Amazon categories

[Patsy]

I've released a collection of ghost/sixth sense stories which aren't particularly scary (It's called 'Slightly Spooky Stories 1' to reflect that). I selected apprppriate categories and keywords when I uploaded it (and have double checked these).

Amazon are now giving it a rating in the 'horror' section. Normally I'd be delighted to make a top 100 slot, but not this time. Anyone buying it expecting horror is likely to be disappointed and I feel that anyone who'd enjoy more gentle ghost type stories will be put off buying it.

Is there anything I can do?

[Patti (baconater)]

I think readers can help with assigning catagories. Give us a link to the book, please.

[Kath]

I felt the same about my three supernatural stories, Souls Disturbed. It's supernatural. It's not horror but Amazon, in its infinite wisdom, put it in that category. I don't think you can do anything other than make sure you include its true category in the product description or tagline.

[Patsy]

This is the book, Patti. Slightly Spooky Stories I

If you can see a way of helping, please let us know what to do, so we can try it for Kath's books too.

[Darren]

Amazon's murky algorithms sort all this out. You can choose your own when you publish, but what readers buy and what they look at soon takes over from you might have chosen. If a bunch of readers of mainly horror decide to read your book then that is where it is going to go because that is where the most readers have come from and therefore most likely where the most readers will come from.

This is one thing it's probably best to leave up to Amazon because they are all about the sales. If your blurb makes it clear (as does the title) then you've done all that you can.

[Patsy]

Thanks, Darren.

You're right that there probably isn't anything more I can do about it, so I may as well try not to worry.

[Catherine]

Hi Patsy,

Are you aware that using certain keywords in Amazon can trigger being included in certain categories? Trying this may have some effect. Here's the info. on it from KDP for Mystery, Thrillers and Suspense on Amazon UK. There is another list for US, which may differ slightly:
http://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/help/topi...

[Patsy]

Ah, that may well be it. Thanks.

[H.E.]

Hi Patsy,

Like you and Kath I write tales of the uncanny that don't fit neatly into Amazon's 'Horror' category, but which none the less end up lumped together with the blood-drenched gorefests that this genre seems to primarily consist of. They could do with an 'understated horror'/ghost stories category, or weird fiction, but unfortunately that's not an option. As Kath has suggested, the best way to get the nature of your content across to prospective readers is in the blurb. It's far from perfect, but the only means we have.

[Anna]

I sometimes feel the need to put in my blurb that it is a love story but not of the formulaic kind. Girl meets boy, they fall in love, they meet a problem(s), they overcome the problem(s), they live happily ever after - mine are not like that.

This thread is reminding me that I need to put 'non formulaic' on the .com site.

[Patsy]

You're right that the blurb should enable us to give the reader an idea of what to expect (or not) from the book.

[Patti (baconater)]

I'm so over genre pigeon holing.

I do two now.

Fiction and non-fiction.

And I don't trust non-fiction anymore.

[Gingerlily - The Full Wild]

Pigeonholing is dividing books into ones that contain the word 'pigeon' and those that don't.

[Darren]

Pigeonholing is a cruel blood sport no longer legal in most civilised countries.

[Tim]

Unlike potholing...

[Michael]

Non-fiction is chuffing brilliant.

I now know far more about 17th century Poland than I did three years ago.