Review of “Self-Publishing for New Authors” by Dale L. Roberts

Score: 95/100 (9.5 out of 10)

Are you ready to finally publish that book you've been dreaming about? Want to know the secrets that successful self-published authors use to become best-sellers on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, and other platforms?

What if there was a guide that could make sense of this chaotic self-publishing world?

Self-Publishing for New Authors by Dale L. Roberts is a practical, engaging, and comprehensive self-publishing guide for aspiring authors!

Roberts is someone who walks the talk: an Amazon best-selling author and self-publishing advocate with around 100K subscribers to his Self-Publishing with Dale YouTube channel!

This book starts from the very beginning of the publishing process—from drafting your core ideas to getting your own online store up and running. It even dives into the minutia of things like managing your taxes as an indie author or getting your formatting size right for different platforms.

Here are a few key topics and takeaways from the book:

• Getting to know your ideal reader.

You should know and identify who you are writing for (your audience) and why should they care about you and your book. Otherwise, who are you going to sell to? When you write for everyone, you write to no one.

• Do your research.

One of the things that Roberts encourages is for indie authors to be actively involved in the process of publishing including doing their own due diligence and their own research. The author provides excellent step-by-step instructions and examples on how to do your own keyword research using various methods.

• You should also be researching the different books in your genre including their cover designs and reviews. These covers will help you to determine what's expected in the genre and what appeals to potential/prospective readers/buyers. The reviews will help you to understand what readers like and don't like, so you can avoid making the same mistakes that other authors in the genre made. It's classic Sun Tzu: Know thyself and know thy enemy. One of the most interesting bits of advice that Robert gives in this regard is to use the internet on online stores for your research as opposed to the library shelves and bookstores. The publishing industry is very fluid and changing, and physical stores and libraries are often a bit behind the internet.

 

• One of our favorite quotes in the book is to “think like a publisher.” This advice, while simple, says a lot. As an indie author, you may not have a publicist, marketing expert, agent, or publisher watching your back and guiding you, but you can try to put yourself in their shoes/these roles and try to think like these people. What would a publisher do to maximize the appeal of my book and profits?

 

• Plan & outline your book.

The author acknowledges that this may sound controversial (with a lot of pantsers being glorified in the industry), but it really shouldn't be controversial. Rather than being all-encompassing, the outline should serve as a guide and help keep you from getting writer's blocked and/or sidetracked. It's not everything you want to write, but it's the main stuff. It doesn't have to be long or elaborate. It can just be like a “detailed table of contents,” which is a great analogy the author uses to give you an idea of how simple it could be.

• Don't skimp on the editing. Roberts provides advice on searching for a good editor who will preferably not charge you an arm and a leg. One of the the best pieces of advice from this section is to get a sample from the editor to make sure they can do the work and maintain your unique voice. Roberts says that once you find a good editor “don’t ever let them go,” which humorously reminded us of Titanic. Stay in touch with them and nurture that relationship.

 

• How long should your book be?

Roberts talks about the pros and cons of different page lengths and about how different genres have different expectations for this.

• Roberts even talks about the different paper types that are available for publishing and the pros and cons of each of them

 

• The author talks about why you should strongly consider having multiple versions of your book: a paperback, eBook, and audiobook—all of which appeal to different types of readers/buyers. He even talks in-depth about the process of creating an audiobook including how to leverage services like Findaway Voices to make one economically. He even recommends auditioning audiobook narrators similar to how you'd get a sample from an editor or illustrator. We found that interesting.

 

• A lot of this book focuses on book covers and book cover designs, and why not? Your book cover is the first thing that readers see. It can substantially impact the marketability and reach of your book. Roberts provides practical advice on how to get a quality cover that sells and why it's worth investing in it (similar to how it's worth investing in editing).

He even shares his inspiring story about how he took up extra work and sold his old, used items to afford to make his first few book covers/hire someone to make them. For those who are committed to making their own cover for whatever reason, he also provides great resources for doing so like Gimp (for photo editing), Pixabay (for free stock photos), and 1001 Fonts (for unique downloadable fonts). He shares a somewhat comical yet educational story about the time he was very excited about changing his book cover design to a new one. He loved his book cover design. However, buyers apparently did not because the book stopped selling. Remember, this is a business. It's not about what you want, it's what the customers ultimately want to buy. In the author's words, “the buyers voted.”

• Roberts talks in-depth about finally publishing to KDP, and we love him for it! It seems like a simple process (and, for the most part, it is), but there are a lot of nuanced and complicated aspects of it. For example: What size should your cover be? What kind of paper? What about digital distribution rights? What about formatting? Does the formatting have to be different for KDP versus other platforms? What about file types? ISBNs? Royalties and pricing? What about this KDP Select thing? What are these proof copy things and why do they have different shipping options than Amazon Prime? And why do they have watermarks? Roberts answers all of these questions in the book! He'll even tell you the pixel sizes and DPI!

 

• Roberts gets really in-depth about marketing, which is awesome. He has a lot of great ideas about keywords, marketing promotions, and book reviews. He also talks about the importance of your ad copy and book description (as well as the differences between ad copies, book descriptions, and summaries).

 

• The book covers how to start your author website and even an online store to sell your books from

 

• He provides great money-management advice. It's sweet and simple. Don't become delusional. Don't overestimate your future as an author and think you're going to instantly become George R.R. Martin. To this end, Roberts provides two GREAT rules of thumb for budgeting your marketing and advertising: 1. NEVER SPEND WHAT YOU CAN'T AFFORD TO LOSE, 2. START LOW AND GO SLOW

 

• Speaking of being smart with your money, he quotes his coach and retired pro wrestler, Lance Storm, in saying, “It's not about the money you earn, it's about the money you save.”

 

• “When in doubt, search it out.” What a great quote! The internet provides a plethora of resources that weren't available to authors decades ago. There are also a lot of knowledgeable, experienced people on there. The only excuse for not knowing is not seeking the knowledge.

 

• Roberts even provides advice about the less sexy aspects of publishing like tracking your expenses and doing your taxes.

Probably our favorite piece of advice from this whole book is to understand that publishing is a business and that you're working with big businesses like Amazon. If you help them, they'll help you. If you draw traffic to them, they will reward you.

Dale L. Roberts has helped hundreds—if not thousands—of indie authors, and he can help you too!

Check it out on Amazon!