Support for Indie Authors discussion

It's been around for 6 months to a year, in a limited beta.

I still haven't gotten in, myself.

I might give it a try. I'm feeling brave.

I've been in the beta since the very beginning! I haven't used it, I already use Createspace. Sorry, I can't help.

I just published my first paperback thru KDP (literally, like within the past 10 days). The process was easy enough. I can't compare it to createspace since I hadn't used them for paperbacks either. I just liked the idea of having everything in one location and on one sales report. I'm waiting for my paperback copies to arrive (hopefully this Friday).

I'm nervous. I started it, but then chickened out without discovering the price. Can you share the bottom line? How much does it cost per book?

My issue is they don't offer wholesale copies to the author whereas Createspace does. That and there is no expanded distribution. I may consider it for a short story I hadn't planned on making into a paperback, but I'm not sure.

My book is 333 pages, 6x9 black & white and the print cost came out to $4.85. They give you the print cost well before the whole process is finished so you can bail if you want. LOL. After they tell you print costs, they do a good job of calculating your sale price range (they give you a minimum price needed to cover printing and distribution) and what your royalty will be so you can decide what price point to set.

Jessica, were you able to select the page size and cover finish?

Yes. Lots of trim size options and matte vs glossy for cover.

I was looking at this actually and still weighing the pros and cons. I'm thinking this might be a great option for international publishers (who don't care about expanded distribution fyi) because KDP does direct deposit whereas Createspace doesn't. But I hate that it's in beta because there's just really no way to know for sure how much of a con the cons are yet...

Also I want to transfer a title but it isn't clear if you can go back to Createspace without creating a brand new ISBN (looks so far like the answer is no).

Plus I heard KDP has worse customer service...not sure if this is true.

I'm glad this topic was made. I just published my novel via Amazon Kindle and I saw the "publish as a paperback through KDP beta". I had planned on releasing my book as a paperback through Createspace in the near future and it's nice to know that Createspace does not do direct deposit. How much do you have to make on Createspace before they pay out?

Eliza wrote: "I'm glad this topic was made. I just published my novel via Amazon Kindle and I saw the "publish as a paperback through KDP beta". I had planned on releasing my book as a paperback through Createsp..."

Eliza, if you are in the US, Createpace does direct deposit with no minimum, just like KDP.

Okay, good to know. Thank you, Christina!

I transferred five of my paperbacks from Createspace to KDP, but left my newer books on Createspace because of the ability to order author copies as my newer series is the one I am actively promoting. I did have a LOT of problems transferring my book information across but I did find the support people to be super helpful and did eventually manage to sort everything out

Eliza wrote: "Okay, good to know. Thank you, Christina!"

Oh yes, sorry if my post wasn't clear. Createspace doesn't do direct payments for international, out of U.S. self publishers. So as someone in Canada, I have to wait until I reach a $100 threshold for checks apparently.

Jane wrote: "I transferred five of my paperbacks from Createspace to KDP, but left my newer books on Createspace because of the ability to order author copies as my newer series is the one I am actively promoti..."

Do you know if this transfer counts as republishing and if so, does it affect the release date at all?

Melissa wrote: "Do you know if this transfer counts as republishing and if so, does it affect the release date at all?"

My release dates remained the same as when I'd published the books via CreateSpace

Based on what I read, I prefer Createspace. And as Christina already pointed out, they don't offer wholesale copies to the author yet. Since we are essentially the only people who ever buy print copies of our books, I like that option.

I did KDP Print beta for my debut novel and have done well with it. It was easy to do and cost was less than Createspace. I would have had to charge 10.99 USD to print on CS and with KDP it was only 5.99. Not much profit margin but for a new author much more reasonable.

Thanks for sharing all this. So far I'm sticking with createspace because I do purchase print copies for resale at author events, and I do sell print copies through expanded distribution. But I'm curious as to why KDP is competing with createspace. I'm keeping my ear to the ground as the KDP paperback program develops.

Well, considering both kindle and createspace are Amazon companies I don't think the idea is to compete. From what I've been reading around, the idea is to gradually bring the features of createspace into kindle directly. Which is why some aspects of the createspace experience are available already and others aren't.

I noticed the feature on my account this morning, but a friend of mine has been in the beta for months now and says she has slowly seen more and more options become available.

My suggestion would be to use the KDP version if it provides the options you are currently looking for, but to continue with createspace for now if there are specific things you need from it.

In the long term, its more likely that KDP will become the primary service for which they offer more support. This kind of cannibalization of their own services is quite common in the tech industry.

The only difference between Createspace and KDP is that Createspace offers authors the option of buying their books for cost whereas KDP does not offer that option. If you are someone who often goes to conventions or supplies copies of paperback books, you're going to pay more for your own book on KDP.

Createspace lets you make your own discount codes. Does KDP offer that possibility?