1. Know why you are writing a book. Are you writing your memoirs for family, are you writing a community cookbook, are you writing a book of regional interest or are you writing a national bestseller? All of these goals are valid, but each goal has different implications for your business plan. Know why you are writing and know that you can create that bestseller if that is your goal.

2. Treat publishing as a business. You are passing beyond realm of author into exciting world of publishing. You are not just a writer, you are about to become a publisher who wants to produce a profitable book, and you want to keep profits for yourself.

3. Write a business plan. Being aware of business aspect of publishing is not an end in itself – you need to formally write your plan. It does not need to be a fifty page document with every accounting possibility recorded, but it should outline all of costs that you will encounter from obtaining necessary funds to knowing price of mailing a book. The business plan needs to account for future expenses as well as pre-publication expenses.

Copyright ----------- It’s yours as soon as you have those words on paper. You don’t have to register copyright to claim it, though if you’re writing a novel or book, it’s a wise investment. Registered copyright is proof enough for a court of law, and is extremely valuable in cases of dispute. However, for short materials like articles or essays, copyright needn’t be registered. You can however, club a number of essays and register them together.

Reprints ---------- Reprints are articles, essays or pieces that have already been published. If you own copyright (more on that later), and want to sell piece again to another publication, it will be termed as a reprint. Most publications pay much less for reprints and some don’t accept them at all. However, for a freelancer, sometimes reprints bring more income than original articles do.

Rights -------- Earlier, magazines asked for all rights to articles. Even today, in many countries, including my own (India), most magazines want to keep all rights ensuring that articles in their magazine remain unique to them. However, this trend no longer exists in America, Canada and England, and is making headway into other nations as well. Now, almost all magazines in these nations refrain from asking for all rights to work. Others have opened their doors for reprints, which is a boon for writers. Let’s look at some of different kinds of rights.

* All Rights: This means that article must not have been published before, and cannot be used again after it has been published in this particular publication. Never give up all rights for a measly sum of money. If you’re selling all rights, make sure you’re being paid what you deserve.

* First Serial Rights: These usually pertain to some country. For e.g., First North American Serial Rights, or First British Serial Rights. Although article mustn’t have been published in country prior to this, you are free to submit elsewhere after publication.

* Electronic Rights: As more and more publications archive their articles online, they are asking for electronic rights. This means that they can carry your article online. Usually a time-period is specified. Also, electronic rights are usually non-exclusive, meaning that you can sell this article elsewhere although it will continue to appear on this publication’s website.

* CD-ROM Rights: A fairly new addition to list of rights, this means that publication is free to use your work on a Compact Disk.

* Anthology Rights: Some publications publish yearly anthologies (collection of articles or stories). In such cases, they ask for these rights for possible inclusion of your work in their anthology.

* First-time Rights: Your article must not have appeared anywhere worldwide. You are however, free to sell your work elsewhere after publication.