If you’ve been a crafts person for some time – regardless of the level you think you’re at – you have valuable knowledge. Knowledge that other people will gladly pay for. All you need to do is write it down and become your own craft book publisher!
Before you think that’s too simplistic an answer, or even a bit sarcastic, let me assure you that is not my intention at all.
You see the age-old barriers to publishing your own craft book are gone. Not only can you use the hugely profitable method of digitally publishing and delivering online but even if you chose to go the traditional printed soft or hardcover route there are print-on-demand specialists who will happily produce just one or two copies of your craft book at very reasonable rates.
Not so long ago if you wanted to publish a craft book you’d have to jump through many, many hops – and for not a lot of reward. First you would have to find an agent (approaching publishers direct was usually unsuccessful). After convincing your agent that the book had merit you’d then have to trust that the agent could find a publisher.
Traditional publishers are notoriously difficult to convince, and not surprisingly. They would have to make a serious investment in pre-production and advertising before they had any chance of showing a profit. Many, many good craft books ended up not getting to press simply because the numbers didn’t add up.
If you managed to survive the cull then twelve months or so later you might start seeing some royalties. Around ten to fifteen percent of the cover price.
Very few people got rich writing a craft book.
Now all that has changed. Digital craft book publishing is a reality and dozens of craft books that might never have seen the light of day are now being published by the craftspeople themselves. You don’t need an agent, you don’t need a publisher, there are ways of marketing your craft book that are zero cost.
The result is not a paltry 10 or 15% but profit levels as high as 90% of the cover price.
Of course there are bound to be other barriers, aren’t there? Surely it can’t really be that easy to become your own craft book publisher?
Well the only possible thing that some craftspeople might consider a challenge would be creating some sort of website from which to sell their craft book. To be frank, with the ease of publishing that some website systems offer, and the alternative of running a craft blog, there really is nothing to stop you.
You might have to learn a few things you don’t know at the moment but as a craftsperson, learning is part of what you do pretty much continually so that shouldn’t hold you back.