Self-Publisher's Guide: Have A Realistic Plan

Reasons to self-publish your novel

Don't hire an editor

How to design your own cover

The importance of free content

Self-publishing is tough. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. While working for yourself might give you the leeway and the freedom to do whatever you want, as the old saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility. And when it comes to self-publishing, believe you me, there are lots of responsibilities. The most important of which is to have a realistic, well-thought-out agenda.

Now, before you set off on your self-publishing career, you have to realize that the odds are stacked against you. Not only do you likely start from a place of obscurity, but you also have to make yourself stand out. Not only from fellow self-publishers, but household authors as well (Stephen King, John Grisham, etc). Competition is fierce. Content is coming out left and right, front, center, and every which direction you can think of. There is simply so much that you have to do to woo your audience that at times it may seem success is impossible.

But that is why it’s important to define “success.”

Let’s face facts. If you’re reading this, and you either are or are planning to become a self-published author, then odds are high that you won’t make a living off your writing alone. You won’t sell a million copies, and you won’t retire doing what you do. You won’t become the next Stephen King, and your name won’t make it on the blurbs of bestselling books. I don’t say this to discourage, so much as to dispel some fantasies that some might have about their prospects of success. While dreams are certainly a good thing to have, everyone unfortunately has to subscribe to this thing that we call real life (except, perhaps, for Peter Molyneux).

Everyone has their own agenda when it comes to self-publishing. Some opt to turn it into a full-time job, some use it simply to publish their work and share it amongst a small circle of audience members. There would be no sense in going into the details of explaining what plans you should or shouldn’t have. That would all have to depend on the extent of your own ambitions. But you always have to pay attention to reality.

A moment of truth. Or, a confession, if I may. I, myself, have been a writer for almost a year now. And in that time I have self-published two books (soon to be three by the end of this month), and I have written a slew of articles on Hubpages, and I have distributed short stories wherever I can. My endgame is to use what progress I make by the end of the year and put that into a resume so that I can find full-time work. At the age of 22, I’m currently a student, and as such my prospects of employment has certain limitations. I self-publish not to make a million dollars on my writing (as nice as it would be), but to build a resume. My strategy as a writer is to provide either free or near to free content as often as possible, and build a repertoire of an audience with my work, which I deliberately make as easily accessible as I can. This entails everything from the articles and the short stories that I write and distribute for free, as well as the books I have written that I deliberately keep at 99 cents.

There is a reason why I charge only 99 cents for each of my books. And it has nothing to do with the quality of my writing. My works have been incredibly well-received, to the point that some have even asked why I didn’t simply take my work to a publishing house.

But there is a philosophy behind my 99 cent pricing. As a newly self-published novelist, sales numbers mean more to me than profit. Sales numbers make me look good on a resume. And they make my prospects of finding a job all-the-more easier. They’re an effective means of marketing my name to agencies and contractors.

The hope is to one day make a million bucks off my writing. But the real-life goal is to use my accomplishments to climb up the rungs of the publishing biz, so that I can do what I love to do with the backing of a full-time salary.

With quite a few book sales under my belt thus far, and a ton of downloads, it’s safe for me to say that I have so far reached my definition for success. While I’m certainly no millionaire, my progress concurrent to my goals has made me optimistic about my prospects for next year, where new goals will take shape.

In short, your plans should always conform to your ambitions. Having a realistic plan not only puts into perspective the work you’re doing as a self-publisher, but it will also make you more ambitious in your craft when you find yourself surpassing your own expectations.