Dr. Amy Tiemann, author of Mojo Mom: Nurturing Your Self While Raising a Family and executive editor of the book Courageous Parents, Confident Kids, has arguably experienced practically every model of publishing available to writers today—a traditional deal, a strict self-publishing option, and print-on-demand through CreateSpace—throughout the process of publishing her three titles.
“I’ve now experienced traditional and indie publishing, they are both great and they both have their place. When I self-published Mojo Mom in 2005, it still meant having thousands of books in the house, deciding how much to order, investing in the copies of my book, then packaging and shipping the books to customers who placed orders. It was only six years ago but it feels like the olden days. The bookstores that carry a self-published author’s books are great, but that route can be very unprofitable. I love the service CreateSpace provides. I’m still the publisher and it’s a very professional book, but the author doesn’t have to figure out how many copies are needed or pay for shipping. There are no start-up costs to print the books because CreateSpace prints the books as they are ordered. The best part might be having my books on Amazon.com next to every other book. The readers don’t care if it was published by CreateSpace or by Random House, as long as it’s a quality book,” says Tiemann of the experience.
An extensively updated version of Mojo Mom was published traditionally through Gotham Books, a division of Penguin Group, in 2009.
One creative aspect that more and more indie authors are enjoying from the self-publishing platforms is the speed to market. Tiemann admits that the timeframe wouldn’t work for every author, but by collaborating with thirteen other experts in their fields to create Courageous Parents, Confident Kids, the book was brought to completion—and therefore the reading market—in just ten months.
“I knew this was the kind of project I wanted to get out quickly and traditional publishing can be a slow process,” adds Tiemann. “I knew exactly the book I wanted to make and I didn’t want to change it to suit the publishing industry. We also had an innovative outreach program, so each contributor sent out an ebook to everyone on our own mailing lists, which allowed us to reach over 30,000 readers that way. It’s hard to convince a publishing house to let you give away that many copies of your book, but we could make that decision for ourselves.”
Having experienced the various ways a book comes to market, Tiemann says that every book is its own unique project and there is no one method that is right for every book. “I am eager to do another project under a traditional publishing deal again in the future, but I would have to decide what is the best route for that current project. In this case, CreateSpace was what the book needed to succeed.”
Mercy Pilkington is a Senior Editor for Good e-Reader. She is also the CEO and founder of a hybrid publishing and consulting company.
