Questions About Markets Offering Royalties

Batspan · Nov 20, 2013

Many sub calls offer royalties only, and often with terms such as 'a fair share' or 'based on quality' which I don't find confidence-inspiring.

In cases where the publisher and editor seem to have a track record, it seems possible the royalties might come to something, yet it also seems possible that the pay per contributor ends up amounting to next to nothing.

So far, I keep leaving the royalty-only calls at the bottom of my list, because I have no way to quantify them and I'm doing a top-down submission process. I lost all interest in "for-exposure" publishing many years ago.

For those of you who submit to these calls, how do you decide if they're worth a try?

Any success stories?

Melinda Moore · Nov 20, 2013

My novella is published at the royalties only press Jupiter Garden's Press. My sales are very low, but she sends a statement every month which I really like. I decided on them because of their track record and for other reasons listed in their submissions guidlines that I liked the sound of and turned out to be true. They were better for me than self publishing because they have several vendors and review sites that they list to and are always posting publicity opportunities. The other authors there are also very supportive and list publicity opportunities as well. Feel free to private message me if you are interested in hearing more.

M. H. Lee · Nov 20, 2013

I think Uncle Jim talked about it in his novel writing thread. He had a royalty-only deal for a short story as part of an anthology and still gets checks for it ten years later or something like that. So it can be a very good deal.

I don't think I like the quality-based payment option. I would want one based on percentage of total word count or evenly divided by number of contributors.

And I probably wouldn't want to be involved in one that didn't have someone quality behind it. Haven't subbed to any yet since I just write what pops into my head.

fihr · Nov 20, 2013

Batspan said:
For those of you who submit to these calls, how do you decide if they're worth a try?

I've only submitted to one royalties only publication, with a piece of flash fiction, and it was my first publication. The royalties were split between every author in the anthology (there were a lot of us). and every six months or so the royalties arrive in my Paypal account, enough for a cup of coffee.

I wrote the story for fun and submitted it for fun, never expecting to earn much from it. The royalties have added up to $10 or $12 overall I think, and it was only 1000 words. Fact is, this is what I would have received by sending it to a 1c a word semi-pro market.

Exposure is something else. I think practically no one would have read my story, buried as it was amongst so many others, from a press that was brand new. But there were some other authors in there that I now know have a following of their own, and maybe some readers may have stumbled across my story as a result.

At the moment, I only submit to markets that pay me up front, rather than royalty based. But I think it depends what you want to achieve with your submission. The financial side may or may not be much different from publishing in a market that pays up front, depending on the profile of the publishers you are comparing.

I think reputation is an important difference. If there were outstanding authors or editors involved, then I'd take that into consideration. If there were none of those, and it was a fledgling publication with no reputation, I would probably choose to submit somewhere else. There are so many markets with good reputations who pay up front. They can be hard to get into, but you know that if you do, your work will actually be read and you have a paid publishing credit.

But that is just my personal view!

Izz · Nov 20, 2013

I'll only sub to a royalties-only project if they're helmed by editors who are well known, or will already feature stories by writers who are well known. If the project has neither of those things, but has had a lot of publicity/interest, i may consider subbing. Otherwise, i figure the chances of me seeing any money for the story are slim.

Batspan · Nov 21, 2013

Thanks, everyone.
I'm glad I asked.

Melinda -- Excellent point about publicizing. I've had a few few adventures with the promotional end and it's not my favorite part. I can see the advantage of going with a publisher who does some of that footwork to get the book or story seen. Thanks for your offer, I'll PM you when I have a better idea of what I need to know.

M.H -- That's one of the things I was wondering. Somewhere I saw a writer report that she's still taking herself out for lunch on royalties from a story she sold years ago. Yeah, every time I see the "based on quality" line I get uncomfortable. It's so subjective and there's no clear disclosure.

Fihr -- Good thoughts. Reputations matter. Great story about your flash. I keep a list of possible markets and I rank them based on pay and that whole subjective thing of how bad do I want to be published by that specific venue.

I'm pushing myself to expand to new markets every month because some of my best responses have come from quality markets I'd never tried before.

Izz -- Good point. If a project has a lot of buzz, or a killer theme, that can translate to sales.

I'm a bit obsessed about finding the best opportunities because I've taken a lot of time away from paying gigs to get back into fiction. It's been weeks since I made a sale so I'm out to diversify my strategy and opportunities and see if I can make something break.

My original plan in the spring was to start putting my stories on Amazon. I'd practiced years of fiction-rejection-aversion while writing non-fiction for a living. Then I decided to try the submissions route again -- but with the top-down method and honoring the no SS policies of most markets, this is slow and becoming discouraging.

Anthology calls often appeal to me, so I'm looking into royalty projects -- and I'm looking ahead at publishers for my novella. It bugs me that there's no way to do the numbers.

fihr · Nov 21, 2013

Batspan said:
I'm a bit obsessed about finding the best opportunities because I've taken a lot of time away from paying gigs to get back into fiction. It's been weeks since I made a sale so I'm out to diversify my strategy and opportunities and see if I can make something break.

My original plan in the spring was to start putting my stories on Amazon. I'd practiced years of fiction-rejection-aversion while writing non-fiction for a living. Then I decided to try the submissions route again -- but with the top-down method and honoring the no SS policies of most markets, this is slow and becoming discouraging.

Anthology calls often appeal to me, so I'm looking into royalty projects -- and I'm looking ahead at publishers for my novella. It bugs me that there's no way to do the numbers.

A highly successful author once told me not to write short stories because you'll never make a living from it. She is one of the few authors in Australia who makes a decent living from novels that sell in multiple languages.

However, I don't write short stories to make a living. Nor do I hope to make my living from them. (I think I'll do a blog post later about why I write them.)

While I haven't done it myself, I gather that if you have the patience and develop the skills to market your work, self-publishing can work, as long as your stories are good quality and you don't sink your money into services that offer to help you and then don't give the returns you are after. Those authors who are successful in this area seem to have put a lot of hard work in to get there.

I like anthology calls when the theme appeals to me. Especially if they have a great editor or excellent authors already involved. Brilliant if you can get in.

M. H. Lee · Nov 21, 2013

Batspan said:
My original plan in the spring was to start putting my stories on Amazon. I'd practiced years of fiction-rejection-aversion while writing non-fiction for a living. Then I decided to try the submissions route again -- but with the top-down method and honoring the no SS policies of most markets, this is slow and becoming discouraging.

I'm trying a hybrid approach. Give each story three to six months to place with a pro-paying market and then self-publish. I have to say that self-pubbing is pretty discouraging as well, but at least the stories are out there. I've also learned a ton about writing from reading my stories on the Kindle, trying to design covers to represent them, trying to write a blurb to describe the story, and reading the few reviews I've received.

(No one gets out of my stories what I think they will.)

I think to be successful at it, you really have to find ways to promote your works and rise above the eight million trillion other books that are out there. Not my strong suit certainly.

And many will say that you should pay for all the things I'm doing myself, but then I wouldn't have learned as much as I have from the experience.

Right now, my thought is if I place a story in a top market then I'll have other work available for anyone who really enjoyed it. (As opposed to having to tell them to wait six months until my next story comes out in x magazine)

alexshvartsman · Nov 27, 2013

As a rule of thumb I do not submit to royalty-only markets unless the project is being created by an editor or publisher with a great track record of actually paying the royalties (and there are way fewer of those than you might expect!) or it's a friend's anthology or some such.

Most fly-by-night venues that promise royalties on their e-book only projects won't amount to anything and should be avoided like the plague. Your story would be read by more people if you post it on your personal blog, and you'll get paid the same amount.

Batspan · Nov 28, 2013

Fihr -- I admit to creating a book-length collection of poetry in grad school without the slightest thought about money.

Still, many people do sell short stories regularly. If I had listened to all the people who told me I could never make a living writing, I wouldn't be doing so. It is true, when I write a story, I'm not sitting there thinking, 'how much can I get for this puppy?' Yet I'm in the Harlan Ellison camp when it comes to caring about being paid.

As far as self-publishing, yes, cautions noted. I'm thinking about Amazon. I've been saving success stories of people who went the eBook route -- some projects have better odds than others.

M.H. -- That makes sense. I'm trying to give my favorite stories a few more shots at finding a home. I may set a date in the spring to start the eBook project. Yeah, working on other parts of the process is a great learning experience. Good plan to work in more than one direction.

One of the reasons I came out of my cave was I learned the value of promoting and interlinking non-fiction projects, and it finally got through to me that despite being shy and averse to self-promotion, a web presence and audience-building are just about requirements now. I see an increasing number of submission calls asking for a website.

BTW, interlinking is a technique I learned from an email friend. It involves linking your websites, blogs and online profiles to strengthen your web presence. It helps to boost traffic. So I've managed to create steady traffic to numerous online projects for the past five years for two alter-egos -- and belatedly got around to resurrecting my fiction and beginning the much-more personally challenging project of putting myself out on the web as the real me.

Alex -- Good rule of thumb. When I see royalty-only sub calls by unknowns I always wonder if anyone ever gets paid for those. Then I figure I'd make more money even if I only sold a few copies on Amazon over the next decade.

Argosy is one that's tempting me: http://argosymagazine.co.uk/?page_id=20
"Successful submissions will earn royalty payments once the collections go on sale. Authors retain all rights to works submitted to Argosy, granting Argosy licence only to distribute the works in ebook format worldwide."

There's the nostalgia factor, but I'm always leery of new ventures, no matter what they're resurrecting. The Weird Tales mess reminded me how badly things can go even with an established publication. And it doesn't look as though the funding is going well: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/argosy-magazine

fihr · Nov 28, 2013

Batspan said:
Yet I'm in the Harlan Ellison camp when it comes to caring about being paid.

I hope I didn't imply you shouldn't be paid! It's just that for me, at least, short stories are highly unlikely to ever bring in enough to make a living off, so that's not my motivation in writing them. However - I also don't believe in giving away my work for nothing. The only exception would be for a charitable cause.

When I was at university studying architecture, I'll never forget being lectured on not giving away work for free. We were warned about the need to value what we do, and that many people would ask us for volunteer work. The lecturer even suggested charging charities for our hours, then donating the fee back to them if we wanted. He believed that if we didn't put a value on our work, other people wouldn't value it; that people don't value what they get for free.

I apply the same thinking to my writing, even though it pays less and the market is different. And there are some areas of writing where there is reputation despite the lack of pay. But in my previous industry, it was common practice for firms with the top reputations to actually pay people less, for the 'honour' of working there. Juniors sometimes worked for nothing. And you know, they did 'nothing' work - photocopying and so on. I'm not sure the rewards were always there in the long term. This seems to be happening with publishing internships today. But that's another issue, one I'm not on top of.

[Edit: Now that I've said this, I'll probably see a market I'd love to submit my work to for free.

]

Things may be different in the US, but in Australia, even successful authors often teach to top up their income.

Non-fiction pays better, so is obviously a different scenario.

Batspan · Nov 28, 2013

fihr said:
I hope I didn't imply you shouldn't be paid! It's just that for me, at least, short stories are highly unlikely to ever bring in enough to make a living off, so that's not my motivation in writing them. However - I also don't believe in giving away my work for nothing. The only exception would be for a charitable cause.<snipped>

Fihr -- I enjoy your perspective. No, I didn't think you were implying I should be sending out freebies. I'm just clarifying my priorities. Short stories are only part of the picture. I decided to start back with them because they are less time-consuming to edit and market, and I had the idea that getting more pro credits might improve my prospects of selling my novels.
Until May, when I went on this fiction-resurrection flurry, I'd submitted one story and one novel once each in the past several years.
There isn't much comparison between NF and fiction, although I'm working on using the business skills I developed with NF to persist with fiction and detach.
I have some completed novel drafts and another in progress, a completed novella draft and a second in progress, and I'm working step by step on getting it all out of here.

I want to give this a serious shot. Given that the fiction enterprise is operating at loss, I'm looking for ways to improve my results, in the interest of maintaining heart. If I hadn't made fiction sales in the past and had three stories shortlisted at pro markets this year, I'd be even more concerned.

Yes, I hope we're not going to run across some jinx of being tempted by a non-paying market now.

Questions About Markets Offering Royalties

Batspan

My Religion is kindness -Dalai Lama

Melinda Moore

M. H. Lee

fihr

Izz

Doing the Space Operatic

Batspan

My Religion is kindness -Dalai Lama

fihr

M. H. Lee

alexshvartsman

Batspan

My Religion is kindness -Dalai Lama

fihr

Batspan

My Religion is kindness -Dalai Lama