Self-Publishing in Australia // Step Three: Advanced Reader Copies (ARCs)

If you're thinking about self-publishing, then you have probably seen what many other writers do in the attempts to grow an audience before their book is released, as well as build hype around the release itself. So, that being the case, I don't need to go into the whole beta/alpha reading, editing and budgeting schpeal.

Instead, I want to focus on the basics that I think are worth investing in. When it comes to ARCs, you will need to look at your budget (you should absolutely have a budget, by the way! It is very easy to spend a lot of money publishing if you have the means to). Living in Australia, it can get very pricy to send physical copies - especially when it comes to overseas readers. Because of this, it is a lot more cost-effective to send your ARCs digitally (remember, at this point in time, your book has usually not gone through its final round of edits, so it is very important that you state that to the readers you are sending copies to - otherwise you get reviews detailing your poor grammar/spelling).

You can send your ARCs in a PDF format or download Calibre to convert your file into a Kindle (MOBI) or Apple Books (ePUB) format (this is what I do for all my digital conversions - it's free to download and super easy to use). Digital is often much more realistic for your advanced readers as well because it is readily available for them as soon as you want to send it out.

Physical books are great, and some reviewers will only accept physical ARCs (Note: you should never have to pay for reviews! There are plenty of readers that will read and review it for free!!), but you will quickly learn that not all of your ARC readers will actually review or post anything about your book. There are a few rules I have for sending out physical copies to readers; they must:

1. Must have a large following, at least 1k; it is important to remember that you are self-publishing, and it is your money that you are investing in this project. If you send out physical copies to everyone that applies, and some of them only have 20 followers, they will likely be the only reader you will get from that copy (if they even read it at all - again, that can happen!). However, if you send it to a reviewer that has 2k followers, your book is reaching a much larger audience

2. Must not only read in the genre you write but also enjoy your sub-genre's/themes; you want to send your physical copies to people that will showcase them, and no one will showcase them more than advocates for your themes. My book A Glimpse of Light & Glory is an LGBTQIA+ Contemporary-Fantasy Romance (it's a busy book, lol) that also contains mental health rep, a demisexual MC and an Asian-American gay MC, so I sent out physical copies to readers who are demisexual or apart of the LGBTQIA+ community, as well as readers who enjoy and advocate for diversity.

3. Must have a good history of posting reviews; it's easy to say you'll post a review, but it's another thing entirely to actually do it. You will undoubtedly send your book out to people who promise to write reviews straight away, but life happens (and sometimes it's just laziness), so it's good practice to anticipate at least 50% of those you send a copy of your book to, whether digital or physical, will not post. So, do yourself a favour and research some bookstagrammers (if you use Instagram - if you don't, what the hell are you doing?), reach out, see what they have in terms of a TBR right now, because yours probably won't be the only ARC on their list.

I hope that was helpful. You can obviously send as many ARCs as your want out into the world and totally forgo those rules - your publishing journey is your own. Only take what you want to implement.