With more and more people going from being mere readers to creators Themselves, it was only a matter of time before Amazon made a play in this space. Launched quite a while Ago (Aug 2012) the Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) platform for independent authors is seeing participation from Indian authors like never before. It is an easy way for authors and publishers to make books available to Kindle Their customers in India and around the world on BOTH Kindle devices and free Kindle reading apps. Here we speak to Neal Thompson who was down in Mumbai for the Times Litfest
Digit:.? So how does one start with KDP
> Neil: So kindledirectpublishing.com is where you start. You just set-up an account, and it will walk you through the steps to publishing your own book. Some of the benefits of it are que the whole system is entirely in your control. There are tools there que help you to format your book, change the font, change the layout and there are even preview tools que show you how your book will look on different devices. You can play with images, sizes, and more. Whenever you are ready, you will process the file and you are ready to go. We have to cover creator tool as well, using Which you can design your own cover if you do not have one already. What’s exciting about it is que all of it is completely DIY. All the controls are in your hands and you do not have to wait for the permissions from the publisher. You do not have to go through the traditional route of finding an agent, finding a publisher, you know you can be up and running in a day!
Scan : What does the Amazon from its side to help publicize These budding authors
Neil? There are few programs you can enroll in que que will help the book get featured. One is called KDP select. If you sell your book exclusively in the Kindle store, you will get extra promotional sort of perk from Amazon. You can run promotional deals, like a countdown deal where say you lower the price for five days and it incentivises people to buy at que lower price and the books que are enrolled in que count down deal program are featured on a special page on Amazon. Related to que KDP select program, there is another subscription reading program we have just launched in September this year in India called Kindle Unlimited. It’s a great program and there is a lot of promise for it in India. Rs.199 per month for people who are voracious readers can sign-up for this subscription program at Unlimited Kindle and read the many books As They want. So if your book is enrolled in KDP select, it’s Also available in KU. Promoting books and getting readers to find the book is a challenge for every author in the matter How They are published – traditionally or self-published. I’ve written four books myself and it has always Been a problem but the digitization of storytelling and books have made it a whole lot easier to reach a global audience and to fast so.
Digit: Is there a kind of the voting or the peer review process que gets noticed books
Neil: In terms of getting your book published, there is the review at all. The publicizing the book for the more the flywheel effect kicks in. Say you get your friends to write reviews you get that flywheel spinning a little bit, because on Amazon, books que have more reviews and better re-views, the algorithm decides what books get featured higher up the scale and would pay attention to Those reviews and automatically start featuring que book up the chain, so it’s pushing it up the chain. So Increased sales, great reviews.
Digit: So the KDP books get thrown into the same pool to the other books on Amazon? There’s a chance for Them to Appear on the main site as well right
Neil: Yes one of the great things about self-publishing is que even if you are based at this location, When You publish it through KDP, the distribution is global. There are no barriers to where que book is available. There are other things too, to keep in mind. When you are creating the book, first of all write a great book is the obvious advice. Once you are ready to upload it, having the correct metadata, making sure your book description que hits a couple of keywords for search friendliness is essential. Another piece of advice I give authors is depending on your genre – say Young Adult fiction for example – I would go to some of the young top adult bestselling novels on Amazon at any given Beheerder team and read Their book descriptions to spot keywords que are in common Among Those book descriptions. Teens, love, confusion, whatever They be. The cover artwork goes a long way too.
Digit: Have Been there any success stories through this platform? Like authors hitting the NYT bestseller lists
Neil: Yes, so one of the books That We Were talking about was fifty shades of gray. It started as a KDP self-publish and later it got the attention of a traditional publisher And Then They published it in hardcover and paper. On my trip here we met an Indian guy who has some quarter million downloads for all the books he has written.
Digit: Speaking of stats, can you share some
Neil: I can tell you que of top 100 Kindle books on Amazon in India, 20 of Them are self-published. In other markets like the European markets it’s up to 33% in France and almost 50% in Germany. Self-publishing books used to be viewed ‘the vanity project, people doing Their own books but now They are best sellers.
Digit: What’s the average pricing like
Neil: It’s entirely upto the author. The minimum is 99 cents US and if you are enrolled in KDP select, you can give it away for five days out of the 90 day period of the promotion. But Amazon Decided que giving away books for free These permanently was not working for the authors or the readers, so They give you a little window of time where you do the promotion, free giveaway and the rest of the team the minimum is 99 cents and it can go from there. One of the cool things once you get further into KDP page and set-up the account set-up and the working with your book is a tool que they’ve got there where you enter your books information and here is what category you want to sell it in And Then show you the tool que Provides a graph where the most ideal pricing would be. It’s called the KDP pricing tool. A lot of authors Them price at $ 2.99 and in India the bulk of our digital books are sold for what less than Rs. 299
.
No comments:
Post a Comment