: Re: Does self publishing via Amazon or similar services make your book ineligible for later acceptance by a publisher? I have a non-fiction book that is ready for publishing, and I am weighing between

@Merenda569

Vote Up Vote Down

If a traditional publisher agrees to take your book, neither you nor they know if your book will be a success. So they will give you some pile of money as an advance (so that if the book does not sell, at least you get some compensation for your effort), arrange to take the lion’s share of the profit (so that if the book does sell well, the publisher’s profit on it will more than make up for their loss on other books), and allocate some money to cover design, marketing, etc. (in the hope that such investment will be good for your book’s sales and hence for their profits).

If you self-publish through Amazon, neither you nor Amazon knows if your book will be a success. Amazon, however, doesn’t give a damn: they aren’t paying you anything up front, they aren’t investing their own money in marketing, and they can make a profit off your book even if it only sells a single copy.

But if you self-publish through Amazon and then try to market the same book to a traditional publisher, your book is a known quantity. In a happy world, you are one of those self-publishers who sells so many kajillions of copies that a traditional publisher says “my precious, we wantssss it” and offers you a sweet deal. In a slightly less happy world, your book is selling on Amazon, and would be profitable for whatever traditional publisher picked it up—but only if they bought it on the same terms they give to their other midlist authors, which are less favorable than the terms you are already getting from Amazon. And in an unhappy world, your Amazon sales figures prove to a traditional publisher that your book wouldn’t be profitable for them.

(0)

Login to post a comment!