January 30, 2022
Being a subscriber to various industry newsletters is not good for my blood pressure. This morning, there was a post from Creative Indie about Amazon going to war with indie authors. That's nothing new. Amazon opened the floodgates for indies but doesn't aid them. It's all about long-tail selling, which is to sell a little of a lot of everything to make money. Of course, Amazon is not opposed to the big sellers at all, hence the ranking manipulation in favor of big sellers, the theory being that they will sell more and more and more.
I know Amazon buries some people. I'm one of them. I'm so far buried in Amazon's ranking system that I'm thinking of going exclusively to iTunes where most of my books are sold. I know that my upcoming release will go to iTunes first, then B&N, then Rakuten/KOBO, and then to other online vendors. It may not go to Amazon at all. Why bother?
Several of the newsletters I receive suggest that it's the fault of the author when he/she doesn't outwit Amazon's ranking system. If I go to Amazon and run a search on "KC Kendricks," why do other authors turn up in my search results? There will be five or six of my books - out of about sixty - and then books from others. Have these other authors put my name in their keywords and that's why their books show on my "specific" search? I don't think so. This is all Amazon's doing.
And yet, these newsletters always suggest it is the author's fault. Is it discouraging? Of course, it is.
I've tried any number of things to improve "my product," but the truth is none of these things that are constantly suggested in these newsletters can manipulate Amazon into giving "my product" fair representation.
The option of pulling my books from Amazon is definitely food for thought.
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KC Kendricks
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