Authors as Businesspeople

There was a time when an author was just an author.

At that time, their focus was on writing the best book they possibly could. Someone else would edit, lay out, design, market, sell, and publish the book, which was a deal that most authors were fine with, at least partially because it was the only option available.

[aside title=”More About Asym“]

• Authors as Businesspeople
• Remove Hurdles, Build Trampolines
• Indie Publishing
• Learning & Teaching
• Vehicles & Stories
• Business Models

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The big downside to that arrangement is that someone else also owned their work. Authors would sell the rights to their book to a publisher, and that publishing company would pay them a small advance (i.e., a loan) and then a small percentage of revenue generated by sales (after the advance was paid back).

It was a decent living for the fortunate few who made it past the several rounds of gatekeepers between them and bookstore shelves, and for some it’s still a good option.

Today there are other options, though, and we feel strongly that even authors in traditional publishing-house arrangements should see their writing as assets and treat them as such. They should be in control of their own promotional efforts and social media content. They should be aware of what is worth what, and which methods of delivery are available on a given project.

Of course, for authors who are independently publishing their work, this goes double. In order to really succeed — apart from the outside chance of being ‘discovered’ and showered with money — it’s best to view yourself as an entrepreneur, not just an author. An authorpreneur. A creative businessperson.

This perspective allows a creative person to look at each business challenge as an opportunity to enhance their work and get it out to more people. Businessy tasks — like updating social media and converting published work into multiple formats — become one more part of the creative process, which they are, if you’re doing them right.

The business of publishing, as well as the published work itself, must be high quality if the reading public is going to be exposed and open to investing their time and money in indie work. If you’re doing it right, the experience of purchasing and consuming your work should be as good as the work itself.