- Have you been thinking about self-publishing on Amazon,
but you're not sure if it's right for you?
Well, today I'm going to discuss self-publishing
on Amazon, the pros and cons in 2019,
so make sure that you stay tuned.
(electric guitar music)
This is Self-Publishing with Dale
where you'll learn to publish books that sell
and build an unstoppable brand.
Given the choice, if you were
to be a traditionally published or self-published author,
but make the same income, which would you choose?
I definitely would love to hear from you
in the comments down below.
Times are a-changing and a lot of you are acutely aware
that the modern-day self-publishing model
versus the one that we come to expect in the past
has greatly changed and this has really happened
more so over the past five years than ever.
Whereas some people used to admit
to being a self-published indie author,
they used to be vilified and often laughed upon.
Nowadays, it's becoming more and more of in vogue,
if you will and that really has come in large part
due to Amazon allowing self-published authors
to share their works on their marketplace,
but why exactly would you self publish on Amazon?
There's a variety of reasons,
but the main one being is Amazon has a wide reach
and it's also growing by the year,
so it only makes sense that you would partner yourself
with a large platform that can get you exposure
to a greater amount of people
than these smaller ones, if you will.
So let's discuss the pros and cons of self-publishing
on Amazon and this includes publisher accessibility.
A lot of you are probably already aware
of the Kindle direct publishing platform.
Yes, it is free to upload, it's free to use
and it's fairly intuitive and considering
that you can actually go and get their free online course
called KDP jumpstart, it makes it super,
super dead simple to publish onto Amazon,
however KTP is not the only place
that you can get access to Amazon.
The other ones include the aggregates like Ingram Spark,
Draft2Digital, Lulu.com, Publish Drive
and the list goes on and on.
The 70% royalty.
Now, there are some exceptions to this rule,
but for the most part when it comes to publishing ebooks
on the Amazon platform, generally speaking,
you get a 70% royalty.
That's not too bad.
70 cents of every dollar, I'll take that all darn day long.
Pay checks every 60 days.
I know, if you're not used to this particular avenue,
you're probably going, Dan that's a con, that's a con.
No, no, no, 60 days before I get my paycheck,
I want it right away, however when you're used
to being in the online space, 60 days to wait
for a paycheck's not terrible.
So I definitely don't feel like this is a con necessarily.
I can at least anticipate my paychecks and I can start
to predict exactly what I'll be paid out
another two months in advance based
on what I'm doing right now.
The KDP select program.
This is exclusivity on the Amazon platform
by way of the Kindle direct publishing platform.
Yes, you are starting to limit yourself,
however the KDP select program does have its benefits
and it includes your having more of a payout,
globally speaking and because you're involved
in a lending program,
anytime somebody borrows one of your books
on the Amazon platform and they flip through it,
each page read influences your best-seller rank.
Customer accessibility.
I know this is given, we know this, I said this already,
but I just thought we just go ahead and revisit this
because there are literally millions of people
on the Amazon platform and they are a warm audience
that have come there to purchase your products.
You could try to sell those things by way of say Facebook
or you can go through your website,
but the issue is they're kind of a cold audience
versus on Amazon, they've got their wallets open
and they're ready to invest in the products
that are available on the Amazon platform.
So customer accessibility, hands down,
one of the nicest features
when it comes to publishing Amazon.
One product page for three iterations.
If you've published an eBook version, a print book version
and an audiobook version of a particular book,
they will go on to one product page,
that way when your ideal audience is showing up
on your product listing, they have a choice to pick
and choose what they would like
and part of the nice thing of going through say,
Kindle direct publishing you do have something
that's called Matchbook.
In the event that somebody purchases the print book version
of your publication, they could also get your ebook
at a severe discount, if you choose
to take part in the Matchbook program.
Free advertising for your author brand.
You're probably going free advertising, wait,
whoa, whoa, whoa, hold your horses Dale,
I didn't understand what you just said.
Yeah, you get free advertising.
Think about it this way, Kindle direct publishing,
aka Amazon and even the aggregates for the most part,
there are exceptions to this rule,
don't charge you to upload.
Think about that for a second.
It may not cost you a dime to get your brand,
more importantly your author brand into a large marketplace.
Now, in the event that you say,
oh, I don't wanna publish on Amazon
at least consider putting your version
of a gateway drug over onto Amazon,
be it a very good stellar publication
and then take the rest of them and fulfill them
through your website.
Have people redirected over there.
It's just a way to get your author brand out there
and you can also think of it in this way,
if you're selling an eBook version, a print book version,
an audiobook version, you're gonna get paid
for the opportunity to be in front of your ideal audience
and then you can educate that audience
about where they can find the rest of your content
and if there is more self-published indie authors
that would know that this free option
is available to us, it's free.
Think about this,
years ago we had to buy a garage full of books
in order to actually get into this business
and then we would sit on these books
that nobody would end up buying.
Now we don't, now all we got to do
is put together a stellar book
and people order them as they please.
Whether through eBook delivery,
through downloadable audiobooks
or through print on demand print books,
but for all the pros,
let's go ahead and address the cons
of self-publishing on Amazon.
The 35% royalty that they have on ebooks.
It's garbage, quite frankly they're saying
that they're gonna pay you 35 cents of every dollar
when it comes to your royalty payout.
Now, some of you that have been traditionally published
or are thinking about traditionally published deals
will sometimes see way less than that.
So you're probably going, quit whining Dale,
but quite frankly, you could get two times as much at 70%
and that to me is why I kind of, I don't know, 35% royalty.
There are times I'm okay with this,
but for the most part I think for 35% royalty
is where I'm kind of going uh and that is generally speaking
when it comes to books that are under $2.99 or over $9.99.
That's outside of what is called the Amazon sweet spot
which is their $2.99 to $9.99 for e-books.
The ambiguous guidelines.
Oh boy, I can't tell you how many comments,
private emails and messages that I get from people
that have either had their account suspended
or banned or terminated, what have you.
The ambiguous guidelines sometimes gets people
and every now and then because there are scammers
in this business, what ends up happening is
that one bad apple ruins it for the entire bunch.
I've actually even spoke with a couple of indie authors
that were in inadvertently hit
by a particular vetting process Amazon puts in place
because scammers were gaming the system.
These ambiguous guidelines,
unfortunately (sighs), it leave something to be desired
and this is why I always tell people
don't put all of your eggs in one basket.
If you're considering publishing on Amazon, awesome,
but exclusively publishing
on there is a recipe for disaster.
Always try to plan to build that author brand
beyond just Amazon.
Amazon's platform, this is Amazon's game, it's not yours,
therefore anybody that purchases your book is purchasing it
through Amazon and they're not your customer,
they're Amazon's customer and in the event,
as I mentioned before with the ambiguous guidelines
or if for some reason you are a chronic line stepper
or something like that, they can pull the rug out
from underneath you and then you are left high and dry
without your customer base and one would say,
well, if you've got such devoted readers,
wouldn't they just go along with you?
Well, that's easier said than done.
If they are going to Amazon to purchase your books,
chances are likely
they are not solely going there just for you.
They're picking up other books, other products.
So in the event that you just disappear,
most times people are going, well,
you probably stopped publishing books.
In that case,
that's where I say it's their customer, not yours.
So you need to always be thinking
about how exactly you can take that customer
and convert them into a lifelong reader
that comes along with you regardless
of the platform you publish on.
Risk versus reward.
As with everything in life, there is a bit of a risk
with a bit of a reward or a lot of risk for a lot of reward
and for those of you out there that have spent tens
of thousands of dollars on your self-published book
or even tens of thousands of hours on a self-published book,
then you are very aware that there is a bit of a risk
and you may never see a dime
self-publishing on the Amazon platform.
I hate to admit it, but there are less successful people
in this business than there are unsuccessful
and I don't want to shame anybody
because I've been in that position before
and I'm sure I could probably be in that position again.
Quite frankly, there is a lot of risk versus reward
and this is an ever-changing business.
The risks change from one day to the next
and the rewards change from one day to the next,
just be aware that it's a risky game
that you're getting into
when you're self-publishing on Amazon.
Scammers aplenty, oh my goodness,
I'm sure I'll probably cover this in a future video
between falsified page reads to keyword stuffing
to fake reviews, aka review swaps, you know who you are.
Those of you out there that are working the system,
you're trying to find those loopholes and work those things.
That is the con of working in this business,
but much like anything else in any walk of life,
there's always going to be one person
who tries to ruin it for everybody.
That one person who's going to try to game the system.
That one person that's going to try to take from you
and take from your business
and there are some people that will say this,
they'll go well, it's it's Amazon,
they can stand to lose a few dollars.
Remember this, and I want you to pay attention,
those of you that are the scammers out there,
you aren't scamming Amazon, you're scamming the audience
that's purchasing from Amazon.
Would you do that to your own family member
'cause if you would do that, remember this,
chances are likely that there are other people out there,
they're scamming your family and scamming your friends.
So just stop doing it, it's that simple.
Stop trying to justify taking from Amazon
because they have a larger, deeper pocket.
These ultimately, you know who's funding that?
Real people
and so let's go ahead
and we're gonna dial this all back here for just a moment.
I do want to address self-publishing on Amazon.
Is this something that's terrible?
No, not by any stretch.
With every pro, there's a con and vice-versa.
In my opinion overall, Amazon is a great platform
to publish your content on.
In fact, might I recommend that you take a look
at one of my previous videos here.
It's about with the KDP selected program
and I give an in-depth review and some insights
on how I feel about that program.
So take a look at it, I'll see you over there.
And that's not all.
If you enroll in KDP select, Amazon allows you one
of two options choose from in promotion.
One is Kindle countdown.