Another interesting point of view

I was recently reading an article by Morris Rosenthal entitled, Do Self-Published Books Sell? He makes a great point that echoes statements I've heard from agents and editors, to wit: what can you bring to the table? If you have successfully sold a self-published book, you'll have something tangible to put in your future book proposals, i.e. you have statistics to show that a) you can market and sell your work, and b) a number of people actually want to read it. Those numbers can go a long way toward interesting a larger publishing house in your material - providing that you're even still interested in selling the book at that point.

At the very least, as a successful self-published author, you may have more bargaining power and will certainly be more savvy when and if you find yourself (via agent or not) at a publisher's negotiation table.

Best tea for researching the odds: Pomegranate Oolong