Hellooo everybody!
You guys have been asking me for a deep dive into self-publishing, and I hear ya. Self-publishing
can be complicated, and it's hard to find straightforward, consistent information. But
there's a lot to cover, way too much to fit into one video. So today we're covering the basics. How
to choose which platform you want to utilize for your book. Typically, self-published authors go
the print on demand route, which basically means that you use a publishing platform that will print
your physical books, as they're ordered. As opposed to printing a stockpile of books and
keeping them in your garage, hoping they'll sell eventually. Print on demand platforms handle the
printing and shipping for you. And in terms of ebooks, they ship those off to your readers.
You don't have to lift a finger. There's a ton of publishing platforms out there, which can make the
decision super overwhelming. But a good starting point is differentiating between a direct retailer
and a distributor. That's what we're talking about today. I’m breaking down the difference between
publishing direct versus publishing through a distributor, their pros and cons, which one might
work best for you, and why you might end up using both of those options concurrently. I'm also going
to compare various platforms side by side, so you can learn which ones are the easiest to work with,
which ones produce the best quality books, and a whole bunch of other stuff. Let's dive in.
(The sound of a pen scratching. LOGO.)
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Now I'm going to give you a straightforward breakdown about self-publishing. Specifically
the difference between self-publishing through a distributor, and self-publishing direct. A quick
disclaimer: this information will eventually become outdated. The publishing industry is
constantly changing, which means one day some of the information I'm presenting here will be
irrelevant. Basically, if you're watching this video two or three years from now,
be sure to do additional research, because I guarantee some of these details will have changed.
First things first, what's the difference between a retailer and a distributor? A
retailer is a store that sells your book, whether it's a physical store or an online
store. Examples of retailers are: Amazon, Book Depository, Barnes & Noble and Apple Books.
A distributor is a third-party platform that distributes your books to retailers. If you
publish your book through a distributor, they then in turn send off your book to different retailers
of your choosing. Examples of distributors are IngramSpark, Draft2Digital, and Smashwords.
What's the difference between publishing direct and publishing through a distributor?
Publishing direct means we're publishing that book directly through whichever
retailer is going to sell it. That means you are publishing your book directly to
Amazon. You are publishing it directly to Barnes & Noble. You are publishing it directly to Apple
books. When you are publishing through a distributor. They are a third party,
not a storefront. You are publishing your book through them, and they are shipping it
off to multiple retailers. Sometimes you get to choose which retailers they send your book to,
other times they'll just send them to as many retailers as possible.
What are the pros and cons of publishing directly to a retailer? The pro is financial. Retailers
are going to take a cut of your royalties, but outside of that the rest of the money is yours.
And for some people that's all that matters. The first con is difficulty. If you publish direct,
that means opening up multiple accounts on multiple platforms, which means you have to
publish your book over and over again, which takes a lot of time and effort. After that
you're going to receive a host of reports and royalties from all these different accounts on
their own different schedules, which can be pretty confusing. Additionally, some retailer platforms
are easier to use than others. For example, Amazon KDP is the easiest platform to use by far,
whereas Apple Books is a total pain in the ass. The last con is range. Most retailer platforms
will only allow you to publish your ebook through them. If you want to publish physical books,
Amazon has this feature, but most other retailers don't have it available yet.
What are the pros and cons of publishing through a distributor? The most obvious benefit of using
a distributor is ease. You publish your book to one place, and just like that it's shipped
off to a bazillion different retailers. You don't have to juggle ten or more accounts,
you don't have to deal with a million different sales reports, all of your information is easily
trackable in one place. It's also important to note that to my knowledge, there are some
retailers where you can't publish direct to. So if you want your book available in their storefront,
you need to use a distributor. Additionally, if you want to publish paperback and hardback books
at multiple retailers, you're probably gonna have to use a distributor. To my knowledge,
the only direct retailer that allows you to publish physical books through their
platform is Amazon. And right now that option is only available for paperback. Though I believe
they have hardbacks kinda in beta testing. The most obvious con is financial. As we've already
covered, retailers are gonna take a cut of your royalties, but so are distributors. Distributors
aren't a charity. They are distributing your book in return for compensation. For example,
Draft2Digital takes 10% of the list price for every copy of your book sold.
Cut the crap, which method should I use? This completely depends on your goals as an author.
First, let's get one thing straight. Almost every single indie author I know publishes their Kindle
ebook directly through Amazon. Amazon's publishing platform is called Amazon KDP. And as I already
said, it is by far the easiest publishing platform to use. They have the most transparent reporting,
the easiest tools, and they have a really good royalty percentage. On top of that, Amazon is the
most popular book retailer by far. Well over half of my ebook royalties come from Amazon,
which means you're probably not gonna wanna split those royalties with a distributor. Basically, if
Amazon is gonna be one of your retailers, you'll likely want to publish through them directly.
Second point: do you wanna sell physical books, like paperbacks or hardbacks? If
the answer is yes, that means you're probably gonna need to use a distributor. And the most
popular distributor for physical books, to my knowledge, is IngramSpark. IngramSpark has a
direct link to the Ingram network, which means they can distribute your physical
books to tons of locations, including brick and mortar establishments. If
you plan to sell as many physical books as possible, a distributor is the way to go.
Now we look at the remaining ebooks. This includes Apple books,
Kobo, Nook and so on. When it comes to these ebooks, I tell writers to look at it this way,
what is worth more to you, your money or your time? The writers I know who value money more
than their time publish their ebooks directly to every retailer they can, then if there are any
retailers you can't publish directly through they use a platform like Draft2Digital. The
writers I know who value their time more than the extra 10% royalties, will publish
all of their non-Amazon Kindle ebooks through a distributor like Draft2Digital and call it a day.
What is my personal publishing method? As of the release of this video,
I published my Kindle ebooks and my Amazon paperback directly through Amazon KDP. I
publish my paperback and hardback books through IngramSpark. And I published my
non Amazon Kindle ebooks directly through Draft2Digital, which is a distributor. Yes,
that means I am taking a 10% cut in royalties, but given that I make most of my ebook
royalties on Amazon and my time is already stretched really thin, I'm okay with that.
Which brings us to the next question, which platform is the best? Years ago I broke down my
experience using multiple platforms based on their customer service, the quality of their books,
the royalty percentages and so on. And I'm doing it again. I am going to compare the
three platforms I use: Amazon KDP, IngramSpark and Draft2Digital. Please note, I am not encouraging
you to choose one over the other because as you know, I use all three of them. Consider this
breakdown and insight into what you can expect if you decide to use any of these platforms.
Number one (1): What type of book does the platform publish?
Starting with Amazon KDP, you can publish Kindle ebooks and paperbacks.
They're currently running beta testing for hardbacks as of the release of this video,
so I'm guessing that's gonna come eventually. But it's not here yet. Draft2Digital offers
ebooks and paperbacks. I've personally never used their paperback service,
so I can't comment on that. IngramSpark offers ebooks, paperbacks and hardbacks. So if you'd
like to self-publish a hardback copy of your book, right now IngramSpark is the obvious way to go.
Number Two (2): Can the platform make your book available for pre-order?
With the Draft2Digital and IngramSpark it is totally popular to make your book available
for pre-order. Amazon KDP allows you to make your ebook available for pre-order;
however, this feature is not available for paperbacks. Hopefully they update this soon,
because they are way behind on the times.
Number Three (3): Is the platform user friendly? The most user friendly platform by far is Amazon
KDP. Everything is quick, straightforward and easy to understand. Reports update quickly with
timely data, all of their graphs are really easy to understand, honestly they knock this category
out of the park. Draft2Digital is also user friendly as far as publishing goes. They make
it super easy to publish your book, but other features on their website could definitely use
updating. IngramSpark on the other hand is well known for its shitty user interface. It definitely
takes time to get used to, so if you are a first-time user, carve out a big chunk of time
to tinker with the website, to read the FAQs, to ask people for help, because you're gonna need it.
Number Four (4): How reliable are their reports? Your publishing platform should generate reports
letting you know how your book is performing. Amazon once again has the best reports by far.
They’re available through your KDP account. They offer spreadsheets, they offer graphs,
you can manipulate them based off the time. Honestly their reports are the easiest to use,
plus they update superfast. Ingram Spark is really, really slow with their reports. Which
makes sense because they're a distributor, so they have to gather information from the retailers and
bring it over, so it's gonna take a while. What I can say is they will email your report directly
to you on a monthly basis, which makes it super convenient because at least you don't have to
go searching for them. Draft2Digital has the worst reports by default. Like Ingram Spark,
they are super slow and they don't email the report to you, So what the fuck?
Number Five (5): What's their customer service like?
Amazon has the best customer service. They respond super quickly, they're very thorough,
and I've yet to experience a problem they couldn’t fix. Draft2Digital's customer service is, meh.
They'll get the job done, but it will take time and they'll move at their own pace. IngramSpark on
the other hand wins the award for shitty customer service. They take a long time to respond, and
they are very eager to pass the blame on to any other platform or retailer even when it is 100%
their fault. I've had multiple situations where I literally had to get a representative from Amazon
or some other retailer to vouch for the fact that it was not in fact their issue, but an issue that
IngramSpark created. That was the only way I could get them to help me, or admit that they made a
mistake. If you're contacting their support team you're gonna need to channel all of your patience.
Number Six (6): Describe the quality of their physical books.
Again, I've never published paperbacks through Draft2Digital, so I can't help you there. When I
first started publishing through Amazon, honestly their paperbacks looked kinda cheap. However,
years have gone by and their paperback quality has improved significantly. I think Amazon has
more issues with consistency, but the quality of the materials used is a lot better. But
IngramSpark by far has the best printing quality. Honestly their books can look interchangeable
with traditionally published books. They're beautiful and professional, and I love ‘em.
Number Seven (7): How are their ebook royalties? We are not talking about physical book royalties,
because that is going to depend largely on a million different factors outside of the
distributor or publishing platform you choose. We can talk about that in another video. If you
publish your ebook through Amazon. You can receive around 70% royalties, so long as your book is
priced at $2.99 or higher. If your book is cheaper than that, then you will receive around 35%
royalties. If you publish through Draft2Digital, they will take 10% of your list price. So
basically whatever retailer they distribute to, they're gonna take a cut of your royalties,
Draft2Digital is also gonna take about 10%, and whatever is leftover, that's what you get to keep.
If you publish your ebook through IngramSpark—(Record scratch sound.)
And we're pausing because I made a recording boo-boo. Anywho, if you publish your ebook through
IngramSpark, according to my research, they will give you 40% of your ebook royalties. That means
60% is going to the retailer and to IngramSpark. This is largely why so many writers prefer to
publish their physical books to IngramSpark, and their ebooks elsewhere. Since you'll probably get
higher ebook royalties that way. It's also important to note that it costs between $25
to $49 to publish a book to IngramSpark. Many writers don't mind this for physical books,
because the quality is so great, but it's still an additional expense to consider.
And last but not least, does this platform offer wide distribution?
Wide distribution means your book is distributed to multiple retailers, as
opposed to just one. As we already covered, Draft2Digital and IngramSpark are distributors,
so it's literally their job to have wide distribution. However,
Amazon is a retailer. It doesn't benefit from sending your book to multiple stores. They don't
want other retailers to make money off of your book. They wanna make money off of your book.
Because of this Amazon KDP does not offer wide distribution for your ebook. However, they do
offer expanded distribution for your paperback, if you opt into their program. With all that said,
this is the final breakdown of Amazon KDP, versus Draft2Digital, versus IngramSpark.
Again, I use all three platforms for different reasons. I use Amazon KDP to capitalize on their
royalties. I use IngramSpark for their physical books, because they have great quality and they
distribute all over the place. And I use Darft2Digital for any of my non Kindle
ebooks because they have wide distribution, and they only take 10%. Your publishing needs may
be different from mine, and that's fine. But this should give you an idea of what
to expect if you decide to use any of these platforms. So that's all I got for you today.
Don't forget to subscribe to my channel. I post new videos on Wednesdays,
and if you wanna be alerted AS soon as I upload, ring that bell. If you want
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