5 Things You Should Consider When Pursuing Self-Publishing
Hello creatives!
As with all things publishing, there are lots of things to consider because the industry is experiencing something of a golden age with how many options are available for aspiring authors. This is not to say that publishing is easy, simply more accessible than ever before. So, with that in mind, I’ll be diving into 5 things every aspiring author should consider if they want to pursue self-publishing.
If You Are Going To Self-Publish, Consider Setting Up An LLC
The thing about self-publishing is that you become a one-person publishing house, which means you assume a lot of liability for producing the product of a book and marketing it. For tax purposes, an LLC separates you from the publishing business you build in the process of pursuing self-publishing. While this may seem like an unnecessary burden for some authors who feel they only have one book in them, if you hire any freelancer to help produce the book, an LLC helps you do that in a more formal way with a paper trail for tax filing purposes. For those who know they will self-publish more than one book or have interest in offering freelance services to other authors as well as self-publish their own works, this is a smart move.
Separate Your Publishing Finances From Your Personal Finances
I can’t stress this enough. When you self-publish, you become an entrepreneur. You are building a publishing business which means for tax purposes it helps to keep everything separate. Separate bank account. Separate checks. Separate bank card.
Why?
Because self-publishing can be looked at as self-employment after a certain amount is earned, which means you are more subject to being audited by tax authorities and may have to file taxes more than once a year to ensure you pay the appropriate amount of taxes. This is especially true if you live in the US.
Begin Building Your Author Brand 12-18 Months Before The Book Launch
It pains me when I see authors publish a book and then go to online forums to ask “now what? when do I begin to market this?”. The answer is always LAST YEAR. You have to market yourself before you can market your book. What does this mean? Well, for starters, find two social media platforms you feel comfortable with and begin creating content around who you are and why people should care. Document the writing journey. If you’re writing nonfiction, post content related to the topics you write in.
Want to learn more about this? I’m working on material to host a free webinar in early 2021. Fill out this form if you’re interested in the webinar and you’ll receive bi-monthly email updates about how I’m building my personal brand in the meantime to inspire you to build your brand too.
Learn Digital Marketing
I know, I know. Authors have enough on their plates trying to write their books and vet publishing platforms. And now, I’m telling you it’s best to juggle an LLC and social media management. And you probably don’t want to hear this, but learning digital marketing is vital to the success of your book. This can be daunting. There are resources out there to help you learn how to use them. Whether it's Google, Facebook, Instagram, Youtube or book specific platforms like Goodreads, you need to have a digital marketing strategy specific to your book.
Believe me, I’m working on content to help you demystify these concepts for you to use when building your personal brand. And I’ll cover the basics of when to begin each stage of the branding and marketing process when I finalize the webinar. So, again, sign up if you’re interested because I’m hoping to have the webinar sometime in either January or February 2021, just in time for you to prep yourself for 2021 and beyond.
Have A Follow-Up Strategy For After The Book Launch
So the book is launched, yay! Now what? Have a follow up strategy to continue the momentum. Continue to build your author brand and build on the success of the first book. Work on partnering with book stores, book clubs, etc to bring in wholesale purchases for your novel. Speak at regional conferences and schools. Have merchandise related to the book? Sell it. Have the second book almost ready to go? Build your email list by offering the first 10 pages in exchange for a newsletter sign up.
If you are going to be more than a one-book author, having a follow-up strategy is incredibly important. It keeps you relevant to your audience and helps you expand your reach as well. Here’s the thing, though. You don’t have to do everything. Just do what makes sense for your book and your brand. This is something that, again, I’m going to cover more in-depth in the webinar if all goes well. So sign up!
I hope these tips have helped put things in perspective. I’m very passionate about this because there are things I learned from my first published book that I don’t want you to repeat. You can learn more about the lessons I learned from my first published book by watching the latest Youtube video I posted. Note: I decided to host a webinar on author branding and book marketing strategy after I recorded the video so I don’t have a callout to it, but I do have a link to the sign up form in the description of the video.
That’s all I have for now. As always, I hope this was insightful and inspires you in your journey as a creative professional.
Until Next Time,
Rochele
P.S. If you are in need of some personal brand coaching or are ready to get serious about your book launch, let’s work together! Feel free to fill out this form to book a discovery call with me for a brand coaching session or my strategic planning consulting service.