PUBLISH WITH AMAZON

1. PUBLISH WITH AMAZON Any hypos associated with this presentation are soulely the respectability of Eddie Jones and in know way refract the quantity of work offended by Christian Devotions Ministries, it’s bored staff.eddie@eddiejones.org

2. Amazon Flattens the World • You could pay a self-pub firm thousands of dollars to publish your book or… • You could load your finished manuscript Word doc to Smashwords (known as “SmushWords”) or… • You could wait for your agent to get a nibble from a large publishing house or… • You could take a chance on finding your own market by launching your book yourself!

3. A Word of Caution • Self-publishing your book through a firm or on your own carries substantial risk. If you use Amazon’s Kindle Publishing and CreateSpace your financial investment will be minimal but a poor book with low sales and a large number of low-star reviews could kill your career. Make sure your book is worth publishing before you begin. • Seriously, I cannot stress this enough – DO NOT release a poorly written and edited novel if you intend to make writing your career. That said, many authors have found KDP and CreateSpace to be a sweet way to earn a living as a novelist.

4. Kindle Direct Publishing • Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) is Amazon’s fast and easy way to self-publish your eBooks on Amazon. The service is free and books self-published through KDP can participate in the 70% royalty program. In addition to Kindle readers are Kindle apps for iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, PC, Mac, Blackberry, and Android-based devices.

5. Write Fewer Words • The attention span of readers continues to shrink. The result? People pay for brevity. By turning a long novel into a series of shorter novellas you can expand your readership. • The price point for eBooks seem to be settling in around: $9.95 (top-selling authors) $4.95 (midlist authors), $2.99 (short books and unknown fiction authors) & 99¢ (really short books and promotional pricing for fiction).

6. Research Your Market • Study the bestsellers in your field. Note the sales rank of the books in your area of fiction. Your challenge is to pick a popular category (Christmas Romance, for example) but one that is not too crowded. You can aim for a smaller market but your readership base will be smaller.

7. Create Your KDP Account • Begin by creating your Kindle publishing account: kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing. • The first time you log into your account you will be asked to set up your contact and banking information. KDP is free but you will need to provide them with banking information so they can deposit money into your checking or savings account. • At the top of the page click the “My Account” tab. This will take you to a page where you can configure your account details, including your full name or company name, the type of business you have (corporation, individual, etc), and your bank account information.

8. Your Account • Your account may look similar to this:

9. Tax Information

10. Royalty Payment Information

11. KDP Bookshelf • After you create your account you are ready to list your first ebook. Select “Add new title.”

12. Loading Your Book’s Info • Book name: • Series title (optional): Volume (optional): Edition number (optional): • Description: • Book contributors: • Language: • Publication date | Publisher (optional): • ISBN (optional but recommended): • Publishing rights status: (This is a public domain work / This is not a public domain work and I hold the necessary publishing rights.) • Categories | Search keywords (up to 7, optional): • Book Cover | Book File • Digital rights management selection (DRM) option: (Enable digital rights management / Do not enable digital rights management)

13. Your Book’s Details

14. Your Book File • You will need (at a minimum) a Word doc and jpg of your cover, plus book description, author name, etc. Once you complete your listing submit it for review. Amazon requires a day to review your book in order to make certain it meets their requirements. • You may upload several formats to Amazon, including HTML, unencrypted .mobi e-book files, Microsoft Word (.doc), plain text (.txt) and Adobe PDF). I recommend you pay an eBook designer to format your mobi file (Amazon Kindle’s proprietary eReading format).

15. Hire a Professionals • Generally you can expect to spend between $100 and $200 for simple Word to mobi conversion. For this price most eBook designers will include your eBook’s cover at the front of the file, a “true” table of contents (the TOC you see in your Kindle reader when you “Go To” the table of contents), proper headers, improved text flow, indents, tables, charts, graphs and pictures. These additional elements may increase the cost of conversion. • Of course you can simply load your Word doc but the consumer will not have a true table of contents and the book may not appear professional. If you need an eBook designer we recommend you place a job posting in Elance (Elance.com). • Once you have your eBook formatted (even if in Word) consider tweaking its title and description.

16. Looooooong Titles • The more your title describes the contents of the eBook, the more likely the customer will find it of interest and click to learn more. Your long title is additional “shelf space” on Amazon. The title length itself will draw attention. You have 200 characters. Use all of them. • Does your eBook deal with grieving? Make sure the words, grief, loss, suffering, depression, death, and disease are in the subtitle. Be creative. This will improve your book’s chances of success. Include the “exact phrase” that is tops in your market. Position that phrase as close to the beginning of the title as possible.

17. Your Book’s Subtitle • Focus your eBook’s title to hit your market and attract customers. Aim your book’s subtitle to hit Amazon’s search engine so others can find your book. With Amazon, key words and phrases are king-makers. For example, Christy Barritt’s novel: Death of the Couch Potato's Wife became: • Death of the Couch Potato's Wife: Cozy Mysteries, Women Sleuths, Murder Mystery, Female Detective Suspense (New Releases for Women Sleuths). Once we changed the title we saw an increase in sales. Note the: (New Releases for Women Sleuths) is the series of this title. We made it up to take advantage of those readers searching with those key phrases.

18. Does That About Cover It? • A book cover with minimal elements can be more pleasing than a busy cover. Don’t use a graphic that merely represents what’s in the book. Use a graphic that draws eyeballs and grabs the reader’s attention. Remember, the primary aim of your cover is to get customers to click on it. Your book’s cover is its “curb appeal.” • On the cover include: • The title • Subtitle • Author name • A single bold graphic

19. Cover Samples • Expect to pay between $250 and $500 for a good cover. Great covers cost more but if you search you will find good cover designers in the $500 range. Some charge less but only give you one cover concept. The key is giving the designer as much input as possible before they mockup your cover. The covers shown all cost less than $300.

20. Cover Samples

21. Product Description • Do NOT use this area to describe your book. Think of this section as your ¼ page magazine ad area. First, note any awards or accomplishments for you or your book. Establish yourself as a subject matter expert. This suggest your book is worth reading. Keep the description brief. This initial portion of your “Product Description” should be at most 2-3 sentences. • No awards? No problem. Put your 3 best quotes/blurbs/reviews for your book (punchy, short, exciting). Again, each quote should not be longer than a few sentences.

22. Product Description cont… • Most customers do not scroll down past the “Product Details” to the official reviews section of the Amazon.com page. So place your most glowing, punchy, exciting quotes up top. The top section of the page is where most buyers stop scrolling. Get them excited about your book first, explain later. • After your three quotes, add a brief description of your book. Do not go on-and-on about the book. Pitch your book, state its promise, benefits and list your guarantee (yes, you will refund their money if they return the book to you – most won’t even if they don’t like your book). Then stop talking.

23. Pricing Your Book • Once you have set up your book save and move to pricing. First, select the territories for which you hold rights: • Worldwide rights - all territories • Individual territories - select territories • Select a royalty option for your book. (35% royalty / 70% royalty). With Amazon Kindle you can choose between two royalty options: a 70% royalty option and a 35% royalty option. • For example, for sales in the US, if your book's list price is between $2.99 and $9.99, you can choose the 70% option. • The 35% option is available in the US for books with list prices between $.99 and $200.00. • Another way to say this is, if you price your book between $2.98 and $.99 you share in a 35% royalty. If you price your book $10.00 or above you share in a 35% royalty. If you price your book between $2.99 and $9.99, you keep 70% of the profit. This is why most Kindle books are priced between $2.99 and $9.99.

24. Your Bookshelf Page • Once your book is approved for sale you will see it listed on your bookshelf page. You can remove your book from sale, change the price, unpublish your book, revise your book’s descriptions, search words, etc… anytime!

25. Units Sold & Sales Rankings • From your KDP account you can also see how your book is selling. On the Reports page you will find the monthly totals of: Units Sold, Refunded, Net Sold and if your book participates in the Kindle Select program, units borrowed and given away (on your free days).

26. Sales Ranking • Your product's sales ranking on Amazon.com can be a great selling tool to include in promotional materials. How do the rankings work? The calculation is based on Amazon.com sales and is updated each hour to reflect recent and historical sales of every item sold on the site. Sales of your title will help boost your book’s ranking and significantly increase your title's search relevance within the Amazon store.

27. What’s That Rank Smell? • It could be your book’s position on Amazon. A book with a sales rank of 5,000 might sell 250 copies a month. If you can keep your book in the top 10,000 you might have a winner over time. 10,000 to 50,000: a good performer. 50,000 to 200,000: not a hot item, but still a respectable earner. If your title fails to live up to last week’s major sales event, your sales ranking will begin to slip. This is why you need to work those sales figures, daily or weekly. Forget about a 6 week campaign: you need a 6 month strategy!

28. Price Pulsing • “Price Pulsing is when you price a book at 99¢ temporarily to gain more unit sales, get into the recommendation queues, and rise into the bestseller lists. As your book peaks, switch back to your higher retail price. In general it will take you seven to ten days to reach your “peak” or “crest.” Changing prices at the height of your pulse puts your book into the recommendation queue/bestselling lists when it is the most discoverable, thereby reaping royalties you could not have seen any other way. All those 99¢ sales give your book “traction” over the weeks ahead.” ~ Carolyn McCray • One way to jump start sales is to use KDP Select, Amazon’s exclusive eBook program.

29. KDP SELECT

30. KDP Benefits • KDP Select is a free way to promote your book on Amazon. When you make your book exclusive to Kindle for at least 90 days, it will be part of the Kindle Owner’s Lending Library for the same period and you will earn your share of a monthly fund when readers borrow your books from the library. • You can also promote your book as free for up to 5 days during these 90 days. • Receive instant feedback - Check real-time performance of your books in the Kindle Owners' Lending Library.

31. CREATESPACE • CreateSpace is Amazon’s self-publishing print division. https://www.createspace.com. • With CreateSpace you load your print book into the Amazon store. You will need two PDF files: your cover and inside. • From there it’s simply a matter of filling in the form fields (description, ISBN, title, author, etc) and submitting for review. • The process of loading your book into CreateSpace is similar to using your Kindle publishing account. On average, if you have all the elements, Title, author name, descriptions, key search words, two pdf files, ISBN, etc… you can expect to spend ten minutes loading your book.

32. Pulse Pricing Your Print Book • You might consider offering a discounted price on the initial release of your book as part of your Price Pulsing strategy. You will make less profit per unit but this can be a good way to increase print sales and keep a book from sliding out of the top sales ranking. Consider offering a promotion tied to gaining reviews for your print version. In general it takes 5 days for a price change to roll out on Amazon via CreateSpace but Amazon is working to improve this feature to shorten the cycle.

33. WHAT ABOUT NOOK? • NOOK is Barnes & Noble’s ebook reader. NOOKs use the ePub format – a universal eBook standard. • NOOKs can be a good option for women’s fiction: “70% of buyers are women,” says B&N’s director of developer relations Claudia Romanini. “The typical buyer is ‘Julie.’ She’s not technical. She most likely has a smartphone but is not a big app consumer – she’s a little afraid of data consumption so won’t download a lot of apps.” • In other words, this is a good market for love stories, romance, women’s fiction, Amish, etc…

34. Setup Your PubIt Account • Begin by setting up your PubIt account: http://pubit.barnesandnoble.com/ • The account setup information is similar to Kindle Publishing with one big difference: once you list your EIN or SS# you cannot change it. So if you plan to incorporate your small publishing firm later (after you are making six figures as a self-published author) you will need to create a new account. You cannot migrate sales and sales ranking so plan ahead.

35. Nook Press

36. INFORMATIONAL LINKS • https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/signin • https://kindlepublishing.amazon.com/gp/vendor/sign-in • https://www.createspace.com/ • http://pubit.barnesandnoble.com/