By Daniel Ottalini
Hi everyone, today I’ll be talking a bit about some new author tools available for Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing (Also called Amazon KDP). First, let me introduce to you….
Kindle Countdown Deals! – Essentially an easier way to manage a sale of your novel, at the cost of being able to only publish the novel on Amazon. This is a big cornerstone of their new push to make authors exclusive on their platform. What do I think? Great idea! (If only they could allow it while being on other platforms.) I think they would make more sales IF you would see that they have it cheaper on Amazon as opposed to elsewhere, rather than just being a lower price on Amazon and not shown anywhere else.
Kindle Lending Library– Want to earn free money for letting people borrow your book? This is the way to go! Alternatively, you could encourage people to buy your book, but hey, some people would rather save precious MBs on their kindle Fires I suppose. You earn a changing fee every month based on the total number of lends/borrows and the total number for the planet out of a set amount of millions of dollars. In essence, you earn a fraction of what the entire world is given, but it can end up being more than the price of the book. Good for those novellas or side novels you’re willing to sell for 99 cents, because you could end up making $2 or more off each borrow.
Free Book Promotion Tool – So, want to offer a great big promotional ‘free day’ without the hassle of having to change the price on multiple sites? Amazon’s got the tool for you. Tell them when you want it free, send people the links, and there ya go! You only get five days of this, so use them wisely!
Overall Thoughts – Amazon’s got some great tools. I read somewhere that they are willing to sell Kindle Fires and E-Readers at a loss to gather market share, and these are definite supporters of that plan. KDP Select is a great tool, but it may not be the best for you. With only one publishing platform, you limit yourself and your slice of the market.
Yes, most to many people use Amazon’s services, but not all. Barnes and Noble & the i-Store for apple may be the strongest competitors, but neither have similar promotional tools. Barnes and Noble matches the ease for uploading that Amazon has, but I have yet to figure out how to upload stuff to the iStore. (Even with directions). That being said, I encourage you to use all the platforms available. Amazon has shown a willingness to ‘change the rules’ before, and thus we should not be surprised if they do it again. If allowed to completely dominate the market, authors will be getting the shaft at the end as Amazon will be allowed to control all aspects of the payment and royalties without our ability to say no.
What do you think? Should authors go with KDP Select, or should they diversify?
Modern Papyrus 