help with book placement

[James]

I have recently put my ebook on Amazon. (Damn theres a lot!) Anyhoo, I'm struggling to see how my book will be found. It is visionary fiction. So, in Amazon if you look on the left hand side it has links for ebooks categories. Now my issue is that my book lives in Literature & Fiction. My book has themes about meditation, reincarnation, self-realisation, etc. but it is still fiction, so no one is going to go to Literature & Fiction and look for books on meditation, reincarnation etc. Therein lies my problem. Any advice? I don't really want to put it in Religion & Spirituality as I would be preaching to the converted (so to speak). Any comments much appreciated.

[Polina]

I think, if it's fiction, it's fiction. Everything comes down to your target audience, the ones you are interested in reaching. Good luck!

[[deleted user]]

One caveat to remember: don't place your book in the wrong category just to attract readers. If readers are disappointed because they think you brought them to your book under false pretenses, they're likely to give you some very bad reviews.

[Riley, Viking Extraordinaire]

Okay, is the book about a story, or is the book about medidation. If the books is a story, and the character expresses themselves with medidation and new age philosophies then I would stick it under fiction, and count on the readers getting what I was going for (Or not as the case may be.)
If it's focus is on bettering yourself through meditation (With little anecdotes that you use to emphasize your point), then I would stick it in a non-fiction category.

[A.S.]

I haven't played with the categories too much, but I know in addition to two categories you are given seven key words. I would try to fit your themes in there, so at least you will show up on relevant search results. Best of luck James!

[James]

Thx everyone. It is as Riley above says: "If the books is a story, and the character expresses themselves with medidation and new age philosophies then I would stick it under fiction." Ok, so it's in fiction. Now, I put Nirvana as one of my seven keywords in KDP. But, when you put Nirvana in the search box, my book doesn't come up. Why would this be ?

[Riley, Viking Extraordinaire]

Amazon is a huge search engine. Either 1. they haven't had a chance to institute your tags into their algorithms when you search, or 2. There's enough things with the tag of nirvana that you're pushed towards the back of the results page.

[James]

Hi Riley, Thanks for the response. I scrolled through 20 pages (right to the end) of search term Nirvana it wasn't there. Im starting to think that maybe as u stated above, they havent instituted the tags yet, as it only went live maybe 5 hours ago. (I am impatient obviously). Thanks

[David]

Thanks, you guys. I'm not quite there yet but will be hopefully soon. These are helpful ideas.

[Steven]

When you published an eBook, give it like 4 days to one week before you try to start tracking it on Amazon database. And about two days before you worry about new Cover, new author name not showing up or 'Look Inside not right' after reformatting.

[C.L.]

There is a thread on here somewhere that tells you what keywords lead to "secret amazon subcategories". That might be worth looking at.

[C.L.]

Also, you might want to think of other fiction books that have similar themes to yours and see what their subcategories are. You can also ask friends/family to buy those books along with yours so that you start turning up in the "also bought" next to those books, so that Amazon will suggest your book to people who like that kind of story.

[Bernard]

James wrote: "I have recently put my ebook on Amazon. (Damn theres a lot!) Anyhoo, I'm struggling to see how my book will be found. It is visionary fiction. So, in Amazon if you look on the left hand side it has..."
Amazon allows you to list sub-catagories. This would be where you might refine the description by looking at the events of the story and seeing where they fit. For instance, what is happening that your character turns to meditation?

[D.]

I also have a Visionary fiction book. My 2 categories are:
Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Religious & Inspirational fiction > Inspirational
Kindle eBooks > Religion & Spirituality > Spirituality > Women

It's not a religious book but it gets to the Inspirational and Spiritual genres. I wish they wouldn't group the Religious & Spiritual genres together. Hope that helps!

[James]

Hi D. Thanks for your comments. I'm not really getting how the KDP dashboard selections appear in Amazon's page. i.e. Paul Coelho's book The Alchemist, (#23 in Books > Religion & Spirituality). What do you select in KDP dash to be in Books>Religion & Spirituality. In the dash I can see ALL>RELIGION>SPIRITUALITY, but I can also see ALL>FICTION>RELIGIOUS. And am I to assume that if it says FICTION after ALL that that is FICTION and ALL>RELIGION is non-fiction so he is in fiction and non-fiction. One confused person right here !! Any help mucho appreciated. James

[Riley, Viking Extraordinaire]

This thread should help James:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[D.]

James wrote: "Hi D. Thanks for your comments. I'm not really getting how the KDP dashboard selections appear in Amazon's page. i.e. Paul Coelho's book The Alchemist, (#23 in Books > Religion & Spirituality). Wha..."

Amazon wouldn't let me use the "Visionary fiction" genre even though it exists. They said it was reserved for physical books. Well, mine is available as a physical book, too. Oh, well. It must be reserved for the big publishers.

Anyway, I read a book that said to go to the Amazon store and put "Kindle eBooks" in a general search. After you pull up "Kindle eBooks," you'll see categories to the left if you scroll down. When you click on them, they open sub-categories. Next to each category, there's a number of books. You want to find the appropriate sub-category with the lowest #. Choose two.
Contact Amazon and ask them to change the categories for your book. Keep clicking each category until there's no more subs. Good luck!

For some reason, Amazon will add a third category that isn't always accurate. Mine also says it's non-fiction and it isn't. I wouldn't worry about it.

[Joel]

Ken wrote: "One caveat to remember: don't place your book in the wrong category just to attract readers. If readers are disappointed because they think you brought them to your book under false pretenses, they..."
Very good advise.

[Jack]

I'm not sure how this works. My book is in paperback and kindle and I've contacted Amazon about five times asking of category changes, and been completely blanked. No reply.

[Riley, Viking Extraordinaire]

Jack wrote: "I'm not sure how this works. My book is in paperback and kindle and I've contacted Amazon about five times asking of category changes, and been completely blanked. No reply."

You change your categories abd keywords from your dashboard. Check out the thread I listed above, it will help you get in the categories you want.