The self-publishing industry has gotten vast, and it’s quite overwhelming to choose one for yourself. Services provided by each of them cater to different types of authors and their needs, and to make sure that you navigate through this hunting process without stumbling, we have gathered for you a few tips that you need to keep in your mind while you are looking for a self-publishing agency for your upcoming book. Let’s dive into it. 

Reputation Does Matter

One of the most important areas that you shouldn’t miss out on is the company’s reputation, and Google is a big help! Since the internet is not too young now, you can easily look out for reviews about your potential self publishing agency. Give your eye around the independent review platforms and see if their previous customers are satisfied with their services or not. Keep in mind, when it comes to good and bad reviews, a few bad reviews are quite fine. However, walk over if you find a list of negative reviews on different platforms. After you have completed your hunt, you will have a clearer gut feeling of whether the company is reliable to work with or not.

Customer Support Is Essential

Without adequate customer service, no company can ever survive. Now that you have made it certain that the previous customers of the company are happy with their work, the next thing to look into is their responsiveness. Don’t wait for yourself to become a customer to check if their customer support is reliable or not; check it beforehand. One of the best ways to do so is to look out again for customer testimonials that mention their customer support. Also, reach out to them with your needs and assess the response that they get back with. If you are satisfied with how they treat you, that’s a green flag! You can definitely move forward.

Publishing Agreement – An Important Document

Being one of the most important documents, a publishing agreement defines the services that you are going to receive from the agency’s hands. All sorts of licensing arrangements, royalties, printing costs, and other miscellaneous services are mentioned in the following document.  Here are a few things that you should consider in a publishing agreement;

Copyright:

Check out if the agreement that you are going to sign up for transfers all the copyrights to you or not. If it doesn’t, ask for the change immediately. If the company delays the change, discontinue working with them right away! Remember one thing, when you are working with a self-publishing agency, 100% of your book’s copyright belongs to you at all times.

Duration:

Don’t get forced into a fixed term. Look out for agreements that remain in effect until one of the parties terminates them. This usually requires you to sign up for a written notice 30 days prior; however, it takes out all the other hassles.

Cost & Royalties

One of the other things that you should stay away from is the companies that don’t pass on 100% royalties. When it comes to traditional publishers, they do a certain percentage of your royalties because they use their own money to publish your own, but again, this is settled beforehand. Therefore, make sure that if you are fronting the 100% cost of getting published, it’s your right to receive the 100% of the profits.

Are Their Editorial Services Reliable?

The caliber of editorial services provided by several self-publishing agencies is not up-to-the-mark. In order to make sure that you are not handing over your book to some junior editor, there are a number of ways to assess if you are getting a good editor or not. The first thing that you can do is to get into a conversation with your editor. Ask your sales representative to get you in touch with them. While having a conversation with them, assess if they have a command over what you are working on. Ask them about their previous work and talk more about the genre of your book.

If the agency refuses to get you in touch with the editor you are going to work with, that’s a big RED FLAG! Walk away right away.

Marketing Services

Without getting in touch with the previous customers of your prospective self-publishing agency, you can never make certain about the reliability of the marketing services of a self-publishing agency. Another thing that you can do is to ensure that you stay away from unwelcome agencies. Look out for what these agencies have got to provide you with and what they are charging.

For example, if a company is charging you $500 for ads to market your upcoming book, that’s nonsense! Why? Because there’s absolutely no value in spending money to place ads if you are not famous. If people don’t recognize you, why would they even click on your ads?

PR Department

It is essential to get your book delivered to your targeted audience. If you have written the plot of your book for women aged up to 40, you would never market it to kids aged under 18. Be mindful while you are choosing your self-publishing agency, and check if they have a strong PR department or not.

With a strong PR department, not only will you be able to network with a great audience, but you will also enable people from all over the industry to give an eye to your book.

After knowing all of the above factors that you should assess your potential candidate companies on, make sure that you use them to screen out all the reliable self-publishing agencies. Invest sufficient time into the vetting process and make choices that benefit you in the longer run.

What are you still waiting for? Start hunting out for self-publishing agencies now, and get your books published now! Remember, you have got a story to tell, and these agencies help you turn your author dreams into a reality!

0