An Intro to Pub Hypothesis

Meet The Author

I’m Lindsey Lamar, an Amazon bestselling and award-winning author. I came to these accolades by creating a publishing experiment for my sophomore novel. After three years of research and modest budgeting, I wanted to see if I could publish my own book and outperform the market.

Like many of you, I was skeptical of the publishing industry. Years of querying didn’t yield the results I was hoping for. Self-publishing sounded like a total crapshoot. Vanity publishing felt like a smoke and mirror show. Some of my friends were losing traditional book deals for no real reason, while others were on their third novel that no one seemed to be reading.

I thought to myself, “Surely there is a way to do this better.” So, I set up a plan and started saving money.

With less than <10% of a traditional publishing budget for the three-year project, I’ve sold thousands of copies of my book, won national awards, secured unpaid press, and made consistent author income.

This project is about that. How I did it. What I would change. What advice can I offer from this journey? It’s not the only answer to the problem. It’s simply my publishing hypothesis.

Busting Publishing Myths

Self-publishing has often been regarded as the publishing option to choose if you don’t have much capital to put up, copious amounts of time to make your book great, and you simply want to see a fast payout.

I disagree wholeheartedly. If indie authors want people to take their books seriously, indie authors need to publish their books seriously. And it’s not by just putting out whatever we want, whenever we feel. As an indie author myself, I’m a little sick of that notion.

Picking your publishing method is basically picking what game you want to play with your career. Different people are better at different games:

• “I don’t want to DIY anything; I want to write books quickly and hand them off to someone else. I don't have the capital to invest money into my author career to get it off the ground and would rather trade the equity instead. This is what I want.” = The best option for me is to play the querying game. To find an agent and a publisher. To write a book that catches their attention.
• “The business of publishing is just as interesting to me as the writing. I am comfortable taking my time with my book to make it great. I don’t mind saving and investing capital to get the book launch I need. This is my business, and I want to invest in it.” = The best option for me is to play the self-publishing game. I can invest my own time and money into this because it is my business. I will pivot when necessary, I will hire experts on my team, and I will run each book as its own project.

This newsletter assumes you picked the second bullet point. Because I did with my sophomore novel. And I found that there’s some serious business to be collected there. And it turns out some major tech giants agree with me.

Reading the Money

We cannot doubt that book publishing is going through growing pains.

Book publishing is estimated to be a $97 billion dollar industry (2023). That might sound like a lot to you. Until we realize that radio is a $149 billion dollar industry. (2023) Gaming is a $184 billion dollar industry, while social media is a whopping $219 billion dollar industry. (2023) For crying out loud, podcasters are already evaluated at a $24 billion dollar (2023) industry, making up a fourth of what book publishing is evaluated at, and it’s a young twenty years old. Meanwhile, the book industry dates back to the 15th century.

As an emerging author, I felt these numbers were more than a little intimidating. Cue the, “How the hell am I gonna make money doing this?” It’s no wonder giant authors have been rumored to hire ghostwriters. In order to pay their publisher’s bills, they basically need to be printing books.

Meanwhile, in another stratosphere, Amazon was recently evaluated at $1.75 trillion. Apple was named the world’s most valuable company, with a $3.30 trillion market cap. Keep in mind that the tech industry is evaluated at $18.29 trillion. These two companies alone nearly make up 28% of the entire market.

They’re disrupting all sorts of industries, from pharmacy to pet products. Somewhere in between, they’re dabbling in publishing. Specifically, indie publishing. There’s obviously something in it for tech giants like Amazon and Apple to be entering the space. But then…why is publishing down so bad?

Cookie Cutter Isn’t Cutting It

“I used to publish with Harper, but it was a nightmare.” A talented ex-Harper Collins author is telling me about her experience recently. “I spent so much time trying to get a book deal. Then I got one, and they forgot to put my book title in the advertisement campaigns.”

“You're joking, right?” I ask her. This is supposed to be the pinnacle of publishing. These people have checks and balances for everything…don’t they?

If you’re under 100k on Tiktok, she tells me, apparently not.

This is an actual conversation I had just a few months ago.

You see, big publishing is just that: big. And I’ve worked for some big companies. I know how this goes. There’s a lot of employees. There’s a lot of slack. Half the people in the middle of the organization are overworked, underpaid, and understaffed. In their five minutes of free time, they love books. But your book is often another project on several people’s to-do lists. Even if your agent and editor would die for it, there might be twenty people in the middle who could care less.

To account for this, a cookie-cutter publishing process must be followed. But the cookie-cutter process is having trouble cutting through the noise because the market is so oversaturated. The authors who have already built their brand are the ones getting reinforced. Hundreds of authors worked to get their book to this dreamy imprint just for Tim in marketing to forget to put the title in the ad campaign that’s already running. Oops?

If you don’t believe me, believe the numbers—the mass exodus of leadership, the push for new publishing models from those who are trying to get ahead of this change. (BTW: We love Author's Equity around here & fully support their mission) We can’t deny that things are changing.

The Good News

There’s still good news. Lots of it.

• Readers are still reading
• People are still buying books
• A good story still sells

Your target market isn’t changing, but your method of reaching them might be. I started this page to empower you to take control of your author career on your own. It feels like my calling to create equity with the information I’ve gained through my own publishing experiment.

I believe the best way to do that is by testing out a new publishing hypothesis.

The Publishing Hypothesis newsletter will cover:

• Publishing strategies 
• Budget development for authors
• Navigating the changing book industry​
• Platform management
• Vendor selection

And much, much more.

Welcome to the ride. I’m so excited you’re here.