Even after designing a Publisher Logo, setting up a Face Book Page under the logo name and starting this blog to boot, I never sat down and said I am a publisher. Strange how the mind works.
An Indie Writer puts on many hats, writer, editor, cover designer, product copywriter, publisher, marketing director, reviewer of other’s stories, and… Well the list I am sure will continue to grow as I learn more about the process.
Wednesday, Ron Collins gave a dozen of us an excellent and detailed peek into the publishing end of this adventure in self-publishing. And I will share at times tidbits of what I learned from him and how it applies to my trip down this road.
Then on Saturday, we had a locale event for authors with four presentations on subjects we all found interesting and helpful.
Developing characters, researching nonfiction, query letters and novel pitching, and how to publishing for little to nothing.
I write fiction, but I found the research for nonfiction helpful. There are many approaches the speaker presented, which I can use in tracing my family tree. Makes sense when you think about it.
Developing characters was a fun presentation to listen too. The presenter bought my latest book, and I cannot wait to hear what she has to say about the people I wrote about it.
Self-publishing for little or no cost is a bit of a misnomer. True it can be done at no cost, but the results will be, “You get what you pay for.” I did that with Time’s Crossroads, and it sold, but not well. I am in the process of editing it, and applying the lessons I have learned with White Hot Skies. Editing costs, good editing cost more, learning editing is not as easy as it sounds. And editing your own work has its pitfalls. The brain reads what it wrote, not what the fingers typed in Word. Then of course there is the use of who v whom, where does the comma go and why, all things that add up. Pitfalls for one wishing to go mainstream, will get a manuscript rejected. And pitfalls that as an Indie publisher, will sure to be mentioned in reviews on Amazon and other vendor sites, and that will impact sales.
But the big subject of the presentation was eBooks, specifically Kindle Unlimited. Here the presenter, Don Snow, has a point. For March, KDP announced the largest payout pool since they inaugurated the system, $9.3 million. However, it is also the smallest payout, at $1.33 per unit since this started.
I did not use KDP for my first book, as it was not available, but did so with White Hot Skies. KU units are moving better, building my reader base, (I hope) than Kindle sales. The problem is in the royalties payments. KU royalty decreased 2% from February to March, while the pool increased 1.7%. One can assume KPD’s take did not decrease.
Please post your experiences and thoughts about KPD here. I am interested in my reader’s take on the issue, including what we as writers can do to stop the bleeding.