The Amazon Way Of Self-Publishing

 The Amazon Way Of Self-Publishing 

At the beginning of the 1990s the World Wide Web was invented and it went live to the world.

From this time on it helped to popularise the internet.

The way that humanity communicated was changed for evermore and a vast accumulation of information became available like never before. 

The way that people thought, connected and created changed in a world transformed.

A world transformed

Google, PayPal, Facebook, YouTube, Amazon became the new household names.

Email, social media, immediate access to information, the sharing of photographs, online networking, new ways of navigating, all became the norm.

No longer was the telephone a simple form of communication it became a computer. People could use a phone to send emails, access the internet, produce documents, read books, take photographs, be a GPS, a pedometer, and so much more.

Everything we now do is done on the internet. It’s become etched into our lives and psychology, and the way we interact with each other has changed for ever.

Publishing

The internet has transformed the world of publishing. The traditional domain of mainstream publishing houses has been challenged by new concepts such as print-on-demand (POD), electronic books, fast self-publishing, online distribution and selling.

No longer do authors have to try to find a publisher because they can now self-publish the fast way and profit from publishing their own books.

In 1995 the traditional bookstore was challenged by the launch of amazon.com.

Fast self-publishing online

This revolution in the publishing industry has impacted my own story. For many years I wrote for a very defined niche market and worked through traditional, internationally renowned publishers.

I produced many books.

I dreamed of setting up my own publishing house and creating and publishing my own books. But I hesitated.  

The heavy costs of printing, managing large print runs, storage issues, and the challenges of distribution were factors that inhibited my move into self-publishing.

I was fearful. Self-publishing books in this era required a substantial financial investment as you had to pay up-front for thousands of copies. I worried about the consequences of books not selling.

Today, the publishing world has undergone a revolution and we now have the concept of fast self-publishing online.  

In 2012 a friend introduced to me to the idea of self-publishing on Amazon. She said just do it. Follow the prompts. It’s that easy!

I had a manuscript ready so I dived in knowing nothing about internet marketing or how to do anything on Amazon. 

In January 2014 I published by first book on Amazon Staying Young Growing Old.

Indeed this was a turning point in my life and I started to explore this exciting new world of selling things online.

A disrupted book industry

The Internet disrupted the book industry. In the early 1990s authors didn’t sell their books online but going forward thirty years most books are now sold this way.  

Many authors started to break away from with their publishers and they started to explore the new way of publishing. 

Amazon was the game changer.

Today, there is a freedom like never before. Authors are liberated as they can access new ways to publishing their creations.

• No longer does an author have to go to painstaking efforts to get past the gatekeepers to land a traditional publishing deal.

• No longer does an author have to experience rejections from publishers, become discouraged, and then feel they should give up all thoughts of publishing a book

• No longer do authors have to be offered such such low royalties that they wonder if it is even possible to see how they can make any money out of publishing a book

• No longer do authors have to be at the mercy of some publishers who offer draconian contracts like wanting to own the copyright of their work, and if the writer reluctantly agrees, they lose  control of their intellectual property rights.

•  No longer do authors have to worry about doing a large print run.

• No longer is storage and a distribution an issue.

All of these challenges are now history.

The new way to publish

Authors can now experience the ecstasy of having their first book published with the modern way of publishing which has been made possible by the internet revolution. For many it is a dream come true.

Not only that but authors now have a fresh gateway to future income opportunities.

With the whole new world of self-publishing opening up authors are now empowered as they take control of their publishing process.

Sources

The following sources were consulted for this article.

Huffman, J. D. “How the internet changed books forever”  22 Feb 2019 https://www.moireepubs.com

Marji Hill