Attention Business Owners/Aspiring Authors: How To Have A Great Relationship With Your Publisher

Despite the recent surge in self-publishing, traditional publishers and small to mid-size publishing houses are still going to be around. Not every business owner can self-publish, nor does every one choose to. Therefore, traditional publishing is still a much-needed route to publishing.

So how do you work with a traditional publisher in this ever-changing publishing environment? Here are several practical tips, which come directly from my own experience as a publisher, and as an author. Some of these may sound obvious--but if you don’t get the basics right, don’t be surprised when your publisher doesn't renew or go forward with your contract.

As in any relationship, remember that publishers and authors are people like you.

1) Be honest with your publisher about submissions and conflicts of interests. In this day and age where the publishing industry is experiencing tremendous growth and change, publishers and their authors must be diligent about checking to see if there is a conflict, which can give rise to potential legal issues. There have been cases where even the largest publishers have published books unknowingly by their authors which have violated copyrights, have published their books elsewhere before, or was submitted to and published by different, separate publishers.

2) Promote as much as you can. A publisher can only do so much promotion for a book. Nowadays, authors are expected to do more.

3) Do not complain about your publisher. Believe it or not, publishers and editors eventually find out.

4) Be willing to make changes and go with edits that will make your book better.

5) Remember that a publisher’s time is important. The publisher is not there to teach you how to write or structure a book… you should already have that down. They will make certain edits, but don’t manipulate the time of a publisher. They won’t be happy if they consistently have to spend more time with you than they spend with other authors.

6) Be an enthusiastic marketer.

7) Be profession...

[Source: Fast Company]