Urging Authors to be Entrepreneurs: iUniverse CEO Kevin Weiss (Part 1)
Writing a book takes dedication. For many authors it is a culminating, defining feat of their lives. Sadly, the chances of an author’s book actually being read are miniscule at best. Rapacious agents, stoic publishers, and that brick wall called ‘marketing’ are typically insurmountable hurdles for would-be authors. Enter iUniverse (parent company Author Solutions) and their new, successful self-publishing model. New York Times bestselling author Amy Fisher published If I Knew Then in 2004 through iUniverse. Since then, a series of partnerships (Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble) and programs such as The Star Program are providing hopeful authors a reason to be optimistic.
SM: Let’s get started by reviewing your background. Where do you come from and how did you end up in this business?
KW: I grew up in the northeastern part of the United States and went to Princeton University. After graduation I went to Manhattan and worked for IBM. I spent approximately 17 years with IBM in a variety of jobs, mostly on the sales side. I did go into corporate strategy for a while, then software, which took me to Austin, Texas. An opportunity came up to work for an enterprise software company called BMC Software, so I joined them in 1995. BMC had just come off of a good growth year at just over $400 million. I stayed there five years, and when I left we had just finished of our fiscal year at $1.75 billion. It was not because of me, I was just happy to be part of such an incredible growth factor.
SM: What did you do at BMC?
KW: I was the head of field operations in the Americas. After that I went to work for a little re-start company. The person who hired me at BMC became CEO of Bindview, another enterprise software company with a security focus. I went there to be the chief marketing officer. Not quite a year after I joined them, the person who brought me in decided he wanted to leave and the founder returned. I did not want to be in the middle of that, so I told the founder I would help him out but that he should get someone in there who would be loyal to him.
I then went to work for Ariba. Ariba was down on its luck but they had a good franchise. I ran their international business and ended up moving to London, where I got recruited to head operations for McAfee in Europe. I left in October of 2006, not of my accord, as the president. I then did some work in Houston for a private investor who had quite a bit of money invested in a company and was trying to figure out if it was ever going make a dollar. I consulted until December of last year, when I came to Author Solutions as the CEO.
SM: How did you get introduced to Author Solutions?
KW: Bertram Capital, one of our investors, was started by Jeff and Ken Drazan. Jeff and I went to college together. Jeff and Ken started Bertram Capital and Author House, which was the largest self-publishing company in the world, was their first acquisition. They followed that up with the acquisition of iUniverse.
Jeff called me and asked if I would be interested in helping them out with this company they just bought. Eventually he asked me if I would be willing to take over the company, which I was not sure about because I did not know anything about publishing. He said I would know what I needed to after six months! Sometimes things just feel right, and this did. I saw the publishing industry, which has been doing business the same way for a long time, was flat. I then saw Author Solutions was posting 20% growth by doing things I thought were unique. I saw a huge opportunity and felt we could be disruptive without knocking the boat over. I took over as CEO in December of last year.
This segment is part 1 in a 7 part series Part 2 →
Jump to part: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
I published 2 books with iUniverse and since the company was sold, the only thing that Author Solution is doing is sending out offers for current authors to buy more of their services. With the Amazon contract in doubt, authors should seriously consider the marketing aspect of their books.
This past June I submitted a book ms. for publication with iUniverse. Since then I have learned a bitter lesson. Anyone considering getting a book published through iUniverse had better think twice. They are bad news! Once they have your cash, they don’t answer your emails; if you call, they lie to you. The reason it seems is that they are so successful they’re backed up till Christmas. One Publishing Assistant told me she is a week and a half behind on looking at her email. They’re all totally swamped, and books are backed up, with many customers angry as hell. My advise: pass on iUniverse.
This company is in serious trouble. I paid in full and sent all my material more than 3 months ago and I have received nothing. The system does not work well so the poor customer service reps are struggling, asking authors to send material via email instead. The editorial department is over booked and they promised editorial evaluation in 3 -4 weeks, 8 weeks passed by and we never received anything. They refuse to provide refunds… check the better business bureau for the open complaints. Stay away from iUniverse by now.
In my opinion based on horrific experience with them, IUniverse should be totally avoided. My book was supposed to be published anonymously, but when they distributed it over the internet they inserted my name!!! The PSA avoided my calls as did his supervisor. The worst publishing experience imaginable. At this point, the customer service supervisor will not even contact me. This is the absolute worst internet experience I have ever had.
iUniverse is one of the most horrible publications I ever have experienced in my entire publishing experience.
Never publish with iUniverse. They are not customer friendly, what they promise they won’t do.
Please, do not publish with them
I think that the best thing for awards is to look at previous winners.
Most of the books seem to have been self-published. Not that that’s a
bad thing, but iUniverse has an appalling reputation.
I wouldn’t touch those awards with a barge pole. $65!!!! And what
kudos would any book have with “winner of Readers Views” on it? Or
many other online awards, to be brutally frank.
I talk to my publishers first about awards.
Erastes
— In MarketingForRomance Writers@yahoogro ups.com, “ruthsims_author”
wrote:
>
> Re: Readers Views Literary Award
>
> Does anyone have any experience or knowledge with this award? It’s
> apparently been around for several years. RV is, judging from the
> website at http://www.readervi ews.com/Awards. html an author service
> site, with reviews both free and express (paid for, but not
> guaranteed to be a good review)and several other “packages” of
> promotion.
>
> The Literary Award has several categories. The prizes are not actual
> monetary awards but are promotional services from various agencies,
> worth $1000 and some are less.
>
> Entry includes a review. Now for the kicker: Entry is $65 for
> entering the book in one category and an extra fee ($10, I think)
> for entering the same book in an additional category. Entry includes
> a review, as I read it.
>
> Are there any thoughts on entering contests with hefty entry fees
> but pretty decent awards? Or should we stick to the few awards that
> are free?
>
> It’s good promotion to have a “Winner of–” description, so I don’t
> think I’m breaking any rules to ask about contests… am I?
>
> Ruth
> http://www.ruthsims. com
It’s about time iuniverse were sent to court, sued and closed down as they are not a company they are low-life crooks. Dirty …
Wow! And to think I was seriously considering signing with iuniverse. I’ve earned a Phd degree, earned every kudo from tenure to full professor to
professor emeritus when I took an early retirement to write full time, published a lot while at the university and yet getting my novel published makes everything else pale in comparison. I guess I’m glad I checked them out but I sure miss the high I experienced when hope walked through the door after I spoke to their representative. Thanks for the warning.
My complaint goes back to January 2008. DO NOT USE IUNIVERSE UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES! The company is an absolute joke. It is a mistake I will be paying for, for a long time. It took them 12 months to from my manuscript into a book. In that time they merged with Authorhouse and after that time it was impossible to get anything done unless I kicked and screamed my way up to the Vice-President du jour! I foolishly signe the 10% royalty agreement because I thought they would incentivize the bookstores to buy my book, but they have ignore any marketing of my book to this point. Someone mentioned them trying to sell their current authors more services. That’s the extent of there company. Don’t do what you promise, just try to make more money for more promises. I paid for the Premier Plus option which was at the time the highest and most expensive service they offered and they have not fulfilled much of what they said they would do. I also think they are now scewing me on the sales of my books as well. I can’t get a royalty report from them and they say they have to wait until (months after the close of the quarter) to get their reports. That’s nonsense. My recommendation is to STAY AS FAR AWAY FROM IUNIVERSE AS POSSIBLE.
My experience with iUniverse was a scant brush; a telephone chat with a representative. The rep called later with the most appalling hard-sell push to sign with iUniverse now and receive discounts of photo charges if ’saving money is a priority’, and the like. Still sanguine about iUniverse I e-mailed my wish to change representatives, but the same hard-sell tyke replied. Hurt feelings, I suppose. I did not open his mail and have no further interest doing business with this company.
Dear Mr kevin
I am your client and very much disappointed with the way my book is handled, unless it is quetsion of grabbing money,it is difficult to get a reponse
My project No 145710 and I need immediate asistanc Hasanat
I am glad I found this site as I was going to give them some money tomorrow, anyone have any suggestions on the best way to get a book published, I have never been published and I don’t have a lot of money.
At the beginning of last year (2008) iUniverse was bought out by a bigger, mammoth company called AuthorSolutions. Before this happened I had published around 200 or more books through iUniverse with great cooperation and efficiency on their side, over a period of over seven years. But with the takeover, they became… not to put too fine a point on it, their service became abysmal! I no longer had a single person as a point of contact, and my emails were hardly ever returned. Submitting a book would
take months, not a matter of two or three weeks anymore – or the books would just hang about in limbo. Fulfilling orders to publishers wanting author copies became a nightmare too. The whole system was no longer user (author) friendly. Their only concern seemed to rake off as much money from the author as possible – so how they continue to exist financially as a viable & respectable publishing company is beyond my understanding. Ordering books that were already published by the former regime, is no problem at all – provided you go through Amazon or their associate booksellers..
When I ran into these difficulties with the new company, I cancelled the two books I already had submitted to them, and asked for a refund of the fee I had paid for each book. Result – emails totally ignored (although the account for each of the two books was indeed cancelled). I resorted to emailing their CEO asking for the refunds—repeatedly—but all emails were ignored. So I realised that if my business (Diadem Books) was to survive, I would have to move. I used LULU for a time, but this too was not as efficient as I wished. So in the end I became my own publisher – now publishing under my own imprint of Diadem Books. The printing and distribution is handled by Lightning Source, and the books are professional and available worldwide as before. So in a sense this takeover of iUniverse was a good thing for me – it forced me to grow and become independent.
I have read the above posts, but there is something far more sinister going on with iUniverse. A friend advised me that Google have my book on on their web page and are showing every page of The Ten Percent Man.
On the site, they state that they have permission from the publisher to do this. I wrote and advised them that I did not give them this permission, nor did I give the publisher the power to make these decisions. I was directed to:
http://www.googlebooksettlement.com It makes interesting reading.
I SHOULD HAVE SEEN THIS WEBSITE MUCH BEFORE .IHAVE READ ALL THE COMMENTS THERE IS NOT A SINGLE INDIVIDUAL HAPPY.I PAID OVER $6000 THEY COULD NOT SELL A SINGLE BOOK ALL THE TIME I AM BUYING MY OWNBOOK -WHAT A SHAME SUSAN DRISCOLL AND KEVIN WEISS ARE ROBBING AUTHORS.THEY DO NOT RESPOND TO LETTERS WRITTEN TO THEM FBI SHOULD INVESTIGATE INTO THEIR PRACTICES
Let me add to the soured scribblers who learned the hard way of the racketeering dirtbags in the self-publishing bu$ine$$. Yes, Iuniverse is truly an unethical pack of swine. I can’t think of a label dark enough to lay on them, except that probably they should set up shop in some toilet facility. Thanks loads, A & K.
Amen.
My e-mails go unanswered-somehow, I gain the impression the people speaking with me on the telephone are not telling the truth…
After the final editing my book was published-there are many childish and clumsy printing mistakes made by the printer-of course, iuniverse thinks I should pay for the corrections…again.
DO NOT PUBLISH WITH IUNIVERSE=BEWARE!
Snafu,
If you are having difficulties with your book, please contact us. You can reach me directly at kevin.gray at iuniverse dot com. I will see to it that the appropriate professionals reach out to you and work to resolve your book’s issues.
Best,
Kevin A. Gray
PR Manager
iUniverse
My sincere apologies for my unjustified earlier bad- mouthing Iuniverse in a moment of dark angst. They are doing a remarkable job for me. Thank you with all my heart, gang.
I contacted Mr Gray. He is “for real”, he is a gentleman and genuinely concerned and did his best to steer me in the right direction. Mr Gray is a credit to the publishing industry.
I was referred to customer services representatives. Getting information from these folks was like pulling teeth. In the end they would finish their spiel buy trying to flog yet another of their weak and ineffective marketing ploys. Incompetent, know nothing, sales people. (They are not there to help you-they are there to sell you junk you don’t need.)
The first two years with iuniverse was a honeymoon-these last two years have been frustration coupled with anger. They now print my book with sixty blank pages-and wont fix it!
The flag ship of the vanity/POD industry is sinking herself. HMS iuniverse is going down the toilet.
Stay away from these people, do not invest a penny in iuniverse. Save yourself time, money and frustration! Buyer beware!
DO NOT PUBLISH WITH IUNIVERSE_BEWARE!
I wish I had seen this site (and many others popping up out there) before paying iUniverse to destroy my four years of hard work. A few of the reps assigned to my project were sincere, hard-working people who honestly wanted to help. But on the whole iUniverse has become a black hole to be completely avoided–run by amateurs, con artists, and snake oil peddlers. AUTHOR: DO NOT ENTRUST YOUR PRECIOUS BOOK TO IUNIVERSE!!
My third comment as to my experience with iUniverse is of pleasant satisfaction. The book is out and nicely executed. Thank you. It was a pleasure dealing with you. Jim Peters.
Mr. Peters, Congratulations on your book and I wish you the best. One issue I and some others I know are running up against now, aside from serious quality and customer service problems, is iUniverse failing to honor valid returnability clauses. At least one major retailer here in my area will not order iUniverse products because they have been stuck with excess books that were sold to them as returnable. Even Barnes and Noble, with whom iUniverse loves to boast of their “strategic alliance,” is hesitant to order any more than one or two copies of iUniverse books at a time. I’m told that some B&N branches will not order any and insist on pre-paid consignment. There are indeed some very good people at iUniverse, but it seems to me that overall it is sinking fast.
I have been working with iUniverse’s sister company, AuthorHouse, and have had the same bad experience with them as others have had with iUniverse. I cannot get one person to focus on the issues I have and I have lost a month in production already. I’m glad I read these comments now so that I can cancel my contract with them and start up with a different self-publishing firm. Thanks, everyone, for your honesty in working with iUniverse.
K Diller,
I’m sorry to hear you’ve encountered difficulties in publishing your book. Please contact me directly and I will see to it that your issue are resolved. We still want to publish your book and I am confident that we can meet or exceed your expectations. Thank you for trusting AuthorHouse with your book.
Best,
Kevin A. Gray
PR Manager – Author Solutions, Inc.
kgray at authorsolutions dot com