Self-Publishing II

As promised, in this article I’ll give my reviews of the most popular self-publishing services. Where possible, I’ll include practical tips on how to use them, plus my personal statistics/data from using them.

Besides KDP, all of these services are aggregators. In other words, they help distribute your book to hundreds of actual bookstores. (They’re not a webshop themselves.) This is recommended, as otherwise you’d have to manually re-upload the same files to all those hundred locations yourself!

You can create your own account and deliver your books to places like Apple Books or Barnes & Nobles yourself. But it’s much faster and easier to let an aggregator deliver it to everywhere with a single click of a button.

Amazon KDP

Kindle Direct Publishing is the biggest and most famous distributor. Amazon sells 90+% of all books, so their own self-publishing service is probably the first place to look. (It’s also why I make an exception for this service as the only non-aggregator on the list.)

Honestly … it’s just fine?

Its advantages are …

• Registration and uploading a book is quick and easy
• The interface, although minimal and bland, is more than usable enough
• Completely free. (Even ISBN is free.)
• Its statistics are very in-depth, though not necessarily clear to a beginner.
• Does what it’s supposed to do and gets your book in several Amazon webstores very rapidly.
• High royalties for you.

Its disadvantages are … that it doesn’t do much more than that. There are no bells and whistles. There are no extra features or nice things to have, such as a great online book editor.

It does what it’s supposed to do, with minimal steps or interface in between.

Now, you get the option between being “exclusive” with KDP or not. Exclusivity means your book is only allowed to sell on Amazon (for the first year or so), but you get much higher royalties in return.

I never chose that option—though I was tempted—because I hate exclusivity or restrictiveness. But it’s an important option to think about.

For me, personally, this has been my weakest seller. Maybe I’m doing something wrong or not taking full advantage of Amazon, but other distributors/marketplaces do much more for me.

My Bestseller

Most of my Dutch books were published here. They are entirely POD: print on demand. You never pay anything beforehand, but simply receive a small royalty on each book sold.

Their advantages are …

• Very clean interface that I (mostly) enjoyed using.
• In the Netherlands, it’s connected to the biggest book suppliers. So my books were automatically available in all webshops and presented to all major book stores (who can choose whether to include it in their offerings or not).
• Cheaper than many alternatives.*

Their disadvantages are …

• A very minimal and ugly webshop.
• You have to buy your own ISBN (for each version of each book) at 13 euros.
• Local only. (In my case, my books were only distributed automatically to Dutch book stores.)
• The price you can ask for each book is significantly higher than anywhere else.

I was quite satisfied with them for years. Why did I move away from them?

• When comparing prices, I found that I could sell my next book for 12 euros somewhere else, while the minimum price (making zero profit) at MB was 19 euros.
• There wasn’t a fast and clean way to provide multiple versions (such as paperback + ebook + audiobook) of the same project. You’d have to redo all that work every time, buying a new ISBN for each, and it’s just annoying.
• I started writing English fiction. It just made no sense to confine myself to Dutch webshops.

I wrote a long Dutch article about how to use the service and my experiences: MyBestseller (a review and explanation)

I wrote a similar article about Brave New Books, although that is only available in the Netherlands and I do not recommend using it: Brave New Books (a review and explanation)

Finally, I wrote an article about Pumbo (a large book printer located in the Netherlands): Pumbo (a review and explanation). I concluded that it’s really more a printer (in case you want to print 1000 copies of your book yourself and distribute them using your own shop) than a publisher and should be used as such.

Draft2Digital

After lots of research, this is the platform on which I settled for my English fiction going forward. (I also published my last Dutch stories there, partially to “test” it, partially because it felt like the better service.)

Its advantages are …

• Free to use. Even ISBN is given out for free.
• Easy way to turn any book into different versions (paperback, ebook, audiobook).
• Lots of control over price, distributors, layout, description, categorization.
• The books themselves can be priced way more competitively (than most other services).
• A free revision (to cover or content) once every 90 days.

Its disadvantages are …

• No hardcover.
• No color content within print books.
• Buying your own “test copy” is absurdly expensive.
• The interface isn’t that pretty or clean.
• Feels unfinished or amateurish at some points. (Such as that you need to send an email to a specific address, with some template copy about rights, to tell them you are allowed to publish on Amazon.) They are very much “we distribute your book, fine, but you have to setup everything else yourself”.

You never guessed it—I wrote a Dutch article about my whole experience. Read it on my author website: Draft2Digital (a review and explanation).

Compared to other services

The results of this switch are …

• Publishing books literally costs nothing. (Because the ISBN is free.)
• I can sell my books for 5+ euros less than previously. (While making more profit on each sale.)
• A much quicker and more painless road from draft to publication.

The downside is the somewhat ugly and clunky interface. It means I often misclicked, or thought a button did something … but it did something else entirely, or I was confused about the order in which information needed to be delivered.

So far, I have little to complain about.

With MyBestseller, my initial sales spiked (first hour/day of release), but almost completely vanished afterwards. With this service, sales are more consistent across a longer period of time. (I do want to note that I haven’t done any marketing for my Dutch test stories, besides making an announcement on my personal blog.)

But I haven’t really stress tested it enough. That will happen in the coming years (2024+), as more than 10 books are planned to be released using their service.

Final remarks

Whenever there’s an issue, D2D has always sent me an email with a pretty clear explanation about what it was.

Similarly, they have an EPUB checker tool which reports errors and why an EPUB might be rejected (by them or other stores). Initially, this is pretty terse and minimal. But there’s a button get the full error log with the details, which has helped me solve numerous problematic cases.

D2D is not without errors or unexplained kinks in the process. But they’ve always sent me a clear email about the issue, which allowed me to fix it fast and before they officially sent out the files.

IngramSpark

IngramSpark uses a different model: you pay per book.

This pricing used to be quite high. About 50+ dollars per version, so if you wanted a print and ebook version you’d already pay a 100 dollars.

Over the years, however, this price has gone done, until recently they’ve become free. It remains to be seen whether it stays that way or has some nasty side-effects.

The advantages are …

• Wider reach (more retailers and distributors)
• More physical options (including a hardcover version and color printing)
• A pretty clean and modern interface and statistics report

The disadvantages are …

• It has a book-building tool, but it’s pretty awful. (Just like the general interface.)
• It toes the line between self-publishing and vanity press, asking (sometimes exorbitant) fees for many parts of the process.
• For example, any revision (after an initial free period) to the cover or content costs 25 euros.
• It takes a pretty large chunk out of your profit, larger than some other services.
• There are endless anecdotes of things going wrong, both major and minor, by users of the service. (At the same time, they seem to be improving every year and listen to feedback.)

I know many people who have used it and read many reviews/explainers. I have never used it myself. So this information is based on my research and other people’s experience.

This was a clear no-go for me before, with the huge fees everywhere. But now that it’s mostly free and more lenient, it has at least become an option.

Publish Drive

Finally, Publish Drive is an option that many seem to forget. Perhaps because it’s quite clearly aimed at more experienced writers (those that have funds or a fanbase already), not beginning writers.

It uses another new system: you pay a monthly fee (depending on how many books you’re offering).

Its advantages are …

• A website and interface that seems the most slick and modern to me.
• 100% royalties.
• Large number of distributors. (Although that’s usually more a marketing ploy than something essential, as most books are sold at the big 5 or 10 stores anyway.)
• If you go full pro (most expensive subscription), there are some neat options for professionals. (Such as reading, uploading and changing books through an API instead of their interface. Or bulk managing books.)
• A bit more focus and tools for marketing and sales. (Although most is still barebones or requires extra payment anyway.)

Its disadvantages are …

• A steep price for the limited features you get in return.
• The old trick of withholding very basic and useful functionality when you only subscribe to the “cheap basic version”.

Honestly, during all my research I could find hardly anything concrete about the service. It just seems … solid. No real mistakes or bad parts, but that’s probably why you pay a high monthly price.

This seems most suitable if you …

• Are certain your books are going to sell well. (So the monthly fee is fine, and you want to keep 100% of the royalties.)
• Just want everything out of your hands. (Trade money for your own time, energy or troubles.)

Conclusion

For beginning writers, a combination like Amazon KDP and Draft2Digital seems wise. No upfront costs, not even hidden costs, just a very simple and minimal distributor. You can get your book out there without worrying.

Once you get more experienced—and perhaps have the funds or the fanbase—you can switch to more expensive services. Those that have better quality printing and more options. Those that aren’t plagued by countless bad reviews about how things went wrong again.

I am, honestly, not at that point yet. I’ve sold a lot of (different) books with self-publishing, but I’m not selling enough to go all out. For now, I’m sticking to the free and simple options, because you don’t really need more. (Also because I like doing everything myself and mostly have the skills to do so.)

Marketing will never be done by such a service. It has to be done by you—or your publisher, if you publish traditionally. Tiny features (perhaps missing in some services or a bonus in others) also aren’t a deal-breaker for most books.

I guess the biggest take-away is: don’t be misled by shiny lights or marketing. It’s absolutely possible to self-publish all over the world for no upfront cost. Paying a lot (either per book or every month) is no guarantee your book will do any better or the system behind the distribution is somehow magically perfect.