How to Take Full Advantage of Kindle to Publish Your Dream Book
September 6, 2018 |
Wisitech Content Team
By Shubhang Saurav
Becoming a published author is a dream of many writers. Undoubtedly, getting your novel or short stories’ collection or poems’ compilation published is not an easy task, especially, if you are a debutant or do not own any famed titles. However, with the advent of digital technology, nothing is impossible anymore. There used to be a time when self-published authors had to face a dismissive readership. Amazon’s publishing platform Kindle proved to be the gamechanger. In a short spell of its existence (launched in 2007), it has become the most popular platforms for authors, both established as well as those who are trying to gain a foothold in the literary world. Says Santosh Bakaya, renowned author known for her eclectic mix of books, many of them published on Kindle eBooks platform, “Kindle publishing is here to stay as a parallel entity along with print publishing, many a time providing that extra edge that is crucial for the publishing industry. Amazon Kindle, with its Kindle Direct Publishing has given tremendous opportunity to many new and seasoned authors to reach out to the world at large with their stories. It has truly been a revolution in the writing world and sky is the limit.”
Ease of Publishing Kindle
Besides the standard e-book publication, Kindle also offers paperback editions depending on the market demand. Unlike western countries like US where e-books are quite popular among readers, in countries like India, the demand of traditional paperback and hardcover books is still higher than their digital counterparts. Another great feature that Kindle offers is ease of publishing without obtaining ISBN number for your book. Unlike the print editions, Kindle e-books don’t require ISBN (International Standard Book Number). Instead, when the book is published on Kindle, Amazon assigns a 10-digit ASIN (Amazon Standard Identification Number), which is unique to the e-book and is an identification number for the Kindle book on Amazon.com.
Kindle also provides free ISBN to publish your e-book in paperback.
Incredible Instant Reach for Authors
There is an endless list of authors who have found their share of success with Kindle. Sejal Badani, Robert Dugoni and S. M. Thayer are a few to name who are proudly sharing the platform with the renowned authors like J K Rowling. Amazon Kindle Publishing is a dynamic platform where the ranking of authors is updated every hour based on their copies sold. Says
Lopa Banerjee, award-winning author who has several
Kindle books under her belt, “As the world goes digital in almost every way, resulting in a proliferation of content, information and knowledge resources, digitization of the book industry has been an inescapable reality and thus, Kindle publishing has made a huge impact in the lives of innumerable authors and readers. The e-book as a product has tremendous potential due to easy reach and also due to economic reasons and thus, the Kindle publishing industry is reaping huge benefits by utilizing technology and streamlining it for wider and optimum use among readers of diverse ages and reading tastes. Almost every traditional publisher these days also has opened up to the kindle option for their printed books, so that they can ensure wider reach worldwide and maximize the marketing potential of the books in any and every genre.” Unlike the traditional publishers who are quite choosy regarding the genres or topics, Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing entertains an array of genres. Samantha Christy, who is popular for her works in the romance genre, says she truly believes that people would not read as many of her books were she not on Kindle Unlimited (an e-book subscription service by Amazon). In India too, several authors have established themselves as popular writers on Kindle such as Preeti Shenoy, Vineet Bajpai, and Ashwin Sanghi.
Why Publish on Kindle?
Publishing your book through Kindle is a step-by-step procedure and can garner great results if done smartly, especially for the first-time writers. However, there are certain things one should avoid to ensure the published book serves the purpose and is not lost in the gigantic digital library of Amazon e-books. The first question arises is, why Kindle? There are several other self-publishing platforms available on the Internet, but none of them got the advantage over digital sphere that Amazon offers to its publishing venture Kindle. For starters, Amazon dominates the market of books. It is the largest paid search engine and people looking forward to buy books often search it on Amazon first. Hence, the chances of selling your book becomes significantly higher when it is published in Kindle format. Besides, Amazon also works as a marketing machine. Once a certain number of copies of your book are sold on Amazon, the platform starts referring your book to others.
With Kindle, you can take your library anywhere
Essential Steps for Kindle Publishing
Manuscript: Before moving ahead with the publication, you need to take care of a few things in order to ensure the success of your book on Kindle. First is of course,
finalizing the manuscript. Get it cross-checked by any professional editor or a friend who has a strong grip on grammar and literature. Redraft it according to the feedback you receive.
Proof-reading and Editing: Often writers skip the proofreading part and decide to go ahead with the publication all by themselves. This is not recommended as it can impact the quality of the book significantly that will ultimately affect the sales and reach of the book. Once the writing part is done, get a friend or hire a professional agency to edit and proofread your content. Make sure there are no typos, grammatical errors, factual errors or gaps in your content.
Format and Design: Next, format the book for Kindle, which requires designing a cover for the book and defining the layout, look and feel of its every page. Whether you have your own design or you hire a professional graphic designer, the cover should be an image that is a JPEG file and at least has a length of 2500 pixels with a height/weight ratio of 1.6 (as per Amazon’s recommendation in their publishing guidelines).
HTML Coding Essential with Images Content: If the e-book consists of several illustrations and graphic content, it is highly recommended to get a professional HTML designer work on the epub format to ensure that it seamlessly converts into mobi files without messing up the content. Pictures inserted in Word file get scattered once the book is uploaded and converted into the Kindle. It ruins the format of the book and disturbs the aspect ratios of the pictures, thus leading to an annoying experience for the readers. This eventually affects the quality and the ratings and reviews of the book on Kindle. Conversion of the content into HTML format helps in getting rid of this problem as the content gets adjusted according to the screen size as well as orientation of the device.
Publishing: Once you are done with the book and the cover, double check everything to ensure textual and visual consistency is maintained. Now comes the publication part. Visit kdp.amazon.com to sign in Kindle with your Amazon account. Follow carefully the guidelines to add your book to Amazon’s e-Book library. It takes around 48 hours to get your book visible on the platform.
Our Kindle Publications
Share to Earn Reviews: However, the job is not yet done. Promotion of the book is crucial and hence, should be done with utmost care. Send the book to your friends and family and remind them to leave a review on Kindle. This helps greatly to attract new readers and also encourages them to rate your book good. Post the launch message on various social media websites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. If you manage pages other than your personal ones on these platforms, post the launch there too. It spreads the word like a wildfire. Once you start receiving orders, do not forget to ask your customers to leave reviews. This will help other interested buyers to know about your book. In order to receive positive reviews, it is important that the content of your book is good. The good reviews play a pivotal role in garnering more readers willing to buy your book.
Choose Your Royalty Option: Kindle provides two royalty options; you can either choose the 35% royalty option or the 70% one. Your e-book needs to be eligible for certain criteria to avail the 70% royalty option. The price of the e-book should be according to the
Kindle’s list price requirements. You won’t get 70% royalty in all the countries. However, you can avail it in US and most of Europe. For the updated list of countries where 70% royalty option can be availed,
see this page. The e-book has to be copyrighted and must not be published on any other public domain. Lastly, the title must also be enrolled in
KDP Select to be eligible for 70% royalty on sales to customers in Brazil, Japan, Mexico, and India. In a nutshell, publishing with Kindle is simple and effective if certain simple measures are taken care of. After all, you have put your blood and sweat in that story, and it deserves nothing less than best.
Contact us today for your Kindle Book Publishing Requirements
Wisitech and its venture The Blue Pencil Editorial Services offer complete Kindle Publishing solutions Editing | Proofreading | Cover Design | Layout Design | HTML Coding | and Paperback
Email: partho.m@wisitech.com Phone: 011.4651.6521, 4162.4097
Wisitech Content Team creates informative and analytical posts on digital marketing, web technologies, ecommerce, social media, SEO and other trends in digital technologies.
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