Bye, Bye, KDP Select; Or, How I Got Screwed by Amazon (and You May Have Been Too)

I blogged a couple of days ago about how some kind of software glitch seems to be swallowing authors’ pages read, and posted the email I sent to Amazon about it.

Well, two days later, still no answer. Two days with a total of 24 pages read, when my daily average is closer to 1000. For all of October, I have have had less than half the pages read that I usually have in a single day. My pages read have flatlined, my rankings have tanked, and my sales have come to a halt. It looks like I’m going...

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Published on October 09, 2016 15:13
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message 1: by Nola (new)

Nola I personally have read over 100 pages of yours in the last two days. Here is the response I received fromAmazon when I noted the trend in some of my favorite authors leaving:

I'm sorry for the inconvenience you've had to face. That's definitely not what we want our customer to experience.

I would like inform you that its the publisher or author rights who decides whether the particular book should be published or not in kindle unlimited program. If a author decides to leave kindle unlimited program, we can't publish his books in kindle unlimited due to restrictions.

However, Our team is working on it, so that our customer doesn't experience this kind of situation.

We'll consider your feedback as we plan further improvements. Customer feedback like yours is always important to us. I'll be sure to pass your message along to the appropriate department as we continue to improve the Kindle experience for our customers.

Thanks for your interest in Kindle


message 2: by Ruth (new)

Ruth Nestvold Nola wrote: "I personally have read over 100 pages of yours in the last two days. Here is the response I received fromAmazon when I noted the trend in some of my favorite authors leaving:

I'm sorry for the in..."


Thanks for the info, Nola! They don't seem to have quite understood the problem, however -- their software glitches are driving authors out of KDP Select, argh. But maybe that's what they want?

What have you read recently besides Island of Glass? That's the only one where I saw any real increase in pages read.

Thank you so much for all your help on this! Can I quote the letter you got in a writer's forum where we are discussing this?

Ruth


message 3: by Nola (new)

Nola Yes feel free to forward and I'll try to clarify to them. I've already read your historical fiction a while back. I don't know if rereads count but it's certainly worth rereading. I loved the Yseult series.. I'll check on what I haven't read. Haha. Nice ploy to get me to read..."now if you would just test this..."


message 4: by Ruth (new)

Ruth Nestvold Nola wrote: "Yes feel free to forward and I'll try to clarify to them. I've already read your historical fiction a while back. I don't know if rereads count but it's certainly worth rereading. I loved the Yseul..."

Heh. :) It really wasn't that way, I swear! And I did offer you free books as review copies, after all.

I really do appreciate your help on this. Really! :)

Ruth


message 5: by Ruth (new)

Ruth Nestvold Hi Nola, just wanted to send you a final update. Got a very condescending email from Amazon stating that my worries were unfounded and their numbers right. I wrote back saying Page Flip was a breach of contract and I no longer regarded my books as exclusive to Amazon. That finally did the trick, and they let me out of Select. So none of my books are available in KU anymore. Sorry!

Ruth


message 6: by Nola (new)

Nola I understand. Will still follow you where ever you go. Will also look for places to post reviews. After all, I have to find out what happens to the glassblowers!


message 7: by Ruth (new)

Ruth Nestvold Thank you. I'm really hoping to get the next one out by January!


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