It’s been a wild, unpredictable, scary, and heartbreaking adventure, and I wouldn’t change a minute!
Welcome to my journey into the self-publishing world.
When I first started in the self-publishing world, I was as green as they came. I knew nothing about the self-publishing world. It was the first industry I began working in after switching careers.
I came from an emergency services background, so publishing was all very new to me. My first job as a freelancer was for a hybrid publisher in Maryland. I worked as a project manager and handled everything. I organized the editors, formatters, and cover designers and ensured the author’s books were loaded to various platforms. During my almost two years with this company, I developed an interest in formatting.
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My Journey Into Formatting and Book Design
Formatting isn’t a career you can go back to school for, as far as I know, as it’s not a career you probably ever heard of before you entered the publishing world.
I started in Word, but it quickly became apparent that I couldn’t format the books as intended. Sure, they were formatted, but they weren’t nearly as professional as they should be.
When I switched to Adobe InDesign, it almost stopped me in my tracks. What a learning curve!
InDesign is really confusing at first, but after months of training, I became more efficient with it. However, I’m still learning even now, years later, and InDesign will throw me a curveball now and again.
I love the aspect of taking a dull Word file and turning it into something clean and professional-looking. But my love is, and always will be, children’s books. I love the planning of the illustrations through to the text placement. I love watching it all come together, going from illustration and text to a beautiful children’s book that a child somewhere in the world will enjoy or even cherish.
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Our Author Journey Into the Self-Publishing World
It’s probably why my husband and I naturally fell into creating and self-publishing our children’s books. We’ve been going strong now since 2016. We initially started with nonfiction books, but quickly transitioned into children’s books.
Our other books were a step into the self-publishing world, but our children’s books were a giant leap! Wow, did we make mistakes in the early days? I won’t even tell you how many times we have had our books edited over the years.
We were on a tight budget when we started, so we tried to do everything as cheaply as possible. We used freelancers on Fiverr or Upwork for almost all of our editing at the time. While there are some great freelancers, the ones we found unfortunately weren’t.
We later discovered that we needed to refine our editing after receiving some negative reviews—nothing like a 1-star review to prompt a rethink of your budget philosophy.
I could handle the formatting, but editing is definitely out of my realm and my husband’s.
When we found Mary Metcalfe, she saved me from giving up. She helped take my small team at Indie Publishing Group to the next level by finding the right people with excellent editing skills.
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Indie Publishing Group and Beyond
I created Indie Publishing Group for my clients who wanted everything in one place.
My clients didn’t want to work with multiple companies or jump from person to person to get their book created.
So, once I had my editors in place, I moved on to hiring illustrators, writers, and cover designers. I have added more services over the years to assist our authors with their publishing goals and to try to create a streamlined process that’s affordable yet still delivers a fantastic end product.
Our team has grown over the years, with some people leaving and others joining, but the core of our work has remained unchanged. They can take an author’s idea and create the most fantastic story and illustrations that bring their ideas to life.
When you start in the self-publishing world, it’s like being a deer in the headlights. You have so much information coming from all different directions, and it’s up to you to figure out what works for you and what doesn’t. The goalposts are constantly moving, too, which means that as a self-published author, you need to change how you do things.
Join Me On My Journey In the Self-Publishing World – I’d Love to See You There!
Unfortunately, like every industry, self-publishing isn’t immune to people trying to take advantage of you or simply promising you the world and, in the end, delivering very little.
I honestly think all the mistakes we made in the early days have helped us spot these issues before our clients publish, so they’re benefiting from the experiences we’ve been through.
I know that budget is always the first thing we think of as a self-published author, but remember that once you publish, you can’t remove bad reviews. It’s hard to take back a book once it’s out there, and bad reviews can sink even the best story.
If it takes you a few months longer to publish while you save for a bigger budget, then take the time. You’ll 100% be happier with a book you didn’t rush or cut corners on, and your readers will appreciate it.
They stay forever. So, in the excitement of releasing your book, make sure it’s as professional as possible. In the beginning, you only have a few reviews, and the bad ones will be in people’s view, which can decrease your chance of future sales.
Until next time, keep writing, keep dreaming, and I hope to welcome you to the self-publishing world soon!
Chrissy Hobbs (Sam Lawrence Author)
Owner of Indie Publishing Group, successful Self-Published Author, but a terrible editor!
If you are writing a book and need any assistance with paperback or ebook formatting, cover design, professional editing, uploading to self-publishing sites such as Amazon KDP and IngramSpark, or Amazon KDP keyword and category research, please don’t hesitate to contact us. We also offer children’s book illustrations and formatting services.
Our experienced and professional self-publishing team is standing by to assist you with your self-publishing dreams.
