Must I only choose one place to ePublish ?

[saoir]

Do I have to choose KDP or Smashwords or iBooks ?

Hi all,

I have just finished my first spy/terrorism book and am self publishing on KDP in the coming week or so.

Is it true that I have to choose only one of the three places to publish .. KDP or Smashwords or iBooks ?

I have written my book in Scrivener and can output any format I like.

[gmw]

Amazon have KDP and KDP Select. If you choose KDP Select you must stay with Amazon exclusively for at least the period specified - read their terms. Aside from that, you can publish with multiple sellers and/or distributors. I currently use Smashwords, Amazon and Kobo.

Note that Smashwords is not just a reseller, it is also a distributor - sending your book on to many other stores and libraries (if you get into the premium catalogue). But if you have also gone with Amazon directly then you should tell Smashwords NOT to distribute to Amazon (for example).

ETA: Note also that (if you don't go exclusive with KDP Select) there are many other places you should look at, including: BookBaby and Draft2Digital (these two are also distributors like Smashwords - typically you would choose one of the three, otherwise it might get confusing about who you have distributing your book to where, since their distribution channels overlap significantly). There are others too.

[zerofatzreturns]

All that being said, where are we all making the most money? 9 out of 10 are probably saying KDP by far.

[Gregg Bell]

Originally Posted by saoir

Do I have to choose KDP or Smashwords or iBooks ?

Hi all,

I have just finished my first spy/terrorism book and am self publishing on KDP in the coming week or so.

Is it true that I have to choose only one of the three places to publish .. KDP or Smashwords or iBooks ?

I have written my book in Scrivener and can output any format I like.

Just take your time and do some more research on this, saoir. There are so many choices but don't worry. As you get more familiar with things it will become clearer. KDP is the big dog so you definitely want to go with them, but with KDP you have a choice to make right off the bat. It was what gmw was telling you about: KDP's "select" program. Where your book is exclusively on Amazon for 90 days. (This can be renewed or ended after the 90 day term expires.) Obviously if you go with KDP Select you can't put your book anywhere else for the 90 days. (As a side note, many people start their book with KDP Select and then after the 90 day term expires they put their book other places as well.)

Now you need to know that if you use a place like Book Baby or Draft2Digital or Smashwords to distribute your book, they are taking a cut of the profits on top of what the direct companies would take.

For instance you can have Draft2Digital put your book on KDP. But Draft2Digital will take an additional 10% of what KDP will take on every sale.

So why go with a place like Draft2Digital or Book Baby? Convenience. They basically do it all for you. But you pay for that convenience and really it is super easy going directly to the individual companies and having them sell your book without the additional middleman taking a cut of the profits.

There is one little exception and that is unless you have a Macintosh computer you cannot submit directly to the iBookstore. That is where a place like Draft2Digital might come in handy because they can.

Here's the way I've done it. And I was thinking of covering as many bases as I could.

I have my books directly at:
KDP
Nook
Kobo

Then I also have them at iBookstore (via Draft2Digital).

Whatever is left over (from KDP, Nook, Kobo, and iBookstore) I have at Smashwords (places like Sony and Diesel). (And it's important to note what gmw said about needing to opt-out of any place you don't want be be distributed to on Smashwords or Smashwords will distribute you to all of them.)

Go slow. Start with KDP. You can start with KDP regular and then add KDP Select later. (Although many feel it is advantageous, as I mentioned earlier, to start right off with KDP Select.) Then pick the others off one by one. I promise you it's easy. Just Google:

how to get my ebooks on (fill-in-the-blank)

KDP, Nook and Kobo are a breeze.

Draft2Digital is too.

Smashwords is trickier.

Go slow. Pretty soon the whole thing will be so familiar to you.

[JSWolf]

Just remember, if you go exclusive with Amazon, you risk alienating those that read ePub.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Just remember, if you go exclusive with Amazon, you risk alienating those that read ePub.

If you go exclusive with Amazon, you should know that you can only sell Amazon books -- no, really?!?!

I would guess the whole point of going Amazon-exclusive is that sales are more important than acaring about minorities.

[crich70]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

If you go exclusive with Amazon, you should know that you can only sell Amazon books -- no, really?!?! :eek

I would guess the whole point of going Amazon-exclusive is that sales are more important than acaring about minorities. p

Isn't the Kindle format the minority one though? I mean I know Amazon goes with that format for obvious reasons but it was my understanding that most everyone else (kobo, B&N, etc.) goes with the epub format.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by crich70

Isn't the Kindle format the minority one though? I mean I know Amazon goes with that format for obvious reasons but it was my understanding that most everyone else (kobo, B&N, etc.) goes with the epub format.

The majority of books sold are Kindle books.

The majority of ebook sellers are not Amazon (because there are at least two other ebook sellers).

There is a big difference between the two. Kindle format is majority format, and a minority type of format.

Besides, B&N uses the Nook format (EPUB+Nook DRM) and Kobo uses the KEPUB format, and most others use the Adobe format (EPUB+ADEPT). So they aren't really EPUB.

Dang! The myth of the unified EPUB standard, shot to pieces -- again!

[crossi]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Just remember, if you go exclusive with Amazon, you risk alienating those that read ePub.

Why would someone who only buys epubs be browsing through Amazon's ebooks? How could you alienate someone who never heard of your book? Besides it's only for 90 days. Now if it was some big name author whose fans were desperately waiting for your new release, well then they might find out your book was only on Amazon and be ticked, a new author doesn't need to worry about that for a while.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by crich70

Isn't the Kindle format the minority one though? I mean I know Amazon goes with that format for obvious reasons but it was my understanding that most everyone else (kobo, B&N, etc.) goes with the epub format.

It's the minority in terms of retailers, but the overwhelming majority in terms of actual sales. Many authors report getting 90%+ of their sales through Amazon.

[saoir]

THANK YOU all of you for your replies ... I am so sorry not to have come back earlier .. I lost my bookmark and thought I had posted this Q to a different forum I know ... shameful

Edit: Having read all of your replies, It seems to make sense to publish (self publish) in KDP for now and think for a few weeks. I am 58 and a first time writer ... so I am pretty nervous

[saoir]

I hope it's not inappropriate to close the thread by saying that my book has now gone live in KDP. I can see from how it is displayed and the pricing that I need to iron a few things out ... but at least it is a start.

Thanks again for the advice

[Gregg Bell]

Congrats! Best of luck with it!

[thewitt]

Originally Posted by saoir

I hope it's not inappropriate to close the thread by saying that my book has now gone live in KDP. I can see from how it is displayed and the pricing that I need to iron a few things out ... but at least it is a start.

Thanks again for the advice

If you did not go with KDP Select, I would encourage you to try Draft2Digital for getting your book into iTunes, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Page Foundry and Scribd with one easy submission. They take a small percentage, but it's a very simple way to get your book into more stores and you an always choose to remove your D2D submission from one of these and submit directly in the future if revenue from that story goes up.

Google Play is another easy place to submit once you have an ePub format you like.

CreateSpace is the Amazon Print on Demand service that you can also link to your eBook. It's a bit more complex to use directly, but you can also do that through Draft2Digital.

Good luck!