Few Unavoidable Costs Of Publishing A Book

The work of an author doesn’t end with writing a book. A good author always wishes that the look and feel of his book should give a real-life sort of experience to the readers.

Doing that doesn’t come for free. As an author, you will have to incur some unavoidable costs for publishing a book to make your dream come true. 

For that you will have to keep in mind the following costs of publishing a book: 

1. Editing

Editing your book is the most common of all the costs of publishing a book. 

Editings are of varied kinds viz. Copy editing, character development, proofreader, developmental editing, so on and so forth. 

You will need a copy editor to take care of your grammar as well as a developmental editor to run a check on the overall picture from structure, content, characters, etc.  

The cost really depends on the genre of your book. An example of that is if you have written on a historical topic that requires an in-depth study and fact check of an era – it will cost you higher than a fictional book editing. 

The work done by each of these editors is unique and vital for your book to come out impeccably. Hence, you cannot skip on anyone.

Each of these editing processes is going to cost you.  

2. Designing your cover-page 

In the real world, most times a book is judged by its cover. So, ensure that you pay attention to this element.  

The cover page of your book will be your first interaction with the reader and you do not want to miss a chance of creating an impression. 

Hire an experienced designer who can understand the essence of your book and design the cover and its graphics accordingly. 

Your cover page designing cost is amongst those costs of publishing a book that you do not want to cut down. 

3. Formatting Cost – costs of publishing a book

The interior of your book is as important as its exterior. 

The formatting cost in a book is essentially designing the interior part of your book. This will include layout, typeset, font size and style, the dimension length and width of any pictures, etc. 

The interior of any book should be eye-pleasing and that part is taken care of by the formatters.

The cost of publishing a book will depend majorly on the length of your book, images used, etc. 

4. Marketing cost

We live in a digital world where we are more connected to technology than humans. Social media is a huge part of our lives and it is also at the centre of all marketing techniques. 

Once you have written a book it is time for you to sell it. And for that, you need to create visibility for your book for which you can opt for various marketing methods. 

You can either hire a marketing agency or can do it yourself. 

Easy are a few cost-effective methods for marketing your book:

• Social Media Posts – Create an account on all possible social media platforms if you haven’t already. Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Telegram, Clubhouse, literally everywhere. 

A few months from the launch of your book, start engaging with your audience by posting regularly and being active. 

This will help you in increasing your followers base. The larger the follower base the better. 

Once your book is published, keep posting about it in different ways. Do not forget to use hashtags as they are game-changers. 

• Pay Influencers to market your book – In case, if you do not have a huge following then you can get in touch with influencers and pay them to promote your book. 

This can help even if you do have the following base. These people can help you spread the word far and wide. 

• Paid Ads – Have you witnessed talking about something and then later seeing ads about those products or services on your timeline? Well, it is not much of a coincidence. 

You can shortlist the websites that you feel have readers as visitors and pay to advertise your book there. Just ensure that you shortlist websites with good traffic. 

• Blog Marketing – In case if you have a blog then you can showcase your book on your blog. 

5. Printing – costs of publishing a book

Most self-published authors are choosing to go for an e-book in which case the cost of publishing a book can be completely eliminated. 

Nonetheless, it is essential to keep this cost in mind. 

Alternatively, if you choose to go for an e-book then there are many platforms that let you publish your book at zero cost. Printing cost is a huge chunk of your overall cost which can be completely avoided. 

Suggested Read – Here Is A Simple Guide On How To Become A Self-Published Author

6. Obtaining your international standard book number

This is the inevitable cost of publishing a book – obtaining an international standard book number for your book. 

For those who do not know, an international standard book number is a 13 digit unique number assigned to a book. 

You can obtain it from any renowned establishment or agency. 

Conclusion

Given above are those costs of publishing a book that one cannot avoid. But the actual numbers usually depend on the genre, and length of the book.