Guys: Kindle is the Ticket!

Do you guys use any software packages to aid in the kindle process? Any of these kindle "submitter" tools or anything like that. I mean directly in relation to the kindle publishing aspect and not in relation to your sites/affiliates.

Hi can anyone help me out my money from amazon gift cards I will buy your Kindle books and you can pay 50% less of its original price...

Small update of my journey:

This my 6th month (with a break of 6 weeks) in the Kindle game. I am doing it full time since day 1 because I already have an automated business/passive income. So I could fully concentrate on building up another nice income stream with Self pusblishing.

When I have heard the first time about Self publishing and read the numbers of other successful publishers I said to myself: "How can I write own books? I have no skills. This ist completely absurd. Even my girlfriend has more talent." I was very very sceptical but I wanted to give it a try because it was/is a completely white hat method and that was the most important point. Make money for long term without an investment. I had nothing to lose so I did it. I thought: "If I can build up an income of $1000/month within a year I am happy." I underestimated this business because I published my first 5 books within the first month and reached my goal of $1000 in the second month! Fuuu... can you imagine how much time and and work I had to spend into my niche websites to build up such an income? That was an awesome result for me.

The more I read about Self publishing, the more I changed my whole business mindset. In the past my thoughts were: Which method is the best to make money money money? I just had the Dollars in my eyes. If I researched the market for profitable niches (for my websites in the past) I just saw the numbers (click rates, prices, competitors and so on). But now I understand that it is more important to focus on the customers. That sounds so simple and everyone of us already know that it is important to create content/products with a high value for our customers ...but most of us don't work with this attitude! And that's the biggest thing I have learned: The customers aren't just numbers. If you work with the honest attitude to provide your customers high quality content you will be successful with every business and the money comes by itself. Yayaya that sounds so simple and is nothing new but I bet that most of the people are already working with the wrong attitude even if they know that there is another/better way to think.

But back to Kindle:
Today I have published my 12th book and make about $120/day with these books. I have 10 Non Fiction books (+ 7 paper backs) in total and 2 Fiction book.

I checked out different niches and it works for me so I decided to invest some money to outsource the writing task this month. Now I have 15 Fiction books for about $1500 in development. I am also looking for more ghostwriters but it's hard to find good ones. My big goal is to publish 30 books more by the end of this year and double my income. But even if I will publish more fiction books in the future I want to stay focused on my non fiction niche because: My FB site of my non fiction niche is growing with 40 likes more day by day. I think non fiction is the only way to build up a huge business in the future. It starts only with books but you can also create other products like videos, courses, smartphone apps, websites, physical products and so on. I think that's not possible with fiction books (except of affiliate and audio books I have no idea about how to create a big business around a fiction pen name to get more independent of Amazon/the book market).

So that's all. I will update my progess if there is something new to tell.


I'm not better than everyone else here and I know a lot of people who are also successful with self publishing. I just want to motivate you with my post. Belive in your skills, think more clever than your competitors and make your dreams come true! Kindle/writing is no magic and everyone can do it! NOW WORK

Hi guys !


I've just signed up here, to thanks all contributors.
I'm a french guy and I've started my journey on kindle a week ago. So far, I published 5 ebooks (2 fiction fantasy, 3 non fiction) in french and 1 romance ebook in english.
I hired few ghost writters on Odesk for more ebook in english and i'll translate them in french to maximize incomes.

My first goal is to earn 10$ per day within 1 month. I'll report if i achieve it or no

Pinger030 said:

Today I have published my 12th book and make about $120/day with these books. I have 10 Non Fiction books (+ 7 paper backs) in total and 2 Fiction book.

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Congratulations, Pinger. I'm glad to see that you've continued your Kindle efforts and that they paid off!

Hey Pinger, Been following and am very interested! Very inspiring.

Just a question, how do the return numbers compare between your fiction and non-fiction? Doy ou find non-fic fluctuates more? Thx!

Hi Pinger, I find your posts incredibly inspiring, I have some questions mostly about your fiction books. Do you find they're profitable at all? What do you think of erotica? What niches do you think are best? How much do you make from your fiction books alone?

The reason I'm asking these questions is because most posters here only talk about nonfiction, and I'm not interested in nonfiction so much because I'm a creative writer and have tons of juice and stories to offer.

Thanks again for your posts man, they really give me hope.

How do you guys SEO your books?

psychotix said:

How do you guys SEO your books?

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$

I'm thinking about this too. Why not create a publisher website which regroups all information about pen names, books, etc.
Depending of the niches of kindles, the SEO could be easy, no ?

@vypersells
I have more refunds of my fiction books. I think the reason is: People like us don't write for passion - we write for the money. So we are more publishers than real authors. To write non fiction books is easier because it only depends on the information you provide (the value of your content is more important than the length or the writing style of your book. Analyse the market for a niche and give the customers the information that they are looking for - if you do it carefully you can't do so much wrong). On the other hand: The analysis of the fiction market for niches and keywords is also important but your storys and your writing style is more important for long term success. So you can not say your content is right or wrong because it's a matter of taste. You can also annoy some customers quickly if your fiction book is too short. The refund number of my non fiction books is less than 1% and for fiction about 5%.

@saltyleaves
I started with non fiction but I will focus more on non fiction. Fiction is more profitable but it's also harder to step in. Look at the bestseller list and browse through the fiction and non fiction categories an you'll see that fiction sells better. Erotica is good but it is just a category and not a specific genre. You have also take a look to the erotica bestseller list to decide what's the best subcategories (erotic romances, humorous erotic, hardcore stuff and so on). There is no right or wrong because you can have success with mostly everything. It's just necessary to analyse the market for the best selling categories/subcategories and niches inside of this categories to find the most profitable niches. And profitability means: High demand and low competition (but I can't tell you specific numbers because it varies from niche to niche).

I have only published 3 fiction books so far. My best non fiction book sells better than my best fiction book. But that's no wonder because: My best selling non fiction book is a collection of a three part series. It has about 350 pages, 100 unique photos and you can not differ it from an official/professional publisher book. When I started in May this year I tested the niche with 6 small books. It worked so I decided to create a high quality series, I also hired 3 photographers and so on. And the same way I'll go with fiction: Test different niches with small books, see what works and publish high quality books that I can sell more expensive. And if you are able to create such high quality fiction books you can earn more than with non fiction. If it is not so I wouldn't focus on fiction.

@psychotix
SEO for what? Amazon or Google? I focused only on Amazon because that's the market where I sell my books and where the customers are (who are willing to buy and searching for books). Amazon is doin a great job outside of its store because of the PartnerNet affiliate program. So for me it makes not much sense to work on Google SEO outside of Amazon. I also have a blog, a Facebook site, email list, ... for my specific non fiction topic but only to funnel the traffic from my books to these platforms to sell them more in the future. Yes, I could optimise these pages for Google but for me it makes more sense to write new books because Amazon traffic (again: the customers are there because they want to buy) is more important than random Google traffic. My opinion...

@Talyn
Try to think like a customer. Did you ever visit a random publisher website and browsed through their categories with the intension to buy a book? NO! You would search directly on Amazon because there you have a big selection and you can also compare the books to buy the best. People who searching on Google are mostly looking for free information. Conclusion: Write more books because even if you just sell 100 copys per month of a book - that means 100 new customers. And if they like your book the chances are high that they will buy another or an upcoming book of you. 100 more "willing to buy-customers" makes more sense than 10.000 "random Google-people".

That doesn't mean that you won't sell more books with such a website. But think on the time and work you have to spend to build up such a website and see results. With the publishing of new books and funneling of the traffic to Facebook and so on (to tie the customers to you) you'll have more and faster success (for long term).

The right way is to publish books successfully, build up a network of sites (blog, facebook, twitter, email list and so on) and pump more and more high quality products into your network (more books or maybe other products like mobile apps, audiobooks, niche websites, videos, physical products and so on). Every new product you'll drop will be successful from the first day because it gets a lot of attention/traffic of your support sites/other products/the customers you already have. At the end you have a big symbiosis of products and support sites. A stable network for the future - a business!

And if you doing it right it's possible to build up a 100.000 Dollar business within a short time, with only one niche, without big investments and without the help of other people. And if you reached this with one niche you can repeat it with a second niche! I'm just a half year in the SP business and I will reach $5k/month at the end of this year only with my books. Next year I will definitely hit the mark of 10k/month. Again: Only with books! So I don't know where's the problem? And I don't know why some people wasting their time with thinking about creating and seo-optmising random websites?!?! This has nothing to do with how to make money with Selfpublishing! Learn how to analyse the market and give your customers what they want - that's all! (and that's how every busines is working)

Pinger030 : you're damn good mate. You're totally right, my idea was really bad May I ask you if you have a specific routine to select the niche ? How do you select it ? A precise search on amazon or on google ? My process is to check : bestsellers, movers and checkers and top rated in the kindle store. Then choose something I like/know.By now, I'm focusing on Non-Fiction, because I can write easier and quicker than fiction ebooks. Moreover I agree with you: with non-fiction you can write good content, with fiction you can't say, it's a matter of taste...

Pinger030: For a comparaison with my own searches, what is the maximum number for X for your best niche ?

Since Pinger030 ​seems to be versed on this topic, a few questions for you mate:

1. How much time do you spend writing (on average, per book)?
2. Who/what are you using to Q/A your stuff?
3. Do your books get a lot of feedback on Amazon?

Thanks!

behemothseo said:

Since Pinger030 ​seems to be versed on this topic, a few questions for you mate:

1. How much time do you spend writing (on average, per book)?
2. Who/what are you using to Q/A your stuff?
3. Do your books get a lot of feedback on Amazon?

Thanks!

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Most of this has been answered already, in this thread or others on this forum.

1. How long is a piece of string? If you want an amazing book that will sell well for months and months, a lot longer. If you want to rush out a piece of junk and ride a trend for a few weeks, alot less. To put it in to perspective, I have a book I've been working on for 3 weeks. I'm almost done, I think it would be considered professional looking. I also have a recipe book I paid someone to do in 3 days. It sells MAYBE 1 copy a day, sometimes more, sometimes none.

2. LOL QA. But seriously you can pay an editor, or you can offer up a couple free copies before launch and have them reviewed.

3. I'm sure his good one does. I only published one so far and it has 3 reviews and 4 stars. You can also review exchange with people, I haven't yet but reddit and here has a group for it!

@Talyn: I calculated the profitability of the categories and not the niches. Have my numbers not here but you can calculate it by yourself. I also did it so everyone can do ist.

@behemothseo
1) When I start in May this year I was really really hungry to make money. I already had a stable passive income but when I have seen the numbers of other successful publishers and thought about the possibilities I was impressed. I have written a series of 4 books within my first month (about 100 pages each book) and published a more expensive 4 in 1-collection. During my second month I published 2 or 3 books in other niches and so on. I also create paper back versions of my books within the next month. Today I am writing on a new series of 3 books (+ a 3 in 1 collection) in my most successful niche. This series will be amazing and you cannot differ this books from official/professional publisher books. I also want to create paper backs with a nice layout. I think I will need about 2 or 3 month until I am ready to publish. But I already know that this niche works and I think I can double my income with this series. With these HQ books I have also not be scared of bad reviews and so I make sure that I will make money for long term. So my intension for the future is to hire cheap ghostwriters ($100/book) to make fast money with fiction books but also to test new non fiction niches. And If I see that a niche is working I want to write some high quality books by myself. I don't enjoy the writing part. It's pure stress for me. So for now my work is more delegating my writers, creating the covers (I love this part), formating the books and analyse the marked. I also spend a lot of time with reading books about self development and so on.

2) I'm not a native English speaker. I don't understand your question. Q/A? Question and Answers? I dont know what/why should I ask? Do you mean where I get my content from?

3) My first series has about 15-20 reviews/book. The average rating is 3,5 - 4 stars. But I have also published bad quality books where I got many 1 star reviews. But I have written these books in 2 or 3 days just to test other niches. But because of Kindle Unlimited I also make about $50 with such a bad book.

@vypersells
I agree with you. I think everything is already answered in this thread. But most of the people are lazy. They want to make money without of work. They don't want ...no, they are not able(!) to think a alone. They want a step by step guide with a guarantee to have success. And there are tons of such guides but at the end all these guides are senseless if you have a weak personality and/or If you are not able to work/think alone. That's the big difference between an unsuccessful worker and a successful business man - the personality and the effort you are willing to cotribute. Sounds evil but that's the truth.

In my whole career in the IM business (also before selfpublishing) I teached about 10 of my best friends how to make money. I have told them everything. I have supported them 24/7 and answered every question. I have even helped them actively and build them up a passive income. The reason: I wanted that the people around me who I love have the same success like me. I wanted that they are also financial free and con do whatever they want. So they really really had the best requirements to be successful. I did everything. The sad truth is: 9 of 10 people fail. They really wanted to make money but they were not able to work and think alone. If I asked them "Did you checked out this amazing forum post or that YouTube video" - No, no, no, never. As long as I did the work and answered them everything it worked for them. But when I have needed the time for my own business and could not report them 1 on 1 what they have to do next ...they failed. Some of my old friend studied but they have no job today. Some of them have a family and doin a job that they hate - all of them are struggling in another way. That makes me sad but I cannot help them and it's not my fault that they are broke today.

Even my dad losts his job after 25 years in his company and it hurts and breaks my heart when I see what jobs he have to take now. He had about 10 different jobs within the last two years and sometimes he just worked for less than $5/hour. This whole system is so ugly. But I am not able to help them. I connot teach them how to make money because he has no business mindset. He's not that pesonality to found a business and he has also no big visions. He is a typical worker who thought that a 9 to 5 job is the safest way (but time has changed). So the only chance I have is to be succesful to share my money with my parents. My biggest dream is not to become a millionaire and live in a big mention or shit like that. My biggest dream is to put my parents $500k in her bag sometime and say "Do what you want. It doesnt hurt me". Thats a mighty mighty intension and the reason why I stand up every day and work hard. And that's also the reason why I will reach my goal ...not tomorrow but in less than 3 years I swear to you.

So belive it or not but I think that 90% of the people will fail and never reach a stable passive income. Even the people in this forum will fail. They are looking for instructions with dollars in her eyes but success only depends a strong personality. If you are a strong personality you will have success in mostly every business even outside of the Internet because every business is mostly the same (find a niche, create products, market and sell your products).

Before someone is screaming: I'm not god and I also have my faults (eg. actually I can not handle the taxes thing because I am sooo lazy right now to hire someone for this task. I am just looking forward to the release of Assassins Creed Unity and Christmas holidays with my family loool). But I think I can afford it. So I just want to motivate other people with my posts here and maybe something sound a little bit harsh ...but I just want to open your eyes. Don't ask stupid questions (and yes, there are stupid question nevertheless what the school or anyone else tought you) and use the chance to ask something where you really need advices.

I have been looking at this method since 2012, I understand it completely, I have no problem except THE FORMATTING. I have a book that I have been properly trying to format for over a month now. I have tried about ten different walkthroughs, no clue what to fucking do, it always comes out fucked up when I open it in the amazon book tester thing. It's been quite a while since I've visited this thread and I've not read a lot of updates so apologies if I sound like a dolt or missed something, but if OP or anyone can at least point me to a straighforward guide on how to format this shit properly for upload it would be more than appreciated. I cannot for the life of me get the chapters and formatting right and I will not pay for someone to do it without knowing how to do it myself first.

I have a quick question regarding making books for kindle. What is the best way to create/format them?

Dragon2010 said:

I have a quick question regarding making books for kindle. What is the best way to create/format them?

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I write them in Word, then I format them by following the kindle's guide, then I save as in web page filtered. It's the best quality/time factor.

How many time you can complete your whole book?