Many authors who have successfully self-published will tell you that digital publishing technology has not only democratized the process of sending a book out into the wild, it has also given them more control and more money for their craft.
The latest partner in publishing is Amazon, which long ago shook up the book-selling retail rivals like Barnes & Noble, and now is possible to solve problems in something similar in the book publishing industry, where it has developed tools to help writers publish their own books, including its Kindle Direct Publishing for e-books. The allure? It allows authors to keep as much as 70 percent of the royalties for digital books and 60 percent for print through Createspace.com. It is far more than they would get from a traditional publishing house – which pays about 25 percent royalty for e-books, according to the Author’s Guild. But the catch is that authors are really entrepreneurs, who do more of the heavy lifting, such as finding a line editor and copy editor, choosing and buying artwork, and promoting the finished product.
However, according to a roundtable of leading Amazon independent authors, all non-fiction writers, who assembled at Bryant Park Hotel in midtown Manhattan last week, self-publishing is well worth it.
Included at the table were: James Altucher’ that-author with Claudia Azula Altucher’of The Power of No; Honorée Corder, whose latest book is You Must Write a Book: Boost Your Brand, Get More Business, and Become the Go-To Expert; Hal Elrod, who wrote The Miracle Morning; Pat Flynn, author of Will it Fly? and Guy Kawasaki, best known as the former chief evangelist of Apple, whose latest book is the The Art of The Start 2.0. He also wrote APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur, which is notably about self-publishing. ( See our previous interview with Kawasaki here.)
- Teresa Novellino
- Upstart Business Journal Entrepreneurs &Enterprises Editor