The 98% rejection rate doesn’t mean you only have a 2% chance of getting published. Actually the odds are better than that because you have a 2% chance every time you submit the same book to a different publisher. Assuming your book is appropriate for every publisher you send it to and that your writing is good enough, if you submit it to ten publishers then your 2% chance is multiplied by ten, giving you 20%.
The 98% rejection rate doesn’t mean you only have a 2% chance of getting published.
The logic doesn’t quite extend as far as giving you a 100% chance of getting published if you submit to fifty publishers. The odds definitely get better for you, but it’s unlikely that there are as many as fifty publishers for whom your book is suitable. Even if there are that many out there you could still trip up each time on the other factors that come into play each time a publishing decision is made.
Combined chance of at least one yes
18.3%
True combined odds at 10 publishers
20%
Rule of thumb (2% × n)
How the odds grow
- Combined chance (1 − 0.98ⁿ)
- Rule of thumb
The dotted line is the publisher’s rule of thumb: two percent times the number of houses. The filled curve is the combined chance of at least one yes if each decision were independent. They stay close at the numbers that actually matter. They part company as you approach the fantasy of fifty suitable publishers — which, as the book says, you probably do not have.
The graph assumes the book is appropriate for every house on the list and that the writing is good enough. Wrong genre, a generic cover letter, or a purple felt-tip pen will flatten that curve to zero at every house you send it to.