How Do I Publish A Book? A Decision Tree.

After three energizing days at the 2025 San Francisco Writers Conference (SFWC), I’m sitting down to reflect on the many wonderful and revealing conversations I had. For those of you who may  not know, SFWC is an annual gathering of authors and book industry professionals–from literary agents to publishers to copyeditors. We meet up–in downtown San Francisco for a weekend of workshops, panels, book pitches, and good ol’ fashioned networking. 

This year, one thing really stood out to me. More than ever, authors expressed a heightened interest in taking the self-publishing route for their books instead of following the traditional publishing model. Certainly, reasons for this trend vary from author to author, but I observed one fairly universal commonality: vast confusion about how self-publishing works. 

Confusion comes with the territory. The publishing industry is complicated, and it takes time to really understand the landscape. I had countless conversations about self-publishing at my vendor booth, during the panels I participated in, and over casual drinks and meals. Most of them centered around these core questions: What self-publishing route should I take? Should I do all the work myself? Should I hire a hybrid publisher? How do I find good, solid professionals to help me? 

During one such conversation, I came up with a simple decision tree diagram (which I originally scribbled on a piece of scratch paper) to help my breakfast mate visualize the often-confusing choices people face before self-publishing:

Given the hieroglyphic nature of my original diagram, I’ve reproduced it more legibly here:

By the way, don’t let the fact that I help people self-publish make you think I’m not an advocate of traditional publishing. I am! In fact, I usually suggest people try to get a traditional deal before pursuing self-publishing. (Here’s an article I wrote outlining the pros and cons of traditional versus self-publishing). But if you end up going the self-publishing route, this decision tree can be helpful. 

As you can see, it starts with one main question, which is followed by two sub-questions depending on your response to the first:

• Question 1: Do you want to hire a company to do all the work of self-publishing your book or do you want to take the DIY approach and assemble your own team?
• Depending on your answer, you’ll need to answer another question:
  • If you answered “Company” to Question 1: 
    • Question 1a: Do you want to hire a hybrid publisher (aka vanity press) or do you want to hire a non-hybrid company?
  • If you answered “DIY” to Question 1:
    • Question 1b: What aspects of the process can you truly do yourself and what do you need to hire freelancers for?

Now, let’s explore this decision tree in more detail. But before we do, it’s crucial to understand that there are no right or wrong answers to any of these questions. Everyone’s situation is different and I met successful authors who’ve taken every variation of the self-publishing journey. In the sections below, I’ll do my best to give you the information you need to answer them for yourself!

Question #1: Do You Want to Hire a Book Publishing Company or DIY?

This is a biggie, and that’s why it’s first. When you decide to take the self-publishing route, you have to decide whether you want to hire a company to do all the publishing work (editing, design, and distribution) for you or take the DIY approach, hiring freelancers for what you can’t do well. Whichever way you go, you’ll find a plethora of service providers to support you, if that’s what you’re looking for. 

 DIY + Assemble Your Own Team

A second approach to take is hiring individual freelancers to help you with your cover design, interior layout, distribution, ebooks, and audiobook production. It often takes a lot of time to find reputable pros (you’ll need to do your due diligence vetting folks carefully), but if you’re up for the challenge, you can save yourself money this way. You may also have the skills to do certain pieces of this work yourself, though I warn you that it’s important to not cut corners if you’re not confident.

Your Personal Answer to Question #1

Which route should you take? It depends. If you don’t have any of the necessary self-publishing skills and don’t want to learn them; and you want to avoid the hassle of finding, vetting, and then managing a team of freelancers, you should hire a reputable company to do the work for you. You’ll spend a bit more, but it will save you time and hassle in the long run, and you’ll get a good product (and experience) if you hire a good company (more on that later). On the other hand, you can save money by assembling your own team, and end up with a high quality product. It will just take some more of your own time and effort to find and manage the team!

Question 1a: What Kind of Book Publishing Company Should You Hire?

If the DIY route isn’t for you, and you’d like to hire a company, you essentially have two options. 

1. You could hire what’s called a “hybrid publisher.” 

2. You could hire a non-hybrid company, which I call author support agencies, that will do all the publishing work for you, but under your own name (not theirs) and maintain all the control and keep all the royalties. 

Let’s explore those two options in more detail. 

Hybrid Publishing

Hybrid companies are essentially fee-for-service publishers who do all the editing and design work on your manuscript, and then publish your book under their own name. Hybrids generally use the same print-on-demand platforms that you’d use on your own. They also generally take a percentage of the royalties (though far less than a traditional publisher would). That is why they’re called hybrids: they combine self-publishing elements (in that you pay for the publishing of your book) with traditional publishing elements (in that they publish your book under their name, or imprint). 

Sadly, the rise of self-publishing has brought with it many unscrupulous hybrid publishers. In fact, I wrote an article about the red flags to watch out for when hiring a hybrid. In three words: proceed with caution! Also, many hybrid companies tout two primary benefits to their authors, which I believe are mostly overstated. 

The first benefit they promise is “distribution,” often implying that your book will be in more places than it would be if you self-publish on your own, like bookstores and libraries. Here’s what that means when you look under the hood: hybrid publishers use the same distribution channels that you yourself would use with a DIY approach: print-on-demand (POD) platforms like Amazon KDP and/or IngramSpark. The difference is that your book is set up under their company account. The result is twofold: 

1. You don’t have access to real-time sales data or control over the back end of your accounts, limiting your ability to do certain marketing. 
2. With rare exceptions, your book won’t be in bookstores unless you personally pursue each store (even though you’ll be in the catalogue from which bookstores order). 

There are a handful of hybrids that give you the option of using the same printing technology as traditional publishers. Called offset printing, this approach means they print a big batch of your books all at once, and do it for less cost per book than you’d get from print-on-demand technology. The downside for you, the author, is they usually only offer this if you buy big bulk orders upfront (usually at least a thousand books). As a result, you end up with 100 boxes of books that you have to store somewhere (garage, or a warehouse) and it’s up to you to sell and ship out all by yourself. So, taking this approach only works if you have the upfront cash to invest in a big print run and a surefire way to move books independently, like through speaking or consulting gigs. 

The second benefit that many hybrids tout is that by having their name on your book, you’ll get a brand boost. In other words, their name will make your book appear more reputable, like with a traditional publisher. In my experience, this just isn’t true (with rare exceptions). There are some hybrids like She Writes Press and Sibylline Press (both great companies) that can add some brand power to your book, and even offer you more traditional-like distribution. But the reason that they carry this brand power is that they are very selective around the manuscripts they choose to work with. Much like a traditional publisher, these hybrids actually read your manuscript (or book proposal) prior to offering you a contract. 

Generally speaking, I don’t find that readers care much if there’s a publisher name associated with a book, unless it’s a household name like Simon & Schuster. Even if they do, you can come up with your own publishing name (an imprint) when you self-publish, and then list it on both your book and your Amazon page. This carries just as much weight as any hybrid publisher. 

Author-Support Agencies

The alternative to hybrids are companies (like mine) that you can hire to do all the work of publishing (editing, design, and distribution), but that publish your books under your name with your accounts. It’s a little like hiring a team of freelancers who will do the work for you, but you end up with all the profits and full control of your publishing accounts, royalties, and files. These “fee for service” companies will essentially help you create your own self-publishing company, and do all the work required to design and publish your book. This way, you save all the time vetting and managing a team, because a good company will do all of that for you!

I’m obviously biased, but I tend to think that the non-hybrid approach is the best option for most authors. There are exceptions, of course, like the hybrids I mentioned above. But most hybrid publishers don’t offer true benefits beyond what you could have without them, and as I mentioned, if you do choose to work with them, you give up control of your publishing accounts and a percentage of the royalties. My general belief is that if you’re paying to publish your book, you should retain all the control and profits. 

Your Personal Answer to Question 1a

Whether you choose a hybrid or non-hybrid, make sure that the company you choose to hire is reputable and does quality work! Don’t be swayed by prices or promises that seem too good to be true. Do your homework and vet them! This is a big investment and an important milestone in your life. Make sure the company you work with truly understands and honors that. Here’s an article I wrote to help guide your search for a solid company. And I’m always happy to chat with anyone about my company’s approach. Feel free to email me (joel@launchmybook.com) if you have any questions.

Question 1b: How Much of the Publishing Process Can (or Should) You DIY?

If you’ve chosen the DIY approach to self-publishing, congratulations! Over the last year, I’ve attended several conferences (like the SFWC) and have met many authors who have chosen this route to great success. This route will take more time and effort, but if you see it through, you can build a solid self-publishing team to support you in publishing all the books you write!

If you’re going down the DIY route, I highly recommend a resource I discovered from Claire Jones, a successful self-published author I met at the SFWC. She’s put together an excellent Self-Published Author 52-Week Planner that will fully guide you through the steps you need to take to publish your book! We also have an online course that outlines the self-publishing process. 

The key decision for any DIY self-publisher is between what you want to hire for and what you want to do yourself. My general philosophy of book launching is that most authors don’t have infinite budgets, and so you’re going to need to choose some aspects to do yourself and some to hire for. Below is a list of the main elements of self-publishing (not including any kind of marketing). As you assemble your self-publishing team, you’ll want to identify which elements of the process you want to do on your own and which you’d like to hire help for; then, you’ll need to search, vet, and ultimately hire the key freelancers to help you bring your book to life.

There are virtually no instances when you should DIY the copyediting piece of the process (unless you’re married to a professional copyeditor). This is a highly specialized skill, so you should use a highly specialized professional. For proofing, it’s possible to do this yourself, but beware! You are going to be so close to the material that it will be hard not to overlook the kinds of simple mistakes that professional proofers catch. 

When it comes to hiring editors for all three levels, please don’t skimp. Good editors aren’t cheap for a reason!

Cover Design

One of my biggest publishing pet-peeves is amateur cover design. Authors will spend years (if not decades) writing their books and often thousands of dollars in editing support, and then cut corners on the cover design! Just because you’re self-publishing your book, doesn’t mean it has to look self-published.

Good cover design will make your book look indistinguishable from one published by Simon & Schuster (and sometimes even better!).

So unless you are a trained graphic designer and have professional experience with book cover design, I highly recommend you hire a book cover designer for this crucial aspect of the process. I’m not saying DIY covers aren’t possible. They are. I’m just saying that most people–even those who have graphic design experience–won’t be able to create a professional cover that doesn’t look self-published. This also goes for the many inexpensive cover designers you can find on Reedsy or Fivver. It’s possible to find an affordable designer who does good work, but in most cases, you’re going to need to pay a bit more for this service. In any case, make sure to ask to see their previous design work for covers in your genre. That’s the best way to assess their ability to give your book the cover it deserves. 

I assess the quality of a print book’s interior based on how “clean” and professional it looks (Are fonts simple and consistent? Are margins and spacing all standard? Are images sharp?), and I look to see that there aren’t any red flags that would result in the reader taking the book less seriously. This is an art as much as a science, which is why there are professionals who specialize in the craft. Of course, these days, there are a lot of software programs available to the DIYer. You simply plug in the text of your manuscript and, Voila!, you’ve got an interior print layout. But these programs can contain “hidden” problems, so it’s worth carefully reviewing your file with a professional. For example, I talked to one author at the SFWC who told us she designed her interior using InDesign, but discovered the file wouldn’t upload to Amazon because any word ending in an “f” or any quotation marks at the end of the line were throwing errors in Amazon KDP’s system, so it wouldn’t let her print the book! 

For the purposes of this article, I’m also including ebook design in this category. In self-publishing, the ebook is always generated after the interior print design is completed, which involves converting your interior design for print into a digital format that will work on e-readers like Kindle or Nook. You can find automated tools to convert your print interior into ebook format. Amazon KDP offers one. But bear in mind that KDP’s ebook files won’t look perfect across all e-reading devices, so I recommend having an actual designer do your ebook conversion.

Distribution Set-Up

Setting up your book for distribution is easier now than ever. In the old days, you’d have to find a printing house willing to typeset and run a big batch of books, which they’d ship to you on a pallet. You’d then need to store those hundreds of boxes of books and fulfill orders as they came in (from your website, an event, or from a bookseller like Amazon). But these days, with the advances in “Print On Demand” (POD) technology, you can essentially upload your files (cover, interior, and ebook) to a POD platform and your books will be available to sell through various online retailers. When a customer buys a book, a single copy is printed and shipped directly to them by the POD platform. You don’t have to lift a finger. 

So when it comes to setting up your book for distribution, I highly recommend a POD platform. This is something you can do on your own (Here’s a guide we developed based on how we do it), or you can hire someone to do it for you. Many self-publishing companies or individual freelancers (like cover and interior designers) will build POD setup into their budget. You can pay anywhere from $250 to $2,000 for someone to do this for you. 

What are you paying for? There are a lot of important details you need to navigate when setting up your POD accounts, and then your titles, within each POD platform. This includes things like setting the price, assigning the relevant keywords and categories, fixing the royalty rates, etc. If you’re up for a DIY project, this is a great place to save, as you can do a lot of googling to find most of the answers to your POD questions. But if you don’t want to go to the trouble, you’ll need to budget for some help here!

Your Personal Answer to Question 1b

Self-publishing is complex, and if you’re motivated, organized, and committed to getting your book published with a limited budget, DIY can be a great way to go. As you review the various dimensions of self-publishing above, you’ll need to decide which ones you can do yourself and which you need to hire for. And you’ll want to be clear where to make sure you pay top dollar and where you can potentially save. 

Conclusion

As I said in the beginning of this article, there’s no right way to self-publish. Everyone’s calculus is different. Some people have the passion and time to assemble their own self-publishing team. Others might prefer hiring an all-in-one company. Some are halfway in between! In any case, the key is asking yourself the right questions up front, so you can chart out the best self-publishing pathway. 

I hope you’ve found this decision tree helpful! If you’d like to talk more about your options, feel free to send me an email (joel@launchmybook.com) or schedule a call with me. I’m happy to chat!