The world is becoming increasing small and digital. If you’re reading this blog, you already know that, because you’re interested in online tools for writing, rather than just the typewriter or word processor in a corner of the house. But while everyone seems closer and more intimate now (read as: in-your-face, everywhere) your personal world is expanding at a breakneck pace.
The Industry
A Cover Is Worth A Thousand Sales
You’ve written your masterpiece. It’s a shining example of literature, a dance of phrases and metaphors. Your readers will cheer and sob, rage and giggle, and at the end they will close the book with a sigh of regret that the story is over.
If they ever read it.
Resources and Collected Links
There are many, MANY sites out there devoted to helping writers on the road to creating their content. There are just as many sites that have compilations of these resources. In case this is your first stop on the road to internet research about writing, allow us to point to a few for you. (This post may be updated as sites come and go, or resources grow.)
Pricing Your Ebook
One of the biggest questions for self-publishing authors, is what to charge for your ebooks. Many sources will tell you that there’s a “magic number” or a formula or something that will answer this question for you, but in reality it’s not that simple. Different audiences, genres, regions, and marketing approaches all lend themselves to different pricing habits.
The Rise of Self-Publishing
In 2011, Bowker (the agency responsible for assigning ISBN codes to all the books in the US) reported that approximately 43% of the books printed for the year were listed as being self-published. They also noted a rise in the listing of ebooks that are self-published, but because not all outlets require an ISBN (and Bowker only counts the ISBNs) the number was likely much higher than they recorded. It’s estimated that in 2008, ebooks accounted for 1% of all published books, but by 2014 that ratio rose to nearly 35%.
Why the sudden increase in self-publishing? In past years an author would write their masterpiece, then search out an agent; or cold contact a publishing house, praying to get someone to notice their work and want to buy it from them. A very small percentage of authors ever made it past the submission stage. Rejection letters would pile up over the years while waiting on a publisher to take notice.