- Are you publishing no content books
or low content books?
If so today we're gonna be discussing
some severe implications when it comes to
no content publishing
and the state of no-content book publishing in general,
so make sure you stay tuned.
Hey, I'm Dale L. Roberts,
best selling author,
as well as a self-publishing advocate,
who wants to show you how to publish books that sell.
And if you want that too,
make sure you click the subscribe,
ring the bell notification icon,
and click it to all so that way you don't miss
a single one of these videos.
Stick around to the end.
I'm gonna tell you this right there,
there's not gonna be any fluff on this.
All info, and even some implications
that we need to kind of consider going forward,
so without any further ado,
let's address the elephant in the room.
What is no content book publishing?
I gotta get this out of the way
just in case you happen to be new to this channel
or new to the specific business
of self publishing no content books.
No content books are anything
from diaries to journals to planners,
anything that's blank.
So think like office supplies
and stationary.
And people are doing it by ways of places like
Kindle Direct Publishing,
and of course the one that we're gonna talk about today,
Ingram Spark.
But who is Ingram Spark?
And what is their relationship with Amazon?
And why does this relate to you?
Well Ingram Spark is actually underneath
a larger umbrella here
of the Ingram Content Group.
Now Ingram content group has probably
the widest distribution
of any self publishing avenue out there.
They've got really great high quality products.
I've actually done some unboxing of their books.
Just absolutely stellar stuff.
And Ingram Content Group as they relate to Amazon,
this is very interesting,
not too many people realize this
that the expanded distribution option
that you have for KDP print books
is fulfilled by way of Ingram Content Group.
Huh, is that so?
So now we've got Ingram Content Group,
and then right below them is Ingram Spark of course.
Ingram Spark released an email yesterday,
and it was a bombshell.
And it needs to be addressed right now.
And what they said was we will actively
remove print content from our catalog
that does harm to buyers
and effects the reputations
of our publishers and retail
and library partners.
It's fairly innocuous at first,
'cause if you're thinking as a no content book publisher
like oh well I,
this is not anything bad.
Uh, well they kind of go a little bit more further
in depth and I'm just gonna highlight
about four points.
The have an entire thing.
And I'm gonna put the links to some
of this information down in the description below.
You wanna take a look at the release email
that they did, as well as the FAQs.
So the four points that they spoke about is
books containing blank pages exceeding 10%,
such as notepads, scratch pads, journals
or similar type content,
so this means that if you're putting out anything
that is blank, that is not nonfiction or fiction,
it's not something somebody reads beyond 10%
of the book, if it's made up of say 20%
or even 100% of blank content
they're like we don't want it.
And so, again, hang in there for just a second.
There's a good reason why I told you
the relationship between Ingram Spark and Amazon.
The next one was books or content
that mirror or mimic popular titles,
including without limiting similar covers,
cover design, title, author names
or similar type content.
So one of the things that has just been blowing up
over the past year is the whole no content
book publishing craze.
And people are just excited about it.
And you know some of them are just kind of dabbling,
and it's great that people are dabbling in it.
But there are some people that have taken it to extremes,
where they are uploading anywhere
from 100 to 1,000 titles in the course of a week,
which is absolutely insane,
and especially if you're not even making a profit from it.
You're just leveraging each one
of these platforms and abusing what's available to you.
So I believe in sending out volume, yeah,
but it needs to be quality volume.
And Ingram Spark's kind of saying enough.
And the reason why I kind of highlight
this specific point is that
there are some people that go
and look at other books that are on the market
and they say oh that title's doing well
so why don't I just use the same title,
and I'll just do a deviation
of the cover concept,
or a slight deviation of the titling
or the key words, or the description.
And listen folks I totally believe
that you should definitely model yourself
from the success pool,
but you shouldn't directly take from people.
You shouldn't be putting out content
that is exactly the same as someone else's,
it makes zero sense.
In order to be heard above the noise,
you need to put out unique products
that better serves the audience.
Okay so the next point is
books that are misleading
or likely to cause confusion by the buyer,
including without limiting
inaccurate descriptions and cover art.
So there are some cheeky books
that you'll get out there
that are no content books
and it might be all
of the best things about Donald Trump,
and you know you open it up
and it's blank.
There's the joke, that's the punchline,
but unfortunately it's a bit misleading.
Yeah it's funny, it's been done before
time and again ad nauseum,
and Ingram's like no, no, no, enough.
Enough of this misleading stuff.
And now this is the one I want to kind
of bring the closest attention to
because if you're using someone's services
that mass uploads you probably should definitely
take heed and caution to all of what I'm about to say here
because their main one is going to be
books created using artificial intelligence
or automated processes.
What does this mean?
All right I'm gonna tell you exactly what they said
in their FAQs.
It says also referred to as mass uploads
and mass production content.
An example is content created via automated customization
such as using scripted or coded processes
and/or templatized content with little to no variation
from title to title.
Content created in this manner
for the purpose of selling via the internet
or publisher's website will most likely not be permitted.
Content created with identical
or nearly identical interiors,
but varying cover designs
in mass will most likely not be permitted as well.
So if you've been getting templates,
and as I tell people you can get templates,
that's great, but you gotta make it your own.
You're gonna have to do something different.
And too many people are looking for that easy button.
They wanna get it just simple.
They're like oh give me those templates,
I'm just gonna go ahead and fire 'em off.
Well Ingram Spark had enough.
The had enough of seeing the same stinking interior
over and over again,
and they were like no, no that's it.
Remember folks that on the other end
of the publishing platform,
of the distributors, there are human beings
that are going through each one of your titles.
So if you're uploading 1,000 of the same interiors
over the course of one week or even less,
that person's getting really sick and tired
of having to handle that.
And much less if it's not even aiding
in increasing their bottom line because guess what
they're a business.
They have to pay their employees.
They have to pay their overhead.
And when you're doing these mass uploads
you're just abusing the system.
So when does this policy take effect anyways?
This is actually gonna be happening
on April 27, 2020.
And they announced this on February the 25th.
And they said essentially don't try to upload it now
'cause we're not accepting anymore.
And we will taking these titles down
as of April the 27th.
What does this mean overall?
I mean what does this mean?
I'm saying the death of no content publishing
so there needs to be some kind of basis on this one.
Now remember, again, Amazon expanded distribution
has relation to Ingram Content Group
that is run by Ingram spark.
I don't think Ingram Spark is quietly
doing these rules without
processing it through Ingram Content Group,
the larger umbrella.
This is probably a company wide thing.
And if they're doing this,
chances are likely in the behind the scenes things
in the Amazon KDP print team,
they might be looking at it and going huh, we can do that?
Well that will save us a lot of time.
And we can go back to the way things were
before people were just putting in
hundreds of thousands of blank books.
So I'm just gonna state some implications here.
This is my theory.
Ingram Spark has set a precedent,
and there's a good chance that KDP
is paying very close mind to this.
And Amazon loves to make money.
Don't we all?
And if you think Amazon's gonna be your best friend
and are gonna go you know what,
nah, you're good, you go ahead
and keep on doing that.
It's taking away from out bottom line
but we owe it to you.
Amazon owes you nothing.
Amazon owes none of us a single thing.
It is a privilege for us
to actually utilize the platform
and leverage it to where we can actually earn
a substantial living,
or at least a modest living and some income for us.
It is not their responsibility
to put out no content book.
It is not their responsibility.
Understand that.
So there might be a good chance
that there's a change in the air.
You might be saying but Dale,
hang on a second, your theory seems
kind of like hogwash.
It's totally cool.
I respect your point of view,
but I also wanna bring to light
that I've actually had a number
of publishers who have had their KDP accounts terminated,
some great people.
Some people that have been in this business for longer,
longer than this whole craze
of no content book publishing.
People who have to feed their family.
And they went from making a substantial living
to not making it at all.
Why?
Because now some things are being rolled out in KDP,
and it's not necessarily in the policy.
What there's happening is
they're starting to detect similar content,
be it interiors, be it titles,
and they're starting to go in
and go nope, nope, nope, nope, nope.
And they're starting to close down KDP accounts.
So I'm not trying to incite any kind of fear,
I wanna bring awareness to the fact
that if you were abusing the system right now
you may wanna stop.
You may wanna move to the next shiny object
because a change is in the air.
And I've said this before, back in the days,
when CreateSpace was king of the hill,
and KDP print rolled out in beta,
and I speculated, I said CreateSpace is going to go away.
And a lot of people thought I was full of crap.
Well I'm gonna go ahead and speculate
the days of no content book publishing are coming to an end.
So what do you do?
There's a couple of recommendations I'm going to give you.
First of all, don't rely on Ingram Spark
for any distribution of no content
or low content books,
just don't even try to test it at this point.
It's not worth doing because
they already said no.
And so there's a good chance
that even getting expanded distribution
for your no content, low content books
through Amazon KDP is probably coming to an end
so don't even click the box at this point.
The next one is do not continue to use
mass uploading software.
Without even any differentiation between
one product and the next.
You need to actually create
a unique product with each one of the uploads.
I get it.
Look, I've done it before myself.
It seems like yeah, all right, I got a lot accomplished,
I was able to publish this many things,
but the bottom line is there's no differentiation.
I mean you got a different cover.
I applaud you, but, you know, the market
needs something better.
You need to be more creative.
And being creative doesn't mean
having to pump out one thing after the other
with just slight deviations.
And the next thing is
if you're truly passionate about no content book publishing,
might I recommend that you actually
start doing it yourself?
There is actually a distribution avenue called Lulu,
and they also have what's called Lulu xPress.
Now Lulu xPress actually integrates with Shopify
so you can end up setting up your own website
and integrate that with Shopify
and Lulu xPress, do your no content books that way,
and then you can drive traffic there.
And guess what?
You're gonna profit way more
than if you were trying to do it
through someone like KDP or Ingram Spark
because it's gonna be all profit for you.
My final thoughts.
Is this the end?
Possibly.
This could be really spelling
the end of all that we know for no content publishing.
And I feel badly for those people out there
that are pulling in substantial amount of money,
be it a couple hundred bucks per month
or couple grand,
or even some people that are pulling in
five to six figures,
I'm sorry to hear that.
I wish I could change something like that.
And I'm hoping that by building awareness
that you are starting to understand
that self publishing is so much more
than cramming 10 pounds of (beep)
in a five pound bag.
It is way more than that.
And when you start to understand
and grasp that, you will start to diversify
what you're doing in self publishing,
and not just relying on one specific type of income.
I'm sorry to kind of finish up a video on this.
Look, I love no content book publishing,
I think it's fantastic.
I've got a number of them over here on my shelf,
I use them on a regular basis.
And I'm sure that you do too.
In fact, you know we talked a little bit more
about no content book publishing in this video series.
You're gonna click this next video down below
if you want some more information,
and a lot of this is still hazy.
And of course drop any comments that you have.
I will see you in the next video.