You can now read nearly all of my novels, non-fiction, and short stories as part of your Kindle Unlimited subscription and through the Kindle Owners Lending Library.
This is a big change for me.
For years, my written electronic works were available in pretty much every online marketplace: Kobo, Nook, Apple Books, Google Play, Scribd, and so on.
I used to advocate “going wide” — broad distribution of an author’s e-books in every possible market, especially if you’ve been around for a while as an author or you hadn’t had anything new on the market for some time (both describe me).
The thought was that it just made sense to go where the readers were, and not penalize a reader simply because they opted to not shop at Amazon.
And believe me, I understand why folks might choose not to give Amazon their business. I’ve got mixed feelings about the company, too, especially when it comes to the labor practices in their distribution warehouses.
When it comes to selling e-books, though… through Amazon alone, I earn in a month what it takes a year or longer to earn at every other online marketplace. Amazon, and its Kindle devices and app, is where people are buying my books.
You could argue that it doesn’t hurt me to keep my books in those other stores, even if I’m not earning much there. After all, it doesn’t cost anything to be included in their catalogs.
However, by not selling my e-books exclusively at Amazon, I miss out on something called KDP Select, which is their suite of promotional services and distribution / revenue opportunities. Understandably, Amazon requires exclusivity in exchange for the right to enjoy those advantages.
It doesn’t cost me anything to be listed in those other e-book marketplaces. Staying with wide distribution, though, could very well be taking money off the table for me.
I sure don’t want to do that.
So, when it comes to my e-books, with the exception of one title that sells well through a marketplace that specializes in role-playing game books, I’m all in with Amazon.
Let’s see how it goes!
Mr John A Lenahan
How’s it gone?
John Lenahan
Matthew Wayne Selznick
Hi John — thanks for the comment! Nice to see you here.
For e-books, at this time, I see no compelling reason to go “wide” again, and that’s because being exclusive with Amazon means my books are available to Kindle Unlimited subscribers. Taking a quick glance at my stats this month so far, for example, revenue from “page reads” accounts for about a third of my royalties. In all the time most of my catalog was distributed anywhere and everywhere, it was a rare, rare month indeed when the cumulative revenue from markets other than Amazon would come anywhere close to that.
So, relatively speaking, being Amazon exclusive on e-books is going well!