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Penny C. Sansevieri

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7 Signs That You're Not Ready to Publish

Posted: 09/05/2012 5:05 pm


  5. You haven't started marketing your book: So you're at the threshold of publishing and haven't done a single thing to market your book? That's bad news. Why? Because there were 300,000 books published in 2012, and if you want to break through that noise you'd better start early.
  6. You're impatient: Book publishing and impatience are not a good mixture. A publishing study done by IBPA cited that it could take up to two years to show any returns on a book you've been working on. Now, two years might seem like a super long time, and yes, it is. But candidly, everything in book publishing and marketing takes a while. I hate to be the one to break it to you, but there's no place for impatience in this industry. This was a hard one for me, too. If you look up the word impatience you'll see my picture there. Take a deep breath and a step back. As long as you're doing everything you can, and you're doing the right stuff, you'll eventually see a return.
  7. You have no marketing plan: It doesn't need to be formal, but you should have an idea of what you're going to do to market your book. Some kind of guideline, something that gives a structure to your plans, your goals, and your marketing efforts.

Finally, let's talk about editing. This extremely important step is often overlooked by authors. Why? Because it's easy to find someone to edit a book, right? Wrong. Editing is a pretty specialized skill set; someone who can find "typos" isn't a good editor. You want someone to help you raise the bar on your work and create a final product that is something you can really be proud of. An editor will give you critical feedback (especially if you've hired a content editor, which I highly recommend), and often improve your work beyond what you might have been able to do on your own.

It's good to remember that publishing isn't just about finding the right place to print and publish your book. It's about a lot more than that. Publishing is a business, if you treat it as a business model you will always succeed.

So, ready to achieve success in publishing? Coming soon: 10 Ways to Succeed in Publishing!


Follow Penny C. Sansevieri on Twitter: www.twitter.com/bookgal