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What Is 'Value Added' And What Does It Have To Do With Indie Authorship?

This post, from Publetariat founder and Editor In Chief April L. Hamilton, originally appeared on her Indie Author Blog on 1/7/09.

I've been taking a lot of flak lately from professionals in the graphic arts and typesetting fields because in The IndieAuthor Guide, I more or less tell indie authors that in most cases, the services of those professionals are optional. The flakkers protest, in frequently ugly tones, that I'm giving bad advice in this regard and a book brought to market without their services is a "defective" product.

Here's my recent response to one such complaint:

The local independent bookseller who stocks my titles has said that to his (professional) eye, apart from the lack of a recognizable imprint logo on their spines, my books are indistinguishable from mainstream books. So long as the readers and booksellers are pleased with my books, I'm meeting the demands of my target audience. And that's what indie authorship is all about: reaching and serving your readership, not slavishly following the conventions of traditional publishing, regardless of whether or not they form a value-added proposition where your intended audience is concerned...I and my books are doing pretty well. And in the final analysis, in attempting to judge the merits of what I propose and advise in The IndieAuthor Guide, isn't *that* the only benchmark that really matters?

After I posted, another flakker chimed in to berate me further, pretty much missing my point about 'value added', and it occurred to me that it may be a term that merits some further exploration. It's something one hears bandied about in the business world quite a bit, and entire books have been written on the subject. In simple terms, a 'value-added proposition' is something in which you invest time or money because there will be a commensurate payoff, or payback of that investment, in the future.

For example, let's say you manufacture protective cell phone covers. People like your covers and they're selling pretty well, but you think you could do even better if you started printing licensed cartoon characters on them. So you go through the paperwork and expense of getting the licensing rights, you re-tool your shop to print the characters on the covers and you invest in some extra advertising to let everyone know about your new product line. Naturally, you must price the new line higher to absorb the added expenses, but you're confident it'll be a hit. Three months down the line you find your old, plain covers are selling just as well as they ever did, and sales on the new covers are decidedly slow. Clearly, printing licensed cartoon characters on your covers was NOT a value-added proposition. Customers may like the new covers, and may even prefer them to the plain ones. But if they don't prefer the new covers enough to pay extra for them, it doesn't make business sense for you to be producing them.

And what does this have to do with indie authorship, you ask? When bringing your book to market, every time you make a choice that involves investment of your time or money you should be asking yourself, "Does this constitute a value-added proposition for my target audience?" Because if it doesn't, you should be looking for ways to reduce or eliminate that investment. Based on my research and experience, I've concluded the average reader doesn't know or care about the minutiae of 'proper' typesetting according to mainstream pubishing standards. So long as the text is easily legible and looks about the same as that in a mainstream book to a typical (non-industry) reader, the reader will not find fault with the layout and typesetting in a given book. I freely acknowledge that people who follow the directions I provide in The IndieAuthor Guide will end up with a book that's instantly recognizable as self-published to most industry pros, but since those pros are not the indie author's intended audience, their opinions are irrelevant in this regard. Therefore, investing hundreds or thousands of dollars in professional typesetting and layout services does not form a value-added proposition for most indie books.

In deciding whether or not to invest in this or that service or product when bringing your book to market, let your target audience be your guide. If your target audience WILL notice and care about details of typesetting and layout for instance, paying for those professional services is a necessary expenditure for your particular book. However, if paying for those services requires you to price the eventual book so high that no one is willing to buy it, then the entire book fails the value-added proposition test.

Cover design is another area where value added comes into play. The IndieAuthor Guide includes directions for designing your own book cover, but many authors feel out of their depth when it comes to graphic arts and design and will prefer to hire out for those services; even so, they must wade through a seeming ocean of possible vendors and price ranges. Of course you want a cover that will draw the potential buyer in, even when viewed as an icon on a webpage if your book will be sold online. However, spending thousands of dollars on a piece of commissioned artwork from a name artist for your cover doesn't necessarily add value for which your eventual readers will be willing to pay extra.

Since increasing the retail price of your book to absorb that cost may alienate potential buyers, you need to consider how many extra books you must sell at your regular retail price to recoup the money you spent on the cover artwork. In some cases, the investment will be worth it. In other cases, not so much. You can usually get an attractive, professional-looking cover which effectively conveys the theme of your book from a journeyman graphic artist at a much lower cost, or even from an art school grad student who's willing to do the cover for free in exchange for the portfolio sample and exposure. As with any small business expenditure, you must balance the benefit against the cost when determining how much money to spend on professional services.

Let me hasten to add: I am not suggesting that indie authors try to do everything 'on the cheap' for the sake of saving money or increasing royalties. On the contrary, I advise indie authors to do all in their power to deliver a product that, to the typical book buyer, is indistinguishable from the products of their mainstream competitors. That means quality editing, paper, printing, cover design, and more. What I AM saying is that each time you're faced with decisions about whether, and how much, to spend on some aspect of your book's production or promotion, carefully consider the matter of 'value added'.

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Value Added Publishing Re: Design

As an Indie Author who has more than 20 years' experience working as a graphic designer in NY, I'd like to weigh in.  I agree with Ms. Hamilton's perception that the paid services of a graphic designer are not necessary to produce a book for sale.  It may well be the additional cost that you are unable to justify when arriving at a retail price the traffic will bear, but there are a few design considerations that you must bear in mind.  These are just a few more steps, and a bit more research that you would not have to do if mainstream published.  But even if you were, you need to at least be conversant in the technology of book design, and to that end, I'd like to share a few points.

First, consider the basic ease in reading that you want to provide your "customers".  Typography should be chosen for legibility, for a reasonable point size, and for approprate context.

There are many type faces available, but only a comparative handful that make good or even acceptable book text.  Look at books you like and find easy to read, then see if the publisher included typographic information in them. They often do, in the fly sheets.  After you've looked through a few, take notes -- and limit yourself to one or two different fonts.  Unless you have a specific, contextual reason to use lots of type fonts, it reduces legibility, and can confuse the reader.  Display fonts, used appropriately, can support your story by adding emphasis, "color", emotion and ethnic-specific familiarity to your tile and headings.

The design of the page itself is critical to the reading comfort of your market.  There are discussions posted about this in the design areas, also, but I would add two small details that has worked very well for me over the years. First, justified (flush left and right) columns tend to contain vertical running lines of white space, called rivers or streams. These disrupt the flow of information to the eye, and slow reading down.  I always avoid using justified text when ever possible, if the text is more than 3 or 4 paragraphs.  Flush left text is easier to read.  It has been studied, and proven, that the eye is most comfortable with lines of type characters between 1/1/2 to 2 times the length of the alphabet in that point size.  Don't make your text colums too wide, or too narrow, or they will be hard to read.

It is easier for the eye to find an indented paragraph than a simple line-break paragraph.  But, indents take up space, and will over the length of a book increase the page count. Context is important, here, too.  Think of your readers, as well -- younger readers are more comfortable with more modern text layouts, which are often non-indented.

Your cover is next, and there are discussions also already posted regarding the design layout, etc.  I only want to stress that this is the packaging for your product.  Consider how it will appear when it's put in front of your "customers"  Will it grab their attention? Will it stand out from those other books around it? Will it only be seen from the spine, or will it also be displayed flat, on a table?  Will it motivate them to pick it up and turn it over? Will you be able to pose questions in your back cover blurb that will require the reader to open it up to get the answers?  These arre the primary issues that can affect the impact of your cover on the reader, and need to be considered. I would recommend making up dummies of several options and running them past family, friends, and book sellers, for their reactions.  You may need to spend quite a bit of time with this until you're satisfied.

The design of your book is very important to the marketability of it as a product on the shelves.  Whether you choose, to "Add Value" by hiring outside consultants, or add value by learning as much as you can about book design, your decision will reward your readers and the book sellers who want to sell your book to them.  Publishers -- and if you're an indie author, you're probably also a publisher-- maintain their own design team. 

The Executive editor may not be a designer, but they can easily recognize good or poor design, and that is a talent you will have to cultivate to make your book the best you can.  That's adding value that might only cost you time and focus, not extra money out of pocket.