Page 31 - Seniorstoday November 2022 Issue

friends and well-wishers was a resounding experiments. By this time self-publishing,
success. I sold 100 copies of the book on
that day. Within the next two years not
only I sold most of the copies I had through
aggressive marketing among my contacts
but also received a handsome royalty from
the publisher over a period of four years,
which was the net amount I earned out of
my effort in publishing my autobiography.
My next book on Rural marketing sold
about 2000 copies and I was happy with
the good royalty I got from the publisher.
However, I lost money on my self-financed
third book, the first collection of my essays,
because I had printed more copies than
what I could sell through my contacts.
Right from the beginning I had decided
that I would try my hand at different genres
of writing and realized that no publisher
would be interested in supporting me in my
SENIORS TODAY | ISSUE #41 | NOVEMBER 2022
digital printing, and print on demand were
becoming popular and I got introduced
to Mr Diwakar of Compuprint who is a
specialist in this area. I decided to use the
services of Diwakar who not only prints my
books but also publishes them. Needless to
say that I self-finance them. He also gets the
ISBN no. and uploads my books on Amazon
and handles the orders received. But he has
no arrangement for distributing the books
to book shops. I, on my own, ensure the
sale of my books in a couple of book shops
in Chennai by directly contacting them.
I am clear that I am publishing my books
not to become a world famous author or
make big money through my books. I am
doing this because of the immense joy it
gives me every time I publish a new book
and it is favourably received by my readers
who are growing in numbers. Besides,
holding the first copy of every new book is
like holding your new baby. I market my
book shamelessly and promote it through
social and other media, which helps create
awareness about my book but does not
result in big sales. What gets me the result
is the direct marketing efforts to targeted
audiences.
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