A few months ago, I decided to try my hand at Kindle ebooks after reading how some regular Joes had made a killing with short stories and other fiction. I am a writer by profession, mostly doing print journalism. I wanted to find something that would allow me to write once and sell many times. I read up on what some people here at BHW had done with the Kindle, took some notes, and gave it a try.
It's been almost 3 months since I created my first Kindle-only book, and it has remained in the "top 100 paid" titles ranking for its category for the US, UK, and Germany. The book itself is in English and is more of a how-to for those wanted to get involved with the mobile tech business (my specialty).
Since I took so many notes from here, I owe BHW some thanks for my modest success. My own notes below will hopefully help aspiring Kindle authors avoid the mistakes I've noticed within Kindle publishing, and actually make some money from it.
Obviously, a lot of the above applies to non-fiction. I have not tried my hand at the fiction side yet, but that is my next plan for the Kindle. I'll be sure to update the info with anything new I learn along the way.
It's been almost 3 months since I created my first Kindle-only book, and it has remained in the "top 100 paid" titles ranking for its category for the US, UK, and Germany. The book itself is in English and is more of a how-to for those wanted to get involved with the mobile tech business (my specialty).
Since I took so many notes from here, I owe BHW some thanks for my modest success. My own notes below will hopefully help aspiring Kindle authors avoid the mistakes I've noticed within Kindle publishing, and actually make some money from it.
- Kindle books should be no less than 50 pages but no more than 100 pages long. Anything less, and the buyer will (rightly) assume that the book is of low quality, written by an amateur, and not worth buying. Any longer and you probably have enough material to turn into 2 books. Provide a quality product that is a value to the Kindle customer, but not too much value.
- Reasonable price for Kindle books of this length are around the $5 mark. Less and it looks like the type of book spam I talked about above. More and it will not sell in the numbers you want, unless you are a known author with a "brand name".
- Use care with the formatting. Learn how to properly format a Kindle book before releasing it. I've seen many negative reviews based purely on the fact that the book had terrible formatting.
- Write about topics that appeal to people's desires. I have 2 books on the Kindle. The first I talked about above and is a success. It shows people how to get started in something with a tangible benefit (i.e. making money). My second book is well written and has valuable information, but has sold 0 copies. It's topic is more of a self-help guide, and people are only likely to buy it when they find themselves in the exact situation it was written for. On the Kindle, you can write the next "War and Peace", but it will likely go unread unless they know you as the author. On the other hand, any Joe can write a book about "the secrets of making online money" and as long as it doesn't look like complete spam trash, people may give it a try, if properly priced.
- Sign-up for Amazon's KDP program. You can only publish your book for the Kindle under the terms of this program, but in return you get 70% royalties. Anyway, where else are you realistically going to publish your book? Google? Apple? They will give you 1% of the total potential that Amazon can offer for sales.
- Use the KDP free promotion period to give your book away for free. A few hundred copies given away for free gets people talking about your book. Buzz creates sales. If it turns out you get a bunch of negative reviews, then your book likely wasn't ready for sale, and it is better to know now, rather than be elated by sales early, only to be disappointed by huge returns later.
Obviously, a lot of the above applies to non-fiction. I have not tried my hand at the fiction side yet, but that is my next plan for the Kindle. I'll be sure to update the info with anything new I learn along the way.
