Writing and Publishing a Book in Thailand

Around a year ago I was contacted about the possibility of writing and publishing a book in Thailand. The book would be co-written with another author and be about moving to Thailand. A year later and with the book, Settling in Thailand, about to hit the shelves I want to share my experience and let you know how you can get your name in print if you have a desire to write and publish books in Thailand.

I’ve set this article up in two sections. The first tells you practical information and then the second looks at the costs and potential profits of writing and publishing a book in Thailand.

The Concept

There are a million topics you could write about and within reason most topics can be published here in Thailand aside from a few notable exceptions such as about the Thai royal family and political parties.

If you are not sure if your potential topic is going to be stocked then you should take a look in Asia Books and see they type of books they carry. This isn’t to say if your book is on a different topic it wont be sold but it will at least give you an idea of what will be popular.

For independent authors in Thailand it seems there are two popular paths. First is writing fiction with a link to Thailand. The second is non-fiction, normally linked to Thailand. This isn’t to say you can’t write and publish fiction about dragons or aliens but it will be competing against many international, well-known authors.

Language

Whilst you are free to write in any language you want it is pretty clear that in Thailand books in Thai and English are the most common. Other languages could be stocked by bookstores but common sense is needed to decide if a book in another language is worth publishing in Thailand.

Writing

Are you going to write your book sitting on the beach or in a hotel in the middle of the jungle? Probably neither to be honest.

There are plenty of cafes in Thailand if you don’t fancy writing in your house or condo.

Editing

When you’ve got something you’re happy with you will need someone to proofread and edit the book. In all honesty there should be at least two rounds of editing to make sure changes are acceptable. Getting friends or family to do this might be a cheap way of doing it but it is better to get some impartial who isn’t afraid of giving direct, honest feedback.

I found myself writing what I thought were excellent paragraphs only for our editor to come back and point out several errors and suggestions on how to improve my writing. I’d say after the first draft around 25% of my work was edited and around another 25% either deleted or made into something more substantial. With editing you don’t have to make every change suggested. In the end it is your book and you have final say and it should be true to yourself if you really believe in something you have done.

When it comes to finding editors in Thailand there are several options. LinkedIn is a great place to look as there are many freelance editors out there. Fiverr is also another site with many great editors and you can see customer reviews. If you are looking for an editor with experience of Thailand then then you could consider looking on LinkedIn or perhaps contacting website writers if you like their writing style.

Typesetting

As a first time author I had no idea what typesetting was. As you may well know it is the process of formatting your writing to make it work in book format. This could mean taking a word document and putting it into the correct format to be printed or it could be to create an E-book. Needless to say you will need someone to do this for you as your book wont be printed if it isn’t in the correct form.

Fiverr is where we found our typesetter. Euan was great at his job and his price included designing the cover for our book. Books all around the word come in the same format so there is no need to use a Thai based typesetter.

Printing

The good news is there are many printing companies in Thailand, the bad news is that if you cant speak Thai then you might struggle to communicate effectively with the cheapest printers!

In printing our book we spoke to 5 different printing companies and prices varied from 85 baht to 195 baht per book. Quite a difference you can see. This was based on different paper and printing methods. Including color images in your book will make printing a lot more expensive.

Tanabutr offer price estimates based on your PDF version and their service is available in English. Santipab get good reviews from many authors too and speak good English.

A lot of smaller printing companies don’t advertise online but offer the cheapest prices with good quality. In order to find these you can ask for recommendations from bookstores or use a distributor (more on these in the next section).

Sell Yourself or Work With a Distributor

One key consideration is whether you want to do all the work yourself or work with a distributor to help get your books sold. As you are selling and producing your book in Thailand you will likely need some assistance along the way.

Book distributors have contacts with bookstores and can help get your book on more shelves. As you will see in the next section some bigger bookstores don’t meet individually with un-known authors so you will probably have to go via a distributor to get your book in there. You can also find out where to get the cheapest printing prices if you have someone helping you. Distributors will speak English and Thai meaning communication is easier too. Luckily my co-author’s wife runs Arun Press, a distribution company who looked after all these issues for my book. You pay for the services you use from them as a percentage of the book selling price. There are other distribution companies in Thailand on Google but I don’t have experience with them.

One of the benefits of a distributor is they will do all the running around, picking up your books and taking them to bookstore warehouses. They will also store your books meaning you don’t have to worry about it. They can also assist you with selling internationally.

If you are just publishing an E-book or have a link with the shops you want to sell in then you might just sell the book yourself and avoid using a distributor.

Where to Sell – Physical Stores

Bookstores normally take your book on a sale or return basis – if your book sells you get paid, if it doesn’t sell you get your books back and no payment. This means there is only a small risk for the bookstores but for an author it is wise to sell in several different shops to maximize sales potential. Not every bookstore in Thailand stocks English language books but the below are good places to start.

Asia Books are the biggest bookstore stocking English-language books in Thailand. They have stores in pretty much every important shopping mall and also at key airports. The problem is unless you are a well-known author they have pretty much zero interest in discussing stocking your book. They don’t want to deal with individual foreigners. They way to get around this is by using a publishing and distributing company who have links with Asia Books.

Kinokuniya is another popular bookstore in Thailand. Their branch in Siam Paragon is always busy and stocks a wide range of books in many languages. The problem is they are not that interested in dealing with individual authors, especially foreigners it seems. Despite many attempts to get them to see our book they have ignored calls and not replied to emails. It is possible to get through to them and again using a distribution company will prove to be your best option. They do sometimes take books on consignment via Asia Books so it is possible to work with both of these two large chains at the same time.

If you are looking at avoiding the big chains, or don’t want to deal with a distributor then you have the option of approaching the many independent stores in Thailand. You can normally find them in more international locations in Thailand such as Bangkok, Pattaya and Chiang Mai. For a selection of potential options check out the following three articles:

The Best Bookshops in Thailand – Culture Trip 

10 Must Visit Bookstores in Bangkok, Thailand – Culture Trip

English Language Bookstores – TravelFish 

Maybe you are reading this article as you are living in Thailand whilst publishing but don’t be afraid of searching out international options for stocking your books. On Google it is very easy to find distributors from other countries who could help get your book into international stores.

Where to Sell – Online

Online sales are important when it comes to a book’s success. This can be in terms of selling E-books or physical books online.

If you are selling your books in Asia Books and Kinokuniya then the good news is that they will also sell your book on their online stores.

If you plan to publish many books then it may be worthwhile to setup a simple website to promote them. In terms of selling physical books from your own website it is probably not worth it for many authors when considering the stress, time and admin of doing so. For my book I researched the option of local and international postage and have decided that it wasn’t worth it for several reasons. For international shipping the price was around 400 baht to ship to mainland Europe or USA which is too expensive. Postage within Thailand would have cost around 55 baht but the hassle of dealing with the paperwork, admin etc meant I decided on other online sales options.

Amazon is most people’s go to place to sell their books online. We use it to sell our book and it has already done pretty well in the first two weeks of being available. Amazon print the book themselves based on the PDF document you send them. Amazon also will offer your book for sale on their Kindle platform too.

This article on Magnet4Blogging was useful for me when it came to finding places to sell my E-book and the commissions and fees they charge – take a look at it. In general you pay around 10-30% commission to sell your E-book online on outside platforms.

We are offering my book on this site as an E-book as the process is quite simple. I run this site on WordPress and use the Easy Digital Downloads plugin and Paypal to accept payment.

Marketing Your Book

Now you have your sales channels you need to think about how (or if) you will promote your book. Sure there is the possibility that people will just stumble upon your book but in reality you will need to push people towards it. This could be by running a blog or having a full on website dedicated to your book. The cost of running a paid website might wipe out your profit so perhaps a free WordPress or Wix site might be the way to go.

If your budget is limited then offer to write guest posts for websites related to your book both based in Thailand and overseas. Most will offer you a chance to link to your book or carry a short advert describing it with a link to Amazon.

If you are selling an E-book on your website then consider setting up an affiliate scheme where website owners can make money by pushing their users to buy your book. Also these website creators can make money via Amazon by writing a review of your book with a link for readers to purchase your book.

If you have a higher budget then consider paid for advertising. Major expat websites in Thailand offer advertising starting from 1,000 baht per month. You could also consider having a promotional event or book launch which could cost as much or as little as you want to depending on where it is.

Setting a Price

When it comes to setting a price for your book there are a few factors to consider.

Firstly you need to look at your costs. Take a look at the next section where I outline what I paid to give you an idea of what it may cost when writing and publishing a book in Thailand. There is no point in selling your book for less than cost unless it is a driver for other business. There are a lot of costs but remember to consider that you will probably aim to print at least 500 copies if not more to make your per unit cost lower.

Next, go into Asia Books or have a look on their website and see how much similar books cost. If you see a book with a similar topic and number of pages then you should be pricing yours in a similar range. When it comes to E-books do the same, check out your competitors and see what they charge.

If you are selling a paperback in Thai bookstores then the shops will recommend prices. With our book we had an idea of what we wanted to charge and Asia Books had a different figure in mind. In the end we met in the middle. If your price is too high bookstores may decide not to stock your book.

The Costs

There are a number of costs when it comes to writing a book. Not everyone will have to pay all of these but I have given guide prices and examples of what we paid for these services.

Editing / Proofreading 

As I said before you should get a professional to look through your book as you will make mistakes. In the end you could spend a lot of money on this stage if you choose an editor with lots of experience. Websites such as Fiverr will allow you to find editors who charge less. A Thai distributor will find you an editor here in Thailand if you need specialist knowledge. For a couple of proofreaders we paid $100 and for editing we used a friend who is experienced in editing.

Typesetting

After printing this proved to be the second highest cost.We used Fiverr and found a highly rated professional who charged $325 for typesetting the book and creating thee-book. Other typesetters were cheaper but in the end we felt we got real value for money.

Sample books

Unless you are a pretty famous author you will not get paid upfront for your books. These days  you will write your book and print at least a few samples and take it to distributors or book stores and present your idea. Having a PDF or Word document isn’t enough. We made five initial copies of our book to give as samples, this cost 2,000 baht. If the distributors or book shops like it they will say how many they would like to take.

Printing

Orders from bookstores could range from five to 200 copies for little-known authors. The issue here is that your print costs will be high based on small numbers and you will probably look to print at least 500 (if not 1,000) copies to get a better per-book printing price. As in the paragraph above you can see that printing a 250 page book with a color cover might cost 400 baht based on five copies. Printing 1,000 copies could mean the costs are down to 100-200 baht depending on print quality and your negotiation skills! What you are looking for is for stores to re-order your book several times and use your stock of books over a longer period.

For our book we decided to print 2,000 books as our printer gave us a great discount meaning we paid around 100 baht per book in total. The price we were quoted for 1,000 copies was close to 125 baht. Settling in Thailand is a 282 page book for reference.

ISBN

A typical ISBN costs around 1,000 baht if purchased individually or cheaper if you buy in bulk.

Distributor 

A distributor will charge a percentage of your selling price as a fee. This could range from 5-25% of the sales price depending on the services you need. They will collect money from your sales and take their cut before sending you the adjusted amount.

Marketing 

This could be nothing or several thousand baht a month or a large one-off fee. It depends what you decide to do to market your book. We offer affiliates 35% of an E-book sale and will be advertising on a few sites at the end of this year too. I estimate in total we will spend around 50,000 baht promoting the book.

E-Book fees

As we are selling our book in E-book format as well as paperback there are a few extra costs to consider. The program we use to sell my book via this site is free but we pay PayPal fees on payments receive, this amounts to around 7-10% when taking into account the poor exchange rates they offer and other fees.

Shop commissions 

As discussed above bookstores will take your books on a sale or return policy. When your book is sold they will take a commission. This can range from 20-60% depending on your book, the selling price and your reputation as an author. For example if your selling price is 500 baht and the store get 50% commission you will make 250 baht per book (less other costs as mentioned in this section).

We managed to negotiate different commission levels from the six companies our book will be sold by ranging from 20-50%. The higher commissions are paid at premium stores such as those at airports.

Online commissions 

There are many online sources to sell your book as mentioned previously. They all charge different commissions. Amazon charge around 60% but they do the printing themselves, nothing for you to pay towards this. Other stores charge between 10-40% commission for selling E-books.

Other costs

Obviously a book doesn’t get written in five minutes. You will spend hours at your computer writing. I don’t personally think of this as a cost but as something I’ve enjoyed doing. If you wanted to you could attach an hourly value to your writing but I think for most authors that would be unfair.

Aside from writing there are potential other costs. For our book we had to make several trips to interview people. One of our interviewees was outside the country and a few others in far flung towns and villages which required spending a few days away from home to visit them.

My final cost per book 

It is pretty much impossible to say what our final cost per book will be as the commission we pay at different stores varies. As two of us have co-authored this book, the costs (and profits) are split. In total I estimate we spent around 250,000 baht in total on printing, editing, typesetting, distribution and other costs. On top of this we will also have to pay commission on sales from bookstores and some online outlets. There will probably be an extra 50,000 to add on to the costs if we decide to pay for advertising or promotional campaigns.

Our book is 282 pages, has a color front cover and black and white images inside. To put a figure here I think the cost per book, including commissions paid to book stores, is around 375 baht per book based on printing 2,000 copies.

What I will say is that we didn’t cut costs and didn’t choose the cheapest options. We also had a large budget for travel and research for the book. You could produce your book for less, maybe around 100,000 baht if you choose the cheapest option and do a lot of the editing and proofreading yourself.

The Profits

When I was first approached to write this book I was told that it should be for the fun and pride of doing it rather than as a way to get rich. Most authors I have spoken to in Thailand tell me that the money they make from sales covers costs and provides them with a bit of extra spending money every month but is certainly not enough to live on by itself. Of course you might be lucky and come up with a bestseller or have so many books out there that in total they bring in enough to live on.

Our book sells for 650 baht in paperback and $9.99 as an E-book. In the end I might end up making 100 baht per book sold after taking off all the costs and splitting the profits. I can tell you I must have spent a good 200 hours or more on writing, editing and researching for the book too which I am not including in the costs of producing the book. we will need to sell approximately 750 copies to break even and from then will start to make money. In the end if all 2,000 copies of my book are sold I will probably make around 200,000 baht.

One year of work, a lot of stress and many hurdles to jump through for 200,000 baht so is it really worth it….

Is it Worth Writing and Publishing a Book in Thailand?

In short the answer is yes. I have loved the process of writing this book. I have met interesting people and made new friends. I honestly feel that I have produced something of true value and in the week or so since my book has come out I’ve had a lot of people congratulating me and I’ve felt proud that I’ve managed to complete this project.

The upfront costs, in our case around 250,00 baht, aren’t insignificant but if you believe in your book then you should be confident to put your money behind it. As I said we didn’t cut corners on cost an you can produce your book for less, especially if you are just making an E-book. Many people spend 250,000 baht on a dream holiday or an experience, if writing a book is your dream then don’t let this put you off, go for it!

Whether you are retired or working here, a lot of people find they have more free time than in their own country and can get around to doing those things they’ve always wanted to. Many people would love to write a book. As you have seen it is possible here and whilst it probably wont make you a millionaire it is possible you can cover your costs and even make a little pocket money.

If you have any questions feel free to message me below or send an email, I’m happy to help!