Making Money By Self-Publishing With Kindle Direct Publishing Select

Self-publishing has come a long way over the past decade and change. With the rise of the Amazon Empire, and the success of the Kindle publishing platform, authors now have the ability to submit their work for ebook and print publication on demand. Anyone who owns a Kindle (or a device capable of reading Kindle ebooks) can download and read your work, often for a fraction of what it would cost to buy the same book at a bookstore. That means more readers are more likely to see your book, check it out, and give you a hefty cut of the royalties.

Yeah, eat it traditional publishing!

While you miss out on the other advantages that come with traditional publishing (the advance checks, the assistance in promotion, getting your book on store shelves, stuff like that), there is something to be said for the control that comes with Kindle publishing. If, that is, you're willing to wear the hats of editor, marketer, cover designer, formatter, and a few others as well. Hard work, and a little luck, can be what gets you noticed, earns you a following, and puts a check in your hand every month.

If you're contemplating using Amazon, though, then you should also think about Kindle Direct Publishing Select.

What Is Kindle Direct Publishing Select?

This program, usually called KDP Select for short, is a way you can make more money from your digital books. The way it works is that, when you first put your book up, you click the option to enroll it in KDP Select. This means your book is going to get more promotion from Amazon, comparatively speaking, and that it will be part of the Kindle Unlimited library. That means any user with a Kindle Unlimited subscription, which lets them read all the ebooks they want that are part of this program, can do so without any extra charge.

Don't worry, you still get paid.

It just requires a bit of math.

The way this works is that anyone who is a Kindle Unlimited member has to pay a fee for that service. So, at the end of the month, all the money is put together in a big fund. Then Amazon looks at how many pages were read in which parts of the world, and divides the fund up accordingly. Then, based on the number of pages that were read in a certain area, a royalty is paid to the authors. Royalties are only paid the first time a particular user reads your book, and there is a 3,000 page limit when it comes to how much page count you get paid for.

However, before you start asking about picture books and research tomes, Amazon uses something it calls Kindle Edition Normalized Pages. These "normalized" pages are meant to represent a "standard" length page, which means that your pages are likely to be counted differently. If you have a text-heavy novel, for example, then you probably have bigger pages than the display suggests.

While the specific payment will vary from month to month based on how many total pages were read, and how much money Amazon brought into the fund, generally speaking this is still a good way to make additional royalties. Because you have a whole new demographic available to you, and at the end of the day, money is money.

Additional examples and specifics are located on the Kindle Direct Publishing Help Section.

Is It Worth It?

Some authors might feel that tying themselves exclusively to Amazon, even if it's only for 90 days, is just too constraining. However, unless you really do have a huge audience using other platforms that will make up for your losses, Amazon is offering a fairly sweet deal. While it might not be quite as sweet as it used to be, before the current overly complex formula that decided how much every page was worth on a month-to-month basis, it's still better than what you'll find in other places.

Well, that's it for this week's Business of Writing edition. Hopefully it was useful, for some of my fellow authors who've been contemplating the leap into Amazon's frothing waters. If you'd like to support me, then why not stop by my Amazon author page to see if any of my books tickle your fancy? Or, if you'd like to support this blog specifically, then go to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to leave a small donation. $1 a month will do quite nicely, and keep content just like this coming right to you. Lastly, if you haven't followed me on Facebook, Tumblr, or Twitter yet, well, why not start now?