Which publishing path fits you?
Ten questions about your book, your audience, your budget and how you like to work. You get all six ways to publish ranked with a fit score, the reasons drawn from your own answers, the trade-offs and what to do next. No email needed.
About three minutes. Your answers stay in this browser.
Traditional, through an agent
A Big Five or other large house buys the rights and pays an advance.
Small, university or specialist press
Smaller houses you can often approach directly, without an agent.
Self-publishing, mostly yourself
Amazon KDP, IngramSpark or Draft2Digital, with you doing most of the work.
Self-publishing with freelancers
You hire the editor, designer and typesetter and keep every right.
Hybrid or author services
A company edits, produces and distributes a manuscript you wrote.
Full service, ghostwritten
A writer creates the book with you, then it is published for you.
Want a person at Scribe Media to look at your result?
If you would like to talk your result through, leave your name and email. Your answers and ranking come with it, so you will not have to repeat yourself. Scribe sells two of the six paths; if yours is one it does not sell, we will say so.
Rather pick a time yourself? Book a free 15-minute consult or call 512-325-0249.
Thank you. Your details are with the Scribe team.
Someone from Scribe will reach out by email. If you would rather not wait, pick a time for a free consult.
About the chooser
How does the chooser decide?
Every answer adds or subtracts points for each of the six paths, and each path's fit score is 50 plus 0.35 times its total, kept between 1 and 99. The full table of points, with the reason behind each one, is on the about page.
Will it always recommend paying for help?
No. Free paths (traditional publishing and doing it yourself) and low-cost paths (hiring freelancers) come out on top for many combinations of answers. A budget under $1,000 pushes the paid paths to the bottom of the list.
Do you save my answers?
They are saved in your own browser (local storage) so you can come back to your result. They are not sent anywhere unless you fill in the optional form. Choosing Start over deletes them. See the privacy page.
What does the not yet result mean?
It means your answers point in different directions, for example a goal that needs a writer and a budget that does not cover one, or that you are not sure yet what the book is for. The result says which answers caused it and what would change it.
Who made this?
Scribe Media, a book writing and publishing company in Austin, Texas. Scribe sells author-services publishing and full-service ghostwriting, two of the six paths ranked here.