Authorpreneurship: The Business of Creativity

HAZEL EDWARDS

Authorpreneurship

Second Edition

The Business of Creativity

Acknowledgement

Thanks to my digital mentor, Kim Edwards.

‘All ideas begin with encouragement, and the creative climate which accepts the necessary risk of failure from experiment and innovation.’

Published in 2024 by Amba Press, Melbourne, Australia.

www.ambapress.com.au

© Hazel Edwards 2024

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

This book was first published in 2012 by Keesing Press.

Cover design: Tess McCabe

Proofreader: Sarah Fallon

Cartoonist: Sheila Hollingworth

ISBN: 9781922607942 (pbk)

ISBN: 9781922607959 (ebk)

A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of Australia.

Contents

1: What is Authorpreneurship?

Authorpreneurship

2: Profile and Professional Areas

The Author as Brand

Strategic Decisions

Asking for Payment and Costing Your Time

So You Want to Get Published?

From Local to International

3: Authorpreneurial Tips and Tricks

Finances, Agents and Legal Stuff

Sales, Marketing and More

The Day to Day

Fans, Reviews, Critics and Privacy

Adaptations, Translations and Judging

4: Case Studies

5: Hypothetical Scenarios

6: AUTHORPRENEURSHIP

7: Therapy Writing: Map of Serendipity

8: Additional Resources

About the Author

1: What is Authorpreneurship?

Authorpreneurship

Author = originator

Entrepreneur = seller who initiates

The business of creativity is changing, not just in the formats in which ideas are presented internationally but also how authors perceive themselves.

Today, a creator needs to be an ‘authorpreneur’. Apart from crafting words or images for specific audiences, this means learning the marketing, publicity, technological, legal and entrepreneurial skills to establish and maintain creative self-employment in the business of ideas.

‘Author’ includes any self-employed creators in the core business of ideas, whether illustrator, designer, writer or multi-skilled innovator in various mediums. Many are very small businesses or sole traders in ideas but unless they operate in a business-like manner, they will not survive.

IP (Intellectual Property) is the core business while time, energy and idea management is part of the process. Great ideas will not reach audiences unless the creators can stay in business and survive financially.

Even those who find the concept of linking creativity and business a philosophical challenge will find common sense approaches here. Beginners, mid-career and established creators alike will find strategies to use tomorrow in Authorpreneurship. Constant innovation and the need to keep up can be overwhelming, especially when you are the only person to do it all.

This book is about sharing strategies which enable you to work effectively at what you most enjoy doing, but also provide ways for you to streamline the process, so you can sell your ideas for longer, in varied new formats and to larger audiences. ‘Authorpreneurship’ is about investing in your creativity, without becoming exhausted or overwhelmed.

The concept of ‘authorpreneurship’ is a constant but the authors who practise ‘authorpreneurship’ need to be flexible in adapting to change and learning new skills and even new terms for processes that have not yet become mainstream.

Hazel Edwards OAM (www.hazeledwards.com) has published over 200 books for adults and children, with mainstream and small publishers. Best known for There’s a Hippopotamus on Our Roof Eating Cake, which has been constantly in print and adapted across other media for over 44 years, Hazel also runs book-linked workshops on ‘Authorpreneurship’ and ‘Writing a Non-Boring Family History’.

A recipient of the 2009 ASA Medal, Hazel was awarded the Monash University Distinguished Alumni; Education, in 2022. Widowed with two adult children and grandchildren for whom she writes a story each birthday. Recently she updated her business card from writer to ‘Authorpreneur’.

‘Open with anticipation and close with satisfaction and profit’.

Your book.

2: Profile and Professional Areas

The Author as Brand

In the Beginning

When you start writing, you don’t have a name as an author. Nor do you have a profile. You just have an idea for a manuscript. So the first stage is to write that idea as well as possible for a specific audience, not just for you. If it’s only for you, it’s therapy. If you want more readers, you’re in the business of creativity.

Profile

An author’s ‘profile’ means that enough people know who that writer is and what kind of work is associated with that author, and are willing to follow or buy those ideas, in whatever format they appear.

This ‘profile’ may be linked to a website, speaking commitments, media slots and types of writing, but more importantly, it requires recognition by groups who like that kind of work.

So an author ‘profile’ matters. Basically, you need to ask yourself, does anyone know your name? And if so, what for? And are they willing to pay to have access to your ideas or stories? If not, what can you do about it?

Brand

It’s a big shift for authors to see themselves as a ‘brand’. This is where a name is being traded or linked to marketable ideas, in varied formats and income is earned.

For some, the book will not be the main income channel, but other paid work will be offered because of the existence of the book.

In the past, an author was associated with a single ‘named’ publisher and their distribution channel but that is now rare. A book may have several ‘lives’ in different formats and with different publishers and be distributed in a variety of ways. Each project may be contracted differently. The link is the author’s name or brand, not the publisher. And it may be the author brand, which is more attractive than the single book.

Authorpreneurship is not just about self-promoting or self-publishing or even vanity. Author brand is part of the business of creativity. If readers like a work by a particular author, they will look for more by that name, not necessarily through a publisher. Considering the speed of publisher mergers, takeovers and fast remaindering of books, authors who consolidate their backlist titles under their brand name and make it available on their website, are more likely to make a living. Otherwise their books may have a short life of a month or so.

Author websites are as accessible as publishers’ sites for international online sales. In the past, only the publisher controlled distribution of books and mainly via bookshops and book clubs. That has changed.

Although many authors consider writing a book as the hard part of the publishing process, long-term the real challenge is in marketing and distribution.

Ego or Business?

If this is your first creation, you probably don’t have a recognisable ‘brand’ yet. For modest creators, there’s also the philosophical dilemma between ‘ego’ and marketing. Should you be talking about yourself? You may fear this is just being egotistical.

However, talking about the public ‘author brand’ and the ‘book’ or the ideas in that work is one remove from the private person behind it. And although your ‘persona’ needs to be genuine, choose how much of your research, writing habits or family you are prepared to reveal. Of course this is a bit more difficult if you’re writing an autobiography!

The slower ‘old style’ proposal to a print publisher was essentially a plea for the publisher to invest money to develop the book, market and distribute it and return 10% of the profits to the original author. The writer only wrote the book. Now the writer has become the ‘authorpreneur’: initiating, writing, publishing and distributing.

Although there are new channels for ideas with digital opportunities for distribution, this also means more risk and more work for an author, who must learn a suite of eSkills. Publication can be faster, but maintenance of long-term marketing of the title may be time consuming.

Both brand and income are directly linked to who holds the rights for the intellectual property of that work in those formats.

Of course the work needs to be of quality and timely – and the production needs to be of a high standard and well edited.

Strategic Decisions

Strategy

A ‘strategy’ is a plan to move you in the direction of your long-term goal, for example:

To become self-employed as a creator

To build a digital business

To research in exotic settings

To get a book published.

A strategic thinker is likely to initiate rather than just react to others’ demands. Or at least choose those demands to which s/he will react. Two people may appear to be doing the same activity, but their motives may differ, and only one may be acting strategically.

Why be strategic? Because it saves time and saves you from becoming frustrated. Because you’ve planned what your reactions will be to certain types of offers, anticipatory anxiety is removed. You need to know why you are doing it.

Is it just a pleasant distraction?

Are you unable to say ‘No’?

Is it strategic for you?

Quantity

Is there any connection between effort and result? In the long-term, yes but not always immediately. Working hard or for long periods and working strategically are not always the same.

Often novice writers mistakenly judge progress only by the number of words written. Obviously it’s necessary to produce, but format, subject and timing may also be strategic. And can you provide evidence of an audience? (Not just your mum!)

How many hours did you spend writing that piece? (If you don’t know, what does this indicate?)

How many words did you write? Were they rough or polished?

If no one buys or reads it, has your work been wasted?

Did you check on the potential readership before starting?

Would ‘tweaking’ it for a specific audience help get a contract or broader sales? For example, adding curriculum links for educators or notes for discussion groups?

Networking with colleagues to become aware of shared challenges, possible markets and specific requirements. Occasionally the ‘cappuccino approach’ of having a strategic coffee may be more effective than isolation.

Inspirational genius is unreliable. Consider the strategy of slow accumulation (i.e. consistent work). Spend an hour daily doing some of the minutiae, which lead to your eventual goal, otherwise the volume is overwhelming.

If you ‘do’ enough times, with the aim of accumulating skills, polished work or contacts, that’s different from the gamble of haphazard procrastinating.

Do you initiate appointments or projects of the kind you desire, accepting that not all of them will eventuate? One in ten might be a reasonable return on ‘punts’. But if you plan to try an extra punt every week, then by the tenth week, the odds are in your favour.

A regular ‘punt’ or ‘extra’ in the direction of the kind of work you wish to do, can be strategic. An example would be to follow up leads on the last day of every month.

Quality

Then there’s the issue of quality. One best seller may be the result of either many discarded, hidden projects or ‘cannibalised’ ones which re-use knowledge or extracts from prior, unpublished work.

Often it’s hard to analyse where you should put your time and