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KDP Select – A Great Promotion Tool or the Slow Murder of the Ebook Market?

Earlier, I have shared my thoughts about Amazon’s KDP Select program, both concerns and positive experiences, but back then the program was still in the beginning stages. Now, the program has been up and running for 5 months and the negative effects are slowly starting to show, while the positives are on the track back.

My concerns, when Amazon first announced the release of Select,  were focused on the requirement of exclusity.

To sum up the KDP Select program, it gives the authors using Kindle Direct Publishing(KDP) the opportunity to enroll their books in Kindle’s Lending Library, allowing Kindle Prime members to borrow their books. Each month all enrolled authors get a share of a monthly fund, depending on how many times their book was borrowed.

It also gives the authors a chance to make their book free for 5 days every 90 days period(A thing authors can freely do on retailer sites like Smashwords), which is a powerful promotion tool.

It all sounds like a great deal, but as with everything else, there is a catch. To enroll in the program, Amazon requires you to agree to sell your book exclusively on Amazon for a period of 90 days. Which means that not only can’t you sell the digital form of your book on places like Barnes and Noble, you can’t even sell it on your own website. To say it simply: Amazon owns you for 3 months.

Being the good little capitalist I am, I balked at the sound of that, but it was completely understandable that many authors didn’t hesitate with signing up for the program. After all, most indie authors have most of their sales(If not all) from Amazon’s Kindle Store and it was no loss for them to take their book down from any other retailer.

And in the first months it did indeed seem like the Select program was a God-sent gift to help indies promote their books. By making their book available for free for a couple of days, many authors (Myself inclusive after I caved) experienced hundreds or even thousands of downloads of their books.

Some might think it’s a self-destructive thing to do if you want to sell your book, but it’s actually a fantastic way to be seen. Not only may someone who download one of your books for free like it enough to actually pay for one of your other books, your freely downloaded title will also be shown in hundreds of places under the “Costumers who bought this also bought:” section that is shown underneath each book. That’s a great way to gain visibility.

In those first months, many saw huge bumps in their paid sales after having run such free promotions, because their book suddenly showed to a lot of new potentiel readers. The program was praised to the skies in the KDP author forum and most swore they would re-enroll after their 90 days were up.

They don’t anymore.

Like with many other things, the program’s success seems to have died down and given backlash. Thousands of authors have made their books free, making the market overflow with free books. So why should readers pay for books when they can get them for free?

Not only has readers had the chance to fill up their Kindle’s with free books, it seems many are actually waiting for particular books to be free, instead of paying to get it immediately. Some authors even experience getting mails from readers, who have downloaded the first book in a series for free, asking if the next book will also be available for free at some time.

Doesn’t bode well, does it?

Many authors have no realized this and are pulling their books out of the program and re-uploading them to other stores. More and more authors on the KDP forums are complaining about their sales having crashed to the ground after the Select program was set into motion, even authors who used to make a living from their books. Books doesn’t seem to be borrowed through the Lending Library too often anymore either. After all, why should Kindle owners pay $79 every year for a Prime Membership that allows them to borrow one free book every month, when all the books are free at some point anyway?

The KDP Select Program might have seemed like a great opportunity in the beginning, but I fear that it has only had negative effects of the market in the end. My hope is that Amazon will soon realize this, and either cancel it or change the details on free downloads to prevent readers to go only for the free books.

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Resounding Echo Back on Barnes and Noble!

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I’m happy to announce that Resounding Echo is once again available on Barnes & Noble’s Nook, as well as other platforms!

Like many others I enrolled into Amazon’s KDP Select Program, which requires you to keep your ebooks exclusive to Kindle and Amazon’s retailer sites.

From the start, I had a lot of doubts about the program and it took long before I finally gave in and enrolled Resounding Echo. Though it did help sales for a short period, it seems like some of my fears about it are getting realized.

I read the Kindle Direct Publishing’s forums every day to hear from other authors, and it seems like everyone have suffered greatly from the Select Program.

So I have no doubts about not renewing the contract and putting my books up for sale on other platforms again.

The ebook will now be available on:

Amazon

Barnes and Noble

Smashwords

BookTango

Make Your Offer

Apple iBookstore

Sony Reader Store

Kobo

Remember that Resounding Echo is also available as paperback:

FeedaRead

Createspace

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The Spiteful World of Indie Publishing

Books Stack

Every day, I take some time out of my schedule to follow the KDP’s author forum as well as a couple other forums dealing with independent publishing. It’s a great way to connect with other writers and get help and useful information.

But it’s also the place for learning more about the business we’re in. Despite many opinions and views on self-publishing, it’s a business like any other, with unending issues you have to deal with. But even though I’m perfectly aware of the spitefulness of human nature and the tough fight to be noticed among thousands of other authors in the crowd, the behavior that seems to be spreading among competive indies like a wildfire is appalling to me.

Now, I have no need to complain, as I myself haven’t been a victim of this, but I still feel the need to address this issue. Had it been a few isolated cases, I would just put it down to a few people who never learned to respect others and compete fairly, but I’m hearing about this being done to more and more of my fellow authors.

The thing I’m talking about is independent authors, instead of just promoting themselves, doing everything to bring down their competition.

We have all heard about authors posting fake reviews on their own books in order to drive the ratings up and make the book seem more attractive to the potentiel buyer, but some of these authors take it much further.

Some actually pretends to be readers with no ulterior motive and posts vicious and downgrading reviews on other books in the same genre as they are writing themselves in order to hurt competition. They act like they have read the books and hated them, but a few clicks leading to their profiles show that they are not unpartial readers, but competing authors. Some even have the nerve to attack other books in their reviews and then suggest readers to read their book instead, even linking to them in the review.

The first time I read about someone who had been a victim of this, I was repulsed and didn’t get how anyone could have so little shame. I felt the same way the second time… And the third… Until I slowly started realizing that this was actually happening often and was becoming a common way to fight competition.

The worst thing is that so often it’s so blaringly obvious. I have seen reviews that don’t even target the book, but are direct attacks on the authors. Many of them are purely hateful comments with no arguments to explain why the “reviewer” dislikes the book/author so much.

And the most scary thing is that it’s not only happening among indie authors. Even some traditional publishers have used this method to bring down competition! This article on DailyMail.co.uk describes the behavior pretty well, and it was already published in 2010 showing that it’s not a new trend:  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1333885/Amazons-amateur-book-reviewing-vicious-free-readers-victims.html

It’s a sad, sad thing that people are willing to stoop so low in order to get success. And in the end, I really doubt ruining potentiel success for others will ever lead to anything good anyway.

And what’s the use of reviews, when you can’t trust them at all?