Ep. 48: Career Changers Wanted: Discover the Path to Success in Book Publishing

Welcome to the Pub Date Podcast, the show where two book broads discuss what should happen before, during, and after your book publication date. Brought to you by Broad Book Group with your host Vanessa Campos and Jen Dorsey.

Just dancing over here, dancing into the weekend. That is a really nice little, you know, I said this before, I think I said it in the last episode, I never get tired of listening to her.

I know, I like our little intro. It's very, it's friendly, it's welcoming. Yeah, it makes me want to dance on into the weekend because it's Friday, right?

Friday. Oh yeah, I got some really good sweet potatoes because I went to Costco, did my Costco run, got some really good sweet potatoes from Roots. They were on sale, huge bag, 2 pounds. Just going through them with my air fryer. They're delightful.

That's wonderful. I love summer. I love all the summer foods. We are, we're living on corn and cantaloupe and tomatoes here because it's that season in the Midwest. So it's awesome. And then, you know, I'll go back into my hibernation cave in winter and eat very heavy things, which, which I should not do, but that's okay. It's all right, but I'm ready. I'm ready for the weekend. I've been working hard all week. You've been working hard all week. Publishing's— it's, it's a lot. It's a lot of work.

Yeah, it's a lot of work, and you go into it thinking it's beautiful. It's like, I'm gonna make beautiful books, and I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that. It's a business, and you know, you see that as— I don't know about you, but like, when I started, I was— when I started, you know, many, many moons ago, you go into it doing the one thing, and then you learn the other thing, and then you learn the other thing, and then you learn how the sausage is made, and then you're like, oh, okay, well, this is less romantic than I thought it was gonna be. It's not like— well, maybe it is like that show, a show with, uh, Hilary Duff. Oh, what was it called? She's in book publishing.

I don't remember.

It's Friday.

I'm too old.

I saw bits and pieces, but I was like, oh yeah, that sounds cool. And just like publishing, there were no people of color. Maybe there was one people of color and, you know, all of that good stuff. The men always took over. It's a business and business sucks and just, just it's not as pretty as you thought it was going to be or as cool.

You know what? You're right. And I think that's why we're going to talk about what we're going to talk about today. So I think we both get questions from people all the time about How do you break into book publishing? So today we're gonna change it up a little bit, and instead of talking about publishing your book and how that piece works, we wanted to talk a little bit about how the sausage gets made and what it's like to have a career in publishing, and how do you get one. Um, because I think it's, for whatever reason, it seems somewhat mysterious, um, for people. They're, you know, they're always asking, well, how does that happen? And it does. It sounds very cool and romantic, and, um, and it is. It's in a lot of ways it's, it's that, but in a lot of ways it's So yeah, talk about that today. How, how do I break into book publishing? So let's share our journeys because they're both different, but I think the common thread is that everyone comes to publishing through some funky, weird way because there's no one way to do it.

It's true. And you always think about location. Like, when I was in college and I was thinking like, oh, okay, so I went to school for journalism during a time where, you know, newspapers were folding and I was like, well, I might as well get a minor in marketing. The good thing is, is that, you know, I learned how to write articles, SEO. Twitter was invented when I was in college.

Okay.

So I was like, I know how to market things on a 140-character thing. You know, maybe I turn it into a passion of mine. So I went to school for journalism, didn't do any journalism. I did, um, right out of school. We— well, I'm in Orange County, so let me preface that, and it is a very medical device-heavy area. There are no— I mean, there's like maybe one or two book publishers in Orange County. Entrepreneur Press, and I think Bowtie was here.

Um, not anymore.

Not anymore. Uh, a lot of, uh, smaller indie book publishers. I believe Teachers Created Material— Teachers— what's the other one? Two teacher publishing companies are in the, in the Orange County area. So very niche publishers, very small. So I, I never really thought to myself like, oh, I'm gonna— I'm just gonna go after that. No, I ended up doing proofreading and marketing for— proofreading for heart catheters. That was my big, big girl job out of college. And Boy, that was boring.

That sounds exciting.

Oh, proofreading labels for heart catheters.

Mm-hmm.

28 different languages, which made me a really good proofreader. So then I started looking around. I was like, maybe I could freelance proofreading because, you know, I need to not read about how to insert a catheter into somebody's leg vein. So then I actually connected with the Teachers Created Material freelancer pool. And started proofreading there, got into a little bit of proofreading for teacher— literally teachers created materials. They do, you know, they create textbooks and things that they can use for their own classrooms and they get published. So I started doing that, a little bit of proofreading there, got into fact-checking. So just by virtue of saying like, hey, I have this skill set that I've been working on. And I love books. You know, obviously you have to take a test to make sure that you know proofreading, Chicago Manual of Style, which I ended up learning in school anyway because you had to learn Chicago, APA, AP Style, MLA, PCP, THC, all that good stuff, right? So I was like, okay, well, I've got all these damn things. I might as well use them. I applied for that and I got, you know, I got really interested in that. That's my freelance gig. So I got little jobs like that, expanded a little bit, and then I got a job working in the medic— the Medicare insurance proofreading and all of that stuff. I'm like, all right, heart catheters, Medicare, health insurance. So I was like, I'm never gonna get into publishing, like real publishing. But then I saw and I found Entrepreneur Press because I didn't even know about them. I found them on Media Bistro. Media Bistro is a, is a platform that you could, or it's, it's basically like a— I was gonna say it's like a Publisher's Weekly. How would you describe Media Bistro, Jen?

Gosh, I, I actually haven't been on it in a while, but I think it's a little bit of everything. There's news on there, but there's also a big job site where, where you can post your resume or you can go on and find jobs specifically in media. So it's a little bit of everything. It's not just book publishing, it's, it's film and it's radio and it's TV, and it's all of it together, kind of smushed together. But yeah, it's a big mega job site more than anything.

Right. And so I was like, well, I have a journalism degree. I might as well go look in here and see if I can find a job that I'm actually gonna be passionate about. I didn't find a job that I was passionate about 'cause I don't wanna move to LA to be part of like the big media companies. And I'm in Orange County and I'm like, I don't wanna really drive anywhere. That's what happens when you move from LA to Orange County. You just stop wanting to drive places.

Right.

I was like, my radius needs to be within here. Like no more than 20 minutes on the 405. And if you've ever been on the 405 during rush hour, you understand.

That could be 1 mile. I mean.

Right. It really could. But I encountered Entrepreneur Press and I found it and I was like, I love it. I was, I remember interviewing for it and I'm like, I'm in. And it was like a marketing specialist position. It was the lowest of the low. It was entry level. And I was like, I don't care. It's a pay cut. I don't care. I wanna be in. Let me be in. Let me be part of your world. And my little Ariel moment. So I got into it that way. And then I started, you know, learning a little bit about this, a little bit about that. I was, you know, still doing freelance proofreading on the side for the children's or for the teacher's publishing place until I just couldn't do both. And then I started just learning and really digging into and sinking my teeth into publishing. And I was just so lucky to work at a publisher. Lucky, big air quotes. I don't know how lucky it is when you have to learn all the things, but it ended up working out in my favor when you're like, I have to do this and now I have to learn how to do this. And I was so hungry and eager that I just like, sure, I'll learn how to do a print run. Sure, I'll learn how to do proofreading or upload to this and find— I was just ready and willing.

Yeah, even at a pay cut, you know, it is what it is. That's how— and that's how you learn. That's how you learn publishing. Because as we'll talk about here a little later, there's no— I mean, there are programs that you can, that you can take and be a part of, like, um, on a— in a higher ed setting, but there aren't that many. And it's not like an another— it's not like a regular major that you find at every university. So you have to be self-taught, um, to some degree. I think that, that's how my story was too, even though I came at it from a slightly different background. Well, not slightly different background, very different background. But our similarity is that I was also a journalism major, and of course had those big journalism major dreams. And, uh, I'm a little older than you, so I don't have Twitter. When I'm, I'm very much dating myself. But yes, it was '90s, so it was all print or broadcast or radio, and those were your choices. And so I have, I have a face for print, so that's what I went with. And I love writing, and, and I always have. So, um, that was my degree. And I, my first job lasted 6 weeks. It was bad. It was for a little weekly newspaper. It was not a fit for me at all, nor was I a fit for them. So I, I did what you're not supposed to do, and I just quit with no plan. I'm like, I can't I cannot do this. I cannot. And I happened to do, you know, I was blanketing all of Indianapolis and the surrounding areas with my resume. And one of the places I sent it to was a very small book publishing company that only did books about Indiana. So that shows you how tiny it was. But a really wonderful regional press, and they took a chance on me. And same thing, it was very, very small. You know, there was an owner, there were 2 or 3 employees. We did 5 or 6 books a year and that was it. And so because it was so small, I, I had to do all the things. I had to learn how to ship books. I had to learn how to do some accounting. I had to learn how to do the editorial and the acquisition. So even though it was chaotic and I was probably pretty underpaid, as most people starting publishing are, I kind of looked at it as my master's experience because I got to try all the things and, and it just— I wouldn't trade it for the world. And I'm so grateful to my former boss Nancy Baxter, who's just amazing and took a chance. And, and so I did. I got to learn those things. And from there I moved on to Wiley, which is obviously a much larger publisher. They're based in Hoboken/New York, but they have an Indianapolis office because they bought a smaller company right when I was joining. And so that's when I started my journey in acquisitions. And I did not know what acquisitions was when I applied for the job. I'm like, mm, sure, I can do it. I'll fake it till I make it.

There you go.

But for those who don't know, the acquisitions editors are the people who, who go out and find the people to write the books. And so you work with the talent and you cultivate talent and go find authors. And then, you know, once you sign them on, you go through the whole contract process and then you shepherd them through the process as they're working with their various editors and production people. And, you know, you just kind of are their person as they go through the process. And I found that, that I really loved that. And it was a wonderful experience and it was on a much larger scale than what I had done at my first place of employment. And that's when I just really got the bug because I loved all of those parts of it. I love the business part and I never thought I would, even though I have a business minor. I thought, you know, Miss Editor Lady, and I have done that for many years and I do. But the business pieces is what really spoke to me. So I love, I love contract negotiation, which is weird because I'm not a confrontational person. And, and I love running a profit and loss statement, which is funny because I'm not a math person. But those pieces kind of doing the big picture stuff is what I loved. And, you know, it's what I've continued to do for many years since then. So that's my journey.

Learning how the sausage is made is never the same path, I think. And I don't know about you, but like, I couldn't afford to go take a summer course in book publishing. I know that there's one, or there used to be one at NYU publishing program. And I was like, man, those people are so lucky. And, and I think that to your point about like there's no real like program about it, there's just no undergrad program. You can't major in book publishing, although it really should be. Um, I'm thoroughly convinced it's when you go to these things and when you know the people that you get into immediately the HarperCollins and all of those places. Because I mean, I had to have X amount of years in order to even get considered for like a smaller imprint of a HarperCollins. Which ended up not being a good fit because guess what? They wanted me to move to the Bay Area for very small pay. And I'm like, I can't afford to do that.

No one can afford to live in the Bay Area if you don't have small pay.

It's like I would need to have 10 roommates in a 2-bedroom.

No. It's a shoebox.

It's, yeah. And then the location of it. So we talked about how there's no degree. Fine, but there are skill sets that you can definitely apply. So like, if you're in, in, um, if you're a copywriter, you can definitely go into this. If you are a, uh, if you're good at finance, you can go into the financial part of it. You know, both of us have been through the wringer, we've been through all of the things, and so we know that there are different skill sets. So we, when we work with people, it's— I like to think that, you know, we hired people who were really good project managers when we were, you know, working together at different publishers. People who didn't have experience in publishing but loved books. And it, you know, it's not usually the other way around. It's like, I love books but have no experience in anything, right?

And I think that's a good point. Like, you know, I always kind of joke and say, you know, people who say, I want to be in publishing because I love books— okay, yes, we— everyone in publishing loves books, and, and that's great, but that's not a transferable skill, just that you like to read and love books. But I think you can tack that on to the skill sets that you have and that you are good at. So for example, like you mentioned, if you're a finance person but you love to read and you secretly always wanted to be in publishing, you can be. Um, everybody has a finance department, you know. We have people who have to help us with royalty statements and P&Ls and, and all the, the financey things. And you can still be in the environment that you want to be in, in publishing, and be around the books, but, but do the thing that's going to actually make you money. Um, so I think that's important too. And You know, if you, if you're transferring from another, um, from another industry, um, for example, you know, you mentioned that you kind of cut your teeth on, you know, proofreading and copy and copywriting and copy editing for other things. I think that's great. I mean, you're— it's very hard to walk in the door of a publishing company with zero experience and zero skills and say, hello, I want to be in publishing. You have to start somewhere. And so maybe that is working for corporate marketing, maybe that is for, you know, writing newsletters or what have you. Take those skills and, and cultivate them for a couple of years, and, you know, then reach out and see where— what you can find in book publishing. And, you know, even though COVID is not a good thing, the benefit of a post-COVID world is that more publishers are open to remote work now, and in the past they weren't. Um, you had to live in New York, you had to live in the Bay Area. Um, you know, there, there were not many book publishers in the flyover states, and so now those walls are kind of broken down, and it's a lot easier to find people who are willing to, to do remote work.

I need to ask you a personal question.

Yes.

Okay, I know we both love to read, but do you find that you read less for pleasure?

Yeah.

At the end of the day, do you want to go in, you know, to your court, the nice little corner of your house, and read?

I do, because I'm a glutton for punishment. We work on books all day, and then I'm like, what should I do for fun? Maybe I'll read a book. Um, yeah, and probably my family who's listening to this right now, they're probably laughing because I buy books like it's my job. And so it is— I have— it is my job. Um, I have so many books that I buy and I don't read, but I love them and they're my babies, and I'm not gonna get rid of them. Um, But you know what's been working for me lately is I listen to audiobooks in the car, and now I feel very accomplished because I, I read that way while I'm out running my errands and driving my kids. And, um, so I read 10 books this year already just on audio.

Congratulations! I think I've broken 3. So I actually think I've read less in the— in my entire, uh, for myself, for my personal— I've read a lot of books, for work, obviously. You read them, you proofread them, you read them for marketing purposes. But for myself, I feel like I've read less books. I've been more into podcasts, which is probably because we've been doing a podcast. But I do feel like my love of reading personally has diminished a little bit, and I'm more into short audio format these days. So I'm still gonna count them. So just because you love to read doesn't mean that it's an immediate fit. It might be the other way around, you know.

Exactly. And, you know, to find out more about what would be a fit, um, you know, I think something people don't realize is there are so many jobs in publishing. It's not just editing, right? There's a lot to do there. So if you're trying to break into the business, I would suggest that you creep around on the corporate websites of companies that you want to work for, see what kind of jobs they're advertising for, get a feel for what those job descriptions are asking for, because that way You know, if you want to kind of make a plan, say, okay, and you know, in 3 years or 4 years or whatever, I want to get into book publishing, you can start making those moves now. Explore the options. Um, you know, for example, you know, me saying I didn't really know what an acquisitions editor was when I applied for the job— I didn't. And you know, now, um, I feel like I kind of know who all the players are in the book publishing company, at least after 25 years I would think I would. Um, but, but do that, do that research, become a student of companies that you admire or that you like. You know, if there are Kinds of books that you like to read. You know, if you, if you love romance books and you want to look into Harlequin, or you love sci-fi and you want to look into Tor, or, you know, whatever. If you're, if you love business books and you want to look into Entrepreneur or Forbes or what have you, I think that there are lots of ways to, to get to know the places that you are shooting for and, and try to craft a work history that will, that will meet those needs.

Absolutely. And I think, um, I'm pretty sure because I took this class and I had an experience on Mediabistro, there are courses that you can take. I took an, um, a copywriting certificate course in, uh, on Mediabistro. And, you know, the instructor and I didn't really see eye to eye, and I was like, well, and I was working, keep in mind I was working in I was in my entry-level position in publishing and I was writing back cover copy and it was getting, you know, it's, it's actually getting published. It's in the back cover copy of some of the books that are still out there. And, you know, it met the criteria for the publisher. It met the criteria for Amazon and met the criteria for all these things. I was like, what am I doing wrong? So then I submitted something very similar to that, to my Media Bistro course. And they're like, yeah, this isn't good. So that told me two things. One, get the accreditation for practice. Don't get it for validation.

Yep.

Because everyone's gonna be different. They probably didn't have the background that I, I wanted them to have in book publishing. So do it for certification, the practice. Don't do it for, you know, validation. It did— just because it, you don't fit that instructor doesn't mean that you're not gonna be good at it. But just continue to do that. Get those things under your belt because as book publishing is changing, it is becoming a little bit more SEO-centric. So advertising-centric, advertising classes. Google AdWords has courses that are free. edX has a lot of courses in copywriting. So just as much writing as you can do to help sharpen your skill set. And then, you know, I would look at this and say like, okay, so you've done these courses, great. You've passed and you have a certificate, great. So then you've done the practice. So that means I don't have to train you as much if I were to hire you.

Right. And, you know, just to walk it back, there are some publishing programs— there aren't that many that actually offer a full degree in it, there are very few of those— but there are a lot of certificate programs, and there are a few master's programs like in professional publishing studies as well. So we've got a list of those, we can put them in the show notes so people can see them. But I did want to give a shout out to a couple. One of those is, um, Portland State's program, their master's in publishing. Portland State actually has their own imprint, and so go through the process of like what it's like to publish a book. Um, we got to know them a little bit through PubWest. Um, they're always at those conferences, so that's an excellent program. And the other one I'd recommend, if editing is your thing, if that, that is your love and that is, you know, where you feel your skill sets lie, taking the University of Chicago editing courses, that's very beneficial because Chicago style is the predominant style used in book publishing. So you will learn it from the source, you will learn it from University of Chicago. Um, but I don't want anyone to come away from this conversation feeling like, well, if I, if I don't do a certificate program or if I don't do a master's program, then I'm not going to get into publishing. That's not the case at all. The majority of us have not done these things, right? Um, but I think, you know, if you've— if that's important to you to have that kind of credential on your resume, then there are some worthwhile programs to follow.

And if you are a woman out there listening to this, then you are like us and feel like we need to take the time to learn the skill set before we apply to the job. And that's just— it's unfortunate for us. And we're just like, yeah, we just fake it till we make it. Truth is, you could probably fake it till you make it, right?

Don't feel like you have to check off a million boxes before you apply to publishing jobs. Just know how to craft your resume. And, um, and there are some wonderful resources out there for that as well. And if there are a couple of different pieces of the publishing, uh, puzzle that you feel like you would be a fit for, do a couple of different resumes. You know, do an editorial resume.

Yeah.

Do a resume for operations and business, or do a marketing-focused resume. Have a couple, because a lot of these skills overlap. So, you know, you and I do very different things. I'm more on the, you know, on the acquisitions editorial side. You're more on the marketing side. But we both have to write a heck of a lot of copy. So that's, you know, there's that, that layover. And so I think you can, you can definitely spin it a lot of different ways for the different kinds of jobs. That you think you'd be a fit for. Absolutely.

And, and don't limit your experience in publishing to the Big Five, to a traditional publisher. No, there are several book coaches, there are hybrid publishers, there are several organizations that work around book publishing but are more operationally similar to just like a regular business. They just happen to work with authors getting them through the book publishing process, right? And so you could be a project manager at like a SaaS company and then come into this and just work with an individual, helping them get through the process. And it may be, you know, and don't limit yourself to that.

No, and don't limit yourself to just book publishers. I mean, you can be in the logistics business, you can work in distribution for a company like Ingram. Yes. Um, or a company like IPG distributes the books and goes out and sells the books to big accounts like Barnes Noble. Um, you can work for Barnes Noble. I mean, there are wonderful corporate jobs there. It's more than just working in a bookstore. Amazon has a million and fun jobs that are definitely more on the, um, you know, more on the, uh, soft— not software, but yeah, like the, the operations side. But, um, there's so much, there's so much you can do. You can work for publicity, you can work for a PR firm, a lot of adjacent businesses touch book publishing proper, right?

So all that to say is the path is never direct. Everyone is different. And we need more people, more people coming from different backgrounds. I would love to see more people coming from the heart catheter proofreading side of business. You know, it's like, Jesus, that was so boring. Well, guess what? Congratulations, now you can probably proofread a finance book about franchising, which is one thing that I did actually, and I didn't fall asleep.

See, look at you. There you go. Heart catheter stuff made that possible.

Thank you, Edwards Life Sciences. For that experience.

I love it. Well, I think at the end of the day, um, even though we, we kind of poo-poo the romantic notion of publishing, the fact is that we, we love it. And yeah, we wouldn't be in it if we didn't love it. It really is a business because that you get into because you care about the product and you care about how it's made. And so, uh, but you know, just prepare yourself for the fact that it is in fact still a business.

Yeah, sausage still has to be and it's sometimes not pretty.

It's not, but at the end of the day, it's still good sausage.

Very good.

All right.

Oh, I've had so many bad thoughts just now.

I know, right? Same. Well then, with that, we're gonna wrap it up. Uh, we want to thank our producer Paul Roberts and our executive producer Emily Carpenter-Poleskamp of Little Red Communications. We'll see you next time.

We hope that you gained some valuable insights into the world of book publishing. Head over to broadbookgroup.com to learn more about us and all our services, and be sure to check out all our social media @BroadBookGroup. Until then, keep publishing!