I recently gave a speech (The Mysterious Evolution of Publishing) to the Professional Editors Association of Vancouver Island, focusing on what I’ve learned about print and digital publishing. The attendees were very enthusiastic and encouraged me to post a blog.
As a multi-published mystery author and self-published ebook author, I’ve determined the following about print versus digital publishing:
Print Publishing:
• Hard to achieve
• Handled by third party publisher
• Respected product
• Universal & world-wide appeal
• Costly to produce; thousands of dollars for smallish print runs
• Book sale price relatively high
• Receive Editorial assistance
• Design & marketing support
• Established distribution / sales avenues
• Author receives 5-15% royalties
• Author expected to self promote; own expense
• Relatively short-lived shelf live; new books always coming
• No changes/corrections once printed; must await new print run
Digital Publishing:
• E-books now wildly available
• May be read on computer or mobile screen
• Can be multimedia like our QUILLR® storytelling platform
• Can be produced by third party publisher, third party + self publisher or author alone
• Gaining respect & audience
• Popular in overseas, especially Asia (multi-million cellphone downloads yearly!)
• Interest growing in Europe & North America
• Editorial assistance, design & marketing support possible
• Limited distribution avenues, though growing (iTunes, shortcovers, booksonboard, diesel, amazon, etc.)
• Author royalties range between 30 and 70%
• iPhone, netbooks and younger generation suit reading online, on mobile and on screen
• Excellent second source of sales for published books
• Ideal for self-publishing; author can create, design, set up accounts, upload and start selling worldwide
• Suitable for non-traditional style, non-traditional format, non-traditional content
• Terrific test marketing opportunity
• Long life as digital bookstores seemingly have endless space
• And it’s cool…absolutely no reason not to give it a shot!
