Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Business: Agencies Helping Clients Self-Publish E-books



Via Publishers Lunch comes this news from Nelson Literary Agency, the latest literary agency coming up with "ways to help their clients self-publish" or, in the language of the agency, answering the question: "what is an agent to do if clients want assistance making backlist titles available in eFormat?"

Their Digital Liason Platform, according to Kristin Nelson, lets clients "self-publish their content within a supported environment." It differs from a publishing house model in that "our clients maintain full control of their titles. They are not granting them to us. They have full say on covers, editing, pricing, etc. The program is voluntary so if they want to participate on our DLP, they can, but they are also welcome to handle their backlist themselves."

NLA offers a full-service and distribution-only option, with authors asked to commit to a two-year term of license on the full-service model "since we undergo all the expense and that would be rather uncool for a client to let us do that and then pull the title a month later." In the full-service model, the agency handles the file conversions; connects clients with designers, copyeditors, publicists; distributes through all venues; and "uses our individual leverage with all the venues to promote."

Interesting to see how so many aspects of our kid lit industry are changing.

Illustrate and Write On,
Lee

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