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You will need to negotiate with different people, depending on who you are. Accordingly, you should figure out who to contact about making an offer for rights:  If you are a publisher, then you should negotiate with the author’s agent or, if there is no agent, then with the author directly. Foreign publishers will probably need to contact the publishing house which published the book initially. They typically have specialist rights staff that you work with. Alternately, you may need to work with a sub-agent. Book publishers often offer the author an advance, which is an amount of money. The advance is usually deducted from future royalties. For example, if you offer a $10,000 advance, then the author doesn’t begin to receive royalties on each book sold until they have earned at least $10,000 in royalties.  There is no easy way to determine how much an advance should be. If the author is unknown, then you might not need to offer any advance. Advances are also broken up and paid in installments. For example, one third may be paid upon accepting the manuscript, another third when the author delivers the manuscript, and the final third on publication. Royalties are standard and don’t vary much from contract to contract. However, you need to understand royalties before going into negotiations. Consider the following:  Book royalties are typically calculated as a percentage of the retail price. For example, if a hardcover sells for $25.95 and the royalty rate is 15%, then the author gets around $3.90 per book. As a publisher, you might try to get the royalty based on the net price. This is the amount you receive as publisher after the book is sold. Royalty scales can be graduated. In other words, the royalty percentage increases as the number of books are sold. An author will want to know quite a bit of detail before agreeing to sign on with you. Accordingly, you should determine the following information before going any further:  expected first run (e.g., 10,000 copies) proposed publication schedule local retail price your marketing plans the amount of your advance Call up the appropriate person (author, agent, publisher) and express interest in the work. You should be prepared to discuss how much you are willing to offer as an advance, as well as your expected first run. If what you are prepared to offer is far from what the author wants, they can decline to negotiate with you. You also should be prepared to talk about your publishing house. Ideally, you will have a brochure or a list of published works that you could share with the author or agent. This is particularly important if you are buying foreign rights, because the author might not be familiar with your reputation in a different country. Before moving on to draft a contract, you should reach agreement with the author on the details of publication. This will make the contract drafting much easier. Talk about the following:  proposed formats for publication (e-book, paperback, hardback) whether the copyright will be in the author’s name or the publisher’s the applicable currency publication schedule length of license any additional rights (such as the right to re-license in your territory) proposed changes price and availability of electronic files who will obtain permission to reproduce illustrations or other images
Know who to contact. Determine the book advance. Choose a royalty rate. Get your details in order as a book publisher. Express interest in the work. Negotiate details.