We were on a break!
Over the last six years, I’ve written four books. Three of them were written with a guy much smarter than I am. All of them involved a traditional publisher. Through that process I’ve made several good friendships with folks in the publishing industry. This isn’t about those friendships. This is about a growing frustration I have with a broken system.
The current book publishing system completely frustrates me.
- The author can’t initiate the process on his own. It typically involves engaging a literary agent to essentially pimp you and your writing services to publishers.
- Publishers are unwilling to tackle non-traditional projects on non-traditional topics because of the underlying fear they currently experience surrounding their ultimate demise.
- Once the publisher gets involved, the author begins to lose part of his voice as the publisher drives the content and branding of the project.
- Unless your name is Joel Osteen or Rick Warren or Andy Stanley or Max Lucado, then writing a book is very unlikely to profit you much more than the hourly wage of a Wal-Mart employee. It’s a lot of work for very little financial reward.
- The process of writing a book with a traditional publisher takes forever. If I started writing today, it’s very likely that you wouldn’t see the book on the shelves of Barnes & Noble until sometime in mid-2012. If your thoughts are time-sensitive, you’re out of luck.
- Traditional publishing requires lots of overhead expenses including agents, acquisition staff, editors, graphic designers, marketing directors and publishing executives. And, they are the middlemen who have the relationships with the printers, distributors and bookstores. Each of these people and entities grabs a piece of the pie leaving the author with a very small portion of the profit.
- In the current model, there’s no room for non-traditional formats. Books are expected to look a certain way and contain a certain amount of words. That creates barriers for those of us who communicate primarily through social media. My audience doesn’t show up at a conference to hear a keynote and then purchase a hardcover book. My audience is on Twitter and Facebook and very willing to share an idea if it’s presented in a format that can easily be forwarded to a friend.
With all of that in mind, I’ve been having some great conversations with Ben Stroup over the last several months. When our efforts to find a publisher for my most recent book project stalled, Ben and I began talking about doing something completely different. Since “we were on a break” with the publishers, we decided to start seeing other people. (Regrettably, only “Friends” fans will find the humor in that.)
We’re not waiting two years to get a book in your hands. In fact, it’ll likely be less than two months. (Ah, I love having agressive goals.) And, it’s very likely that instead of just one book being released in 2011, it’s going to be multiple books.
I’ve been wondering for several years if it’s possible to spread ideas and generate a platform without a book publisher. I’m tired of wondering. I’m ready to test the waters. My theory is that, without a publisher, I’ll be able to distribute my writing to more people and make more money than I would with a book publisher.
By the way, this little experiment has nothing to do with making money. Yes, I want to use this experiment to prove that a new process for distributing my writing will be profitable. Emily and I have decided, though, that we will be giving away 100% of the profits from this project. (More on that later.)
With that, I better get to work. The clock is ticking. My writing deadline is fast approaching. For the publishers who are reading, just remember…
We were on a break!
Love this direction and vision. If you have something that you’re passionate about saying, and if you truly believe people need to hear it, then there’s no reason to let a machine stall it out for two years.
Way to go.
Again, Love It!!!! Looking forward to getting my copy. I’m sure it will be brilliant.
Having just published a non-traditional devotional and not going by the name of Osteen, Warren, Stanley or Lucado, I found the timing of this post to be impeccable, thanks!
I look forward to seeing how things turn out with your experiment. I am also launching off on a different writing journey. I believe this new direction will allow me to write to my strengths and interests instead of trying to change myself to impress publishers. Not sure if I will make money but I know I will have a lot of fun.
Please keep us all in the loop as you “test the waters.”
Wow, I could not agree more with your assessments of the process. Last year I wrote a book about losing my ministry position and the way God grew me through that. I never had a chance with publishers because I did not have the means to go about it the way they required. I didn’t have the means as a result of the story that lead to the book!
I had to self-publish, still lost thousands and as a result feel bad that what God taught me has not been exposed to as many people as could learn from it.
P.S. – this is not a prop to sell books. All the money from all 50 books I have actually sold has been given to plant a church in the Ukraine.
Great post and I’m sure many writers out there share your frustration. I look forward to your future writing projects and will be watching your next steps with interest.
I have 3 devotional books coming out and the publisher is doing zero, zip, nada promotion. I greatly appreciate your thoughts on the subject. Any clues as to your step by step process with this project? That would be a huge help for those of us in a similar position. Thanks!
Tony, such good timing on this. I totally agree with you. Traditional book publishers seem ridiculous to me — they offer so little right now. Also, did you see Seth Godin’s new venture with Amazon — Domino? His post about why he is doing something new in publishing is very similar to your post. Great minds think alike :)
Penelope
Tony,this is the way of the future. In fact I’ve started doing some work with Samazidat Creative who are specializing in hybrid publishing models and multiple distribution methods with e-books. http://samizdatcreative.com/ for more information about them.
We’ve worked with Darin Lindley at Good Catch Publishing. He works with local churches to gather stories from within their congregation. Then books are used as an outreach tool.
http://www.goodcatchpublishing.com/
Tony, this is a daring and risky idea.
I LOVE IT! I’m looking forward to supporting this project for sure!
Thanks to National Non-fiction Writing Month, I’m 150 pages into a book on podcasting for churches. I’m self-publishing with CreateSpace.com and hope to have it ready to print in January. Not bad for starting on 11/2/10. I’m doing everything I can myself and I’m hoping to make $3-4000. If I don’t that’s still cool; I wanted to know if I could do it.
(Shameless plug) Read what I have so far at http://trinitydigitalmedia.com/podcasting-church (end shameless plug).
Paul
Thanks for the words Tony. I too share your frustration, as I’ve been trying to get a traditional publisher to give me the look (or in the manner of Joey, say, How you doin?) for the past three years. Since I’m known by next to no one outside of my Twitter world and Facebook, they’re not even interested; so, I self-published.
I’m looking forward to the model upon which you’re embarking. Keep us posted.
If you’d like to look at my book and sample my writings, go to http://livingclear.net/. I’d be honored to have your feedback.
Interesting. Popular blogger Seth Godin is working on something similar. Check out: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2010/12/the-domino-project.html