From Carolyn Howard-Johnson,
Author of The Frugal Book Promoter, 3rd Edition
This may be the shortest post I’ve ever done for this #WritersontheMove blog. But why wait when there is good news afoot. And why stretch it out? I’ll try to keep it simple, too.
Amazon just announced the best new feature they have instituted for the benefit of authors in a very long time. It’s for print books only—paper or hardcover. It will help Amazon authors with a pre-release feature that is very nearly as valuable as the preorder campaigns big publishers are using for their books.
Think Rachel Maddow’s Prequel. I just ordered it. Her hardcover of that title is promised on October 17th at a bit of a discount. It seems to me that her book has been available for preorder for what seemed an immeasurable chunk of time. If it’s a good enough marketing tool for Maddow, indies, and those published by a publisher smaller than Penguin sure enough should want to use a similar marketing technique for their books. Whether you have your manuscript ready now or plan one for the future. The announcement from Amazon makes it clear that the new plan isn’t quite as broad as it is for Penguin and other biggies, but there are intimations that, too, may be on the horizon. Until then, we will now be able to set our own release dates for print up to 90 days in advance.
Here's what self-published authors (Amazon-published authors) of print books (including hardcover books) can now do and it came straight from Amazon to my mailbox:
“We're excited to announce that starting today (Oct 5, 2023), you have the option to decide when your book’s detail page [I call that page our “buy page”] becomes available to readers on Amazon for your KDP paperback and hardcover books. When creating a new print book, you'll see an option to release your book now or schedule a release date. If you choose to schedule a release date, you'll be able to select a date 5 to 90 days in the future for your book to go live on Amazon. On this date, the book’s detail page will become visible at 12:00 AM GMT for readers to purchase your KDP book on Amazon everywhere you have territory rights.”
This will let Amazon-publishing peeps...
1. Have a big hunk of time to use the Amazon link for their book’s buy page on much or all of their pre-marketing campaign—up to ninety days.
2. That allows us to spend time focused on engaging readers and marketing our books instead of doing the rushed release so many authors tend to do now.
3. You can order author copies early so you’ll be covered for your very first launch party or book signing.
4. You’ll have that comfort level of knowing the copies you order are on their way.
Reminder: Please note, scheduling a release date is not the same as setting a preorder time for your readers to buy your book—yet. KDP says, “KDP doesn’t offer [that] for print books at this time. To learn more about release date options, supported formats, and requirements, visit our Help page: https://kdp.amazon.com/help/topic/GZUV7SNV728WT4QE .”
MORE ABOUT TODAY'S CONTRIBUTOR
Carolyn Howard-Johnson brings her experience as a publicist, journalist, marketer, editor, and retailer to the advice she gives in her HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers and the many classes she taught for nearly a decade as instructor for UCLA Extension’s world-renown Writers’ Program. The books in her HowToDoItFrugally Series of books published by Modern History Press include the third editions of The Frugal Book Promoter and The Frugal Editor which won awards from USA Book News, Readers’ Views Literary Award, the marketing award from Next Generation Indie Books and the coveted Irwin award. That series includes books on other topics for writing as varied as writing book proposals and editing tricky homonyms.
