Entry #6, Bill Ruesch recession-recovery diary

Dear Reader,

In my last post I mentioned redirecting my efforts toward book printing. Some may think that is a fool-hardy strategy, after all, e-books are all the rage. Paper books are passe. E-book readers are being sold everywhere. Amazon has the Kindle. Barnes & Noble markets the Nook. Sony sells the Librie and there are at least 8 other brands available including the iPad and iPhone. In fact, the e-book reader competition is so hot that it makes the war between BetaMax and VHS seem tame. It’s anybody’s guess as to which reader will dominate. I’m sure they are taking odds in Vegas if you are a betting person and want to get in on the action.

One e-reader can hold hundreds of books

There is even speculation in the industry that the Kindle by Amazon may soon be offered free, so if you haven’t been able to afford one yet you may get it as a bonus for buying a certain quantity of e-books.

So why would I choose books for a focus when the world seems head over heels for e-books?

There are two reasons:

1. Over 700 Thousand self-published books were printed last year.
2. I feel that we aren’t done with books yet. A tangible book has an intangible value over an electronic book. It’s tactile. You can hold it in your hand and savor the feel of the binding, the smell of the paper and the beauty of the design. Try as you might, there just isn’t any way for you to lovingly rest a signed first edition of an e-book in your library.

From my observations, self-publishers as Rodney Dangerfield used to say “Get no respect.” Being brutally honest about it, they don’t get respect because they stop short of doing the job right. Publishing a worthy book requires massive amounts of effort. It’s an exercise in attempting perfection. Readers who report that a book is full of typo’s, grammar errors, and poor syntax will persuade other readers to give your book a pass. No wonder most self-published books only sell around 50-100 copies. It costs a little to hire proofreaders, editors, graphic designers, and layout artists, but if you go cheap on your product you will get what you paid for–a cheap product that doesn’t appeal to the masses.

My specialty is printing, which I assure you is much more complicated than sending your masterpiece to Kinkos, or most of the on-demand printers. Yes, you can get a decent book printed if you know what you are doing, but so few do. I also know artists, editors, and marketers that can help self-publishers win. So, if you are a budding self-publisher and want the help of proven professionals don’t be afraid to call. It doesn’t cost anything to talk. My number is (801) 474-1270 or you can email me at billprintbroker@comcast.net.

In reading a response to a discussion I started on a writer’s group on LinkedIn, I was struck with the thought that it isn’t just self-publishers who need to pay attention to the quality of their products. Some very big names are guilty of foisting-off crap.

The kind of food you'll find at Cracker Barrel.

Recently I visited a Cracker Barrel Restaurant with my wife. For those who may not be familiar with Cracker Barrel, it serves southern style comfort food at reasonable prices. We like to go there when we just want foody-food. Nothing fancy.  No cooking with exotic spices like saffron or curry. On the menu will be dishes like meatloaf, country fried steak, and catfish. You can choose your sides from a menu that includes fried okra, turnip greens, and corn. For desert there are various cobblers, pie, and ice-cream. Yum.

Before you get to the restaurant part of the place you have to wend your way through kitschy collections of merchandise that change with the season. My wife loves to peruse their tables of nick-knacks, music boxes, and stuffed animals. Now, as I am writing this it is three days from Christmas, so they were all decked out in a torrent of red and green. Santas and gift items were stacked nearly ceiling high. My eye caught an illustrated book of The Night Before Christmas. The illustrations were beautiful. I wish I could say the same for the book. The workmanship, especially on the cover was a disaster. Both covers, front and back, bowed outward from the spine. It was not only ugly, but made it impossible for the book to lay flat on a table. Here was a book that I wanted to buy, wanted to take home and treasure, wanted to read it to future grandchildren, but I couldn’t get past the cover. This was not an heirloom piece; it was a piece of carnival crap. I looked at the spine and was surprised to see that Simon & Schuster allowed this mess to go out under their banner.

I believe that books are a treasure. They last decades and centuries even. It saddens me to think that the noble business of publishing, especially the giant houses like Simon & Schuster, may be more focused on profit than quality.

I have heard authors complain that their traditionally published books were an embarrassment to them. That the cover designs didn’t truly represent the book, and that cheap cost cutting methods were implemented. Authors who have sold their rights to the publisher have no claim on how the book is manufactured. As for The Night Before Christmas I’m guessing it was sent to a sweat shop overseas to be printed and bound for the lowest price possible, a price guaranteeing maximum profit but sacrificing the honor of the book. I didn’t buy it. I’m hoping no one does. If enough customers reject poor quality the publisher will have to ask why. Why didn’t this book sell?

I plead with self-publishing authors to realize that they have total control of their children. Dress them up in their Sunday best and send them out to play. The day may come when the marketplace will select a self-published book over a traditional one because of the value added that comes from your care.

I’m here to say that writing a book is good for the soul as long as your expectations are realistic. The chances of being a best selling author are probably worse than winning the lottery, but notice that the lottery’s notoriously slim odds doesn’t keep people from entering. If you write only for the pleasure of writing and keep your expectations in line, you will find much to commend it.

1.

A book gives you prestige and raises confidence. In my profession I am known as a print broker. Those in the graphic arts industry know what that is, but no one else seems to. The best I can expect after trying to explain what I do is an unenthusiastic, “Oh.” On the other hand if I say I am an author and starting an association of self-publishing authors, I get, “Wow, that’s great.” That is a big difference.

2.

A book allows you to say all the things that you’ve wanted to say. Whatever your experience or field of expertise is, don’t you just hate it when people get it wrong? The Stephen Spielberg movie called Catch Me if You Can, made me indignant. Toward the end of the movie Spielberg’s lead character was printing checks on a press located in France. It was all wrong. Checks are not printed the way they were portrayed and it made me question this movie, and frankly every other Spielberg movie made. Has he never visited a print shop?

3.

Writing a book is a pleasant pastime. I’m a morning person. I wake up a good two hours before anyone else in the house. Writing gives me an opportunity to jump start my brain. It is good exercise. Currently I write for two blogs (Talking Through My Hat and Chicken Scratchings), submit articles to Ezine, and am working on two books, one fiction, and one non-fiction. I also belong to the Utah State Poetry Society and have written two books of poetry. Many of our poets are older people. I’ve noticed some things they all have in common, their minds are sharp, and they love life. When I’m in my 70′s, 80′s, or 90′s if I can be like them I will consider it a great accomplishment.

4.

Writing fiction lets your imagination soar. Most of us in our daily lives have to deal exclusively with the mundane and routine details. It can get very boring. If you write fiction you can go anywhere, do anything, and experience things that are considered impossible. My wife writes a blog The Misty World of Arial Hollyberry. She has created a connection between a fairy world and our backyard. She writes in a serial style with each entry a continuation of the story. Arial Hollyberry has enriched our lives.

5.

Writing is meditation. I don’t know about you, but my life seems to be like a runaway freight train. I find I have to react to situations far more than I would like. When I write, however, my mind is focused on my thought. It’s a kind of meditation. My wife complains sometimes that I don’t hear a question she asked. She’s right. When I’m in the writing space the rest of the world is cut off. Ah.

—————–

What do you do once you have a book? You may want to find an audience. After all, what good is a book that no one but you reads? Learn how to use the Internet for book marketing the easy way through the Author’s Platform.

Maybe the Health Care issue affects me more because I’m self-employed and have been for the last twenty years. We do tend to get more worked-up over things that impact us directly, don’t we? I don’t really know who reads this blog, but I suspect that many of us are in the same boat. Writers, salespeople, and small business owners have all felt the crunch of rising health care costs.

Health Care Without the Care.

Let me tell you a story. Years ago, I worked as a life and health insurance salesman. I was sent to a week-long seminar in Denver, Colorado. At the training was a speaker. I don’t remember his name, but I can say he was an engaging executive type fellow and the story he related stuck with me to this day.

It seems that when he was much younger he was just an average guy working at an average full-time job. One day a favorite cousin came by to visit him. The cousin had taken a position selling a new product called health insurance. The speaker said that he laughed out loud and told his relative that it was the most ridiculous idea he had ever heard. After all, hospitals at that time were primarily community facilities and often run by religions or other charitable organizations. A hospital bed ran around 10 dollars a day. No patient was ever turned away, and doctors would accept terms, trade, or dismiss debt entirely if the patient couldn’t pay.

As much as the speaker tried to persuade his cousin, he held firm. So, he decided to prove his relative wrong by conducting an impromptu survey. He got a clipboard, a pen, and some paper and started ringing doorbells. When the door was answered he would lead with the worst opening ever conceived, “You wouldn’t be interested in buying health insurance, would you?”

“No” was the answer he received door-after-door-after-door.

Just when almost satisfied that he had collected enough no’s to make his cousin see the light, he got a “Yes.” The people invited him in and asked him to tell them more. Of course, he wasn’t knowledgeable about the product, so he phoned his cousin and invited him over. Together they wrapped up a nice sale. Then the new policy holder said to his wife, “We have friends and neighbors who should hear about this.”

So they invited other people over. Before long, they earned more in commissions than the speaker earned in a month of full-time work. He was so excited, he quit his job the next day and became an agent.

Health Insurance Took the Care Out of Health Care

It was a compelling story and got the crowd of insurance agents wound up and ready go out and sell, sell, sell, but the enthusiasm of the speech is not what I want to convey. Let’s take a look back at some of the facts: $10.00 per day hospital beds, charity run hospitals, no one turned away, and doctors more interested in treating patients than in paying their country club dues.

Follow the Money–Who Really Benefits from Health Insurance?

Think about it, since the inception of health insurance who has benefited? The patients? No. Health insurance has made it possible for a one day hospital stay to rack up thousands of dollars. It created the 1 dollar aspirin and the $2,000.00 per dose medicine. It has made Doctors wealthy. It has made health insurance executives millionaires. But it hasn’t done anything for policy holders except drain our wallets and gets us to believe the big lie that we have the finest health care in the world. Ha–that’s a laugh.

Who runs health care now? CORPORATIONS. It is no longer about the patient it is about the profit. Hey, that would be a good slogan for them, “Profit Over Patients.” How do they make those profits? They make them by denying claims. They aren’t really in the health care business they are in the claim denial business. One has to wonder, if they are so good at the art of minimizing their risk, and they are, why does your insurance go up 20% or more every year? Can you say Corporate greed? The Lund Report said that the CEO of the Oregon Blue Cross/Blue Shield in 2008 was the highest paid insurance executive in the state taking home nearly a million dollars. “So what did Regence do that resulted in its leaders being rewarded so well? If you take a look at the company’s performance last year, it’s hard to find the merit. Not only did the state’s largest insurer lose 32 percent (334,228) of its members, bringing its enrollment down to its lowest level in five years (776,647), Regence’s profit margin barely reached 1 percent. However, the company collected more in premiums than during the previous year.” Where did the increases come from? Duh, from raising premiums on the policyholders.

They’ve Got Us Over a Barrel.

Doesn’t this sound suspiciously like the greedy Wall Street titans? They take theirs, and then some, while everyone else suffers. If health insurance executives want more money they raise premiums, after all, what can you do? If you have been sick while under their plan, you now have a preexisting condition. No other insurance company will cover you. And if you drop your current coverage because it is too expensive, they will never take you back. Talk about having us over a barrel. We are screwed. As long as health care in America continues business as usual, we will be paying twice as much per person as any another other country in the world. But do we have the best health care in the world? NO! According to W.H.O., we rank No. 37. We are 37th and we pay more than anyone. Double in many cases.

How Stupid Are We, Paying Double for Half the Benefits?

Let’s stand behind the president and give the public option a chance. Private industry has had its chance and unless you’ve got your head buried in the sand, you’ll agree that it has been a failure on a massive scale.

Attention Authors

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Electronic Communication or Paper What’s Greener?

I promised to continue with the subject of International Paper’s brochure that asks the question, “Are pixels greener than paper?” As I said in my last blog, before reading their information I would have answered, “Of course, pixels are greener than paper.” After all, no trees have to be sacrificed to create electronic blips. Now I see that there is an argument to be made. You may disagree with International Paper, it’s no skin off my nose. I’m only serving as a purveyor of information.  When it comes to hot potato issues like the environment, I tend to run to the middle ground myself. The hostility that surrounds such issues tends to be fierce and in the end neither of the more radical views will prevail anyway. That being said, I think it wise to listen to all points of view so I can find  the middle ground for myself.

The previous post discussed energy use.  From I.P.’s  brochure Down To Earth I quote, “Every decision to communicate has some impact on the environment. For example, whether we email or send a letter, we consume energy and resources. There are environmental trade offs in every choice we make, and there is no simple ‘right answer.’ Effective stewardship requires a careful examination of the larger picture that compares the entire life cycle, from raw materials to energy use and end of life, to fully understand the impact and performance of both electronic media and paper. The facts may surprise you.”

Negative Carbon Footprint

More Planted than Harvested

In this post we will focus on sustainability. “One of the great things about paper is that its primary raw materials are renewable. The paper and forest products industry replenishes more than it takes and ensures the sustainability of our forests by planting 1.7 million trees every single day, more than three times what is harvested. And the U.S. Dept. of Energy has stated that the carbon sequestered on forested lands in 2006 was greater than the carbon released from harvesting wood over the same period.”

Side-by-Side Comparison

Is it recycled? Paper is biodegradable, recyclable, and reusable. Nearly 60% (57.4%) of paper used in the U.S. is recycled and more than 63 percent of fiber used to make paper products comes from recycled paper. Paper waste won’t kill you unless a skid falls on your head, but that isn’t true of electronics, according to earth 911, “Electronic waste accounts for 70 percent of the overall toxic waste currently found in landfills. In addition to valuable metals like aluminum, electronics often contain hazardous materials like mercury…in 2005 alone, almost two million tons of e-waste were landfilled. While toxic materials comprise only a small amount of this volume, it doesn’t take much lead or mercury to contaminate an area’s soil or water supply.”  There is even a report that says the dust collecting on our computers can be harmful to our health (see CNET). Sources say 150 million PC’s are expected be discarded annually, with only approximately 3.6 percent recycled.

Is it sustainable? The great thing about paper is that its primary raw materials are renewable. In fact, as stated earlier, three trees are planted for every one harvested. We may be in more danger of being crowded out than we are of risking barren landscapes. To create a computer for example “typically requires the mining and refining of dozens of minerals and metals, including gold, silver, and palladium as well as the extensive use of plastics and hydrocarbon solvents. (DTE brochure)” Plus computers are short lived. A five year old computer is about as productive as a paperweight, which is partially the reason that “electronics have become the fastest growing waste stream in the world. (DTE brochure).

I could go on, but there are massive amounts of information available to anyone who wants to research these matters further. International Paper in their brochure would refer you to the following resources: ipsustainability.com; iplifeoftheforest.com; abundantforests.com; epa.gov; fsc.org; iea.org; pefc.org and sfiprogram.org.

The Author Platform

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14,400 hits, 94 countries, 7 months

I find it fascinating that this modern Internet age has brought both its opportunities and challenges. For example, I began writing this blog in January of this year. So far, I’ve had 14,400 hits in over 94 countries. I’m not telling you this to brag, but to express amazement that this Salt Lake City, Utah lifetime printing broker who has only been two foreign countries in his life, Mexico and Canada, has through the Internet been able to reach out to the entire world.

Seeing the Forest for the Trees

Now, my progress is not spectacular. I’m not an Internet shooting star. What I am is a person sitting at my desk on the lower east slope of the Wasatch Front in my eighty-year-old home overlooking the Salt Lake Valley. I’m a publicly-educated, middle-class guy, raised in a middle-class family, without any particular social advantages. My only real leg up is that I have a better-than-average capability to see the forest for the trees and a strong work ethic. With these abilities, I’ve managed to make a lower-upper-middle-class income over the past twenty years by selling my knowledge of printing and offering my services to help customers get their printed projects delivered on-time, at competitive prices, at improved quality levels.

What I’m trying to say is that I really haven’t achieved any more than millions of other Americans in similar circumstances.

Writing the Great American Novel

So what is it that this unspectacular, pretty average guy brings to the table that  people throughout the world might want to know? Obviously, my understanding of printing and how to get things done efficiently has proven to have value. It has been that knowledge that paid my bills for 20 years. What else? I wrote a novel and that experience brought me to the edge of my knowledge chasm.

Reaching my knowledge chasm

I looked down and realized that I had no idea of how to cross to the other side. In the real world a printed book makes a poor bridge across a wide gulf. In the mind, however, a book can be anything. It can give you wings.

Could I produce a book? You bet. I could do that in my sleep. Did I know what to do with it once it was created? No way.

Those Who Sort the Avalanche

That’s when I discovered some interesting facts. I believed that writing a book was unique. Wrong, some 80% of adults would like to write a book. Of that 80%, many, like me, actually do it. I also believed that publishers would be anxious to get their hands on my special novel. Wrong again. I learned that most publishers aren’t interested in a manuscript that hasn’t been presented to them by well-connected agents, so I contacted a lot of agents. For the longest time I couldn’t figure out what was wrong with them. They seemed oblivious to the particular genius of my book, then I discovered that both agents and publishers face daily avalanches of manuscripts. Far more than they could ever get through. How could anyone deal with this mass of paper? They take short cuts and make primary decisions on arbitrary things. Oops a misspelling–you’re out. Darn the manuscript was bound when the instructions said unbound–you’re out too. And so on. I was told that less than 4% of submitted manuscripts ever become books. Getting a book traditionally published isn’t an up hill battle, it is a vertical climb without a rope. I didn’t like the odds and began to seriously consider the concept of self-publishing.

Pre-build the Audience

That’s where I am now. I am learning everything I can as fast as I can about self-publishing and marketing. This blog, example gives me an opportunity to introduce myself to the world. So far this year, as I said earlier, over 14,000 people have checked in. By the end of the year, could that number double? What about the year after that? At some point, and I’m not sure when that will be yet, I will feel ready to invest in producing my book and offering it to my readers. My reasoning is that if people like my blog they will likely like other things I write.

Free, Free, Free

Again, I’m not a shooting star. I’m just a regular guy who has the ability to express myself fairly well in the medium of the written word. I have hopes and dreams just like any other person. I’m thrilled with the response to Talking Through My Hat–may it continue to grow. The reason I wrote my story here is to give others hope too. The Internet provides a platform to talk to the entire world. If you aspire to be an author, and apparently, 80% do, write a blog. If you don’t know how to get started look into The Author Platform by following this link. Talk to people and tell them who you are. Let them get to know you. It’s free or nearly free. It’s the First Amendment to the US Constitution in action. Free Speech for Free how could you get more democratic than that?

P.S.If you already have a self-published book and would like to enter it into a no-fee contest with winner chosen by reader votes go to Wake Up Celebrity Author on The Author Platform. The winner becomes the Barnes & Noble. com Best-Seller. Cool.

Talk about trying to catch the train after it has left the station, the big publishing houses are just now looking into Internet and network marketing.  The Internet hit the publishing industry like a runaway freight and it wasn’t truly respected until upstarts like Amazon, and Google were seen riding off into the sunset lifting their glasses of champagne high into the air.

Even now Amazon is leading the book selling revolution with electronic books. What are the traditional guys doing? Mostly moaning about how book sales are down (is that true Amazon?), and gnashing their teeth about how foot traffic into bookstores has decreased.

This is why I say if you go the traditional route your chances of success are very slim.  I’ve read that a new title will get a whole 30 days of shelf exposure before being flung into the discount bin. Or even worse, having their covers ripped off for return credit and the book destroyed. You have to make a big splash early and fast to survive.

Chew on this thought–what if you published your own book and you could take the time it needs to build its audience? What if you controlled the presentation, marketing, and distribution? AND, instead of getting a 10% royalty earned fifteen times as much? This is the essence of self-publishing.

I’m not saying that everyone is ready, willing and able to do what it takes to be a self-publisher, but what most don’t know is that it is easier than you might imagine. You can build yourself up and become an industry thought leader in six months without even leaving home. Blogging makes it possible. The Internet makes almost anything possible. I know–I’m doing it. I started a blog last January (it’s July now) and I’ve had nearly 11,000 hits so far, and my monthly totals are going up, up, and up.

Why am I doing this? Exposure. Name recognition. I haven’t even published my books yet, but before I do I’m laying the groundwork. I’m networking and making world-wide connections daily. That’s so cool I can hardly stand it. If you scroll down the right side of my blog you will come to a yellow map of the world. Click on it and see how far and wide my words have gone.  I even have a language translator so that they can read what I’ve written in their own tongue. Technology–don’t ya’ love it?

Social Networking (web2.0) is flipping the whole book marketing system upside down. It used to be that you would sell books and then people would come to know you. Now people can get to know you and then you sell books. Which method would you rather use?

I’ve been following T.A.P. (The Author Platform) to learn the ropes of blogging and social networking.  Without this guidance I would be lost. TAP very clearly shows the path to follow and gives very valuable tidbits of information along the way. I can heartily endorse it because I use it. Oh, and by-the-way there’s a No Risk 15 day FREE trial too. What could be sweeter? Just click here for more information.

What do I get out of it? I get a little slice of the action, it’s true, but more than that I get the satisfaction of knowing that I’ve helped my fellow self-publishers, which is the same reason I have for creating The Red Hen Association of Self-Publishing Authors (click here for more information). I believe that we all benefit if we strive to raise the bar. We can do that by producing better self-published books, and selling them smarter than the big guys.

I love to question generally accepted truisms and it drives my wife crazy. “Why can’t you just accept it or let it go?” She tells me. This trait used to get me into trouble in school too. Just because the teacher presented something as a fact, that didn’t mean it was. Teachers don’t like little snot-nosed kids challenging them. I took more than one trip to the coat closet, I can tell you.

Everyone has a book in them and 80% want to write one.

I am bringing this up for two reasons, the first being the statement that “Everyone has a book in them.” I looked for the source of this quotation and it seems to be either unknown, a cliché, or anonymous. If anyone knows its origins, I would love to hear about it. The second statement treated as fact is that “80% of [people/adults] want to write a book.” How was that research conducted I wonder? Did a student with a clipboard wander up and down the streets stopping pedestrians to ask, “Have you ever thought of writing a book?” No matter how the research was done or even if it was done, it might be true. Ever since I wrote the manifesto for The Red Hen Association of Self-Publishing Authors (to read click here) everyone I know is either writing a book, has written a book, or has a close friend or family member working on a book. You might be tempted to ask, “Bill all of those sources you quoted know you, and you’ve written books, shouldn’t the figure be 100%? Okay smarty that would be true if they all pointed to me, but they didn’t, they were talking about themselves or some other person. I have enough sense to exclude myself from this highly questionable research I conducted.

Are 43.56 million books being written right now?

If you use my personal experience as valid research (note: not actually recommended) and take a wild a_ s guess, you would probably be correct in assuming that most would never really attempt it. But just suppose that 20% did give it a go. The adult population of the US according to the last census was 217.8 million. Twenty percent of that figure would mean that there could be 43.56 million books in process right now. Over forty-three million is a mind boggling figure. Even if 1/2% is true that would still come to nearly 11million books. Good grief–no wonder only 4% or less of manuscripts presented to publishers ever make it into print.

Family histories and journals are books too.

Let’s address the maxim that everyone has a book in them. I suspect that is true also. If for no other reason, our life stories will make interesting reading for someone. Especially once, we’ve passed on. After my father retired from his job as a computer systems analyst, he spent time gathering diaries and journals about our immediate ancestors. For me it was a good read. For someone unrelated, not so much. The point being that it is a book. A book printed on a home printer and hand bound with a metal strip you can purchase at any office supply store.

Is the book my father self-published going anywhere other than the bookshelves of his children? Probably not. But, what if one of our descendants became famous or heaven forbid infamous, wouldn’t someone love to have their hands on this information so they can speculate all day long on what made that person tick?

The difference between a book, a good book, and a great book.

The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger

The question isn’t does everyone have a book in them. That answer is yes. The real question is does everyone have a good book in them? This answer is obviously no. The authors that can weave a story in such a way that it becomes a living thing are still far and few between, but as we have already discussed there could easily be a million books in development right now that given a chance could be the next Catcher in the Rye. There are too many manuscripts for traditional publishing and distribution to handle. If you are the next yet unrecognized great author, you may have no choice except to publish your own book, promote your book, and take it like The Little Red Hen to the next level by yourself.

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Bite your Tongue.

Those who decide to self-publish can hold their heads high, because they will be counted among some of greatest authors in history. Below is but a partial list of authors who have chosen to self-publish at sometime in their career.

• William Blake, Ken Blanchard, Robert Bly,Lord Byron, Willa Cather, Stephen Crane,
  
• e.e. cummings,  Alexander Dumas, T.S. Eliot,Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Benjamin Franklin,
  
• Zane Grey, Thomas Hardy, Nathaniel Hawthorne,Ernest Hemingway, Robinson Jeffers,
  
• Stephen King,Rudyard Kipling, Louis L’Amour, D.H. Lawrence, Anais Nin, Thomas Paine,
  
• Tom Peters, Edgar Allen Poe, Alexander Pope, Beatrix Potter, Ezra Pound, Marcel Proust,
  
• Carl Sandburg, Robert Service, George Bernard Shaw, Percy Bysshe Shelley,Upton Sinclair,
  
• Gertrude Stein, William Strunk, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Henry David Thoreau, Leo Tolstoi,
  
• Mark Twain, and Walt Whitman.

Note: The list was pulled from John Kremer’s Self-Publishing Hall of Fame

If you don’t find at least one of your heroes here I would be very surprised. Also you may have noticed that quite a few poets populate the list. Modern poets complain that publishers aren’t interested in their books. It’s said that poetry doesn’t sell. Compared to a fast paced pop-novel of sex, violence, and action they are probably right. I have to keep reminding myself that publishing isn’t primarily about getting the finest works into the public’s hands–it’s a profit generating business like a grocery store. If the stock isn’t turning it is costing money. I, like many others, tend to glamorize the traditional publishing houses and imbue them with a nobility they just don’t have. It’s a business. Poetry, on the other hand, is something else. Poetry is a work of passion, not business. Publishers probably weren’t any more anxious to publish poetry then than they are now and that is why so many poets had to resort to self-publishing.

Ernest Hemmingway

One of my Talking Through My Hat readers added this comment about self-publishers:“For me all I had to do was find out that Hemingway’s first book was “self-published,” to help me make my decision and after 32 years of “practice” I feel I did it just right. And then later this year when I found out about Mark Twain’s force of ten thousand book agents scattered across America selling his works and Ulysses S Grants Memoirs (also published by Twain’s company which was run by his young nephew Webster).” Miles Cobbett, Author the Alaska book CHAMPION.

Miles followed up with this comment in another post: “One more tasty tidbit about Hemingway and his publisher, that I bet you already know is his lively discussions in letters between him and Charles Scribner about Royalty Payments. I was fascinated to read in copies of Hemingway’s “Letters” that CS only offered to pay Ernest Hemingway 10 % of the net. And Ernest wrote back in a lively letter that he wanted 15 % or a Minimum of 12.5 %…
This was fascinating to me, especially when I read in the other book I wrote to you about, (Birth of a Salesman), how Mark Twain offered and paid U. S. Grant and his widow, a whopping 70% of the profits from publishing Grant’s Memoirs.”

I have more sympathy for the traditional publishers than you might think from reading my posts. They have to have highly tuned crystal balls to foresee the future. If they choose to take a gamble on an author, and it tanks, what do they lose? Why the entire investment, of course. And what about credibility? What happens to the employee who stands behind a book bomb? Or two, or three? Can you say pink slip?

If you know your book will sell–you stand behind it. Raise the money to print and promote it. You might be like my friend Miles Corbbett whom I quoted above. His self-published book CHAMPION is selling well and he owes it all to word-of-mouth advertising. Miles has this to say about his success: “Getting the word out has been a fun & challenging journey, but it’s all been done so far without any help from a Madison Avenue super advertising blitz.”

If you are a self-publisher, considering self-publishing, or a supplier to self-publishers be sure to check out the manifesto for The Red Hen Association of Self-Publishing Authors, Inc. (click here).

I, Bill Ruesch, have a confession to make. Although I’ve been in and around printing for some 35 years, book publishing is comparably new to me. You see, I did something that most Americans (somewhere around 80% wish they would do) I wrote a book. Actually I wrote four, one non-fiction, two poetry, and a novel, but that is beside the point. My novel would be my break through book. It  is a children’s fantasy story set in the fictional 1950′s small Florida town of Burns. It’s called The Whistlin’ Salamander. The thing is, I didn’t know what to do next.

Does that seem odd to you? I don’t mean to imply that I don’t know how to get a book printed. I could do that in my sleep. What I didn’t know was how to get it published. So, I turned to the Internet and bought several books on the subject.  I found tons of information on the business from landing an agent, to wooing a publisher. Publishers, for the most part, I was advised, won’t even look at a manuscript that hasn’t been presented by an agent, so I tried, and tried, to find an agent.

I learned about query letters. I came up with what I believed was a dandy, and made sure it was letter perfect. Agents, I read, have zero tolerance for grammar or spelling errors. I found out that different agents required different numbers of pages to sample your manuscript, and that I had to scrupulously follow every instruction or risk immediate rejection. I was very certain that they would love my letter and the submitted pages would be hailed. In my daydreams agents competed to sign me. That was the fantasy. The reality–not so much. Not only didn’t anyone bite, they didn’t even nibble.

What next, I thought?

Aha! An old friend Karen Christoffersen, I recalled, had worked with Richard Paul Evans author of the best-selling Christmas Box. Maybe Karen could help me. I called Karen and she told me that they were working on a program to teach self-publishers everything they needed to know through a practical hands-on method. At the completion, authors would receive fifty copies of their bookstore-worthy book printed, designed, edited, and proofread. That sounded like a good idea, but I already knew how to get all of the production things done. What I needed to know was how to sell my book. The great-agent-chase convinced me that traditional publishing wasn’t ready for me yet.

Karen introduced me to Phil Davis the owner of ZDocs a digital printing company specializing in short-run books. Phil, being the savvy entrepreneur that he is, had created a course to teach authors how to use the Internet to establish or increase credibility, and to sell books. He named the course T.A.P.The Author Platform. I told Phil about my quandary and he gracefully allowed me to study TAP with the proviso that I would report back to him anything I didn’t understand. Hey, I could do that. Through The Author Platform I learned the importance of creating a blog. Viola, that’s what you are reading now. I learned about social networking and you can find me on Facebook , Linkedin and Twitter, I found out that through social networking you can reach thousands of people with your sales message in less time than it takes for one person to walk into a bookstore, pickup your book, and look at the jacket.

I’ve been practicing the principles Phil teaches in TAP.  I now know that self-promotional activities are challenging. They take time, they take energy, and they require all of your creativity. How well does it work? In just a few months I’ve become connected with amazing people all over the world that I could never have met in 10 lifetimes otherwise. My network gets stronger everyday. The more I learn the more I realize there must be thousands of people in the same boat as I was, authors stuck  somewhere along the path between writing a book to successfully selling it. My need became the incentive to develop The Red Hen Association of Self-Publishing Authors. You can read the manifesto, which is just a fancy way of saying vision and purpose by clicking here.

I’ve heard sad stories of garages full of self-published books that don’t sell because the authors don’t know what to do once they have them. I would heartily recommend The Author Platform as an excellent way to begin. It costs a little money, but compared to the cost of just storing unsold books, it’s a pittance. Knowledge truly is powerful.