This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
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Amazon makes it very simple to publish your book using their direct to Kindle service. But of course, they don't offer the service of writing your book for you, at least not yet. Give it time, Jeff Bezos will get to it, I'm sure. Now, in addition to writing the book, you also have a number of other tasks to tackle, including everything associated with getting that book or guide or collection of stories, whatever it is you're writing and hope to share, ready for publication. So, in today's episode, a listener wants to publish her husband's science fiction stories and books on Kindle.
She's wondering a few different things, including where can she find affordable editing and cover design? That's what we'll talk about in this episode, right after the message from our sponsor. [Music]
Hey, Chris, this is Brittany from Madison, Alabama, and I've been listening to your show for two years now. I'm thinking about starting a side hustle. I wanna publish my husband's sci-fi short stories and books on Kindle Direct Publishing.
My question is, where can we get affordable editing and cover design? Do you believe this could be profitable? Thank you all for hearing your answer. - Hey, Brittany, thank you so much for listening in Madison, Alabama. I used to live there many years ago, fun fact.
Now, this is a two-part question, technically a three-part question. So as for the cover design, that part is pretty simple. So book cover design is an established subcategory on work for hire sites like Fiverr and Upwork. I think it's totally fine to go to one of those sites and hire somebody to do the work there, and it will be quite affordable. You can get a good quality design with several revisions for a couple hundred dollars at most, and there are probably gonna be some options to pay a lot less depending on where you hire the person from.
Some agencies working on Upwork have hundreds of people in overseas locations where the price can be quite low. Now, editing is a different matter because with editing, I wouldn't just randomly hire someone. You should first think about what you're looking for or your husband should think about it since he's the writer, but maybe in some combination. Are you guys looking for a developmental editor? That's somebody who will read through and suggest structural changes to improve the flow of the book.
Are you looking for a copy editor who will go line by line and make lots of picky suggestions which are often helpful? I always have this love-hate relationship with my copy editors. Or are you just looking for a proofreader, someone to catch those pesky typos that you tend to miss or your husband tends to miss because you've been close to the work for so long? That happens to me all the time too. Like I write eight drafts of a book and then review it over and over, and yet there's still some typos that somehow I miss just because I'm seeing the same things over and over.
So those editing functions are not the same, and most editors tend to specialize in one or the other. And there's some others as well. So you want to understand first of all what you're trying to accomplish. I think that's the best advice there. And last but not least, Brittany also asked if this could be a profitable activity.
Now that is an entirely different question. That's something totally different. Short version there is I don't think this is the quickest road to making money. I mean, we have had some stories of people doing sci-fi fantasy stuff and have been able to make some money with it. But I'm imagining in this case that her husband didn't start writing his stories with that as the primary goal.
So I tend to think of it as you want to be a writer, you want to share your work. That's great, go do it. And if it ends up being profitable, consider that a bonus. That's my two cents, profitable or otherwise. But good luck, and listeners, if you have a question, come to sidehustleschool.com/questions.
We'll continue to feature them throughout the year, along with updates from other listeners as they launch their projects. Thank you so much, you're a rock star. My name is Chris Guillebeau, this is Side Hustle School. [Music]
From the Onward Project.
