Finding a Publisher

The fastest way to get a book contract is to do some research and figure out which publishers are most likely to be interested in your work.

Established commercial publishers purchase the right to publish the author’s work and then pay the author a royalty in exchange. Established publishers carefully select and invest in books based on their assessment of marketability and profitability.

Create a preferred publishers list by going to a bookstore and looking at the section in which your book would be shelved if it were available. Write down the names of 6 to 12 publishers that publish good books in that section of the bookstore.

Publishers who already publish books for the audience you want to write for are far more likely to be interested in your book than other publishers. You hope to find publishers who already publish books that aren’t competitive, but are complementary to the one you want to write.

Besides knowing which publishers you want to contact, it is vital to also create a personal connection with an editor at that publishing company. Never send a book proposal to “whom it may concern”. One simple way to find an editor at a preferred company is to look in the acknowledgments section of one of the books published by them and see if the author thanks an editor at the company. That person could become your personal connection at the publisher.

Tanyab 08:03, 5 December 2008 (UTC) | www.publishing-store.com