Publishing Realities at a Big House

David Kent, CEO with HarperCollins Canada, spoke at the Humber School for Writers about the realities of publishing, starting with the statement that publishing is a business and must make a profit or it will not exist.

Most books that are published don’t sell more than a hundred copies. That’s the reality. Publishers take all the risks and with that in mind, they publish a range of books. It’s similar to an investment portfolio where you want to have a range of stocks and bonds to minimize the risk.

Publishers are looking for good writing, whether it’s commercial writing or literary writing.

If you want to be published, get to know editors and editors’ assistants. How? Ask writers about their editors. Ask them who they’ve worked with. Look at the Acknowledgment page at the back of their books. Who are they thanking? Try to figure out if your book is a good match with an editor’s expertise.

Take advantage of any opportunity to introduce yourself to an editor. For example, if you are attending a workshop and editors are there making presentations, just go up after the talk and introduce yourself. If you have a finished product, tell them about it.

The pitch. When someone asks you what your novel is about, you should be able to tell them in three sentences. Prepare your pitch in advance. Ask your friends, “Does this sound good? Too timid? Too egotistical?” Don’t oversell your work. Don’t undersell it. Just answer the question: What’s your book about?

An advance is important, no doubt about it, but even more important are royalties. The bottom line is that you want people to buy your book. Do everything you can to get the word out.

Build your author platform before your book comes out. What’s an author platform? It’s anything that tells the world that you are an author and you have a book. It’s networking and it comes in many forms from the traditional word of mouth – tell your friends – to social media like Twitter or Blogger.

The good news? Publishers are looking for good writers. They want to find you.