Should you bother self publishing?

I know this post will create some hate mail, but here goes.

We've all read about the handful of success stories about writers that have self-published such as Amanda Hocking, E. L. James, etc...  but for the few that we heard about there are tens of thousands that sell a dozen copies and all to the author's family.  Now, I'm not saying this is a bad thing necessarily.  Many writers feel the need to put down the words into a story and it can be a very cathartic experience; just don't expect to quit your day job.  The constant media attention given to these very rare success stories vastly inflates the true value of self-publishing sales. 

Most of the companies that offer self publishing platforms make their money on offering add-on editing, design and marketing services.  They end up getting the writer to spend $1000 or more on services designed to help there book.  You can also just elect to put your title up on Kindle, iBooks, Nook, etc..

The absolute only way that these books compete is based on price.  Many are free and most are $.99.  Most consumers are willing to take a gamble on a $.99 book especially in popular genres like romance where the readers are voracious.  Some of these books might be good but the vast majority of them unfortunately are not.  The only way to find about these books is to make them free or $.99 so that the ebook retailer lists will show their sales climbing the ranks on the bestseller lists.  Keep in mind how many books a writer must sell to make any money at these low prices. Publishers still exist for many reasons, the most important being the editorial relationship that develops between the writer and the author.  The editor helps shape the story and once it's completed the publisher gets behind the book with marketing and publicity efforts.

As a publisher my biggest concern is the clutter of the books put out by publishing companies that have been professional designed, edited, copy-edited, proofread, etc... with the books that are just put up by self-published authors.  The established publishers have to charge more money because in most cases they have paid an advance; sometimes very substantial, and can't possibly afford to give the book away for $ .99.  If this were the business model and publishers were making greatly reduced revenue on the sales of these titles, the entire model of publishing would have to change.  There would be no way for the publishing company to recoup their advance and advances would drop precipitously. 

In my ideal world I would like to see a separate section for self-published books, maybe even separate websites.  I know this is selfish and self-serving from my perspective but I truly believe that it helps the reader help distinguish the books as well.  Readers don't purchase books based on the publisher and in most cases don't even know the publishing companies.  They might not even know if they're buying a book that was professionally edited versus one that was self-published.  Publishers are devaluing their own content as well by even adding to the confusion.  All publishers will discount first titles in a series, or a novella by an author with a new book coming out.  These get blended in with the other less expensive books and just adds to the clutter.  But to date, price has been the most effective marketing tool.  Publishers better start acting smarter and realize that free is not a viable business model.  If I were smart I would probably start a new website called $ .99 books and then I could retire :)

These self published books climb the lists to high ranking numbers because of the low price and then a few of the authors become big celebrities and end up going to a traditional publisher.  It remains to be seen how they perform when the publisher then has to payout an advance and raise the price of the book to cover this advance.  So far those that have made the leap to traditional publishing have not proven to be very profitable ventures in many cases for these publishing companies. 

The ebook stores have limited ways to promote books just like a physical bookstore.  They can send out email blasts to readers who opt-in.  They can also feature them on the homepage, very risky for a low priced book, or in various category pages.  The reason this is risky for the e-retailer is because this marketing space is very valuable and you're better off selling higher priced books to generate more sales.  This is all very similar to the retail store experience where readers see books on a table in the front of the store or in the bestseller section or even on displays at the end of the aisle.

Now don't get me wrong, if I were a writer and I thought I had a story in me that had to be told, I wouldn't hesitate to self-publish it either.  I just think that these  story tellers should have their expectations put into reality from the media rather than the media focusing on those very rare exceptions that have made big money from self-publishing and then have gotten $1,000,000 contracts from publishers.  Let's give it a little more time yet and see how those that have crossed over to the traditional side of publishing perform.

Steve