The Problem with NYT best sellers

I often wondered if the small profits from traditionally published authors' books were used to help promote the bestsellers (since they are not used to promote the books that sell mere thousands of copies, compared to tens or hundreds of thousands). Seems that I am right:

"I can start selling an ebook immediately, just hours after I finish
writing and editing, and a print book only 4-6 weeks after I finish
writing and editing, rather than waiting years for it to hit the market.
That's one to three years of sales I'd have not made had I waited for
someone else to get my book to market - someone who is more interested
in using my book's profits to promote their best selling authors."

http://www.writersweekly.com/the_latest_from_angelahoycom/004062_05232007.html

Great article!

I guess it depends on how you're going to market the books. When Pat Conroy comes to market with a new book, he outsells in a few weeks what the e-book people have been selling for all that lag time. Why? We don't have the buzz or name recognition and nobody's ever heard of us.

Malcolm

The article raises important issues but I don’t think they are dealt with well.

I agree that: “It is much easier to find a market for, and to serve, a non-fiction niche”. I am not against self publishing but I don’t agree with much else in the article.

My traditionally published books appear 7 months after the acceptance of the manuscript not years as suggested.

How about: “I can sell more copies on my own, through online marketing of an ebook and self-published print book, and keep far more of the profits, than I can get from a small traditional contract”.

I am the consultant editor of a series. We accepted a book that someone had self-published and he had achieved sales of 3,000 in the life of the book. The publisher sells more copies than that each year. In the life of the book the author will earn more and not have to market or distribute it. A small traditional contract = 2,000 sales a year from my experience.

Then there is the $100,000 they would need to be offered before the self publisher would go to a traditional publisher again. If by self publishing they pocket $5 per copy then they need to sell 20,000 copies to match the $100K. I doubt if an individual could sell as ebooks and print books 20,000 copies of any self-published non fiction book. I don’t believe they could market and distribute 20,000 copies of their self published book or half that number in the timescale the traditional publisher would be working to.

For the time being the book trade still accounts for 70% of my book sales – ie people going into a bookshop and buying them. The publisher has a team of reps visiting shops in order to realise these sales. The article refers to an ebook..years ago. Again from my experience ebook sales have increased noticeably in the last two years however before then there were hardly any. Even today some of my titles ebook sales amount to a few hundred sales a year. Yes they will become a significant market but not yet and certainly were not ‘years ago’.

You should take this article with a huge grain salt. The writer of the article is Angela Hoy, who co-owns Writer's Weekly and Booklocker, a POD self publisher.

All the testimonials to her philosophy are (drum roll) written by Booklocker authors.

I'm not saying her information is right or wrong but she definitely has an agenda coming into it.

I concur with C turkel, My idol. The only problem I have enciountered as a NYT best selling author is the outright , open and downright prejudice and hatred displayed towards me from the POD group.

Lately I was in a bookstore, minding my own business when a PA author accosted me by name and said I was keeping his book off the shelves.

When I profusely apologized and said I had never heard of him or his book, he snarled at me "BECAUSE ALL YOU THINK ABOUT IS YOUR OWN STUPID BOOK!"

I was crushed.

I feel for you. I would have been crushed, too.

Who do these PA authors think they are? A bit uppity aren't they?

I can't imagine facing down such venom. How horrible.
There is room in this world for everyone. Can't see why folks don't see this.
You have nothing to apologize for...far as I can see.