Partner-Publishing Business Model
But one thing has not changed: most self-published books sell fewer than 100 or 150 copies, many authors and self-publishing company executives say. - NY Times
There are somewhere between 600,000 and 1,000,000 books published every year in the US alone, depending on which stats you believe. Many of those – perhaps as many as half or even more – are self-published. On average, they sell less than 250 copies each. - Forbes Online
If the big publishers plan on spending $5,000 to $7,000 for a first printing of 5,000 copies, your plan to spend $500 randomly with no experience, is accepting that your book will indeed sell less than 500 copies. Realistically, you can probably expect to sell 50. - Goodreads
Tru Publishing believes you have a better chance of making money on your book by paying lower upfront fees, then splitting the royalty made on each sale. Some companies make a very big deal over not taking any part of your royalty, but fail to tell you how hard it is to recoup your investment from large upfront fees.
Below is some food for thought from credible industry articles:
Below is some food for thought from credible industry articles:
The average print self-published book sells about 100-150 copies -- or two-thirds to three-quarters of your friends and family combined (and don't count on all your Facebook acquaintances buying). - CNET
We include the above quotes not to discourage your dreams of becoming an overnight success, but because it's the realistic Tru-th about self-publishing. If most people are only selling 100-150 total books, then why would you agree to a fee structure that requires selling 300, 500, or even more books just to break even? It doesn't make sense to us either, which is why we operate with the business model we do. Partner-publishing lets us charge lower upfront fees and share in royalties so there's a realistic chance to see an actual return on your investment.
Production management - Much like building a house, producing a book needs to be done in the proper order by qualified professionals. We know which parts of production can work in tandem and which need to be done before the others. Additionally, we have a huge network of professionals whose work can be trusted.
Distribution - While anyone can now access retailers such as Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com through avenues such as CreateSpace and Ingram Spark, there are still limitations that will restrict a self-published author from maximizing print distribution. The primary issue is setting a wholesale discount for brick and mortar retailers. The industry standard discount that most bookstores expect is 55%. When a book is published through CreateSpace, the wholesale discount is fixed at 40%, way lower than what most bookstores will accept. Ingram Spark is more savvy, allowing a range of discount from 40-60%, but there are very valid reasons to set a discount at 20% too.
Promotion and marketing assistance - This is often biggest reason authors choose to partner instead of go it alone. The world of book promotion and marketing is a huge unknown, with many very expensive options to choose from. We understand when and why to use different promotions at different times and we can ensure your marketing budget will not be wasted.
Network Collaboration - When an author contracts with a publisher, they gain the advantage of having the collective lessons learned from all of the other authors in that publishers family. This is a huge benefit because they gain the ability to share knowledge in various marketing methods, event successes
Title Management - This includes all of the administrative details that are often neglected by self-published authors such as writing effective sales copy for your retail pages, ensuring the sales pages are utilizing SEO techniques to increase visibility, making changes to sales copy if updates are required, price testing to ensure a title is priced optimally to maximize profit per sale while balancing an acceptable price for your niche, optimizing the category of your title to
Distribution - While anyone can now access retailers such as Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com through avenues such as CreateSpace and Ingram Spark, there are still limitations that will restrict a self-published author from maximizing print distribution. The primary issue is setting a wholesale discount for brick and mortar retailers. The industry standard discount that most bookstores expect is 55%. When a book is published through CreateSpace, the wholesale discount is fixed at 40%, way lower than what most bookstores will accept. Ingram Spark is more savvy, allowing a range of discount from 40-60%, but there are very valid reasons to set a discount at 20% too.
Promotion and marketing assistance - This is often biggest reason authors choose to partner instead of go it alone. The world of book promotion and marketing is a huge unknown, with many very expensive options to choose from. We understand when and why to use different promotions at different times and we can ensure your marketing budget will not be wasted.
Network Collaboration - When an author contracts with a publisher, they gain the advantage of having the collective lessons learned from all of the other authors in that publishers family. This is a huge benefit because they gain the ability to share knowledge in various marketing methods, event successes
Title Management - This includes all of the administrative details that are often neglected by self-published authors such as writing effective sales copy for your retail pages, ensuring the sales pages are utilizing SEO techniques to increase visibility, making changes to sales copy if updates are required, price testing to ensure a title is priced optimally to maximize profit per sale while balancing an acceptable price for your niche, optimizing the category of your title to
The Nu Series
Tru Produced Titles
The Tru-th About Self-Publishing
Tru Publishing offers three e-Publishing packages to suit writers' various needs. We believe that a royalty-based fee structure is the most accommodating to authors, as it allows us to carry the risk. We get paid more if your book does well, creating a partnership we have a stake in. Other self-publishing companies charge a very large upfront fee, publish your book -- then forget about it unless you pay them more money. Tru Publishing believes that if we don't take personal accountability for helping you succeed, then we are doing you a disservice. Also, a royalty-based fee structure puts money in your pocket faster. Here's an example:
One modestly priced company charges $1100 for their entry level e-publishing package, but they do not take any royalties on the back end. Most e-books on Amazon are priced from $2.99 to $9.99 in order to capture the 70% royalty option. So let's say you publish your book and set your price at $5.97. After Amazon takes their cut, the total royalty will be $4.18 per book sold. However, you will have to sell 264 books just to break even because of the large upfront fee.
Using the E-ssential Core plan with Tru Publishing works out much differently. The same book priced at $5.97 still yields a royalty of $4.18, of which $2.09 is the author's net. At a starting price of $297, you are already putting money in your pocket after selling only 142 books. With Tru Publishing, by the time you sell 264 books you will have MADE approximately $300 instead of breaking even. In fact, in this particular example you will have to sell nearly 335 books with the other company before equaling your profit with us.
Here is food for thought from some significant articles...
One modestly priced company charges $1100 for their entry level e-publishing package, but they do not take any royalties on the back end. Most e-books on Amazon are priced from $2.99 to $9.99 in order to capture the 70% royalty option. So let's say you publish your book and set your price at $5.97. After Amazon takes their cut, the total royalty will be $4.18 per book sold. However, you will have to sell 264 books just to break even because of the large upfront fee.
Using the E-ssential Core plan with Tru Publishing works out much differently. The same book priced at $5.97 still yields a royalty of $4.18, of which $2.09 is the author's net. At a starting price of $297, you are already putting money in your pocket after selling only 142 books. With Tru Publishing, by the time you sell 264 books you will have MADE approximately $300 instead of breaking even. In fact, in this particular example you will have to sell nearly 335 books with the other company before equaling your profit with us.
Here is food for thought from some significant articles...