#407 Publish with a Purpose: How to Avoid Publishing Scams

Welcome to Kingdom Writers, where we help equip and empower Christian writers of all genres to share your unique gifts with the world. We're your hosts, C.J. and Shelley Hitz.

This podcast is filled with spiritual encouragement as well as prayers to help you overcome the resistance you face as a writer. Your story matters.

Hey, Kingdom Writers. This is Shelley Hitz, one of your hosts here at the Kingdom Writers Podcast. And in this episode, I'm just going to talk a little bit about how to avoid publishing scams. Now, I'm not an expert in this. I'm not a lawyer, I'm not trying to give legal advice. But I have noticed quite a few of our Christian Book Academy members, as well as people emailing us, have asked us about these offers. They're getting through phone calls or emails, emails or messages, and they're just asking, like, is this legit? Should I do this? Should I sign up for this? And I thought it just might be a good thing to cover in the podcast. And so one of the most common things, and this happens to CJ and I as well, is getting a phone call. So somehow they get your phone number and they know you're an author or they know you're. You want to be an author, and they call you and they offer you some sort of package. It might be a publishing package, it might be a marketing package, and it's going to be at a cost. And so, you know, it might be through email. They might email you, or they might reach out, like on a LinkedIn message or a Facebook message or something like that, but they're reaching out to you in some way to see if you will purchase their services or their packages. And so there are three things I just want you to consider. Again, I am not, like I said, I'm not an expert in this, but these are just some things I'd like you to consider as you come across these offers. So, number one, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

That's just, to me, it's kind of common sense. But I just wanna remind you, like, people know, like, they're there. Some people are really good at, at copywriting, which is writing to sell. And so they're really good at just pulling at your heartstrings and your emotions and the emotional reasons that you want to publish a book or that you want to market your book. And they'll promise you all of these things. And yet.

Often, you know, you spent, you might spend thousands of dollars for something or even hundreds of dollars. And at the end of the day, end up feeling disappointed because you didn't get the results that you wanted. And so, you know, there are very few instances when I'm going to recommend that you spend thousands of dollars on a marketing package. Now, if you have an established platform or, you know, you're going to be on a speaking circuit and you're going to be able to sell a lot of books or you're selling programs and services on the back end of your books, and so it's going to be very profitable for you then, yeah, maybe it might be a good idea. But to be honest, like, even in our business and promoting Christian Book Academy, I haven't spent thousands of dollars on it until this year. So I have finally hired some people and spent money to really get expert help. And sometimes it is, it, it is necessary. But you, you know, when you're marketing a book or when you're trying to get published, I just, I very rarely recommend spending thousands of dollars. Like, we can help you get your book published in Christian Book ac at an affordable price. Like you don't have to spend $10,000. And these companies are, you know, so persuasive that it's so easy to think, oh, well, yeah, this is going to be fast and easy. And then I'm going to, you know, get this and this and that. And I just, I just want to again, reiterate if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. And then number two, read the fine print. So I have found a lot of authors come to me after they've worked with some publishing companies and they've paid 5 to $10,000 to get their book published. You know, their royalties that they're getting are a lot less because they have to split royalties with this company. And, you know, there's different things that come up legal right reasons that like, you know, one person told me that they had created the artwork for their book cover and they wanted to go separate ways with this publishing company and independently publish it, self publish what we teach. And the company said you can't do that because you signed a contract that you gave us the copyright to your artwork. So read the fine print. I would. If you're spending more than $5,000. So if you're spending five to $10,000 on something, I would spend a little bit of money, a couple hundred dollars to hire a, a lawyer to look through the contract and to find any red flags or anything that you may not catch on your own just because it's a, you know, it's a significant amount of money and you just want to make sure like what kind of contract you're getting into. So number one, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Number two, read the fine print. Number three, like know your options. Don't get pressured and into buying something now for a specific bonus or a discount just because you don't want to lose out on that bonus or discount. Take your time to read, do your research. And this wasn't, you know, in, in relationship to publishing, but my mom recently did across the, across the country move and she was researching movers and up on Google came like top 10 movers or something. And I don't know if it was an ad or what it was, but she clicked on it and this company was on there, that list. So she contacted the company and when they had her on the phone and she just got really excited, like they were really good sales, they were a really good salesperson and they promised her like that she would get this amount off. And if she, you know, signed up right now and put down her down payment and all the things, you know, and she just got caught up in the emotions of it and the excitement of it and you know, seeing, saving more money. And you know what, it was not a good situation. So if she would have just taken some time to do a little bit of research on that company. We ended up doing it, researching them later because they were late on delivering her stuff. They weren't communicating with her, they weren't answering her calls. And we're like, oh no, is this a moving scam? So we did, we just did a little research and found some reviews online. And most of the reviews honestly were bad reviews. And they were saying like our stuff took 30 days to get here. It wasn't in good condition when it got here. And there was just all of these reviews that honestly, if, I think if my mom would have read those reviews before she handed the company her credit card and everything, like she wouldn't have used them. She would have found a different company. So just take a little time to do your research. Don't get pressured into making a decision when you're on the phone with somebody or when they say you have to do it right now. And you know, we all use some sort of urgency at times and scarcity with marketing. You know, when you have a book launch, you may offer a bonus just for a specific amount of time. But when it comes to a really big purchase, like when you're purchasing a publishing package or a marketing package, I just encourage you take your time, like take time to pray about it, take time to do some research and just make sure that you have some time to think it over before you make an emotional response. It ended up working out okay for my mom. She did end up getting her stuff delivered and everything was delivered and nothing was, you know, was broken or had an issue except she had some scratches on her piano, her, her grand piano. And so the piano still works fine. It just has some scratches. Thankfully, it's the scratches are on the side of the piano that it faces the wall. But anyways, it ended up working out okay for her in the end. But we were really concerned that she may have gotten caught up in a moving scam. And I just want you to avoid publishing scams, and not only just scams, but getting into something that you don't need. So please reach out and ask me because, you know, we can, we can really help guide you. Just email supportrainingauthors.com or if you're in Christian Book Academy, post in our private group. We can help you to publish your book for a very affordable price. It could be maybe 500 to 1500 dollars and we're going to help you to find the people that will do the work for you. And it doesn't need to cost you $10,000. I just had a Christian Book Academy member join and she said she paid $10,000 for her book. And I said, oh my goodness. I don't want to discourage you, but we could have helped you to do this for a lot less and then you would have all that extra money to spend on marketing or to publish other books. Right? And so contact us first. Most marketing packages are probably not going to be worth it, in my opinion. I think there's a lot that you can do for a little about a little amount of money and most of it you can either do on your own or you can hire maybe a virtual assistant to help you. But there's just, there's just a lot of people out there wanting you to buy things and it may not be the best option. So I hope that this has helped you out just a little bit. At least think through when you find these offers that, that pop up. So number one, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Number two, read the fine print. And number three, know your options. Don't get pressured into buying now just for a bonus or a discount. Make sure you take time to really research the company and pray for, pray about it. So let me pray for you. So God, thank you so much that you have given us the Holy Spirit that can help guide us into all truth and guide us when we're in these situations. I pray that you would just give us wisdom. Like James 1:5 says, if we lack wisdom, we just need to ask you and you will give it to us. So give us wisdom when these opportunities come up or when these options are offered and show us, Lord, what we're to do. Give us wisdom. And if we have gotten caught up in something like this in the past, Lord, help us to just be able to work through that and ask for your forgiveness or to forgive ourselves or to let go of any regrets of the past and to move forward in what you have for us, to not let it stop us from the calling that we have in our lives. So Lord, thank you for each Kingdom writer listening right now, I pray your blessings over them. We pray this in Jesus powerful name. Amen.

Thank you for listening to this episode of Kingdom Writers. We believe that you, as a Christian writer, have a specific role to play in the Kingdom of Heaven to impact lives for eternity.

And because of this, we choose to pour out our lives into encouraging writers like you to not only tell your stories, but to take the courageous step of self publishing your stories in books that will outlive you and leave behind a powerful legacy. This podcast is sponsored by Christian Book Academy, where we help you give birth to your books. We invite you to join our community of Kingdom writers.