Writing a technical book: from idea to print
Having recently released a "technical" book with a large traditional publisher (Wiley) [0], here are a few of my learnings:<p>- Expect nothing from the publisher in terms of marketing support. In fact, a good nonfiction book proposal is going to spend most of its length explaining to the publisher how you will sell the book for them through your connections and credibility - not the other way around. It's all on you.<p>- Don't do it for the money. You're going to make 10-15% of a pretty small pie. If you want to write info products as a moneymaking side gig and you have any following at all, self publish!<p>So why go with a traditional publisher? I don't feel this is fully articulated in the OP, but here was my reasoning:<p>- The publisher probably will get your book in the hands of a larger absolute number of people, so if you care about maximizing readership and you don't have a stupid-large online following, their network effects through bookstores, library sales, etc will help you sell more copies than you could on your own (though again, you'll see very little of the money!)<p>- There's still some social proof involved with traditional publishing, and it's a nice thing to do once - just so you know in the back of your head that you "can"<p>- In my case, I was producing a highly graphic book that really doesn't work except in print and in full color, and I needed the resources of a traditional publishing house to make it not look terrible.<p>The Wiley experience was overall positive for me and I don't regret it, but if I ever produce a text-based info product in future it's hard to look away from the ROI advantages of self-publishing.<p>[0] <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Read-Aloud-Cloud-Innocents-Inside/dp/1119677629/" rel="nofollow">https://www.amazon.com/Read-Aloud-Cloud-Innocents-Inside/dp/...</a>