Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Something I have learned

I want readers to know that I do editing on manuscripts for books. Am I a 'professional editor?' Well, I guess that depends on Your definition of professional. Do I write my own books? Do I edit my own books? Do I self-publish? A resounding YES to all of the questions. I do okay in the selling department and I'm learning about promoting and advertising my books.

Are my books good? Yes they are and if I'm not on the 'best seller' list right now it is because of lack of knowledge about advertising, but I absolutely am learning that part too. So if people have not discovered my books,it is simply because I cannot afford a huge ad in Times Square. That's fine, I WILL get there.

If you self-publish because you have been turned down by publishing companies, does that mean your stuff is no good? THAT would be a resounding NO! Why? You have to understand that editors and those publishers are taking an educated guess. There is NO magic bullet for success. Have Enough money and You Too can sell anything. Marketers will tell you this too. Publishers go with celebrities because celebrities are already known, so a Big chance publishers are Not taking by banking on a celebrity. The rest of us are unknown, at least for now because we don't have Big Advertising buckaroos! So what? It just means people like you and I have to be more creative with less bucks.

I have read blogs written by people who had popular subjects, got book deals and one blogger became an editor. Do I think making ONE book deal makes anyone a professional editor? Nope!

So hang in there, keep writing and publishing,come up with creative ways to market and contact me,if you like, about my editing fees.

Thanks for reading and if by chance, you want to offer me tips on shoestring marketing ideas, well, I'm Always open to suggestions.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Thanks, I needed this!

steve & Roberta weathers said...

melsbabysis: Hi, thanks for stopping by and I'm glad you found this useful.

Unknown said...

I am finding that once you have found a way to self publish and do the editing professionally at a minimal outlay then you have a fighting start to getting published. So far my first book of Poetry is out there. Although I am not expecting huge sales, nor do I care. I simply want my author name to be present in the book world. This was a very useful blog and I found it so interesting. Your absolutely right about being a celeb, they simply have to sit before a publisher and talk. The rest is taken care of based on the strength of who they are and of course the MONEY the publisher is getting paid from them and how much they will earn simply for writing about this celeb.

steve & Roberta weathers said...

We are so glad you found this article useful and interesting.We see more and more people publishing there own book instead of using a publisher even the former Mayor of Louisiana(Ray Nagin published his own book.Publishers like to cut your work up to much if its not up to their standards.