5 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Self-Published

5 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Self-Published

Interview with Lizzie Dunlap

Writing a book or short-story is one of the greatest feelings in the world to a writer. There are stories brewing inside the mind just begging to be written onto paper or Microsoft Word – whatever your preference is. With that being said, when the book is done, what do you do? Many authors and writers have NO IDEA what to do or where to go. By default, thousands make choices that they wish they never did. This week, I caught up with Lizzie Dunlap to talk about, “The 5 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Self-Published.” After doing an interview with her on Game of Thrones, author of the recently released, The Knight of the Hunted, we thought we would collaborate once more about a topic many people often ask about: Self-Publishing. 

Whether you are in Facebook writing groups or have writing friends, every writer will ask the same question: Traditional Publishing Route or Self-Publishing Route? With that being said, I decided to interview Lizzie Dunlap, a successful self-published author about her journey in BOTH fields. Our goal is to provide some valuable information that will not only entertain you but also educate you.

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For more details on Lizzie Dunlap, please head to: 

Website - http://www.lizziedunlap.wordpress.com  

Instagram - instagram.com/elizabethdunlapnifty  

Twitter -twitter.com/edunlapnifty  

Facebook -facebook.com/elizabethdunlapnifty

Her most recent book is for sale right now on Amazon, feel free to click the image right here:

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Thank you so much for being so willing to do another interview! After such a successful one, I figured what an opportunity to learn more about you, Lizzie. Today, I am going to interview more about publishing and really giving people some feedback and information that is often unknown. So before we begin, could you tell us a little bit about your writing history? Also, what was your inspiration to write?

I have been writing for a good long while. I published my first story in 2015, it’s a short story. I published two more in 2016. My first novel was published in 2017, which is SUPER exciting. Did I mention, they are ALL self-published.Now, what inspired me? I used to draw little pictures or color pages and I would make up a title for them, like “The Red Dress” or whatever and write my name on it. I was essentially making book covers for fun, and one day, I made one of a lady in a red dress, and I stared at it and I realized that if I Liked the idea of making a book so much, I should learn how!

That is a beautiful story, thank you for sharing. Now, a question many of us are asking, what are the names of these stories?

Well, there’s a two-part short story series about a superhero named Aero, which is the title. The other short story was inspired by the game Dragonvale, which I wrote to be included in a guide for the game that came out last year, that one is called Minerva and the Dragon Park. My novel, which was released this year is called the Knight of the Hunted, which is about a vampire named Lisbeth. Hmm, I just realized, all of them are in different genres.

What a coincidence, eh? So, do you have any other books or series in the works?

SO MANY! I would say around 7. This does not include the others in the series that go with the Knight of the Hunted. One is finished out of the 7 and it is called the Grumpy Fairy. It is a story about a fairy named Drusinella, and basically, her hobby in life is turning princes into frogs. Her front yard is swarming with frogs!

So, yet another new genre? Look at you go! Inspirational. I am curious to learn what makes her so grumpy. When can we expect that?

VERY soon, I am working on the cover now. I will send it out for editing and then publish it. I think it turned out FANTASTIC, it’s a very exciting and funny story.

Very exciting!!!! I am sure all this information is on your website as well (INSERT LINK HERE). So, let me ask, why did you publish self instead of traditional?

The main reason was how difficult it is to actually be traditionally published. You have to submit it to companies, and if you don’t go through a book agent, you’re basically sunk. So finding a book agent is paramount, and they are so overbooked that it takes at least 4 months to get an answer about your sample, which may be a no. I knew that my stories were so special that I could not NOT publish them. There is also the success of many books that were once Self-Published. For an example, Warm Bodies, The Martian, Fifty Shades of Grey. All are now traditional published, and have movies!

Thanks so much for that. I think a lot of people will appreciate that. So, this post is not geared towards traditional publishing; however, if there is someone seeking to take that route, do you have any advice from your experience?

Well, like I said, you have to find a book agent, and there are sites that connect you with them. Two that I know of for an example, querytracker and agentquery. They are both free services, if I remember correctly, but paying for a subscription puts your samples at a higher priority, of course.

So now, you specialize in self-publishing, do you feel like you were prepared for self-publishing?

Absolutely not, haha. I do love challenges though and I always find a solution.

Could you share with us a couple areas that you ran into that were challenging?

Honestly before my novel was published, I used to stress out over covers ALL the time. My first cover for Aero was just awful, and it’s still up on Goodreads, taunting me! Being self-published means you have to be Jerry Lewis.

Now, aside from book covers, did you run into anything that you needed to research or literally had no clue about?

Yes! Formatting my eBook. You Don’t HAVE to, since KDP helps you do that, but I wanted to make sure the chapters were in separate pages, so they wouldn’t overlap. You also put in the title, author summary, and ISBN information. I fiddled with it a lot so I learned some tricks. Doing it that way is the best to ensure there are no blank pages.

Great learning experience for some new writers. Now, I do have a BIG question for you. You just gave writers a new piece of advice on taking the time uploading a formatting their books. Do you have three to five pieces of VITAL advice that you can offer NEW writers and authors in the self-publishing world? Advice that you know is beyond helpful that will assist getting their book up as fast as possible?

Absolutely!

My first one is all about money payout, KDP and CreateSpace.

What is KDP, briefly?

KDP stands for Kindle Direct Publishing. Everything is done through Amazon. In this service, you can also enroll your book to be included in Kindle Unlimited, which is a subscription service people pay of $9.99 a month, or free with Amazon Prime, on Amazon where anyone can read your story or book for free.

What about the money payouts that you mentioned?

Kindle Direct Publishing has a money payout system of 60 days after the end of the month the sale happened. What this means, if you get a sale in January, you will not see those fresh dollar bills until April. There is no express shipping on this one. I would not be surprised if Amazon offered a feature under Amazon Prime to get your payments faster.

KDP also has a restriction on international sales, which you do not receive unless there is $10 in that country in sales, like 10 sales in England. So, let me give you an example. Say someone in Denmark buys your book, you don’t get that money unless enough people in Denmark buy copies and it totals $10.

WHOA! WHAT! I never knew that! Are there any benefits to KDP?

Yes! It is FREE to use. Most companies will charge you for self-publishing, keep that in mind. It is also EXTREMELY user-friendly. On top of this, if there are mistakes after publishing, you can fix it!

Wow! I am learning so much. Let’s move onto Create Space – what is happening there, what is it?

CreateSpace is a free service that prints self-published paperbacks. The thing with Create Space is that it has restrictions on money payout that you need to be careful as. You do not get any money until you’ve earned $20, and you have to wait 30 days after that happens. For an example, you can earn $10 in May, and $15 in June, you will receive a check in July of $25.

So, wait. You’re telling me that Create Space is for paperback publication –

Correct! Their standard size is 6x9 but you can choose which size you want. Personally, I don’t have very many 6x9 books so I found that odd to be the standard size.

So let’s get clear ONE MORE TIME! Create Space is for Paper Back, if someone wants to offer an eBook, is that done through KDP then? Meaning they would have to sign up for Create Space and KDP?

Yes! Well, both sides do both, which is funny, but doing them separately is better in my opinion. KDP for eBooks and CreateSpace for paperbacks. They are designed to cater to that type of format, and therefore are the better option. In other words, KDP does better eBooks, and CreateSpace does better Paperbacks. It is like asking a turkey farmer to grow you a tomato.

                                            

YES! LEARNING MOMENT! Oprah AH-HA moments. Love it! I feel like many writers can appreciate this advice, thank you SO SO SO MUCH!

Knowing is half the battle! Why do you think Tyrion Lannister is still alive and so many other people are dead?

Okay so that was essentially piece of advice number 1, what would be your second piece of advice for new authors and writers?

My second piece of advice comes down to pre-orders. Here’s the situation. If you want to do a pre-order of paperbacks, CreateSpace limits that to only a few days in advance, while KDP lets you pick a much longer time (weeks even) Some people like to fiddle with the system, making an account on Amazon Advantage, and stuff, but that didn’t work for me. It actually messed up my listing for several weeks.

Okay, pause, let’s back this up. What is Amazon Advantage?

There is a site that connects factories that makes products with Amazon, like say you have a factory that makes teddy bears, and you want to connect that to Amazon, you make an account and it links the orders to your factory.

How does that relate to books and publishing?

You can make a listening for anything, like books, and link it to your ISBN so it’ll theoretically tell CreateSpace to print books when people order one, but the work-around is people put the book up for pre-order on Amazon Advantage and then cancel the listening right before the book releases, and that is just so hinky to me. I can’t imagine that actually working without a hitch.

I never knew that! So to all new writers, be wary when you are preparing your pre-order sales!

Oh by the way, this is a private note for CreateSpace if they are reading this: fix the pre-order time limit so people don’t have to do that.

Hey, if enough people, LIKE, COMMENT, SHARE AND SUBSCRIBE, we can totally get CreateSpace to maybe fix this ;) What is your third piece of advice?

My third piece of advice involves CreateSpace. When you make a book on there, it gives you six channels of distribution, Amazon, Amazon.eu, the CreateSpace Store (because people totally buy from there, NOT!), book stores and online retailers, libraries and academic institutions, and CreateSpace direct. My advice: DO NOT check mark bookstores and online retailers, or CreateSpace Direct. I had to find this out the extremely hard way.

Uh, oh. What happens girl? What happens and why?

If you put those on your distribution channels, that means online retailers can buy your book in bulk, or sell it online in their store, and you do not get full amount of royalties for it. My book is $9.99 normal price. Out of that, I make $2.14 per purchase. If someone buys from retailers, other than the official $9.99, I get $0.14. That is not the best part. The best part is that they can sell their copy for less than the official one, so no one will buy the one that gets you your royalties. I thought it would be fine letting other retailers sell my book, since it theoretically means bookstores will buy it, but it’s not worth it.

I feel like NO ONE is talking about this. I would easily be convinced as well!

It was devastating to my sales. I have no idea how many paperbacks were sold that way, and it will take over a month to rectify after I turned off that sales channel. And yet, there is still a cheaper copy than my official one. Always buy the official one people! PAY THE EXTRA DOLLARS! It matters more than you can ever imagine!

I am BLOWN away by this. I am so grateful for you sharing this message! Do you have a fourth piece of advice?

YES! It is so hard to get a cover made if you lack the skills, which most authors do. We write, we don’t design! Most companies want several hundred dollars up front. Meaning, in order to make any money off of your eBook, you need to sell almost 100 copies to at least break even. So, I discovered this little gem, called Fiverr. It is a website for digital services. Care to guess how much my book cover for Knight of the Hunted costed?

Yes! Please share.

Guess!

$75?

HA! Guess again.

$50?

$30!!!! That included being given the source file and the CreateSpace paperback cover. ARE YOU SHOCKED?

$30 for something SO BEAUTIFUL!

Right? Everything on that site starts at $5, so extras are extra money. You can still get an amazing cover for $5 though.  One like mine is $15, if you don’t need the source file or a paperback cover. Having a good cover is crucial, I really hope more people will learn about Fiverr.

Wow! That is amazing. Does anyone else even know about this!? You are handing down $100,000 worth of advice!

I take PayPal ya’ll ;)

Do you have one last piece of advice? One last piece – for all new writers and authors. Something that is so important and detrimental. Something that you wish you knew.

Page numbers. Do NOT forget to put page numbers on your paperback! I totally forgot to do that. Woops! I ordered one author copy for myself and just, where are the page numbers? OH MY GOSH WHERE ARE THE PAGE NUMBERS? Oh yeah. I forgot them. They’re a little helpful. So you can say, “I was on page 42” instead of “the page where they were doing the thing.”

I can only imagine!

One last tip – don’t give up, ever! I know that this hard, and you feel like you have no idea what you’re doing. Just don’t give up. You will have the copy in your hands one day and it will all be worth it.

I adore that piece of advice. I totally agree with you. Many people often get lost and lose their motivation and confidence. You have to stick with it!

I almost did several times because I just felt so lost. But you can do it, trust in yourself! Once you do it one time, it will be easy peasy!

Yes! I love that piece of advice, I think it’s so important for everyone to let this soak in.

Are you ready for a little fun? What I am going to do is ask you a series of questions, you have to answer with your FIRST answer in your mind. This is all about getting to know the writer, Lizzie Dunlap.

Peanut Butter or Jelly?

Both

Wings or No Wings?

Wings

Game of Thrones or LotR?

Sorry, Legolas, GoT.

Pokemon or Digimon?

Pffft. Pokemon, duh!

Your Favorite Author?

Gail Carson Levine

Your favorite written character?

Claire Danvers from Morganville Vampires

Favorite Color?

Blue

Favorite line or quote?

“I am a man” he told her, “and men do not consume pink beverages. Get thee gone woman, and bring me something brown.” -  Cassandra Clare, City of Glass

Disney or Nickelodeon?

Disney Movies, Nickelodeon TV Shows.

Yes or No?

Yes, it makes me feel like I won someone over!

1 Fun Fact About You!

I collect playing cards!

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Thank you so much for checking out my interview with the ever-so-amazing Lizzie Dunlap. Please take the time to share this information with as many writers as possible. If you have any questions or comments, please comment below! We would love to hear from you! If you are seeking more books on this information, check out the following:

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