MINDING YOUR OWN BUSINESS

Starting any new business is hard...and expensive. In addition to all the "regular" costs, there are hidden ones that crop up, making you question if you're really ready to take on the challenge of creating a new enterprise from scratch.

#Freelancing is a lot like that. Many mistakenly believe you just open a new social media account, announce you're "open for business" and the money and clients come flooding in.

But like any new business, starting a freelance gig requires some strategic planning and some cash outlay. Those business cards are not free. You may need hardware/software updates to do the job. You might need to build a network of service providers who can do parts of the job you can’t or don’t have time to accomplish. For writers and editors, like me, whose services literally come out of our heads, there are all sorts of things that require payment to do the job. As my tax preparer reminds me annually, SURELY you have more expenses than that. (And I do.)

Recently, I've delved more into the #self-publishing side of the book world. I continue to be stunned that writers planning to self-publish their books don't grasp a basic fact: that they're essentially opening a new business. And that requires understanding how a business works; in this case, how a publishing business works.

Some writers believe that, once they’ve written the manuscript, the rest takes care of itself through some online publishing system. After all, that’s what traditional publishing does: it takes care of all the parts and pieces, from editing, designing the cover, printing and distribution to legal issues, promotions and all the rest. These writers believe they can be the next E.L. James – rich, famous, successful in a seemingly effortless act of writing just the right book.

Discussions in online book communities highlight the lack of knowledge of the myriad aspects of getting a book from the writer’s head to the reader’s hands, despite the availability of a vast amount of background information on Google! However, knowing the steps required and acting on them are two separate stages of the process. A self-publisher must take on responsibility for all those tasks for themselves, but they’re not necessarily trained for or experienced in those skillsets.

Some writers believe they can magically become graphic designers, editors, legal consultants and business managers – not to mention PR and advertising consultants – without any skills beyond watching a YouTube video or two. Or worse, they can just “make do” and everything will be fine. (Cue the inevitable whining in subsequent posts about not selling any books.)

For those bemoaning their lack of success or, in one recent post I saw, worried about copyright violations, the obvious response is to hire people who know how to do the things you don’t or can’t get to. If you’re running a restaurant, you don’t cook, clean, wait tables, run the cash register, empty the trash, balance the books all yourself. You may be able to do most of those jobs, but you can’t get it all done. (Or you might be a good business manager but a lousy cook!) No, you hire qualified staff to do their specific jobs, the same as in any business.

Mention this, and you’ll get the inevitable, “But I can’t afford it.” How can you afford to start a business without money? Will you get investors? Or are you just going to attempt to do it yourself, with the results I just mentioned? Every freelancer could recite a litany of “I didn’t realize I’d need to pay for this” and “You wouldn’t believe how much it cost me to get that” items. And sometimes, you’re hiring services that you can’t do yourself. I’m not a graphic designer or website builder; I have to pay people for that!

Working for yourself brings its own unique benefits; most people cite control of the decision-making process as one of them. And that’s one that many self-publishers-to-be name as their reason for not going the traditional route; they want to control all aspects of the process. But they also must be versed in all aspects of the process to succeed.

 Working for yourself also has its challenges, including financial requirements; you just can’t do something for nothing. And until self-publishing writers understand this, they will continue to wonder why their books aren’t doing better.

I don’t mean to disparage self-published authors. I know several who are very successful, but they are so because either they have skills and experience in all those areas or they’re smart enough to know they DON’T and hire the right people to do the job. They fully appreciate that they are running a business and require a variety of types of services to get the product to consumers.

For anyone contemplating the freelance life – or self-publishing the book they’re almost finished writing – I’d say this: DO YOUR HOMEWORK. Figure out what you can legitimately and professionally do yourself, then hire out the rest. If you say you can’t afford to, then you’re probably not ready to run your own business yet. Make a plan that will lead you to that point, then work the plan.