Further Misadventures in the e-Publishing World

There’s a term that e-published authors have been using to describe the old way of doing business in the writing world: Legacy Publishing, meaning that it’s the old way of doing publishing. As one of those who got his start in the legacy publishing industry, where my first two novels were published as physical entities, I’ve slowly been trying to build a writing career by embracing the non-legacy model, i.e., publishing my work as e-books myself. In the process of doing that, something strange has started to happen that I never really anticipated. Let me explain.

When I started publishing some of my completed novels as e-books, I wasn’t really expecting to make a huge profit, or even to sell a whole lot of books. I hoped to sell a few and at least get a few readers interested in my work. Honestly, that’s what every writer tends to want to do. I’m really not that different. Not knowing the first thing about connecting to an audience that I don’t have, I’ve tried all sorts of different marketing, including Facebook ads, google ads, viral marketing, standing on the corner and yelling out loud, and all sorts of other antics that are capable of bringing on all sorts of restraining orders. As a result, a few people have started to read my books, and let’s just say that while I haven’t been extremely successful, it’s proving to be an interesting experiment.

However, a new development has occurred, and that’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I mentioned that some of my earlier work was published by Legacy Publishers. So far, they have done absolutely nothing to sell my work other than orginally publish it. I’m an unknown to them, so why would they be interested in pursuing any marketing on my behalf? So far, there’s been no reason. However, because I’ve been doing a LOT of marketing myself recently, some of my work has actually started to sell. Most of it as e-books, but some of that marketing has actually caused potential readers to go to bookstores and buy physical copies of my novels. Great. This is leading to something, however, and what it’s leading to is the realization by the original Legacy Publishers that I’m capable of actually selling books. It never dawned on me that they’d ever be paying attention to the fact that my marketing would start to pay off. And it has. Which has led them to start paying a bit more attention to me, and that attention has proved to be quite eye-opening.

You see, when I was originally published by them, the whole e-book universe was not even on the radar. So they never bothered to negotiate those rights. Those rights are mine still. Well, they’re now realizing that, and they’re also realizing that because I am self-publishing the rest of my work, it’s pretty obvious that my work they originally published will net them absolutely no profit whatsoever when it comes to the e-book market. So, rather than just contact me and be honest about it, their contact has been the kind you expect from a Shakespearean villain. The kind that goes: “Did you know that people are selling their books as e-books, and they’re making millions? We’re willing to publish your book as an e-book if you’re willing to sign that right over to us.” They also forget to mention (and sometimes they do) that they would like to set up the generous terms that are similar to the ones that happened under the old contract, where they get about 90 percent and I get 10. In other words, rather than have me publish it myself where I get 70 percent and Amazon gets 30, they’d rather they take 90 percent of the 70 percent, leaving me with (doing the math….for every $1.00 a book makes, I get $0.07). So, for a book that normally sells for (if they put it up at the maximum they’re trying to get) $12.99, I’d get 90 cents. Now, if I sold that book for $4.99 by publishing it myself (or even at $2.99), I’d make $3.49 (or $2.09 at the $2.99 rate). In other words, even if my book sold at a massive discount (my pricing), I’d still make 2 to 3 times more than what a publishing company would give me for it. And keeping in mind that the publishing company has NEVER marketed one of my books EVER, I get absolutely no benefit from them being the ones publishing it. None.

So, you might see why many writers are turning away from the normal legacy publishers. It’s not profitable, and unless you’re already a marketable name that they’re willing to throw money behind, you get absolutely nothing out of the deal. Instead, you sign over all of the profit to an entity that doesn’t do anything to deserve it.

It would be different if they actually went out of their way to do something to benefit my name. But they don’t. Or they never have. Now, if I was to find a publisher that was willing to do something to help me sell books, then we’d be talking a completely different story. But the way this model works, they don’t want me until I can already do the job that they won’t do themselves. Once I have the name recognition and the ability to sell my own work, my need for them goes away completely. So, somebody please tell me how quid pro quo thing works here if one side is continuously leeching off the other.