<\/p>\n
How Ama\u00adzon Did Right by Me<\/b><\/p>\n
But, as grate\u00adful as I am for that one-time sales bonan\u00adza, I\u2019m sad to say that\u2019s it\u2014that\u2019s the best of what came from my 3\u2011year \u201cSelect\u201d rela\u00adtion\u00adship with Ama\u00adzon. (Dur\u00ading which time all of my books were only<\/em> avail\u00adable on Kin\u00addle.)<\/p>\n After that, I used some of the Ama\u00adzon \u201cfree days\u201d and \u201ccount\u00addown sales\u201d to attempt to gen\u00ader\u00adate inter\u00adest in my work, but none of the \u201cpro\u00admo\u00adtion\u00adal tools\u201d worked near\u00adly as effec\u00adtive\u00adly as that first give\u00adaway peri\u00adod back in Feb\u00adru\u00adary 2012.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Why I Dumped Ama\u00adzon KDP Select<\/strong><\/p>\n This, to me, was the equiv\u00ada\u00adlent of the cheap all-you-can-eat sal\u00adad and dessert bars you see in mediocre restau\u00adrants. The restau\u00adrant lures in cus\u00adtomers with the promise of being able to get as much sal\u00adad and as many desserts as they want, and then charg\u00ading a pre\u00admi\u00adum for the entrees them\u00adselves.<\/p>\n An even bet\u00adter anal\u00ado\u00adgy, I think, is that of the free food sam\u00adple dis\u00adplays you find in Wal-Mart and some gro\u00adcery stores. The vendors\u2014like inde\u00adpen\u00addent authors\u2014provide their food\u00adstuffs for free (or at a sig\u00adnif\u00adi\u00adcant dis\u00adcount). The ven\u00addors are in effect used<\/em> to attract cus\u00adtomers. Their con\u00adtent (the food\u00adstuffs) are only impor\u00adtant to Wal-Mart inas\u00admuch as the con\u00adtent brings peo\u00adple to the store and keeps them spend\u00ading mon\u00adey.<\/p>\n With KDP Select, Ama\u00adzon has cre\u00adat\u00aded a store\u00adhouse of 800,000 titles (a lot of food\u00adstuffs) with which to bait in cus\u00adtomers and get them to spend mon\u00adey.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s the thing, though: I and oth\u00ader very good writ\u00aders don\u2019t write the qual\u00adi\u00adty of work that we do only for it to be put at the free sam\u00adple booths, or in the all-you-can-eat trough. I\u2019m not free sal\u00adad bar mate\u00adr\u00adi\u00adal; I\u2019m La Closerie Des Lilas<\/em><\/a>, and you\u2019re going to have to pay for it. Sor\u00adry.<\/p>\n And that\u2019s a fur\u00adther point: Any authors part of KDP Select, when any of their books are read from Kin\u00addle Unlim\u00adit\u00aded, are paid a frac\u00adtion<\/em> for the read com\u00adpared to what they\u2019d be paid if the customer\u2014oh, I don\u2019t know\u2026actually BOUGHT the book. For a title that I give a list price of $4.99, I\u2019m paid about $3.50 when the book is pur\u00adchased; but if the same title is \u201cbor\u00adrowed\u201d via Kin\u00addle Unlim\u00adit\u00aded, I only get a per\u00adcent\u00adage of a pool of mon\u00adey (it fluc\u00adtu\u00adates between 2 and 5 mil\u00adlion dol\u00adlars a month)\u2014and only that amount which my bor\u00adrow rep\u00adre\u00adsents. For exam\u00adple, if the fund is a mil\u00adlion dol\u00adlars one month and one of my books is bor\u00adrowed one time out of a mil\u00adlion bor\u00adrows, that means I\u2019m enti\u00adtled to 1 one-mil\u00adlionth of the fund, or, as dra\u00adma\u00adtized in one of my favorite movies, Trad\u00ading Places<\/em>, ONE DOLLAR.<\/p>\n![\"KDPbanner\"](\"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/KDPbanner-300x97.png\")
In Feb\u00adru\u00adary 2012, back when the abil\u00adi\u00adty to give your books away for free under Ama\u00adzon\u2019s KDP Select pro\u00adgram was still rel\u00ada\u00adtive\u00adly new, I put A Real Piece of Work<\/em> up for free for a few days, in the hopes that, once the free peri\u00adod was over, the increased expo\u00adsure would lead to out\u00adright book sales. And it did. It worked beyond my wildest dreams. In this weblog entry from 2012<\/a>, I detailed some of the results. In the end, I end\u00aded up sell\u00ading enough copies of the first Dako\u00adta Stevens mys\u00adtery that I was able to finance two lux\u00adu\u00adri\u00adous 2\u2011week trips to Europe for myself and my wife in 2012 and 2013.<\/p>\n![\"phone-call-friend-friendship-ecards-someecards1_large\"](\"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/phone-call-friend-friendship-ecards-someecards1_large.png\")
Ele\u00adments of Select had both\u00adered me for a long time, but it was\u00adn\u2019t until Jan\u00adu\u00adary of this year when I learned about a new pro\u00adgram that Ama\u00adzon had sur\u00adrep\u00adti\u00adtious\u00adly insti\u00adtut\u00aded: Kin\u00addle Unlim\u00adit\u00aded. For only $9.99\/month, any Ama\u00adzon cus\u00adtomers in this pro\u00adgram can read as many books as they want, and if you\u2019re an author whose books are in KDP Select, your books become avail\u00adable to Kin\u00addle Unlim\u00adit\u00aded mem\u00adbers.<\/p>\n