I have a friend who used to do independent publicity. She had worked at several major publishing houses and had excellent contacts at major news outlets. At the same time, without the name of a known publisher behind her, she found it difficult to get the same media attention for her books. She returned to the comforts of a brand name publishing house.

POD and self-publishing are pretty tricky. If you are thinking about hiring a publicist, be certain to interview them thoroughly. Find out where they gained experience, what they know not only about POD, but the genre of book you are selling. Find out what they've done publicity for before. How many clients are they handling now? What percentage of their time is your project going to get? Will you get to view press releases before they are sent?

There are probably a hundred more questions to ask, but these are a few to get you started.

Good luck!

Glynis

QUOTE: Originally posted by mammamaia

1. most vanity published books aren't good enough that people the writer's not related to [or isn't sleeping with] will buy them
and
2. pod publishers over-price the books and you have to spend money to buy them to resell, making your profit margin slim to non-existent...


I don't get it. When I say that, people get on my case and start citing the dozens of people they've heard of who earn a tidy living from podding.

You should also add
3. Most bookstores will not touch pod books with a bargepole.

QUOTE: Originally posted by mammamaia

that's all good advice... however, anyone who's good enough to do what you want done will be more expensive than you can possibly justify, since 99.9999% of all pod-published books just won't make more than a bit of pocket money, no matter how you publicize them... chances are you won't make enough in a year, to cover even the retainer a publicist will charge, much less the final bill...

for two reasons...
1. most vanity published books aren't good enough that people the writer's not related to [or isn't sleeping with] will buy them
and
2. pod publishers over-price the books and you have to spend money to buy them to resell, making your profit margin slim to non-existent...


You're such an encouraging mentor--I value your advice at the fee you charge.

"You're such an encouraging mentor--I value your advice at the fee you charge."

mentoring doesn't mean one should make people feel good by not telling them the truth... do you always repay the well-meant providing of facts/info/advice with snide sarcasm?

We know nothing at all about your book-but it remains very true that the great majority of POD books are of a poor quality. This fact makes POD books of any quality hard to sell as they are all lumped together. in the customer's mind

I think a POD book would be very hard to publicise as even if customers want it the book will be high priced and not on the shelves in local stores. I suspect money would be better invested in getting the book traditionally published or placed with a 'slealth' POD that nobody knows is a vanity outfit.

QUOTE: Originally posted by Jamesaritchie


... I'm not sure what a publicist can do.


I get that. I was hoping to hear from those who are sure how a publicist might be able to help me promote my nonfiction POD-published books.

My question is about publicity, not about the pros and cons of POD publishing. I've done my research and separated the facts from fiction about POD publishing. It is apparent that you and others here have been swept up by the propaganda and not investigated the facts.

QUOTE: Originally posted by mike moore

Just curious about what facts you're speaking of Factuality. Do you have some statistics or something? Just wondering.

I wish I knew how to quote someone elses post on this forum...


It looks like you've devised a clever way of getting me to do your research for you! It would be too lengthy for me to list all of the "facts," so rather than explode every myth, I will explain how you can do it for yourself and offer a couple examples.

First, use the old high-school-multiple-choice-test-taking rule: look for "always" and "never" statements or implications. Rarely is something "true" or "false" in ALL cases—find the exceptions.

Second, take every assertion against POD publishing and test it for truth yourself—use your own eyes, ears and touch; don't rely exclusively on information others provide, no matter how "official" or "authoritative" they sound—personal agendas tend to introduce bias.

Here is one example of how find out one of the "facts" about POD publishing. Take Mammamaia's assertion:

" pod publishers over-price the books and you have to spend money to buy them to resell, making your profit margin slim to non-existent..."

Ask, where did she get this information? Is it true in all cases or some cases? Now, go find the answers. You will find that SOME POD publishers do over price books—but not ALL of them. Publish America, for example tends to over-price books because of their business model: they don't charge authors for their services upfront, so they make their money on a higher-priced per-copy basis with a 7-year lock-in contract. That's the deal, and they're upfront about it—take it or leave it. However, POD publishers do not all use that business model. Get a list of POD publishers and check them out—read their web sites, send for their literature, evaluate their options, look at their prices and then look at prices elsewhere. Check Amazon for both the retail price and the discount price. Amazon buys from many POD publishers at deep discounts and then offers a discounted price. For example, Infinity Publishing offers a 40% discount to any purchaser of 5 books or more, books which can be resold at retail or discounted prices and still afford the reseller a profit. But for Amazon, Infinity offers a 55% discount—ever wondered why they can sell so low?

Here's another example. Take Jamesaritchie's assertion:

"…the quality just isn't all that good with the printing…"

Ask, where did he get this information? Did he buy books from POD publishers and handle and read them? Or did he get his information from a third party or some widely spread propaganda? I have purchased, handled, and read soft cover books from several POD publishers as well as traditional publishers. Guess which ones have spines that break? Guess which ones have print that I find hard to read? Guess which ones have book covers that fall off? The traditionally published books! This is not to say all of them are this way—just those I have experience with.

Now, take those links to the Science Fiction Writer's Association that Linda Adams posted and do the same thing with each assertion about POD publishers on their lists until you have your own body of evidence. Your own see-touch-read experience will give you the facts so you can objectively evaluate any propaganda that's coming your way.

So that's the process for obtaining "facts." As you can see, it would be too lengthy and time consuming to list all the facts here. An important point is to do this work for yourself if you are interested in using a POD publisher. Know what you are buying and what you will have to do to supplement the publishing package you purchase to make your book "good" (for example, hire your own editor if the publisher doesn't provide that service).

I hope I've adequately responded to your concern.

QUOTE: Originally posted by veinglory


POD is a high risk strategy for a mainstream fiction novel and a publicist is unlikely to help much.

That could be, but it's not relevant in my case; I write non-fiction "how to" books.

I got the information about quality from having my hands on a few dozen POD books, and from opening up the machinery and looking at it from the inside out. No, I didn't buy POD books. I haven't found one I would buy. But I have been given many of them for review purposes, and by those who wanted to convince me they were just as good as commercial books. They aren't.

There are many ways of printing a book, and not all of them are equal. ALL paperbacks have spines that break eventually. ALL paperbacks have covers that fall off eventually. But if any paperbacks from a commercial publish fell apart just by holding them, you had a defective book, purely and simply.

POD publishers use POD technology, and it just doesn't yet work as well as commercial quality printers. Go take a look at the actual machinery used for both, and have someone there explain to you what goes into each.

Claiming places discount POD books in no way means they don't cost too much, it just means the profit margin is lost. No matter how much you cut the price of a POD book, a commercially printed book will still be less than half the price, if you give it the same discount.

To bring a POD paperback into cost comparison with a commercially published paperback, you must cut away all profit margin. Some POD companies do just this in hopes of gaining readers, but it hasn't worked at all well.

Looking at Amazon is a good idea. The prices of POD paperbacks on Amazon are outrageous. Even after sharp discounts, they still cost too much.

It really doesn't take much research to learn how much it costs to print a POD book, and how much it costs a commercial publisher to print one of their paperbacks. Mass production is always going to be far cheaper on a per unit basis than is individual production. This means you can have higher quality for less money with large print runs than you can by going the POD route.

And it shouldn't take much research to quickly learn that most POD books are simply too God Awful to read, either. I know every writer wants to believe his or her own books is well-written and a good read, but it just isn't so.

Maybe one POD book in a hundred reaches the quality of the average commercially published novel, and maybe one in a thousand reaches the quality of truly good writing.

If you've written one of these really good novels, and if you go about promoting it and hustling it, and working your buns off, it can be a hit, but it will almost certainly have to be picked up by a commercial publisher before any real sales are made.

POD actually isn;t a bad route for those who write niche nonfiction, but it simply does not work at all well for novels. Most POD novels stink on ice, and the stink carries over and sticks to the very few good POD novels.

Partly because of this, and largely because no one needs POD novel, sales generally stink, as well. No reader alive can read more than a small fraction of novels published by mainstream commercial publlishers each year. With commercial publishers, reader get known names and quality writing at a far cheaper price than any POD company can begin to offer. So why buy POD? It would take me a hundred years just to read the commercial novels that will be published this year alone. Nevermind all the ones that were published last year, and the year before last, and the year before that, or that willl be published next year. Nevermind all the used bookstores that sell commercially published novels at very low prices.

It would take me a hundred years just to read through all the quality commercial novels my local library will let me take home for free. This means no one needs POD books to have more than enough reading material at cpmp[aratively low prices, or even for free.

If you do have a really well-written POD book, it can sell well. BUt it won;t be because people need it, it will be because you do a ton of work to make them want it, and cut your profit margin to near zero, or even below. You need a publicist, you need to be willing to travel, you need to put up a good website and let people read chapters for free, etc. Making something good happen with a POD book is not easy and is not cheap.

And in all honesty, it usually comes down to this:

'Vanity presses are called "vanity" presses for a reason.
They appeal to the writer's vanity, not the writer's sanity.
Stay away if you want to be a serious writer.'

- Kristine Kathryn Rusch, SciFi.com interview, 2002.

Hello,

I thought about hiring a publicist for two nonfiction books I'm having printed by a POD company. I'm using these books to add value and help me grow my business. I spoke with a few publicists who told me I could save a lot of money and easily learn to do this for myself since I already have writing skills (that's what they said—I'm not tooting my own horn here!). They said their services typically start at around $2,500 for writing a few basic news releases. So…I've been reading a bunch of books, some recommended and some I found on my own, and putting together my own publicity plan. A few of these books recommend joining forums like this one!

I've read all the warnings I could find, including the ones mentioned in this thread, and I know that everyone does not get the same result. I think that's more the fault of the individual authors than the companies they hire to print their books, although I'm sure there are exceptions. Anyone can publish something bad by hiring a POD service. But anyone who cares about what their name goes on can do whatever is necessary to write a good book before they publish it; those people can benefit from this service.

I know other business people (and novelists!) who've used the POD company I chose, and I know some who have used other POD companies. I like what I see! My acquaintances have met their goals and are happy with their decision (one even used a local 24-hour quick-print service and keeps getting reorders from the local bricks & mortar big chain store in her town!). I've even noticed that I've purchased a couple very helpful books at the big online bookstore that were published by a POD company, but I didn't know it at the time. One of those is a book-publicity book that's now offered by a "traditional" publisher!

"Publishers" is probably not the best name for POD companies because they do only some of the "publishing" work for you (like getting your ISBN, printing your book, designing your cover if you don't do it yourself and things like that). Maybe that's why there's so much controversy about them—"publisher" seems to bring to mind the names of the big 6 (or however many there are today!) and all that they offer.

The POD company I chose has charts in their promotional booklet that tells you the retail price they recommend for your book based on its number of pages. They also allow the author to increase that price if the author thinks they can get it—the increase goes straight through to the author as part of the royalty—I like that! I noticed in their online bookstore that many of the business writers increased the POD's recommended retail price! I'm going for it because it's an opportunity to actually increase my profit on my book sales! It's up to me to sell my books—just like it's up to me to sell my services at the fees I charge, which are sometimes higher than my competitors (I justify my price based on the value I offer).

This company also discounts off their recommended retail price for sales of 5 or more (not the actual retail price I set, the lower price they recommended!) I like that I can offer that as an incentive to my clients who might buy in bulk! I also like that I don't have to have 10,000 books printed and sitting in my basement!

Vanity is something I hadn't thought about. Is it vain to want to use books to promote and grow your business? Almost all those books I'm reading recommend it! I don't know if I'm vainer than other business people who publish books with traditional publishers, but I think we're probably looking for the same end result: to add value to our business; to help get our ideas out to people who can use them; and to supplement our income. There are probably some who want to become famous, but I'm not one of those (fame has its downside) and I don't expect my books to bring me fame or fortune—but I do expect them to help my readers.

I'm looking forward to "talking" with others here who've made the POD choice!
Have a happy 4th of July!

WordedWrite