Cecil needs to revise things to explain why most “print on demand” publishers are actually vanity publishers in sheep’s clothing.
In the past few years, there has been a rise of this sort of thing – publishers claiming to be “print on demand” or “self-publishing.” They also talk about their new paradigm of print on demand and how they’re something new. They aren’t.
One of these publishers, for instance, charges $1295 for “services.” For this price, you get twenty copies of your book, hardly enough to market. If you want any more copies, you buy them at $5-7 each. I had a conversation with their live help, who claimed this was much better than a vanity press since a vanity press would charge you $3000 for 5000 copies. I pointed out to them that it would cost the author much more than that to get a mere 500 copies from their POD system. They insisted they weren’t a vanity press, but whenever I asked what the difference was, they couldn’t name anything specific at all.
(This is a newer entry into this particular scam. Earlier electronic vanity presses charged less, but they’ve been having trouble making money. I wondered why Vantage Press didn’t get in on this, but they probably realized it wasn’t sensible for them economically.)
Vanity presses – electronic or otherwise – have a vested interest in blurring the line between what they do and self-publishing. They exaggerate self-publishing successes, often stating misleading facts (sometimes Edgar Rice Burroughs is cited. Yes, he published his own books – but not until after he became the most popular writer in America). Try asking them how many of their books have achieved publishing success.
If you’re self-publishing, you’re the publisher, which means you contact the printer directly, then market the book yourself (most POD vanities don’t do their own printing). You go from bookstore to bookstore, asking them to carry your book. You send copies to reviewers. You get on talk radio shows. You do readings. It’s hard work, and not likely to succeed, but you do have a slim chance. You don’t have one with a vanity press, and you have even less of a chance with a POD one (if you don’t have copies to hand out, you can’t promote).
I’m a little confused here. I’m planning a comic book; I’ll pay to have fifty or a hundred copies printed, then handle promotion, ordering, and so on. No problem: I’ll be self-publishing.
Do the ‘vanity publishers’ represent that they would handle promotion and distribution as well?
Primarily, they represent that buying their services will make you a success. They usually neglect to mention anything about the need for promotion. If asked, they’ll say it’s your responsibility.
Vantage Press does talk about their promotional services, which traditionally have been limited to one appropriately named “tombstone” ad in the New York Times listing that last 10 or so books they published. Not very useful. The newer presses put your book up on their web page as promotion. Not that useful, either.
You can tell a vanity press from a legitimate publisher by looking at their web pages. Legitimate publishers sell books and thus have their books featured. There probably isn’t a link soliciting manuscripts. Online vanity presses feature their services for authors.
The disadvantages of a vanity press are that they cost more than publishing the book yourself, and the books they put out aren’t taken seriously. You can create, say, Marcia Press as your own company and the booksellers and reviewers don’t know anything about it and might give you a chance. If you used Vantage Press, the bookstores and reviewers take one look at that and ignore the book.
I just wanted to note that Cecil’s comments on the author’s need to self-promote, even when you’re dealing with a major published, are rigght on the mark. Note my recent thread:
I realized, going in, that I’d have to do some of the work on my own, but I had no idea how much of it I’d have to do on my own. Most of the publicity I’ve gotten has been the result of beating my head against doors and walls. It’s as much work as writing the book in the first place. Still, I’m glad I didn’t have to pay for the printing of the book myself.
Amen to the posts above about vanity-press scams. They’re especially familiar from poetry-contest frauds (the scammer accepts every poem sent in, then contacts poets congratulating them & then asking them to send in money to buy copies of the resulting anthology; the book is priced at an absolutely ridiculous sum, e.g. $50…assuming it’s ever published at all).
Thought I’d add that the most effective method of self-publication is to do so by advance subscription or donation. I run a little magazine; it’s usually a cheapo xeroxed chapbook but issue #4/5 was a 232pp book of essays on a poet from the UK, Peter Riley. Virtually every subscriber to the mag sent in some dough. I ended up doing the volume at Toronto’s venerable Coach House Press–400 copies, 232pp, $2900 Cdn; because of the initial fundraising I’ve already broke even (2/3rds of the print run is gone).
Weep in my beer, Cal, I’m not drinking anyway . . . I work with a reputable university press, and already I am making lists of newspapers, magazines, etc., to get copies of my next book; bookstores and TV stations that might have special interest; thinking about overseas distribution, advertising and promotion . . .not to mention trying to make contacts re: movie or TV rights! And I have the advantage in that a smaller, university press may actually LISTEN to me, whereas Knopf or Doubleday would just put me on hold till I died of old age . . .
