It’s sadly true that some people are just plain scared of self-publishing. I mean really when you think about it, who to best sell your book than… well… you?
Although self-publishing has been on the rise for the past few years, titles and genres have been blurred so much that sometimes it can be hard to look or even, be original. With this I’m referring to ebooks; when you scroll down amazon or the book store on iTunes, you begin to notice how similar all of the books look. After scrolling to page 16, well, I don’t know about you but I sometimes feel like the first page is just repeating itself. It’s because of this that it can seem daunting to self-publish.
I mean lets face it, the person that knows your novel the best is you right? So why is it that many of us want agents or publishing houses to help get our novel noticed?
Expertise? Of your own novel?
Now let that just sink in… you want an expert in your novel that you wrote…
A lot of the time we know the truth but we are too scared to make the first move. We can market our book the best but ultimately, we leave it for someone else to do because we doubt ourselves.
If we believed that we could deliver good marketing techniques to our book to give it great sales and publicity, would we do it? Absoloutely. Dare we try it? Not a chance.
I partly think that we all think like this because of two reasons. We either:
A: Want an agent or publisher to tell us that they think it’s good enough to publish (aka, tell us our writing is good!)
or
B: Are scared to put our all into marketing our book because we don’t want to fail in either marketing or writing.
Yes it can be a tough one to call sometimes, but the best advice I can give is to think of all that hard work you’ve done. Do you really not want to share it with the world?
If you don’t attempt to get it seen then it never will be.
This concept is something that I’ve been battling with for quite a while. However after much deliberation and looking for a publisher, I have decided that I could do a better job. I know that I believe in my piece and want the world to read it. Whether people pay for it, is another question, but I would love for people to see how much hard work I’ve put in to it.
So without further ado, I’m going into self-publishing… are you?
This post was originally published on my Medium page. Check it out here.
Charlotte Anne Barker 
Good points. I think traditional publishing, for the most part, is for people that need to be validated by others. There are some definite pros to traditional publishing. However, I prefer the self-publishing route too. I’ll let my readers decide if my book is worth reading or not.
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Yes, lynette. I recently self published a Kindle novella and then my memoir with Archway. Many famous (or later famous) authors self published. There is no shame in that (or less than before.)
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I totally agree with you!
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No shame at all!
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Reblogged this on Memoir Notes.
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Planning to also! Good luck.:)
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I’ve self-published. So, I have a little insight into self-publishing. I self-published my one and only book of flash fiction in 2005. The only reason I self-published is because I couldn’t find a traditional publisher to publish the book. Publishing is a business. You may know your book better than anyone else; but do you know the business of publishing? That’s the rub. Enthusiasm will only take you so far. Self-promotion is a full-time job in itself. A traditional publishing house usually will already have a network to get the word out about your book to the right people and outlets, people and outlets you cannot reach or even know about. This is what my experience with self-publishing has taught me. And I’ve been promoting my book ever since it was published. How many copies have I sold since 2005? Oh, I would guess 30. I hope you have a better experience. I realize that I’m just one person; but you should also know the possible downside of self-publishing. I am not making this up. Good luck!
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I self-published my first book, written eight years ago, this past September. Now I’m getting my fifth one ready for September release of this year. It’s been wonderful! I wish I had done it ages ago. But I also have a terrific editor…my daughter, and a dear friend that did my covers. Two very key items for getting out a great book. Marketing is very difficult…but if you never start…you won’t have a chance to see what YOU could do!
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