Do only traditionally published books become bestsellers?
We all have this firm belief in mind that only traditionally published books can become bestsellers. We believe it is the big publisher's tag that can help drive book sales. We believe traditional publishers know how to make your book a bestseller.
We also believe that bookstores help drive enormous sales and thus huge royalties for authors.
Let these beliefs remain beliefs while I talk about facts that I have witnessed being in the self publishing industry for quite a few years now. While these beliefs may be true in certain cases but cannot be generalised for all published books.
1.Self published books become bestsellers too. It is the unique, novel content meant for a wide audience that can help your book to sell well and thus make your book a bestseller. Knowledge of the trending topics or topics that would become significant in the near future, based on certain policies being implemented, any changes in the system happening, any new business aspects taking shape, changes in the education system, industry-related shifts, etc. can drive your book to sell, if written taking the trending topics into consideration. It is for this sole reason that literary agents from traditional publishers chase famous authors to write on the trending topics for them.
2.No publisher's tag can guarantee your book to be a bestseller. Only a few of the traditionally published books become bestsellers, not all. It is impossible for each book that is published traditionally to be a bestseller. As the trends in the publishing industry have changed, books published by self publishing houses can be seen topping the sales charts of prominent ecommerce channels. What if the author is a first-timer and the publisher has less than a decade of experience? These aspects do not hold any significance if the final output i.e. the book is par excellence both in terms of content, designing and printing. It is the final quality product that sells no matter who wrote it or who published it.
3.Ideally, traditionally published books are the best, minutely reviewed and then chosen typescripts from thousands or lakhs of submissions made daily to publishers. With such a stringent selection criteria in place, one would definitely expect quality content. And thus, such quality content should have a fair chance of performing well in the market. That is why, the typescript was selected for publishing in the first place. In self publishing industry, there are no significant checks in place and almost every writing is published. Since quality is found only in few published books, the percentage of bestselling books accordingly seems low. But do not forget the fact that less than 5% of submissions make it to traditional publisher's catalogue. For the remaining 95%, self publishing can be the route. It should no way be assumed that all the 95% books are below average or of poor quality. I have seen several of our books become bestsellers and remain at the top ranks for several months. White Falcon Publishing is proud to have published these books.
4. Traditional publishers have been the rulers of the publishing industry for decades. They have seen this industry inside out and drive it accordingly. They have successfully delivered amazing books to the readers and thus are expected to have significant budgets that they can allocate to their future publications. Thus, one would expect better publicity and marketing by them. Self publishing is still a young bud in nascent stages. Started by entrepreneurs without any huge backing, such firms have limited budgets to allocate to market their books. Still, we at White Falcon Publishing, try to invest as much as we can in any manner to help promote and market our books and authors. But definitely, these budgets cannot be matched with those of big publishers.
Check our bestsellers to get an idea about the work being done by us at White Falcon.
From the Director’s desk
Navsangeet Kaur