From Substack & startup to best seller...
Writers like Ali Kriegsman and Erika Veurink are re-making publishing in their image: and the future's looking bright.
Notice anything different in the book and publishing universe lately?
I have: digital-first creators like
and are re-writing the playbook when it comes to publishing, marketing and selling their books— bringing the “start-up disruptor” mindset and workflow to a pretty un-startup-y legacy industry.Traditional marketing for a book launch follows a pretty copy paste format, and it’s not necessarily a bad one. In broad strokes: author sells book or signs contract, in-house publishing team uses their headcount to edit, package and produce the physical product of a book that they believe will sell— and sell well. Their marketing team picks up the ball from there, sometimes supporting a book by buying ads and using their leverage with communities like NetGalley to get advance copies to early readers who can in turn leave reviews on platforms like Goodreads. That’s a massive oversimplification of an industry, particularly one that’s a well-oiled machine…but machine it sure is.
But what happe…