7 Things to Understand Before Traditionally Publishing Your Book

During the month of May 2013, this blog focused primarily on how to traditionally publish your blogged book. Before moving on to look carefully at self-publishing, I’d like to recap what we covered. Here are 7 aspects of publishing you must understand if you want to land a deal with a traditional publisher and have your experience be a successful and pleasant one:

1. You need to have the right personality for traditional publishing, including being willing to release control of your project to editors and the marketing team at a publishing company. If you don’t like project management, don’t want to back your project financially, want credibility in your field and wide distribution for your book, traditional publishing may be the right choice for you.
2. Publishing is a business, and publishers seek good publishing partners. If you can prove you can help sell books—as well as write them, publishers will be more likely to want to go into business with you.
3. There are three major types of traditional publishers. Know which one might suit you best and the appropriate way to approach them.
4. The traditional publishing process involves many people. You should understand how to pitch agents, how agents work with and pitch acquisitions editors, and how a book idea gets pitched to and approved within a publishing house before an aspiring author gets offered a contract. This will help you move through the process, which can by lengthy, with less difficulty.
5. You will need a literary agent. Understand their value, what services they offer, the percentages they earn on your published work, and that you need to obtain one before you approach all but small, independent publishing companies.
6. You need to know how to write a query letter to obtain a literary agent (and a publisher).
7. You need to know how to write a book proposal that will help you obtain a literary agent and help your literary agent land you a traditional publishing contract. It serves as the business plan for your book.

If you aren’t sure if traditional publishing is right for you, this post and this post may help you determine if traditional or self-publishing suits you best. If you need help with a query letter or proposal, please check out the services provided by CopyWright Communications.

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