Are you an AMAZON & KDP basher?
Every day I receive dozens of
emails from sites for authors, and every day, somewhere on the list is a
recurring theme—complaints about Amazon. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen one that had
something good to say about any of Amazon’s practices regarding things for
writers.
Are you among the many authors who
constantly criticize KDP and take your books out every time Amazon does
something that you don’t approve of?
It’s important to take a step back
and examine the big picture here—Amazon’s KDP does authors a huge service.
Don’t think so?
Then take an even further step back
and think about what life would be like without Amazon's assistance. Realistically, chances of getting your work published the traditional way, through an
agent and then a publishing house, are similar to your odds of winning
your state lottery.
And even if you do manage to get a
publisher to pick up your work, then guess what? The publisher expects authors
to do their own marketing. Now, you’re making considerably smaller royalties,
while doing the same amount of endless marketing chores.
Maybe this phenomenon of complaining is a natural
thing; Amazon is, after all, our employer, and everyone loves to complain about
their employer. Unlike a traditional employer though, there are no touch-bases,
no monthly or even annual dialogue to discuss how the employer/employee
relationship is going. Admittedly, our Amazon employer is not easy to
communicate with.
KDP does answer
email questions, although it takes one to two days to get an answer. Their
answers are canned, and are usually not specific enough for your problem unless
you happen to ask just the right question. If it were up to me—and I know many
of you will violently disagree—I’d be in favor of Amazon charging authors a
minimal fee for publishing in order for them to pay for an easy-to-access
support system.
Most of us have a
love & hate attitude toward Mother Amazon.
Where is the love?
Ten things to
love about Amazon and KDP
1.
Any writer can publish his/her eBook on
Amazon in only 2 days.
2.
There are now millions of Kindle owners all over the world buying
eBooks.
3.
Amazon has made it easy now for people with
other digital readers to download AZ products.
4.
An author can get as much as a 70% royalty from his/her book sales.
5.
KDP pays authors for eBooks lent to Prime
members by paying for pages read.
6.
Profits are deposited directly into an author’s
bank account.
7.
Amazon sells eBooks to a worldwide market and
shares the profit.
8.
KDP’s Select program offers authors free days to
help promote their books and many other options for promotion.
9.
Amazon is continually adding new ways for
authors to market their writing.
10. Author
profile pages give writers a platform for all their books, their trailers, their blogs, and other information they want to supply to their readers.
My personal experiences
with publishing on AZ have been over a period of five years. I’ve seen their promotion choices go from offering free days to many different
options. Formatting instructions for uploading books are improved
regularly, making the publishing process simpler.
For an indie
author Amazon and KDP remain—the best game in town.
Dear Readers,
You’re probably
wondering if I ever add my complaints about Amazon to the long list that others
whine about daily. Like any employee, yes, I have my criticisms.
Right now, I
love the profits I’m receiving from their pages-read system of rewarding those
who put their books into Amazon Prime. I write long books and people tend to
read the entire thing, so pages-read has been a bonanza for me. I know that system most
likely is not something that Amazon will use forever and when it’s changed, I'll probably complain. But I believe that Amazon wants to keep their authors happy and
when it is changed, I trust that it will be to something equally profitable.
Wishing everyone
a happy, healthy, and successful spring,
Marla
