Ten Reasons Why You Need To Self Publish

Choose to go indie over traditional

Hi. I’m Lacey Dearie. I’ve been self-publishing since 2011. You could say I’ve been self-publishing since 1987, if you count the little romance I wrote and illustrated about a butterfly and a flower and stapled together with Care Bear stationery.

I sold one copy to my grandmother. But I digress.

You will meet people who have published more books than me and you will meet people who have sold more copies than me. But you won’t meet anyone more honest about the self publishing experience than me. I firmly believe that. That’s why I have compiled ten reasons why you should self-publish, even if you’re still on the fence about which direction you’d like to take your book.

Your book can be a success with self publishing

One of the many reasons I hear for people not choosing self publishing, and choosing to pitch to agents and traditional publishers instead, is that they think their book will be more successful with a traditional publisher. What a lot of newer writers don’t realise is that you’ll still have to do the bulk of the promotion yourself. Yes, a publisher will take care of editing, proofreading, cover design, formatting and printing, but promotion, and ultimately success, is still down to you.

There’s also a fear that your book won’t be picked up by a traditional publisher once you’ve self published. While this can be true in the majority of cases, it’s not impossible. Scottish author Sophie Gravia self published her first novel, was a word of mouth hit and climbed the charts, then got picked up by a big publisher, Orion. It can happen!

You can still be a respected writer with self publishing

People who criticise self publishing and think it’s second rate are common. There are also people out there who only care about the quality of the writing. And to be fair, there are plenty of people out there who will criticise and talk down books published by the biggest and most respected publishing houses in the world. You just have to realise that these people are snobs and filter out their opinions.

People are making good money at it

Are you going to make a million dollars? Unlikely. Are you going to make a full-time living? Well, that depends on what you write, how you market it and whether or not you can be consistent. If you churn out any old rubbish, chances are you’re not going to be a success. Just like being successful as a blogger, it takes research and targeted marketing.

It’s a legitimate business model that you’ll be in control of

Indie publishing is a legitimate business model. Forget about the writing for a minute. You don’t even have to write a book, because low-content products can also be included in this discussion. Producing and marketing digital products is a legitimate business. As a writer of independently published books, you’ll be running a business and you need to remember that.

If a plumber is employed or self employed, they are still a plumber and no less worthy of success. If a hairdresser is employed or self employed, they are no less of a hairdresser. The same is true for writing. Whether you’ve got a contract with a big publishing house or you have decided to be self employed, you are still a writer, and a business owner.

There’s a huge network of support from other writers and publishers

It’s everywhere. Every second person I meet these days is a writer or knows someone who has self published. My hairdresser, my friendship group, the woman in my local supermarket who works stacking shelves… there are so many people out there who are writers. We all support each other.

You can find your biggest support networks on X, here on this platform and in Facebook writers groups.

Higher royalty share

Publishdrive have reported that royalties for traditionally published books were, generally, under 10% of the profits. Meanwhile, with self publishing, you get to choose what the royalties are. With Amazon’s KDP platform, you can make up to 70%, so long as you price your product between $2.99 and $9.99. Outwith this narrow pricing range, you’ll make 35% royalties, which is still much better than 10%.

With other platforms, where you’re likely to sell fewer books, the royalty share can be as much as 85% with Smashwords and you’ll be charged a 10% flat fee with Gumroad. I’m not saying you’ll get a lower quality book from these platforms, but many of them won’t have ISBN’s and be logged with the British Library or your country’s equivalent, so it’s more digital content than a legally registered book. I’ll write more about that in another post.

You’re the only one responsible for your success

If it fails, it’s on you. You don’t have a boss to blame, although it would be nice to be able to blame someone. You can blame the book buying public, but the harsh truth is, if nobody bought your book, it either wasn’t marketed properly or the cover and blurb weren’t appealing. These are all skills we can work on.

If you do it for a living, you can choose what you do each day

This is self explanatory. When I was self publishing full-time, some days I did research. Some days I wrote for eight hours. Some days it was erotica, others it was cozy mystery.

And just between us, some days I stared at the screen wondering what the hell I was doing.

You don’t have to stick with Amazon

As I said above, in the royalty paragraph, you can publish with other platforms. Amazon are the biggest fish, but not the only one. They’re more of a shark, taking up space so you can’t see the little guys in the water. You could choose Smashwords, who distribute to different platforms for you — actually they distribute anywhere that takes e-books except Amazon. You could choose Gumroad — but personally, if you’re aiming at the book buying public I would not recommend. If you’re targeting digital content creators who want to read on their laptops, then yes, choose Gumroad.

You also have the option to really self publish in the truest sense and organise printing yourself, or create digital files yourself and sell them from your own website. An author friend of mine is heading in this direction himself. I’ll keep you updated on how that goes for him.

It gives you a realistic idea of what it’s like to have a book published

You’ll get that magic feeling of having a book that you’ve written, with your name or pen name on the cover. There’s nothing else like it in the world. You’ll also get to see how people react to your book, both in your personal life and online. You can receive reviews and get feedback from real customers who don’t know you and don’t care about your feelings — you’ll be subjected to criticism and you will learn a lot about yourself from how you react to that. You might encounter a bit of snobbery, depending on your genre, or a bit of jealousy from those who wish they too could write a book but haven’t put the work in.