GETTING PUBLISHED
"THE END". There it’s done.
Now, gazing at those two words, a sparkle twinkles
in your eyes. You’ve plumed yourself on your
skill in creating a "killer novel".
Then, you let out a brief sigh of relief, which
is quickly interrupted by the thought of a perplexing
question. "Should I get an agent or submit my
manuscript directly to publishers of my genre?"
The answer, in reality, is neither because
your work has just begun. Your next effort should
be to create a marketing plan to sell yourself
and that newly created "killer novel" to an
agent or publisher.
And this can only be accomplished if you’re
confident that the manuscript has been professionally
edited and is ready to be submitted. You’ve
spent months or longer carefully concocting
a well-written novel, but how do you sell it
as an unknown writer? Answer: A superb marketing
plan and a marriage, if you will, with an agent
or publisher.
The first paragraph of your novel has a hook
to draw the reader’s interest and you’ve woven
suspense, drama, action and romance with a splash
of dry humor in perfect sequence throughout
the chapters. The setting of your novel invites
visits to foreign places and the hero gets the
girl and they live happily ever after. Believe
it or not, this is not good enough to sell your
manuscript.
Without convincing an agent or publisher that
you can assist in selling your brilliant work,
it’s all been in vain. Agents usually want you
to give them something that they can sell to
a publisher beside a well-crafted manuscript,
and that’s a well-developed explicit marketing
plan, which becomes their tool to grab the interest
of a publisher. Then, the editor uses these
tools presented by the agent to sell the manuscript
to the publishing company’s board members who
actually appropriate the money to publish your
work.
Publishing is a business and its investments
in authors must return a profit or at least
present the opportunity to do so. Usually, this
is the format that makes it happen. Unless your
manuscript falls into a market niche like J.
K. Rawlings, of the fantasy Harry Potter series,
and like her are lucky enough to get an agent
/ promoter to market your work, you probably
won’t become a "rich and famous" writer.
It takes a whole lot more than the love of
writing to become a successful author. The ability
to accept rejection hundreds of times, plus
writing thousands of edited words, are needed
to complete an apprenticeship in the writing
profession.
Once you have completed a marketing plan, then
you must put your expertise to work developing
a query letter that will arouse the interest
of an agent or a publisher.
How you present this form of introduction will
give them an idea of your writing skills. This
is assuming you’re not a published author with
past successes.
Once you’ve got their attention they will ask
for a sample of your work. Again, be sure it’s
ready to be submitted. Because if it isn’t,
a rejection letter will waste that SASE that
you included with your query resulting in having
to start the process all over.
There are plenty of books in your local library
to assist you on how to write a proper query
letter. It’s best to keep a query letter to
one page. Its intention is to spark an interest
in your work, so that its receiver will request
your manuscript. It is not a cover letter,
which is used to accompany a manuscript.
In other words, a query letter is used to sell
your work and a cover letter identifies the
manuscript’s title and you. The less you say
in your cover letter may coax the agent or editor
to read your manuscript.
Please remember when writing a query letter
that it is most important that your lead paragraph
should have a solid impact. Make the beginning
kick start the agent’s or editor’s juices flowing,
so they won’t lose interest in the rest of your
letter.
Lastly, keep focused on your love of writing
because once you begin the process of searching
for an agent, you have entered their world of
"subjectivity". In other words, what tickles
their fancy is most essential to them.
Here are some helpful hints to find an agent
or publisher:
- Attend writer’s conferences to network with
other writers/authors. If they are already
published and have an agent, ask them to introduce
you to their agent. Maybe, the agent will
like your work and accept you as a client.
- Join writer’s groups. You never know whom
you will meet. They usually have guest speakers,
and here again is where networking becomes
very important.
- Enter writer’s contests in your genre. They
can be found by typing the words "Writer’s
Contests" into any search engine.
- Visit major booksellers (Barnes & Noble,
Books-A-Million, etc.) and see what’s hot
on their shelves. Always try to keep up with
the current reader’s market trend.
- Become familiar with agents and publishers
that specialize in your genre. You can do
that by obtaining current copies of Fiction
Writer’s Market or The Everything Get
Published Book by Peter Rubie. If you
can’t purchase one of these books, the library
has them, plus many other books on the subject.
Here are four basic publishing methods:
- Traditional royalty publishers do
not charge for printing a book, usually extend
an advance payment and pay royalties to authors.
Most major publishing houses generally will
not consider an author’s work that isn’t represented
by an agent. Smaller publishers (presses)
will consider manuscripts from authors without
an agent, but vary on extending advances.
The major publishers arrange marketing programs
for their authors. The smaller publishers
(presses) do not have marketing programs,
but there are those who have reader’s clubs
and their own online bookstores to sell and
promote their books.
- Subsidy publishers expect the author
to pay the book’s production costs and take
little effort in promoting or marketing a
book. Most subsidy publishers have stringent
editorial standards. They are often confused
with POD (print on demand) publishers. Their
selling hype is usually more than is delivered.
- Vanity publishers can be Internet
publishers, which use text files to produce
a POD (print on demand) book or eBook at little
or no cost to the author. Some even pay small
royalties to authors. Other Vanity publishers
will charge exorbitant fees for a book’s production
and render no assistance in marketing or distribution.
The significant characteristic of these publishers
is that they will publish anything for a buck
and have no publishing ethics. Caution is
advised when doing business with this type
of publisher.
- Self-publishers are authors who incorporate
to produce, market and distribute their own
work. This doesn’t mean that they won’t hire
other firms to assist them or handle the printing,
promotion and circulation of the book. This
method is expensive and takes a good deal
of business savvy to accomplish.
I hope all of the aforementioned material will
pave a smoother path on your publishing journey.
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