How Entrepreneurs are Self-publishing the Books These Days to Disseminate the Information
Till a few years ago, self-published books were considered inferior than traditionally published books. The thought was that only the books that haven’t been selected by any publisher are self-published. Things have changed drastically now. Many entrepreneurs are now choosing to self-publish instead of giving their work to a traditional publisher. As they have their own circles where they can send the books for reading purpose.
Readers too don’t look down self published e-books as inferior. In fact, lately these books have even started appearing in Amazon’s best-seller lists and are now earning a decent income from their books. The numbers of independent authors is increasing day by day and the self-publishing industry is flourishing.
According to research,The Global E-Learning Market is poised to grow at a CAGR of around 7.0% over the next decade to reach approximately $331 billion by 2025. Most of the current best-sellers among indie books are either on experiences or help-based for the audiences. Books that are light reading and have interesting titles and spicy cover images are seeing most success. There is a surge of erotica books disguised as romances. However, one can also find some very meaningful and thought-provoking books too by independent authors.
There are now numerous online and offline services that help in the process of self-publishing. Thanks to services like Smashwords and Amazon’s KDP, publishing ebooks has become very easy. Print on Demand services like Amazon’s Createspace and India’s own Pothi.com require no advance investment for publishing print books. Thanks to these, anyone can now publish a book.
Of course, to bring out a quality book, you also need quality book cover, book designing, editing and proof reading. Those still cost money. But the experienced indie authors have learnt to tackle even these requirements by themselves. Or, they can use vanity publishers or paid publishing services that include editing, cover designing etc. in their publishing package.
A major advantage is that marketing does not remains a challenge for the entrepreneurs as they write these books for their specific audience and circles. Self-published books have a better shelf-life as the fear of loosing the presence in brick and mortar stores is less. In India books are now competing strongly with traditionally published books, though they are winning the race yet but have started creating an impact. As their reach is not limited. And a self-published author has to wear many hats. Writing a book is just the start of their struggle.
By now, a whole industry has risen up to cater to the needs of self-published authors. These include online cover designing services, vanity publishers, online grammar checkers, etc.Sadly, along with these helpful resources, many scamsters have also risen up to take advantage of independent authors’ vulnerability and desperation to win recognition. On Facebook or other social media platforms, many dubious publishers can be seen inviting authors to submit their work for publishing. These ask for money from the authors, may take away their copyright, and give only a copy of the book or some meaningless certification in return. I’ve even seen one such publisher demanding that all authors they publish must pre-book their own book, in addition to paying them the publishing charges. And there’s no mention of any royalty. Writers yearning to be published often fall into their trap and get duped.
Anyone wishing to self-publish a book must learn to recognize genuine services from scams. They must also have a robust marketing plan. Publishing a book is easy now, but finding readers for it is too hard. So, having a good marketing strategy is imperative before you bring your book to the market. It is a good idea to spend some time researching and collecting relevant information before embarking on the self-publishing journey.
