Editor’s note: This article was first published in September 2010; the start-up cost of under €500, the online sales channels described and the promise to expand on the topic soon reflect that time, and Google closed its Affiliate Network in 2013.
There are thousands of aspiring writers looking for a publisher to publish their books. Most writers don’t realise how easy it is for someone to set up their own publishing house. In fact, some great writers found that no publisher wanted to publish their books and had no choice but to open their own publishing business. With this idea, they could publish their books. However, the book publishing business today is very broad and comes in different variations.
Money isn’t a problem for this business, since you can start it for less than €500, and once you have your first writers or aspiring writers, everything becomes much easier. Once you have the raw material (books to publish), all you need is to negotiate a price with a printer, who will take care of printing the book.
The printing cost varies depending on the books you’re going to print, and in many cases a large part of those costs is borne by the writer, although, ethically speaking, that isn’t how it should be.
Next you’ll need sales contacts (we’re still talking about the print format): bookshops, shopping centres, and partnerships with bigger publishers, which can get you into wider markets, although as a rule they’ll try to squeeze you as hard as they can, so that isn’t advisable either.
Let’s say you’ll have to be the writer’s guide, their representative, their agent, their marketer and their distribution network. Put like that, it sounds like a lot of tasks, but it’s simpler than it seems.
Nowadays you can’t forget the digital format (the ebook), where there’s a broad market to cover. First of all, Amazon, a site that sells books in both formats and one of the most important online bookshops in the world.
Second, you have affiliate systems: Google Affiliate Network gives you the chance to include your publications.
And finally, there’s the incredible market offered by blogs and websites related to the subject of your books, which in many cases would be delighted to offer your book in exchange for a small commission.
Today, an unknown writer can sell 100,000 books in less than a year, thanks to good online advertising and good marketing.
For any writer and any publisher, it has never been easier to publish, get known and, above all, sell. We’ll soon say more about this profitable business idea.
Further reading
- Business ideas related to art
- Business ideas on the internet
- Buying and selling companies: an alternative to real estate
- You can be a successful entrepreneur
Featured image: Politics and Prose Bookstore, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Flickr.
