Self-Publishing Benefits Outweigh Traditional Publishing

One of the main reasons so many authors are self-publishing today is twofold. One of the main reasons is because there is a huge market to capitalize on for POD or "Print on Demand" publishers. The other reason is because traditional publishers want to sign a sure thing when it comes to authors and their books.

The art of getting published these days is a rare commodity indeed. Many times, authors that are in the market of trying to get published will write umpteen query letters, send off countless chapters for initial review to agents and then receive the "Thanks, but no thanks, Don't call us, we'll call you" letter. Dejected and frustrated, the author pulls themselves up by the bootstraps and hones their manuscript once more, writing an even more intriguing query letter to the next agent or publisher only to get continually rejected.

There is something romantic to the notion of getting rejected as a writer, but after months and months of it, it gets very borish and tiresome. The postal clerk has learned your name, comments on the agency or publisher you're sending the manuscript to, automatically knows the postage it will take to ship your 3 chapters to anywhere in the U.S. and so on and so on.

How in the world can a new author complete with a James Patterson, Stephen King or John Grisham? They can't. All of these authors have long successful careers and have had million sellers. They are the cash cows for the traditional publisher. Is it any wonder traditional houses are so hesitant to take a chance on a new author? Much less spending money on promotion? Hence, the multitudes of rejections being cast like confetti upon eager new authors.

Well, new authors are taking matters into their own hands! POD companies (Print on Demand) have noticed that their are literally millions of people that want to publish their memoirs, fiction, non-fiction, etc. without having to go through the years of anguish over rejections.

Say hello to the world of Self-Publishing!

So what are the benefits to self-publishing versus Traditional Publishing?

Self-publishing offers the author a much larger royalty

Self-publishing costs are relatively inexpensive, sometimes even free!

Self-publishing doesn't require storage space for your printed books, as each one is ordered, a book is printed and mailed to the customer. No muss, no fuss!

Self-publishing offers the ability to sell your book online with Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com as the Traditional publishers do!

Self-publishing offers fast, easy formatting, book design and other book services to the author for a relatively low price.

Self-publishing offers immediate clout to their authors because they have a book in hand to sell.

Self-publishers will never refuse your work!

That's alot of perks, so what are the disadvantages of self-publishing?

All formatting, editing, proofing, designing etc. must be done by the author or farmed out for others to do.

ALL promotion is done by the author

ISBN #'s must be purchased in order to sell your book in bookstores and they can be costly.

The author must register as their own publisher in order to receive an ISBN # which takes some time.

Just because your book is listed with Barnes & Noble doesn't mean it's going to sell a million copies and allow you to retire! Did I mention ALL promotion such as planning book signings, contacting news outlets, getting book reviews, etc. is done solely by the author.

It's alot of work, but when you hold a copy of your book that you are so proud of, in your hand, there is nothing like it! For more information about self-publishing, check out sites such as : http://www.lulu.com/, http://www.booksurge.com/, http://www.iuniverse.com/ and http://www.authors-promotion.com/publishers.php .

Good Luck!