For Authors: Tiny Tips for Marketing on Amazon
After publishing my ebook TOP TIPS FOR HOW TO MARKET YOUR BOOK ON AMAZON AND FACEBOOK, I have been spending time utilizing my own advice.
The result of my efforts? I have discovered the opportunities on Amazon are even more complicated than I had previously thought.
First, a shoutout to Publicity Hound Joan Stewart. I wrote a guest post for her blog about the Amazon Author Central profile (Chapter III in TIP TIPS). Joan and I worked on the phone to make the post as clear as possible. One thing we added to the post is this:
If you have a U.S. Amazon Author Central profile, people on Amazon can get to your Author Central profile in at least three ways:
First, if they type your name in Amazon’s browser field, your Author Central profile will be one of the choices returned in search results along with books by the same author name.
Second, if they have typed in one of your book titles and then are on that book page, they can click on your name right under the title at the top of the page.
Third, they can scroll down the Amazon page of a book of yours until they come to: More About the Author.
My quest continues:
After writing this guest post, I spent more time on Author Central profiles of the other country Amazon sites whose languages I could puzzle out. (In my case, forget Amazon Japan.) It appears that the U.S. Author Central profile is the most robust.
Other Amazon country Author Central profiles do not have as many options, including at this time these other profiles do not provide the opportunity to make changes on the product description in the way that authors can on a U.S. Author Central profile.
HERE IS THE FRUSTRATING THING I JUST DISCOVERED:
If you have a title in both physical format and Kindle and you have told Amazon to “link” the two formats into one title, you still have to make changes in the product description in the physical format book screen in Author Central as well as the Kindle format book screen in Author Central.
Okay, you think. What’s the big deal? You’ll just cut and paste.
Surprise! Not so simple as I discovered yesterday after a lot of back and forth experimentation.
While both product description boxes give authors the “theoretical” ability to use Amazon html code for product descriptions, the Amazon html code works for Kindle descriptions – not for paperback descriptions.
At first I thought I was seeing things. Then I checked out Jeff Bennington’s product descriptions for his book AN INDIE AUTHOR’S GUIDE TO THE UNIVERSE. Sure enough, he had an enhanced product description for the Kindle format but not for the paperback format of the book.
To see what I mean — here are the links to the two product descriptions for my technothriller LT. COMMANDER MOLLIE SANDERS (scroll down the page):
Click here to see product description of the paperback of LT. COMMANDER MOLLIE SANDERS.
Of course, this could change tomorrow — or even today. With Amazon it is a never-ending revision project for authors. And when I learn new things, I’ll share them here, so consider signing up below to be notified of new blog posts.
FREE KINDLE BOOKS: On Tuesday, July 24, and Wednesday, July 25, TOP TIPS FOR HOW TO MARKET YOUR BOOK ON AMAZON AND FACEBOOK and my new thriller CIA FALL GUY will be free on Amazon as part of the KDP Select program. Mark your calendars now and please tell your friends.
To read my entire guest post “Secret Publicity Sauce on Amazon: Author Central Profile,” click here for the Publicity Hound blog.
© 2012 Miller Mosaic LLC
Phyllis Zimbler Miller is the author of fiction and nonfiction books/ebooks. A new nonfiction ebook of hers is TOP TIPS FOR HOW TO MARKET YOUR BOOK ON AMAZON AND FACEBOOK and her newest fiction ebook is the thriller CIA FALL GUY.
Click here to visit her Amazon author page at amazon.com/author/phylliszimblermiller
She also has an M.B.A. from The Wharton School and is the co-founder of the online marketing company www.MillerMosaicLLC.com
Glad to see you giving this much-needed booklet away. It deserves all the buzz it can get. Hope those who get the freebie pass the word, Phyllis!
Best,
Carolyn Howard-Johnson
Excited about the new edition (expanded! updated! even more helpful for writers!) of The Frugal Book Promoter, now a USA Book News award-winner in its own right (http://budurl.com/FrugalBkPromo)
Carolyn — Thank you for such a lovely comment! I really appreciate it. And, yes, we all need help in marketing our books on Amazon.