Publishing Pitfalls to Avoid

Last night I had the privilege of being the guest speaker for the Book Authors of Southeastern Pennsylvania group. These authors, both unpublished and published, were wonderful to chat with and I so enjoyed sharing the publishing knowledge I’ve accumulated over the last ten years. While I put together a full presentation, I thought I would highlight an area here that the authors found very helpful.

Publishing Pitfalls to Avoid:

Editing

Don’t skimp on a good editor. Whether you’re self publishing or planning to go the traditional publishing route, you have to invest in a strong developmental editor. This editor will help find any plot holes, show areas that need extra clarity, and provide suggestions for the overall structure. Putting your best foot forward is incredibly helpful to catch a publisher/literary agent’s eye and keep readers turning those pages.

Cover Design

With traditional publishing, you don’t really have a say in what the cover design looks like. However, if you are hybrid or self publishing, you do get to have more control over what the end design is. Therefore, you want to make sure the cover fits the target audience. The design should be similar to what other books in your genre look like. While it is nice to put your own spin on things and stand out from the crowd, you still want to make sure this book looks like the other books to appeal to the same readers. For instance, if you’re publishing a children’s book about picky eating, you wouldn’t want to have the cover design just be a photograph of different foods. Instead, opt for a professionally illustrated cover showcasing a scene that fits the interior of your book. This would appeal more toward kids as well as parents who purchase the book. It is always important to do market research and see what other books in your realm are doing.

Goals

Don’t assume every publisher is the same. Really dig deep to see what your goals are for publishing the book before you start the publishing process. Since every publisher operates differently, it’s very important to work with a company that aligns with what you’d like to accomplish. An example of this would be if you decided to work with a self publishing company like Print Ninja, but your goal is to be on the New York Times Bestseller List. To achieve that status, you would need to sell at least 5,000 copies of your book within the first week of publication and it has to be to a variety of outlets. Since you pay to print the books with Print Ninja, that means you personally would have to pay for at least 5,000 copies and sometimes that’s not feasible. You would be better off trying for traditional publishing if your goal is to be on the bestseller list.

Research

Don’t skip researching your genre, topic, or similar books in the industry. You do yourself a disservice if you do not take the time to look at what other authors are currently doing to make sure you’re targeting the right audience and marketing to the right readers. While this can be overwhelming, it is incredibly important to gather a list of similar books to yours so you can have strong comparable titles when pitching to publishers or writing your book’s blurb.

It is imperative for your book’s success to follow theses suggestions and make sure that you put a book out into the world that is the best it can absolutely be!