on that one clause then remember that a book publishable by one publisher is usually publishable by another.

FUWriting, have you ever gotten an answer from someone who actually self-published and then was picked up by a publisher? If you want it from the horse's mouth, you'll need to actually do that.

There are a number of romance/erotic romance authors who have been picked up in the last few years. Many are approachable, many more detail their happiness and frustrations in their blogs. None that I personally know and none that I've followed are 100% thrilled, but everything has drawbacks. None are 100% thrilled with self-publishing, either.

I know one who got a huge, mid-6 figure deal and opted to self-publish again once that contract was fulfilled despite another offer from the same publisher. Others keep signing new contracts, happy with their arrangements.

You're looking for sales and money answers, but that's a sensitive area for many and tricky besides. A self-publisher can track these things daily if she wishes. Royalty statements and payments from trade publishers are twice-a-year affairs much of the time. So someone published by big trade less than 6 months ago probably won't even know.

Go find these people and read their stories of publication if you want to know what it's like. Some are active on various message boards. Approach politely, read their past posts to see if your questions have been answered, and ask a question if not. The worst that can happen is you're not given an answer.

shelleyo said:

FUWriting, have you ever gotten an answer from someone who actually self-published and then was picked up by a publisher? If you want it from the horse's mouth, you'll need to actually do that.

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I agree that would be useful.

However, I also think it's useful to have some of the myths against trade publishing debunked. It helps people make more well-informed choices.

Old Hack said:

I agree that would be useful.

However, I also think it's useful to have some of the myths against trade publishing debunked. It helps people make more well-informed choices.

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Absolutely.