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The Economics of Writing a Technical Book

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Re: The Economics of Writing a Technical Book

#71

Post by ballenf »

jashmenn wrote: post #13

We've published several books, and the author for our latest Vue book earned $20k on the opening weekend. The economics change completely if you self-publish or publish with a smaller firm that has marketing abilities (and better royalty rates). Self publishing is awesome because you keep all the money, but it takes years to build an audience. Honestly, writing the manuscript is the easy part. Building an audience, m…

BTW, fullstack.io barely works with an adblocker on. Can't download free chapter of your new React Native book. I'm accustomed to that on non-dev oriented sites, but might be a first for a site catering to devs. My blocker doesn't like 6 of your 20 (!) domains serving tracking / payment code.

Not saying you should cater to me, just that you might not realize it's happening.

Love the book covers. They are very attractive and professional.

Re: The Economics of Writing a Technical Book

#72

Post by Retric »

megaman22 wrote: post #32
rco8786 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There aren't many topics with such a wide audience. What now? The number of people who develop in angular actively is probably in the low 6 figures. In the context of the world that's a very small audience.

In the context of programming languages and tech stacks, that is an astronomical audience though. I work in a niche where there are two books that have ever been written, by the same author, and there might be a couple thousand people total in the whole world that use this particular SDK. Most technical books appeal to an incredible narrow slice of the already small pie that is software people.

I suspect that the total number of books written on SQL/C/C++/C#/Java etc probably significantly exceeds those written for niche languages. Similarly, Windows/Linux/Unix/iOS or MS Office or Visual Studio... across the various CS domains.

Re: The Economics of Writing a Technical Book

#74

Post by mygo »

scottinseattle wrote: post #73

OK. Doesn't anyone else who read this now think, "Well gee why would I ever write a book then?" You could easily make $23 an hour as an entry-level server in a diner if you include tips.

Because unless you do backflips on the way to the table without spilling a drop, you’re not getting asked to do any $peaking engagement$.

Re: The Economics of Writing a Technical Book

#75

Post by dfox »

scarface74 wrote: post #56
commandlinefan wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I commented above - I published a technical book about 8 years ago, that's been pretty well received (lots of 5-star reviews on Amazon, still selling 8 years later). But boosting my career? Solidifying my expertise in a topic? An MCSE would have done more in that direction than having published a book. Mostly people are just confused when they find out.

I would say just the opposite. I think a certification is a slight negative signal, it seems like there are too many "paper tigers" who memorize enough to take the test and don't know how to implement anything. I took the 6 tests back in 2010 to get the MCSD for a Software architect (?) but even then I didn't think it was all that valuable. I don't think I ever used it on my resume. But it was more to force me to lea…

This heavily depends on the technology involved and on what your preferred career path is. There are technology stacks where in corporate sectors you will only find "paper tigers", with Cisco and MS certifications being the most significant example (although the Cisco's certicication system is surprisingly sane in the sense that it is not gradual).

I somehow thing that I mostly built most of my reputation by mostly ignoring both vendor certifications and academic qualifications, or to frame it better by not ever using such things to land a job or gig.

Re: The Economics of Writing a Technical Book

#76

Post by mooreds »

yosito wrote: post #4

Another payout of writing a technical book is that it pretty much solidifies you as an expert in the topic and can be a springboard leading to great job opportunities and things like paid offers to speak or teach. If I ever write a technical book, it won't be for the immediate monetary payout, it will be to solidify expert status in a topic.

Be careful what you pick.

I've done a couple of projects (book, video course) because the opportunity presented itself. Then, at the end of the projects I either was burnt out on it, or wasn't in a career position to take on consulting around it.

So, nice resume burnisher and proof I can finish something, but not a springboard.

Re: The Economics of Writing a Technical Book

#77

Post by JamesBarney »

mseebach wrote: post #20
JustinGarrison wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

author here Do you have examples on how you would correctly capitalize on this expertise? I put some things that have happened since writing the book in the outcomes section but so far they have all been free speaking engagements.

Basically $1000+/day consulting rates. You still have to do the legwork of getting the gigs, but justifying those kinds of rates are much easier when you literally wrote the book on the subject of your contract. Having written it for a well known, respected, even iconic, publisher does a lot of the work here too, self publishing would have a lesser effect.

$1000/day is pretty standard, and might even be low for someone who has the expertise and communication skills required to write a book. Even if that person had not written one.

Companies routinely pay agency rates this high.

Re: The Economics of Writing a Technical Book

#78

Post by bluedino »

mseebach wrote: post #20
JustinGarrison wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

author here Do you have examples on how you would correctly capitalize on this expertise? I put some things that have happened since writing the book in the outcomes section but so far they have all been free speaking engagements.

Basically $1000+/day consulting rates. You still have to do the legwork of getting the gigs, but justifying those kinds of rates are much easier when you literally wrote the book on the subject of your contract. Having written it for a well known, respected, even iconic, publisher does a lot of the work here too, self publishing would have a lesser effect.

Pff. One of the better known guys in the little world of some accounting software we use, charges $300+ an hour.

He’s done some e-books, YouTube tutorials, and a blog with tips/tricks.

The $300+ comes from consulting, training classes, and speaking, just depends on which. A day of training is $3000 plus travel and expenses.

Re: The Economics of Writing a Technical Book

#79

Post by themodelplumber »

braythwayt wrote: post #51
themodelplumber wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It could also be that you write off the cost of the book-writing as an expense in an experience-establishment communications effort. Like building up your professional resume. In effect you are giving time and maybe a little money to be able to say "I'm an author who has published N books on this subject." That's part of the equation, if not the whole equation, for many people.

Quite a few people make this argument, thank you for mentioning it. My feeling is that this is a holdover from a time when there was a substantial barrier-to-entry for authorship. Back when publishers were the gatekeepers, anybody could write a book, but relatively few were published. People could vanity-press anything, but nobody would hear about them, because just as publishing was concentrated, so was marketing. -…

I don't think it's really as easy as you say. At the same time, it wasn't really hard to self-publish in the 20th century either; even self-marketing could be a matter of buying mailing lists and paying for help with bulk mailing. I had friends who did it and sold their books in local bookstores too.

Putting a book together, as compared to many things, takes a lot of time and energy and definitely sends social signals. Just last night a friend dropped "he just published a new book" in conversation where Stack Overflow creds would have sounded like a joke. SO just isn't known the way book publishing is. Since the comment was an effective social cue to the audience, she freaked out and asked a bunch of questions. It still works just fine.

Re: The Economics of Writing a Technical Book

#80

Post by eadmund »

fao_ wrote: post #35
slothario wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the main reason I would write a book: to tell people that I wrote a book. You can literally say, "I wrote the book on that."

Hi, you've been shadowbanned, which is a shame because your last three or four comments have been perfectly reasonable (I vouched for them so they'd show up). I'd contact a moderator or something if I were you.

> your last three or four comments have been perfectly reasonable

His first banned comment looks pretty reasonable too.

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