I have done a lot of anthologies, and here is my quick and dirty theory on running them.
They are hard. They are complicated. They are pains in the butt and you will make no money on them.
Even my best selling anthologies barely made me any money.
The most important reason to put together an anthology, aside from working with some of the most amazing creators in the world, is if you are making an anthology that will funnel into your other work.
It is a singularly amazing tool for that, maybe the best tool in your toolkit, as it can actually make you money while being a valuable marketing asset.
Your anthology is the best shot you have of bringing in a bunch of like-minded people into the rest of your work.
The first Monsters and Other Scary Shit book raised $27,000 on Kickstarter, and its purpose was to bring awareness from the right fans to then buy Pixie Dust, which ended up raising $25,000 at launch, and those two books launched everything else.
That first anthology funneled into the Pixie Dust book and directly launched my career into the next level, just like Cthulhu funnels directly into Ichabod.
Putting together an anthology is a labor of love and pain. If you aren’t using it as a lead magnet for the rest of your work, then you are going to waste all that effort, because an anthology is a grueling process.
Don’t make a “Cthulhu” anthology just because it’s hot, Find something that’s exciting for YOUR NICHE READER, the kind that will read ALL your other work, and make THAT anthology.
It’s the only way an anthology makes sense.
This makes perfect sense. Thanks for the peek under the hood!
Yay! Glad you got something out of it!