Many people who churn out countless articles, blog posts, and ebooks falter at the idea of creating a “real” print book. As a veteran ebook publisher, publishing consultant, and author and publisher of my own ten print books, I’ve found people resist going to print for several reasons.
- A “real” book seems intimidating. When you write a book, you put your creative efforts “out there” for anyone to see and criticize. That can be scary. An ebook seems “safer” to a lot of people, so they never make the leap to print. Making that leap; however, gives you a tremendous amount of credibility. When you say you are a book author, it sets you apart. The press doesn’t quote ebook authors; they quote book authors.
- The technology is scary. With an ebook, you can get away with simply saving a file as a PDF and selling it. Although some ebooks are professionally done, tens of millions are hideous. The quality bar is extremely low on ebooks, so you can get away with ugly layouts, questionable writing, and zero editing. After all, an ebook won’t be sitting on someone’s shelf next to beautifully laid out coffee table books. When you move to print, you encounter the rarified world known as the book publishing industry. You have to play by their rules, which means doing things like purchasing ISBNs. Getting a print book into the world is more complicated than an ebook, but it’s hardly rocket science. Many freelance editors, book designers and consultants are available to help with the mechanics of producing a good book.
- The costs appear to be astronomical. In the past, self-publishing a book meant making a huge investment in printing and storage. Now, thanks to print-on-demand printing, you can get set up as a publisher and produce books more affordably than ever before. You don’t have to risk spending thousands of dollars printing 5,000 books and storing them in the garage and hoping they’ll sell. Now you can print 1 at a time, figure out your marketing, make changes, and sell more.
All three reasons come down to the same thing: fear. Whether its fear of rejection, fear of unknown technology or fear of going broke, these issues are easy to overcome with information and education. If you want to affordably and profitably publish a print book, get the help you need to turn your publishing dreams into reality.