Apr 12, 2012

K is for KDP Select

KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) is growing in popularity as a promotional tool for Indie authors. But is it the right tool for you? There are some benefits and drawbacks to this program, your book will boost in popularity, the free days will flow on to create more paid sales and your book will show up underneath other popular books, but, the more popular this program becomes, the less effective it will be for individual books. Also this program requires you to only have your book listed on Amazon, cutting out many other ebook sales sites like Smashwords or iBooks.  With the popularity of iPads growing, I'm not sure it's wise to keep your book off iBooks.

My experience? MY ZOMBIE DOG was downloaded over a thousand times on the one free day I held. The flow on sales were more in one day than the first month. My next promotion will last for two days to see if that works even better. I haven't decided yet if I will stay with KDP or list my book on some of the other sites as well.

If you want to try this program, read up on these helpful posts:

K is also for Kev. Kev is a character who has a small role in MY ZOMBIE DOG, but turned out to be so popular the next book features his story. I'm working on Chapter One of UNDEAD KEV to add to the back of the paperback edition of MY ZOMBIE DOG. CreateSpace are putting the novel together for me and doing a great job, here's a sneak of the cover:

14 comments:

  1. Amazon seem really keen on knocking out any competition. They provide a great service, but I do wonder if it's all part of a master plan to take over the world.

    mood
    Moody Writing
    @mooderino
    The Funnily Enough

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  2. Wow, that does sounds like great short term results.

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  3. This is great news, especially for first time authors like myself.
    My first book with be ready soon and I've been looking at ways to go - so this post has come along at a good time, thanks!

    Bex
    www.leavingcairo.blogspot.com

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  4. I don't possess a kindle, but I was thinking perhaps it's time I got one as most people have now.

    Yvonne.

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  5. I love the cover.

    You make some really good points. And thanks for the links. All good information for those of us still trying to decide...

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  6. Wow that's amazing ....I love the cover

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  7. Good advice to not limit options. Amazon is a powerhouse, but then Apple always seems to excel as well. I'm enjoying My Zombie Dog.

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  8. I currently have two books in KDP. I can't say the results have been great, but it's someplace to start.

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  9. I think I'm going to go that route for my collection of short stories.

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  10. I'm still on the fence with this one. Seems a bit drastic not to have your books on other formats. I've actually sold more books on ibooks than amazon.

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  11. Timely post! I was googling for pros and cons about joining KDP today. What a coincidence!

    I am now wondering whether to spread my ebook around.

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  12. this is all too confusing to me at the moment--but glad to know things are working for you!

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  13. Hi Charmaine. I see there are some pending courtcases re e-books and Apple's anti competition policies and price fixing. I wonder how Amazon misses out seeing they are trying to get the stranglehold on every other publisher.

    Thanks for the opinions and interesting how the free sales worked for you. I hope they lead to lots of paid sales.

    PS Later on today I'm putting up my childhood post. You might be interested in reading it. Got it set for about 2pm so as not to upset anyone but I just read an L from an American. Hmm.

    Denise

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  14. I put both my books on Amazon and find them very good to deal with

    Yvonne.

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