What happens to your readers when your publishing changes?
They stay where they always were: with the bookshop that sold the book, or the website that sold them the download, not with you or your publisher.
Litopia Editorial, with Peter CoxUpdated
The one relationship that travels with you from deal to deal, or out of traditional publishing altogether, is the list you built yourself.
That’s why a list matters to every kind of writer. Traditionally published, self-published, hybrid or not yet published, sooner or later something changes, and the readers who can hear from you directly are the ones who move with you.
Who knows your readers’ names?
For most of publishing’s history, nobody did. Kevin Kelly pointed out in 2008 that New York’s publishers, after centuries in business, didn’t know the names of their most dedicated readers (source). Sales passed through wholesalers and shops, and the reader’s name stopped at the till.
Online bookselling moved the records, not the relationship. The customer data now sits with the online retailer, which doesn’t hand it to authors.
What can change in a writing career?
Almost anything, and usually without much warning. Each of these happens to working writers every year:
- Your editor moves on. A book can lose its champion inside the house. With your own mailing list, your readers still know the book exists, because you told them.
- The next book goes elsewhere (or nowhere). A publisher declining a second manuscript doesn’t erase the readers who loved the first book. Your list tells them where the next one is.
- The book goes out of print. Most contracts let you reclaim your rights once a book stops selling. The Authors Guild’s model contract allows a request two years after publication, once the book is unavailable or earning the author under $250 to $350 over two accounting periods (source). With your rights back and a list, you can reissue the book and tell your readers how to buy it.
- You switch to self-publishing, or mix the two. A self-published book’s launch is largely the author’s launch, and the list is where it starts.
- The company changes. Imprints merge, close and change direction. Your readers’ interest in you doesn’t.
What does a list do that a publisher can’t?
A list follows you, not a single book. It lets you:
- Announce every book, from every publisher, to the same readers.
- Keep your backlist alive, because new subscribers discover the older books.
- Show an agent or publisher that readers follow you from one book to the next.
What a true fan does goes further into what a loyal list does for a launch.
Does this mean you should go it alone?
No. Kelly himself has worked with big New York publishers, published his own books, and used Kickstarter, choosing whichever suited each book (source). A list doesn’t replace a publisher. It means that whatever happens, you never start again from zero.