Self Publishing On Amazon Is A Wonderful Opportunity
Whether you’re an entrepreneur or a writer by practice, you're always looking for ways to grow your brand, impact and help your audience, and make more money. It's important to you that your audience views you as an expert they can turn to time and time again. Whether you're new to the business of writing and you're looking for a great way to break into your niche, or you’re interested in expanding your presence, Amazon Kindle publishing is an extremely smart way to do it.
When you publish books for Kindle, you get access to Amazon’s customers, the power behind their ebook recommendation engine, the esteem that comes from being a published author, and more. Amazon has an extremely popular ebook service that stands far above the rest and it's just smart business to take advantage of it. Every day, there are people looking for and buying books related to your topic on Kindle – it may as well be your book they’re buying.
I imagine there are two different kinds of people reading this right now. The first type sees Kindle publishing as just another leg to their business. They want more visibility and to catch more customers or clients with a wider net. The other type of person reading this right now is a writer-- and plans to create an entire income stream by publishing their words to Kindle.
The fact is that either one can work. They can even work together— you can earn a full time income on Kindle while using it to grow your list, make more sales of your off-Kindle products and services, and become more visible in your niche.
Or, you can focus exclusively on publishing on Kindle and earn a fantastic income, so let that sink in for a moment. It will, of course, take a lot of smart marketing and consistent releases to make that happen. It's especially important that you choose a popular niche on Kindle if you want to rely on it for your income.
The number one most important part of your being successful on Kindle is consistently releasing high quality books that are a perfect match for your target audience.
The 80/20 principle applies here. Depending on your number of reviews, Kindle optimization efforts, and marketing efforts, you might sell just 1 copy of a book each month, but if you do it right and focus on building momentum, single books could earn you full time incomes each month.
You have to study other successful Kindle publishers and pay attention to things they do to be successful, such as building a mailing list, getting a lot of reviews, building a street team of loyal readers, and so on. With that said, what you’ll read in these pages is most important. You have to release high-quality books consistently to “win” at this game.
In order to be successful on Kindle or any other ebook platform, you actually have to write and release content. That's the part so many people miss. They read book after book on how to be successful by self-publishing. But, they never actually stop and publish anything. They constantly consume content instead of constantly creating content. This is frustrating, and you're really holding yourself up. You're not doing yourself any favors by learning and studying and never releasing anything at all.
I think many people neglect to actually go ahead and publish anything on Kindle because they think it's too big of a task. The thought of writing "a book" causes most people to go wide-eyed. I get it—there’s something very intimidating about sitting down and staring at that blank cursor on the page.
Will your life, business, and income change if you can release a new book on Kindle? There are no guarantees, but I really do think so. I think you can change your life by self-publishing on Kindle and it makes me happy that you’re ready to do it. This is a great time for writers and entrepreneurs, and you're leaving money and exposure on the table if you ignore this opportunity.
You don't have to be the world's best writer to write for Kindle. It doesn't matter whether you’ve ever written a book or not. It doesn't matter if you've ever written online content or not. You can do this.
This Could Help Transform Your Business
One of the main ways I've made a lot of money over the years has been writing and releasing many information products (mainly ebooks) online. Selling these ebooks on my own sites has meant a lot of finding and working with joint venture partners, contacting and managing affiliates, writing and managing my own sales pages, dealing with merchant accounts and product delivery, and so on. Honestly, it’s a lot. It’s been worth it, but there are a lot of moving pieces to running a business based on selling infoproducts to people.
Publishing on Kindle eliminates most of that hassle. I’m not going to stop publishing and selling the other way (it’s how I make a large chunk of my income), but Kindle offers a much lower barrier to entry, in my opinion. They host your “sales page,” they manage any affiliates that want to promote your book, they drive the customers and recommend your book, and so on. If you’re someone who loves to write to please and help an audience, publishing on Kindle is just an easier way to do that.
Again, I love releasing my own infoproducts and can’t see myself giving that part of my business up. However, the process is often daunting and scary to those who haven't done it before. So much so that they shy away from it all together. You can definitely make a lot of money by releasing your own infoproducts from your own sales pages, if you want to.
But, it's just smart to also (or only) release books for Amazon Kindle. You get to tap into their huge audience. You don't have to write complicated sales letters – their "sales pages" are optimized already.
You just need to upload your file, create a cover (or have one created for you), write a description, set some keywords, and choose your categories. The hard part is writing your book and I’m going to make sure that's very easy for you when you read other lessons inside The IM Inside Track.
When you’re ready, you can also focus on getting more Amazon reviews, building a street team, optimizing your categories and keywords, and all that other fun stuff. But write first, study those who are successful in your niche, and then worry about optimization.
Amazon desperately wants people to self-publish quality books on their site because it’s in their best interest to be the best ebook game in town. They want independent authors to fill their pages with new books for sale. Amazon's number one goal is to make their customers happy. If you are writing unique, very high quality nonfiction books, you'll make sales and Amazon will reward you by showcasing your book to more people via their book rankings.
Now, you have to know that you're probably not going to be able to just publish one book on Amazon and make dozens of sales instantly. You have to really build up momentum in your Amazon account with frequent releases. There are some great books on Kindle marketing that can help you as well—Steve (S.J.) Scott has some good ones, for example. When you have a substantial catalog, work on getting more reviews, buying ads, building your list, and so on. But you have to get the content ready before you deal with that stuff.
Open up your mind to this opportunity. There's a reason you're interested in writing books for Kindle. Maybe you dream of diving through piles of cash. Maybe you want to expand your brand so you can be found everywhere the people in your niche are – which definitely includes Amazon.
There's nothing standing in your way. All you need is a word processor and the motivation to push through no matter what. Make it your goal to put everything else aside so you can write and publish a book for Kindle soon. Make it happen, even if you're feeling doubtful right now. Kindle’s just too good of an opportunity to pass up.