Half of self-published authors earn below $999 (£650) a year, according to a survey of author incomes published earlier this year by Digital Book World. The median income for traditionally published authors, even taking into account the smaller cut they get from book sales, was $3,000-$4,999 (£1,900-£3,200).

An uncharitable conclusion to draw from this is that self-published authors aren’t much good. A more sympathetic person might say that publishing a book on your own is extremely hard work, and that if independent authors had access to the same quality of editing, design and marketing as their traditionally published counterparts do, the picture might look very different.

Publishing startup Reedsy is shaking things up with a marketplace where independent authors can connect with talented freelance editors, designers and publicists.

Since opening its doors last November, it now has 3,000 authors signed up, and a pool of 300 freelancers. Unlike some other freelancing sites, quality control is fundamental: out of 6,000 applications, only those with the most glittering CVs were spared the trash folder.

The main thing that sets Reedsy apart from the many companies offering “author services” is its platform. This is a tech company first and foremost; its USP a lean, highly usable interface that draws inspiration from the blogging platform Medium.

As well as wanting “high-quality design for everyone”, co-founder and CEO Emmanuel Nataf is determined to reform the publishing process, finding it “quite backward” that editors and writers still send documents back and forth via email. A collaborative editing tool will launch over the summer. After that, Reedsy will, inevitably, start publishing.

“I want to build a beautiful publishing house,” says Nataf. An early success story, Life in the Loop: Essays on OCD by US journalist Matt Bieber in collaboration with British designer Jason Anscomb, shows that Reedsy can already build beautiful books.