This morning I realized something that is both shocking and disappointing. Most independent publishers of novels, anthologies, and magazines are leaving a great deal of money on the table.
Here’s what happened. I’m spending this morning preparing for MileHiCon where I’ll be attending panels, carousing, comingling, and generally keeping in touch with fans, peers, and hopefully an agent and publisher or two. In preparation for that, I wanted to be able to show all the work I’ve done.
I’ve got an old iPad, and I’ve been loading all the eBooks I’ve been involved with onto it. There are nearly sixty titles on it now, most of them the WordFire Press eBooks I’ve created for Kevin J. and Rebecca Anderson. However, I’ve produced 6 short fiction anthologies as well as my novel “Chemical Burn.” But I wanted to add all the indie anthologies and magazines I’ve contributed short stories to. So I went looking.
And that’s when it hit me.
MOST… to around the 90th percentile… of those titles aren’t anyplace other than Amazon. They’re not on Kobo… they’re not on Smashwords… they’re not on Barnes&Noble. I didn’t check iTunes, but I figured there was little point.
I was dumbstruck.
Folks, if you run an indie press, and I don’t give a damn what type of books or magazines you’re producing, you NEED to get your titles up on every sales channel reachable by your Internet connection. Amazon may be the biggest game in town, but it’s not the only game in town.
The bare minimum you should be making your titles available is on Amazon, Kobo, Smashwords, and Barnes&Noble. MINIMUM. And keep in mind that a properly formatted file uploaded to Smashwords gets you out on Sony and iTunes. Hell, these days, even the ISBNs are free, so you don’t have any excuse.
Some may say that it’s too costly to do all of that. Bulls*#t. For between $25 and $50, you can get your average magazine up on all of those venues. And for between $50 and $100, you can get your average novel or anthology up there too.
Even with a minimum of promotion, you should more than pay for that initial investment.
These days, simply producing a print copy and dropping it on Amazon isn’t enough. Nor is using Amazon’s meat grinder to create the eBook from that print. You have to go one step further.
And I just happen to know a guy who will do this sort of work… for these rates… and guarantee his work so that you can upload to all of those venues without any hitches.
So what are you waiting for?
Agreed, I’m publishing through Smashwords, which distributes to Kobe, Apple and B&N. Amazon has much more total traffic, but overlooking any market is just silly.