Ready Set Sell – Self-Publishing through KDP: What to expect, what I did, what I’d do again, what I’d do differently

CONGRATULATIONS! You have done it. That final draft is ready for your readers, ready to go out to the world and pull people into the story. So…what now?

 

You’ve decided to self-publish your novel, short stories, poetry collection, or novella and now you’re stumped. There are a lot of options, and there are a lot of pros and cons to each. I can only speak for myself, what I did and what decisions I’ve made.

 

When I decided KDP was the right route for my first book, it was after several hours of weighing decisions. These are some of the things that caught my interest.

 

Money! Or the lack thereof… Working my 8-5 was getting bills paid for a house, a horse, a dog, myself, and so on. To publish through some self-publishers was an expensive upfront that I couldn’t afford and wasn’t willing to take a loan out for. I’ve never been a credit card person, and this wasn’t the time to become one. With Amazon KDP, it was a “free” means to publish. I’ll explain the quotations around “free” when we get to the decisions I made later on.
It’s Amazon! Yes, you read that right. The print on demand style would be sold straight through Amazon, one of the biggest suppliers of books in the world.

 

DIY: Do It Yourself Publishing that was made easy. It was a way to get my book out there with some research but all of that was in my control and I liked it. However fast I got it published was up to me. I set a goal and was able to hit it for a release date because it was all on me.

 

KDP Select: This is the ultimate back and forth. I did a lot of research and I recommend you do the same for this. When it boiled down to a decision, I opted to join KDP Select for the following reasons
ROYALTIES! Your eBook Royalties double when you agree to be part of the KDP Select Program. 70% per book sale meant my $4.99 eBook was bringing in more than my $14.95 paperback.
Page Reads: With Kindle Direct Publishing Select you are paid when users of Kindle Unlimited (think Netflix for eBooks) decide to reach your book. You are paid roughly $.005 per page which doesn’t sound like much, but it can add up if you’re promoting your book.
Page Reads Help You Again: Page reads on Kindle Unlimited actually improve your over eBook Best Seller ranking in Amazon. This is great for getting it to trend upwards.
Promotion: These are some pieces I am still figuring out but there are some great tools through Select for your Promos. These are countdown days and free days. The Free Days are what I opted to use. I did a free promo out the gate (Perhaps not wise but I had reasons) because I wanted to get my book to readers going into COVID-19 lockdown (see. Reasons.) I was able to give away 199 books over 5 days and, to top it off, they count as sales in my Best-Seller Ranking (BSR).
It’s not forever: Every 90 days you are automatically reenrolled, but you don’t have to be. If you decide that Kindle Select isn’t for you, you can opt out.

But there are reasons you might not be interested and here they are

You’re agreeing to exclusively sell your eBook through Amazon Kindle. There is no option for Apple, Google, Nook, or any of those platforms. You can’t even share portions online for your friends. If a PDF version is leaked and put online, you will be warned and later removed from the program if it’s not pulled off the internet.
Page Reads may not be reliable: someone pointed out to me that page reads rely on the reader having Wi-Fi when they are reading. This means that if they are in the car or something, their pages read may not count. This wasn’t a big deal to me because, in my mind, I wasn’t aiming for page reads. I was aiming for sales and page reads are a bit of added candy.
Some Awards are a Nope: Notable prizes like New York Times Bestseller List are a no go when you’re in KDP Select. Bummer, right? They need your eBook available on several platforms and to sell a certain number through those (though not the purpose of this post.) Long and short: You can’t win in KDP Select.

 

When I weighed those out against my goals, Select was still the best choice for me and, if later down the road that changed or changes, I have the ability to opt out. Win Win.

 

 

Where I saved money

 

Editing… WHICH IS NOT RECOMMENDED FOR ALL AUTHORS! If you have a bad edit, you will get bad reviews, you will lose readers. The only thing that was my saving grace was family. My father, an author himself, read it three times while my sister, an avid reader with attention to detail and an amazing English and Grammatical mind, went through it once. She caught a lot, even after my dad and I had gone through it. She was editing for mistakes in writing as well as editing pieces of the story that weren’t great. If I didn’t have those two, I would have paid. Don’t trust any reader to be just an editor. Make sure attention to detail is there as well as an expectation of what needs done.

 

Formatting my eBook and Paperback editions: I would do it again without a doubt. I actually enjoyed formatting, once I wrapped my head around it. There are some amazing videos on YouTube for how to format your paperback copy while Kindle Create – a free software on KDP – can help lay out your eBook for in simple steps. If you are looking to save money, consider your own formatting

 

Audiobook Options: This is something in the works for me, because I am still waiting to get back my first audiobook. KDP is somewhat of a sister company with ACX. There is an option on their site that, going exclusively through Audible, you can split royalties with your narrator and get your audiobook done for virtually free. I won’t dive too much into this in this blog, just know it’s out there when you’re ready.

 

 

Where I spent money

Book Covers: This is one of the places that I implore people to stop pinching pennies. You need to do your homework, don’t just steal images on google. KDP has a way to create a basic cover, so that would be free. The big thing is that people really do judge a book by its cover. I designed what I wanted for Ranger of Kings, found a reputable cover designer on Fivver, and sent her the sketch asking if she could find stock images to recreate it. If you go this route be aware; unless you make it different, that cover could be the same as someone else’s with a different color. I had a backup option, as well as having designed exactly what I wanted, so I knew the likelihood was lower. Look at reviews, be sure you get the source file and your cover designer is using images they have purchased the licenses to.

 

Marketing: This has been my biggest expense and I don’t regret anything about it. Since the release of my book, I have learned how to create and manage Facebook and AMS ads. There are amazing resources on YouTube for both of these. Also, check out the Kindlepreneur – they offer a free course about AMS ads. There are organic ways to grow your following and sell for free. You will invest hours into that and, again, it’s worth it. I’ll post another blog at some point and my most successful organic reach strategy to date.

Software: After taking the Kindlepreneur course, I did invest in the Publisher Rocket Keyword Tool. This was $97 but, with the number of books I will be writing, plus the fact that I will be helping out my dad in marketing his book shortly, it was logical. My time is worth that investment.

 

ISBN: Now you don’t actually have to do this. Again, you can publish for free on KDP if you do everything through there and do it yourself. But, in using the free ISBN, you are willingly selling only through Amazon. My eventual plan is to get into a brick and mortar style establishment, so I wanted my own ISBN. I needed different ones for each “edition” of my book (i.e. you need one for your eBook, one for a paperback, one for the eventual hardcover, one for your audiobook.) What this means is you need about 2-4 ISBNs. This can get expensive. I purchased my own from Bowker, where one can cost you about $150, but ten of them are $300. I split the purchase with my father, who, as I mentioned before, getting set for his publication. He bought three of them off me, I got the rest. Now I have them for future books. Again, this was a personal choice not to go with the KDP offered one, not a required purchase.

 

What would I do differently?

 

BETA Readers: I didn’t do enough homework before I published, and I will fully admit to that. I didn’t have Advance Readers Copies of my book because I didn’t know it was a thing. When it came out, therefore, I had to push the book to be purchased and then push for reviews. Beta Readers are readers who read and honestly review your book before publication. This helps your book stand our better on Amazon for a few reasons 1) the algorithm likes more reviews whether good or bad and 2) readers like reviews because we like to know we are buying a good book. I will go this route in future.

 

Pre-market: I did this organically, but I will be doing this again with more force. Try to build a mailing list to email updates about your next book, market about the release date and get people to pre-order. This his huge to kick off your first days of sales higher on the best-selling pages.

 

Other marketing strategies: I was learning when I released my book. I hadn’t looked into Goodreads, Bookbub, Twitter, or even merchandise. Be prepared to try multiple marketing strategies. For me, I plan bookmarks as part of my next book release.

 

Edit Again!!! Seriously. You can’t edit your book enough. Even the first print of Harry Potter had six errors in it, with a professional editing team. Go through your book and let someone else who is good at editing do the same. Be harsh on yourself. Use free tools like Grammarly and Google Docs. Get your book right or fear that it will be roasted in the reviews. The saving grace is that you can pull your book off of Amazon and edit it and reupload it.

 

Would I still do it?

 

YES.  Given the chance the only thing I would do differently is my marketing. I would put more into it. There are free and organic ways to build a following (Another blog later on) but be ready to invest in your book. If you can’t invest in your book, why should your readers? Make sure you’re adding value in anything you do. Because it isn’t your book that sells. It’s the value you bring to the table that is being purchase.

Hopefully this has helped some of you in your decision making. Now, happy publishing and be sure to check back in for future blogs!