The value of a “high-profile” is a contentious topic in publishing. In the eyes of career authors and “real writers”, at least, it’s the celebrities and influencers who are monopolising the big-money deals. The truth is that, for all their reverence for the written word, agents and editors are still number-crunchers, and a degree of fame or a social media following translates to a ready-made audience.“First, we’ll be looking at Twitter followers and then it will be Instagram followers,” says James*, a literary agent who’s worked in all facets of the industry.

For Charlie*, an editor at a boutique publisher that specialises in glossy coffee-table books, “the key for us is having a ‘brand’ on board – whether that’s a writer or a luxury house. The subject could be quite niche, but if it’s got a guaranteed cult audience, then that’s good for sales.”

Above all, a high follower count aids in being spotted in the first place, ­ but for aspiring authors with less social media savvy, there are still plenty of other routes for getting your name out there. Having a short story published in a highbrow magazine that’s canonised by the literary crowd will quadruple your chances of landing a book deal and move any agency submissions to the top of the pile. “Once The New Yorker took my story, [my current agent] immediately said, ‘I’m sending you a contract!’” says Lucas*, whose debut novel is set to be released this year.

It’s worth keeping an eye out for the wealth of awards for new writers, too (including those run by literary agencies). “Any time there’s a longlisting or shortlisting for a novel prize – the Bath Novel Award, the Bridport Prize, the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize – I see what material I can read, and if I like the sound of them, I’ll try to find them on Twitter or DM them on Instagram,” says editor-turned-agent Grace*.

If you’re aiming for top dollar, fiction is where it’s at, according to Nina. “But it also depends what kind of fiction – if you’re a commercial fiction author, then often the advances will be lower, but the volume of units sold will be higher, whereas with literary fiction, it’s the other way around.” Short-story collections aren’t generally money-makers – or at least that’s what Lucas was told when he pitched his own to an agent. Children’s books, on the other hand, are “perennially strong sellers”, and while it might seem like easy money – child’s play, you might say – the opposite is true, says James. “You’re trying to work out what a child would like, what they would find a good story. It’s kind of an amazing feat of imagination… and it’s a very crowded market.”

If imagination isn’t your strong suit, then it’s time to narrow down your niche within non-fiction. Memoir might seem an obvious start, but unless you’re offering juicy titbits from the inner sanctums of power, then your story will have to be especially unusual, beautifully written and say something about the wider world, Nina says. Other big sellers include history books (especially military history), pop science and cookbooks by “lifestyle chefs” and doctors. Meanwhile, glossy, illustrated books are not quite as lucrative as they tend to attract a more niche audience, but they promise a slightly less daunting word count – and those who’ve built impressive careers in design-led industries will be at the front of the queue.

That said, the market for books is as much at the whim of evolving tastes as any other. Publishing houses will keep an eye on emerging trends and subscribe to databases such as Nielsen for figures on book sales, and often shape their strategy accordingly. In non-fiction, for example, MBS (mind-body-spirit) is a growing trend, according to Nina: “People are really interested in spirituality, astrology, the body, sexuality at the moment.” But if it’s a big-money book deal you’re after, best to get ahead of the trend rather than chase it. “You’ll get a slew of books that follow that trend until it naturally dies out, because interests move on,” says James. “The key is trying to find that hit before it’s a hit – and how that occurs is complete black magic.”

The advice – whether you’re writing literary fiction or zeitgeisty self-help – is to start with what you know, and hope that passion and authenticity shines through. “[With my first attempt], I was trying to be super hip… and I was writing really far away from myself, and anyway it got rejected,” says Lucas. He has this advice for fiction writers: “There’s [value] in writing from your place of very personal truth. The advantage of that is that no one else will be telling that story.”

In the realm of non-fiction, particularly, a degree of expertise in a specific subject is highly prized. “When I get submissions from people who are like, ‘I’ve written this amazing book about how we should rethink the way we do X, Y and Z,’ but they’re Joe Bloggs, I’m asking, ‘How am I going to make readers believe in this?’” says Grace. As Charlie sums up: “It’s better to write the book that only you can write.”

In most industries, it’s deemed good business sense to cut out the middleman; in publishing, the opposite applies. For better or worse, it’s a cosy world and agents will be able to leverage their Rolodex of contacts and ensure your book gets pitched to exactly the right editors. They’ll also be the ones to polish your proposal so that by the time it arrives in an editor’s inbox, it’s already in pretty good shape – and more likely to get a yes. “Publishing now is so high volume that editors don’t have the time to sit down and go through a manuscript with a red pen,” says James. “That’s really the agent’s job.”

For every deal secured, the agent will take their cut – commission is around 10 to 15 per cent in the UK, about 20 per cent in the US, and the overriding consensus is that it’s worth it. “If you were just trying to represent yourself, you’re gonna get low-balled because publishers think, ‘Well you’ve got no yardstick, so why would I overpay you?’” says James. “It’s better to get 90 per cent or 85 per cent of a lot than a hundred per cent of not very much.”

Actually attracting the interest of an agent is the tricky bit. If you’re lucky, one or more might come knocking – high-profile journalists might be offered a book deal “on spec”, and prestigious creative writing programmes will often have agents circling the campus. “At the end of [the writing course], they come and do talks and they see your bios, and that’s how I met my agent,” says Lucas. Otherwise, the standard way to find yourself a rep is via the submissions portal or by cold-emailing with a query letter.

By pitching stage, that million-dollar idea will need to be fully fleshed out. In fiction at least, it’s expected that the author will have written their book, although at the early stages, it’s crucial to only give the agent what they are looking for. “Most agents will have submitting guidelines – normally an outline and a summary, and maybe three sample chapters,” says James. “If you send everything, you’re immediately getting on the wrong side of [them].”

Each agent will typically list their interests on their page – if not, you can often gauge them from their client list. In essence, don’t send your football tome to someone who expresses a taste for a domestic narrative. From there, success comes down to the copy. Grace will assess the quality of the writing in the email as a precursor, but it’s the opening lines of your sample text that will do the heavy lifting. “From my experience, you can tell within the first sentence – and definitely paragraph – whether someone can write or not,” says James.

For non-fiction, editors and agents are still looking for a “flavour” of your writing and will be keen on a sample chapter, along with a one-line pitch, an outline summary and table of contents. But the proposal also acts as a bit of personal pitch deck. “There’ll be a detailed bio, which will say what experience that author has, and why they’re writing about the subject they’re writing about – basically to make them seems as authoritative as possible,” says Nina. “You also need to talk about the audience you’re trying to reach and who will be buying your book.”

The publishing world can be cagey about money. Advances are strictly confidential, and cold, hard figures are pretty hard to come by. However, you’ll occasionally get refreshingly frank admissions from successful authors that shed light on the sort of money you can command at the top end. In the summer of 2020, for example, Mr Matt Haig took part in a pay transparency challenge on Twitter (with the hope of highlighting racial disparities), revealing he’d earned a staggering £600,000 for The Midnight Library.

But for the aspiring author looking for a ballpark number, there’s not really such thing as an average advance. “It varies so wildly from book to book,” says Nina. “For example, in the sort of smart-thinking area, a good proposal that’s been written by an academic and backed up by lots of research could go for anything between mid-five figures to low-six figures, depending on the sales potential.” For the illustrated art and design books, Charlie says five figures is typically the maximum (although there’s potential to wangle an extra few grand down the line). Seven figures in fiction is rare, but not unheard of – and more common in the US than the UK. Deals in the tens of millions, often for multiple books, are the preserve of record-shattering globally bestselling authors and those fresh out of the Oval Office.

How publishers arrive at the advance figure is part semi-algorithmic calculation, part speculative gamble. “When I first joined publishing, I was kind of like, ‘How are people plucking these numbers out of thin air?” says Nina. “[But] it’s basically a mix of guesswork and trying to spread your risk.” The final figure will factor in the costs of everything from freelance project editors to sourced imagery, plus sales projections based on profile and comparative titles and potential income from selling rights – with the hope of still turning a profit, and an awareness that agents will haggle upwards. Negotiations will be for the most part between the editor and the agent, but, says James, the author will always have “last right of refusal”.

If your advance isn’t the windfall you’d expected, don’t abandon all hope of making the big bucks. Once you’ve done the hard slog of actually writing your book and it’s time to press publish, there might still a chance to cash in on royalties. “An advance is essentially an overdraft,” says James (albeit one you don’t have to pay back). “Each book sold will have a royalty attached to it and that advance will slowly be recouped. And then when you’re in the black, you’ll start getting paid royalties on top of that.” In reality, most authors will not recuperate enough of their advance to ever see a royalty cheque. But if your book turns out to be a surprise hit, it’s possible to make more than the initial sum many times over (and if you’re lucky, even receive a call from HBO).

So, what exactly makes a book fly off the shelves? The official line might be a compelling story, exquisite prose and a serendipitous stroke of timing, but certain levers can also be pulled to help shimmy along sales. Publishing PRs will set about generating buzz by contacting journalists, podcasters and literary festival organisers, and oftentimes there’s an expectation on the writer’s part to sing for their supper. “A big plus for editors is authors who are willing to sell their books themselves – do lots of talks, tour around, do a lot of promotions,” says Charlie. “It’s a huge get as it saves us budget on marketing campaigns.”

Landing national press coverage as a debut author is tough. “To be blunt, a paper will lose readers if it reviews a complete unknown’s debut book instead of Sally Rooney’s follow-up,” says Simon*, a former books editor at a Sunday supplement. “What might tip the balance is buzz from trusted sources – agents, early readers, publicists. Beyond that, you are literally confronted by a wall of proof copies by people you’ve never heard of.”

The best hope for a new author is to be included in a newspaper’s debut writers roundup or named “most promising” by a literary magazine. Winners of debut writers’ prizes such as Desmond Elliott in the UK or the Pen/Hemingway and First Novel Prize in the US will also draw in extra media attention (often with top newspaper journalists on the panel).

Nowadays, what can often have a more profound impact than any elusive award or five-star review is a celebrity shout-out – whether that’s a spot on Mr Barack Obama’s annual reading list or the enduring “Oprah effect”. (Drake even got in on the book-stack trend earlier this month, sharing first-time novelist Ms Maddie Mortimer’s Maps Of Our Spectacular Bodies among others to more than 100 million followers.)

It’s mostly the luck of the draw, but there’s no harm in tapping your wider network to see if you can land your book in influential hands. Shopping your magnum opus around like a salesman might seem a tad grubby – but nothing will stand you in better stead for your sophomore advance than big numbers in your back pocket.

*Names have been changed to protect confidentiality