How to Become a Self-Published Author by Anna Bergfors

I was so inspired to read Cassandra Brunstedt’s article  “10 Steps to Become an Author” at Business & Dreams Online Magazine so I wanted to write an article about how to become a self-published author.

As Cassandra wrote, one of three Swedes has dreams about being an author and write a book, but unfortunately most of us will never be published, even though we have fantastic stories to tell, stories that deserve to become books. 

In this post, I would like to share with you how I proceeded when I published my book via so-called self-publishing.

The traditional way of publishing books is that book publishers publish books, but it is often very difficult to get a publishing contract as many are called but few are selected…

I contacted eight book publishers when I decided to publish my book and all these eight publishers said "Thank you, but no thank you".

But because I was so determined to publish my book since it was so important to me, I decided to do it myself!

I used a company called Books on Demand in Germany (BoD) to publish my book “I. Have. No. Words. Left", (Jag. Har. Inga. Ord. Kvar” in Swedish).

My book is a poetic prose about being a relative to a person with drug addiction, with illustrations by my mother Ann-Margret Johansson Pettersson.

There are more similar companies that work with self-publishing, but I do not keep a close eye on the others. (Google self-publishing and you will probably find more if you are curious about that market).

It is important to understand the difference between a book publisher and a publishing company. A traditional book publisher takes all the costs (and risks) of publishing. If a writer gets their book published via a traditional book publisher, it is the publisher who is responsible for everything, unlike if you make your own publication where the writer (you) are responsible for all costs.

I used BoD which is not a book publisher, they are a company. A company that offers layout help, setting up, marketing, production, printing and sales of the book the author wants to publish.

One reason why I chose BoD is that I do not know layout, setting etc. But if you are good at that, you can do the work yourself and just let BoD print the book.

So what I did was that I submitted my script in word and the illustrations I wanted to include in my book. Then BoD did everything. Of course, we had a dialogue all the time and they came up with various proposals that I approved or asked them to change until I was satisfied with the result. You could say that what they do is produce a print original.

One thing that I think is really good, and sustainable, is that BoD uses print-on-demand, which means that there is no stock. My book is printed when a customer orders it via the internet.

BoD has its own website with an online shop where customers can buy my book and other books that BoD has on their site. Everyone who is there is a self-publisher. They also make sure that my book is for sale at other web-based bookstores such as Adlibris, CD/ON, Bokus, Amazon and others.

I have to do all the marketing of the book myself, which is an extensive job that takes time. You have to be prepared for that because the book does not sell by itself…

Since my book is not so comprehensive, rather a booklet than a book with its about 40 pages and soft cover, my book did not become super expensive. 

I earn a certain percentage on each book sold and I earn the most from customers buying the book via BoD over the others.

I am happy with BoD and think it was worth every penny and my first financial goal was to sell so many books that I get back the money I spend. And now I can say “check” at that goal.

The next step for me is to market the English version of my book to English speaking readers.

/Anna Bergfors, author