Publishing is the activity of making any of the following, information, literature, music, software, and other content available to the public free of charge or for a fee. The term publishing refers to the distribution of printed works, such as books, newspapers, and magazines but with the advent of digital information systems, the scope has expanded to include electronic publishing such as eBooks, academic journals, micro-publishing, websites, blogs, video game publishing, and a number of others.
In this article, we’ll walk you through the step-by-step process of starting a publishing company. Ensure you follow through.
What Is A Publishing Company?
A traditional publishing company is a business that creates and distributes copies of a written work. The written work they distribute can include children’s books, novels, cookbooks, and magazines.
Large publishing companies publish books in their numbers (thousands) yearly under different “imprints,” or departments while small publishing companies may only publish a handful of books annually.
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How Much Does It Cost To Start A Publishing Company?
The cost of starting a publishing company varies from state to state. On a general note, the lowest amount of money you will pay to start a publishing company is $50, and the highest is $800. There are usually annual fees due each year.
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How Do I Start My Own Publishing Company?
Starting your own publishing company is one of the best decisions you can make if you know that you can thrive in the business.
But to do that, you need to find out the means by which the target of starting a publishing company will be accomplished.
To create a publishing company, you are to do the following:
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Solidify your goals
Before you start a publishing company, you are to ensure that your goals are solidified first and foremost. To solidify your goals, you have to do the following:
Create your brand
After solidifying your goals, the next right thing to do in order to get closer to the goal of starting a publishing company is to create your brand. At this stage, you are to come up with the following:
You are to note that one of the things that makes a brand thrive has a relatable brand that will be memorable and enticing for readers, writers, and booksellers.
Select a business structure
Selecting a business structure is one of the ways to start a publishing company. Here, you are to decide which business type (from corporations to nonprofits) will apply to the publishing company you want to create.
The Business type options you can take up include sole proprietorships, partnerships, or limited liability companies (LLC) and you are to consider the circumstances surrounding the establishment of the business so as to know which is best for you to sign into.
Register for an Employer Identification Number
In addition, you are to register for an employer identification number. This registration will enable different agencies in charge of identifying and tracking businesses to do so.
Set up your infrastructure
Setting up your infrastructure is among the ways to start a publishing business and is quite pivotal as it involves setting up the administrative aspects of the publishing company.
The following should be in place:
Also considered here is the hiring of workers.
Start Publishing
After you might have been down with all of these steps, the next thing to do is to start publishing books.
To publish, you are to put a number of resources together and this includes:
• Having the book designed
• Uploading it online or sending it to the printer.
Market and sell your books
At having a product to sell, the next line of action is to create a marketing plan that is tailored in such as to have very good sales.
You can either market the product by yourself or by hiring a marketing professional. Either way, you are to ensure that there’s an actionable plan to market the product and that the right audience is targeted in the marketing plan.
Before you start marketing your product, you are to find out what it is that makes it interesting or different and highlight it in your marketing materials.
To build an audience in the modern era, social media marketing is one of the keys. As a Publishing company, it is needful that you create a social media presence for your publishing company and make it active. You are to promote all of your upcoming releases there.
As an avenue to draw the attention of your audience to book review publications, you can send out advance review copies. Additionally, revisit your marketing plan often to see if there are any opportunities you missed and any better alternatives to reaching your audience.
How Much Does It Cost To Start A Music Publishing Company?
To start a music publishing company, you are to pay a $150 fee for solely-owned publishing companies to affiliate; $250 for partnerships, corporations, and limited liability companies.
There is no fee to affiliate with Broadcast Music Inc. (BMI) as a writer.
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How Does Publishing Companies Make Money?
Traditional publishers make money through the sales of the books of authors to consumers while self-publishing companies make money when YOU write them a check.
For online publishers, the avenues through which they make money are different from the ways traditional publishers make money.
Some of the ways online publishers make money include:
Which Equipments Do I Need To Start A Publishing Company?
To start a publishing company, you need the following equipment:
The combination of three facilities together gives a wide range of services covering Digital Printing, Offset Printing, and Wide Format Printing options include:
PRESS ROOM
Your press room should have the following facilities:
DIGITAL
LARGE FORMAT
BINDERY
MAILING
How Much Can You Make From A Publishing Company?
Publishers are pivotal in the business of publishing and can find employment heading newspaper, magazine, and book publishing offices.
The salary a publisher can make varies depending on the size of the publishing company and the type of publishing being conducted. The highest-paid publishers can earn about a quarter of a million dollars while the lowest paying jobs can bank a publisher just over $60,000.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Starting your own book publishing company is a profitable business idea. According to a survey, retail book sales exceed $16 billion per year. Whether you plan to sell printed or online e-books, the overall process of starting up a book publishing company is about the same.
The four types of book publishing are Traditional Publishing, Self-publishing, Joint-publishing, Vanity Publishing
On a technical note, yes. But what is needed is not just the ability to write but the money and time to do all the other stuff that comes alongside it.
Book royalty is the amount of money that a publisher pays an author in exchange for the rights to publish their book. By calculation, royalty is a percentage of book sales.
The top 10 self-publishing companies include Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), CreateSpace, iBooks, Barnes & Noble Press, Kobo, IngramSpark, Smashwords, Draft2Digital, Lulu, Bookbaby
Conclusion
Just as you’ve seen, owning a publishing company is one of the best establishments you can think of having. By following the aforementioned steps, you are sure of owning and running a successful publishing company. Also made available to you here is the equipment you need to start up a publishing company, etc.