There was an interesting article in yesterday's
Guardian reflecting on the survey into self (or
Indie) publishing recently conducted by the
Taleist web site. Taleist's founder, journalist Steven Lewis, asked one thousand and seven correspondents sixty one questions and from their answers was able to glean a number of interesting facts:
- Genre -- writers of romance made 170% of the Indie average income, science fiction 38%, fantasy 32% and literary fiction 20%.
- Output - the highest earners produced approximately five hundred words a day more than their less successful colleagues and spent on average 24% more time on each word they wrote.
- Investment - Indie writers who paid for professional help with editing, copy editing and proof reading earned 13% more than those who didn't and money spent on professional cover design increased profits by 34%.
Apart from the light shed on the popularity of romantic fiction, it seems to me that the most salient point to emerge from the survey is a simple and yet profound truth: in literature, as in life, you get out what you put in. Writers who self-publish successfully invest more of their time and their money in their work.
Lesson learnt.
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