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How does KDP Select work?
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N.B.
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Mar 26, 2014 02:14AM
I've never used KDP Select before as I was always put off by the fact that you couldn't release your book anywhere else. However, I'm hoping to release my next book later this year, and I know you get a lot of promotional tools with KDP Select, so I have two questions. Has anyone actually found it beneficial? Could I enroll for a limited time, say three months and then return to a General KDP set-up, allowing me to then release my book elsewhere?
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I found KDP Select tremendously helpful. The exclusivity doesn't bother me because I sell bupkis through the other platforms. The chief benefit of a short freebie promotion is that sales actually rise even after the freebie is done.
"A lot" of promotional tools is stretching it a bit. You get to make your book free, occasionally, and you can set up a countdown deal, and that's about it. But to answer your questions:1) I did a 5 day giveaway of my very niche film criticism piece last December. I had 60 downloads across various territories, and spent several days at number 1 in its specialist categories. Off the back of this giveaway, I sold maybe two copies of my previous book, and eventually two new reviews appeared. Since the promotion, the book has sold just 3 copies. But it's a seriously specialist title, so my experience is probably not typical.
2) Yes, you enroll for 3 months at a time, and once that period of exclusivity is up you can go back to broader distribution. Be warned, though, that KDP re-enrolls you automatically, so you have to actively deselect your book from the programme. People have got caught out that way ;)
Steven wrote: "I found KDP Select tremendously helpful. The exclusivity doesn't bother me because I sell bupkis through the other platforms. The chief benefit of a short freebie promotion is that sales actually r..."
I've had nearly the same results from other sites besides Amazon. I would say enroll and if it does not work for you, do not re-up.
I've had nearly the same results from other sites besides Amazon. I would say enroll and if it does not work for you, do not re-up.
I have kept track of my metrics since I started selling books five years ago. My ePub versions (via Barnes & Noble, iBookstore, etc.) distributed via Smashwords consistently out-sell Amazon by a factor of 5:1. Exclusivity is a pig in a poke. Why? Because if people cannot discover you, they cannot buy you. And please, no one say "People can just get a Kindle app for their computer or smart phone." Not everyone has a computer that can handle apps, or has a smart phone ... I know, unbelievable but true.
Furthermore, KDP-S takes a very US-centric view of which device is most popular. The most popular device OUS is the Kobo, and it is starting to catch on in the US. I've been a Kobo user since 2008; when my first Kobo gave up the ghost earlier this year, I bought another one ... and I had a huge array of options from which to choose. I genuinely like the platform ... but I digress.
It is my opinion as an author that making your content available on only one platform is a figurative slap in the face to people who have chosen a different one. It is saying to them, "I don't want you in my audience."
I realize that everyone's business is different, but given my statistics over five years, you couldn't pay me enough to go KDP-S. I go KDP regular and put everything up on Smashwords for distribution.
Edited to add: With Smashwords, you can have as many "free days" as you want, because there is a coupon function. That means you can also have a 50% off day, or a 25% off day, or anything you feel like, when you feel like it.
I've tried KDP-S for a couple of my novels before, and always got healthy download figures... while it was on the free promotion period. It had neglible improvement on actual sales through Amazon, for either the promoted book or my other books. I've never once received payment for a book being borrowed through KDP-S.For me, its not worth the exclusivity, and I've decided against using it in future.
Other writers have different experiences though, so you might want to try a 90 day trial to test the water in your target market. If it works, great, if it doesn't then put it on wider release.
My experience is very different. I sell almost nothing through Smashwords and have given up on distributing through them because the formatting is such a horrific headache. On the other hand, I do well with KDP select promotions. I'm a specialty romance writer and I have a series of Regency era shorts that I usually run free for a few days and then have for .99 a pop. The last one had over a thousand downloads in the free store between the U.S. and the U.K., was at the top of the free store in its category for much of that, and then, when it was unfree, continued to "sell", particularly in the U.K. It was actually on the top 100 in the UK paid store in its category for several days. I only have the first one available on Smashwords and I think I've sold 3 copies and had about 120 downloads when it was free, and it was free for months. And I had an issue with someone confusing free and copyright free and reposting it on another site.
It depends a lot. If you historically do well on other sites I would say no, but if you don't you might find that it works for you. I've been less concerned about the "single platform" issue. It does exclude people who choose not to do business with Amazon as a matter of principle, but I don't know how many of them are out there. Amazon is bent on world domination, but one of the reasons why they've been so successful is that they are very easy to do business with, and those free Kindle apps they throw around with abandon are part of that. I am also a hybrid, and my traditionally published titles are more broadly available, including through venues that Smashwords does not distribute to.
I completely agree with you on all counts. I'm blind and can't use either a Kindle E-Reader or the ap. I, too, have been selling books for some years and I avoided Amazon KDP Select precisely because of its exclusive policy. Like you, I thought it was unfair to non-Kindle users and it seems to make good business sense to me to distribute your product as widely as possible. The only reason I was considering KDP Select this time was because I was under the impression that there was a lot more promotional help available with this programme, but if I am to believe what I've read in the comments above, this isn't the case? Just out of interest, when you enroll, is your book free for that enrollment term and then you set your price afterwards? By the way, as someone who is blind, I, too find EPub the most friendly when it comes to my computer's speech software. I buy all my ebooks from Kobo and I'd get their e-reader as well if any of them came with speech, but that's a whole other subject thread.
I'm not published yet, but my understanding is that if you set a sale price on Smashwords Amazon will price match. So you can, in essence, have a free day across multiple platforms without having the exclusivity.
I've been in regular KDP for over a year. I started experimenting with KDP-S this last month because I wanted to run a free promo for my first novel while I'm releasing the second. Since Amazon is ~75% of my sales, it seemed like a good place to start. I'm still sifting results and I'll try a countdown deal before the 90-day minimum runs out. I really don't like restricting readers to the Kindle, so I'm looking for other ways to provide 'promo deals' that don't lock me into Amazon.
I do KDP Select. It has been a great experience. Doing necessary updates were easy and the help support was prompt and most helpful. I did two free day promotions. Hundreds and hundreds of downloads. The first gave me a good bump in paid sales. The second one was - less. To be honest, as far as I can determine the 'free day' readers did not post reviews. So, don't be disappointed.
KD wrote: "I'm not published yet, but my understanding is that if you set a sale price on Smashwords Amazon will price match. So you can, in essence, have a free day across multiple platforms without having t..."They will, but it is a pain. Not only do they not do it automatically, you generally have to have a number of users notify Amazon of the lower price.
I was not aware that Amazon didn't have a visually-impaired friendly app. I do have text-to-speech enabled on my titles, and Amazon claims availability for various devices, but I have no idea how it works. Someday I'd like to have audiobook editions, but that's not going to be in the very near future.
Nadia wrote: "I completely agree with you on all counts. I'm blind and can't use either a Kindle E-Reader or the ap. I, too, have been selling books for some years and I avoided Amazon KDP Select precisely becau..."Hi, Nadia KDP Select only allows you to have your book free for 5 days out of the enrollment period. Just to clarify.
KD wrote: "I'm not published yet, but my understanding is that if you set a sale price on Smashwords Amazon will price match. So you can, in essence, have a free day across multiple platforms without having t..."That isn't actually how it works, no. If you change your price for an extended period on SW, Amazon may or may not price-match. But it has to be reported ... and Amazon may not catch up when you go back to your regular price. Just so you know.
Unless it's changed since my last book release, Smashwords don't even distribute to Amazon. They just make their books available in Mobe (think that's how it's spelled) format so Kindle users can purchase it That's why I always published my books both on Smashwords and with KDP. So KDP Select only lets you make your book free for five days? Seems rather pointless to me. Surely you'd have to have a lot of people know about your books for that to help you. I've always had trouble reaching my target teen audience. Every teen site or blog I've ever approached has always ignored me. Just out of interest, does it help having your book published with CreateSpace? How have people found that as a sales platform? Is it worth doing? Presumably KDP Select's exclusivity only applies to Ebooks and not paperback? I'm sorry, I can't remember who mentioned the Text To Speech function on the Kindles. All that does is read the Ebooks aloud. It doesn't help you to navigate any of the menus or select books. There was a plugin, but it couldn't read with any fluency and I believe it was discontinued.
That is correct; KDP-S applies only to eBooks.CreateSpace is useful for having your book available in paperback, obviously, and allows for you to have copies at cost so that you can sell them on at events and such.
Smashwords *had* an arrangement with Amazon, and Amazon (so far as I am able to tell) reneged because they were working on KDP-S. The arrangement you cite, Smashwords and regular KDP, is what I use. I do not know about text-to-speech for Mobi; my visually impaired friend who uses it (I do not recall the name of the program) says it only works with ePub.
Nadia wrote: "Unless it's changed since my last book release, Smashwords don't even distribute to Amazon. They just make their books available in Mobe (think that's how it's spelled) format so Kindle users can p..."It was me, and I'm not familiar with it, just aware it existed. Obviously I'd have no choice in the matter if I lost my sight, but I have hyperlexic tendencies and I'm slightly hard of hearing so listening to books does not work very well for me.
The advantage of a KDP freebie is that it's a huge audience. That said, some writers get a great response from it, and some writers find it completely useless and nobody seems to know with any reliability why this is.
I'm guessing a little at what the likely factors are, but I'm betting that general track record on Amazon and genre have something to do with it. I'm fairly sure that at this point I have a tiny fan base waiting for D.C. Williams freebies, and even if there are four of them, they help increase visibility. The free rank and the paid rank are separate, but a lot of downloads increases visibility, because free/paid is not part of whatever arcana Amazon uses to determine what pops up in the "recommendation" feed or the "other buyers purchased this".
I wonder if your friend is using Jaws. That's my speech software programme and it does only work with EPub. The advantages of CreateSpace are obvious as you say, but is it worth the hassle to get your manuscript formatted and everything? Can you get a lot of sales or is it Ebooks where the most money is made nowadays? Just out of interest, I'm assuming that to get help formatting my books for CreateSpace, KDP and Smashwords would cost money? I used to ask my dad to help but he doesn't have the time he once did, and this would be my first time using CreateSpace if I decide to go ahead with it.
Nadia wrote: "I wonder if your friend is using Jaws. That's my speech software programme and it does only work with EPub. The advantages of CreateSpace are obvious as you say, but is it worth the hassle to get y..."Yes! That is the program he uses.
I sell very few paperbacks, to be honest; almost all of my sales are in eBooks (mostly ePub, as previously noted). My main use is getting the books at cost so that I can sell them on.
Yes, most folks charge to do formatting ... and CreateSpace is not at all intuitive. I would see if you can barter with someone, frankly; x number of homemade meals, or assistance with some project in exchange for formatting help.
Sharon wrote: "Smashwords *had* an arrangement with Amazon, and Amazon (so far as I am able to tell) reneged because they were working on KDP-S."Smashwords still has an agreement with Amazon, but only for manual uploads, so Smashwords only upload their 1000 bestsellers. So it has nothing to do with Select, and everything to do with Smashwords being a mostly automated service. Although if you were in Select why would you use Smashwords and give them 10% of your Amazon earnings, when uploading to KDP is just as simple?
I suspect that Amazon do not want automatic uploads from Smashwords because they do not like the quality of the mobi files creates by their automated system and the fact that Smashwords allows its authors to make unlimited updates to books.
I don't choose to do KDP select. I use Draft2Digital as my aggregator/file conversion/distribution provider for all non Kindle books. There are readers, myself included, who won't buy a book if it's only on Kindle. I read a great blog post on Booklikes about lost sales authors don't know about. Some readers are willing to jump through various electronic hoops to covert a Kindle book to a format their device can read, but others simply decide that there are plenty of other books in the world and if the author won't go to the trouble to make it available to those readers then the author loses the sale. People who own Nooks and Kobo e-readers should be able to just buy and download as easily as Kindle owners. I don't want Amazon to have a monopoly on anything, including my work.
Amber wrote: "I don't choose to do KDP select. I use Draft2Digital as my aggregator/file conversion/distribution provider for all non Kindle books. There are readers, myself included, who won't buy a book if it'..."Thanks for the suggestion about Draft2Digital. I'm continuing to seek ways to reach non-Kindle users. I'll check it out.
I completely agree that Amazon shouldn't hog all the sales, particularly as I myself can't use Kindle, and since, so far as I can tell from your comments, the only advantage of KDP Select is that you can list for free five days out of your enrollment time, it seems a bit of a cop-out. If you're going to be exclusive, you should surely offer your users a lot more promotional help in my opinion, help they couldn't get elsewhere. I'm so glad I broached this topic before going ahead as I'm now thinking better of using KDP Select.
Also I found that the mobi conversion on D2D was better than Amazon's. I do publish through KDP (not KDP Select)but I do the mobi conversion through Draft2Digital since it does not induce errors that Amazon's process did.
Sharon wrote: "I have kept track of my metrics since I started selling books five years ago. My ePub versions (via Barnes & Noble, iBookstore, etc.) distributed via Smashwords consistently out-sell Amazon by a factor of 5:1..."I'm curious -- have you found any worthwhile publicity outlets that target Nook or Kobo? I'd love to boost my numbers out there, but it seems that everyone still focuses on Amazon.
Tell me about it. It's very unfair. I know you can publish through Barnes & Noble, though I've always distributed through Smashwords. Whether Barnes & Noble offer any promotional support, I don't know. The nearest I've ever come to being able to promote EPub, which is virtually everyone but Amazon, is through the free Smashwords Coupons, but I've had hit and miss success with them. I think a lot of readers are put off by the fact that they have to set up a Smashwords account to use them. Personally, I don't understand the problem. They're getting a free book, after all, but that's the only reason I can come up with for my poor results. I wouldn't dismiss it as a marketing idea though. For all those who have ignored the coupons, I've had the odd few who've taken advantage of them, and as an earlier message points out, you can create them as often as you like, unlike KDP-'s 5 day limit. Currently, it's the only free promotion of non-Kindle ebooks out there that I know of. If there are any others, please mention them here. I know of a lot of websites like Write into Print, Indi Author News and Author's Alliance. Are any of those helpful does anyone know?
Lance wrote: "I'm curious -- have you found any worthwhile publicity outlets that target Nook or Kobo? I'd love to boost my numbers out there, but it seems that everyone still focuses on Amazon."
I make sure that all of my marketing efforts indicate that my books are available across numerous fine outlets, including Barnes & Noble, Kobobooks, Apple iBookstore and Amazon (in that order). Since my first book was published OUS, I have many fans abroad, and I periodically put up links on my FB page that say things like "Hey, French fans: you can get my eBooks on FNAC" (which is a Kobo company). That, BTW, is a huge advantage with Kobo ... their international distribution is enormous.
I do my own publicity and marketing because I want to make sure that all the bases are covered. However ... at the end of the day, it's discoverability that is more important than your marketing efforts, as odd as that may seem. Because, just like in the brick-and-mortar bookstore, people can find you by accident if you are available to them.
Sharon, what is OUS? Outside the US?I made my ebook free on Smashwords. It's a short story with the same main character as my novel.
I'm still waiting for Amazon to price match. I even clicked the link on my Amazon book's page to notify them of a lower price on Smashwords.
From what I've read on the Kindle forum, they may not always price match. We'll see. It's been 5 days so far. If they don't price match, that's ok.
Danielle wrote: "I made my ebook free on Smashwords. I'm still waiting for Amazon to price match. I even clicked the link on my Amazon book's page to notify them of a lower price on Smashwords. From what I've re..."
Post a link to your book and ask for help in letting Amazon know. That does the trick for many people.
Great idea, D.C.! Thank you! Here it is: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00FG1Y4FU The link to click to notify Amazon is in the Product Details section near the feedback link. It says 'tell us about a lower price'.Thanks, if anyone does this for me! :-)
Here's the free one on Smashwords. https://www.smashwords.com/books/view...
I of course make my books available for Kindle but I never really enroll them into the program. I did with my first book, though I don't know if I've seen any differences in sales from it.
