I NEED expert Advice From Kindle EXPERTS!!!

[Toocoo82]

Hey everyone. Ok, I wrote a nice book to put out (enough to split it into 2 books), and I had a few questions about releasing it on kindle:

1.) Do you still think fiction is still profitable? I mean my book is not very long, but not very short either, and I am by no means an expert or professional writer. I just have a nice book, had some revisions from others and had someone edit it, and I have it formatted pretty decent for Kindle. I am not sure to release all my books at once, or just release 1 (I have only one that I can split into 2), and see how the sales go the first month? Then I can see if I want to release part 2.

2.) Do you have to do a ton of marketing to make your book hit the top of the list? I am thinking about doing some marketing for it (post in forums, email, join boards), but I am not sure what types of sites to hit up, or should I just stick to doing some SEO (can you help me out)?

3.) Where is a good place to get a decent cover that is not cheap, nor will break my bank either? People say fiverr, but I wonder if someone will do a quality cover that will attract many visitors for $5 lol?

4.) How much does amazon take per sale? For example if I release my book for $4.99, or $3.99, how much do I take, depending if I join the kdp program where I get 70% I believe (are there any other fees involved)?

5.) How were you sales like when you first released your book? Did you release one, or a lot at once? I am just trying to get an idea. I want to make money, but at the same time, I don't want to release crap and get a negative review.

6.) Any other advice you can give or prepare me for? This is my first time releasing a book on there, and I'm trying to read some wso's or just get an idea, but if you can recommend any particular wso or anything, thanks.

Thank you for reading!

 

[Toocoo82]

Anyone?

 

[spids]

You can find great quality work on fiverr, some people are just naturally very good at design and it would take them 5min to do a very decent cover.

Fiction is prob the most popular genre imo.

I am not familiar with selling on amazon but you should also look into how Amazon algorithm works.

You should also plan on advertising on places like forums and yahoo answers. Maybe start a question with one account asking about "best fiction book on amazon" and then have a more reputual account answer, you can prob outsource this, maybe even fiverr.

And use http://www.google.com/alerts to track keywords like "best kindle book" "best fiction book" new kindle releases" and use keyword tool to generate a lot more. What alerts does is email everyday with latest for your terms so you can then go to the page and reply.

Best of luck mate

 

[Toocoo82]

Thank man, I appreciate the advice. I wish someone with some kindle experience could also chime in, give a few pointers of any good ideas or past mistakes.

 

[maroanglais]

I just started with kindle publishing in May.

1) Fiction is actually a very profitable genre. I myself publish in 'How to' niches, but I'm considering putting together a short story collection soon.

2) I haven't done any marketing for my books, I only take advantage of the free promotions amazon lets you make as to raise the popularity of your book in the search rankings. Of course I also get friend to post reviews and likes for the book, which helps a lot.

3) I make my covers myself, but I think the best place to go for a cheap and well designed cover are freelancing sites like oDesk where you can get a talented graphic artist to do it for you for a very reasonable price. If you don't like the quality of the cover, you don't have to pay. If you need any help with this, my friend makes great covers too.

4) I participate in the kdp program so the royalties can be 35% or 70% percent, depending on the price. Also, if you live outside the USA you have to remember that the IRS will withhold 30% of your royalties. You can bypass this if you get a US tax ID number and then send apple a tax exemption for. I just did this and I'm waiting for it to get confirmed.

5) Sales all depend on the attractiveness of your book. If people like it, or need it (as with how-to books) they will buy it. I published a book last month, and have sold over 30 copies to date, which I consider a success since I don't do any marketing, just the free promotion, reviews and likes.

It is definitely a good idea to post multiple titles, not necessarily all at once. More titles= more profit. It's also important to get your book formatted for kindle properly. If people see that it's poorly formatted they will refund it.

Setting up an author profile with a bio on amazon's 'author central' also helps make the book look more attractive.

Hope my small bit of experience is helpful in any way!

 

[conceptman]

maroanglais - very nice first post

 

[benderbot]

Maroanglais, how do you get the book formatted properly? Is it easy to do yourself? Do you need special software, or is it cheap enough to just outsource?

 

[maroanglais]

It isn't very hard. It's basically HTML formatting and then conversion using a special program. It CAN be quite difficult if your book has images/tables in it, as it's hard for a kindle device to display those properly. If you like I could offer to do this for you.

 

[brosy]

Maroanglais, how do you get the book formatted properly? Is it easy to do yourself? Do you need special software, or is it cheap enough to just outsource?

Search for Rosa Kindle Formatting Formula somewhere on BHW or on the web. It will give you all you need to format a kindle ebook. That's what I use and it works well for me.