Dos and Don’ts throughout…
Step 1 – Writing
So you want to become a published author. More power to you. Many will disagree with me. But forget your audience. Write what you know or whatever voices are talking in your head. (And to think they said listening to voices when we were younger was a bad thing) Unless you have the funds to drop whatever you’re doing, don’t quit your day job. Believe it or not, sometimes what you do, may influence your characters. (Plus you still need to pay your bills)
Step 2 – Copyrighting
So you've finished your book. Now what? Let’s face it, the poor man’s copyright is the cheapest and you’re automatically protected. Right? Right – BUT and yes there’s a huge BUT!!!! The poor man’s copyright – your work is automatically protected as soon as you write it. True. But if you read all the lingo within the copyright services – and yes trust me they do somewhat contradict itself.
Example: I wrote my novel at the age of 17. You wrote it at the age of 20. (We're 35 years old now.) You become published and it’s a best seller. Awesome – right? Well duh yeah! But what about me? I’m stomping my feet screaming I have written it before you. Okay? How do I prove it? Here’s my pad of paper with ink dating back three years before you were started. Great! Right? Well yeah, but you know the costs that are associated with that? Even with technology, hate to say it, can be warped.
Do – Pay the $35 to register it yourself. (Prices may change)
Don’t – If you go with a self publishing company, pay them to do it. Sure it’s a nice feature in their packages. But if you really compare packages you’re paying almost $500 more for them to do what you can do for $35.
Step 3 – Publisher versus Agent versus true Indie
Okay, so you got your book written and copyrighted. Now what? Well like me, publishers rejected, agents laughed and my book sat on the back burner. Unless you know what you are doing, always have a lawyer on retainer. The contracts are tricky. (We’ll cover that later) What are you looking to get out of your book?
Traditional publishing – is HARD! They are very picky and a lot won’t even look at you if you’re not already published or represented by an agent.
Agent – Let’s be honest. Middle man. But they have more inside connections to who will want your book. (Usually) They know how to ‘sell’ it to make it more desirable.
True Indie – You keep more profit. Exposure very limited. If you don’t want to have someone eat your profits and you just want to call yourself a published author. This is the way to go.
Do NOT think of going self published without going through all the steps. Do NOT think, oh people will love it and a big publisher will pay me big for it. It's nice to dream, but dreams come true when you're realistic and put the time and effort into it.
Step 4 – Editing (Read my last post)
Yes, I’m back tracking a bit. But this is the most important. I went through countless editors. The first several dozen couldn't get past the third page. Threw it back at me and said that it was crap. Did I cry? Oh hell yeah. But I didn't give up. I found one that was just extremely awesome. She loved it. If there’s one that likes it, there’s more. Remember not everyone is going to like your work. In all honesty I don’t like Picasso’s art. Does that mean he’s a horrible artist? No.
You may have to find two editors. One to go over details and the other one to concentrate on commas and periods. I’ve heard a lot of people who have spent thousands on editing and got nothing in return.
Tip: When interviewing editors – give them ONLY the first few pages to first chapter. NOT the full book. That way you can get a feel if they are the right to handle your book.
Find an editor that enjoys reading your genre. Not just for the money. It does show in their work.
Step 5 – Title
This may sound easy to you. It’s actually the toughest. It took me almost a year to find a title. Do your research! Make sure that your title isn't going to conflict with something else out there. Example: Harry Potter – Yeah even though names aren't copyright-able doesn't mean that they aren't trademarked. You also don't want to write a book that will conflict with another possible title out there.
We'll use the famous Twilight. Eeek! I know!? Say Twilight fits your work. Twilight is not copyright-able. (Trademarked, yes) Yes, you are free to use Twilight as your title. (As long as it doesn't look like the original twilight usage.) However, great, your title is appearing in search engines and everyone wants to know more. No matter if you have the next hottest book on the market, you killed yourself. Why? Well, we all know what Twilight is about. When someone sees Twilight, they're going to think about the hot selling Twilight. When they start reading yours, they'll become pissed off and say it's not the same. You may get a few trying to challenge the others. Their voices won't be heard. So, pick another title. It'll save you a lot of hassle.
I'll give you a great prime example. My last book set was called The Mystic Diaries. It fit the book. It was perfect. However, because The Vampire Diaries had a 'subtitle' in one show because it was featured at Mystic Falls, they had called it The Mystic Diaries. (On note - I've never seen the show or read the books) So, I have no clue what it's about except for vampires. Whatever.
I knew one of two things was going to happen. The first one, people were going to compare and the book would die before it even got started. Which is what happened.
The second thing, it would take off but with a mixture of both good and bad reviews. They would be comparing it to Vampire Diaries compared to my book that has NO vampires. I thought I would be on the safe side and make disclaimers. Yeah, that didn't work.
I revamped the books into a saga and renamed them in the second edition.
Step 6 – Trademarks
They ARE different from copyrights. Copyrights only protect your words. Trademarks protect your logos. I.E. Coca Cola ®- The way they have their wording – IS trademarked.
‘But I want to use them to describe what I’m writing.’ In theory – that’s perfectly legal. Again in theory. Contact the trademark directly. It doesn’t hurt for you to ask their permission to use their trademark in your book. Nine times out of ten, they’ll come back and say, ‘Yes, it’s fine BUT you have to adhere to our guidelines’. Okay? So adhere to their guidelines. It ain’t that hard people. They don’t ask the world and it’s to protect them as well. The one out of ten – may want money, not get back to you or their demands are just outrageous. So move on.
Tip/Hint: For arguments sake you want to use ABC Brand - You get their permission. But every time that you use the words ABC Brand it must be followed by a ®. So every time you see ABC Brand in your book you’ll see ABC Brand ®. ABC Brand must be in English format – no matter which format your book is going to be published in.
Tip/Hint: Do NOT use a photograph of a trademark item until you have their permission. Best case scenario - you’ll receive a cease and decease letter from their lawyer, telling you to pull your books. Now one of two things may happen. You’ll have to purchase your books back from the people who bought them. Yeah that can get yucky and end up costing you thousands. The second thing that WILL happen is that your book will be off the market while you search for a new design.
Public park settings – sounds like common sense right? Wrong. Read the rules and regulation of the park you are shooting in. You may need to acquire a permit. Which 99% is free or at the most, a small fee. So it’s just a pain of acquiring one. Then you’re protected. Better safe than sorry.
Tip/Hint: Do NOT steal – ‘borrow’ pictures from the internet. Plain and simple. Just like copyrighting – the person who took that picture is automatically covered. Any lawyer will jump on that one for their client. (Which is not you)
Step 7 – Covers
Okay – so your top cover of the book is white with black letting for your title. How do you determine a cover for your book? Where do you go? A photographer once told me that the average design will cost a couple thousand. Yeah! – Sorry but unless I’m hiring a famous photographer who takes a celebs photo, two grand is a bit steep. I don’t care what degree you have to take a picture of a rock.
Do you want a photograph? Do you want it drawn?
Tip/Hint – Someone’s gotta start somewhere – right? Right. Find a high school student or a college student that is majoring in designs. They’ll work with you on a small budget. They want their name out there. If your book does well – then you just returned the favor because now they are known.
There are a lot of ‘professionals’ out there. After all it’s the day and age for everyone to make a quick dollar. You just wrote a book so you know what type of design you are looking for.
Tip/Hint – I never and I mean NEVER work with anyone who will bad mouth another. As soon as they bad mouth (even in general) I will NOT work with them. Because if they are bad mouthing others behind their back – what are they saying about you? They may be great. They may be the best. But say you don’t like one little dot on the picture. They may call you too picky and ruin your name even before you have a chance to begin.
Do not have a busy cover. When you have a busy cover – people are distracted of why they had picked up the book. Sure it may look pretty/fancy/elegant but let’s face it – today, people’s attention spans are not what they used to be. Plus it could be that one little detail to where you think makes the cover – that deters the person from buying the book. People are weird! Plus, you want people drawn in to your words not your art. Writing and drawing are two different arts.
Step 8 – Websites
Wow – who would have thought there was so much into writing. You thought you’d just write and become a hit. Ummm- *scratches head* No comment. Let’s move on. :) Is this your only book you’re going to write? Or are you like me to where you have stories a state wide that want to be written? Do you want your webpage to be a one stop all? Do you want it simple? Do you want it complex?
Depending on how many books you’ve written – you might want a website for each book. My first saga has 12 books in it. Each additional book I’m writing may be only one book. So I may have ONE webpage for those other books.
Again do your research. Also again like the cover – find a high school student/college minor/major to help you. Right now I use wix. It’s decent. You can customize to how complex you want it. It’s easy to navigate through. And they have a lot of templates for you to choose from. But, the editor can mess up to where your page looks like puke.
Hint/Tip – Put a counter on each page so you know what pages are getting the most hits and which ones aren’t. That way you may be able to delete the ones that aren’t getting hits and it’s one less thing for you to monitor.
Hint/Tip – Yes to purchase the name is around $10ish a year. Example: You buy a CD for $10. That’s great. But how do you listen to it? You say – my computer has a CD player, duh! Okay, well how did you get your computer that has the CD player for you to play your new CD? You need a place to store that CD you just bought. Hence – web hosting. There are many carriers out there with different prices and what they have to offer. Find the one that works the best for you and then see their customer service. What backups they have to offer. The last thing you want is to spend hours developing your website and oh crap their server went down and you lost everything.
Step 9 – Social Media
Yeah – this one has me laughing too. I’m NOT part of every single social media out there. If and when your book does well – people will come find you. Most people are already on every social media already. I’m part of facebook/twitter/google+. That’s it.
Hint/Tip – create an email account that’s directly related to JUST your book. I.E. – yourbook@email.com or yourname@email.com That way your personal account doesn’t become flooded and it’s easier to separate the two.
Okay – we all love when we know authors have a life outside of writing. But don’t advertise every little thing you do. (Sometimes’s I’m just a bit guilty of this but not to the extend that I’ve seen others) That’s what you’re personal account is for. I keep the two separate.
Yes, we like to know that you’re human and do screwups just like the rest of us. But that’s why you have a separate account just for your author name or your book and then you have your personal account.
Social media is great advertising – don’t get me wrong. But I don’t need my inbox spammed on every single book that an author has written. If I’m interested in your little synopsis on your book I’ll buy it. I’m sorry but I’m not going to read the first 2-3 chapters. I know the theory behind that – it’s to get you hooked. I don’t have time to be reading 2-3 chapters of every single author that is giving them to me. Sorry. :(
It’s okay to spam your own wall. It’s NOT okay to spam forums or other group walls. Your wall is your own wall and who cares if you list your book for sale every day. I don’t need to see it in a forum to where I’m there to chat about other author relations. I don’t need or want to should I say scroll through advertisements. (Now yes, there are some forums just for that)
There are pages out there that allow you to spam and advertise.
https://www.facebook.com/booksinreview
Step 10 – Feedback
Do NOT trash others for hating your book. That’s so tacky and makes me not want to read your work.
Hint/Tip – NOT everyone is going to love your work.
Read what the bad reviews have to say. Take it with a grain of salt. Simply thank them for taking the time to read your book. Now if they just say, ‘I didn’t like it.’ Well you can’t give that too much credit. But see why those who didn’t like it and exactly what they had to say. For example: “The story line was dry” Well okay, maybe it was to them. So maybe it’s something to work on for your next book.
Not everyone is going to like your sad ending. Not everyone is going to like your happy ending. Don’t know what to tell you besides not everyone likes the same thing.
Hint/Tip: Bestsellers like Twilight – Harry Potter – and others like such, read their bad ratings.
Even the multi-million dollar books that were into movies – have bad reviews. It doesn’t mean a thing. The complaints may be that they didn’t like the way the book ended. Again reread just above. You’re not going to please everyone.
Did I personally enjoy reading Twilight? *Blushes with embarrassment* Yes. BUT! Bella – I’m sorry – for all you hardcore Twilight fans – she was a whiny shallow character. I personally did not like her character.
Do I read the positive reviews? No. I don’t need 48446374959373523 people to tell me that it’s a must read. In fact that’s why I did NOT read Twilight until AFTER the third movie was released. Did I take in consideration what the bad had to say? Nope. I based my OWN opinion off the book itself. (That and the five minutes of watching it on TV sort of peaked my interest) Don’t ask me which part.
Step 11 – Contracts
Do you know what you’re looking for? Do you know the average specs in a contract? Do you know what to do and what recourse you have when one side breaches it? Unless you know what you are doing, how to write/word them, have a lawyer look it over. It could cost you to a free consultation to $300 or more – but it’s well worth it.
Know the terms. When someone mentions rights. There are so many rights when it comes to contracts.
Hint/Tip – Yes it is perfectly normal for you to give up a slight part of your rights to have someone else publish your book.
Now does that mean they hold the rights to sell it to someone else? Nope. Not at all! There are many types of rights out there. The main one when working with a publisher is exclusive rights. You are providing them the ‘rights’ for a fee to market/sell your book.
But what’s in those exclusive rights? That varies contract to contract. I have a confidentiality clause in mine so I’m not aloud to discuss. But each contract will and is tailored to the author.
One right to be aware of is sole rights. As of right now – you hold SOLE rights to your book. If the publisher wants sole rights and you sign that contract. You have NO say in what takes part in that book. It’s like signing over a title to a car. Once you sign over that title you have no say in how the new people treat it. Unless there’s a time frame specified – you can kiss any claims to that book goodbye. No matter if it’s recorded with the copyright office. They now have a contract to state that the book will be transferred over to their name.
But wait! It says that they own the rights and I’m only the author on the copyright.gov website. - Duh! They are protecting their investment. You both hold entitlement to the rights. Neither one of you are allowed to do anything with it until your contract states otherwise. (The terms in the contract vary again. Some could be two years some could be ten years or longer)
Think about it like this – do you think the bank is going to hand you over the deed to your house before it’s paid off? When you look up your property in the county records, does it just state your name? No. It states you name primary – saying you own that property BUT their name is lien holder. Meaning if you do anything that’s going to breach contract – I.E. failure to pay your mortgage – they have the right to take the deed back and give it to someone else who is willing to pay.
You mean I have to pay monthly to keep my rights?
No! I was using that as an example. Let’s use the car example again. You have it financed. I.E. You are loaning the book to the publishers to publish and market. Once the car is paid off – the fiance company hands you the title and you are free to do what you want with it. (Once the contract is done all rights revert back to you)
A contract is very similar to buying a house or car. Can you live with the payments? I.E. Can you live with the terms that are addressed?
Step 12 – So now your published – now what?
Sit back and collect the cool hard cash. – NOT! You’re not done yet!
You have to maintain your website – keep your readers posted – answer questions – and if you’re an Indie author – keep marketing yourself.
Even though I’m working with a publisher I work about 6-8 hours a day on everything myself. Sometimes I think that they hate it – but it keeps the work load off of them. (I’d like to think anyways)
Even if you have an agent/publisher – market yourself. Get within the community. Help others. This isn’t a free for all. This is a help for all. What you may not know – someone else may. That same person may not know something but you do. So trade ideas. Trade secrets.
What if someone steals my secret?
Look at where you’re reading this. There are over a thousand articles out there. They’ll find it on their own. They may find it faster than you’ll find yours. Other authors do not mind helping others. I’ve made great friends near and far by just being there. If I have a question – they’ll give up 30 seconds of their time to help. Which in return saves me hours from researching and reading article after article of the same thing to find what I need. In return do the same.
Hint/Tip – Even though the communities are large and spread out – authors do talk. If you are taking advice but not helping – other authors do make notes and won’t take that 30 seconds to save you 5 hours of research.
Step 13 – Publishers
How much involvement do you want? Do you want – Here’s my book make it happen? Do you want to be hands on?
I’m a hands on person. I do most of everything myself and like to think that I leave the marketing up to my publishers while I take care of everything else. Is it a hassle. Oh yeah, no doubt.
But remember it’s your art. Do you think Picasso sat there and did half and let someone else do the other half?
Some publishers I’ve read hate when you contact them once a month. I’m sorry but I like to know where my book is in the process. Unless you just paid me 1 million dollars for it, I treat it like my baby. Even though if you paid me that much, it’s still my baby.
Because of my last publisher, right now I'm sticking to self published.
Remember publishers and agents SHOULD have more experience – even with a contract to find a way that you breach it to get rid of you as a client. So what you don’t like the picture they picked. Unless it turns your stomach, or has nothing to do with the book, then yes voice your opinion. But remember they’ve been in the business a lot longer than you and knows what will sell and what won’t.
Step 14 – Don’t become discouraged.
I see a lot of people writing the same deviations from another book that was previously published. What that means is that they have somewhat of the same story line but in their words. It’s not bad. Every person tells the story differently.
So what, you didn’t make the top sellers. If you really look at those who are successful they didn’t start out that way. In fact it took them years. Does a good review outweigh a bad review? Nope. I’ve read lots of books and loved them – I don’t leave reviews. I’ve read lots of books and asked myself how it got published in the first place. - I still don’t leave reviews. I hate reviews. If you’ve followed me, you know I hate reviews. Your opinion is your own. Plain and simple. Opinions are like pennies – everyone’s got a few laying around but doesn’t mean that the next person has a need for them.
I'll go into each topic more into detail with each new blog.
So those are my do’s and don’ts. Remember they are like diet plans. Some/all/none of them may work for you. This profession is all about trial and error.
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