Entrepreneur Publisher shares his letter to prospective client

 One of the many things I do is publish with my firm Ask Publishing LLC. 


I saw an opportunity in a series of messages my pastor recently presented and approached him with the following letter. I'm sharing it here before actually sending it so I can't tell you yet if we are working on the project together. 

The reason why I'm sharing it here is to let you know that if you are a writer that I may be interested in publishing your (family-friendly) work. 

Here's the letter I composed and sent; minus his contact details... 

Pastor,

I would like to pass an idea by you and see what you think after giving it thought and prayer.

One of the things I do as an entrepreneur is publishing, and I would like to publish your Bible Moments that Changed the World Series as a book; Kindle, paperback, and perhaps an audiobook later on.

I’m not sure how having a published book after your ministry ... would be for you, but if you think having one would be worthwhile, I’d like very much to discuss it. This may not result in much money but both the proceeds and your message would become a legacy as well.

Essentially the process would work like this.

If you have everything in a Word document, I could use that with minimum editing (changing up phrases like “last week” to “in the last chapter”, etc.) If not, I would have your actual sermons transcribed and edited from that. You would then have the final touch before it is published.

I would strongly suggest that you add an Intro and also a concluding chapter to what you already have.

Pictures would be minimal if at all. I would suggest an “about the author” with your picture at the back of the book. 

My company, Ask Publishing LLC would publish it on Amazon in both Kindle and Amazon’s paperback versions.

This would not be so much about money but your message. We should never approach a book project as a “big moneymaker” for either of us (there are fewer disappointments and only surprises that way). Most authors do not make any money with their books and only use them to promote other services. You can use the book as a “business card”, for giveaways, and also direct people to Amazon for purchase.

Doing a quick Google search, you’ll find that “Under standard royalties, an author gets roughly 20 to 30% of the publisher's revenue for a hardcover, 15% for a trade paperback, and 25% for an eBook. So, very roughly, every hardcover release that earns out brings the author something like 25% of all revenue earned by the publisher”. So if a book sells for $20, the publisher makes $5 and the author gets a buck from that five.

There is a lot of work to get your content into book form and published (see my The Chicken that Soared on Amazon) so if we choose to work together, we’ll split the profits 50/50 which maybe 50 cents to a buck a book; more or less. And since I’ll be working on this project while earning a living with other things, it may take 3 to 6 months to get this just right, and published.

There is more to discuss if you would like to move forward. All inspiration comes from above so I’m thinking that perhaps God gave me this idea, and I felt compelled to bring it to you.

I don’t know what your life plans are after ... and just how busy you may be immediately after leaving so if you want to table this to any time in the future, that’s fine too. However, if you have an interest in doing this, I suggest we start a discussion and I can get started doing things on my end.

Either way, let’s get together to discuss it.

Thanks for all and God bless!

Your brother in Christ,

Terry Lee Scott

Author, Publisher with Ask LLC




No comments:

Post a Comment