Why Some Authors Fall for Vanity Publishing Scams
A vanity press is a publishing company that makes money by selling publishing to authors at extraordinary costs. They often promise you the world but will give little for what you pay. Very expensive!
There is no shortage of scams out there. Authors need to publish their manuscript in order to issue a novel or book. These vanity publishers prey upon the desperate and uninformed. You can avoid getting scammed by vanity publishers by knowing in advance what the warning signs are.
Pay to Play
The first warning sign that a publisher is a vanity scam is if they ask you to pay them to publish your manuscript.
Writing a book is hard. However, it’s the easy part of what’s ahead for you as a writer. Publishing your manuscript is challenging. Vanity press agents know this and actively seek out new authors to prey upon.
Vanity publishers prey upon your dream of publishing your book and having it in the hands of thousands or millions of readers worldwide.
The cold, hard fact is that as a new author, you are most likely not going to write a book that sells thousands of copies. And if you do, kudos to you! I want to become your best friend. But if you are like me, you will have to work hard to sell your book. And it will not come through a vanity publisher offering their services for $5,000 to publish your book.
Preying Upon Those Seeking Help
Vanity publishers prey upon writers who are seeking help in getting published. Most new authors don’t know how to get published much less who to trust.
How you might fall for a vanity press scam:
You are…
- Seeking help to publish your manuscript.
- Finding the publishing process overwhelming and confusing.
- Fearing never becoming published.
- Not skilled at self-publishing and want someone else to do the work.
- Wanting someone to handle the marketing and sales of your book.
What Should You Do Instead?
The first thing you should do is just breathe. You wrote a book. That is an amazing accomplishment. The next step is to get published. It is not easy, but you can do it! Just make sure you don’t pay thousands of dollars to do it.
Traditional Publishers and Literary Agents.
Writing query letters and finding an agent or traditional publisher is a way to get published. However, it is far from an easy task.
Do your research! Publishers typically do not respond to new authors and prefer to work with literary agents they know and respect.
Most agents and publishers are busy professionals who don’t want unsolicited manuscripts. They often have a portfolio of authors and genres they represent. It is of critical importance that you do not waste their time. Only contact agents who represent your genre. You do not want to contact a romance literary agent if you wrote a sci-fi space adventure.
Make sure you write a good query letter and send it to the appropriate agent. The agent will contact you if interested.
Self-publishing.
Self-publishing is the great democratization of the publishing industry. Anyone can self-publish. My wife self-published her vampire novel New Breed which has sold online and in bookstores all across the country.
There are several self-publishing options you can use. Be sure you research the pro’s and con’s of each. Some require you to only sell on their platform.
Maybe you have watched a video of a successful author who self-published and is making thousands of dollars a month from book sales and think it’s a common result. It is not. It takes a lot of work to be a success in life. There are no easy paths.
Self-publishing requires you to invest time, money and effort. You become the author, publisher, marketer, salesperson, web-designer, etc. It’s a lot of work, but you will learn much from the process. And, you may have fun doing it as you attend author signing events and literary fairs.
This is how we did it, and why we started 80percentdone.com. We wanted to share our experience and what we learned with other authors so you may have an easier path to success than what we had. And we ask for nothing in return! Well, maybe…you could share our blog with others (wink)!
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