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Is it time to bail on Kindle?

Skilled Workman Posted on by

Kindled MessAaron Shephard is close to giving up in Kindle. [You may need to search as I could not find a post-specific link.] He’s found evidence that Amazon might, and probably will, destroy your formatting well after it has been published.

As you can read below about the new KFX format, Amazon simply does that to your book. It’s out of our control and we have been given no tools to produce KFX files.

 

I suspected all of this, but I’m not surprised. I’ve been ready to bail for quite a while. I mean, many of my books are about formatting, and Kindle really doesn’t allow that. Kindle produces bottom-end ebooks. If formatting is important to you (and it should be), make sure you give the other distributors of ePUBs a chance. Make sure you recommend the better options to your readers who have choices.

Another possibility: Kindle textbooks

You can produce a fixed layout version of your book to maintain the formatting. It starts with your print-ready PDF. Because there is no live type, Amazon can probably not mess with it too bad. But don’t count on it. The 500# gorilla could well stomp on this type of book also.

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Comments

Is it time to bail on Kindle? — 3 Comments

  1. Depressing news, even for someone who’s long been suspicious of Amazon. Like it or not, they’re our largest path to readers. Whatever hurts our distribution through Amazon, hurts them.

    I’ve thought about sending Amazon a PDF to give students a textbooks that are identical to the printed version. A 6×9 book certainly looks OK on my iPad 3. But I worry how readable it will be on smaller-screen iPads and other tablets. I hate factors I can’t control. And PDF is a print format. Using it for digital strikes me as iffy.

    ——

    Authors who are in direct contact with their readers might educate them on buying from other platforms. One option would be to:

    1. Publish digital versions first through non-Amazon retailers such as Kobo and the iBookstore. Offer a ‘early bird’ discount, making clear to readers that after a certain period of time, say a month, the price will go up, say from $2.95 to $4.95.

    2. When that time is up, add Amazon to your distribution system and, at the same time raise the price all around to $4.95.

    Results: Your readers learn that they can get the book cheaper and quicker from other sources. Amazon can’t complain that you’re undercutting them elsewhere.

    Yes, you’ll have to make a bit less with that discount, but it might encourage enough added sales to make up for the difference. And you’ll become less dependent on Amazon sales.

  2. Pingback:More on Kindle Problems… | The Skilled Workman

  3. I’ve been converting my PDF {after adding color} by using Kindle Textbook Creator. It seems to work quite well for fixed layout, the books have been selling well. Since it’s a new title [I add Textbook to the title] I can use KDP Select and I’m getting quite a few borrows.

    I’ve been quite surprised at how well they have sold.

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