Indie Book Club discussion

I've read some posts on here about people deciding not to take advantage of Amazon's KDP select, mainly because they make you take your book off all other sites. I only have one book published and as I've mentioned before, it has only sold to family and friends so I thought, why not. I signed up in December. I haven't sold a single book in the past 4 weeks so I thought I would try using 2 of the free days I'm allowed so it was posted for free Monday and Tuesday.

I'm not sure if my results are typical and would love to know other's experience but in the 48 hours my book was free it was downloaded over 2200 times. It go all the way up to #132 in the free store. Since my book went back to $2.99 at midnight, I have sold 14 books today so I'm thinking maybe it's not all bad.

Also, just a pondering question but I wonder if Amazon has some sort of system where they notice things like a book being downloaded that much and realize maybe it's a book they can make 30% on and maybe they start featuring it better in search or in different places. It would make sense for Amazon to do stuff like that. They are in business to make money and it would make sense for them to feature books they think might sell....just a thought anyway. At any rate, I have had a positive experience with KDP select and just wanted to share my story.

I've had good results as well. It seems the more my book is borrowed, the more sales I get. I think it's worth trying:-)

The Select program free promotion days certainly kick started my sales. In the two weeks after first publishing it was just family and friends (of friends).

Over 800 free downloads in a weekend. Selling 10-15 a day full price the week following and charting top 50 in genre.

My view is that it gets you seen. If I had 2000 free downloads at the royalty rates in place, I'm not losing much compared to the potential upside.

Paul wrote: "The Select program free promotion days certainly kick started my sales. In the two weeks after first publishing it was just family and friends (of friends).

Over 800 free downloads in a weekend. S..."

My thoughts exactly:-)

I think the KDP select is worth it. In fact we ended up making more sales and writing a book about it. And we created a new website to help other authors. Post your promos, books and author interviews here: http://kindlebookpromos.luckycinda.com.

Or the book is $2.99 on Kindle: $ell More eBook$ - How to increase sales and Amazon rankings using Kindle Direct Publishing

The free promos have definitely boosted my sales.

I just published recently, but apparently if your book is downloaded during the promo days, it helps increase your ranking on the best sellers list. As well it allows you to gain spots in 'if you like this book, please consider .....' which essentially is a billboard advertisement for your book. If you have two books published or even a series, you're laughing since you can continuously have your products marketed. Great idea from Amazon! I'm creating my marketing campaign around this idea as we speak, so I hope I have some good luck!

I like the idea of Amazon helping Indie authors further promote their book. However, I do not like their exclusivity requirements. Publish with only one retailer? I'd shoot myself in the foot if I did that. I have too many fans, readers, and sales through other outlets to write them off.

Yes, Amazon has the most sales, but coming up in a strong second is Barnes & Noble. Now while I realize that for some KDP would be advantageous, if not appealing for some, but for me it's too restrictive.

I hope it works well for you, L.W.!

Big J

L.W.: when KDP first rolled out, free downloads would shoot your book up in the non-free rankings. It was great! But Amazon has since changed their algorithm. 1 free download no longer equals 1 purchase, as far as ranking is concerned. You now have to give away a crap-ton of downloads in a short period of time to see a rankings bump after your promo ends.
On a similar note, Amazon now weighs the purchase price of a book to it's ranking, meaning a $0.99 book needs more purchases than a $2.99 book to climb an equal distance in the rankings.

If you're going to use the KDP promo and you want to know how it works, and how to use it to your advantage, this is an awesome and DETAILED podcast: Self-Publishing Podcast-Decrypting Amazon's Algorithm

Thanks for the info Eric! I've been doing some reading online about how to market my free promo day. I'll check out the podcast.

Thanks for the well wishes Jeffrey!

Outside of the free promo days KDP allows, there is another benefit to the program, the option to have your book included in the Kindle Direct Lending Library program.

How this works is as follows, members of Amazon Prime can 'borrow' a book once a month from those books included in the KDLL. There are two ways this benefits authors enrolled in the program:

(1) There is a pool of cash which pays a royalty to the author of a book for each Amazon Prime member who borrows said book. Royalties can vary, but typically average around $2 a loan, close to what an author realizes on the sale of a $2.99 book.

(2) Loans from the KDLL count for ranking purposes as a sale for the purpose of listing one's book in the Amazon Best Seller's ranking. Should a book be borrowed often enough, such loans can have a serious affect on one's ranking, resulting in both more sales and more loans, each feeding off the other.

Whether or not the KDLL option is worth the exclusivity requirement Amazon demands is a choice only the author can make, of course.

That's interesting. I put up a collection of short stories/poemsjust the other day. I had two sales almost right away and it jumped up to about 60 in the historical fantasy category, but nothing since. No lends either. I have been saving my 'free' days but may just go ahead and use them; I'd be quite happy with upwards of 1000 reads, free or not! My main interest really was to get people to read a sample of my writing/themes and hopefully buy my already released novel and its forthcoming sequel.

J.P. wrote: "That's interesting. I put up a collection of short stories/poemsjust the other day. I had two sales almost right away and it jumped up to about 60 in the historical fantasy category, but nothing since. No lends either. I have been saving my 'free' days but may just go ahead and use them; I'd be quite happy with upwards of 1000 reads, free or not! My main interest really was to get people to read a sample of my writing/themes and hopefully buy my already released novel and its forthcoming sequel.

I'd recommend saving your free days and using them when you release your sequel, so new readers who learn about you through seeing promotion for your second book have a chance to try the first book in the series risk-free.