Outliers Publishing Private Limited is an international publishing house started in March 2017 as a provider of high-quality publishing services to authors across the world by Bhavini Mehta. Outliers Publishing is a full-service, new-age publishing house that offers the best of both the words; self-publishing and traditional publishing. It is a one-stop solution for all that the author might need to create, publish, market and distribute the books.
How did you come up with the idea of Outliers Publishing?
I was always passionate about reading books. Publishing as an industry in the past was closed with publishers and agents making the decision about what gets published. Publishers had control over what gets published, hence they controlled the flow of the content people had access to. With the emergence of self publishing, people no longer had to rely on traditional publishers to get their books published. They could easily use the tools available online to do so. However, publishing has never been as easy process. There still is a lot of work into books which people cannot do on their own. Hence, I decided to help people publish their books and that’s how Outliers Publishing came to be.
What problems are Outliers Publishing solving?
While people can publish their books, there is still a lot such as editing, designing, formatting, and pricing that goes into a book. It is important to treat your book as your magnus opus and also an important business investment. Since this undertaking is so crucial, we let people focus on writing their stories and take care of everything else. We not only take care of the book and all its financial aspects, we also register for ISBN and copyright on behalf of the author, meaning that their work belongs to only them and no one else can copy their book and make their own.
How does Outliers Publishing work?
We begin when we receive a manuscript. We edit the book and format it and consult the author to create a front and back cover. We create multiple versions and multiple book covers until we decide one that conveys best what the book is about and what can one expect from it. We also work on the financial implications and distribution platforms of the book. After working so much on the book it is important it reaches the right kind of audience and people are able to afford it. Otherwise, all this work will be down to nothing. Once we’re done editing and formatting the book, we design a copy and send it to the author for confirmation. Once they give us the green signal – we go ahead and publish the book.
What do you want to achieve from PublishBook.me and what is your larger goal or vision?
Our vision is to be the number one option for publishing at least in India for people who wish to publish. The India-publishing revolution is really something special and people will catch on to it sooner rather than later.
I wish to look for a world where everyone who aspires to be an author can become one while availing the best services from us.
Vision to become PublishBook.me International Publishing House
Who is your target?
We are ready to serve anyone who writes and wished to be an author. We indirectly also serve readers as we allow new content to enter the market which gives readers much more of an option to read.
What is the revenue model of Outliers Publishing?
We offer customized packages to our clients. While they can choose our full publishing packages, they can also customize and choose only the services they wish to avail. For example, our clients can just get their book formatted or get their front cover designed. We’re happy to help them with anything they require. Hence our clients pay for only what they need.
What are your customer acquisition strategies?
We are in touch with literary agents who get us in touch with people who are willing to get their work published. We then sit down with them and have a discussion of how to take their book ahead. Also, a lot of clients we have served in the past are happy to refer us to other people since they believe in our services.
What is your competitive advantage?
We believe our biggest advantage is we really are connected with our authors. Since work on only 4-5 projects at a time, we can stay in touch with our authors as we’re going through the process of publishing their book. What’s more is we connect with authors long before they have a manuscript ready and help them through the process of writing, and even give them advice on how to write more efficiently and effectively.
What expansion plans are you looking for the next 2 years, next 5 years and 10 years?
We’re looking to add a whole bunch of services such as instant publishing and even an author’s retreat where we’ll be able to take authors on a retreat where we coach them on how to write a book and also on the financial aspects of the same.
We want to be as India’s number 1 publishing option by the next 10 years.
PublishBook.me aiming to become India’s #1
Tell us more about your team and uniqueness of Office culture
Our culture is one that learns from it’s mistakes and is constantly striving to do better. Mistakes and trying new things are encouraged as long as we’re able to learn from them and improve on our processes.
Share your Success Story
So far, we have published 11 titles and are working on many more. We’ve also brought in a lot of services since we started and recently finished designing our first author’s tour. We have expanded our portfolio to publish in different formats such as Audio CDs and Audio Books. We’ve also expanded our portfolio of books, and are working to publish books in different genres. Outliers Publishing Private Limited has done very well for a bootstrapped company with no debts on our balance sheets. We have been shrewd in managing our resources, generating a positive Return on Investment on the business. We deal with clients from different countries, coming from different cultural background but all having the common expectation of
“world class service at affordable price.”
Bhavini Mehta shared Success Story of PublishBook.me
What was the most challenging part of your journey till now? How did you overcome those challenges?
The challenges we faced were handling a lot of things at the same time while coordinating with authors. As we learned, we improved our processes and stopped making mistakes we used to do before and showed better results for our efforts.
Anything, you would like to say to our readers or fellow business people?
Writing as an activity is full of joys and helps one grow as a person.
“I would encourage more people to pen down their wonderful stories.”
Bhavini Mehta’s message to VyapaarJagat readers
