Self-Publishing vs Traditional: The Truth About Royalties & Control

In this conversation, Michele DeFilippo discusses the evolution of self-publishing, emphasizing the balance between quality and budget, the importance of engaging with an audience before writing, and the challenges of maintaining high standards in a DIY publishing landscape. She highlights the need to invest in high-quality services, the role of AI in editing, and the realities of earning a living through self-publishing. Michele also addresses common misconceptions about bestsellers and the importance of multiple drafts in the writing process.

• Self-publishing has empowered authors but comes with challenges.
• Quality should not be compromised for budget in publishing.
• Engaging with your audience before writing is crucial.
• Productivity in writing should focus on quality, not speed.
• Perfectionism can hinder the publishing process.
• Beware of scams in the self-publishing industry.
• AI tools can assist but should not replace human creativity.
• Making a living from self-publishing is challenging and requires effort.
• Investing in quality services is essential for a successful book.
• Multiple drafts are necessary for producing a polished manuscript.

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Chapters

• 0:00 The Evolution of Self-Publishing
• 2:51 Quality vs. Budget in Publishing
• 5:52 Engaging Your Audience Before Writing
• 9:01 Productivity and Quality in Writing
• 12:07 The Diminishing Returns of Perfection
• 15:04 Avoiding Scams in Self-Publishing
• 17:48 The Role of AI in Publishing
• 24:04 The Reality of Making a Living from Self-Publishing
• 27:02 The Importance of Multiple Drafts
• 29:48 Mindset Shifts for Aspiring Authors

Transcript

0:01

Michel DeFilippo, welcome to Productivity! Thank you so much Santiago, it's a pleasure to be here. You've seen book publishing evolve for over five decades. So what's the single biggest change, good or bad, for today's authors? Without question, it's the ability for authors to self-publish their book, and that has been both good, it started out really, really good, and it's also been bad. like all things humans are involved in, there's the good with the bad. So is there a moment where you doubted the self-publishing model which you vouch for? Was this the time where you say, well, this is not going to work or this is not for everybody? No, think that depends on the individual author and I think that may be where the 80-20 rule comes into play, right? Because it's human nature to go for the easy solution in any situation. But uh with self-publishing, it was really, really good at the beginning because authors understood that they were going to be the publisher of their own book. And with that, role came all of the responsibilities of being a publisher, hiring experts to produce a good book, seeing it through the distribution process, marketing the book and so on. And in return for that effort, the authors were able to keep all of the money, all of the net revenue from sales when a book was sold. And that was great. But it wasn't too long before we started to see self-publishing companies and and now they call themselves hybrid publishing companies or just publishers, but the intermediate model between self-publishing and traditional publishing has become very complicated. Now, to just back up a little bit, traditional publishing, the author pays nothing. The publisher has all the responsibility to produce the book, pays the experts, and then pays the author a small royalty when the book is sold. That's a fair business model because they deserve a return on their investment and on their effort. Well, today's publishers, uh hybrid publishers and so forth, they charge the author to produce the book, but then they also keep a portion of the revenue when a book is sold, paying authors a small royalty. So that doesn't work out too well for the author. And that's why I'm doing these podcasts to talk about that. Hmm, very interesting. I did go the other day, I will tell you a little secret, Michelle. I'm trying to write a book. I was doing some research before this interview and I asked Chagy P.T. tell me um all the participants or actors that are involved in a book and their cost. And it was a bit daunting. Do self-published authors need to go through the entire thing? Editorial and the rest of the things? Is there anything that newcomers can do to self-publish a book on a budget? Well, the budget part is where the problem happens, right? Because when you're buying a service, you're buying the time and attention and expertise of a person or persons to provide that service. It's much different than buying a product where the product is the same and you might choose to buy it at a store that's offering it at a cheaper price, right? There's no harm in doing that because the product is the same. But in services, there's a wide difference. ah in the expertise that people have, in the amount of time that people spend on the job, and so the price usually follows that. You're not, you shouldn't make the assumption, in other words, that you're getting the same level of service for a cheaper price, because that's rarely true. Very true. So do you think there is a... some say that self-publishing it's an easier way for those who can't land a deal on more traditional publishers. Do you think that there is still a bit of glamour or premium brand on uh being published by a large publisher? yeah, I'm still a big believer in traditional publishing. That is the gold standard in the industry. The problem with traditional publishing is that it's very difficult to get a traditional publishing deal. So self-publishing has made it possible for authors to produce and publish a book without, uh instead of just being completely disappointed and giving up on their dream. But again, like I said, there's the good with the bad in that. And a lot of players have entered the industry who do not produce the good quality book that a traditional publisher will produce. And some are outright scams. Some just don't know what quality is. So there's a lot of problems that the author needs to be aware of. And you might not be aware of these things if you're publishing for the first time. So that's where I guess I would always recommend that you hire experts with experience. You listen to them and take the guidance from them and don't necessarily go out and say, I want to publish a book but I only want to let's say $2,000. You can find people who will meet that budget but you won't get a good book for How often do you see people making this mistake to trying to go for a super short cut or trying to spend a bare minimum and getting low quality and therefore low audience as well and readers? it's an epidemic. No doubt. Again, I think the 80-20 rule, 20 % of people recognize quality publishing and want that for their own book. But 80 % of the people are just, they don't mean to do it, but they're purchasing like consumers, looking only at the price, right? But publishing is a business, right? So you should buy like a business owner would buy, and that is find out what does it cost to do the job right? and then decide whether you're going to move forward or whether you need to save up a little or wait a while or whatever. But the thing that authors do wrong, many authors do wrong, is they go for that low budget, they say they can't afford anymore, which is probably true, but your buyer knows the difference between good quality and bad quality. So when you're offering a product to the market and you're asking people, to turn over their hard-earned money for your book, you have a responsibility to make it a good book. That's our take on Let's talk about something is... popular in this industry, which is you should have an audience before you launch a book. You shouldn't go and write and publish a book if you don't have already an audience behind you. Is that true? Yes, it's also true that you should actually start engaging with your potential audience before you begin writing and find out what your audience wants. Now, you know, maybe you'll want to talk about your book and what you're intending to do, but you have to get out of your, unless you're writing a novel, you need to get out of your imagination and find out who's my audience, what problem do they have. How can I solve it in a unique way? And that's what you put into your book. So that when you do release the book, there's people ready and willing and waiting for it. So you recommend to do this even before start to write the first word? Yes, yes, because you have to figure out what am I going to write. Now that's not true of fiction. You can write whatever you want. what about creativity, Michelle? What if I want to start writing something that is in my head and I think it's brilliant and I want to write it down and publish it? Well, it is a productivity issue, right? Because no business will release a product to market without research, right? So you have to think like a business owner. Is there a market for what I want to release? And if so, let's drill down and find out what are people looking for. I would say that some businesses launch products without doing any research, but maybe they're not very successful. Yeah, not big companies, that's for sure. Can we talk a little bit about productivity for writers? It's a productive writer, one that pumps out content really fast. It's one that produce quality content, which is your side. I'm not a writer. My background is in design. But I would say that no quality product or service ever comes about quickly. And I think that's especially true of writing. em Even after the author has poured over their manuscript for months or sometimes years, when we get into the production process, there's always new things that come to everyone's attention. There's always things to change and improve and make better. So. while nothing will stop you from pumping out a book quickly and releasing it, I don't think that's the best thing to aim for. What is a workflow that you recommend people you work with to follow to be productive and obviously as you said produce a quality content, quality writing? Well, my, uh, if, if the authors I talk to are representative, they, most of them have been working on their book for a very long time. And it helps, I think, to, to write what you can, take down the barrier of perfection, right? Don't try to be perfect on that first draft, because it's not going to be perfect. Maybe put it aside, think about it a little bit, you know, just put it aside for however long you think you should. and then come back to it with fresh eyes. And you'll see things that you didn't see before and you'll think of ways to improve it. Yeah. People will come to us sometimes and they'll say, I can't read this one more time, let's go. So there's, you have to make a judgment call at some point is like, okay, this is the best I can do and now it's time to release it. Very interesting, Michelle. The principle of diminishing results says that at some point, time invested doesn't equate to output or uh benefit of whatever you're doing with this time. It's a bit of a bell chord that says at some point, no matter how much you put on this, it's not going to be better, but you're wasting your time now. Does it happen for books? yeah, I think it happens for everything, And maybe especially, I know we see it in proofreading, when we are proofreading a book, sometimes the author will just keep coming back time and time and time and time again to make changes. And so again, how much time and productivity do you want to sacrifice to finding that last change, right? Is it really worth it or is it just... in some cases it's that you're afraid to release the book so let's just keep let's just keep working on it forever. Do you have a time, Michel, a timeline, a length of writing where you say, well listen, you've been three, five, seven years writing this, it's about time. Is there such a I think it depends on the individual. just finished an epic poetry book from an author who had been working on it for 40 years. That was the longest timeframe I've ever heard of. 40 years. I guess it depends on your time, right? Everyone has other demands on their time. Maybe they can only write once a week or once a month. So that's gonna take longer than if you write every day. Wow, the work of a lifetime, literally. Yes, yes. So assuming that someone has only 30 minutes a day for their book, right? They can block 30 minutes, 20, 30. Where should they spend this time? Should it be more putting the skeleton of the book, writing stuff that comes out of their minds? I'm not a writer, like I said, so I guess that's an individual answer for each person. oh Some people just like to put down words and let it flow. Other people like to make detailed outlines and follow that outline and make progress that way. I would say if you're not having fun, you probably should do something different, right? Because if you're not having fun, you're not doing your best work. What is an underrated investment uh that pays off big on a book launch? uh That really again depends on the book and it depends on the author, right? You can, uh one of our most popular services is author marketing coaching, where we teach you how to market your book yourself. So in terms of investment of your time and of your money, that's really efficient, right? Because you're not depending on anyone else to market your book. And when you pay someone else to do anything, they're going to charge you. you know, for their services. And so it's difficult for authors to market a book for any length of time, to launch and market for maybe any longer than six months, that starts to get really expensive. But if you learn how to do it yourself, then you can market it for as long as you You said that many authors spelled thousands on vanity presses. What is the list or checklist to avoid being scammed? Well, you go online, will find all sorts of... The biggest misunderstanding is that you need a publisher. Indie authors do not need a publisher to be in the mix, right? All of the distribution services and all of the editorial and design services that you need to publish a book under your own name exist for you. But it's difficult to find that because a lot of these... Publishers know how to dominate the search engines and so companies like mine that that offer author services and Project management, it's very difficult for us to be found so and then publishers like I said in addition to charging authors for those services nowadays They also take money out of their pocket every time a book is sold So that's the thing to watch out for you know when someone when someone offers you a free ISBN That usually means they're a publisher because it's not free. What they're doing is they're giving you one of theirs, which means they are the publisher of record of your books. That's the first red flag. ah Payments in a royalty is also a red flag to watch out for because if you manage your own distribution and your own publishing project, you won't get a royalty. You'll get a much larger figure than that. usually about six to eight dollars per book, where some of these publishing companies are paying you one to two dollars per book, maybe three. So they're making more money on the book than you are, even though you paid them for the services to produce that book. So that's the big thing to keep in mind. Right. The other, another red flag is promises of a best seller. Right. And that apparently is very powerful. Authors love to hear that they want to be a bestseller, but it's accomplished today by dishonest means. It's not real. A real bestseller is a book that sells 10,000 copies a week and it's listed by the New York Times. That's a bestseller. Fooling Amazon's computer to put a bestseller tag on your book is not real and I think everybody knows it. I wouldn't fall for that pitch if I were you. You triggered my curiosity. someone, so you said that it's like these things in Instagram, these ads, I'll make you billionaire. When people want to be a bestseller or be a bestseller author, as better said, is it because they want money or because they want fame and ego? I think it's fame and ego, right? Because I think, well, some of the companies out there promising bestsellers to authors are charging a horrendous amount of money. And then are the sales there? Probably not. So now when I see an author claiming to be a bestseller, and never heard of him, I know automatically that you're not an honest person, right? Do you really want to start out your publishing career by announcing you're not an honest person? Michelle, I want to throw you the first AI question. I promise there's going to be only a couple of them. Is it worth using AI tools on the process of editing and publishing a book? In a limited way, I would say yes. I use Grammarly, right? It helps to have uh an AI tool to fix your grammatical mistakes that everyone makes. But in terms of writing your book, boy, no. Because AI, at least now, doesn't have a voice. Only a human being can have a voice. So I wouldn't try to cheat that way. We have a rise of expert business books. um Almost everybody is, well, not everybody, but a lot of people, even myself, Michelle, is trying to write a book. All these expert books create valuable content or is noise and flooding with things that are redundant and repetitive. Well, I guess that depends on the book, right? I can't answer that. But writing a book to promote a business or a speaking career is a proven effective tool. I've done it. I give away my little 88-page book, and it has brought in more customers than I can count. So if that's your goal, then I think writing a book as a business owner is a good thing to do. Because it lets people learn more about you. uh in a non-threatening way. People don't necessarily want to jump right into a sales call when they're interested in a company. If you offer them a little product, doesn't have to be long, uh let them learn about your approach, your philosophy, what you offer. Then if they like what you're saying, then they'll give you a call and they'll almost be ready to work with you before you even speak to them. So that's the value of a business. What's your response to critics who say that DIY publishing boom is ruining books? I would agree in a lot of areas that's absolutely true. The do-it-yourself message has created so many bad books and that's the bad side of self-publishing, Self-publishing is the biggest opportunity that authors have ever seen, but the DIY message, the do-it-yourself message where authors are told they should design their own cover, that they don't need editing, that they can format their own pages, that's... has created books that are not up to the standard of traditional publishing. it's, uh from the consumer side, consumers can no longer be sure a book is going to be well made. We used to take that for granted, right? But you can't count on that anymore. Michelle, I um wrote the question, the next question, can someone get rich self-publishing books? But I want to edit the get rich. Can someone make out a living from self-publishing books? I wouldn't count on it. It's highly, no really. And those, again, people who promise that, again, are misleading you, right? Everybody knows this, you don't get rich quick. The people who promise you they'll make you rich quick are the ones who are getting rich quick. Real riches, real success in any business takes thousands of hours, years of effort. you know, it just doesn't come quick. I couldn't agree more, Can you give some advice for people that has excitement, like me, about writing something that they think could be useful for the society? Where should they start? Where can they help to get some help to resolve some of the doubts or many questions they will have? I think if you're excited about something and you think you have a unique take on it, you should absolutely move forward, right? Just keep your expectations realistic. And that's the part of self-publishing that I find most disturbing because people are saying, you know, you can write the book fast, AI can write your book, you're gonna be a best seller, and none of that is true. It's all just a scam. Michelle, let's do a few quick questions. Um, number one, what is the most avoidable mistake that you see new authors make? not budgeting enough to produce a quality book. I'll tell you, you're not gonna find good designers and good editors on Fiverr. They're not gonna waste their time trying to compete with people who are working for 10 cents on the dollar. They're just not. So you shouldn't follow the advice that authors are giving each other, which is, found this book cover designer for $50 and I found this editor that'll work for a dollar. a penny a word, it's just not going to happen. The people who have real skills are going to take a lot of time to do the work and they're going to charge accordingly because they have to make a living. Just business. Do you have a figure in your mind that authors should also have in their mind before start writing a book to get a quality publishing? Yeah, mean good editors don't come cheap, good designers don't come cheap. uh For our clients, typically a 50,000 word novel will run about $8,000 for full service. And that's editing, cover design, interior design and layout, ebook formatting and distribution set up in the author's name, right? A nonfiction book's a little more, that'd be more like 9,000 closer to 10 because nonfiction is typically more complicated. But that and... People who know books tell me that's a very fair, low price. People who don't know books and don't know about publishing quality tell me it's outrageous. So you can draw your own conclusions. I already did, Michelle, and I don't think that the figure you gave to start, it's too crazy considering the cost of living of these days and that everyone is a professional. And if you want with good quality, you need to pay for it. Yeah, of course, and that takes, I'm paying seven people out of that figure. So, you know, and that's what it costs. Can you name a productivity tool? And I know you said you're not a writer, but I'm going to put you on the spot a little bit, maybe for writing or maybe for your job, a productivity tool or app you could not live without. There's so many now. I don't know how to answer that. For our purposes in project management, we have to have collaboration system to manage multiple projects at once. I think that's a really great thing because that gathers all files and all messages regarding a particular project in one place. uh Early on, we didn't have that and we were kind of using Word files to keep track of all the details in a project. Yeah, I'm a big believer in these collaboration platforms that you can now get. What is a publishing myth you wish would finally die? Well, we talked about it, the bestseller. You're not going to be a bestseller, right? Even major publishers with all of their resources and firepower and marketing expertise, even they have books that fail or don't make back their costs. Occasionally, they'll have a bestseller and that makes up for it. for the average, especially if you're a first-time author, uh just don't go after the bestseller. Do you know what is the ratio of bestsellers out of all books published? Sorry, I'm a data guy, so I'm curious. I think it has to be a zero, a good number of zeros, and then a one or something like that. I wish I, if you have the answer, I'd love to know it. I'm a picture person, not a data person. You know what, I'm to try to research it and get back to you with the percentage of books that become a bestseller. Kindle or print? m Both. Both formats are selling equally well. uh I talk to a lot of people who say they still love what they call a real book, a print book. And I do too, because when you look at a screen all day when you're working, who wants to look at, in my opinion, who wants to look at another screen when you're reading and trying to relax in the evening? I love a print book. I like audio books. But smart. Indie Publisher will offer the book in all the formats so that the buyer can make the choice. You never want to lose a sale because you're not offering it in the format that your buyer wants. You mentioned audiobooks. Do you also recommend to publish an audiobook? uh I recommend it with a professional narrator. Now we're seeing AI narration. I don't know about anybody else. I can hear the difference. The voice is flat. uh But a professional narrator, of course, charges a lot of money because they have their expertise and they know how to bring a book to life. uh I don't recommend authors narrating their own book unless they have some training, voice training. And even then, I've listened to audio books from people who have TV shows. You would think they have the training to make a good audio book, but they don't. It's a unique skill to read a book and make it really worth listening to. makes an audiobook unique in your view? I personally like it because after working for 12 hours at a computer I can close my eyes and still enjoy the content, just relax and listen to it. Fast edits or multiple drafts? Oh, multiple, multiple, multiple drafts. know, authors tell me they've been at it for months or years and even after we start the job, which with supposedly the final manuscript, there's always more to find, right? It's just, again, it's the time necessary to make the book the best it can be. Michelle, for any writers stuck in idea mode, what's the smallest possible next action they could do today to start moving forward? Just that word, start. Just don't take away the barrier of perfection. You don't have to know everything yet. don't have to... It helps, I suppose, to know where you're going. But if you don't start, you can never make any progress. So just make yourself start. And then the power will be there to continue. And if listeners remember only one mindset shift about publishing from you, what should it be? You do not need a publisher to self-publish your book. uh You'll be much better off working with author services companies like mine, where we charge you for the services, but then you get all of the control and the revenue when the book is published in your own name. um So just keep that in mind. You don't need to share your revenue with anyone else. You don't need to give control of your book to anyone else. Keep it for yourself. I can get people avail your services, tell us. You can find us at oh 1106design.com. We have lots of educational articles. All of my pricing is on the website. We believe in complete transparency. And we would love to offer you a free consultation. I promise no pressure. I promise we won't send you five emails a day after you contact us. We don't do business that way. We do business the old-fashioned way, person to person. Very good. I'm glad to hear that, Michelle. um There is so much of spam and pressure going on on anything you want to do on the internet or online or offline that it's really overwhelming. I don't think it's effective, do you? It just annoys me. think it does works it has some science back in it I think it works but again as you said it works on certain industries more than others and on certain topics more than others. Michelle I want to thank you so much for bringing us a little bit closer in the audience to what does it take to write, publish a book and the rest of the things that you must do and consider doing this. I'm taking a few things away. The first one I think is about the bestseller and I'll probably combine it with enjoy what you're doing and forget the bestseller and try to have some joy. And the second one is definitely don't underestimate the power of a good service or a company or a professional or a number of professionals that can help you publish your book and have some warranties of quality. Thank you so much, Michelle. Thank you Santiago, it's been a pleasure.