I just finished "The Business Of Books" by Andre Schiffrin, which was primarily interesting to me for one reason. The business of publishing that he describes growing up in is not the business that I write about, but then again, it's a publishing world that he's eulogizing. His conclusions about the new world of trade publishing being focused on the frontlist and the bottom line agree with my own observations, though he tends read politics into everything at the same time. I don't believe the publishing business has ever stopped evolving, or that there was ever a time that bestsellers weren't important for various reasons. But I do agree that publishing for backlist potential isn't in fashion at the big trades.
One of the remarkable things about the Internet is the speed at which evolution takes place. It's still a game of incremental changes and survival of the fittest, but the word gets around very quickly and to the winner belong the spoils. When I talk to publishers about working the Internet into their business model, I suspect my enthusiasm sometimes makes it sound like I'm asking them to give up paper books, or distribution relationships. So many publishers have made major commitments to the Internet and received little to show for it because their focus was on budgeting, rather than understanding how a web presence could compliment their existing business model. Evolution may come quickly on the web, but a publisher who tries to get to the finish line in one shot rather than testing incremental adaptations to their organism is just begging to become an evolutionary dead end.
Changes on the margins of any business lead to big effects over time. Positive changes to book margins (ie, the gross profit per book) when publishers face very similar costs for NYC office space, printing and authors may make the difference as to which publishers survive in the long run. Winnowing out the weaker publishers may be a process of a few percentage points on the margins, not spectacular blow-ups due to over-sized advances that don't pay out or huge bookstore returns of no longer promising titles. All things being equal, if two publishers are competing in similar areas with similar staff and cost structures, I would expect the publisher who adapts better to the Internet to be the publisher who survives. But bestseller obsessed publishers think, "If the Internet didn't work for Stephen King, how could it do anything for us?"
I believe, from multiple discussions with publishers whose Internet efforts are highly limited, that the stumbling point is the mental commitment to learning something new. Most publishers have no trouble coming up with a budget for web design and upkeep, but their desire is to write a contractor a check and not hear about it again. The website, for them, is like a space advertisement intended more for branding purposes than anything else. But those same publishers would be horrified if they found they'd spent fifty cents a book more on printing than everybody else in the business for the same quality product. Survival in the long haul is often a question of being a second faster or fifty cents cheaper. Publishers who don't spend any money on marketing, on title acquisition, on direct sales, peer reviews, focus groups and public relations can afford to ignore their websites as long as the e-mail works. Publishers who do spend money on those activities and hope to be around after the next meteor hits had better start evolving now, a little at a time.
Poetry And The Professional Poet
As long as we're talking about cold hearted calculations, I figured it was time to say something about poetry again. Not the art, I'm one of those weirdos who remembers the poems I like, even though I wouldn't agree with most as to what the poet was talking about. I probably wouldn't agree with the poet either, if any of my favorites were alive to express an opinion, but as with rock n' roll, it pays not to confuse the messenger with the message.
I read an article by Willard Spiegelman this week in which he mentioned the submission process at Poetry Magazine. It should be called a rejection process. According to the article, Poetry Magazine receives around 30,000 submissions a year and publishes around 300 poems. That's not quite as bad as a lottery ticket, submitting a poem to Poetry Magazine does actually increase the odds that it will be published. But the question for us self publishers is, does publishing significantly increase the odds that you will earn a living as a poet?
The Census Bureau lists Poet in the Industry and Occupations Index, but they lump poets into the Writers and Authors category. Likewise, the Bureau of Labor Statistics includes poets in the category A183 AUTHORS. I spent some time googling around without finding even an estimate of the number of professional poets in America, people earning their living primarily from writing poetry. I'd assume there are at least dozen or so at any given time, Poets Laureate, some poets writing on grants, some visiting scholars or chairs at universities or liberal arts colleges. I did find a reference to the Poets in the Schools program in California, where "professional poets work with children", though it wasn't clear from the reference if they get paid.
Interestingly, Poetry Magazine maintains a Poetry Bestseller List on their website, which goes to show I'm not the only person involved in publishing who expresses a passing interest in sales. The top selling contemporary poet in the country these days appears to be Billy Collins, with two books dancing around the 10,000 rank on Amazon. Between those two books and his extensive backlist, if he was self published, I believe he'd be earning a better living from self publishing than I do. Of course, the ability of a self published poet to achieve fame would depend on what came first, the publications or the platform.
Overall, I suspect it's easier to earn a living as a famous dead poet than a famous live one, though the taxes will kill you in either case unless you do a lot of traveling:-)
I read an article by Willard Spiegelman this week in which he mentioned the submission process at Poetry Magazine. It should be called a rejection process. According to the article, Poetry Magazine receives around 30,000 submissions a year and publishes around 300 poems. That's not quite as bad as a lottery ticket, submitting a poem to Poetry Magazine does actually increase the odds that it will be published. But the question for us self publishers is, does publishing significantly increase the odds that you will earn a living as a poet?
The Census Bureau lists Poet in the Industry and Occupations Index, but they lump poets into the Writers and Authors category. Likewise, the Bureau of Labor Statistics includes poets in the category A183 AUTHORS. I spent some time googling around without finding even an estimate of the number of professional poets in America, people earning their living primarily from writing poetry. I'd assume there are at least dozen or so at any given time, Poets Laureate, some poets writing on grants, some visiting scholars or chairs at universities or liberal arts colleges. I did find a reference to the Poets in the Schools program in California, where "professional poets work with children", though it wasn't clear from the reference if they get paid.
Interestingly, Poetry Magazine maintains a Poetry Bestseller List on their website, which goes to show I'm not the only person involved in publishing who expresses a passing interest in sales. The top selling contemporary poet in the country these days appears to be Billy Collins, with two books dancing around the 10,000 rank on Amazon. Between those two books and his extensive backlist, if he was self published, I believe he'd be earning a better living from self publishing than I do. Of course, the ability of a self published poet to achieve fame would depend on what came first, the publications or the platform.
Overall, I suspect it's easier to earn a living as a famous dead poet than a famous live one, though the taxes will kill you in either case unless you do a lot of traveling:-)
Writing The Right Book
I was having an imaginary conversation with an aspiring self publisher who owns a pet store while I was out running this morning. She was bouncing ideas off me for both fiction and nonfiction books she was thinking about writing - I'm rubber. The conversation went something like this:
Adrian: "I really love dogs, I've been working with them for over 20 years, I go to all the shows and conventions. If I know one thing in this world, it's dogs. So I was thinking of writing a novel about an alcoholic vice cop whose daughter turns tricks to support her drug habit."
Morris: "Uh, does the cop have a dog? Does the daughter have a dog? Is there a crime in a pet shop? Do you have any experience with police work, or, uh, you know..."
Adrian: "Well, I read a lot of books and watch a lot of TV and there don't seem to be that many dogs in prominent roles. I want to give myself the best chance of success."
Morris: "If you really feel you have to start off with an action novel, I'd at least try to work some dogs and a pet shop into the plot, maybe even the title. It helps quite a bit with believability if you can write from experience."
Adrian: "Oh, if you mean I should write some how-to book about animals, I have been thinking of a book on raising possums for pets."
Morris: "Uh, is there a lot of demand for pet possums?"
Adrian: "Well, I did some research, and there aren't any competing books, so I should be really successful."
Morris: "That's not always a great sign in publishing, it could mean that there isn't much demand. Have you considered writing a book about, you know, dogs?"
Adrian: "Oh, there are thousands of books about dogs, I sell them in my store. How can I compete when it's all been done before? Every show I go to there are dog books for sale, dog breeding, dog feeding, dog psychology, dog humor, and most of them aren't any good! People are always asking me to suggest a book about choosing a puppy, but it's hard because I don't agree with the authors of the published books."
Morris: "That's usually a good sign in publishing, that there's a lot of demand. If you write a good book, even if there's direct competition in your niche, say, "Purchasing A Pet Shop Puppy", at least you know that there''s a market. If you write the better book and do a better job marketing, you'll do well."
Adrian: "But I could practically write that book in my sleep! What would that prove?"
Morris: "That you're a pretty smart self publisher."
Adrian: "I really love dogs, I've been working with them for over 20 years, I go to all the shows and conventions. If I know one thing in this world, it's dogs. So I was thinking of writing a novel about an alcoholic vice cop whose daughter turns tricks to support her drug habit."
Morris: "Uh, does the cop have a dog? Does the daughter have a dog? Is there a crime in a pet shop? Do you have any experience with police work, or, uh, you know..."
Adrian: "Well, I read a lot of books and watch a lot of TV and there don't seem to be that many dogs in prominent roles. I want to give myself the best chance of success."
Morris: "If you really feel you have to start off with an action novel, I'd at least try to work some dogs and a pet shop into the plot, maybe even the title. It helps quite a bit with believability if you can write from experience."
Adrian: "Oh, if you mean I should write some how-to book about animals, I have been thinking of a book on raising possums for pets."
Morris: "Uh, is there a lot of demand for pet possums?"
Adrian: "Well, I did some research, and there aren't any competing books, so I should be really successful."
Morris: "That's not always a great sign in publishing, it could mean that there isn't much demand. Have you considered writing a book about, you know, dogs?"
Adrian: "Oh, there are thousands of books about dogs, I sell them in my store. How can I compete when it's all been done before? Every show I go to there are dog books for sale, dog breeding, dog feeding, dog psychology, dog humor, and most of them aren't any good! People are always asking me to suggest a book about choosing a puppy, but it's hard because I don't agree with the authors of the published books."
Morris: "That's usually a good sign in publishing, that there's a lot of demand. If you write a good book, even if there's direct competition in your niche, say, "Purchasing A Pet Shop Puppy", at least you know that there''s a market. If you write the better book and do a better job marketing, you'll do well."
Adrian: "But I could practically write that book in my sleep! What would that prove?"
Morris: "That you're a pretty smart self publisher."