Indie Publishing vs. Self-Publishing: An Honest Comparison

Publishing a book is like building a house. Self-publishing is like being your own general contractor who must hire and manage all the subcontractors. Indie publishing is hiring a general contractor who already has an experienced and vetted team of subcontractors ready to go.

So the choice is cobbling together your own team to publish a book, or hiring an experienced team with a process to ensure success. There are many nitty gritty details that go into publishing a book that represents you well.

As a self-published author, you’ll need to hire a number of professionals to get your book ready for sale. If you work with a publisher, they will take most of these tasks off your plate. Either way, remember, the author is always responsible for marketing the book. This is true with traditional publishing, indie publishing, and self-publishing.

If you are a do-it-yourselfer, self-publishing may be for you. If all goes right you can spend less money. However, mistakes can be costly, and you do not know what you do not know.

With self-publishing you get a bigger share of the royalties and the lowest author price on the book. With an indie published book you get the major share of the royalties, and the hope is with their help you will sell more books and make more money in the long run.

But please, if you go the self-publishing route, do not say your book is self-published. That is a marketing kiss of death. Instead, create a publishing house name and make the book appear as if it were published by a third party. This is marketing advice, not legal advice.